A Michigan community being sued by the Obama Justice Department and CAIR for rejecting the construction of a large Islamic school has agreed to settle out of court for $1.7 million and allow the project to go forward.

The tentative settlement agreed to by Pittsfield Township would be one of the largest cash payouts ever by a U.S. municipality to a mosque. The deal could send shock waves throughout the nation among communities fighting to keep large mosques and madrasas out of residential areas.

image: http://www.wnd.com/files/2016/10/imam-from-ann-arbor.jpg
Shaykh Moataz Al-Hallak emigrated to the U.S. from Syria and founded mosques in Texas, Maryland and Michigan.

Shaykh Moataz Al-Hallak emigrated to the U.S. from Syria and founded mosques in Texas, Maryland and Michigan. The FBI has investigated him in the past for ties to terrorists but never found sufficient evidence to warrant an arrest.

The settlement grants an Ann Arbor-based mosque led by a Syrian imam the right to build a 70,000-square-foot Islamic school, a residential development consisting of 22 duplex units and three single-family homes, plus a park, the Detroit News reported.

Shaykh Moataz Al-Hallak migrated to the U.S. from Syria in the 1980s and has been organizing and leading mosques ever since. The New York Times reported on Sept. 18, 2001, that Al-Hallak was “a Muslim cleric suspected of ties to the Osama bin Laden organization” and that he had been banned from preaching at a Texas mosque because he was “considered by some congregants as having an overly rigid interpretation of Muslim theology.”

But he has found a home in Michigan and is poised to greatly expanding his influence after this week’s settlement, a deal he won with the full backing of the U.S. Department of Justice.

Pittsfield Township not only agreed to pay $1.7 million and allow the project to move forward, but it also agreed to have its elected leaders and staff receive sensitivity training in how not to discriminate against Muslims or any other religious minorities.

The Pittsfield case, by the sheer amount of the payout, could have a chilling effect on any city or town considering a mosque location or expansion, say legal experts. Many such legal battles are in process, including a major one in nearby Sterling Heights, Michigan

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2016/10/city-agrees-to-pay-mosque-1-7m-for-discriminatory-zoning-regs/#izvEcZMgsJ3GScxJ.99