My enlightening conversation with friendly Muslim store owner. Be pissed. Be very pissed.

So sorry for the wall of text but this is very important.

Let me start by saying I live in rural southern ohio. Most people get the mental pic of red neck and racist. But you couldn't be farther from the truth. These people are very accepting of anyone that wants to contribute to community and live in peace. However there are still only a handful of ethnic or foreign families. And if fills every stereotype there is. The mexicans own the Mexican restaurant. Chinese... restaurant. Iraqis own the gas station/ carry out/ head shop.

Last night I stopped for gas on my way home. Amir, the owner, was working as usual. He is a super friendly guy. Loves all his customers. Always goes out of his way to make sure you know you are appreciated for your patronage. We have talked for years. He moved here after the military decimated his town in Iraq. It just so happens to be a town I had "visited" in my second deployment. He knows this. We have discussed my service before and he always told me he was grateful to have been "liberated". I never fully believed that. After all he is in the business of marketing himself to a white rural community.

Over the years I have learned that he is not a particularly religious guy. He doesn't attend mosque. Where in the hell would he even go, around here? And he doesn't follow daily prayer. But due to his upbringing he still holds views and traditions of Islam.

So last night he was about to close up. I asked him how his family felt about cases of head shop items in his store. Or their thoughts on him selling alcohol. Every Christian I know would probably not sell this kind of stuff because of the nature of it. I mean is does still enable "drunkenness" and illegal (for now) drug use.

Amir asked if I minded if he closed up while we talked. I said of course not. He locked the door and spilled everything. I went home 2 hours later, not shocked but in awe of his candor.

He told me Muslims do not feel the same as Christians when it comes to these sales. Christians want to convert with love where Muslims have no such desire. He said Islam does not have any "outreach" ministry because they don't like us. In their minds they have been given the world. We are simply invaders and occupiers that will meet with a bad end.

As for the vice items, it is seen as a tool for our destruction. He said most Muslims celebrate the fact that we are coming in and giving them our money to get drunk and dumb ourselves down with drug paraphernalia. He told me about cousins who went out of their way to get younger kids to buy bath salts and synthetic shit, while it was legal.

He knows that I have killed Muslims during my service. I had opened up to him in the past about struggles I have with some of those memories (he asked first). So maybe he was returning the candor. I am paraphrasing here, but he told me that even the most moderate, to non practicing, Muslim will act when or if the time ever comes to permanently occupy this country. To him this was nothing personal. He doesn't hate us. He has disdain for how we live but not murderous hate. But to him it is their manifest destiny. They have been charged by Allah to bring Islam to world and instal sharia in all corners of the map.

I don't know why he wouldn't be afraid of this also, as a non practicing Muslim. Maybe he feels as most people do. That it will all work out with their God if they do the right thing. Maybe he has just been programmed this way from childhood. Who knows? But the conversation was truly enlightening. I have always known this. But for Amir to be this ooen about it was truly an eye opening gift. I really like the guy. But in the event of uprising, he will be the first person I visit.