A year after the controversy over the so-called “Ground Zero mosque” started fading from the national scene, Rep. Allen West (R-FL) on Wednesday hosted a screening of a film that deems the planned cultural center “another type of Islamic jihad.”
West didn’t show any signs that he’s planning to seek common ground with Muslims, as he criticized Herman Cain for doing. At a news conference held ahead of the Capitol Hill screening of the film “Sacrificed Survivors: The Untold Story of Ground Zero Mega Mosque,” West warned that political correctness or the desire to be a multicultural society could make America forget Sept. 11.
And after frequently equating Muslims with terrorists or terrorist sympathizers, West insisted he didn’t have a problem with those who practice what he deemed a “theocratic-political construct, ideology.”
“I am not sitting up here and condemning people who call themselves Muslims,” West said. “I have been in Muslim countries, I have fought beside Muslims, I have helped some of my previous interpreters over in Afghanistan get green cards to come here and be a part of this great thing that we have in the United States of America.”
“But I think now’s the time that we have to challenge this ideology and if we are to peacefully co-exist I think that they have to come into the 21st century and push aside some of these seventh century ideals that they still hold onto,” West said.
Video below.
Disqus Conversations
Click here to read the Disqus Commenting FAQ.