The county executive of Long Island’s Nassau County, Ed Mangano, was sworn in for his second term last week. And he continues to tolerate and reward a massive injustice, by keeping Habeeb Ahmed on the Nassau County Commission on Human Rights.
Last April, Habeeb Ahmed strong-armed a Long Island synagogue into silencing free speech and enforcing the Shariah by canceling my scheduled speech there. It is always a very sad day for freedom-loving peoples when fascist tactics trump free speech. Leftist goons, pushed and prodded by Islamic supremacist Habeeb Ahmed and his co-conspirators, threatened a march on the shul (among other things) on the day I had been scheduled to speak, which was a Sunday. Imagine how terrorized the Sunday school children would be. What was outrageous was that this Islamic supremacist would be telling a synagogue that a fellow Jew couldn’t speak.
Rabbi Yoseph Geisinsky of Chabad of Great Neck invited me to speak at his synagogue instead, and I addressed to an overflow crowd there – but that didn’t make Ahmed’s smear campaign and attempt to silence me forcibly any less outrageous. Ahmed’s conduct was so far out of bounds that the Nassau County Attorney’s office opened an investigation to determine whether he “misused his title” in his thuggish campaign against free speech and the truth about Islam and jihad.
He certainly seems to have done so. He organized a coordinated leftist/Muslim campaign to intimidate Great Neck synagogue officials (read these emails). Throughout this campaign, Habeeb Ahmed identified himself in his emails as an official of the Nassau County Human Rights Commission. He used the power of his position deploy a small coterie of leftists and Islamic supremacists in a covert effort to strong-arm the shul. Ahmed and his accomplices ordered their minions to make calls and pressure the synagogue leaders to cancel a proud Jew scheduled to speak at their synagogue (more here).
Then he said that he didn’t mean to imply by identifying himself as an official of the Human Rights Commission that his attempt to get me banned was an official HRC activity. But the implication was clear. Not that I believe him, but if he really didn’t mean to violate any laws and was only using his title “for identification purposes only,” ignorance of the law is no excuse.
As a result of this egregious violation of the public trust, the investigation was opened. But instead of removing this thug from office, Ahmed remains on the Nassau County Commission on Human Rights. He is one of four Muslims on that board (out of a total of 12 commissioners), along with Board Chairman Zahid Syed and Dr. Usman Khan M.D. and Mohammed Z.A. Siddiqui. No wonder Ahmed was exonerated of wrongdoing in getting my talk canceled.
Why are there so many Muslims – fully a third of the board? Is a third of the population of Nassau County Muslim? Where is the Jew? The Greek? The Thai? Why are Muslims so overrepresented?
There is more that is unsavory about Habeeb Ahmed. He said of Rep. Peter King’s hearings on jihad in the U.S. that they were “branding the whole community as if we are all suspects.” Really, why? Was Ahmed suggesting that Muslims support jihad and the Shariah, the most oppressive and brutal ideology on the face of the earth – in direct contradiction to the idea that most Muslims are “moderate”?
Habeeb Ahmed is also the chairman of the Islamic Center of Long Island. Look who speaks at that hotbed of questionable activity: Islamic supremacist Mauri Saalakhan, who has railed against a supposed “Jewish, Zionist” conspiracy in Iranian government-controlled media, has spoken at the Islamic Center of Long Island. Habeeb Ahmed doesn’t seem to have complained about his talk.
Ed Mangano should have removed Habeeb Ahmed long ago. He must go. Using government offices to abet the demonization and marginalization of those who are fighting for freedom is unconscionable and unacceptable. Thuggery and the forcible suppression of the freedom of speech shouldn’t be tolerated, much less rewarded, in Nassau County or anywhere else.