Muslim group invites Virgil Goode to explain his surge resolution speech

Goode’s the congressman from Virginia who demagogued Keith Ellison over his swearing-in on the Koran and called for limiting immigration by Muslims to the United States. Now the Muslim-American Public Affairs Council (not to be confused with the Muslim Public Affairs Council) wants him to come to its annual dinner next month and beg pardon for his latest offense, a four-minute speech on the House floor last week in which he addressed the subject of jihad:

A Muslim group said Monday it had invited Rep. Virgil Goode, R-Va., to expand on biting remarks he made last week during debate on a House resolution disapproving of President Bush’s decision to send more than 21,000 U.S. troops into Iraq.

The Muslim American Public Affairs Council has “extended this invitation to Congressman Goode to give him a venue to explain his recent comments about Muslims and Islam,” MAPAC Executive Director Marc Conaghan said in a statement. MAPAC also asked Goode to share a dialogue with Jamal Badawi, an Islamic and comparative religion scholar.

Here’s the clip of Goode’s remarks. Judge for yourself how “biting” they are. He’s careful to distinguish between Muslims and radical Muslims, and his fears about jihadis slipping into the U.S. amid a sea of Iraqi refugees are hardly far-fetched. So what’s the issue? Or did Fox misinterpret the press release and, in fact, the “recent” comments MAPAC wants him to address are his earlier statements about Ellison, not the House speech? I can’t find a copy of it online so I can’t tell.

Oh, and here’s a little background on Badawi, whose appearance is advertised prominently on the MAPAC website:

In an interview with the Saudi Gazette on June 24, 2005, while visiting the kingdom, Mr. Badawi said: “9/11 was un-Islamic,” and “I strongly condemn the September 11 attacks … whoever did it,” adding, “It is not confirmed yet who is actually behind the attacks.” In the Saudi Gazette story, Mr. Badawi discussed the difficulty in drawing up an “agreement on how terrorism should be defined” and said exploding cars in Iraq’s markets and killing civilians should be included.

Mr. Badawi went on to make an outrageous claim – that America could be behind these attacks: “This has to be investigated as to who is actually behind this … There have been allegations that I cannot confirm that people going to the market to buy vegetables are stopped in the name of inspecting their cars by [American] forces, their hands are tied and they are blindfolded. There have been cases and I want a clarification from American officials to these allegations. After inspecting their cars they are allowed to go and when the car reaches [the] checkpoint it explodes and they call them suicide bombers, perhaps the occupants of the car were not even aware that they are carrying a bomb in their car. Such incidents should be thoroughly probed.”

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