Religious Retreat ?

04/13/04 | vanity

[genefromjersey]

The NYC area TV stations carried a sad story about a car crash: 6 young Muslim men were on route to a "religious retreat" ( that's what the newscasters called it) in the Lake Ariel,PA area. Their vehicle went off the road and hit a tree ;killing 3 of them;seriously injuring 3.

It was unfortunate;yet my curiosity is aroused: Could this have been one of those "Jihad Camps" I've read about: sponsored by Wahabbi "charities",and dedicated to teaching violent Islamic extremism ?

How about it, Pennsylvania Freepers ? Can you tell us the name of this camp,so it can be checked against the "roster" of "down-home jihad" organizations?

PS: I'd appreciate it if only those with actual knowledge would respond !

[alisasny]

the night before the crash, a large group of boys were hanging out at the Split Rock Resort near Lake Harmony in Kidder Township, Pa., where about 160 others in their Muslim-American community had traveled for a weekend getaway.

[alisasny]

http://www.mcall.com/news/local/all-b1-5fatalfoloapr12,0,5468357.story?coll=all-newslocal-hed

The boys and their families were part of an informal gathering of about 160 people who meet each year at Split Rock. The group was made up mostly of Muslim families from Long Island that had come to the resort at the end of last week's school break.

They were part of Long Island's close-knit Islamic community, which gathered at the Melville Islamic Center on Sunday to mourn. ''The whole community is like one family,'' said Amro Elnakib of Bay Shore, N.Y., a family friend. ''These are all our kids.''

[alisasny]

http://www.timesleader.com/mld/timesleader/8409579.htm

The Islamic way of life teaches us that we belong to God. We come from God and will return to God Almighty," Ghazi Khankan, executive director of the Council of American-Islamic Relation's New York chapter, said before the funeral.

"We loved them very much, we saw them grow up from when they were children and they grew up so beautifully. ... They were our future, the future of the families, they were part of the young growing Muslim community," Khankan said.

[alisasny]

http://www.techcentralstation.com/041204F.html Even the "Wahhabi lobby" in American mosques injected itself into the uproar. The Islamic Center of Long Island, in Westbury, NY, is a notorious center of Islamist extremism. On April 9, 200 of the mosque's members signed a petition circulated by one Ghazi Khankan, regional director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). CAIR, for its part, is a fake "civil rights" organization that seeks to impose the ultraradical ideology of Wahhabism, the state religion of Saudi Arabia, on American Muslims. The CAIR petition demanded that President George W. Bush withdraw American forces from Iraq.

[genefromjersey]

CAIR is well known ! The events leading up to this tragedy don't seem to have any relationship to jihad: more like an inexperienced driver going way too fast.

Thanks for the input !