(Image: The Guardian)

BY CHRISTIAN BRYANT


A St. Louis-based publishing company is under fire for publishing a recently released children's coloring book.
KSDK reports -- it isn't your average children's book.


"It starts off like any other children's coloring book, but the pages that follow describe the 9/11 terror attacks. It's creating a lot of buzz, because of the images included.
“And it goes on to page 19 and it shows the Navy Seal shooting Osama Bin Laden in his home in Pakistan..."



But is the text appropriate for children? 
Really Big Coloring Books Incorporated Publisher Wayne Bell says the book educates children on the September 11 tragedy in a very general way.


"This book under no way… zero, zero… under no way mentions the Muslim faith. It does not mention Islam in generalities…" (ABC)



But a spokesperson for the Council on American-Islam relations, or CAIR, say its the book's inflammatory language with which they disagree.  ABC News interviews.


"I think it's very clear that the book has an agenda and is anti-Muslim.  In the 36-page book, the phrase 'radical Islamic Muslim extremists' is used 10 times.  In one passage, the book says, 'Some Muslim people believe the attacks were a conspiracy caused by Jews.' And in another section, it says, 'These attacks will change the way America deals with the Islamic and Muslim people around the world...'"


HLN picks up the debate.  Dawud Walid, executive director of CAIR Michigan, adds that the book fails to tell the whole story. Walid says Muslims were also victims of 9/11 and the book doesn’t recognize that.


"As a minority, he may not be able to understand, since he’s not a minority, in regards to the effects that this can have as far as portraying...”
“This doesn’t have anything to do with minorities. This is about 19 terrorist hijackers that murdered people in our country...”
“Yes it does...”



So, who's right?  The Atlanta Wire’s Alexander Abad-Santos believes, so far, neither side is winning this fight.


"The fight over this book is partly about the difficulty and responsibility adults have in explaining what happened on September 11, 2001 (and the repercussions) to children."