9/11 created a wound that aggravated the divide between the Muslim World and the West. The demise of Osama bin Laden, coinciding with the wave of revolutions in the Arab world, is a hopeful milestone. We hope it will bring to a close the chapter of terrorism, whether committed by non-state actors like al Qaeda or state actors like Libya's Gaddafi.
I applaud President Obama for his resolute efforts in the war against terror, including bringing bin Laden to justice and supporting the aspirations of the Arab world to establish democratic regimes responsive to the needs of their people.
As our president reminded us, bin Laden did not represent Islam. The Quran explicitly states that no soul shall be responsible for the sins of another. Terrorism, which targets innocents who had no part in a crime, fundamentally violates this Quranic commandment. Thousands of innocents, including Muslims in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, have been the targets of al Qaeda's actions.
Terrorism breaks down the structures of civic society, destroys lives and economies. What we all need now is to build the vibrant bonds of community and commit to peace work.
I join my fellow human beings of all faith communities in praying for a more peaceful world to come.
WATCH IMAM FEISAL DISCUSS BIN LADEN'S DEATH:
Video produced by Odyssey Networks.
Osama bin Laden - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Osama Bin Laden Dead, Obama Announces
Do governments in Christian majority nations reflect the principles of Christianity?
There is no separate sect in Islam called Al Quaida; majority of them are Sunnis. The most peaceful sect is Ahemediaas, who are persecuted by both Sunnis and Shiaas as apostates.
"The Quran explicitly states that no soul shall be responsible for the sins of another."
How about the hundred and odd Meccan violent verses?
"What exactly is the "Islamization of the USA and Europe"?
Destruction of native culture as it happened in Christian Egypt and Lebanon,Persian Iran and Buddhist Afganistan and replacing it with militant Islamic culture.
“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
And, as discussed before, per the quotations you posted above, anecdotal statements from individual Muslims over a time range from 8 to 18 years ago, don't exactly represent the world's 1.6 Billion Muslims, currently.
Maybe we can look for a statement by a Muslim that's more current.
Here's one:
"What we all need now is to build the vibrant bonds of community and commit to peace work."
~Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, 2011
I agree wholeheartedly.
May i ask what is your relationship to Islam or perhaps Mr Abdul Rauf ?
LOVE and HATRED MAKE ONE BLIND.
on one hand AL-Qaeda blinded by hatred of US ...........on the other hand this blinded by Love of Islam
Their love of Islam have blinded them to the real world..............
Simple; for the Sunnis and Shiaas they are apostates, like Ahemediaas. That is the cultural rule. Read this:
"Before I was nine I had learned the basic canon of Arab life. It was me against my brother; me and my brother against our father; my family against my cousins and the clan; the clan against the tribe; and the tribe against the world and all of us against the infidel." – Leon Uris, 'The Haj'
"Imam Rauf has done exactly this, in coordination with the U.S. State Department, during both the Bush and Obama administrations."
I can see the effect. Read this:
"The church of Saint Mina church was the first to be attacked. According to its pastor Fr. Abanoub the attack started at 5.30 PM on Saturday May 7, when church parishioners noticed a large number of Salafis, estimated at 3000 men, congregating near the church. Anticipating trouble, the army was called. The Salafis went to the church and asked to search it because they believed a Christian girl named called Abir, who had converted to Islam, married a Salafi and wanted to revert back to Christianity, was hiding inside the church. The Muslims circulated a rumor that the husband of Abir received a call from her asking him to save her as she was being "tortured" inside the church."
http://www.aina.org/news/20110508144114.htm
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2010/1105/In-Pakistan-militant-attacks-on-Sufi-shrines-on-the-rise
Incorrect. If mainstream Sunni Muslims felt free to kill Sufis, there would be a lot more murder in the world. Al Qaeda doesn't murder people because they're Sunni, but rather, because they are mass-murdering extremists.
"I can see the effect."
Sometimes you almost seem like a cynical person, especially where Muslims are concerned.
Peace is a lot harder to measure than violence -- but it's infinitely more powerful (see: Gandhi).
As a practicing Jew, and 6th generation American, I have been privileged to read your book the Great Theft, which opened my eyes to the deep rooted similarities between our respective religions (Muslims have a body of scholarship akin to the Talmud, and its commentators!!, a thought provoking analogy). This prompted me to become close friends with a scholarly and practicing Muslim-American of Turkish decent. Our conversations always turn to the need for more true and indisputable Muslim-scholars, like yourself, to speak out loud and very clear.
True, I respectively disagree with your decision to build the mosque at that site, and see Islams inherent need to spread its method of worshiping one G-d as providential and problematic (for another time, by another man). Still, until your interpretation of Islam prevails, "you must incessantly shout from the roof-tops".
I wish that all our hearts should truly desire manifest peace,
Mendel H
They will bitterly regret what they did, because it will destroy them.
Your very first sentence feels a bit dodgy. "9/11 created a wound that aggravated the divide between the Muslim World and the West"
9/11 is a date. A reference point. Perhaps a title, if you like.
"Created a wound that aggravated the divide"... There have been thousands of such wounds. We have seen them celebrated as "glory to god" throughout the Muslim countries of the middle east and in many Muslim communities for decades. Many times have we witnessed the dancing in the streets. We have heard the outrageous bloodthirsty sermons by the Imams in their holiest of places. We saw that the name "osama" became one of the most popular arab names of all time.
I applaud the rest of your post.
However, until the Muslim worldwide community faces the devil it has created, nothing will change.
Will the so called "Arab spring" bear the fruits of democracy, of mutual respect and understanding,
of equal rights, an even playing field, and fairness....?? It is a long way off.
It begins with the people, but it begins as well in the mosques. The Imams are the leaders; and until such time as they face the destruction they have championed from the pulpit, and renounce it completely, it will continue.
I am acutely aware that you do not speak for all Muslims on a global scale.
I thank you for your post.
we can say the same for Christianity, can we? Crusades? Inquisitions? Perpetual wars of convenience in the last 20 years?
"Many times have we witnessed the dancing in the streets. "
you must have heard that this was an Israeli fabrication. Palestinians were the biggest loosers of 9/11, if they did something it was probably only sobbing
"We saw that the name "osama" became one of the most popular arab names of all time. "
it is a nice name, its deeply rooted in arabic language and tradition. It didnt become any more popular after 9/11, i know a lot of osama's who changed their names
I thank you for your post as it seems sincere, but highly misinformed about muslims, islam and history in general
They did dance as Saddam rained down scuds during Desert Storm.
With respect to the Palestinians support of terror operations, the naming of city squares, soccer teams and schools after mass bombers of civilians is a fact for which there is no dispute.
The internet is full of videos of Muslim clerics worldwide in full support of Jihad against the "infidel" wherever he/she may be found. We see the deaths of UN workers because of a burned Koran; in very recent memory.
I fully suspect that the Muslim community has a PR problem. I mean that earnestly.
However, a community that is seen rioting over a cartoon, whose leadership issues fatwas at acclaimed authors, has more than just a PR problem. It has an ongoing identity crisis. For which many innocents are paying the price.
Even CAIR was included as an "unindicted co-conspirator" in this case:
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA § VS. § CR NO. 3:04-CR-240-G
HOLY LAND FOUNDATION §
FOR RELIEF AND DEVELOPMENT,
also known as the “HLF” (01)
(http://www.camera.org/images_user/cair%20unindicted%20coconspirator.pdf)
I know that this does not represent the Muslim community in its entirety. But the few "bad apples" are so bad that they are poisoning the entire basket.
The truth about him is easy enough to determine, for anyone who knows how to use Google, and who is not naive enough to believe the lies propagated via anti-Muslim hate sites.
To give you an idea of the very broad base of interfaith and secular support that Imam Rauf and his Cordoba Initiative have, just click on the link below to see a list of supporting organizations:
http://www.cordobainitiative.org/about/supporting-partners/
If Imam Rauf was any kind of extremist, would so many organizations lend their names to support his project?
Here's a sample handful from that list; please click the link above to see the entire list of supporting organizations:
American Civil Liberties Union
Aloha Sangha
Auburn Seminary
American Jewish Committee
Beit Simchat Torah Congregation
Cathedral of St. John the Divine
Congregation B’nai Jeshurun
Downtown Independent Democrats
Episcopal Diocese of New York
Islamic Networks Group
Jewish Community Center in Manhattan
New York Buddhist Church
September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows
Tanenbaum Center
Trinity Church
Union Theological Seminary
UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Asia and the Pacific
It isn't.
We as Muslims need to reach out to all our brothers and sisters in the Human Family and help move them away from fears that have stemmed from yes the actions of a small vocal and violent extremist minority of Muslims as well as the radicalisation of the mindset of an increasing number of people in the United States from media such as Fox and the Islamophobic Tea Party which is gradually taking over the GOP Republican Party.
We all need to find ways of stepping back from fears induced by extremists - period!
Agreed.
Faved.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/11/AR2010081106254.html
And there are actually quite a few groups in other religions that are more than happy to reach out to Muslims, too.
Here are just two recent examples:
Heartsong Church Welcomes Islamic Center, Memphis, TN
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/08/heartsong-church-memphis-islamic-center_n_710053.html
Jewish Leaders Support Imam Rauf's Community Center Project
http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Jewish-Leaders-Gather-to-Support-Ground-Zero-Mosque-100049479.html
Thousands of other Muslims in Egypt literally risked their lives to act as human shields, at Coptic Christian church services, supporting and defending Coptic Christians against death threats made by Muslim terrorists.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/07/egyptian-muslims-serve-as_n_805951.html
Islam, like all religions, has a complete spectrum of people in it ... from peaceful and loving to violent and extreme, with a whole lot of regular people in the middle.
If your entire knowledge-base of something is based on news stories and/or hate sites, your understanding may be incomplete, at best.
No large group of people in the world has ever been able to be accurately evaluated by only news stories and derogatory statements about it.
Why would Islam and Muslims be the first?
"Cordoba project"! "
What has Imam Rauf said, or done, to give you this impression?
As far as I know, what he has said about Cordoba, a key city of al-Andalus, as southern Spain was known from the 8th through the 15th centuries, is:
"The name Cordoba was chosen to symbolize the time in history when Muslims, Jews and Christians lived together in peace and harmony and created a prosperous center of intellectual, spiritual, cultural and commercial life in the city of Cordoba in Southern Spain."
Source: http://www.cordobainitiative.org/about/
Here's one example:
20+ Min. interview with Imam Rauf on al-Jazeera
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zJCZheCCkA