“Violent Jihad” is really popular in Islam, but very unpopular with the people getting bombed, run over and knifed. Squaring this circle can be challenging.

And sometimes requires telling the Imam of Portland’s biggest mosque that he might enjoy his violent Jihad better far away from all the roses.

That’s exactly what happened to Imam Kariye.

The U.S. government has revoked the U.S. citizenship of the former imam of Portland’s largest mosque after he arrived in Somaliland last week. Mohamed Sheikh Abdirahman Kariye is on the government’s no-fly list, but the government arranged for him to travel back to his homeland after reaching a settlement with Kariye in January. Under the deal, Kariye agreed not to challenge an order revoking his citizenship and acknowledged having provided false information to immigration officials in July 1997 when he had applied for U.S. naturalization.

It’s a win-win.

They get an imam. We lose an imam.

In October, federal government lawyers told a federal appeals court that Kariye was placed on the no-fly list based on his history as a “mujahedeen fighter in Afghanistan against the Russians,” as well as his expressed support for “violent jihad” in conversations recorded between a cooperating informant and two members of the Portland Seven. They were a group of American Muslims from the Portland area who were prosecuted and convicted of trying to join al-Qaida forces in their fight against the United States military and coalition forces in Afghanistan. During the process, the FBI informed U.S. Justice Department attorneys that Kariye had coordinated with Osama bin Laden and other known terrorist leaders and was associated with terrorist organizations including Makhtab Al-Khidamat, or MAK, a designated terrorist organization and pre-cursor to al-Qaida.

It’s odd how these ‘big mosques’ keep choosing imams who are into violent Jihad, as opposed to the peaceful kind, which involves handing out flowers and petting kittens.

It’s almost as if these big mosques are into… Jihad.