Stop Islamization of America
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| Abbreviation | SIOA |
|---|---|
| Formation | 2010 |
| 27-2518993 | |
| Location | |
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President
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Pamela Geller |
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Co-founder
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Robert Spencer |
| Website | freedomdefense |
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Formerly called
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American Freedom Defense Initiative |
Stop Islamization of America (SIOA), also known as the American Freedom Defense Initiative, is an anti-Muslim, pro-Israel American organization known primarily for its controversial, Islamophobic advertising campaigns. The group has been described as extremist,far-right and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) lists SIOA as an anti-Muslim hate group.
SIOA was founded in 2010 by its current leaders, Pamela Geller and author Robert Spencer, at the request of Anders Gravers Pedersen, the leader of Stop Islamisation of Europe, of which it is the American affiliate. It has launched ad campaigns in urban public transit systems, including one in New York City opposing Park51, a Muslim community center that had been proposed for Lower Manhattan near the World Trade Center site in 2010. In 2016, they have run public transit advertisements in San Francisco calling for the end of United States security assistance to the Palestinian Authority.
SOIA refers to itself as a human rights organization, promoting freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and equal rights. The SIOA's ideology has been called Islamophobic by political and historical scholars, news sources, religious leaders, and hate group watchdogs.
SIOA first entered the public eye with its early opposition to the construction of Park51, originally named Cordoba House, a 13-story Muslim community center proposed for a location two blocks from the World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan. On May 6, 2010, Geller posted a blog piece calling the building a "monster mosque" and a "stab in the eye of America" and comparing it to the reconsecration of the Hagia Sophia as a mosque by the Ottoman Turks after they conquered Constantinople in 1453. In another blog post Geller encouraged readers to protest its construction.
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Wikipedia