ACT for America

[Excerpt from Video:  "As a Muslim, I'm not buying that at all [that the mosque is being built to show respect for the victims of 9/11].  How does building a mosque in the very place where Muslims murdered so many other Americans would create any kind of respect.  What I'm hearing from people, especially those who are victims and  who are families of the victims, is that this is very hurtful and it's very painful."]

[Excerpt:  "The inability to recognize terrorism when it is dressed in a suit, totes a blackberry and uses academic language—is one of the greatest blind spots of Western civilization today. "]

In response to the Islamic terrorist attacks that murdered 76 people in Uganda, Barack Hussein Obama delivered the usual homily about Islam being a great religion, and Islamic terrorism being the work of a small handful of extremists who reject modernity. And while many people have stood up to take issue with the false claim that only a small minority of Muslims view terrorism as legitimate, fewer have tackled the underlying premise behind this liberal critique of Islam, which claims that it is a lack of modernity that is the problem.

The reason why the “Modernity” narrative is so dangerous, is because it has drawn even liberal critics of Islam into a false paradigm, in which Muslim terrorists reject modernity, and therefore Muslims who do not seem to reject modernity cannot be terrorists. That is why Tariq Ramadan can waltz from campus to campus, shielded from accusations of “extremism” by his supposed embrace of modernity. Terrorist groups and terrorist front groups, from the Taliban, which before 9/11 sent an ambassador to Berkeley who delivered lectures explaining that the Buddha statues had been destroyed to protest against global economic injustice, to Hizb ut Tahir, whose spokesmen talk like moral relativists, even as they preach uncompromising Jihad to their followers—have learned to talk like “moderns”, even when their real goals have remained the same since Mohammed and his followers rode down on their enemies.

[Excerpt:  "Since locating the absent Rauf last week in Malaysia, I have now discovered that he's about to embark on a nearly month-long swing through the Middle East, with plans to visit Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain and Qatar."

"Ultimately, in response to repeated questions, a member of Rauf's New York Cordoba Initiative foundation e-mailed me Friday, saying that Rauf's trip to the Middle East, "in the near future," will be hosted by the U.S. government as part of an outreach program to "bring the message of moderation, peace and understanding." ]

While debate rages over plans for an Islamic center in Lower Manhattan, the imam behind this project, Feisal Abdul Rauf, is not available to answer questions in New York. Since locating the absent Rauf last week in Malaysia, I have now discovered that he's about to embark on a nearly month-long swing through the Middle East, with plans to visit Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain and Qatar.

Not that I learned this from Rauf, whose Malaysian office staff told me by phone on Tuesday that "All media requests have to go through his office in New York." Nor did his New York colleagues simply volunteer information about his imminent trip to the Middle East. It took a series of phone calls and questions to eke it out of them, starting with a vague reply from a staffer who then tried to backtrack with a message that, retroactively, her remark was "completely off the record."