https://pjmedia.com/culture/robert-...o-prayer-broadcast-over-loudspeakers-n1563380
A 57-year-old man named Edward Wright is being investigated for possible commission of a hate crime and has been charged with simple assault and bias intimidation after he walked into a mosque in Paterson, N.J. to complain about the adhan, the Islamic call to prayer, being broadcast over loudspeakers. If Wright is guilty, he should receive the due penalty for his crimes. At the same time, any controversy over the broadcast of the adhan in American cities is being dismissed as “bigotry” and “hate,” while reality, as is always the case with Leftist propaganda, is more complicated.
New Jersey 101.5 reported that Wright was arrested following an “encounter” at the Islamic Congregation of North Jersey: “Video posted to YouTube by the New Jersey chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, shows surveillance footage of the man entering the mosque on Preakness Avenue in Paterson on Dec. 23. The full video includes repeated profanities.”
Wright was angry because of the broadcast of the call to prayer: “‘Everybody’s not Muslim here,’ the man yells on the video footage taken on a phone, with profanities laced in between. ‘I don’t want to hear that **** every day.’”
According to people who were present, Wright didn’t just complain: “Not seen in the video, witnesses said to police that Wright shoved and hit a prayer leader while yelling in a threatening manner. Wright is accused of pushing the man from the back, slapping a microphone from his hand and hitting his shoulder.”
How very interesting that the video shows Wright going into the mosque and out of the mosque, and the portion with audio captures his complaints, but the part where he allegedly shoved and hit a prayer leader isn’t captured. At a time when there are so very many false claims of anti-Muslim hate crimes, that should give investigators pause. It could be absolutely true that Wright assaulted people inside the mosque, and if he did, there is no justification for such behavior. But even if he did, the alleged assault should not obscure the fact that from the looks of the video, Edward Wright is obviously not a MAGA-hat-wearing “right-wing Islamophobe.” He is just a neighbor of the mosque who was fed up with the noise. Should his concerns and those of others like him be entirely dismissed as “bias”?
Many people have predicted for years that the assertion of supremacism involved in the broadcast of the call to prayer would lead to anger from non-Muslims, as it has in other countries. But as the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) makes clear in its response to Wright’s actions, any such anger is dismissed as “bigotry” and that’s that.
A 57-year-old man named Edward Wright is being investigated for possible commission of a hate crime and has been charged with simple assault and bias intimidation after he walked into a mosque in Paterson, N.J. to complain about the adhan, the Islamic call to prayer, being broadcast over loudspeakers. If Wright is guilty, he should receive the due penalty for his crimes. At the same time, any controversy over the broadcast of the adhan in American cities is being dismissed as “bigotry” and “hate,” while reality, as is always the case with Leftist propaganda, is more complicated.
New Jersey 101.5 reported that Wright was arrested following an “encounter” at the Islamic Congregation of North Jersey: “Video posted to YouTube by the New Jersey chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, shows surveillance footage of the man entering the mosque on Preakness Avenue in Paterson on Dec. 23. The full video includes repeated profanities.”
Wright was angry because of the broadcast of the call to prayer: “‘Everybody’s not Muslim here,’ the man yells on the video footage taken on a phone, with profanities laced in between. ‘I don’t want to hear that **** every day.’”
According to people who were present, Wright didn’t just complain: “Not seen in the video, witnesses said to police that Wright shoved and hit a prayer leader while yelling in a threatening manner. Wright is accused of pushing the man from the back, slapping a microphone from his hand and hitting his shoulder.”
How very interesting that the video shows Wright going into the mosque and out of the mosque, and the portion with audio captures his complaints, but the part where he allegedly shoved and hit a prayer leader isn’t captured. At a time when there are so very many false claims of anti-Muslim hate crimes, that should give investigators pause. It could be absolutely true that Wright assaulted people inside the mosque, and if he did, there is no justification for such behavior. But even if he did, the alleged assault should not obscure the fact that from the looks of the video, Edward Wright is obviously not a MAGA-hat-wearing “right-wing Islamophobe.” He is just a neighbor of the mosque who was fed up with the noise. Should his concerns and those of others like him be entirely dismissed as “bias”?
Many people have predicted for years that the assertion of supremacism involved in the broadcast of the call to prayer would lead to anger from non-Muslims, as it has in other countries. But as the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) makes clear in its response to Wright’s actions, any such anger is dismissed as “bigotry” and that’s that.
