Habibi blogged yesterday about a “Dawah” tour being planned by iERA, the Islamic Education and Research Academy. They’re a new group launching themselves onto the scene with a series of events in Manchester, London, Leeds, Luton, Bristol and Brighton. In particular, Habibi examined the deeply unpleasant Hussein Ye, one of their speakers and a man who claimed “a group of Jews was so happy in America, they were having a party when the twin towers had been burned. They had a celebration, they had a party going on.”
iERA may be a new group, but one name associated with them will be very familiar. Bilal Philips, the man caught by Dispatches justifying marriage to 9 year-old girls in the modern world because Muhammad did so over a thousand years ago – a clear case of anthopological illiteracy -, is not just one of their advertised speakers, he is one of iERA’s advisors.