Florida Mosque Attack Shows Man in the Mirror

If someone firebombs a Florida mosque, does America care? Clearly not, because it’s been almost two weeks since someone tried to blow up the Islamic Center of Northeast Florida and there’s been extremely scant coverage. The silence isn’t just deafening. It’s dangerous.

On May 10, around 9:30 at night, an apparently non-Muslim man approached the Mosque in Jacksonville, lit a gas can and fled the scene before the thing went off. No one was hurt, thankfully, but the local FBI warned that this incident isn’t to be ignored. “It was a dangerous device, and had anybody been around it they could have been seriously injured or killed,” said Special Agent James Casey. “We want to sort of emphasize the seriousness of the thing and not let people believe that this was just a match and a little bit of gasoline that was spread around.” It’s so serious, in fact, that there’s a combined $20,000 reward for the culprit’s rhetorical head. So why doesn’t anybody give a damn?

Perhaps its because anti-Muslim attitudes are nothing new. Sure, they ebbed in the post-9/11 panic and it was shocking, though not surprising, to see Americans turn on fellow Americans with such fury. These xenophobic sentiments continue to flair from time-to-time, especially after incidents like the failed Times Square attack. And Florida has definitely seen its fair share of anti-Muslim activity.

In 2002, a man drove his car into a mosque. Then, four years later, someone opened fire on a Mosque in Melbourne. And earlier this month, Congressional candidate Dan Fanelli released a series of commercials stressing the importance of racial profiling. “Does this look like a terrorist?” asked the Republican, presenting a white man. He then brought out a “Muslim,” and wondered, “Or this?”

Fanelli goes on to say, “It’s time to stop this political correctness.” Apparently so, because another video features a bomb-wearing “Muslim” next to a plane and the Tea Party-backed candidate insisting, “Send me to Washington and I’ll make sure guys like this get nowhere near things like this.” It’s truly unbelievable. I’ve included it below so you can see for yourself.

Muslim groups are rightfully upset over the inadequate media coverage of the mosque firebomb. “It is disturbing that our fellow citizens are largely unaware of the fact that a potentially-deadly bomb exploded at an American house of worship,” said Nihad Awad of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “One can only imagine the public and media response if someone with a Muslim name was the perpetrator of this apparent terror attack.” Never mind the name. What if this had been a church?

Religious buildings are sacred in America. Whether or not you worship there, most people are taught that a “holy” building shouldn’t be disturbed. Freedom of religion and all. Church and state are separate and the Church should be respected, although never venerated.

The Birmingham Church bombing was especially important in tuning our ears to attacks, physical or otherwise, on religious buildings. Hell, even the Westboro Baptist Church, the fundamentalists who protest soldiers’ funerals, made headlines when someone painted a swastika on their garage. Clearly that’s not the case for mosques. Could it be because Muslims are “foreign,” and therefore not sympathetic enough?

The Times Square and Underwear bombers both received scads of press for good reason: they both set out to kill Americans on American soil. And they’re both Muslim, thus giving news agencies and politicians a convenient picture of our nemesis. The Hutaree militants and Joe Stack, who flew his plane into an IRS building, grabbed some ink and analysis, but are definitely “B-list” when compared to Faisal Shahzad. This slanted coverage doesn’t give Muslims a fair shot, and may be because non-Muslim America doesn’t want to recognize its own dark side. Dale Carson, a former FBI agent, told a local news agency, “I think anytime there’s an attack on our religious institutions in the country, that it is terroristic.”

The Muslim Public Affairs Council also released an irritated statement on the Florida mosque, and calls the unbalanced coverage a “double standard.” Their research show 62 non-Muslim extremist attacks since 9/11. The dearth of media coverage ignores a simple fact: “Terrorism is terrorism, no matter what the identity of the perpetrator is, so let’s be honest with ourselves and treat it that way.” More than that, this absence of information alienates an important population of American citizens, and further fortifies the illusion that our nation’s enemies all look alike.