Analyst's note: Here we see "information warfare" at its absolute finest being executed by the Islamist jihadist Feisal Abdul Rauf. For a great example of “information warfare” check out the recent column penned by the Ground Zero Mosque imam Feisal Abdul Rauf and carried in The Wall Street Journal (highlights added). It’s worth the two minutes it takes to read it and see for yourself how the lame-stream media is being used by our Islamist enemy.
Remember, this is the man who started a sharia index to measure how sufficiently governments comply with sharia law, a central doctrine of which is jihad. This is the man who said governments that don’t practice sharia are “unjust.”
Now he’s claiming, “I hope that people of all faiths will accept my assertion that those who kill innocents in the name of Allah are not true Muslims.”
Our question for Imam Rauf: “If your assertion is true, what does that make Muhammad?”
After all, the prophet Muhammad, in the name of Allah, led, organized or ordered dozens of raids, attacks, and assassinations, and thousands died as a result. Perhaps his most brutal act was his order to behead approximately 800 Jews in Medina who had surrendered to him.
Maybe, according to Rauf, Muhammad was not a true Muslim. Well, we know that can’t be the case.
So maybe, in Muhammad’s eyes and Rauf’s eyes, those people Muhammad killed weren’t “innocent.” Note that Rauf doesn’t say “those who kill PEOPLE are not true Muslims.” He says “those who kill INNOCENTS.” So maybe it depends on how Rauf defines an “innocent.”
For supporting details and additional perspective, please consider a search of the now 9406 news items within this CSIA Report on the terms of "Sharia", "information warfare", "jihad", "Islamist", "Salafists", "Dhimmi", "Achilles Heel", "Tawfik", "Phares", "Muslim Brotherhood", "Caliphate", "Iran", "Hawala", "Cordoba", "Moderate Muslim", and "CAIR"
Information warfare folks. With your help we can continue to expose it.
Fox News host Bill O'Reilly was right when he insisted that Abders Behring Breivik, who committed mass murders in Norway in July, is not a Christian. Even though Breivik referred to himself often as a Christian, Mr. O'Reilly noted, no one who slaughters innocents can be a follower of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace.
The Bible says "Thou shall Not Kill." The Bible says we should love our neighbor as ourselves. Those are the values of a true Christian.
Now I hope that people of all faiths will accept my assertion that those who kill innocents in the name of Allah are not true Muslims. That's a much harder thing for Christians and Westerners to accept. In the immediate aftermath of the horror in Norway, Western news media leapt to the assumption it was the work of Muslim terrorists.
When I launched my effort last year to build an Islamic Community Center in Lower Manhattan as part of reconciliation after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the vitriol hurled against me and Islam was overwhelming. Islam is evil, our critics said. The only good Muslim is a dead Muslim.
It is little wonder, then, that the screeds of the sharpest critics of our community center showed up in the 1,500-page manifesto Breivik wrote to explain his actions. Hate breeds hate.
But the fact is that true adherence to Islam at its essence is as peaceful as true adherence to Christianity. The Holy Quran says that whoever kills an innocent, it is as if he has killed all mankind. True adherence to Islam would end terrorist attacks not just against civilians in the West but also among Muslim groups that still are blowing each other up in Iraq and Afghanistan.
At some point, we must recognize that the real battlefield in this world is not between Muslims and non-Muslims but between extremists of any stripe and the anti-extremists of all faiths.
We hear very little about the underlying fundamentals of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. These are three faiths based on the Abrahamic principle that the purpose of humankind is to praise God and to help each other. The tenets of each religion provide common ground to work out the underlying issues of power and control that actually are at the root of conflict.
Moderate people in the West and the Muslim world understand this. But too often, especially in this time of indiscriminate communication, the moderates have let themselves be hijacked by extremists.
It's time to build a Global Coalition of the Moderates. This may sound like a wimpy thing, but I can tell you from hard experience, moderation is a dangerous place to be. It takes courage and stamina to stand up to the people who love their megaphones and nurture their hatred.
We must start with this premise: Extremists can never live together in peace. Conflict for them must be eternal. That's why the Coalition of the Moderates must work together—different religions not just in toleration of each other but in acceptance of each other.
We must use the basic peaceful principles of our religions to overwhelm the extremists. In this way, religion can be part of the solution, not the cause of the problem.
I ask my brothers and sisters of all faiths, especially members of the media, to join hands with me in building that future.
Imam Rauf is the founder of Cordoba Initiative, an independent, multifaith and multinational project that works to improve Muslim-West relations.
