Atlas readers are very familiar with the supremacist Islamic academy, Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy (TIZA), a K-8 charter school in Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota. Charter schools are public schools and by law must not endorse or promote religion. TIZA is an Islamic school, funded by Minnesota taxpayers.
TIZA has many characteristics that suggest a religious school. It shares the headquarters building of the Muslim American Society of Minnesota, whose mission is "establishing Islam in Minnesota." The building also houses a mosque. TIZA's executive director, Asad Zaman, is a Muslim imam, or religious leader, and its sponsor is an organization called Islamic Relief.
Now they are threatening parents who criticize the Muslim school with death fatwas.
The Muslim American Society of Minnesota, (the Muslim Brotherhood front group that financed devout Muslim Congressman Keith Ellison's trip to the haj) received nearly $900,000 in taxpayer money in 2006 and 2007 from a rental arrangement for Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy (TiZA), an Inver Grove Heights charter school.
TiZA has been sued by the American Civil Liberties Union and probed by state officials for allegedly promoting Islam, which would violate the church and state separation required of public schools -- including charter schools. The school received state funding to pay rent to the Muslim American Society Property Holding Corp., a nonprofit spinoff of the Muslim American Society that owned the building. The corporation then turned over $879,000 to the Muslim society as a grant.
Now threats of Islamic violence to silence parents who criticize the school have been exposed.
Why hasn't TIZA been shuttered?
Here's an excerpt of Katherine Kersten's column. Kersten has been unmatched in her bravery and pursuit of this story and Islamic supremacist infiltration in the Minnesota area. She is a national treasure.
Katherine Kersten: Affidavits portray TiZA as threateningWitnesses describe the charter school's response to criticism. (hat tip Diane)
Most of us occasionally have differences of opinion with our neighborhood public school. If you voice your complaints, you may risk a frown from the principal or a cold shoulder from other parents at a school softball game.
But at one Minnesota public school, critics may be in for something more sinister. Khalid Elmasry says in an affidavit that after he criticized Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy (TiZA), which his child used to attend, the school's executive director made a statement at a parent meeting that Elmasry took "as an attempt to incite violence against me and my family." Even more disturbing is what Janeha Edwards -- a former administrative assistant at the school -- says in an affidavit the director suggested after she displeased him: "We could just kill you, yeah tell your husband we'll do his job for him."
These bizarre developments are described in documents filed in a legal battle royal between TiZA -- a K-8 charter school with campuses in Inver Grove Heights and Blaine -- and the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota. Last year, the ACLU filed a federal suit claiming that TiZA impermissibly promotes religion.
In January, the ACLU sought a protective order, telling the court that intimidation by TiZA was discouraging potential witnesses from appearing. On Feb. 10, the court barred witness harassment or intimidation by either party.Elmasry is one witness who sought such protection. In January, he testified about TiZA's financial entanglement with the Muslim American Society of Minnesota at a Minnesota Senate subcommittee hearing on charter school lease aid. Shortly thereafter, Elmasry says in an affidavit, he was informed by a friend and TIZA parent that TiZA authorities had called a parent meeting, where they showed a video of Elmasry's testimony. Then, according to the parent's account, Asad Zaman, the school's director and an imam -- or Muslim religious leader -- accused Elmasry of talking to the Minnesota Department of Education and "selling" his "Iman," meaning his Islamic faith, according to Elmasry's affidavit.
Elmasry was frightened, he says. "It is well-known in Islam that a Muslim who rejects his or her faith is committing an act punishable by death," according to his affidavit. "There are many accounts of Muslims taking matters into their own hands and killing people they believe have sold or rejected their Islamic faith or Iman."
Tell that to Rifqa Bary's lawyers and judge.
Elmasry was worried, he says in the affidavit, because "the overwhelming majority of TiZA's enrollment is Somali, living in a community that has been troubled with many acts of random violence. I am concerned that Zaman could be exploiting this fact in the hope that word will reach a radical or unstable individual or group within the Twin Cities Muslim community that a Muslim has sold his Iman and is trying to shut down a Muslim school that serves Somalis."
There is much more. Read the whole ugly thing.
