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THE WASHINGTON TIMES
March 5, 2002
Vivid Examples of Fundamental Wrong
By Dennis Prager
There are frightening lessons to be learned from the Islamic
terrorists' kidnapping and slaughter of Daniel Pearl.
The first is that, unlike any preceding immigration to the West,
millions of Muslims living in the Western world remain unaffected
by Western values such as religious tolerance. Omar Saeed Sheikh,
the head of Jaish-e-Mohammed (the Army of Mohammed), the Pakistani
terrorist group that killed Mr. Pearl, was born in England and
educated at the London School of Economics.
One would think that the West's core values would influence the
Muslims in its midst. Sometimes this happens, but more often
Muslims living in the West actually become more insular and radical.
It was British Muslims, not Middle Eastern Muslims, who first
raised the charge against the Indian Muslim writer Salman Rushdie
that he belittled Islam and Mohammed in his novel "The Satanic
Verses." They pushed the Islamists who rule Iran to issue
the infamous fatwa (religious decree) calling on Muslims throughout
the world to kill the novelist.
The Ayatollah Khomeini's fatwa against Mr. Rushdie provided an
early example of how radicalized organized Muslim life in the
United States and Europe had become: American and European Muslim
leaders reacted to the fatwa with either silence or support.
The Washington Post reported last week that Muslim elementary
and high schools in the United States routinely teach religious
hatred:
"
[One] 11th-grade textbook, for example, says one sign of the
Day of Judgment will be that Muslims will fight and kill Jews,
who will hide behind trees that say: 'Oh Muslim, Oh servant of
God, here is a Jew hiding behind me. Come here and kill him.'
Several students of different ages, all of whom asked not to
be identified, said that in Islamic studies, they are taught
that it is better to shun and even to dislike Christians, Jews
and Shi'ite Muslims."
In addition, "maps of the Middle East hang on classroom
walls, but Israel is missing." And the article quotes a
19-year-old American Muslim student at George Mason University: "A
lot of the [Muslim] students can't make up their minds if [Osama
bin Laden] is a good guy or a bad guy."
Given the anti-Christian, anti-Semitic and anti-American sentiments
that are held by many Muslims in the West, it is not surprising
that there has yet to be a single reported Muslim demonstration
in the United States or Europe against Islamic terrorism. Just
as it is unsurprising that the leader of the Islamic terrorists
who killed Daniel Pearl was British born and educated.
The second frightening lesson of the Pearl killing is the degree
of evil emanating from parts of the Muslim world. Let's be honest:
Islamic terrorist groups and their many supporters are morally
indistinguishable from Nazis — they invert good and evil,
are sadistic, are imbued with a belief in their superiority over
all other groups, and seek to dominate the world.
Yet many in the West deny this evil. Some view Muslim terrorists
as inevitable products of the poverty of their societies (despite
the extraordinary wealth of bin Laden and the affluence of Omar
Sheikh); or as an understandable reaction to U.S. sanctions on
Iraq and support for Israel (as if containing Saddam Hussein
or enabling Israel to fight Islamic terrorism are not moral policies);
or as simply one more example of religious fundamentalism, comparable
to American Christian fundamentalism. Former New York Times columnist
Anthony Lewis likened Attorney General John Ashcroft, an evangelical
Christian, to Osama bin Laden.
Perhaps those Americans and Europeans who resist applying the
term "evil" to U.S. enemies (whether to the Soviet
totalitarians during the Reagan era or to the Muslim totalitarians
now) ought to be compelled to view the videotape of Daniel Pearl's
throat being cut for the crime of being an American and a Jew.
Come to think of it, Muslim school officials should also see
the tape.
Watching that Islamic snuff film might awaken them to the type
of human beings some textbooks, maps and mosque sermons are producing
right in our midst. |
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