A Memo to American Muslims ("EXCELLENT READ")

Islam for Today ^ | Unknown | Dr. M. A. Muqtedar Khan

[FairOpinion]

It is time that we acknowledge that the freedoms we enjoy in the US are more desirable to us than superficial solidarity with the Muslim World. If you disagree, then prove it by packing your bags and going to whichever Muslim country you identify with." In the wake of September 11, Dr. M. A. Muqtedar Khan calls for soul searching, reflection and reassessment among US Muslims.

In the name of Allah, the most Benevolent and the Most Merciful. May this memo find you in the shade of Islam enjoying the mercy, the protection and the grace of Allah.

I am writing this memo to you all with the explicit purpose of inviting you to lead the American Muslim community in soul searching, reflection and reassessment.

What happened on September 11th in New York and Washington DC will forever remain a horrible scar on the history of Islam and humanity. No matter how much we condemn it, and point to the Quran and the Sunnah to argue that Islam forbids the killing of innocent people, the fact remains that the perpetrators of this crime against humanity have indicated that their actions are sanctioned by Islamic values.

The fact that even now several Muslim scholars and thousands of Muslims defend the accused is indicative that not all Muslims believe that the attacks are unIslamic. This is truly sad.

Even if it were true that Israel and the US are enemies of the Muslim World, wonder what is preventing them from unleashing their nuclear arsenal against Muslims, a response that mercilessly murders thousands of innocent people, including hundreds of Muslims is absolutely indefensible. If anywhere in your hearts there is any sympathy or understanding with those who committed this act, I invite you to ask yourself this question, would Muhammad (pbuh) sanction such an act?

While encouraging Muslims to struggle against injustice (Al Quran 4:135), Allah also imposes strict rules of engagement. He says in unequivocal terms that to kill an innocent being is like killing entire humanity (Al Quran 5:32). He also encourages Muslims to forgive Jews and Christians if they have committed injustices against us (Al Quran 2:109, 3:159, 5:85).

Muslims, including American Muslims have been practicing hypocrisy on a grand scale. They protest against the discriminatory practices of Israel but are silent against the discriminatory practices in Muslim states. In the Gulf one can see how laws and even salaries are based on ethnic origin. This is racism, but we never hear of Muslims protesting against them at International fora.

The Israeli occupation of Palestine is perhaps central to Muslim grievance against the West. While acknowledging that, I must remind you that Israel treats its one million Arab citizens with greater respect and dignity than most Arab nations treat their citizens. Today Palestinian refugees can settle and become citizens of the United States but in spite of all the tall rhetoric of the Arab world and Quranic injunctions (24:22) no Muslim country except Jordan extends this support to them.

While we loudly and consistently condemn Israel for its ill treatment of Palestinians we are silent when Muslim regimes abuse the rights of Muslims and slaughter thousands of them. Remember Saddam and his use of chemical weapons against Muslims (Kurds)?. Remember Pakistani army’s excesses against Muslims (Bengalis)?. Remember the Mujahideen of Afghanistan and their mutual slaughter? Have we ever condemned them for their excesses? Have we demanded international intervention or retribution against them? Do you know how the Saudis treat their minority Shias? Have we protested the violation of their rights? But we all are eager to condemn Israel; not because we care for rights and lives of the Palestinians, we don’t. We condemn Israel because we hate “them".

Muslims love to live in the US but also love to hate it. Many openly claim that the US is a terrorist state but they continue to live in it. Their decision to live here is testimony that they would rather live here than anywhere else. As an Indian Muslim, I know for sure that nowhere on earth, including India, will I get the same sense of dignity and respect that I have received in the US. No Muslim country will treat me as well as the US has. If what happened on September 11th had happened in India, the biggest democracy, thousands of Muslims would have been slaughtered in riots on mere suspicion and there would be another slaughter after confirmation. But in the US, bigotry and xenophobia has been kept in check by media and leaders. In many places hundreds of Americans have gathered around Islamic centers in symbolic gestures of protection and embrace of American Muslims. In many cities Christian congregations have started wearing hijab to identify with fellow Muslim women. In patience and in tolerance ordinary Americans have demonstrated their extraordinary virtues.

It is time that we acknowledge that the freedoms we enjoy in the US are more desirable to us than superficial solidarity with the Muslim World. If you disagree than prove it by packing your bags and going to whichever Muslim country you identify with. If you do not leave and do not acknowledge that you would rather live here than anywhere else, know that you are being hypocritical.

It is time that we faced these hypocritical practices and struggled to transcend them. It is time that American Muslim leaders fought to purify their own lot.

For over a decade we have watched as Muslims in the name of Islam have committed violence against other Muslims and other peoples. We have always found a way to reconcile the vast distance between Islamic values and Muslim practices by pointing out to the injustices committed upon Muslims by others. The point however is this – our belief in Islam and commitment to Islamic values is not contingent on the moral conduct of the US or Israel. And as Muslims can we condone such inhuman and senseless waste of life in the name of Islam?

The biggest victims of hate filled politics as embodied in the actions of several Muslim militias all over the world are Muslims themselves. Hate is the extreme form of intolerance and when individuals and groups succumb to it they can do nothing constructive. Militias like the Taliban have allowed their hate for the West to override their obligation to pursue the welfare of their people and as a result of their actions not only have thousands of innocent people died in America, but thousands of people will die in the Muslim World.

Already, half a million Afghans have had to leave their homes and their country. The war has not yet begun. It will only get worst. Hamas and Islamic Jihad may kill a few Jews, women and children included, with their suicide bombs and temporarily satisfy their lust for Jewish blood, but thousands of Palestinians then pay the price for their actions.

The culture of hate and killing is tearing away at the moral fabric of the Muslim society. We are more focused on “the other” and have completely forgotten our duty to Allah. In pursuit of the inferior jihad we have sacrificed the superior jihad.

Islamic resurgence, the cherished ideals of which pursued the ultimate goal of a universally just and moral society has been hijacked by hate and call for murder and mayhem. If Bin Laden were an individual then we would have no problem. But unfortunately Bin Laden has become a phenomenon -- a cancer eating away at the morality of our youth, and undermining the spiritual health of our future.

Today the century old Islamic revival is in jeopardy because we have allowed insanity to prevail over our better judgment. Yes, the US has played a hand in the creation of Bin Laden and the Taliban, but it is we who have allowed them to grow and gain such a foothold. It is our duty to police our world. It is our responsibility to prevent people from abusing Islam. It is our job to ensure that Islam is not misrepresented. We should have made sure that what happened on Sept. 11th should never have happened.

It is time the leaders of the American Muslim community woke up and realized that there is more to life than competing with the American Jewish lobby for power over US foreign policy. Islam is not about defeating Jews or conquering Jerusalem. It is about mercy, about virtue, about sacrifice and about duty. Above all it is the pursuit of moral perfection. Nothing can be further away from moral perfection than the wanton slaughter of thousands of unsuspecting innocent people.

I hope that we will now rededicate our lives and our institutions to the search for harmony, peace and tolerance. Let us be prepared to suffer injustice rather than commit injustices. After all it is we who carry the divine burden of Islam and not others. We have to be morally better, more forgiving, more sacrificing than others, if we wish to convince the world about the truth of our message. We cannot even be equal to others in virtue, we must excel.

It is time for soul searching. How can the message of Muhammad (pbuh) who was sent as mercy to mankind become a source of horror and fear? How can Islam inspire thousands of youth to dedicate their lives to killing others? We are supposed to invite people to Islam not murder them.

The worst exhibition of Islam happened on our turf. We must take first responsibility to undo the evil it has manifest. This is our mandate, our burden and also our opportunity.

---------

Muqtedar Khan, Ph.D. Director of International Studies, Adrian College, MI Association of Muslim Social Scientists Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy.

[Centurion2000]

He sounds almost Christian .... I wonder how long until some demented imam or gutter mullah proclains a fatwa killing against him ....

[FormerlyAnotherLurker]

It is old.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/546460/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/551665/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/555731/posts

Reported in Larry Elder's column, October 25, 2001;
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/larryelder/printle20011025.shtml

And other places.

[FairOpinion]

Mansoor Ijaz is Muslim, and he has tangibly has been helping us in the WoT.

He was the one who was negotiating Sudan handing over Bin Laden to us, but Clinton wouldn't take him.

[BOOTSTICK]

"Islamic resurgence, the cherished ideals of which pursued the ultimate goal of a universally just and moral society has been hijacked by hate and call for murder and mayhem."The author is simply wrong, where is there a universally { for all peoples} and just society in the world of Islamic nations? Saudi Arabia?, Afghanastan? Iran?,
Pakistan? Syria? Where all persons no matter their religion, or lack thereof all have equality????

[tinamina]

I think it would be great if someone who knew how to hack websites would post this article on Al Queda's website, Al Jazeera etc. That's the only way they'll see the message.

[FormerlyAnotherLurker]

Sorry, I didn't notice your post. I was looking for links to the first postings and glossed over you. I remember reading Elder's column and found it in an old folder from 2001.
See post #62 for some of the Free Republic threads from then.

[JSteff]

"I just think that we should give a chance and support the few, who are trying to talks some sense into their fellow Muslims."

It will never happen until they reject the Koran. The history of Islam is of conquest, discrimination, lies, subjugation, and slavery. The very basis of Islam is not of love and respect, but of certain eventual death to all who do not agree with it.

They are angry with the success of the rest of the world and like the soviets would rather take it and make it theirs without the work to develop it on their own. Like the soviets they either need to be beaten or destroyed.

They are a primative group, barely a mob. Show us what development to benefit the world as come from an Islamic state in the last 50 years. Send us the link to the scientific article about some discovery they made that will benefit humanity. Send the article about the medical discovery or technique has come from a moslem country in the last 50 years.

Send us the text of any Islamic counties laws that show unequivical belief that all men are created equal and deserve the equal protections of that state.

I am sorry sir, but I know you can show NONE of those things... because they do not exist. Their very religion prevents those things. Until they shun their religion and it's EVIL foundations they are not to be trusted nor worthy of being equal partners with the CIVILIZED world.

This man is playing part of their religions play book, the Koran to a "T"... deceive their enemies until they can kill or enslave them. I don't buy it at all and hopefully neither does most of America.

Heaven help our country if more of us don't see it soon. I assure you the heaven I speak of does not promise me 78 (or whatever) virgins and several young boys for my own pleasure.

Geez what sort of sick people and religion would promise or want that?

Oh! That's right it is Islam.

[SevenDaysInMay]

The Koran and other scriptures COMMAND "good" muslims to first kill peaceful ("hypocrites") muslims even before the "spawn of pigs and monkeys" (Jews)..."where ever you can find them". "Good" muslims must kill "bad" muslims, who are willing to live and let live, like 90+% of all men, women, and children on earth.

Keep in mind that of all populations, some 3-5% are sociopathic, 1-3% are psychopaythic. There a claimed billion or so muslims, at least that many live in islamic claimed territory. More about that later.

Some estimates I've read indicate that around 10% of muslims qre devout muslims, meaning "good" muslims who believe that they are commanded to kill "bad" muslims, Jews, and infedels, aka you and me.

This is the daily islamic message, especially on their good Fridays call to mosque. Think of it. Their prophet was a murdering desert caravan raider who kight tripped and decided that invasions' booty was the best life, living well off of other societies; greqter productivity. The rampage was checked several times; dar al-islam is their dogma thqat once islam's territory, always islam's territory. That is why they cannot allow Israel to exist. Paris is to be once again theirs, as is Spain, Portugal, Balkans, etc., etc. etc.

Islam is the death cult of the third and fourth world which is breeding jihadies faster than we are willing to kill them, so far.

Jihadies attacking us are engaged in their resumption of their religious war. Watch their young jihadies, whether in Iraq or West Bank, they want to kill their enemies. They slaughter their suspected traitors and hang them from their own street lamps.

This war has been slow to ignite, since Tehran in 1979 to 9/11. We will be in aa total war after we lose a city or more to nukes or a Black Pox. We will not likely know who, as in a crime scene model of the Clintons era, so who do we attack? Attack we must, amid a worldwide condemnation of GW's war mongering "terrorism".

War is hell. Our enemies think that their societies' hell is our fault. We must make dead certain that when we are shocked to the truth that islam is our mortal enemy, as it is written, we annihilate the nest procreating the jihadies who live to murder us, according to their Koran, Haddith, other scriptures and fatwa after fatwa. "Death to America!" Submit or die; as it is written in their Koran.

Know your children's chilrens' mortal enemies and smite them. They are setting their sights on your families.

Prepare for total war at your front door and at your children's school.

We Christians may turn the other cheek, but our dead loved ones killed by "good" muslims is our reality. Atheists and pantheists have their own issues, but will die the same as the rest of us. Most of us are unwilling to face extinction by islamists without a fight, hightech and lowtech.

Who shall fight for us so that we may live our lives in peace without islam's theofascism constantly killing some of us?

[Stultis]

I imagine the author will be branded an Uncle Tom

There's precedent:

Brief history of Uncle Tom and all hijabs (lefty muslim org labels Amir Taheri as "Uncle Tom") ^
			Posted by Stultis On 10/18/2003 2:23 AM CDT with 6 comments Muslim WakeUp ^ | 27 August 2003 | Jawad Ali August 27, 2003 Brief history of Uncle Tom and all hijabs Let us start with...Muslim Wakeup! guide to writing a neo-con article about Muslims.It is a simple three-part process. Any dimwitted chicken hawk can do this. Many have. Start with something obnoxious, real or imagined, that some Muslim may have done. Take extra care to blur the line between the offender and the remaining one billion Muslims. No matter what the obnoxious act is, always make the dramatic assertion that this shows that the culprit, but really all Muslims, are real or closet terrorists, Nazis, or communists, and about to...
Muslim MP slams 'extremist' muslim talks, spokesman calls him a "Uncle Tom" ^
			Posted by Pikamax On 08/23/2003 8:18 AM CDT with 11 comments icbirmingham ^ | 08/23/03 | Guy Newey MP slams 'extremist' muslim talks Aug 23 2003 By Guy Newey, Birmingham Post Birmingham’s only Muslim MP has condemned the organisers of a major Islamic event taking place in the city this weekend and said they were no different to the British National Party. Khalid Mahmood (pictured), MP for Perry Barr, hit out after a spokesman for the radical Islamic political party Hizb ut-Tahrir accused him of being an “Uncle Tom” figure in the Muslim community. Up to 10,000 delegates are expected to attend tomorrow’s event at the National Indoor Arena, which is entitled British or Muslim? and will debate...

[tkathy]

"would Muhammad (pbuh) sanction such an act?"

Sadly, yes, Muhammad WOULD sanction such an act. The Muslim world needs to wake up.

[prairiebreeze]

Thanks for the ping. I'll be sending this around for people to read.

Prairie

[FlyLow]

It is time that we acknowledge that the freedoms we enjoy in the US are more desirable to us than superficial solidarity with the Muslim World. If you disagree then prove it by packing your bags and going to whichever Muslim country you identify with. If you do not leave and do not acknowledge that you would rather live here than anywhere else, know that you are being hypocritical.

---

This is an enlightened man. I long for more like him.

[E Rocc]

Its time that we acknowledge that the freedoms we enjoy in the US are more desirable to us than superficial solidarity with the muslim world.

Its way too late for that. Is that an admission that muslims did'nt support the war on terror? The author just sees whats coming the muslims way and this pig doesnt like what he sees!!

So if they don't say anything they support the terrorists and if they do they are only acting in self-interest?

Actually, nearly all American Muslims have little or any use for the "sharia" supporting fundamentalists. They are here to get away from those people, not to spread that kind of bullclinton here. Those that are not should be condemned by their actions, not their beliefs. That's how things have been done here for over two hundred years.

-Eric

[Luis Gonzalez]

Muslims are not anti-progress.

Most certainly those who live among progress are not.

The main difference between Muslims, Jews, and Christians right now, is the vitriol of radical Muslim clerics.

Your basic John Q. Muslim individual has the same day-to-day concerns that we do.

They work to feed their families, keep a roof over their heads, raise their children, etc.

John Q. Muslim does not strap a bunch of explosives to himself and walks into a crowded school, as a matter of fact, John Q. Muslim is getting killed by those bombs being set off by radicals.

John Q. Muslim feels powerless against these radicals, and most likely wishes that they would just let him be.

We need to raise the confidence of John Q. Muslim, to help him believe that he can be the master of his destiny, and to overcome the vestiges of a thousand years of the Imam's rule.

If we strive to elevate John Q. Muslim, and to eliminate the radicals, he will eventually police those radicals himself.

[Coroner]

I worked with 11 muslims. 6 of them were constantly trying to get me to hate Jews. The rest would remain silent! Their silence spoke volumes!! A large percentage want Islamo-land in the USA!!

[Coroner]

In a poll posted on FR. 19% of Palestinians wanted to raise a little suicide bomber. OPEN YOUR EYES!!!!!!!!!

[Luis Gonzalez]

So, based on the opinion of 19% of the Palestinians, mind you, 80% of Muslims live outside of the Middle East, and you cite a poll of ONLY Palestinians, we should declare war on 800 million people, and violate the constitutional rights of nearly 10 million Americans adherents?

So then, if I came up with a poll that said that 19% of French Catholics believed that abortion is a woman's right, should we then accept that abortion rights are the norm for Christians in the world?

Open YOUR eyes.

[Luis Gonzalez]

By the way, I can post a poll that says that nearly 50% of Americans, the overwhelming majority of them self-described Christians, support abortion rights.

That means that Christians believe abortion is a right.

Right?

Your logic, not mine.

[Luis Gonzalez]

"In a poll posted on FR. 19% of Palestinians wanted to raise a little suicide bomber. OPEN YOUR EYES!!!!!!!!!"

In other words, 81% of Palestinians would rather not see their children blowing themselves up in the name of Allah and some messed-up "Jihad".

I'm not the one with my eyes closed here.

[sheik yerbouty]

There is also Fouad Ajami, but not many others.