"I Am Charlie"

                                                      -The Independent

*This article was originally posted yesterday in Eagle Rising prior to the bloody conclusion of the Charlie Hebdo attack and the attack at the Jewish grocery store in Paris.


On Wednesday, we awoke in America to yet another horrific terrorist attack in France. This time, the Islamic killers attacked the offices of the satirical French magazine, Charlie Hebdo. The reason? For the past several years, the magazine had targeted not only Christianity and Judaism for satire, but Islam. That led to death threats, which were finally carried out. As I write this, 12 are dead including the editor, Stephane Charbonnier, several of his assistants, and two French policemen. Several others are wounded including four in critical condition.

This will clearly not be the last attack in the West. Under the inspiration of ISIS and Al Qaeda, attacks are now occurring in Europe, Canada, Australia, and also here in America.  I say this with caution since the last thing I want to do is inspire any retaliation against innocent Muslims, but we must face the reality that the next killers are walking among us. They are here.

Already, the Council on American Islamic Relations has made their statement  condemning the attacks and repeating that this has nothing to do with Islam. They have offered their condolences to the families of the victims. Of course, they are concerned about Islamophobia. Yet this is the same organization that has tried to place itself between law enforcement and the Muslim community. The FBI and other law enforcement organizations have tried to reach out to the Muslim community, but when it comes to knocking on doors and trying to solicit intelligence, CAIR has tried to stop it. In San Francisco a few years back, CAIR's director Zahra Billoo sent out this message to the community with a very explicit image (Hat tip Investigative Project on Terrorism).
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http://www.investigativeproject.org/2492/cair-imagery-makes-obstructionist-goal-clear

In January 2013, Billoo spoke at the University of California at Irvine, and I attended her presentation on Islam. I asked her about that poster, and she gave me a run-around answer. CAIR pulled the poster because "it did not represent appropriate legal advice", said she. Indeed.

http://garyfouse.blogspot.com/2013/01/muslim-awareness-week-at-uc-irvine-2013.html


Today in Europe more and more people are marching against the growing Islamization of their countries, the violence, the murders, the intolerance. They are peacefully demanding that their leaders take action. Specifically, they want an end to Islamic immigration-not because they are racists, rather because it is tearing at the fabric of their societies-and for the above reasons.

Here in America, the severity of the European situation has not reached our shores. We don't have riots in the streets. We don't have have cars being burned. We don't have random acts of Jews being attacked on the streets for wearing Jewish garb-at least not on a regular basis. Yet, we do have terrorist attacks by lone wolves following the inspiration of ISIS. The man who killed the two New York cops recently was a Muslim convert, an aspect of the case that the media wants to downplay. We have had a recent beheading in Oklahoma. Sooner or later, our government must also face the question of continuing Islamic immigration.

On Wednesday, I affixed the Charlie Hebdo logo to my website (Fousesquawk). I also went to the reader threads of like-minded blogs and asked them to do the same. Not that I am some brain surgeon who has come up with the idea because it is already popping up in France and here in the US as well. The logo was made for this moment. On a black background are the words, "Je suis Charlie" (I am Charlie). They also have it in several other languages as well.

http://garyfouse.blogspot.com/2015/01/je-suis-charlie.html

Christians and Jews may also have been offended by satire directed at our religions, but we don't resort to this. We need to all (including decent Muslims) stand together and adopt this logo.