Charles Krauthammer explains it better than any I’ve seen:
…Radical Islam is not, by any means, a majority of Islam. But with its financiers, clerics, propagandists, trainers, leaders, operatives and sympathizers — according to a conservative estimate, it commands the allegiance of 7 percent of Muslims, i.e., more than 80 million souls — it is a very powerful strain within Islam. It has changed the course of nations and affected the lives of millions. It is the reason every airport in the West is an armed camp and every land is on constant alert.
Ground Zero is the site of the most lethal attack of that worldwide movement, which consists entirely of Muslims, acts in the name of Islam and is deeply embedded within the Islamic world. These are regrettable facts, but facts they are. And that is why putting up a monument to Islam in this place is not just insensitive but provocative…
The only thing I’d add to that is the fact that while almost all Moslems are not terrorists, the evidence clearly indicates that we, in the West, are incapable of determining which particular Moslems will or won’t become a Jihadist. There is no patter to who joins – long-domiciled Moslems in the West; Moslem who are rich; Moslems who are poor; Moslems who have never committed a crime; Moslems who have a rap sheet a mile long; Moslems straight out of the middle east; Western converts to Islam; Moslems who until just yesterday were acting like Westerners; Moslems from the worst Islamic tyrannies; Moslems from comparatively moderate Islamic nations. We can say who is recruiting, we can determine where the appeal of the Islamist message lies – we just can’t tell who will fall for it.
To then try to separate the wheat from the chaff becomes an impossible task – any Moslem, any where, might wind up being an enemy or a friend, and may change sides back and forth. Given this, great care has to be taken in dealing with Moslems – with the most important thing being a clear assertion on our part of strength. Flabbiness invites contempt and people – especially the gullible sorts of people who would go in for jihad – like to be on the winning side.
By standing firm against the mosque – while maintaining our respect of Moslems as individuals and for those truths which Islam adheres to – we are showing the Moslems of the world our strength. While a few – and invariably these are in the enemy camp – will loudly complain, most reasonable, decent Moslems will both understand and respect us for standing on principle.
This War on Terrorism is only partially a military conflict – it is primarily a conflict of ideas. And ideas are not sold entirely on their merits but also on the public perception about the ideas. Who wants to subscribe to the ideas of people who won’t even stand up for themselves? We spoke in our Declaration of Independence of our manly firmness in resisting tyrannical demands – we must be just like that in confronting and dealing with Islam. Do that, and we’ll be half way home on defeating terrorism.
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