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Exposing David Wood: Of Mosques and Men, Pt. 1

David Wood is a Christian apologist who attempts to save Muslim souls through his organization Acts 17 Apologetics and www.answeringmuslims.com. In the past Wood and his entourage, including Nabeel Qureshi, have targeted the Dearborn Arab Festival in Michigan for proselytism.

At the 2009 Arab Festival, David Wood made a controversial, and some claim one sided video that received over a million hits on YouTube which showed them getting kicked out of the festival. They claim that they were just engaged in free speech, whereas security at the festival stated that they were insulting and harassing festival goers.

Other Evangelical Christians criticized Wood and his group as being agitators,

“The Rev. Haytham Abi Haydar, a Christian evangelical convert from Islam with Arabic Alliance Church in Dearborn, said that a Christian group called Acts 17 Apologetics caused the problems at this year’s Arab festival.

They put cameras in their faces and were very antagonistic,” Abi Haydar said of the group that produced the controversial video that has drawn almost 1.4 million views on YouTube.

Just recently at the 2010 Dearborn Arab Festival, David Wood, Nabeel Qureshi and two others were arrested for disorderly conduct. Obviously intending to make a scene in an attempt at more YouTube success by portraying themselves as being persecuted.

Now David Wood, whose “love of  Muslims” seems to be akin to Pamela Geller’s (who he links to favorably a number of times) is joining arms with the anti-Muslim hate group SIOA in opposing the mosque and cultural center that is to be built a few blocks away from Ground Zero.

In the following video, filled with disinformation, falsehood and inaccuracies he expounds his reasons as to why he is against the mosque, and why he sees Muslims as a lurking evil attempting to take over the West. We expose it all in this series.

Of Mosques and Men

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxFzFIDbKpg 350 300]

10 years later, two groups of Muslims, the Cordoba Initiative and the American Society for Muslim Advancement are planning to build a Massive 13 story mosque right here behind me.

Right off the bat we see the disinformation at work, this isn’t a “13 story mosque,” (why would Muslims need 13 stories to pray in the middle of Manhattan?). The fact is this is a cultural center, that along side a space for a mosque will contain a theater, swimming pool, restaurant and other facilities with the expressed goals of promoting tolerance and mutual co-operation between people of different and varying backgrounds.

“Understandably, many people here in the West are concerned…”

WTF? Many people in the “West” are concerned? I highly doubt the masses of people in Europe or Canada really care about this particular Islamophobia-driven agitation, unless the “many people” he is referring to is the small hate group SIOE (Stop the Islamization of Europe and parent organization of SIOA) whose main campaigns revolve around opposing mosques and other anti-Muslim initiatives.

“…this isn’t an attempt to honor the victims of 9/11 instead, it may be an attempt to build a symbol of Islamic victory. Now, I have the same concern, but mine is slightly different, my concern is slightly different, it is based on a photograph I saw, while I was still in College.

While I was in College my best friend was a Muslim named Nabeel Qureshi. Nabeel showed me some photographs shortly after the September 11th attacks, and I found them quite surprising. Muslims were passing these photographs around and Nabeel thought they were absolutely hilarious. The first photograph was a picture of George W. Bush as a Muslim, and I have to admit that was actually pretty funny,

The second photograph wasn’t so funny, it was a photo shopped picture of the Statue of Liberty covered in a full veil.

Now, this one bothered me a little bit. The Statue of Liberty, the symbol of freedom and justice, covered by a full veil, a symbol of oppression and Shariah Law, now these two pictures actually worked their way around the internet and lots of people are familiar with them.

The third picture, is the one that disturbed me however, it was a photo shopped picture of New York City covered in mosques and minarets, in the bottom corner it said New York City 2006.

The idea was that the terrorist attacks had cleared the ground for the construction of new mosques.

David Wood makes some audacious claims that we are supposed to take as veritable truth upon his word. First, that the photographs he saw originated with Muslims. Second, that Muslims at his College were passing them around, (ostensibly in “celebration of 9/11”). Third, that a burka is a symbol of Shariah Law, and fourth, that the third picture was meant to convey the “idea that the terrorist attacks had cleared the ground for the construction of mosques.”

The truth is that all three of the photographs originate from a comedy website called “www.joe-ks.com,” (a fact conveniently hidden by David Wood in the video) which claims to be the “largest source of internet humor.” The site is definitely not Muslim or terrorist sympathetic, essentially it is a website that has jokes about everything, and a lot of the jokes lampoon terrorists and extremists, and some of them even lampoon whole countries such as Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, etc.

For example one of their posts is titled Afghan Humour:

Q: What do Kabul and Hiroshima have in common? A: Nothing,…. yet.

Q: How do you play Taliban bingo? A: B-52…F-16…B-1…

Q: What is the Taliban’s national bird? A: Duck

Q: How is Bin Laden like Fred Flintstone? A: Both may look out their windows and see Rubble.

Q: Why does the Afghanistan Navy have glass bottom boats? A: So they can see their Air Force.

Q: What do Osama Bin Laden and General Custer have in common? A: They both want to know where those Tomahawks are coming from.

Q: Why aren’t there any Wal-Marts in Afghanistan? A. Because there’s a Target on every corner.

David Wood must have seen the original post on Joe-KS which would put the pictures above into their proper context instead of the deceptive context that he has created. The pictures weren’t created or disseminated by Muslims after 9/11 as a means of celebrating or “dealing with the tragedy through humor”, in fact the post that first contained the pictures was lampooning terrorists. The post published in October 2001 was titled, If the Taliban wins the War #1, #2, #3.

David Wood makes a claim that Muslims were passing these pictures around when the truth is they were created by and disseminated by non-Muslims who were making fun of terrorists and extremists. He doesn’t provide any evidence of Muslims passing these pictures out, instead we are supposed to take him at his word.

In reality it is a clever ploy that omits the fact that not only were Muslims also victims of 9/11 but all major American Muslim organizations condemned the attack in the strongest possible terms. However, he wants to caste Muslims in a dehumanized image: ‘they are not part of our suffering, in fact they are mocking our suffering and enjoy and support 9/11.’

His disingenuous claim that the third picture is meant by Muslims to convey the idea “that the terrorist attacks had cleared the ground for the construction of mosques” is a cynical attempt to link the humor piece deriding the Taliban to the current construction of the Cordoba Cultural Center.

He attempts to instill in the minds of his watchers the idea that this was the plan all along. In doing so he asserts the interesting, if off the wall conspiracy theory that Osama Bin Laden was somehow in cahoots with the founder of the Cordoba Initiative Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, (a Sufi Imam who has condemned Bin Laden and supported the War in Afghanistan).

You see, the plan all along to subvert and take over the West was that Bin Laden’s goons would fly planes into the Twin Towers, then ten years later Imam Abdul Rauf, (who has never spoken to or met Bin Laden) would telepathically (through secret Muslim Taqqiyah radar) communicate with Bin Laden to receive orders to stealthily build a gigantic 13 story Mosque a few blocks away from Ground Zero!

Stay tuned for part 2…

 

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    • Read Carefully

      Are U Serious– While it IS true they have the right to speak, they do NOT have the right to film others without their consent. That is the right to privacy. Furthermore, freedom of speech is also limited in many cases. When you are attempting to use your speech as propaganda or even disseminate it as fact, speech is limited (look at the FCC). Lastly, you can not under any circumstance, use freedom of speech to insight chaos or slander others. Since Wood et al. were arrested under charges of disorderly conduct, that is exactly why they are not protected under the first amendment. You waive those rights as soon as your intent is to cause a scene or inflame a situation.

    • Are U Serious

      Guys, it seems you all have a low opinion of david Wood and his friends. Yes, you may catch them at many lies, you may call them jerks (I think they are jerks), but I would also like to ask you to do two things. 1. Watch his video. You’ll see he and his friends are jerks. But then, 2. Read the first amendment of the US Constitution. Then, tell us all that they were breaking the law when they were arrested, twice, for doing nothing moore than talking and filming as they were talking. They may be jerks and even liars, but the video does not lie. This is still the US, and people have the right to talk and film. Had they been promoting a liberal agenda, you guys would be screaming bloody murder over this. Come on guys, try to be more objective. They may be jerks, but they have a right to speak and film.

    • Qasim Rashid

      You know what’s amazing to me is that loonwatch.com is self described as “hate-allergic bloggers,” yet you folks have no problem placing a hate filled disclaimer at the bottom of your article?

      How are you any different than David Wood, I wonder? Yes, Ahmadi Muslims are Muslims who believe Imam Mahdi and Messih has come. They differ in belief than you.

      Why does that give you the right to endorse such a hate filled statement, and then not at the very least ask those commenting on here to not question another person’s Iman?

      How about that, on one hand you ridicule David Wood for being a bigot, and then you go ahead and do the exact same thing yourself to a (peaceful) group of Muslims just because you don’t agree with their beliefs.

      So much for being allergic to hate.

      NOTE BY Garibaldi [5/1/2012]

      @ Qasim Rashid:

      Your comment was noticed by me today (since this article was referenced in today’s featured piece). The disclaimer was inappropriate and was not consistent with LoonWatch’s views. Therefore, the disclaimer was removed.

      I realize that this is two years late, but I sincerely apologize for this slip-up. The article underwent multiple edits by more than one author, and the disclaimer was added afterward when I took reader input in the comments section too uncritically.

      To be clear, LoonWatch does not play the game of deciding who is a Muslim and who is not. Furthermore, LW recognizes the persecution of Ahmadis throughout the world and we stand in solidarity with them. We also support the repeal of anti-Ahmadi legislation in Pakistan, in particular the official governmental decree castigating them as non-Muslims, which is no doubt a great source of discrimination against them.

      -LW

    • DrM

      @TYO,

      Commenting before reading as usual, eh troll? You’re trying too hard, not as hard as your lame attempt to pin Hitler’s popularity in India(85% of whose population is Hindu) on Muslims. Noboddy’s checking religions at the door, I went to an Arab festival years ago in California and they even had a booth run by Scientology. David Wood and his group of thugs were rightly kicked out, not for being Christians but for being a bunch of confrontational trouble makers.

    • Charisma Magazine wrote an article about Christians proselytizing Muslims in Dearborn, and it includes some pretty damning quotes from Christians in Dearborn who are absolutely NOT thrilled with David Wood and Acts 17 Apologetics.

      http://www.charismamag.com/index.php/news/28835-charismatic-pastor-says-michigan-muslims-open-to-gospel-

      Here’s a taste:

      “It really discredits us as a Christian when we make claim that Shariah law is being implemented in Dearborn,” said pastor Haytham Abi-Haydar of Arabic Fellowship Alliance Church, who has ministered in Dearborn for more than a decade. “Any guy above 50 percent IQ score would know that that’s not true. So our credibility in the community is being compromised. Second, we are being perceived as hostile. We evangelical Christians are coming across as [if] we are out to get [Muslims].”

      Christian groups have evangelized at the festival for years without incident, said Scott R. Cherry, a minister who has served among Muslims in Dearborn for 13 years. He said at this and previous festivals evangelical author Josh McDowell and several Arab Christian ministries have reserved booths to distribute evangelistic pamphlets in an area reserved for such groups.

      “I’ve been one to walk away from the restricted table, to push the envelope, and I’ve found that if I’m not aggressive, if I’m not obnoxious, nobody has bothered me,” Cherry said. “And if they have, they have asked me to go back to my table area. At which point I say I’m OK with that.”

      “But the way that Acts 17 does it, they want to attract hostility, they want to attract negative attention,” he added. “They want to get the authorities to surround them so they can say this is evidence of Shariah law.”

      My suspicions confirmed!

    • Garibaldi

      regarding the disclaimer that you added about Ahmadi’s, i just want to mention that the Alawai’s (Wafa Sultan is/was one) are also considered heretics because they believe in other God’s too. Thus these two sects and a few others are considered apostate sects.

      Also, in Judaism, the Messianics who believe in Jesus as God, but call themselves Jewish, are in reality an Evangelical or Southern Baptist sub sect. They’re not Jewish, but call themselves Jewish, and are considered apostates because they give divinity to a man and as such like Ahmadi’s claim to be a persectuted minority when the reality is they wouldn’t be if they did not pretend to be Jewish. The same with Alawi’s and Ahmadi’s, if they didnt’ call themselves Muslim, they wouldnt be persecuted.

    • TYO

      Is it an Arab Festival or an Arab Muslim festival? Arabs are of several faiths. If this is an Arab festival then Arabs who follow Judaim, Christianity and Islam should all be welcome, as well as Arabs who follow other religions. There are Arab Buddhists you know.

    • Sir David ( Illuminati membership number 5:32)

      Dan muslims belive that Mohammed was the last messanger of god, the Ahmadis believe otherwise thus many muslims believe them to be heratics. As someone who was brought up as a christian in a christain country I believe the JWs are child murders because along with other loony sects that deny there children modern medical treatment and as a result some needlessly die . I would rather my neighbour was a sunni muslim anyday than one of those loons. I wonder what Bob and Pam would say if some muslims esposed those views. The Koran is very clear about the fate of child killers and I certainly go along with that part of it .

    • Excellent work ! just today I was wondering how come Loons like Wood aren’t on this website ? You just made my day ! looking forward for part 2.

    • David Wood is now soliciting money on his blog so he can take his aggropreaching show to Chicago next weekend for the Islamic Society of North America’s annual convention. Of course, he had to spend another $500 for a new camera since the Dearborn police refused to give his back. He also says the Chicago police respect his rights–which begs the question, why does he need a new camera except for publicity?

    • IbnAbuTalib

      David Wood is at it again! This man has no shame whatsoever.

      http://www.answeringmuslims.com/2010/06/support-acts-17-trip-to-isna.html

      I hope those Muslims who are attending this event will bring their own cameras and record all of the thuggery perpetrated by Wood and his groupies in the name of peaceful debate. Since that foul mouth Sam Shamoun is accompanying them, you can expect anything but peace from their side.

      As Allah says in the Quran, “When it is said to them: ‘Make not mischief on the earth,’they say: ‘Why, we only Want to make peace!’” (2:11)

    • Jack

      The bizarre thing is: the same pictures David Wood adresses as being thought of as a hoot by Muslims, are being spread by islamophobes across the web to convey the idea that George W. Bush was a dhimmi, and that America is being islamized.

      So if islamophobes send this material around, smirking about it, saying to one another this illustrates quite well what the US is really like, that’s just common sense or something; but if Muslims send the same material around grinning about the silly conspiracy theories some people entertain, it’s proof they carry a secret agenda and are radicals at heart.

    • Dizz

      These Christians fail to open up to new cultures, even after Pope John Paul II accepted Muslims as followers of God and prayed in a Mosque and even kissed a Quran (Note that Catholics once considered Muslims to be “heathens” and “pagans”)

      If Catholic Church can accept opinions other than its own, its about time Woody dropped his act.

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