Is Your Muslim Doctor the Enemy?How terrorist groups target middle-class Muslims.
By Eboo PatelPosted Monday, July 23, 2007, at 11:53 AM ETThis article appears in conjunction with a special weeklong series on Islam published by On Faith, the Washington Post's religion blog. To read more, visit On Faith.
This seems to be what happened to Mohammad Asha, the young Jordanian doctor of Palestinian descent accused of playing a key role in the London/Glasgow terror plot. A brilliant medical student from a family of physicians, Asha's parents and professors insist he had no interest in political Islam while in Jordan. A friend of his, speaking to the United Kingdom's Daily Mail, said that Asha had become radicalized at the hands of extremist recruiters in Britain. The issue they used to stir his rage? The Danish cartoons defiling the Prophet Mohammed.
The way to win this war is to define us and them based on clear principles and resist all divisions based on religion or ethnicity. The central principle we stand for is pluralism, the commitment to a society where people with different beliefs live in equal dignity and mutual loyalty. People who believe in pluralism come from all backgrounds—Christian and Muslim, believer and atheist, Arab and American.
Their central principle is totalitarianism, the conviction that one group should dominate and everyone else should suffocate. Totalitarians are an equally diverse but much smaller population. But there is a somewhat larger group of people who are susceptible to the totalitarian message, especially if they feel like the pluralists have already written them off.
Sun Tzu wrote in the Art of War, "If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle." Every time a mainstream Muslim is accused of being a terrorist because of his accent, his beard, or his prayers, we violate our central principle and erode our essential identity. Every time the sacred symbols of Islam are desecrated, we arm the enemy. The sooner we learn this lesson, the faster we win this war.
Remarks from the Fray:
I suppose that it doesn't help our cause to have idiots assaulting Muslims for looking like terrorists, or to have idiot cartoonists make deliberately offensive cartoons about the prophet, but really do you think those are the major issues on the minds of Muslims considering conversion to terrorism? Probably they are only icing on the cake.
The wonderful thing about Patel's commentary is that it allows us ordinary citizens to make peace with the Muslims. As long as we treat Arab and Muslim individuals with respect, so long as we don't physically assault the citizens of our countries than any further terrorism on their part must need be evidence of pure insanity and evil.
Unfortunately Muslim anger at the west is not limited to controversy over whether a Muslim girl can wear a head-scarf in grammar school, but also whether marines in Haditha should be given the opportunity to rape and murder 14 year old Iraqi girls and their families. Now I know someone is going to say that "that doesn't represent all marines" and I know this, but it was only able to happen because we are there and we are only there because George W's intelligence was "mistaken" something he has admitted, but which he hasn't done anything to rectify.
In short this is another one of those articles which purports to get "in the minds" of terrorists and their recruits, but only barely grazes the target. If we are to demonstrate to Muslims that we are not targeting them then we must do more than not assault them in our neighborhoods we should try not to assault them abroad.
--Beaujoe
(To reply, click here.)
The author is probably right that Al Qaida leaders appreciate the psychological effect of recruiting doctors to be terrorists, but I suspect that the recruiters have a more practical reason for choosing doctors. Because doctors' services are in high demand, they are able to immigrate to western countries much faster than, say, a taxi driver. In conducting a terrorist operation in a foregn country, getting your operatives where they need to be at the time you need them is paramount. Al Qaida leaders might want any number of types of persons to plant the bomb, but their choices were limited to those who could get a work visa.
--JeffMcQuary
(To reply, click here.)
It's despicable to elide 'harassing women with head scarfs', 'beating up children', and drawing a cartoon in the same light. These things are not alike in any way. One is public speech, a necessary and good part of our marketplace of ideas. The other is personal harassment, which should never be tolerated under any circumstances.
I know the author wants to pretend that these acts are of a kind. They're not. And until he (and, I suppose, the Muslim extremists) understand this, there can't be true peace. Peace will not come by eliminating differences and shutting people up. It can only come by setting ground rules of what is acceptable in a society.
I can say whatever I want about your God, anyone's God, and I demand to feel safe doing it. You can say whatever you want about my God, and you should demand to feel safe while doing it. Those are the rules, and they are absolute. I'd move heaven and earth to stop anyone, however good intentioned, from pretending that beating up a person and drawing a cartoon are along the same spectrum. They're not.
--Sickday
(To reply, click here.)
(7/26)
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Remarks from the Fray:
I suppose that it doesn't help our cause to have idiots assaulting Muslims for looking like terrorists, or to have idiot cartoonists make deliberately offensive cartoons about the prophet, but really do you think those are the major issues on the minds of Muslims considering conversion to terrorism? Probably they are only icing on the cake.
The wonderful thing about Patel's commentary is that it allows us ordinary citizens to make peace with the Muslims. As long as we treat Arab and Muslim individuals with respect, so long as we don't physically assault the citizens of our countries than any further terrorism on their part must need be evidence of pure insanity and evil.
Unfortunately Muslim anger at the west is not limited to controversy over whether a Muslim girl can wear a head-scarf in grammar school, but also whether marines in Haditha should be given the opportunity to rape and murder 14 year old Iraqi girls and their families. Now I know someone is going to say that "that doesn't represent all marines" and I know this, but it was only able to happen because we are there and we are only there because George W's intelligence was "mistaken" something he has admitted, but which he hasn't done anything to rectify.
In short this is another one of those articles which purports to get "in the minds" of terrorists and their recruits, but only barely grazes the target. If we are to demonstrate to Muslims that we are not targeting them then we must do more than not assault them in our neighborhoods we should try not to assault them abroad.
--Beaujoe
(To reply, click here.)
The author is probably right that Al Qaida leaders appreciate the psychological effect of recruiting doctors to be terrorists, but I suspect that the recruiters have a more practical reason for choosing doctors. Because doctors' services are in high demand, they are able to immigrate to western countries much faster than, say, a taxi driver. In conducting a terrorist operation in a foregn country, getting your operatives where they need to be at the time you need them is paramount. Al Qaida leaders might want any number of types of persons to plant the bomb, but their choices were limited to those who could get a work visa.
--JeffMcQuary
(To reply, click here.)
It's despicable to elide 'harassing women with head scarfs', 'beating up children', and drawing a cartoon in the same light. These things are not alike in any way. One is public speech, a necessary and good part of our marketplace of ideas. The other is personal harassment, which should never be tolerated under any circumstances.
I know the author wants to pretend that these acts are of a kind. They're not. And until he (and, I suppose, the Muslim extremists) understand this, there can't be true peace. Peace will not come by eliminating differences and shutting people up. It can only come by setting ground rules of what is acceptable in a society.
I can say whatever I want about your God, anyone's God, and I demand to feel safe doing it. You can say whatever you want about my God, and you should demand to feel safe while doing it. Those are the rules, and they are absolute. I'd move heaven and earth to stop anyone, however good intentioned, from pretending that beating up a person and drawing a cartoon are along the same spectrum. They're not.
--Sickday
(To reply, click here.)
(7/26)