25th Annual Muslim Day Parade 2010 (video and pics)

UPDATE: September 29; Part 7 (last video ) is now posted

September 28: The first of two parade videos (Parts 6 and 7) is up now (please scroll down for Part 6)

New video posted: September 27, 2010
(please scroll down for Parts 4 and 5)

Part 1: The parade came to an end at  Madison Square Park at 23rd  and Madison Ave. The early part of ceremony had an award to Mayor Bloomberg as well as The Priest, the Rabbi and the Imam. (who seemed to be a non-note band of sorts)

Part 2: Three speakers from ICNA, MAS and the Islamic Cultural Center of NY

Part 3: This speaker is Nihad Awad of CAIR (Council of Islamic Relations) was one of the Grand marshals of the parade.

Part 4: While many spoke on the stage of how the American Muslim is “suffering ” at the hands of bigots they used three groups of lovely children to sing of the “joys” and ” peace” that Islam brings. Good ol’ Da’wah.

Part 5: The prayers before the  parade were at 38th and Madison this year (even though it ws published at 41st as it had been in previous years). There was a delay putting out the tarps (prayer “rugs”) due to this location. Seemed police weren’t ready to close the intersection in time for the zuhur prayer.  The Imam kept singing. There is a wudu basin on Madison this year. The tarps were laid out and finally the prayers (at approx. 10 minutes into video )

Part 6: The parade began with flags..lots of flags followed the the police band playing “This is My Country”…followed by the Muslim Police Officers Association. Then lots of local masjids, mosques, floats celebrating the Victory Mosque that destroyed the  great Jewish Temple….women’s groups, schools, hijabs, niqabs,families…. da’wah was loud and bold for the Ummah of North America with lots of loving, peaceful quotes from Mohammed and chants of takbir. takbir. takbir.

Part 7: I walked with the parade to Madison Square Park at 25th Street. The takbir. takbir. takbir. mixed in with other chants was relentless and then…the occasional…silence .The parade was quite simple. It was families, children, schools and masjids and, of course, the da’wah signs. At the park, there was a popular da’wah table(FREE)andthen more prayers were sung from the stage. After a young woman with a lovely voice sang the National Anthem, the program continued with the speakers ( See videos 1,2 and 3)

On September 26, our first observations :

The parade seemed to be confused. Announced to start at 41st and Madison , but they were all at 38th st. the police were not blocking off the intersections so the prayer tarps could be put down. The clock was ticking and the Imam was BEGGING the police to get the intersections blocked.Police pointed out that they weren’t where they were supposed to be….I think they weren’t planning on closing an intersection (interesting)

Slide show is of prayers and the TARPS on Madison Avenue. The parade floats, some signs and banners….and the children….

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The speakers did a lot of complaining about Park 51 with the usual bigots, hatred slander and it was no surprise that it was also a LOVE-Fest for Bloomberg and Obama.

The unannounced theme: Da’wah. To Educate and rewrite Islam’s “history”.

9-29-10: And a few more pictures will be posted.