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(Reuters) - A rally at the Texas Capitol on Thursday by Muslims seeking religious tolerance was repeatedly disrupted by a small group of protesters who said the state belonged to followers of Jesus Christ and that Muslims should go back to the Middle East.

During opening remarks at the Texas Muslim Capitol Day event, a Christian activist from Michigan grabbed the microphone from the speaker and said: "I proclaim the name of the Lord Jesus Christ over the capitol of Texas. I stand against Islam."

A group of people who described themselves as Christian activists also heckled the group of about 600 who showed up for the rally. The protesters shouted as the Muslim group sang the national anthem and then tried to interrupt speakers calling for religious tolerance.

Some of the protesters shouted: "Go home. You ain't going to be happy here."

There are about half a million Muslims in Texas, according to some estimates, with many being in the state for several generations.

The Texas Department of Public Safety said no arrests were made at the event.

"As soon as I got to the lectern, that woman came and grabbed the microphone out of my hands. It made us feel a little unsafe," said Ruth Nasrullah, a spokeswoman for the Houston branch of the Council of American-Islamic Relations, which helped arrange the event.

Some U.S. Islamic groups have reported stepped-up harassment since deadly attacks by Islamist gunmen at the offices of the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket in Paris this month.

"This reinforces that rhetoric and propaganda about Muslims is really gaining traction," Nasrullah said.

The Texas Legislature was not in session on Thursday, but one lawmaker, Republican state Representative Molly White, wrote on her Facebook page that she had instructed staff members how to manage any person who came into her office from the rally.

"Ask representatives from the Muslim community to renounce Islamic terrorist groups and publicly announce allegiance to America and our laws. We will see how long they stay in my office," she wrote.

In neighboring Oklahoma, state Representative John Bennett, a Republican, spoke out in January against the Oklahoma chapter of a national Islamic organization, calling on leaders to condemn verses of the Quran.

In September and October, Bennett told media that Islam was a cancer that needed to be "cut out" of America.

Hmmmmmm

and one lawmaker, Republican state Representative Molly White.

Why did you post an article, and then post half of the article?

and then post half of the article?

Hmmmmmmm Shocking.

Seems pretty natural that if a rally was needed to be held to promote and call for tolerance that there would be a loud presence of intolerance. Amirite?

They should be protesting against the violent muslims in the middle east.

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/02/11/us/cha...ng730aStorylink

3 Muslim students shot to death near UNC at Chapel Hill

Well Mr. Nasrullah, part of that is your fault.

“If we are practicing Muslims, we are above the law of the land,” said Mustafa Carroll, executive director of the Dallas-Fort Worth CAIR branch. (From 2013 rally in Texas)

Those types of comments aren't helping you.

man that.....sucks.

these 3 people didn't do anything wrong. They're american. hell one pic was them at a Panthers game having a blast.

that's just dumb.

that would be like Me being pissed off their's some racist white people in alabama, so i decide to go beat the crap out of some random whites here in ohio.

simply tragic.

We can't be doing dumb crap like this. All it does is add fuel to the fire. If we are gonna try to be this country that supposedly has this moral high ground over muslims, we need to start acting like it.

My fear is this is only the beginning. The Muslim community needs to get a good PR campaign going and fast. People will blame American Muslims for the acts of the radicals eventually.

Get on the News and condemn the atrocities! Explain you are afraid to howl to much because you have family over there and they could be harmed! Explain it is your people who are suffering the most.

During WWII, we allowed the German Americans their freedom but we locked up the Japanese Americans. You never know how people will react to fear and treachery.

Good luck fellow Americans, I fear the crap is soon to hit the fan.

I really wish they wouldn't describe themselves that way. I don't remember anything in the Bible about Jesus telling us to disrupt and yell at people and generally be intolerant to them.

In fact, I believe the golden rule was to treat those as you wish to be treated and I don't think anyone wants to be treated the way they treated this group.

There is no excuse for anyone who calls himself a Christian to go out and murder anyone because of his or her religion.

Christ did not want Christians out fighting, and killing anyone. In fact, when the soldiers came to take Jesus to His mock trial and to His death, Peter grabbed a sword and cut off the ear of one of the men sent to bring Jesus in. Christians are not expected to murder people because they believe something different. Christ wants us to save them by bringing them to Him, not killing them so they can be condemned. Now those people who were murdered have no chance to ever come to Christ.

Now, in the case of the murders in Chapel Hill, this is in the article:



It really doesn't matter in the larger scheme of things, but people will probably assume that this guy was a Christian, and he claims instead to be an atheist.

Anyway, hatred solves nothing. I do agree with DC though, when he brought up the propaganda put forth by too many Muslims, saying that they will, and/or have to overthrow the laws of the US and impose their own laws, have to destroy the US and its people, and so on. That is not helpful in creating and maintaining peace. That also has to change.

Unfortunately, I have a feeling that it never will.

just more proof that idiots come in all shapes, sizes, colors, sexes, and religions.

Ain't that the truth....

There are many, many, many Muslim leaders who have spoken publicly condemning terrorism in the name of Islam.

So you are saying "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" and I can put my fears for the Muslim community to rest. Great!

Yes, and you could have for quite some time now...

No, I was just responding to this part of what you wrote.

Yea but that's not exciting, that's not news worthy. Just like a couple hundred "Christians" who showed up to protest Muslims is more exciting than the 15-18 million Christians in Texas who didn't.

As a Christian I can tell you that I get tired of defending my faith when somebody else who claims to be a Christian does something stupid. I have no doubt that Muslims feel the same way. They get tired of having to validate their religion by speaking out against a few morons who use their faith for evil purposes..

man...i've been saying the same thing about blacks, yet nobody seemed to understand that...

I did.

That's pretty much the same thing I took from this too DC and the media (all media-TV, Movies and News) makes it worse.

Mr. Nasrullah, that's funny! Above the law....really??? And you question why there are difficulties?

Thats the biggest problem i have with Islam.

Islam is meant to be a religious AND political system, AKA Sharia Law.

Atleast christians are told by god to obey the laws of the land.

But it's still confusing, because most muslims are like any other americans: they follow the US laws like most of us. But thats in spite of Islam.

Turkey is the same way.
so is UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, even Iran in some instances.

what is happening is what i said before with christians in this country: They are muslims, but not really.

Right now whats going on in the middle east is desperation mode. All the old heads and radicals are dying off, and mark my words: these next 30-50 years will see the end of the middle east being exclusively hardcore Islamic. The poorest countries in the area area are where all the extremist are coming from.

Just like christianity had to finally conform to the ways of progress in the world, so to will Islam. They are just the last religion that needs conforming.

Perhaps we can help them with that.

Obama ask the senate for a war declaration.

ball in you guys court.

I believe in freedom of choice for all in many circumstances including gay marriage, abortion and religion. However, when we circumvent the law of the land, we are setting ourselves up for chaos, turmoil and further division.

You are wise and wrong.

(I took the liberty of capitalizing the C ) This is an interesting take....seriously. When do you foresee a turnaround where the radicals start having less influence? They've been gaining steam ever since the USSR/Afghan conflict, and Hamas and Hezbollah aren't going anywhere. IMO, until the mainstream Muslim community takes a very hard line and stands up to the radicals...they will continue to proliferate and possibly get a foothold in the more advanced countries. Look what happened in Egypt.

the movement has already been started a while ago.

Look at who has the most valuable currency on the exchange right now: Bahrain and Kuwait.

have you ever been to those places? you should. These people are nuts with their money. All use you see is huge ass American SUV's and Lambo's. the princes get out of their cars with some of the most beautiful women i have ever seen. and they damn near got nothing on.

Then you look at UAE and Qatar. Dubai is out there having a skyscraper race with nobody but themselves. they got this resort with crazy swimming pools and slides, and you see is arab women in two piece bikinis.

Don't even get me started on my country, Turkey. Istanbul, or the city where my family is from, Adana. man....the only thing that reminds you that you are in the middle east is that its hot as balls and you can't get any bacon McDoubles at McDonalds. other than that?

club life, Istanbul. Thats all imma say.

also remember, UAE and i think Jordan has FEMALE fighter pilots.

if that ain't progress, i dunno what is.

so now we getting into this war torn countries. well, have you ever heard of Erbil? It's a Kurdish city in Northern Iraq. we did a mission there to drop of M1's.

They got working street lights, signs that say "speed detectable by radar". the streets are in better condition that here in cleveland(i guess thats not really hard to accomplish), the women walk around either with the hair wrap or nothing at all. just normal clothing. they have BMW, Mercedes and Jaguar dealerships.

right now the Kurds control northern Iraq, and parts of Syria. And they have a very tight grip in those areas. i wouldn't be surprised if in the next 50 years, they finally get their own country again. And better believe that when they do, that country will be an instant power house in the middle east.

Iran is a bit behind. but they still allow their women to go to school and such, access to birth control, and they only have to wear the hair wraps there.

When we were withdrawing out of Iraq in 2011, Iraqis were getting started on their civil war. countries like Iraq, Afghan, Syria and such. they NEED that. We can only do so much, ultimately, in order for the rest of the middle east to get with the program, they have to get down in dirty within themselves.

you can see countries like Pakistan TRYING, but they are still trying to deal with terrorist groups within their own political system before they can take the next step forward.

The only reason the middle east APPEARS worse is because of social media. we can witness everything going on now. but it's ALWAYS the same countries over and over again.

It's only a matter of time.

Interesting. It's enlightening to hear from someone with experience from that part of the world (not just the war zones). What bothers me is that we don't hear much from the more developed countries denouncing or taking action against the radicals, despite the fact that they're committing atrocities in their own backyard.

well for one, the middle east and these developed countries have been dealing with radicals for centuries now. As long as it doesn't spill too much into their own country, they don't really care.

Second, man bro...you should hear some of the stuff my family says about iraqi's. good god. one could say they iraqi's social standing with the rest of the middle east is more or less the same as illegal immigrants here in the US: there is no social standing. They treat them like absolute crap. so does a lot of other countries.

I think people don't realize how much each country really dislikes each other. its like a circle of hate.

Third, denouncing actions? sorry but thats old. I get tired of people constantly telling me that i need to denounce these violent acts blacks do here in America. Why should i have to open my mouth every single time some dumbass in the hood does something stupid?

same thing applies to the middle east. Theres a point where denouncing anything doesn't make a iota of difference. you think ISIS cares of some muslims in America condemns the actions of their group? no. so why waste your breath? They're killing their own people right there in the region, so they dont give a damn what some second,third, fourth generation arabs living in france or England care. To them, they aren't even really arabs anymore.

Anybody who knows puerto ricans know what i'm talking about. Puerto Ricans from the island do NOT claim those Ricans from NYC.

another thing: I don't know if anybody on this board have been to the middle east. But if you have, then you know that in certain countries, denouncing anything will get your head, and your FAMILY'S head cut clean off. countries like Afghan, Iraq, parts of Syria, Yemen. there's no such thing as freedom of speech. Their opinion, no matter how true it is, isn't worth getting your whole neighborhood block bombed. A lot of the middle east is ran by fear. They rather be alive and take care of their families then watching your daughter raped and killed because you all of sudden had feelings.

and that would be the same for any one of us.

On top of that, not to insult anyone on this board, as its not my intention, but us Americans in general aren't very well traveled. We don't know the pulse of the world like that. So we only know who denounces what from what the media reports. For all we know, there can absolutely be outrage from muslims in Asia and Europe. But very few of us even speaks a second language.

Man I got homeboy I met in Bratislava on a guy trip. He told me he always rolls his eyes when Americans make statements about foreign issues, because he thinks most of us don't even leave the state we live in, let alone the country.

and he has a point. How can we tell somebody else how to live, when we don't even know the pulse of the people?

I can't tell rich people how to live, i'm not rich. I don't know the typical routine these guys went through to make it big. So can i even remotely understand what their lives are like?


sorry for going off on a rant. Really passionate about social issues. I'm not a smart dude like in economics and such. But i got street smarts, and I've been to a lot of different places around the world bro. Sometimes i wish i could be an ambassador.

Don't stop. Not ever.

You speak to us from a vantage point that most of us will never have... and more info/input is always a good thing.

I don't have your life experiences, but I try very hard to get my news of the world from a variety of sources: CBC, BBC, Al-Jezeera US, etc. They may all have their own spin on things, but after awhile, an overall sense of perspective sets in that I'd NEVER get if I limited my input to the "usual suspects."

Additionally: when you speak of such things, you do so from a POV that comes from your own life experience... and that Truth brings with it a credibility that guys like me simply can't lend to our opinions. You've actually LIVED it- with your family history, your overseas service, and the experiences that such a life brings to one's perspective.

On issues such as these, your words bring a weight and gravitas that I could never bring to conversations like this one (or many others, for that matter).

Share what's on your heart, my young brother... and NEVER apologize for "going on a rant." Not when it means this much to you.

You may get push-back from others... but you'll always have my support- even on issues when we see things differently.

More voices ALWAYS make the chorus stronger.
Sing loud, Young Dawg.

Clem.

This whole talk about Muslims condemning other "muslims" is rather ridiculous. Apply it to another group and it'll showcase that. For example, I've never had a white person apologize to me about Columbine. I've never had a white person say they're sorry for the Aurora shootings. In fact, the media will usually sanctify the criminal by calling them "misunderstood" or some other garbage. The whole condemning thing is just one gigantic double standard.

I managed quite a few Muslims in my previous job and they were some of the nicest and most understanding people. I'm really tired of everybody lumping extremists in with normal Muslims. Muslims are one of the most misunderstood groups of people, based on my experiences.

Thanks man.

I totally agree and would add in many other groups. They say prejudice is taught.

A general question to you and everybody-what source is the most responsible for promoting prejudice in our country?

They say parents and family and I agree, but I imagine there are other sources too.