Lately, Congress appears to be obsessed with Muslims.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., is holding hearings Tuesday (March 29) on "Protecting the Civil Rights of American Muslims," and Chairman Peter King has announced a second set of hearings on "Radicalization in the American Muslim Community" in the House Homeland Security Committee, this set focusing on radicalization in prisons.
Although the word "Muslim" is the one getting the most media play, I believe these hearings are really about America, and whether we value the contributions of, and cooperation between, our many different communities.
Our founding fathers were emphatic on where they stood. When George Washington was asked about his preferred workers at Mount Vernon, he replied: "If they are good workmen, they may be from Asia, Africa or Europe; they may be Mahometans (Muslims), Jews, Christians of any sect, or they may be atheists." For Washington, it wasn't just about the principle of freedom, but the practicality that in a diverse nation, bigotry toward any community not only hurts that group, but weakens the nation.
As the leader of the Continental Army, the first truly national American institution, Washington took a strong stand against anti-Catholicism. He banned insults to Catholics (including burning the pope in effigy) and told his officers to make sure Catholic soldiers were welcomed. He scolded those who disobeyed: "At such a juncture, and in such circumstances, to be insulting their religion, is so monstrous as not to be suffered or excused."
Later, as president, Washington took a stand against another prevalent form of religious bigotry: anti-Semitism. In 1790, he received a letter from Moses Sessius, the leader of the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, R.I., who was worried about the fate of Jews in the new nation.
Would they be harassed, hounded and hated as they had been for so many centuries in Europe?
"The government of the United States ... gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens," Washington replied. "May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants -- while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid."
Do these words still ring true today?
The King hearings in the House presented Muslims as a problem and, even worse, a danger. Yet that flies in the face of the best evidence. A recent study by Charles Kurzman at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill shows American Muslims were the key group in disrupting attempted domestic terror plots, and that domestic terrorism actually has multiple sources. Targeting the Muslim community -- especially while ignoring the multiple sources of risk -- hampers us from finding productive solutions to homegrown threats.
Furthermore, focusing on Muslims as a problem both ignores and frustrates the very real contributions Muslims make to America. An American Muslim, Muhammad Ali, is one of America's most celebrated sports icons. Another, Fazlur Rahman Khan, helped design the Sears Tower and the John Hancock Building in Chicago. A third, Salman Hamdani, rushed to aid his fellow Americans during the 9/11 attacks, and died when the towers fell. Don't we want young American Muslim kids seeing Congress focus on the heroes of their community rather than the villains?
George Washington welcomed the contributions of many communities because that's what America is built on, and not simply in a theoretical way. Think about Catholic schools and hospitals, or Jewish philanthropic groups -- it wasn't that long ago such efforts were viewed as seditious threats. Today, America would be unimaginable without such institutions.
President Obama, for one, realizes this. "We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus, and non-believers," he declared in his inaugural address. "We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth."
The Durbin hearings -- focusing on Muslim Americans as citizens, not some outside threat -- should be applauded. It's not just about protecting a minority religious community, but strengthening American society and reminding us of the tradition of pluralism set forth by those who built this great country.
This story was published originally via the Religion News Service.
Follow Eboo Patel on Twitter: www.twitter.com/EbooPatel
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"I have posted previously about the plight of the Jews of Malmö, Sweden, who have been under siege by the Islamist-Leftist Anti-Israel Coalition, what I called Malmö Syndrome.
Islamists across Europe have used anti-Israel agitation to justify acts of anti-Semitic violence, and anti-Israel leftists have either encouraged or excused such violence, as in Malmö. In a prior post, Not Just Malmö, I also noted the shared extremism of neo-Nazis and migrant Muslim youth in Germany fueled by anti-Israel rhetoric.
Now the Swedish tolerance of Islamist violence is coming around to haunt Sweden, as the Islamists have turned their attacks against Sweden itself, using publication of cartoons of Mohammed as the all-purpose excuse. As reported by The New York Times (emphasis mine):
One man was killed and two other people were injured when two explosions hit the heart of Stockholm’s city-center shopping district on Saturday evening, the police in the Swedish capital said. The country’s foreign minister called the blasts a terrorist attack, and an e-mail to news organizations minutes before the blasts seemed to link them to anger over anti-Islamic cartoons and the war in Afghanistan....
http://legalinsurrection.blogspot.com/2010/12/all-swedes-are-malmo-jews-now.html
mpac article is clearly partisan and is unacceptable. Rand information does not conform to reality; taking note of more than 16,000 terror attacks have been committed by the jihadis world over since 9/11. It appears to be poitically balancing act.
First there are no violent verses in any Hindu scriptures; they are there in the Quaraan and OT.
The instances you have quoted are stray incidents and court cases have been filed and convictions secured. To compare them with the record of 1400 years of uniterrupted jihadi violence is inappropriate.
"But there are plenty of hindu and sikh hate or terror organizatiÂons"
Rubbish. They do not have any theological backing as in the case of Islam.
"Get some perspectivÂe, man! If 1 billion-plÂus Muslims resembled anything you spew about"
If one billion plus muslims are so peace loving, how do you explain the wholesale disappearance of co religionists in all muslim countries?
"Of course Islam is a religion and they worship the same God as ChristiansÂ."
The Christians in Malaysia said that and muslims burnt some twenty churches. No. Islam is a socio political movement.
"A conservatiÂve estimate shows that 2/3 of all terrorist acts in the US since 9/11 2001 have been committed by non-MuslimÂs, namely by right-wing extremists and white supremacisÂts."
Rubbish. No proof.
[Of the] 83 terrorist attacks in the United States between 9/11 and the end of 2009, only three…were clearly connected with the jihadist cause. (The RAND database includes Abdulmutallab’s failed Christmas Day attempt to detonate a bomb on an airplane.) The other jihadist plots were interrupted by authorities.
http://www.rand.org/pubs/occasional_papers/2010/RAND_OP292.pdf
A report by MPAC in 2009, so a little dated:
"There were 80 total plots by U.S.-originated non-Muslim perpetrators against the United States since 9/11. In comparison, there have been 45 total plots by U.S. and foreign-originated Muslim perpetrators since 9/11."
http://www.mpac.org/assets/docs/publications/MPAC-Post-911-Terrorism-Data.pdf
The question is why only muslims, not Hindus or Sikhs, do plot/commit such attacks? Is it because the theology underlying the religion is violent? Read what the traveller in 14th century say:
Things haven't changed since the 13th/ 14th century when Marco Polo (1254-1324) travelled through Islamised Central Asia:
"The Muslims in Persia are wicked and treacherous.
"The law which their prophet Mohamet [Muhammad] has given them lays down that any harm they may do to one who does not accept their law, and any appropriation of his goods, is no sin at all..
:And if they suffer death at the hands of Christians, they are accounted martyrs.
"For this reason they would be great wrongdoers, if it were not for the government". From Penguin 1958 edition of The Travels of Marco Polo, pp 57-58.
Last time I checked American army was involved in occupying and killing more Muslims or Muslim nations than Hindu/Sikh nation. Well, there is no Sikh nation because the Hindu majority India never allowed to form one and brutally killed anyone with such demands. The Hindu mob is so fanatical that they killed several thousands Sikh in 1984 because one of the Sikh killed Mrs. Gandhi. So revenge of one death of a Hindu resulted in thousand of Sikh dead. Similarly, the Hindu mob again killed several thousand Muslims in Gujarat since they presumed that a train was burnt by a Muslim mob that resulted in less than 100 deaths. Once again, the Hindu mob killed several Christians in Kandhamal Orissa and burned their houses and place of worship because they assumed that a Christian attacked one of their holymen. Why is that the fanatical Hindu mobs uses disproportionate force against people of other religion? Is it because of the theology underlying the religion is violent.
Ashoka, the Hindu kings killed millions in a battle and felt such a remorse that he left Hinduism to adopt Buddhism as his religion. Why did he feel the need to leave this religion? Is it because he felt the theology underlying this religion promotes disproportionate use of violence against other people?
Because the poorest country is the biggest exporter of terrorism!!!
The auhtor should explain whether Islam is a religion per se like Christianity or Hinduism etc. Read what they themselves say:
Dr. Muhammad al Alkhuli, a popular Islamic scholar, says: "Islam is a religion, but not in the western meaning of religion. The western connotation of the term "religion" is something between the believer and God. Islam as a religion organizes all aspects of life on both the individual and national levels. Islam organizes your relations with God, with yourself, with your children, with your relatives, with your neighbor, with your guest, and with other brethren. Islam clearly establishes your duties and rights in all those relationships. Islam establishes a clear system of worship, civil rights, laws of marriage and divorce, laws of inheritance, code of behavior, what not to drink, what to wear, and what not to wear, how to worship God, how to govern, the laws of war and peace, when to go to war, when to make peace, the law of economics, and the laws of buying and selling. Islam is a complete code of life."
God=Allah=God
...have you met the Republican party?
Gotcha, same old line. You may have plenty of grinning sycophants on HuffPo, but the rest of the world, thankfully, isn't quite so naive.
Really, right here are the most recent hate crimes stats directly from the FBI
crimes against Muslims: 9%
crimes against Jews: 70%
crimes against Christians: 6%
So where's all this violence? it doesn't exist you just want to believe it does. Of course you don't care about the violence against Jews because anti-semitism is cool when you're a liberal now