Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, one of the ostensibly mainstream politicians who has come out vocally against building an Islamic community center in downtown Manhattan, today spoke out against a Florida church’s plan to burn Korans on Sept. 11.
“People have a constitutional right to burn a Koran if they want to, but doing so is insensitive and an unnecessary provocation — much like building a mosque at Ground Zero,” Palin wrote in a press release. “Book burning is antithetical to American ideals.”
Many of the most vehemently anti-Muslim and anti-mosque voices — including Pamela Geller and Bill Keller — have spoken out against the Koran burning. There has not been as much vocal outcry from the politicians who have urged protests against the Cordoba House, which they call the “Ground Zero mosque.”
Palin used her repudiation to speak out, again, against Cordoba.
“Freedom of religion is integral to our charters of liberty. We don’t need to agree with each other on theological matters, but tolerating each other without unnecessarily provoking strife is how we ensure a civil society,” she wrote. “In this as in all things, we should remember the Golden Rule. Isn’t that what the Ground Zero mosque debate has been about?”
House Minority Leader John Boehner today also drew a parallel between burning a holy book and building a community center and prayer space near Ground Zero.
Late update: Palin adds a paragraph:
Update: Book burning is bad. But the Muslim cleric who is running for parliament in Afghanistan is calling for the murder of American children in response to scorched Korans, which is worse. Where is the media’s focus?
It’s possible she was talking about this, from an NBC News report:
“It is the duty of Muslims to react,” said Mohammad Mukhtar, a cleric and candidate for the Afghan parliament in the Sept. 18 election. “When their holy book Quran gets burned in public, then there is nothing left. If this happens, I think the first and most important reaction will be that wherever Americans are seen, they will be killed. No matter where they will be in the world they will be killed.”
