WGN 9: Card causing controversy among Muslim community [VIDEO]

Muslim leaders are blasting a greeting card that portrays a doll as a terrorist. The card caught the attention of Chicago’s Council on American Islamic relations

Executive director Ahmed Rehab says the card was brought to his attention by a staff member.  The original package shows a doll in traditional Muslim dress. The issue? The photo-shopped version on the card, Rhab says, “basically correlates Muslims and terrorism.” “It’s playing to an ugly ravenous stereotype that suggests that anybody who looks a certain way is a terrorist,” he said.The card maker is from New Jersey and the card itself is being sold all over the country, including at a small stationary store in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood. Known for having avant garde and somewhat offensive items, the shop now finding itself the subject of this controversy.

The shop’s owner wouldn’t talk  on camera but said that the cards are now sold out at his store.  He doesn’t understand this protest against his small business and invited the woman who first called attention to the card to come back to the store and talk with him face to face about tolerance in the United States and around the world.

Rehab says the card isn’t funny, even if that was the intention.

“I would urge him to make fun of us, but do it intelligently,” said Rehab.  “Humor ought to have even a minimal amount of intelligence but when it lacks all intelligence and is the same kind of message that you would get out a white supremacist group then, it’s not so funny."