Martyn Burke, co-producer with Frank Gaffney, Alex Alexiev of PBS' banned, "Islam vs Islamists"
PBS Accused of Same Tactics Radical Muslims Use Against Moderates
"PBS is doing what the Islamists are doing," Santa Monica-based filmmaker, Martyn Burke charged. "They are silencing these people [Muslim moderates]."
California Gov. Arnold Schwartzenegger, Lt. Gov John Garimendi, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Israel Consul General Ehud Danoch, and Valley Beth Shalom Rabbi Harold Schulweis welcomed wife of Senator Joe Lieberman, Hadassah Freilich Lieberman, daugher of Holocaust survivors, to commemorate the devastating capability of anti-Semitism.
Discourse revealing autocratic, repressive elements in Islamist culture and politics were validated as Islamists were joined by far-leftists to attempt to squelch ideas of experts Prof. Daniel Pipes, Dr. Wafa Sultan, and Dr. Yaron Brook. (Uncivil disruption begins at 1:20 min point in video).
Al-Jazeera did an episode of Behind the News last Saturday on Bush's silly big speech. Jumana al-Nimour hosted, with Shibley Telhami, Mohammed al-Sayid Said (al-Ahram Center), and Daniel Pipes the guests.
Read entire column: http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110009890...the non-Muslim priests of enlightenment in the West have come, actively
and passively, to the Islamists' defense.
These "progressives" frequently cite the need to examine "root causes." In this they are correct: Terrorism is only the manifestation of a disease and not the disease itself. But the root-causes are quite different from what they think. As a former member of Jemaah Islamiya, a group led by al Qaeda's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, I know firsthand that the inhumane teaching in Islamist ideology can transform a young, benevolent mind into that of a terrorist. Without confronting the ideological roots of radical Islam it will be impossible to combat it.While there are many ideological "rootlets" of Islamism, the main tap root has a name--Salafism, or Salafi Islam, a violent, ultra-conservative version of the religion.
It is vital to grasp that traditional and even mainstream Islamic teaching accepts and promotes violence. Shariah, for example, allows apostates to be killed, permits beating women to discipline them, seeks to subjugate non-Muslims to Islam as dhimmis and justifies declaring war to do so. It exhorts good Muslims to exterminate the Jews before the "end of days." The near deafening silence of the Muslim majority against these barbaric practices is evidence enough that there is something fundamentally wrong.
Politicians and scholars in the West have taken up the chant that Islamic extremism is caused by the Arab-Israeli conflict. This analysis cannot convince any rational person that the Islamist murder of over 150,000 innocent people in
Algeria--which happened in the last few decades--or their slaying of hundreds of
Buddhists in Thailand, or the brutal violence between Sunni and Shia in Iraq
could have anything to do with the Arab-Israeli conflict.Western appeasement of their Muslim communities has exacerbated the problem. During the four-month period after the publication of the Muhammad cartoons in a Danish magazine, there were comparatively few violent demonstrations by Muslims. Within a few days of the Danish magazine's formal apology, riots erupted throughout the world. The apology had been perceived by Islamists as weakness and concession.
Worst of all, perhaps, is the anti-Americanism among many Westerners. It is a resentment so strong, so deep-seated, so rooted in personal identity, that it has led many, consciously or unconsciously, to morally support America's enemies.Progressives need to realize that radical Islam is based on an antiliberal system. They need to awaken to the inhumane policies and practices of Islamists around the world. They need to realize that Islamism spells the death of liberal values. And they must not take for granted the respect for human rights and dignity that we experience in America, and indeed, the West, today.
Well-meaning interfaith dialogues with Muslims have largely been fruitless. Participants must demand--but so far haven't--that Muslim organizations and scholars specifically and unambiguously denounce violent Salafi components in their mosques and in the media. Muslims who do not vocally oppose brutal Shariah decrees should not be considered "moderates."
