Twin Cities: "center of fanaticism and extremism."

Nation: All this coming from the Minneapolis airport controversy where Somalian Muslim taxi drivers are refusing to take people carrying alcohol. Why is this not happening anywhere else and is this an enderound to political power there and in Somalia?

Muslim taxi drivers serve airports throughout the country. Yet a dispute about cabbies refusing on religious grounds to take passengers with alcohol has flared only in the Twin Cities. Some Muslim leaders said the alcohol controversy is part of a larger ideological clash within Minnesota's growing Somali community, which they said helps explain why the issue erupted here without spreading to other cities. "There is a group of orthodox Islamic groups who are using the Somali community," said Martin Mohamed, head of the Immigrant Credit Education and Financial Counseling Agency in Minneapolis. "We have seen this all the time. They want to make their own political agenda here, using the Somali cabdrivers." Other community leaders said the alcohol matter is a legitimate issue of faith, one in which committed Muslims are standing up for their religion. "It's not for radical purposes," said Abdirahman Omar Ahmed, the imam, or prayer leader, at the Abuubakar Islamic Center in South Minneapolis. "They are talking about their faith, nothing else."

But some Somalis suspect there's more to the taxi dispute than religion. "The Twin Cities has become — more than any other city — the center of fanaticism and extremism as far as Somalis are concerned," said Omar Jamal of the Somali Peace and Justice Center in St. Paul. Carrying alcohol in cabs "is not an issue at all for most of the Somali community, but (leaders) use that as a political platform." Jamal said he believes the goal is to raise money and gain influence on the political situation in Somalia.

Long article, but the end result must be telling the cab drivers no to their request.