Free Republic

EDITOR'S NOTE — This is another story in an occasional series examining the fault lines within Islam between the forces of moderation and extremism. The consequences of this fight that shook America on Sept. 11, 2001, reverberate today, and the struggle for Islam may be the defining conflict of our era. LOS ANGELES — UCLA law professor Khaled Abou El Fadl has a scholarly manner and speaks in soft tones. But listen as he tells his story. A Kuwaiti native, he was fascinated by militant Islam as a young man, then evolved into a moderate champion of democracy and suffered...

How the CIA Funds Anti-Bush Propaganda By Bill Gertz The Washington Times | September 14, 2004 The CIA's Counterterrorist Center has spent more than $15 million in the past three years funding studies, reports and conferences produced by former Democratic administration officials and other critics of the Bush administration. The latest effort was a $300,000 grant by the CIA to the Atlantic Council for a study co-authored by Richard A. Clarke, the former counterterrorism official who wrote a best seller accusing the Bush administration of failing in the war on terrorism by invading Iraq.

"The disease of apologetics." That's what he calls it. "For a century, Muslims have seen their primary function as defending Islam. Not to honour Islam by critically engaging it and rethinking it and making sure that it remains viable and moral and humane, but to defend it. "They see their role primarily as marketing agents, as cheerleaders, offering the same old excuses, attributing the problems to culture or customs or colonialism or Orientalism."The speaker is Dr. Khaled Abou el-Fadl, professor of law at UCLA. The Kuwait-born and Egyptian-trained Arab scholar and prolific author has emerged as a prominent Muslim dissident...