sadly many of Dr. Pipes allegations are true

Submitted by Abdul Rahman Reijerink (Australia), Jun 28, 2006 at 07:47

Sadly, I must concur with Dr. Pipes on several counts.

In my experience, far too many Muslims deny (sinful) Muslim involvment in the atrocities perpetrated in the US on Sept 11 (i.e. not the US sponsored atrocity in Chile on the other forgotten Sept. 11) against the civilians of the US, a crime in anyone's language, especially that of practising Muslims. conspiracy theories abound like those blaming the CIA (insert other federal institution here) to justify an attack on Islam.

Such foolish conflation of a conflict involving sinful muslims and a general war on my religion seems childish. They genuinely see the "war on terror" as a conspiracy to eliminate Islam, rather than an attempt to combat the enemy of Muslims and non-muslims alike, this is exacerbated because innocent muslims have suffered in the attempt to eliminate/capture terrorists.

There is also a revolting tendency especially prominent amongst born muslims to blame Jews for much of the conspiracy theory nonsense. which is sad, because there was a time when Muslims treated Jews (and vice versa) much better than Christians did, I guess the conflict in Palestine/Israel is too blame for much of this. this leads to the (largely valid) charge of anti-semitism, which Dr. Pipes runs with elsewhere, neglecting to mention that arabs are also semites!

I would like to know what the statistics are for Muslims who blame the umma for its own problems and what the break downs might be between practising and non practising muslims is. It is a core belief of most practising Muslims that I know that we are responsible for our position because we have lost the way religiously (I.E. extremism and non-practice). We do not do basic things like seek higher education enough despite the Qur'anic injunctions to learn and work hard. 14- 43% is not a majority although the upper number is disturbingly high. Afterall, even if we do not believe that we are being humiliated by God for our disobedience, it is a fundamental Muslim belief that nothing happens without divine will and planning, therefore, even if the US (insert other official muslim bogey here) is to blame in a worldly sense, ultimately "they" can only do these things because God allows it, therefore it is not the fault of those parties, the theological arguements around this are complex and too long winded for here.

My feeling is that most suicide bombing is condemned by most muslims. apart from suicide and murder being great sins, as much as many muslims complain about "the west" and its "moral laxity" (i.e. difference) etc, they do not like to see people hurt. I think the question was probably too broad and caught a lot of support for Palestinian violence against Israel, even unfortunately the highly sinful attacks on civilians, or attacks against military targets that result in civilian casulties (ie so called "collateral damage", just another way of saying you don't care if civilians get hurt because they are not important). All the muslims that I know (many from countries like Sudan, Somalia, Turkey, Lebanon, Pakistan, India, Indonesia and even Saudi) reject totally the attacks on Sept 11, in Bali, Londan, Madrid, the beheadings etc in Iraq and so on as evil. even if some of them deny muslim involvement (they say that a muslim could never do such a thing!) and similar terrorist atrocities even if they support insurgent and terrorist attacks on allied troops in Iraq or against Israel.

In Peace, for a united front of the sons and daughters of Adam (all human beings) against ignorance and hatred

Abdul Rahman.

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