In Toronto, members of a local Muslim group who spoke out against Iranian and Saudi influence on Canadian mosques have received death threats. (Hat tip: LGF readers.)

OTTAWA–Toronto police have launched a hate crime investigation into a phone call from a man who vowed to “slaughter” members of a local Muslim group unless they stop speaking publicly about Islam.

A message left Monday on the voice mail of the secretary general for the Muslim Canadian Congress warned that organization members must “cease from your campaign of smearing Islam” or “I will slaughter you.”

The message mentioned congress founder Tarek Fatah and current president Farzana Hassan-Shahid by name. Both have openly criticized the politicization of Islam and alleged influence of Iran and Saudi Arabia in Canadian mosques.

It’s not the first time they’ve been threatened. Hassan-Shahid said since publishing her book Islam, Women and the Challenges of Today, she has been heckled and had her home vandalized.

“But swearing by God that `I will do this and slaughter all of you,’ that’s pretty chilling,” Hassan-Shahid said yesterday.

Note that Tarek Fatah has been featured previously at LGF; and unfortunately, he’s a “moderate” only in comparison to the ones who would slaughter him. It’s good that he denounced the radical infiltration of mosques, but last June he demonstrated why it’s difficult to feel very enthusiastic about him as an example of moderate Islam.

Tarek Fatah, communications director of the MCC said, “It is ironic that Muslim extremists are portraying themselves as anti-imperialist, when in fact Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are nothing more but a creation of the CIA.”