Only one woman showed up for a protest at the Noor Islamic Center in Dublin last week.
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A few tried to talk to her about their perspective of Islam as a religion of peace.
A photo of a Muslim woman approaching an anti-Islam protester outside a Ohio mosque and giving her a hug in a universal show of friendship has gone viral. However, after almost thirty minutes of conversation she started to come around.
“I just thought it was attractive”, said Imran Malik, the chairman of the Noor Islamic Center who was there at the time. “I can tell the different types of people at a protest”. “We don’t know who they are”.
“That was the category that she fell into”.
The crowd convinced the protestor to come inside and have a few coffee.
Protesters and counter protesters on open carry, Islam from radical Islam and immigration held rallies separated by a metal barricade at the Henry Ford Centennial Library in Dearborn on Saturday, October 10, 2015. At first Annie resisted. She accused the Koran of stealing stories from the Bible and she referred to Islam as “a glorified death cult”. Debbie Stabenow in Michigan over her support of the Iran deal, was one of the leaders who instigated the nationwide protests, said the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Eventually, she admitted to having had Muslim friends online at one point, but noted that they had a falling out due to a disagreement over Israel.
A number of protests around the country ended with similar results. “I feel passionately because I see children getting raped and tortured, and it breaks my heart”.
The woman told the mosque’s members that her husband and her pastor did not want her to come to protest.
Most of the anti-Islam protesters did not give their names.
“Gee, I can’t believe these guys asked me to come and then didn’t show up”, she said on camera. “I was set up”.
It was one of about 20 weekend rallies planned near mosques across the U.S. The organizers wanted to protest against the Nation of Islam’s “Justice or Else” event, held in Washington, D.C., and against what they said is the threat of the Muslim faith.
“Normally, I don’t go up to somebody who despises me and give them a hug”, de Boutinkhar said.
“I felt her body go from tense to soft and I asked her to please come inside with me”. It was an actual encounter with the people she was standing against that changed her mind and that is what is needed more. I asked if I look scary to her. She said I didn’t. We all began applauding. “I asked if she’d like a tour and to my surprise, she agreed”.
Ms Boutinkhar and Annie share a hug outside the Islamic centre in Columbus, Ohio. She seemed bewildered about the fact that she was alone. “We tend to rely on our social media for knowledge and fail to reach out to people on a one-on-one, human level, and I think that is creating more ignorance and arrogance in our communities”.
The protester Annie admitted she got most of her information from the Facebook pages she followed.
“Will Annie ever become Muslim?”
Cynthia DeBoutinkhar wrote about the experience on Facebook. That’s in God’s hands.
Before she left, they gave her an English translation of the Quran, Islam’s holy book.
“I’m here today to protest the Islamophobic protesters that are here bearing arms”, said Rekab Semaj of Oakland County, Mich., with an AK47 rifle slung over his shoulder and a sign reading “Muslims Deserve Freedom”.
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“Then DeBoutinkhar hugged her and things “took a 360”.
