A reader, Asif Samad, recently responded to a column of mine (“Cowards in Washington” Sept. 15), objecting to the term “Islamic terrorism.” He is a Muslim born and raised in America, and his e-mail made me think how it must feel to constantly see your religion and culture connected to hate and death.
I worked for a company recently that recruited Arab-speaking Americans, most of whom were Muslim, to work for the U.S. government.
With only a few exceptions, I found these men and women to be outgoing, hard-working, family-oriented Americans.
In 2004, I lived and worked as a journalist in Jerusalem, home to a significant Palestinian population. I often ate at restaurants in Palestinian neighborhoods, especially on the Jewish Sabbath when the rest of the city was quiet. I spent a day wandering the Arab-Israeli town of Nazareth, and traveled briefly to the West Bank towns of Bethlehem and Ramallah, where the AK-47 wielding guards at Yasser Arafat?s compound politely declined to pose for a picture with me.
Everywhere I was greeted warmly.
I do not believe that all Muslims, especially Muslim-Americans, are terrorists, nor that they silently sympathize with the extremists who kill in the name of Allah.
I think most Americans agree. Since Sept. 11, President Bush has repeatedly said al-Qaida and the Taliban hijacked a religion of peace.
But all of us who cherish a way of life that allows us to choose Christianity, Judaism, Islam, another religion or no religion at all have to face the fact that the most immediate and persistent threat to that way of life comes from terrorists who wish to impose their form of fundamentalist Islam on all of us.
That Muslims bristle at that fact is understandable. But the ugliest truths make for the most painful sting.
It would be better if there were strong Muslim leaders in America and around the world to condemn and suppress the hateful words and deadly actions committed by a small minority of Muslims.
But that has not been the case. When President Bush used for the first time the phrase “Islamic fascists” earlier this year, the Council on American-Islamic relations denounced him.
“Islam is not fascism. Words like that only serve to deepen a great chasm between peoples, to fan the flames of anger and mistrust that already burn in the Muslim world.”
Those words are very similar to CAIR?s criticism of Bush, but they actually came from Fox News reporter Steve Centanni during his videotaped “conversion” to Islam (which you can see on YouTube by searching for “Centanni, Wiig convert to Islam”).
Many Muslims may be afraid to stand up to the Islamic terrorists that perpetrate crimes like this for the same reason crime victims and witnesses in American cities refuse to testify. Their lives may be at stake if they do, as much of the sectarian violence in Iraq shows.
Samad, the reader, stressed the need for more interfaith dialogue, and he is right.
Pope Benedict attempted to do this with his recent speech at the University of Regensburg, in which he stressed that reason and faith must both be welcome in all conversations among all religious and secular viewpoints.
Some Muslims reacted to those comments by firebombing churches in the West Bank and by killing an Italian nun at a Somali children?s hospital.
When violence like this took place during segregation and Jim Crow, Americans ? black and white, Christian, Jewish and secular ? eventually mustered the moral courage to stop it. Some of them died to stop it.
Our common struggle now is against terrorists who use Islam to justify themselves.
We would see more success ? and non-Muslims would be able to see a clearer picture of how most Muslims really are ? if the silent majority of peaceful Muslims would vocally and forcefully join the fight and refuse to let killers define their faith.
Aaron Keith Harris writes about politics, the media, pop culture and music and is a regular contributor to National Review Online and Bluegrass Unlimited. He can be reached at [email protected].
