DEARBORN
– Terry Jones finally
held his protest at the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn on
Saturday, April 7 much to the dismay of the community and local civil
rights groups. The protest, which passed without incident, came days
after back and forth arguments between the City of Dearborn and
Jones’ camp who claimed his freedom of speech was being violated
after the city requested that he sign a liability agreement.

Although
Jones succeeded in putting on the protest as planned, the event
wasn’t nearly as big of a spectacle as last year’s Good Friday
counter-protest of Jones, which resulted in multiple community
meetings with interfaith groups and a media frenzy which concluded
Jones being briefly held in jail by Dearborn Police after he
originally refused to pay a $1.00 “peace bond.”

Despite
the lack of responses from locals on Saturday, who urged the
community to ignore him this time around, there was still a
counter-protest that was held by the civil rights group BAMN (By Any
Means Necessary), only about a block away from the mosque. The group
brought along about twenty individuals who demonstrated up and down
on the sidewalk of Ford Rd., while chanting phrases such as “Hell
No, Terry Jones.”

“We
think that people like Terry Jones should be stopped from building a
movement,” said Donna Stern, a Detroit resident and BAMN member.
“This is a racist, anti-immigrant, anti-Islamic movement. This man
is the perfect example of someone who would incite the type of
violence that we saw occur in California when a woman was murdered
for wearing a headscarf.”

Tristan
Taylor, another BAMN member echoed in on some statements of his own.

“We
need to make it clear that we won’t tolerate racist thugs and hate
speech in our communities. We need to treat this threat seriously and
making sure that we are not silent,” Taylor stated. “Hitler
started off small and the approach people took was to ignore him.
That gave him even more opportunities to build a stronger base.
That’s why it’s important that we stop his message now before it
grows,” he added.

While
BAMN was demonstrating their anti-Terry Jones protest on the
sidewalks of Ford Rd, in an earshot distance were Terry Jones’
protestors of about 20-25 people who were demonstrating right in
front of the mosque.

Dearborn
Police blocked off all corners of the mosque to prevent any sort of
confrontation. During the two hours of Jones’ scheduled protest,
the only people allowed on the mosque property were protestors who
were on Jones’ list. According to a Dearborn policeman on duty,
this was a request made by the Islamic Center of America. Still, it
angered some locals who were standing nearby.

“I
don’t think this is fair, this guy has prejudiced views and he’s
an extremist. He’s trying to keep us isolated and show that we are
evil,” said Ali Ahmed, a Dearborn resident. “Look at all this
wasted resources. We are spending money to break the community apart
rather than bring it together,” he stated, referring to the number
of cops who were on duty at the scene.

An
out-of-towner was also upset that she wasn’t allowed to go pray in
the mosque. It was something she was looking forward to after hearing
so much about “The biggest mosque in America” while living in
both Dallas and Washington D.C.

“I
came all the way here from Washington D.C to visit a friend and the
first thing I told him over the phone was that I wanted to visit the
Islamic Center of America,” said Nancy Al-Mahdi. “I wanted to
come here and pray and I was not aware all of this was going on until
today. This guy just needs to stop. You have the general of U.S Armed
Forces who asked this man to stop, and you are telling us that as
Arab Americans we are a threat?” she added.

The
Islamic Center of America re-opened its doors around 3:30 p.m. after
Jones and his protesters had cleared out.