The recent controversy over Juan Williams' choice of words underscores just how little progress has been made since I sat in a packed Cairo University auditorium last June, witnessing firsthand President Barack Obama dazzle and inspire a cross section of Egyptian society.
His now famous address, titled the "New Beginning," energized Egypt and the wider region, but more than a year later, tensions between the United States and Muslim majority societies are far from eliminated. Two wars, a sputtering Middle East peace process and the continued threat of al-Qaeda inspired violence present difficult hurdles to fostering trust.
The most powerful first step leaders can take to rebuild partnership between Muslim communities and the U.S. is to resolve these acute conflicts and end terrorism.
However, leaders cannot put global engagement on hold until these complex problems are solved. In spite of these challenges, governments and civil society on all sides must take an interactive holistic approach to move the relationship forward.
Here is what we must do:
1. Engage the home team: leaders educating their own constituencies. Often times leaders on all sides view their job as speaking on behalf of their people to the other. While this type of public diplomacy remains necessary, a far more powerful approach to move U.S.-Muslim relations forward is for leaders to spend at least as much time speaking to one's own people in a way that shows empathy and respect for the other community.
2. Keep each other honest: convening a critical mass of influential journalists to form a pact on framing the "other." Punctuating the decade since 9/11 is a string of global communication catastrophes involving Muslim and Western communities. From the Danish Cartoon controversy to Park51, news media in the United States and in Muslim majority societies have often escalated public outrage, rather than informing reasonable debate. To turn this around, a group of influential journalists from the U.S. and Muslim majority societies should convene for honest facilitated conversation on how each is framing the "other." The goal of this convening is to create a set of mutually agreed upon principles for framing the "other" in reporting. Eventually, each society will have a critical mass of reporters who inform rather than incite.
3. Cooperate for the common good: creating a multi-national, multi-faith "Cooperation Corps." Citizens of Muslim majority countries and of the United States often find themselves telling the other what they are against. It is time to show the world what they are for by forming a multi-national "Cooperation Corps," since charity and service is a shared value. While the idea of young Americans spending two years serving in a developing country as a Peace Corps volunteer is familiar, the "Cooperation Corps" would include a multi-faith, multi-national group of young people who would spend a year in the U.S. and a year in a majority Muslim country serving underprivileged communities. This approach would truly favor partnership over paternalism in the area of international development.
4. Upgrade to Exchange 2.0: dramatically increasing cross-cultural communication through new media. Studies show that less than half of Americans personally know a Muslim, and even fewer citizens of Muslim majority countries have ever met an American. Studies also show that knowing someone from a group makes one less likely to harbor extreme prejudice against that group. This is why international exchange programs are so powerful, yet have limited reach by their very nature. Currently less than 1 percent of higher education students participate in such study abroad programs. Through creative use of new media platforms that percentage could be 25, 50 and eventually even 100 percent. Imagine the differences that could make in people's worldviews and respect for one another. The United Nations is leading an effort on this in partnership with diverse public and private sector leaders, including an international non-profit organization I know well: Soliya. It is time for an Exchange 2.0 approach, where young people engage in a meaningful way over social media networks, thereby dramatically increasing the touch points between cultures.
While the situation seems grim, history teaches that groups, even those who have been in conflict for centuries, can ease tensions and build trust. Today the majority of Lebanese Muslims and Christians say they have a positive opinion of the other, less than a generation after a civil war fought roughly along confessional lines. Majorities of whites and blacks in America now say relations between their groups are good only a generation after the civil rights struggle. Other examples -- in Rwanda, South Africa and Northern Ireland just to name a few -- prove that progress is possible.
Dalia Mogahed is Executive Director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Study. She also directs The Abu Dhabi Gallup Center. Ms. Mogahed co-authored Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think with John L. Esposito. In 2009, President Obama appointed her to serve on his Faith Based and Neighborhood Partnerships Advisory Council.
Follow Dalia Mogahed on Twitter: www.twitter.com/dmogahed
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"Hero and the hatemonger: One is a maimed soldier who launched the Poppy Appeal. The other's an Islamic fanatic freed from the London jail on the same day
But at almost exactly the same time, Izzadeen walked out of Pentonville Prison in London and leapt on a wall to address a crowd of supporters.
He urged a boycott of the Poppy Appeal, claiming anyone wearing one to mark Remembrance Day ‘supported the murder of Muslims’.
He said: ‘If you look at how the poppy campaign has gone this year it was talking a lot about the people who have fought in Afghanistan and Iraq. ‘The troops are occupying foreign lands.
'That’s what a soldier’s job is – it’s to bomb houses, and to kick doors in. It’s to rape them, it’s to handcuff them, it’s to rob them.’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1324681/Hero-hatemonger-One-maimed-soldier-launched-Poppy-Appeal-The-Islamic-fanatic-freed-London-jail-day.html#ixzz13jRcwsNs
when i hear lots of women converting to Islam, i ask why. I grew up in a muslim country, to a pious entended family. When I was old enough, I studied and studied and found what it was all about: self-righteous oppresive politicized heterogenous communal delusion. you are wrong. Allah is imaginary.
Rubbish. Where was US imperialism when muslims commited the following jihadi genocides?
Jihad in the Modern Age 20th and 21st century
> The Jihad against Israelis (1943 – 2009 onwards); > against Americans ( 2001 onwards); > against the British ( 1947 onwards);> against Denmark (cartoon controversy onwards);> against Netherlands ( 2006 onwards);> against Filipino in Mindanoa ( 1970 onwards); > against Indonesian Christians in Malaku and East Timor ( 1970 onwards); > against Russians (1975 onwards); > against Dutch and Belgians (2003 onwards); > against Norwegians and Swedes (2003 onwards); > against Thais (2003 onwards); > against Nigerians ( 1965 onwards); against Canadians ( 2001 onwards); > against Latin America ( 2003 onwards); > against Australia ( 2002 onwards); global against the infidels ( 2001 ongoing); > on the high seas with the crews of the commercial ships (ongoing)
http://www.loonwatch.com/2010/01/not-all-terrorists-are-muslims/
According to FBI data, there were more Jewish acts of terrorism within the United States than Islamic (7% vs 6%). These radical Jews committed acts of terrorism in the name of their religion. These were not terrorists who happened to be Jews; rather, they were extremist Jews who committed acts of terrorism based on their religious passions,
The ignorance dispalyed in your comment is all to common. As a matter of fact, there are Christian churches throughout the Muslim world, and there always have been. Saudi Arabia is currently negotiating with the Vatican to build a cathedral in the Kingdom.
http://www.angelfire.com/az/rescon/DECLCHRCH.html
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/williams.laments.church.decline.in.middle.east/25347.htm
http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/declining-palestinian-christian-population-fears-its-churches-are-turning-into-museums-1.317689
http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/stemming_the_decline_of_middle_east_catholics
I'm an atheist so don't really care either way (other than the violence of the persecution involved), but I do research my claims
And a lot of that culture has been destroyed by Islamic fanatics. during various Jihadi waves of the last 1,300 years.
The idea that Muslim leaders have no agency or agenda of their own--that they are merely reacting to Western imperialism--is laughable on its face. It would be nice if the problem were that simple and easy to solve--unfortunately it is not.
I propose that the main problem is the continuing conflict between two incompatible worldviews represented by political Islam and liberal democracy. This conflict is represented by the bifurcation of the United Nations. All the nation members ascribe to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights except the Muslim nations. They refuse to honor the UDHR and have instead drawn up the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam, which essentially lists the rights found in Sharia law.
The conflict, as usual, is rooted in ideology.
Islam at least seems founded on the belief that a clergy in the Judeo/Christian sense is undesirable. Despite this belief, religious leaders in some Muslim countries manage to gain far too much control--typically in the name of religious purity and a desire to return to "better times" that in fact never existed except for the human tendency to remember the good and forget the bad...
"Much of the ensuing debate has focused on Muslim immigrants, with some migrant families reluctant to integrate into a society they feel is prejudiced against them.
“I don’t think that changing my personality, or the way I look, or the way I talk, or even my mother tongue would have any effect on the German culture,” said immigrant Anissa Feras.
Projects like this local community centre are aimed at aiding integration and teaching children the German language from an early age. But with few bilingual Arabic or Turkish schools, families like Anissa's are sending their children to private schools where her children do not yet learn German."
"Immigration officer Arnold Mengelkoch takes RT to New Koln, in the west of Berlin. “They call this area the Gaza strip because the further along it you go the more Arabic it becomes,”
http://rt.com/Top_News/2010-10-26/germany-ethnic-enclaves-immigration.html
A society cannot grow when people of a similar heritage choose to live by their own tastes in a place with a traditional and long-rooted heritage and tastes of their own. The society grows when new members adapt to and eventually bring about their own change to the mores and tastes of the host culture.
Multiculturalism is FAR too similar to the idea of "separate but equal"!!!! Frankly, I believe they are one and the same--just named by those of opposite perspective.
In the above case and with others, the struggle was for civil rights, equal opportunities and equal treatment. In the case of muslims it is not possible because they carry a domineering ideological baggage. Name one non muslim country which is comfortable with a muslim minority. They can not integrate and they will demand extra rights; like halal food, footpaths, time for five prayers, dislike of dogs and liquour etc and it is the majority that will be forced to cave in.
It is an ultimatum and it should be enforced; allowing the muslim countries to be theocratic will condemn the minorities there for wholesale elimination. Is this acceptable? The bigger danger is muslims trying to make a Somalia out of Switzerland. Reade their5 own stated objective:
“We reject the U.N., reject America, reject all law and order. Don't lobby Congress or protest because we don't recognize Congress. The only relationship you should have with America is to topple it. . . . Eventually there will be a Muslim in the White House dictating the laws of Shariah." -- Muhammad Faheed, Muslim Students Association meeting, Queensborough Community College, 2003
"Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Koran should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on earth." -- CAIR cofounder and longtime Board chairman Omar Ahmad, 1998
"I wouldn't want to create the impression that I wouldn't like the government of the United States to be Islamic sometime in the future." -- CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper, 1993
"If only Muslims were clever politically, they could take over the United States and replace its constitutional government with a caliphate." -- prominent American Muslim leader Siraj Wahhaj, 2002
May I offer constructive criticism from the relative security and tolerance of the Jordanian Dead Sea as I look across to Palestine and Jerusalem near the end of my very long holiday in the region?
The idea of a "Cooperation Corps" is reasonable, but why do you speak only of student participation? The U.S. students willing to volunteer for such are most likely not among those who most need to be reached. Honestly, I believe that participation by adults and even traditional family units would be most beneficial.
Also, "underprivileged areas" of the U.S. (especially in cities) tend to be dangerous and violent. Those who would come from Muslim-majority countries where violent crime tends to be extremely rare would likely be intimidated, frightened and even targeted. Moreover, given the opportunities afforded to and relative wealth of even the "underprivileged" in the U.S., I have a terrible feeling that such exchange would not produce the desired result and in fact make the problem worse.
Oh how I wish that something similar were currently available to me as this stage in my life finds me able to go away for extended periods and I would truly enjoy working and living alongside basic people in a Muslim-dominate country. Their world remains somewhat foreign to me yet the strength that binds good people of all nationalities, religions etc. seems especially abundant in their lives. They seem to have an overabundance of what, to me, seems to be dying in the U.S.
Now stop talking about doing something and do something.
Good luck.
Do you (or anyone) know of any organization that could aid me in this quest? While quite spiritual, I am not truly religious and would prefer not to work with any organization religious group for this purpose. Language is also a problem. While I can speak and understand very basic Turkish, my knowledge of Arabic is nearly zilch.
Quite the contrary, it may radicalize those who participate in these online slug fests.
The re-engagement must begin with art: music, dance, poetry. cartoons ( OK not cartoons).
This is the primary medium of exchange right now-- Hollywood films and Western music are dominant in the Islamic world.
And some Islamic music is becoming familiar to Westerners.
For instance, the music and singing of late and much lamented genius, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan is well known in the West. Turkish Whirling Dervishes, toured the West to considerable acclaim.
Artists are the only ones who finely attuned to various indignities and absurdities of life.
Nietzsche, the supreme social psychologist once said :" We need need Arts, lest we all perish from the Truth."
Time to take the debate out of hands of religious fanatics and political demagogues, Of any stripe.
I feel I can talk more freely and coherently with a gigging guitarist from Algeria than a multikulti obsessed colleague from the social studies department. Sad.
The commenter seems to suggest that it has to be "his/her way or the highway", and I don't know the nationality of the commenter. Regardless, that doesn't suggest freedom of any sort to me. Also, I was unaware that the "West" created the modern world, frankly I don't know what that means. Telling "Muslims of Islamic lands to accept Western freedom" sounds more like an ultimatum. And of course there will always be conflict. Ultimatums and rigid adherence to personal beliefs or nationalities is no solution.
I believe I was referring to the violent reactions by Muslims in Muslim dominated lands to the Mo-Toons, Draw Mohamed Day and Qur'an burning.
My point was that we have the right to do those things here. Violent behavior, death threats cannot be tolerated. That was what I meant when I said they must accept Western freedom.
I am American BTW.
Not sure what the Modern World is? A short list.
Space exploration.
The Internet.
The Telephone.
Light bulbs.
Assembly line production of automobiles.
Smallpox vaccine and eradication of it.
The Camera and photographs.
The typewriter.
Ac/Dc electricity.
Hydro electric power plants.
The Drill bit that got the Chilean miners free.
Antibiotics
Satellites
Airplanes
Radio
Democracy and representative Republics
My point is this. The Western world, that is Europe, some Mediterranean countries and the USA have made the world what it is today, modern, as in not hunting and gathering tribally led communities.
I will try to be more clear in the future.
I must have watched the Vatocum fall apart & roll onto all the believers 30 times.
I love that scene.
Until the Muslims of Islamic lands accept the Western freedom and learn to adapt to the modern world created by the free West there will remain conflict.
The two civilizations and ways of thinking are polar opposites of each other. Yes people are people, and our point of references do make it seem that we are worlds apart. Unless the Muslim world begins to welcome freedom of speech, thought and press along with the right to practice all religions freely there will be conflict.
It is well past time the Muslim dominated world begin to demonstrate to the rest of the world that they are serious about finding common ground and building lasting peace with the unbelieving world.
With the simplest of accomodation to the mores in countries dominated by Islam, I find an amazing degree of acceptance and genuine hospitality with hardly any hint of a desire to convert or change me in any way. I even say this as a gay man traveling with my lover of 25 years. While I suspect that nearly everyone suspects that we are a gay couple, nobody seems to care and does not seem to treat us with either contempt or fear. Even in areas that I would deem to be extremely conservative, we are frequently given a room with one bed to share without asking and without any funny looks.
My few conversation with Saudis have been utterly enlightening--please believe me when I report that they too find the religious domination of their country to be old-fashioned and believe that their own royal family is FAR less conservative and doing their best to bring about change.
It's a pleasure reading your posts. Insight and clear prose--a powerful combination.