Towards critical mass.

[brian]

New York Times

FDNY Chaplain Resigns After Remarks About 9/11 Conspiracy Theory


Published: September 30, 2005NEW YORK (AP) -- The fire department's Muslim chaplain abruptly resigned Friday after saying in a published interview that a conspiracy, not 19 al-Qaida hijackers, may have been responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"It became clear to him that he would have difficulty functioning as an FDNY chaplain," Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta told reporters an hour before Imam Intikab Habib was to be officially sworn in. "There has been no prior indication that he held those views."

Habib told Newsday that he was skeptical of the official version of the attack on the World Trade Center, which killed 343 members of the Fire Department of New York. The newspaper published the interview hours before the swearing-in ceremony Friday.

"It takes two or three weeks to demolish a building like that. But it was pulled down in a couple of hours," Habib told the newspaper. "Was it 19 hijackers who brought it down, or was it a conspiracy?"

The 30-year Guyana native joined the department as chaplain on Aug. 15 after the FDNY's Islamic Society recommended him for the part-time position, which pays $18,000 a year.

Scoppetta said Habib, who was educated in Islamic law in Saudi Arabia and preaches at a New York mosque, had appeared qualified and passed a background check.

"It's sad," said Kevin James, a spokesman for the Islamic Society of Fire Department Personnel. "We had no idea those were his views. He's entitled to his opinion but he's not the right person for the chaplain."

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/30/nyregion/30wire-chaplain.html

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident.

-- Arthur Schopenhauer, philosopher, 1788-1860

[Andrew Johnson]

Was that an Islamic Chaplain of the New York Fire Dept? 1st time I heard Fire Depts had chaplains...

Even if they did, I think they would more likely not be Islamic.

That story has a bit a niff to it....

[brian]

Andrew it appears factual.

http://www.nynewsday.com/nyc-imam0930,0,4529238.story?coll=nyc-tophead lines-span