IA's Mickelson Says It's “Total Rubbish” That Paris Attackers Do Not Represent Islam

Mickelson: “Americanized” “Cigar Store Muslims” Do Not Represent “The True Islam”

Written by Michaela Halnon

Published

Iowa radio host Jan Mickelson argued that the terrorists who committed the Paris attacks represent the “true Islam,” not Muslims who denounced the attacks. 

On his November 18 radio show, Mickelson criticized Muslims who say “terrorists hijack their religion.” Mickelson began by playing audio from a local television news broadcast, in which Muslims from Des Moines, Iowa, said the Paris attackers do not represent Islam, “because Muslims do not kill innocent people.” Mickelson called their comments “total rubbish,” and said, “I call them cigar store Muslims, meaning they are template Muslims, Americanized Muslims.” Mickelson continued:

MICKELSON: So the people out here in the cheap seats saying that the cigar store Muslims here in Des Moines are the true Muslims -- the non violent, worldwide peaceful kind -- while those people over there are the aberration and they've just invented a new religion. Who's left to actually believe that except, well, people like that?

Mickelson also played an interview with Anjem Choudary, a radical preacher from the United Kingdom. Choudary, who has been condemned by major Muslim groups in the UK, is well-known for his support of ISIS and Sharia Law. Mickelson told his listeners to “put an asterisk in your memory” when some “cigar store Muslim tries to sell you otherwise,” connecting Choudary's extremist statements with the local Muslims interviewed previously.

MICKELSON: Why they would allow this guy who, he, you just heard him say, “do you support the people who want to commit those kinds of acts of violence in the United States?” The guy said of course he does! And he says the Internet makes the world a very very small place. Put a little asterisk in your memory at this very point when some cigar store Muslim tries to sell you otherwise.

Mickelson has been advocating in recent months for Americans to reject Muslim refugees and keep "Islamic cultures" out of the United States. The host also recently argued “we ought to foreclose on [the] property” of churches who can't fully pay for refugees they help resettle.