By Michael Ireland
Chief Correspondent, ASSIST News Service

DEARBORN,
MI – (ANS)- Four Christian missionaries who were arrested at
Dearborn’s Arab American Festival last month were arraigned Monday on
misdemeanor charges of disturbing the peace.

According to www.clickondetroit.com
, charged were Negeen Mayel, Dr. Nabeel Qureshi, Paul Rezkalla and David Wood
Mayel, all members of a group called “Acts 17 Apologetics.”

The website says Negeen Mayel faces
an additional charge of disobeying an officer.

All four defendants pleaded not guilty.

The four were arrested on June 18
while handing out Christian literature and videotaping themselves.

The website reports the group
said they were arrested over religion, but police insist that it’s not true,
and continue to stand behind their arrest.

The website also stated that
Dearborn Mayor Jack O’Reilly defends his police department’s arrest, saying he
saw the video police confiscated from them and he believes the missionaries
came into town to cause trouble.

The website article says Reilly
believes the video shows the group’s ulterior motive, which was to seek out
Arabs in the crowd and try to rile them up by preaching to them.

“They look for a mark. They
look for someone they know is going to be agitated with, for someone who is
going to be engaged in a very heated way, and use that to draw a crowd,”
said Reilly.

The website goes on to state that
Reilly said they use the videotape of the angry Arabs to solicit donations from
other Christians to fund their missionary operation around the country.

“That is absolutely not true.
We were not looking for a confrontation. We were looking for dialogue and
discussion,” said Qureshi, one of the accused.

The four missionaries, from
California, New York and Virginia, apparently came into town especially for the
festival.

The Michigan chapter of the Council
on American-Islamic Relations said the four were not arrested for religious
reasons, but because they did not follow the festival’s rules, which were that
religious groups could only hand out material in designated areas after paying
for booth space.

Defense attorneys argued in court
Monday that the group did nothing wrong and their arrest violates their
constitutional rights of freedom of speech and religion.

“The people are offended by the
fact that they are preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ to Muslims and trying
to covert Muslims, well guess what, we have a First Amendment,” said
Robert Muise of Ann Arbor, who wants a breakdown of the charges against the
accused missionaries.

The website account of the
arraignment says the videotapes are being used as evidence, but city attorneys
said the cameras and videos would be returned to the missionaries this week.

The defendants will be in court
again on Aug. 3 for a motion hearing, and the trial is set to begin Sept. 20

When one of the accused, Negeen
Mayel, was asked if she was afraid of going to trial she said no, “because
God is with me.”

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