Controversy Over Muslim Imam's Address at Democratic National Convention Winter Meeting

There's a lot of controversy brewing among conservatives over last Friday's Democratic National Committee's annual winter meeting in Washington, where Husham Al-Husainy, Imam of the Karballa Islamic Education Center, a Shi'ite mosque in Dearborn, Michigan, offered the invocation prayer.

As the attending Democrats bowed their heads, the Imam prayed:

In the name of God the most merciful, the most compassionate. We thank you, God, to bless us among your creations. We thank you, God, to make us as a great nation. We thank you God, to send us your messages through our father Abraham and Moses and Jesus and Mohammed. Through you, God, we unite. So guide us to the right path. The path of the people you bless, not the path of the people you doom. Help us, God, to liberate and fill this earth with justice and peace and love and equality. And help us to stop the war and violence, and oppression and occupation. Ameen.

Debbie Schlussel is a blogger who went undercover to Hezbollah events and rallies in Dearborn Michigan and wrote about it in her New York Post column. She and other conservative bloggers are questioning whether the DNC's chosen Imam clergy provide insight into the Democratic Party's direction. She writes that Mr. Al-Husainy led "almost daily protests" last summer "of thousands of Hezbollah supporters on the streets of Dearborn and Detroit, swarming with swastikas and anti-Semitic, anti-American signs. Later, I watched him ... at an anti-Semitic rally of 3,000 Hezbollah supporters at Dearborn's Bint Jebail Cultural Center. He was among several who delivered hate-filled, anti-American rhetoric. I watched him cheer others on when they called for the hastened destruction of the Jews and when they said Americans are 'diseased.'"

Cal Thomas of The Baltimore Sun wrote that in its quest for Muslim votes, the Democratic Party has invited "a dangerous invocation from an Imam." He questions whether Democrats are pandering to this group in an effort to "outrun Republicans" who hope to gain the Hispanic vote by not tightening down the southern borders to illegal immigrants.