Solsticewitch13's BOS: Controversial 'Killing Jews is Worship' posters will soon appear on New York City subways and buses after judge orders MTA to run anti-Muslim group's ads

Friday, April 24, 2015

Controversial 'Killing Jews is Worship' posters will soon appear on New York City subways and buses after judge orders MTA to run anti-Muslim group's ads

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3049731/Judge-Pro-Israel-group-post-Killing-Jews-ads-buses.html

Ad was created by pro-Israel lobby American Freedom Defense Initiative
Federal judge sided with the group, ordering Metropolitan Transportation Authority to run the posters because it is protected speech
MTA officials claimed in lawsuit the 'Killing Jews' ad could incite violence
The judge wrote in his decision MTA and Chairman Thomas Prendergast 'underestimate the tolerant quality of New Yorkers'

By Associated Press and Daily Mail Reporter

Published: 00:31 GMT, 22 April 2015 | Updated: 07:18 GMT, 23 April 2015216 shares

A controversial pro-Israel advocacy group known for publicly criticizing Islam can display its political advertisement containing the phrase 'Killing Jews is Worship' on New York City's buses, a judge ruled this week.

Judge John Koeltl said in a decision made public Tuesday that the incendiary ad is speech protected under the First Amendment.

He said he was sensitive to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's claim that the poster could incite violence and appreciates the efforts necessary to prevent violent attacks targeting Jewish people.

AFDI 1, MTA 0: A federal judge has ordered the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to run on its buses anti-Islam ads featuring the phrase 'Killing Jews is Worship' created by the pro-Israel lobby American Freedom Defense Initiative

But he noted that substantially the same advertisement ran in San Francisco and Chicago in 2013 without incident. He added that examples of violent attacks cited by the MTA show that individuals may commit heinous acts without warning.

Koeltl also noted that the MTA and Chairman Thomas Prendergast 'underestimate the tolerant quality of New Yorkers and overestimate the potential impact of these fleeting advertisements.'

'Under the First Amendment, the fear of such spontaneous attacks, without more, cannot override individuals' rights to freedom of expression,' Koeltl said in a ruling dated Monday.

He delayed enforcing his order to run the ads by a month so it can be appealed.

MTA spokesman Adam Lisberg said the agency is disappointed in the ruling and is preparing a response.

It came in a lawsuit filed last year by the American Freedom Defense Initiative, an organization headed by firebrand blogger Pamela Geller that's behind the advertisement.

David Yerushalmi, a lawyer for the organization, said the decision 'sends a strong message both to government bureaucrats who would restrict our freedom of speech based upon what they perceive to be a global jihadist threat, and it also sends a telling message to our enemies abroad and at home: Their threats of violence will not prevent the courts from upholding the First Amendment.'

The lawsuit said Geller's group buys the advertisements to express its message on current events and public issues 'including issues such as Islam's hatred of Jews.'

An ad from the pro-Israel American Freedom Defense Initiative is seen on an articulated Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) bus featuring a 1941 photograph of Hitler and supporter Hajj Amin al-Husseini, a Palestinian Arab nationalist, Wednesday, April 1, 2015, in Philadelphia

The lawsuit was filed after the MTA notified the group in August that it would display three of four proposed posters but not an ad with the quote 'Killing Jews is Worship that draws us close to Allah' because it could incite violence.

In the ad, a man's menacing face wrapped with a checkered scarf is shown next to the quote, which is attributed to "Hamas MTV." It is followed by the words: 'That's his Jihad. What's yours?'

It also includes a disclaimer that the ad's display does not imply the MTA's endorsement of its views. The MTA, whose buses and subways have been forums for policy debates, has accepted other ads from the American Freedom Defense Initiative.

In September 2012, subway stations in New York featured AFDI posters that read: 'In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat Jihad.'

Two years later, Pamela Geller's group agreed to pull an ad from the subway system showing captive journalist James Foley with the masked militant who decapitated him in the moment before the beheading.

In a September statement, the MTA said it recognized that the 'Killing Jews' ad was a parody of 'MyJihad' ads sponsored by the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which said it was promoting the concept that jihad is an individual and personal struggle rather than a violent conflict or terrorism.

Koeltl said he recognized that the MTA believes it would be far more difficult to counter the advertisement because it has parodic aspects.

Past ads: A man stands next to ad in the New York Subway saying: 'In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat Jihad' in New York on September 24, 2012

But he said he believes the agency underestimates 'the power of counter-advertisements to explain that the MTA does not endorse the ad and that the ad is not to be taken seriously.'

Monica Klein, a spokeswoman for Mayor Bill de Blasio, noted in a statement that the mayor has said 'these anti-Islamic ads are outrageous, inflammatory and wrong, and have no place in New York City, or anywhere.'

'These hateful messages serve only to divide and stigmatize when we should be coming together as one city,' she added. 'While those behind these ads only display their irresponsible intolerance, the rest of us who may be forced to view them can take comfort in the knowledge that we share a better, loftier and nobler view of humanity.'