Mosque leader calls hate watchdog group’s listing “slanderous”
Compiled by MCJ Editorial Staff
The Milwaukee Mosque of the Nation of Islam is on a list of 15 Wisconsin hate groups compiled by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), which tracks and monitors U.S. hate and extremists organizations.
The Milwaukee mosque is one of three named groups based in the city. Nationwide, the SPLC identified more than 1,000 hate groups.
The leaders of the Milwaukee NOI mosque took exception to being on the list, calling it “slanderous.”
In a letter to the city’s Black community that was placed on his Facebook page, Student Minister William Muhammad, who heads theMilwaukee Mosque, Muhammad Mosque #3, said a Channel 58 news report, which included a picture of the mosque, placed them as “the face of hate to the public.”
“We do not take the escalation of this slander lightly,” said Muhammad in the letter. “In an environment of heightened racist violence and Islamophobia, to target our mosque could potentially direct misguided individuals to our location to do harm to the believers, our children, and guests”