Jack Minor of the Greeley Gazette writes:
Recently, two different hotels cancelled events on radical Islam’s threat to American freedoms citing security concerns and physical threats.
In Nashville, Tenn., the Hutton Hotel cancelled the Preserving Freedom Conference after receiving threats of violence to Hotel guests. Stephen Eckley, senior vice president of Hotels for Amerimar Enterprises, the Hutton’s managing corporation, told WND, “There were veiled threats that there were going to be protests that could easily erupt into violence.”
Pamela Geller, editor of Atlas Shrugs, told the Gazette she will not be attending the conference at its new location. “I will not have my message ghettoized and driven from the public square. I will not be speaking.”
Geller continued, “While I have nothing against speaking in a church per se, I refuse to have my message driven from the public square. What's next? Secret meetings? A White Rose Society? I have been invited to speak at the new conference, but right now I'm more concerned with the marginalization and ghettoizing of our message of freedom. I am not going to consent to the attempts of the Left and Islamic supremacists to drive our defense of freedom from public spaces.”
Amir Arain, a spokesman for the Islamic Center of Nashville praised the Hotel for cancelling the event which was critical of Islam saying the conference was promoting bigotry and had no place in Nashville.
Several days earlier the Hyatt Hotel in Sugar Land, Texas cancelled a similar Tea Party event citing “security concerns.”
Geller likened the cancellations to the enforcing of “blasphemy” laws that exist in Islamic countries under Sharia law. Under Sharia, no criticism of Islam is allowed and criticism of Islam can result in a death sentence.
Geller said the cancellations actually vindicate her warnings about radical Islam.
