Let's make sure the next generation are deaf, dumb, blind and stupid!

If I could have one magic wish, it would be to fill my head with fluent Arabic so I could read "Alf Layla iwa Layla" in the original. I believe it's the single greatest work in all world literature, and I would kill to be able to read it as it was first written -- apparently in Cairo around 1300 AD.

I have a personal suspicion the anonymous author was a woman. The attention to the rich nuances of human personality and character, the attention to emotion and feeling, the attention to the rich warp and weft of relationships in a family and in a community. And of course the entire story -- the Frame Story -- is about a woman, Sharazade, without weapons, force or power, with no standing or rights under the law, who can only save her own life by her wit and her cleverness. Yet she volunteers to face death to save all the young women of her city.

Of course a woman in the Arab world in 1300 should have been almost illiterate, so it's a ridiculous suspicion. BUT ... throughout history, there've been doting, indulgent fathers who pampered and spoiled their beloved daughters, and I think a wealthy father in Cairo encouraged his daughter to do whatever she wanted in his library, and had her privately tutored.

If my suspicions are right, the world owes a huge debt to an indulgent father.

Then of course The Koran, so I wouldn't have to take the word of psycho bigoted Muslim-bashing neocon fundie guests on Fox News for what's inside it.

But until my magic wish is granted, I recommend the Penguin English version of the Koran, by the Anglo-Iraqi scholar Dawood -- who also publishes a wonderful Penguin collection of stories from "Alf Layla."

Come on, come on, you know what "Alf Layla iwa Layla" is. PizzaQ, 1 slice, to the first Comment that nails it.

Well. So here's Bob the Vleeptron Dude wishing he could speak and read and write Arabic. So he could understand more about the world. So he could talk to people all over Asia and Africa and the Middle East. So he could enter doors to magnificent and important literature and wisdom.

Of course there's another Theory. We should all learn LESS Arabic. We should all learn LESS about the Muslim world. We'll have better lives, safer lives, a safer New York, a better America if FEWER Americans learn Arabic.

I guess that's a plan. I'll bet it's working out great for the American military in Iraq. We're stuck in the middle of a mega-violent Muslim religious civil war, and nearly all our soldiers, Marines, generals, colonels, captains, sergeants, corporals are totally deaf and blind to nearly everything that's going on around them.

(During World War II, American troops were lousy with fluent speakers in every Euro language -- German, Italian, French, Slavic and Scandinavian lingos, Hungarian. We weren't deaf, dumb and blind. Our military intelligence could read all the signs.)

Let's encourage the American educational system to be blind, deaf, dumb and stupid. That's a plan.

===========

The Associated Press
Saturday 5 May 2007

New York City Arabic school
without a home,
officials looking for space

by Colleen Long
Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK -- Proponents of an Arabic-themed middle school see it as a reflection of internationalism and a recognition of the city's growing Arab population.

But school officials were restarting efforts Friday to find a space for the institution after plans to open it in a Brooklyn elementary school building foundered amid parental concerns and contention over its mission.

The Khalil Gibran International Academy was supposed to share space with Public School 282 in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn. But parents of PS 282 pupils criticized the option, saying squeezing another school inside the building would hurt resources available to their children.

Some have noted that the school has generated ideological controversy and have questioned whether that could mean a security risk. And some say they don't want older students sharing a building with their young children.

City Department of Education officials said Friday the school would not be housed at PS 282, but they did not say whether the protests had anything to do with changing the location.

"After further consultation with the principal and school leadership team of PS 282, we determined that siting the Khalil Gibran International Academy at the school would be detrimental to its core academic programs," spokesman David Cantor said in a statement.

Other locations were being scouted, but Cantor would not say where.

Organizers say they still plan to open this September with a sixth grade and gradually expand into a full middle school and high school. About half the students are expected to be of Arab heritage, although the school will have open admission.

The school is named after the famed Lebanese-American Christian poet who promoted peace. It would be one of a few nationwide that focus on the Arabic language and Arab culture.

Education officials say the curriculum will be in line with basics required from public schools, while integrating elements of its theme. Debbie Almontaser, a longtime New York City educator and a Muslim of Yemeni background, is to lead the academy. She has done extensive interfaith and cultural work to fight stereotypes about Arabs and Muslims in the post-Sept. 11 world.

New York already has schools specializing in Asian culture and Chinese language, and is opening one that centers on Latin-American culture.

But when the education department revealed plans for the Arabic school earlier this year, the reaction from conservative groups was fierce.

Conservative Web sites have seethed against the idea, as have some members of the public. "Jihadi," "public madrassa," and "segregationist" are just a few of the labels that have been tossed at the plan.

- 30 -

Associated Press Writer Nahal Toosi contributed to this report.

========================
Here's a real Piece of Work ... God Bless Free Blog Speech!
& God Save All our Dumb Sorry Asses ...
========================

From
http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2801

[in the text, the blogger refers to the blog as MIM]

Khalil Gibran International aka Islamist Academy -
Taxpayer funded NYC madrassah promotes Arab/ Muslim 9/11 victimhood hoax

April 2, 2007

MIM: According to NYC Board of Education spokesman David Castor the "Khalil Gibran International Academy" "will not be a vehicle for political ideology". His claim is both dangerous and disingenuous and a more apt name for the school would be the Khalil Gibran Islamist Academy.The individuals and groups involved are promoting an Arab/Islamist leftwing agenda running the gamat from diversity to da'wa.In short the KGIA will be the first taxpayer funded public school madrassa in NYC. http://www.danielpipes.org/

KGIA Principal Dhabah aka Debbie Almontaser is a long time practioner of da'wa [Islamic propagation] in the guise of "multicultural educator" and not surprisingly received a CAIR award for community service together with Ghazi Khankan former director of CAIR NYC who is on record as shouting"I bring you salaams and greetings from the Mujahideen at CAIR" at one of the group's rallies.

Yemen born Almontaser wears a hijab and has spent years doing da'wa in the public schools after 9/11 when the NYC Board of Education decided that the best way to deal with the attacks was to present her with the job of "multicultural educator" and send her into public school classrooms to tell students about "Islam and Arab culture". As with everyone involved with the KGIA she hyped a non existent backlash and hysteria, with the operative word being discrimination and fear on the part of Muslims to exploit 9/11 for da'wa purposes [i.e. non Muslims must learn about Islam to understand us].

In the documentation that follows it should be noted that never once does anyone involved with the KGIA allude to the fear and shock which non Muslims felt after 9/11 and it is always Muslims and Arabs who are depicted as the real victims who are in need of understanding and federal and state funding which is also given as one of the raison d'etre for the KGIA which will open 7 years after the attacks.

See: "New York set to open Khalil Gibran 'Jihad' School" - connected to Saudi funded ADC -principal won CAIR award http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2755

MIM:One example of Almontaser's perifidiousness can be seen in her response to non Muslim public school children who asked why Muslims and Arabs perpetrated the attacks. In reponse Almontaser ,an experienced pedagoge/propagandist exploited the children's naivete and inability to comprehend nuance by telling them that was not really Arabs and Muslims who perpetrated the 9/11 attacks because she as the authority figure and expert has determined that they could not have been.

"I don't recognize the people who committed the attacks as either Arabs or Muslims," ...Those people who did it have stolen my identity as an Arab and have stolen my religion."

Almontaser and some of her colleagues have plans under way to extend her technique and workshops to a wider pool of schools. She and some of her Jewish and Christian colleagues have created a group called Brooklyn Bridges and are devising a "Sept. 11 Curriculum" to be taught in schools across the city. "We're all ignorant until we learn," she says.

"I'm just grateful for the opportunity to educate."

MIM: In a VOA interview Altmontaser explained how she was able to do da'wa funded by Christians and US taxpayers in the public school in the guise of a "multicultural educator". Her position and access to young children is a study in legal Islamism at it's most insidious and is more proof of why she should not be in charge of an Arabic/Islamist public school.

Debbie Almontaser teaches a class of fifth graders about Islam and the Arab world
Debbie Almontaser teaches a public school class of fifth graders about Arabs and Islam

"...After September 11th, ... I left my job as a classroom teacher, took a leave of absence, to do Islam sensitivity training; Arab culture training, as well as presentations at churches, synagogues, community based organizations…wherever there was a need...There was such animosity and fear, that it was important for me to help people understand who Arabs, Muslims and South Asians were...The Arab and Muslim and South Asian communities really feared having their kids go to school... they kept their kids home for weeks on end ...we were fortunate to get the Christian Children's Fund to pay me a part-time salary. I was able to work part-time and also do this work for free in our schools.."

http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2004-11/2004-11-24-voa51.cfm?CFID=56741565&CFTOKEN=53120549

MIM: Here is a description of Almontaser's BOE funded and facilitated jihad through da'wa [Islamic propagation activities) prior to her being given her position as KGIA which will enable her to have an entire school dedicated to turning out students who will promote an Islamist/Arab supremacist agenda and Koranic religious instruction under the guise of multiculturalism.

Twenty-six expectant faces stared at her and the board as they waited patiently for her to tell them why she was there. She smiled warmly to the class and introduced herself, "My name's Debbie Almontaser," she told them, "and I'm a multicultural educator."

Almontaser explained that they would be spending the next hour discussing Arabs and Islam and the importance of acceptance and tolerance among different communities....

After 9/11, Almontaser, whose name means to win or overcome, was overwhelmed with requests to help foster dialogue among different communities. Her occasional workshops transformed into her full time job. "After Sept. 11 there was an unending need to educate people," she said, "and because I had always had a passion for this type of work, I felt equipped to do it."

Just as Almontaser was considering leaving her teaching job to pursue her workshops more seriously, the district superintendent, Carmen Ferenia, approached her to begin a multicultural program designed specifically for school children.

"She was the obvious choice to do the work," Ferenia said of Almonatser.

Today the Board of Education and the Christian Childrens' Fund pay Almontaser to go from school to school teaching children about Arabs and Islam and the importance of tolerance and respect. This is the first time that the Christian Children's Fund has ever sponsored a project of this type in New York.

As part of the sixth-grade workshop, Almonataser asked each student to write questions and thoughts about Islam and Arabs. "It's important to give children a safety net to talk about their concerns," she explained. "They need to feel safe enough to say what they think and feel."

Almontaser pasted the students' anonymous responses on the board and addressed each one. "Why are women covered in clothes and men are more free?" wrote one sixth grader; "People from the Middle East pray a lot," wrote another. Other papers said simply "war" or "Israel" or "9/11." She also took questions from the children. "We heard that their God, Allah, asked them to do it." said one boy in the back row, "Why would their God tell them to do that?" he asked.

Almontaser's responses to the children's concerns were always clear. "I don't recognize the people who committed the attacks as either Arabs or Muslims," she told them. "Those people who did it have stolen my identity as an Arab and have stolen my religion."

Almontaser and some of her colleagues have plans under way to extend her technique and workshops to a wider pool of schools. She and some of her Jewish and Christian colleagues have created a group called Brooklyn Bridges and are devising a "Sept. 11 Curriculum" to be taught in schools across the city. "We're all ignorant until we learn," she says.

"I'm just grateful for the opportunity to educate"
http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/studentwork/cns/2002-06-10/584.asp

MIM: Almontaser as "multicultural educator" aka Islamist missionary must also be grateful for the chance to obfuscate to young children and tell them that it could not possibly have been Arabs or Muslims who perpetrated the 9/11 attacks because:

"...I don't recognize the people who committed the attacks as either Arabs or Muslims," Those people who did it have stolen my identity as an Arab and have stolen my religion...".

MIM: This example of Almontaser's 9/11 denial is in itself a reason why the Khalil Gibran International Academy should never be opened and provides a preview of the distorted and disingenuous world view which will be promoted by the school. The fallacious idea that an identity or a religion can be "stolen" is one of the cornerstones of radical Islamist propaganda and is deliberately calculated to dispel and ideas the students might have that Islam or Muslims could possibly have been or be involved in any of the terrorist acts which are taking place daily around the world since according to Almonstaser they cant be "either Arabs or Muslims". The KGIA and Almontaser's multi/pluri culturalism are both facades and euphemisms for Arab/ Islamist world domination as Swedish blogger Fjordman explains:

In The Force of Reason, Italian journalist and novelist Oriana Fallaci recalls how, in 1972, she interviewed the Palestinian terrorist George Habash, who told her that the Palestinian problem was about far more than Israel. The Arab goal, Habash declared, was to wage war "against Europe and America" and to ensure that henceforth "there would be no peace for the West." The Arabs, he informed her, would "advance step by step. Millimeter by millimeter. Year after year. Decade after decade. Determined, stubborn, patient. This is our strategy. A strategy that we shall expand throughout the whole planet."

Fallaci thought he was referring simply to terrorism. Only later did she realize that he "also meant the cultural war, the demographic war, the religious war waged by stealing a country from its citizens — In short, the war waged through immigration, fertility, presumed pluriculturalism."

http://globalpolitician.com/articledes.asp?ID=2582&cid=2&sid=2

MIM: The Arab American Family Support Center [AAFSC] is in the forefront of pushing the multi/pluriculturalist agenda and is the main organisation involved with planning and coordinating the school whose board of directors consists of individuals with direct ties to organisations promoting an anti American and anti Western agenda and promoting Islamo/Arab supremacism.

The make up of the KGIA enterprise reveals that all of the individuals and groups are interlocking and will in effect be running an insular religious institution [with staff coming from a pool of their own Arab Islamist connections such as mosques. Islamic centers and groups like the Arab American Anti Discrimination Committee]. This interdependency allows all the groups to promote their mutually agreed political,cultural,and religious Arab/ Islamisation agenda with federal and state funding in the guise of a public school aided and abetted by the NYC Department of Education.

MIM: In the wake if 9/11 the NYC DOE liberal political correctness spin went faster then a derwish on speed. Terrified that non Muslims would see radical Islam as a growing problem they decided to hire Islamists to explain to elementary school children that Muslims and Arabs were the real victims of the attacks. Like other Islamists Dhabah Almontaser "piggybacked" on 9/11 and seized the opportunity to take classes to Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn where they visited a mosque and Middle Eastern shops.

Not wanting to burst her charges multicultural bubble it is doubtful if Almontaser told them that Arabs and Muslims living in their neighborhood were responsible for the 1993 WTC bombing and that one of the largest mosques in this multicultural utopia was Al Farooq, the home to the first wave of Al Qaeda operatives who arrived in the United States in the 1980's.

Almontaser and her KGIA live in a parallel Islamist universe where places like Atlantic Ave are presented a shining example of the immigrant experience instead of being seen as a hotbed of jihadism for over two decades.

The fact that an Arabic Islamist school is coming into existence before the 9/11 memorial to the victims speaks volumes about the affirmative dhimmitude rampant in the New York City Department of Education whose priority is to as Almontaser puts it "help their students understand more about Arabs and Muslims." It is also an alarming exercise in denial regarding the origins of the terrorist attacks which have altered the mental and physical perceptions of the city forever.

http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2006-09/2006-09-08-voa28.cfm

Other teachers had their students write stories or invited guest speakers to their classrooms. Debbie Almontaser says teachers felt they needed to do something to respond to the children's questions.

"The Department of Education didn't want teachers to spend a great deal [of time] talking about what happened. I and many teachers across the city felt like you can't pretend that what happened didn't happen," Almontaser says.

She says teachers engaged in a number of activities to help their students understand more about Arabs and Muslims. "[We did that] through videos, books, inviting guest speakers, doing fieldtrips to local places in the area like a mosque, or like the Atlantic Avenue, which is all Middle Eastern stores." A few weeks later, Almontaser was assigned to travel around the city to do cross cultural presentations.

MIM: The American Arab Family Support Center AAFSC is the main organisation involved in the planning and the running of the school. An old webpage with a description of their mission inadvertantly reveals that they are attempting to encourage and aid Arabs to utilise all kinds of taxpayer funded facilities and services to help them "reap the benefits of the American dream". The AAFSC's mission to bilk Americans for the upkeep of a voluntary displaced Arab population was so sucessful that they also announced they hoped to open 5 more AAFSC franchises in the Metropolitan area. The 9/11 attacks proved to be a boon to the AAFSC whose founder and director Emira Habiby -Browne dissembles with atrocity propaganda of how terrible Arab suffering and discrimination in the New York area and never mentions her trips abroad as a quasi diplomatic sponsored by the U.S. State Department to talk in Europe about multi culturalism and integration.

In what must be the ultimate irony Habiby Browne was sent as a US government emissary to advise local councils how to provide funding and resources for their (mostly illegal) Arab immigrants to profit from who are swamping the country precisely because of the generous handouts and assistance they receive from social welfare agencies.

Ms. Browne's presentation at the Catholic University of Milan, A Project of Islamic Integration on the Urban Territory: The Case of New York City, outlined some of the differences between the U.S. model of integration and the Italian focus on assimilation. Ms. Browne described some of the psychological problems commonly experienced by Arab immigrants upon their arrival to the U.S., leading to a discussion of how services and social assistance to the Italian Arab community might be further developed. http://milan.usconsulate.gov/news/NE_ENG_100306_Browne.htm

According to Habiby Browne Arabs and Muslims in New York were the ones to suffer most from 9/11 as victims of a non existent backlash and hoax discrimation charges and are in dire need of state and federally funded support. Her role as quasi ambassador and the planned opening of an Arab public school debunk all of her claims that Arabs are having problems due to 9/11. In fact the contrary is the case with social services and the public school system bending over forwards to make sure Muslims feel understood and loved to the point where people like Dhabah Almontaster (mentioned above) have gotten full time jobs telling Americans that it really wasnt Muslim and Arabs behind 9/11 at all. An excerpt from the mission statement of the AAFSC clearly shows that as long as the myth of Arab and Muslim victimisation is promoted the more funding, services and public sympathy will pour in.

Another reality is that groups like the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) who fraudulently present themselves as the Muslim NAACP are using legal means to intimidate non Muslims to the point of not daring to resist any Arab or Muslim demands no matter how outrageous or self serving by spinning every case of non accomodation as discrimination.

According to the AAFSC website life for Arab and Muslim in the United States is untenable.

After the events of September 11th, Arabs and Muslims in the United States have been targeted purely on the basis of their ethnicity and religion. They have been singled out for selective enforcement of immigration laws and other types of racial profiling. Members of community lives in a general state of anxiety and fear as families are threatened with separation from husbands and fathers through deportations and detentions. Students experience discrimination and harassment at school and shop owners have suffered a significant decline in revenue.

http://www.aafscny.org/mission.htm
http://www.cafearabica.com/organizations/org12/orgaafsc7x3.html

Since June 1994, AAFSC has served over 90 families under its child welfare prevention program, and responded to at least 350 incidents of domestic violence; it has enrolled over 160 adults in English language classes, and assisted 126 community members with citizenship preparation. It has provided 16 educational workshops, tutoring to 35 client children, and has provided over 1000 people with information and referral services. AAFSC also held its first Arab-American Youth Conference last June, and recently initialed a Big Sister/Brother Mentoring Program, matching young professional Arab-Americans with client children to provide them with positive role models.

The needs of the Arab-American community are immense. While Arab immigrants have been settling in New York for over a hundred years, their social-service needs have been largely neglected. By addressing those needs, encouraging positive leadership and promoting a stronger and more united Arab-American community, AAFSC seeks to help Arab-Americans share more fully in the life of their communities and reap the benefits of the American dream.

AAFSC is presently located In Brooklyn where a large number of new immigrants reside. It seeks to serve all Arab-Americans in New York City and is easily accessible by public transportation. It hopes to open offices in all 5 NYC boroughs in the future.

MIM: The AAFSC High School Youth Club is the perfect da'wa vehicle as one of their stated aims is to "reach out to other groups educating them about Arab culture and Islam. This contradicts Dhabah Almontaser's disingenuous claim in a recent IHT article that the Arab culture has nothing to do with Islam. The youth group also fosters a siege mentality among Arab youth who complain of discrimination, degradation, stereotyping and offensive acts being committed against them. Here is an excerpt from a testimonial from one Arab youth member of the AAFSC High School Youth Club lamenting their fabricated victimhood and complaining that life is becoming "more and more difficult".

Note that : "The club aims at creating an enviornment of tolerance and inclusion in the school by reaching out to others student groups and educating them about Arab culture and Islam".

The most significant activity for me is being involved with the Arab American Family Support Center, particularly in my high school's Arab-American Youth Club...
The AAFSC is crucial to the Arab-American community. We constantly feel isolation from other Americans caused by political figures and the media… Our image is usually degraded by the media, which result in offensive acts and stereotypes towards us. The Youth Club helps us youth cope with such cases by providing education concerning immigrant rights. Also, since the youth are very important in general society, the club provides us with the positive environment in which our mentality can grow and mature and we then have the capability to improve our image and make effective changes. I feel that I am making a difference right now…rather than keeping silent and moping about why life is becoming more and more difficult for me."

Excerpt from speech by youth club participant, Phatin Jarara, at the Center for Women in Society and Government & Civil Society on June 28, 2004.

http://www.aafscny.org/high-school.htm

MIM: According to the AAFSC mission statement Arabs in America are being brutalised and victimised on a daily basis which raises the question as to why they are encouraging them to come at all. If things are as horrific in the United States for Arabs as they claim then deportation should be a welcome relief and provide the added benefit of a free trip back to their country of origin on the taxpayers dime.

Since the events of September 11th Arabs and Muslims in the United States have been targetted purely on the basis of their ethnicity and religion. They have been singled out for selective enforcement of immigration laws and other types of racial profiling. Members of the community live in a general state of anxiety and fear. Families are threatened with deportation and seperation of husbands and fathers through deportation and detention. Students experience discrimination and harassment at school and shop owners have experienced a significant decline in revenue.

http://www.aafscny.org/mission.htm