Do Not Be Fooled by These "Moderates" in Florida

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Gatestone Institute

The Darul Uloom Institute -- who? -- in Pembroke Pines, Florida will hold its annual fundraising dinner and awards ceremony on May 6. If it is anything like last year's gala, which saw honors go to a prominent local politician, a rabbi, and a pastor, you will hear some "moderate" messaging.
Do not, however, let this radical Islamic center's attempt to ingratiate itself into mainstream American society fool you. Its history is mired in violence and hate.
The Darul Uloom Institute was founded by its imam, Shafayat Mohamed, in October 1994. Originally from Trinidad, Mohamed left for India in 1975, where he was educated at Darul Uloom Deoband, the school where the hardline Sunni Deobandi movement was established in May 1866. In a show of favor to his student, Darul Uloom Deoband selected Mohamed to lead a group of Americans in a 1979 tour of its facilities.
Since its creation, the Deobandi movement has produced a number of militant offshoots, most notably the Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and spread its tentacles around the world, including in the United States. Mohamed returned from India and set up one such tentacle in Florida.
Shortly after its founding, Mohamed's institute became affiliated with "dirty bomber" Jose Padilla, a soon-to-be al-Qaeda operative who plotted to set off a radiological bomb in the U.S. Padilla, then a recent convert to Islam, was a student of Mohamed's and attended the institute from 1995 through 1997. The following year, Padilla abandoned his wife and home in Florida for Egypt and then Pakistan, on his way to becoming a full-blown terrorist.