President Obama Seeks to Bridge Differences with Islam
Jerome Socolovsky | Washington 18 March 2010US President Barack Obama has again postponed his trip to Indonesia because of pressing issues in the U.S. The trip is part of his ongoing effort to reach out to Muslims worldwide. Last year, he gave a speech in Cairo that was considered a landmark in the effort to bridge differences between Islam and the West. Many Muslims believe he should do more.
Of course they do, and they will never be happy until we cater to their every demand. Does the author of this article, even begin to realize that?
Frictions between Islam and the West often flare up – like when when a Danish newspaper published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed – or when Muslim girls in Europe went to school wearing veils, or new minarets in Switzerland were banned.
If Muslims cannot deal with freedom of speech, and expression that is their problem. The West should not change a thing to suit a backwards ideology like Islam. If Muslims do not like the rules of the West, they should move to an Islamic country. We owe them nothing.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have also complicated America’s relationship with the Islamic world.
Last year, President Obama went to Cairo hoping to change that. He extended the traditional Muslim greeting, and said while he is a Christian, his father’s family includes generations of Muslims. “I’ve come here to Cairo to seek a new beginning, between the United States and Muslims around the world,” he said.
The real translation of this is that Obama wants us to cater to Islam, and respect the religion of war.
He declared that the U.S. is not at war with Islam, but is against violent extremists who exploit the tensions between Islam and the West.
Herein lies the problem, because Islam is at war with us. Those “violent extremists” are only following the Islamic scriptures.
Those tensions go all the way back to the Crusades – when Christian armies invaded the Holy Land.
The Crusades were the result of 100’s of years of Muslim aggression, and if they did not happen, we would all be living under Islamic rule now.
Since the September 11 attacks, attempts to bridge the differences between the two civilizations have acquired a new urgency.
Recently, Sunni and Shi’ite clerics met with Christian counterparts at the National Cathedral in Washington.
So what? Interfaith dialogue has been going on for centuries, and now the problem is in our backyard. The talks are just a stall tactic by Muslims, as their agenda of taking over the world moves forward. How can we believe anything that they say anyway? As their religion encourages them to lie.
Professor Ahmad El Tayeb of Al Azhar University in Cairo said the President’s speech there was a landmark. “I was there, and I admired that speech very much. But we are still waiting to see practical results,” he said.
He says the U.S. shouldn’t side with Israel or fight wars in Muslim countries.
Of course not, and their hatred of Jews stems from Islam itself.
Abu Huraira reported Allah’s Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him; but the tree Gharqad would not say, for it is the tree of the Jews.
As for not fighting in Islamic countries, in other words Muslim countries should be allowed to harbor terrorist organizations. Apparently the author of this article, has no problem with this endless list of demands.
Fouad Ajami heads the Middle East Studies program at the School of Advanced International Studies in Washington. “I think in many ways some of the issues Mr. Obama raised were legitimate ones. But he overpromised, he overpromised, and eventually he was going to come down to earth,” he said.
Ajami says there’s only so much an American president can do. He says the conflict is actually within Islam. “In fact what has happened over the last generation is that Islam has been hijacked for all practical purposes by the most extreme elements in the Muslim world. And you have these radical preachers in Yemen, you have these radical preachers in south Asia, you have these radical preachers in Pakistan. And I think that the Muslims finally awakened to the fact that their faith is in danger, that their faith has become in many ways synonymous with radicalism,” he said.
Mohammad himself was a terrorist.
Volume 4, Book 52, Number 220:
Narrated Abu Huraira:
Allah’s Apostle said, “I have been sent with the shortest expressions bearing the widest meanings, and I have been made victorious with terror (cast in the hearts of the enemy), and while I was sleeping, the keys of the treasures of the world were brought to me and put in my hand.” Abu Huraira added: Allah’s Apostle has left the world and now you, people, are bringing out those treasures (i.e. the Prophet did not benefit by them).
So did Mohammad hijack the religion that he started? Come on Ajami, you are going to have a lot better than the “hijacked” con.
The president’s task is not easy. At home, critics accuse him of apologizing for America.
Still, Mr. Obama holds up his own country as a place where people of all religions can thrive. “And that includes nearly 7 million American Muslims in our country today who, by the way, enjoy incomes and educational levels that are higher than the American average,” he said.
He is apologizing for America, and we are sick of it. Like I said earlier, we do not owe Muslims a thing. Their education levels do not mean that they do not want Islam to dominate America. It only makes them more dangerous.
Several hundred Muslims worship every Friday at the Islamic Cultural Center in Washington, D.C.
Some are diplomats from nearby embassies. But many are citizens who have lived in America for decades. They still believe in Mr. Obama’s message. “People think he’s going to do the thing in a snap, he cannot do that,” said Mohamed Adje, a worshiper.
Another worshiper, Mohammed Abdul Meguid Saleh, added “No way can push everything fast. Everything is going to be okay. It’s not easy, it take time to get everything together.”
When the president travels to Indonesia, he’ll have another opportunity to reach out to the Muslim world. It’s a place that is personal for him – he lived there as a child. So at the very least, he can once again present himself as a symbol of hope for reconciliation between Islam and the West.
If you noticed, the author does not care that nothing has been asked of the Islamic world. He is ready to drop to his knees in submission, I will not! Will you?
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