Identifying Moderate Muslims

There is good news to report: The idea that "militant Islam is the problem, moderate Islam is the solution" is finding greater acceptance over time. But there is also bad news, namely growing confusion over who really is a moderate Muslim. This means that the ideological side of the war on terror is making some, but only limited, progress.

The good news: Anti-Islamist Muslims have found their voice since September 11. Their numbers include distinguished academics such as Azar Nafisi (Johns Hopkins), Ahmed al-Rahim (formerly of Harvard), Kemal Silay (Indiana), and Bassam Tibi (Göttingen). Important Islamic figures like Ahmed Subhy Mansour and Muhammad Hisham Kabbani are speaking out.

Internationally, an important petition posted a month ago by a group of liberal Arabs calls for a treaty banning religious incitement to violence and specifically names "sheikhs of death" (such as Yusuf Al-Qaradawi of Al-Jazeera television), demanding that they be tried before an international court. Over 2,500 Muslim intellectuals from 23 countries rapidly signed this petition.

With time, individual Muslims are finding their voice to condemn Islamist connections to terrorism. Perhaps most outstanding is an article by Abdel Rahman al-Rashed, a Saudi journalist in London: "It is a certain fact that not all Muslims are terrorists," he writes, "but it is equally certain, and exceptionally painful, that almost all terrorists are Muslims. … We cannot clear our names unless we own up to the shameful fact that terrorism has become an Islamic enterprise; an almost exclusive monopoly, implemented by Muslim men and women."

Other analysts have followed al-Rashed's example. Osama El-Ghazali Harb writes from Egypt that "Muslim and Arab intellectuals and opinion leaders must confront and oppose any attempt to excuse the barbaric acts of these [terrorist] groups on the grounds of the suffering endured by Muslims." From Virginia, Anouar Boukhars holds that "Terrorism is a Muslim problem, and refusal to admit so is indeed troubling."

The bad news: There are lots of fake-moderates parading about, and they can be difficult to identify, even for someone like me who devotes much attention to this topic. The Council on American-Islamic Relations still wins mainstream support and the Islamic Society of North America still sometimes hoodwinks the U.S. government. The brand-new Progressive Muslim Union wins rave reviews for its alleged moderation from gullible journalists, despite much of its leadership (Salam Al-Marayati, Sarah Eltantawi, Hussein Ibish, Ali Abunimah) being well-known extremists.

Even anti-terrorist rallies are not always what they seem to be. On Nov. 21, several thousand demonstrators, some of them Muslim, marched under banners proclaiming "Together for Peace and against Terror" in Cologne, Germany. Marchers shouted "No to terror" and politicians made feel-good statements. But the Cologne demonstration, coming soon after the murder of Theo van Gogh on Nov. 2, served as a clever defense operation. The organizer of the event, the Islamist Diyanet Işleri Türk-Islam Birliği, used it as a smokescreen to fend off pressure for real change. Speeches at the demonstration included no mea culpas or calls for introspection, only apologetics for jihad and invocations of stale and empty slogans such as "Islam means peace."

What pray tell was that outburst about?

Christians have always been permitted to bear arms in the wars of a duely constituted civil authority (the impediment in the days before Constantine was a requirement that legionaires perform pagan sacrifices), though from the day of St. Basil the Great, at least, there were penances on those who actually shed blood, and our clergy were not permitted to bear arms.

And however do you see that staking out a position on the degree to which those who accept the false teachings of Mohammed are obliged to put into practice the most violent face-value interpretation of those teachings--a matter of considerable policy importance for the conduct of the wars currently waged by America's duely constituted civil authority, wars which represent the defense of both what is left of Christendom and its secularize post-Christian remnants--makes one less Christian?

It's not healthy having a muslim for a friend.

"A Saudi Arabian national who slashed a Jewish friend's throat after apparently undergoing a religious reawakening has pleaded guilty to murder rather than face trial." This from the Houston Chronicle, with thanks to Mrs. Obelix and Nicolei.

"Mohammed Ali Alayed, 23, faces up to 60 years in prison for the Aug. 6 attack in which Ariel Sellouk was almost decapitated with a knife." He got 60 years because of a deal made involving his guilty plea. The case was not tried as a hate crime; another story about the case explains that "although there was no direct evidence the killing was a hate crime, attorneys said jurors might have been particularly unsympathetic to Alayed because the slaying raised the specter of Islamic extremism and stereotypes surrounding terrorists. 'Now is not a good time to be trying a case with these facts,' said Alayed's attorney, George Parnham. 'I believe a jury well could have given him a life sentence.'" That has been known to happen in murder cases. Meanwhile, the prosecution agreed: "Prosecutor Stephen St. Martin said there was no clear motive in the killing, which Alayed's roommate witnessed. There was no strategic advantage to prosecuting the slaying as a hate crime, because that and murder by itself carry a maximum sentence of life in prison, St. Martin said."

The connection to his "religious reawakening" apparently was made by the Chronicle, not by authorities in Houston. Police can't find a motive — they're just sure that the murder didn't have anything to do with religion: "Although Alayed went to a local mosque after the slaying and no clear motive was established, Houston police said they could not find any evidence that Sellouk, also 23, was killed because of his race or religion."

Nevertheless, these are the facts of the case: "Alayed, of the 2500 block of Winrock, was arrested Aug. 14 in a friend's empty Galleria-area apartment." According to the victim's father, Michel Sellouk, the victim "became friends with Alayed a few years ago. He said Alayed underwent 'a religious experience' about two years ago, became a devout Muslim and broke off contact with Ariel. On the day of the slaying, Sellouk said, Alayed called his son and suggested they get together. The two had drinks at a bar before going to Alayed's apartment about midnight. Alayed's roommate told police the two were not arguing before Sellouk was killed."

No clear motive? Not a hate crime? This is a craven example of the astounding state of denial that dominates the public discourse today about radical Islam. Did prosecutors investigate the possibility that in the course of his religious reawakening Alayed may have come across the hadith collection Mishkat Al-Messabih, which states: "When judgment day arrives, Allah will give every Muslim, a Jew or Christian to kill so that the Muslim will not enter into hell fire" (vol. 2, no. 5552)? Did they take note of the fact that a recent Muslim murderer of a Jew in France cried after the deed, "I have killed my Jew. I will go to heaven"?

I am quite sure that they did not. I am quite sure that they thought that ignoring the possibility that Alayed's murder was an exercise of jihadist hatred would be better in the long run. Better not to stir up trouble. But they are only buying for us more trouble down the road.

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