ISLAM IS NOT THE ENEMY?

Submitted by Mike Davis (United States), Apr 13, 2003 at 22:36

Gentlemen:

. ...Islamism rejects every important value that we revere here in the U.S.: Secular democracy, pluralism, tolerance and an acceptance of diversity. Furthermore, there are a whole lot of them who want to kill me and my family.

Fuller denies that Islamism is analogous to fascism or communism. Did he somehow miss what went on in Afghanistan under the Taliban? Or what still goes on in Iran today, when a fatwa is issued calling for the death of an academic because he wrote something unacceptable to the Ayatollahs? You characterize one of the motivating forces behind Islamism as the drive for modernization, yet these are people who look backward, not forward. Exactly how do we help these poeple embrace democracy?

.... Dr. Pipes' litany is "Islam is not the enemy; but Islamism is." Well, it seems to me that Islam has been hijacked by Islamism. Where are the Progressive Muslims? Or is that an oxymoron? Where are the Moderate Muslims? Has anyone heard from them? I hear nothing but deafening silence.

If I'm right and the entire religion has been hijacked, there are two additional conclusions that are inescapable: First, only Muslims can take back their own religion. Second, if they don't take it back soon, then we will face a cataclysm of unparallelled proportions - Islam and the West locked in a fight to the death that will go on for generations.

Please convince me that I'm wrong. But your arguments need to be a lot stronger ...

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