Everyone you know breaks into prayer at the gym, right?

Okay, probably not. But the “right” to pray to Allah in an excercise club was not cheerfully accepted by another patron. So now a tiny social hiccup in the Clash of Civilizations experienced by a Mooslim woman has propelled the Religion of Intimidation into today’s demand-fest [Muslim woman cites gym after interrupted prayer, Detroit News 12/05/06].

DEARBORN — Fitness USA, a gym chain, is investigating an alleged civil rights violation involving a local Muslim woman who says her afternoon prayer was interrupted by a fellow patron, and that her complaint to management about the situation was rejected.

“The manager told me, ‘You have to respect her (the patron), but she does not have to respect your God,’ ” said Wardeh Sultan of Dearborn. “I’ve had my membership for seven or eight years, and I’ve never had a problem with praying there.

“I told that manager, ‘I can’t believe you said that’ ” Sultan said. “Honestly, I feel humiliated and I feel ashamed, right now, to go back to Fitness USA.”

Is there a shortage of mosques in Dearborn such that Muslim women are forced to pray to Allah at Fitness USA? Hardly, there are at least 14, including the largest mosque in America, a $15 million colossus.

The gym incident may be part of the latest strategy of radical Islam, exemplified by the Flying Imams caper, to make every public place a mosque zone, thereby forcing Americans to be deferential to Islam in the name of freedom of religion. Exhibit A below: imams conducting a pray-in at the Minneapolis airport, where they are demanding a special prayer room.

Last year, considering the case of Victor Davis Hanson huffing, puffing, but ultimately falling obediently into line supporting amnesty, I remarked that there was a definite market for columnists willing to masquerade as conservative, but who could be counted to advocate surrender on anything important. Slaughterhouses have a term for the type.

So it was no surprise to find the stable maid of National Review Online (a major shelter for the species) busily engaged in surrendering on the War on Christmas (For Christ’s sake – literally By Kathryn Jean Lopez townhall.com Saturday December 2 2006)

Thanksgiving passes and it’s “War on Christmas” time - what an awful concept and a waste of time…The whole thing is infuriating — in large part because, quite frankly, there are much more important things I’d rather be thinking about.

The War on Christmas concept must indeed be deeply infuriating to the current management of NR, if only from a narrow professional point of view. The magazine was first in the field with the concept, abandoned it, and then saw it turned by others with more enterprise into probably the most popular and successful rallying point for their target audience of recent years.

But how can anyone who pretends to be conservative – or even American – not care about the eviction of Christmas from the public position it has held since the nation’s foundation?

Because this is a zero sum game, as the proprietor of a small DVD house has just found out - and had the courage to say. (Un-Holy War? Anti-Christmas Forces Attack Magic Tree’s Santa’s Sing-A-Long top40-charts.com 21-01-2006)

our Santa’s Sing-A-Long production has been savaged by Hollywood film critics who’ve never before even reviewed kid-oriented DVD programming,’ producer Joseph J. Wheeler said. ‘We’ve apparently become the latest target in their ongoing ‘un-holy war’ against all things Christmas.’

Harsh and oddly inappropriate reviews by film reviewers who’ve never before covered made-for-DVD kids programming have attacked this low-cost, values-oriented production for what reviewers think it should have been, but wasn’t: secular, glitzy and high-budget.

…why they even bothered to rip us apart was a mystery, until we realized that this was part of a larger assault on Christmas itself. I’m sure that if we had left out all mention of Silent Night, or if we hadn’t explained that Gloria In Excelsius Deo means ‘Glory to God in Heaven,’ we wouldn’t have come under this kind of fire,’

Of course, defending the likes of Joseph Wheeler - and Christmas - would seriously inhibit one’s life on the Manhattan social circuit. It is a question of priorities.

Commiserate with Kathryn Lopez