Tawfik Hamid, a former member of the Islamist terror group Jemaah Islamiya, has written a brilliant indictment of the Western left's tolerance for violent Islam. He knows whereof he speaks.
It is vital to grasp that traditional and even mainstream Islamic teaching accepts and promotes violence. Shariah, for example, allows apostates to be killed, permits beating women to discipline them, seeks to subjugate non-Muslims to Islam as dhimmis and justifies declaring war to do so. It exhorts good Muslims to exterminate the Jews before the "end of days." The near deafening silence of the Muslim majority against these barbaric practices is evidence enough that there is something fundamentally wrong. ...Yet it is ironic and discouraging that many non-Muslim, Western intellectuals--who unceasingly claim to support human rights--have become obstacles to reforming Islam. Political correctness among Westerners obstructs unambiguous criticism of Shariah's inhumanity. They find socioeconomic or political excuses for Islamist terrorism such as poverty, colonialism, discrimination or the existence of Israel. What incentive is there for Muslims to demand reform when Western "progressives" pave the way for Islamist barbarity? Indeed, if the problem is not one of religious beliefs, it leaves one to wonder why Christians who live among Muslims under identical circumstances refrain from contributing to wide-scale, systematic campaigns of terror. ...
The tendency of many Westerners to restrict themselves to self-criticism further obstructs reformation in Islam. Americans demonstrate against the war in Iraq, yet decline to demonstrate against the terrorists who kidnap innocent people and behead them. Similarly, after the Madrid train bombings, millions of Spanish citizens demonstrated against their separatist organization, ETA. But once the demonstrators realized that Muslims were behind the terror attacks they suspended the demonstrations. This example sent a message to radical Islamists to continue their violent methods. ...
Well-meaning interfaith dialogues with Muslims have largely been fruitless. Participants must demand--but so far haven't--that Muslim organizations and scholars specifically and unambiguously denounce violent Salafi components in their mosques and in the media. Muslims who do not vocally oppose brutal Shariah decrees should not be considered "moderates."
It's hard to excerpt because the whole essay is worth reading.
And look what the good folks at CAIR have to say about the messenger: Opinion: Metro Detroit groups burn bridges with false images of Islam.
Funny, I haven't heard CAIR specifically address the individual criticisms put forth by Mr. Hamid. I wonder why?
AllenG: Thanks for the link. The side that would lose typically prefers ad hominem attacks to rational argument, which is yet another thing the left and radical Islam have in common.
Mr. Hamid is obviously not of the same ilk as radical Islamic terrorists, primarily because he's both alive and a former terrorist. His presumptions about what must be done to bring down terrorists and radical Islam assume a level of "professional detachment" and objectivity that the radical nature of the beliefs of radical Islamists cannot accommodate.
Yes, Mark's hit it right on the head! After pulling his head out of his rear, Mr. Hamid is thinking like a rational person, not a terrorist.
Mark and wag_the_dog: I don't understand... are you saying that Hamid's opinion is less valid than others' opinions because he has first-hand experience with terrorists?
The fact that he's a "former" terrorist.. and still alive.. makes him less than qualified to speak to what will make "current" and "future" terrorists a smaller and smaller group of people. Someone who becomes a "former" terrorist is obviously not of the same mindset as terrorists, so how can his pontifications about how to cure terrorism be any more valid than anyone else's?
Mark: That's just... ridiculous. I mean, seriously.