Islamic Fascists

Islamic Fascists

Shortly after the announcements were made about a group of terrorists plotting to blow up a number of airplanes and shutting down traffic out of Heathrow airport, President Bush stated the U.S. is “at war with Islamic Fascists who will use any means to destroy those of us who love freedom, to hurt our nation.”

Immediately U.S. Muslims reacted to the choice of the President’s words linking Islam to fascism.

One Yahoo article on this can be found at http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/060810/dcth069.html?.v=37

Nihahad Awad, the Executive Director of The Council on American-Islamic Relations (“Cair”) said : “We once again urge law enforcement authorities and elected officials to caution against stereotyping entire religious or ethnic groups based on the alleged actions of individuals.”

The U.S.A. has become prisoner of “right speak.” Although President Bush is a big boy and can defend himself, Harley Dad agrees with him.

It is ironic that we are more concerned about “right speak” than we are about terrorists blowing up our citizens, both Christian and Islamic, out of the air.

The issue is not what the President said. The issue is whether he was correct in his terminology.

First was he correct in calling them “Islamic”. Let’s look at the suicide notes, were references made to Islam or Allah? Perhaps one or more of them was a secret Baptist or Methodist. I think not. Were these actions done to support Islamic fundamentalism. I think so.

Next were they fascists?

Wikipedia defines fascism in the following manner: “Fascism is a radical totalitarian political philosophy that combines elements of corporatism, authoritarianism, extreme nationalism, militarism, anti-anarchism, anti-communism and anti-liberalism.”

The Islamic states do seem to be totalitarian purporting that Quran is to be the rule of law. They are certainly anti-anarchistic, anti-communist and anti-liberalism. They do not allow freedom of religion unless such religions admit to be subservient to Islam. Women are second class citizens.

But even if we are unable to agree that these individuals were fascists, there is little question that they tried to murder a number of innocent people. So would the term “Islamic murderers” been more palatable to the critics. Unfortunately the answer is “No.”

The issue is that Islamic extremists are giving all of Islam a bad name. But then there seems to be limited attempts of Muslims to police themselves and extreme speech by Islamic clerics can be found both in the U.S. and Great Britain, despite laws against “hate” crimes or inciting hate crimes. These laws for some reason appear not to be enforced.

“Right speak” is easy to say when things are not going your way. And so when Islamic fundamentalists try to blow up ten planes of civilians we hear primarily cries that we (non-Islamics) should not stereotype.

However, some of the cries not to stereotype may in fact be justified. Our soldiers in Iran and Afghanistan fight along side Muslims as well as against them. The U.S. conducts joint operations with the Afghan Army and rest assured the Afghan Army is not made up of Baptists or even athiests.

In part, the plot to blow up the aircraft was exposed through the assistance of agents of Pakistan. Rest assured they too are Muslim. So perhaps we need to consider some of the points of the CAIR.

Further, terrorists appear quite happy to kill both Sunni Muslims and Shiite Muslims and appear to be endeavoring to incite civil war between the two groups. To the Islamic fundamentalists, any one not of their particular brand of Islam is an “infidel” deserving of death.

The first part of the Cair statement on the airline terror plot reads as follows:

“American Muslims have consistently condemned all acts of terrorism, whether carried out by individuals, groups or states. We repudiate anyone or any group that plans or carries out a terrorist act. We welcome ealy actions by law enforcement authorities against crebible threats to the safety of the traveling public.”

I invite you to investigate the webpage of the Council on American-Islamic Relations by going to http://www.cair-net.org/

In addition the U.S. Muslim Religious Council of North America has even issued a fatwa (religious pronouncement against terror). I quote the first two paragraphs:

The Fiqh Council of North America wishes to reaffirm Islam’s absolute condemnation of terrorism and religious extremism.

Islam strictly condemns religious extremism and the use of violence against innocent lives. There is no justification in Islam for extremism or terrorism. Targeting civilians’ life and property through suicide bombings or any other method of attach is Haram-or forbidden-and those who commit these barbaric acts are criminals, not “martrys.”

These words are strong and clear.

You can read the entire fatwa by following the link in the CAIR website or by going to http://www.cair-net.org/FatwaJuly2005.pdf

On the other hand, I wonder if we would have the same type of fatwa if the majority of the U.S. was Islamic. Who knows? But I doubt it.

I do know this—the vast majority of the people of the Islamic faith would just as soon not be lumped into the group of the extremists trying to blow up airplanes of innocent people.
At the same time, I do not hear them speaking very loud for changes in Islamic lands where women and Christians are oppressed. And the silence is deafening.

Religious freedom apparently is a virtue to Muslims when they are in a minority and an evil when they are in a majority.

Now that is convenient.