Deportation of Christian convert questioned
Chad Groening - OneNewsNow - 6/21/2010 6:30:00 AM
The Institute on Religion & Democracy (IRD) is calling on members of Congress to intervene for a Muslim who converted to Christianity. Mosab Hassan Yousef, son of Sheikh Hassan Yousef, is currently being threatened with deportation from the U.S.

Yousef converted from Islam to Christianity and came to the U.S. in 2007, applying for political asylum. While in the states, he wrote the best-selling book Son of Hamas in which he recounts his experiences in the radical Islamic terrorist organization and his work as a spy for Israel, helping them foil terrorist suicide bombings and saving many Israeli, Palestinian, and American lives. In an interview earlier this year with Associated Press, he stated that "the biggest terrorist is the god of the Quran." (See related story)

Faith McDonnell, director of religious liberty at IRD, says "[Yousef] is a Palestinian. He would be out in Gaza or somewhere like that or maybe back in Israel, but there are fatwas issued against him." A fatwa is an Islamic death sentence issued against a person who is considered to be an infidel.

McDonnell continues: "It would be a death sentence to send him back there. And [with] the influence Islam has around the world, he could...be assassinated."

She says it is outrageous that at the time the Department for Homeland Security is threatening to deport Yousef, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is lifting the order that bans Tarik Ramadan from entering the U.S. McDonnell describes Ramadan as "a man whose grandfather started the Muslim brotherhood and who was not a friend of democracy and freedom."

"And yet a man who is the polar opposite of that [Yousef] is to be deported?" McDonnell wonders.

She says the IRD is going to work with several other groups to urge sympathetic members of Congress to prevent Yousef from being deported.