One man's path from hate to Islam the focus of film, Hofstra panel

Richard McKinney, then a white nationalist, was going to blow up a mosque in Indiana and kill as many Muslims as he could.

But before he could carry out his plan for mass murder, he met some of those he had targeted for attack.

Posing as someone who wanted to learn about Islam, McKinney went to the mosque on a reconnaissance mission.

There, he was showered with friendship and warmth. He eventually converted to Islam and became president of the mosque. Now he travels the country delivering a message of interfaith understanding.

On Sunday, he came to Hofstra University, where local Muslim leaders invited him for a panel discussion and a screening of the documentary film “Stranger at the Gate,” which tells his story and was an Academy Award nominee last year in the best documentary short film category.

The event was especially crucial given the war in the Middle East between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, pitting a mainly Jewish nation against a Muslim enclave, organizers said.

“It’s really important for the world to see that people of different religions have come together to honor one another, respect one another, but also show how when religions come together transformative change truly happens,” said organizer Daisy Khan, a board member of the Interfaith Institute of Long Island. The film and McKinney’s story “is a demonstration of that.”

“The world is witnessing deep division between the Jewish and the Muslim community, and Israelis and Arabs,” she added. “This is a demonstration that the opposite is possible.”

McKinney, 55, a former Marine who fought in the Iraq War, said that when he came home from the front lines, he was consumed with hatred for Muslims and other “different” people.

By 2009, he was working as a prison guard when he decided to attack the Islamic Center of Muncie in the town where he lived.

“I built a bomb. It was done. I was just waiting for Ramadan, when they would all be there,” he said in an interview before the event Sunday.

But before he enacted his plan, he went to visit the mosque “because I needed to find tangible evidence that these people were truly evil,” he said.

“I didn’t trust them. … I figured they would have me in the basement with a sword to my throat,” he recalled in the film.

Instead, members of the congregation embraced him and helped him learn about Islam.

“The evidence I found actually contradicted everything I believed,” he said.

One family in particular took him in, inviting him to their home for meals and showing him compassion, he said.

Soon, he dropped his plan for a massacre at the mosque.

One day, the FBI and other law enforcement showed up at his house. “I said, ‘What took you so long?’ ” he said.

By then, McKinney had disposed of his bomb-making material, he said.

He was not arrested.

Zaki Bahrami, 27, a member of the family that befriended McKinney, said at the event that he was shocked when he learned of the plot, since by then he had gotten to know the veteran, whom he calls "Mac."

“Any human being is capable of kindness and is capable of hate … We have to choose kindness,” Bahrami said. “If my family and the community in Muncie did not show kindness to Mac … you would have had a blown-up mosque.”

The Brooklyn-based director of the 2022 film, Joshua Seftel, who is Jewish, said it is taking on even greater significance given the violence in the Middle East.

The film “shows that bridges can be built in even the most difficult situations,” he said. It “is about finding our share of humanity — that we all share something, which is being human.”

One couple from Port Washington said they found the film inspiring.

“It’s a message of hope, especially for times, which are so difficult,” said Susan Hicks.

Her husband, Tom Hicks, said, “We all have much more in common than what separates us, and we need to embrace that and we need to listen to each other and we need to reach out to each other and try to understand.”