The Gray Lady’s Willful Blindness About a Jihadist Boston Mosque

Yesterday, the New York Times provided fresh ammunition to critiques of the Obama administration’s “Muslim outreach” initiatives. The newspaper gave astonishingly favorable treatment to the Islamic Society of Boston – a mosque the President actually cited last month as a model for “countering violent extremism.”

To do so, the Times had to downplay or excuse the significance of abundant evidence to the contrary. For example, the mosque was founded by a notorious – and now jailed – terrorist with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and al Qaeda. At least twelve other jihadists have been involved with the ISB over the years. Yet, the newspaper pooh-poohs such associations unless “radicalization” provably took place inside the mosque.

No true “newspaper of record” – or its readers – would knowingly promote such willful blindness.