Posted on 05/15/2007 6:37:58 AM PDT by nuconvert
Yes, there is a moderate Islam - let's support it
Daniel Pipes
THE JERUSALEM POST
Apr. 17, 2007
'What moderate Muslims?" is the near-inevitable retort to my stating that radical Islam is the problem and moderate Islam the solution.
Where are the anti-Islamists' demonstrations against terror, their combating of Islamists, their reassessments of Islamic law? I am asked.
Moderate Muslims do exist, I reply. Admittedly, they do not constitute a movement but represent mere wisps in the face of the Islamist onslaught. This means, I argue, that the US government and other powerful institutions should give priority to locating, meeting with, funding, forwarding, empowering and celebrating those brave Muslims who, at personal risk, stand up and confront the totalitarians.
A just-published study from the RAND Corporation, Building Moderate Muslim Networks, methodically takes up and thinks through this concept. Angel Rabasa, Cheryl Benard, Lowell H. Schwartz and Peter Sickle grapple intelligently with the innovative issue of helping moderate Muslims grow and prosper.
They start with the argument that "structural reasons play a large part" in the rise of radical and dogmatic interpretations of Islam in recent years - one of those reasons being the Saudi government's generous funding over the last three decades for the export of the Wahhabi version of Islam. Saudi efforts have promoted "the growth of religious extremism throughout the Muslim world," permitting the Islamists to develop powerful intellectual, political and other networks. "This asymmetry in organization and resources explains why radicals, a small minority in almost all Muslim countries, have influence disproportionate to their numbers."
The study posits a key role for Western countries here: "Moderates will not be able to successfully challenge radicals until the playing field is leveled, which the West can help accomplish by promoting the creation of moderate Muslim networks."
DOES THIS sound familiar? It resembles the late 1940s, when Soviet-backed organizations threatened Europe. The four authors provide a helpful potted history of American network-building in the early Cold War years, in part to show that such an effort can succeed against a totalitarian enemy, in part to glean ideas for use at present. (One example: "a left hook to the Kremlin is the best blow," implying that Muslims can most effectively batter Islamism.)
Reviewing American efforts to fight Islamism, the authors find these lacking, at least with regard to strengthening moderates. Washington, they find, "does not have a consistent view on who the moderates are, where the opportunities for building networks among them lie, and how best to build the networks."
They are only too right. The US government has a disastrously poor record in this regard, with an embarrassing history of twin delusions: either thinking Islamists are moderates, or hoping to win them over. Such government figures as FBI director Robert S. Mueller III, State Department undersecretary Karen Hughes, and National Endowment for Democracy head Carl Gershman wrong-headedly insist on consorting with the enemy.
Instead, the RAND study promotes four partners: secularists, liberal Muslims, moderate traditionalists, and some Sufis. It particularly emphasizes the "emerging transnational network of laicist and secularist individuals, groups, and movements," and correctly urges cooperation with these neglected friends.
In contrast, the study proposes de-emphasizing the Middle East, and particularly the Arab world. Because this area "offers less fertile ground for moderate network and institution building than other regions of the Muslim world," it wants Western governments to focus on Muslims in Southeast Asia, the Balkans and in the Western diaspora, and to help make available their ideas in Arabic.
This novel stratagem defies a centuries'-old pattern of influence emanating from the Middle East, but it is well worth a try.
EVEN THE generally hard-headed RAND study sometimes lets down its guard. Dismayingly, the quartet refrains from condemning Washington for dialoguing with lawful Islamists even as it cautiously endorses European governments treating some Islamists as partners. It mistakenly characterizes the US-based "Progressive Muslim Union" as promoting secular Islam, when it is really another Islamist organization, but with a hip tone. (No other Islamists dared host a feature called "Sex and the Umma.")
Building Moderate Muslim Networks is not the final word on its subject but it marks a major step toward the systematic reconfiguring of how to implement Washington's policy to combat Islamism. The study's meaty contents, clear analysis and bold recommendations usefully move the debate forward, offering precisely the in-depth strategizing Westerners urgently need.
Can someone explain to me how one can be an "American Muslim?"
Cancellation of American Idol, perhaps.......
I'm from Missouri. Show me.
Its not just tribal but also a system of governance. They will govern also non-Muslims, not belonging to the tribe, if they have the political power, but the no-Muslims will be lower acste, dhimmi’s, subservient to the true Muslim.
A Muslim that does not endorse the actions of Al Qaida is not a faithful Muslim and will be subject to punishment even by detah. The Koran supports Al Qaida.
There are no moderate Muslims only quiet Muslims (quiet until they are free to speak and act in favor of Al Qaida) and fallen Muslims (who shun Al Qaida but then must shun Islam as well)
Islam cannot ever be integrated with a Christian society to any degree where it may acquire political power. They will defeat all laws of liberty and free practice of religion. (that is their history. irrefutable)
You forgot “crickets chirping”
Great just spit my coffee all over the computer screen from laughing..now to cleaning up. Moderate muslin...hahahahah
Agreed.
I would welcome an explanation to either question.
Muslims worship Mohamed as a God. Yet Mohamed was far, far more violent and murderous than Al Qaida.
Muslims pray 5 times a day that they could be more like Mohamed.
You cannot be a Muslim and not pray for the success of Al Qaida.
To be a moderate Muslim is impossible. It is like being a moderate murderer. You either condone and support murderers (like the murderer Mohamed), perform murder like Mohamed, or you’re not Muslim.
“Inside the mosques, there are no moderate muslims..........”
That’s a valid opinion, though I’d say there are very few moderates, not none.
Fortunately, the vast majority do not attend mosque. They know what goes on in most mosques too, and stay away.
The bible advocates extreme violence. Stoning people to death for eating shellfish, or planting two crops next to each other. Even the NT isn't immune from silliness.
Matthew 10:34 - Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword
Mark 7:10 For Moses said, Honor thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death:
Acts 3:23 And it shall come to pass, that every soul, which will not hear that prophet, shall be destroyed from among the people.
I won't even post any quotes from the Old Testament!
You're right of course, but my point was, what really causes the problem for us at this stage is the tribalism. If "Islam" were just "a system of governance" - or just "a religion" - without the tribalism (the xenophobia, the imperial/land-grabbing ambitions, the amoral "us vs. them" attitude) - everyone else would have far less of a problem with it.
“Not all Muslims are terrorists.”
Not all Muslims are Muslim, is what you say.
Oh I couldn’t agree more! Zalmay Khalizad he’s the worst of the lot, and don’t get me started on Colonel Douglas Burpee
http://www.nysun.com/article/31393
Road Map for Moderate Network Building in the Muslim World (long read)
RAND Corp. ^ | Angel Rabasa, Cheryl Benard, Lowell H. Schwartz, Peter Sickle
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1818382/posts
Posted on 04/16/2007 6:09:23 PM CDT by Valin
Identifying Key Partners and Audiences
A critical part of U.S. network-building efforts, as well as in its broader public diplomacy and strategic communications policy, is identifying key partners and audiences. Difficulties in distinguishing potential allies from adversaries present a major problem to Western governments and organizations attempting to organize support for moderate Muslims. Work done by the RAND Corporation—in Cheryl Benard’s Civil Democratic Islam and Angel Rabasa et al., The Muslim World After 9/11—has begun to lay the framework for identifying ideological tendencies in the Muslim world,1 which is necessary in order to identify the sectors with which the United States and its allies can be most e.ective in promoting democracy and stability to counter the in.uence of extremist and violent groups.
Around the world Muslims differ substantially not only in their religious views, but also in their political and social orientation, including their conceptions of government; their views on the primacy of shari’a (Islamic law) versus other sources of law; their views on human rights, especially the rights of women and religious minorities; and whether they support, justify, or tolerate violence perpetrated in advancement of a political or religious agenda. We refer to these as “marker issues,” and the position of groups or individuals on them allows for a more precise classifcation of these groups in terms of their a.nity for democracy and pluralism.
(snip)
The biggest problem that islamists have is trying to explain away what is written out, CRYSTAL CLEAR, in their own damned bible.
Butt up, head buried! Good for you.
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