That should be "Qur'an," and that small mistake is a reflection of the general ignorance about Islam that pervades this story from the Montgomery Advertiser, "Entertainment media's Muslims bear little resemblance to reality" (thanks to EPG). Reporter Darryn Simmons seems to have gone to the Masjid Qasim B El-Amin in Montgomery to ask about Fox's "24," and has credulously reported as fact all the half-truths and distortions the people there fed him.
It starts with a red herring:
If they just watch TV and movies, Americans may think that many of those who believe in Islam are Arab terrorists, but local Muslim Ahmad Hasan said most Muslims aren't even of Arab descent."That's the most ironic thing," Hasan said. "They portray Arabs as representing the religion, when, in truth, the number of Arabs that are Muslims is a minute percentage."
I guess this is supposed to illustrate the ignorance of the masses, but in this context it isn't even relevant. I myself have pointed out many times that most Muslims worldwide aren't Arabs and most Arabic speakers in the U.S. aren't Muslim, but what of it? How does it show that Fox is way off base? After all, there are Arab Muslims, and Arab Muslim jihadists. It isn't as if the producers of "24" invented the concept. It looks as if the people in the Montgomery mosque want us to regard Arab Muslim jihadists the way we would regard Pennsylvania Amish car bombers.
And from the Ironic Juxtaposition Department:
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) took Fox to task about the "24" episode in the publication Broadcasting and Cable.Rabiah Ahmed, spokeswoman for CAIR, said that the show is "taking everyday American Muslim families and making them suspects ... it's very dangerous and very disturbing."...
Abdullah said he didn't complain to the station, and he isn't surprised to know that other Muslims did not.
"When you complain, it makes you look small," he said. "It naturally bothers us of course, but we don't complain to people about it -- we complain to God."
The reporter doesn't seem to have asked Abdullah whether he thinks CAIR looks small for complaining about "24."
"It doesn't make sense," he said. "Muslims are not like this, and Islam is an excellent religion -- but if a lie is told often enough people begin to think it's the truth."
Ain't it the truth! In fact, here comes a whopper now:
Muslims do not believe in converting people to their religion by force. In fact, the Qu'ran (or Koran) accepts religious pluralism and sees strength in diversity.
Note the language: the "Qu'ran" (sic) accepts "pluralism" and "diversity." Whoever it was at the mosque who told this to Simmons has mastered the art of pushing today's most effective cultural hot buttons. Muslims believe in diversity, you see. Not like those nasty Christians.
But of course, Simmons asked nothing about the humiliations and second-class status mandated for non-Muslims by Islamic law, and rooted in the Qur'an (9:29). "Pluralism"? "Diversity"? "The subject peoples," according to a manual of Islamic law, must "pay the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya)" and "are distinguished from Muslims in dress, wearing a wide cloth belt (zunnar); are not greeted with 'as-Salamu 'alaykum' [the traditional Muslim greeting, "Peace be with you"]; must keep to the side of the street; may not build higher than or as high as the Muslims' buildings, though if they acquire a tall house, it is not razed; are forbidden to openly display wine or pork . . . recite the Torah or Evangel aloud, or make public display of their funerals or feastdays; and are forbidden to build new churches." If they violate these terms, the law further stipulates that they can be killed or sold into slavery at the discretion of the Muslim leader. (‘Umdat al-Salik, o11.3, 5.)
Yeah. That's pluralism and diversity, all right. But like virtually every other reporter, he accepted what Muslims told him at face value, without probably even being aware that he might need to employ a bit of critical thinking in this regard.
This is just typical PR rubbish from the moslem side.
And here is some more from the BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4283717.stm
Islamic encounters of the third kind
By Dominic Casciani
BBC News community affairs
Dr Mustafa Ceric: Came to prominence during Balkans wars
Is Islam secure in Europe? One of the continent's leading Islamic thinkers says the future direction of Islam may depend on it being so.
You may not have heard of him, but the Grand Mufti of Bosnia is the kind of person who gets to have tea with the Prince of Wales.
On a whistle-stop speaking tour of London late last week, Dr Mustafa Ceric spent a morning debating the future of Islam and the West with Prince Charles.
And it's Dr Ceric's track record of pushing the boundaries of what is publicly sayable among Muslims that leads to such interest in his views.
The Grand Mufti is the leading Islamic legal authority among Muslims in the Balkans - some of his supporters have even dubbed him "Islam's Nelson Mandela".
He represents that strand of the faith that clung on in Europe after the Turkish Ottoman empire rolled back from the frontiers of the West.
It's difficult to admit but Muslims [in the Middle East] now need to learn from Muslims in the West - the wise men of the Islamic east and the rational men of the west must meet - and then we will have moral men
Dr Mustafa Ceric
And so, with a European and Islamic heritage ("I am proud that Islam defines my European patriotism", he says) he is well placed to see where things are going.
He came to prominence during the bloody break-up of Yugoslavia by speaking out against those who used faith as a justification for violence.
Today he has an international reputation as a man of peace and is involved in efforts to counter fears about Islam in the United States in the wake of 9/11.
Rights and fears
Appearing in London to talk to British Muslims about their own fears amid security-related tensions, he says that they themselves may hold the key to the faith's future in the world. And London may be the arena where this Islamic identity is being formed.
So is Islam secure in Europe?
"We have two extremes of approach. One says that Muslims are not secure and that Europe is an anti-Islamic environment. The other extreme says Europe is a haven for Islam and Muslims," he says.
ISLAM AND THE WEST
Early Baghdad thinkers developed Greek learning
Islamic Spain re-introduced ideas to Europe
European Muslims export ideas back East?
"I believe that the truth is somewhere in the middle because we are all in a process of learning.
"The West is learning about Muslims - trying to figure out what they are doing here in Europe and [asking questions such as] how should governments deal with this phenomenon."
"Well, we've been here for a long time - but the presence now is different to what it has been through history."
The difference, he argues, is that European-born Muslims are quietly embracing European notions of freedom and human rights. This can be seen no more clearly in the rise of young, professional - but religiously devout - Muslim women who challenge the idea that it's men who should have all the say.
But thanks to today's political and media climate, argues Dr Ceric, Muslims in the West need "freedom from fear and freedom from poverty" - both of which are undermining their position in the West.
"Europe is facing some kind of dilemma of fear [over Islam] and that Muslims themselves are seeking freedom from this fear.
"No-one knows where this process will lead - but if we are rational people we must accept the challenge of what I call the 'third encounter' between the West and Islam."
Moments of history
Dr Ceric says there have been two major historical moments when Islam and Western civilisation have met and changed each other.
GRAND MUFTI
Born in Bosnia
Studied at Cairo's top Al-Azhar University
PhD in the USA
Becomes Grand Mufti on return home
A grand mufti is a leading Islamic scholar
During the first, Islam's early Baghdad philosophers preserved and developed the learning of the Greeks. During the second, these ideas and more were sent back to Europe via Islamic Spain, sowing some of the seeds for the Renaissance.
But this third meeting is different because it has the potential to change the nature of Islam itself. If European-born Muslims look inside their faith for what are presented as Western notions of human rights and individual freedom, they will find them, he argues.
The challenge will be to convince other Muslims that these ideas are universal - and then western Muslims can export them back to the heart of Islamic society.
"They cannot do it at the moment, but if they are given this freedom [from fear and poverty], they will succeed.
"It's difficult to admit but Muslims [in the Middle East] now need to learn from Muslims in the West.
"The wise men of the Islamic East and the rational men of the West must meet - and then we will have moral men."
London at the centre
The problem he faces however is that there is enormous resistance of the West coming from the East. The UK and London, however, will play a vital role in negotiating this tension, says Dr Ceric.
Its leading mosques are full most Fridays and many British-born or educated thinkers are urging their congregations to take the best of the West and put it to good use.
Friday prayers: Thousands attended Dr Ceric's sermon
"London is well-placed because of its history," says Dr Ceric. "And British Muslims are more emancipated than other European Muslims.
"They know where they stand in this society - they have freedom to oppose the government, for instance, over the war in Iraq. London is a good place for us to discuss what this third encounter will mean."
This encounter does not mean giving up an Islamic identity, he says. This future Western Muslim identity will represent neither assimilation nor isolation, but co-operation.
He likens the process to that experienced by British Jews: at first outsiders, they later became part of the fabric of society but have defended their identity and world view. In turn, that world view influences decisions of the state and international relations.
But Dr Ceric says the question is whether or not European governments are helping Muslims along this path.
Paris got into bother over its ban on religious symbols in schools - and London continues to face community criticisms that the anti-terror laws criminalise Muslims. Throughout Europe's capitals there is an emotive debate over modern multicultural societies and whether they trap people into religiously closed communities and encourage division?
Dr Ceric says governments must essentially buy the trust of Muslims by institutionalising their faith - giving it state sponsorship through schools, official bodies and so on. Resistance is a "tribal mentality" that allows others to present Muslims as alien outsiders.
"Muslims don't like this idea, they think that governments would control them," he says. "But, my dear brothers, I say you are losing your sovereignty already if they [the police] are entering your homes and mosques.
"I say let them in today because if not they will come in tomorrow and the consequences are a long-term bad image for Islam."
AND MORE
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4275299.stm
UK Muslims urged to accept West
Dr Mustafa Ceric: Ecumenical work
One of Europe's top Islamic thinkers is to tell British Muslims they can reconcile their faith with the West.
Dr Mustafa Ceric, the Grand Mufti of Bosnia, will give the Friday prayers sermon at the East London Mosque.
The cleric, internationally recognised for his peace efforts, has previously accused the media of creating hysteria around Islam.
He is expected to tell hundreds of worshippers to stand by their faith for a productive life.
In his sermon at East London Mosque, Dr Ceric will talk to British Muslims about civil engagement within the UK and their wider human rights in a time of high security fears.
He is also expected to talk about how different faiths can co-exist at times of crisis, referring to his own experiences of the bloody break-up of the former Yugoslavia.
Dr Ceric will say that their duty is to recognise and reconcile the differences between the east and the west. Muslims would "regain their honour" by balancing their faith and a duty to work hard.
"The difference between the East and the West is in that that the East believes more in God's mercy than in hard work, whereas the West relies more on hard work than on the mercy of God," he will say.
"Islam is beyond East and West because it is beyond the eastern fatalism and the western hedonism."
International scholar
Dr Ceric is one of the few widely internationally recognised Islamic scholars born outside the Middle East or Asia. His views are considered important by many observers because of this European rather than Arab heritage.
Islam has no equivalent to Christianity's hierarchy of bishops and cardinals - but the title Grand Mufti is conferred on somebody considered within their own country to be the leading legal authority.
Beginning his career studying in Sarajevo, Dr Ceric won a place at Islam's top seat of learning, Egypt's Al-Azhar University. He then went on to study in the United States before returning to his homeland.
He came to prominence during the collapse of the former Yugoslavia by speaking out against injustices and arguing that people had a responsibility to use their faith to end the violence.
Since the September 11 attacks, Dr Ceric has been heavily involved in cross-community dialogue in the United States and in efforts to counter claims that Islam is linked to terrorism.
In an interview last year, Dr Ceric said that tolerance of others began with how you approached those closest to you.
"Once you learn tolerance in your family, with your wife, with your children, with your local community, with the people of your own faith, then you will pass this tolerance to others," he told Australia's National Radio.
"We have rights to love our faith, our religion, but to respect others.
"We have no choice but tolerance, we have no choice but dialogue."
There is nothing in anything he says that reassures non-Muslims. Today's "moderate" can turn, overnight, into an "immoderate" Muslim. The "secularist" Turkey that supposedly was permanently remade by Kemalist constraints has turned out, obviously, not to be so "permanently" remade; Islam keeps coming back, keeps slipping its knots, and that is the danger. Of course someone like this would wish there to be some permanent modus vivendi, some accomodation, within Europe. For all I know, he may even believe what he says, and work towards it.
So what? 1350 years of history, and the texts, remain. No Infidel should, having studied something of the theory and practice of Islam, be tempted by the "Tariq-Ramadan" false promise of a "Europeanized Islam." One does not bet one's civilization on some implausible (though in other, more sinister ways, "plausible") possiblity.
One is sorry for the genuine "moderates" who wish that Islam were otherwise. But non-Muslims do not owe them anything, and certainly not ignoring, much less embracing, the permanent features of Islam. Good that some, but by no means all, Muslims can find ways to mimic some, but by no means all, the achievements of the West. Bad if we permit that to fool ourselves into still more dangerous compromises and continued heedlessness.
Hugh: It so happened that Tariq Ramadan was being interviewed this morning on CBC radio. He is a smooth talker who slides around the everyday events that are readily visible to anyone who cares to see them. He even managed to sound more hurt than offended when the U.S. blocked his visa to teach at Notre Dame. He managed to trot out every myth - the religion of peace, tolerance to other religions and of course - jihad is an internal struggle.
... the way we would regard Pennsylvania Amish car bombers.
Of course you meant Pennsylvania Amish buggy bombers. Everyone knows the Amish don't drive cars!
And just as Islam can keep 'slipping the knots that constrain it' through the power of meaning in foundational texts, so too in Christianity social and political knots have been 'slipped' by the power of the meaning in texts like the Gospels. But the meanings are very differet. There is a tendency in Islam to ressurrect practices in Sharia and those endorsed by 'the perfect man Muhammad' that are antithetical to contemporary Western conceptions of human rights: inequality for women, oppression of non-believers, slavery or quasi-slavery, in addition to things like jizya and the archaic interest free banking, which now has even taken a foothold in the United States. But consider the Gospels. What meanings have carried special historical power? Do texts like the Sermon On the Mount have anything to do with the evolution of European moral and political categories, even if some of these categories are developed and promoted by groups that considered themselves 'anti-religion'? Despite religious institutions, like the Catholic Church, that has suppressed in a variety of ways the principle of political equality, the principle emerges in European history with irresistable power (but we should not demonize the Church. Look at the influence of the foundational principles and texts on this institution. Could one ever imagine the Pope commanding armies again? The Church is utterly in the embrace of a pacifism that is richly expressed in the stories about Jesus. And there are many other stories to tell as well.). There are complex causes, of course, but surely the idea that all persons are equal before God, that the meek are blessed, that riches and social status are irrelevant moral status (and in fact perhaps a detriment), that all human beings, even non-believers, are deserving of not only respect but sacrifice and care, don't these notions, which define the ethos of the Gospels play crucial roles in the evolution of social and political forces that purged injustices such as slavery, political and social inequality for women, unjust taxation, from European history?
What is said in these foundational religious texts is important. The meanings of these words, the tone and texture of the stories, the examples set by the main actors in the stories, all these and more have influenced the evolution of our social and political institutions, as well as the ways we view ourselves within those societies. And the stark constrast between those cultures under the influence of the Qur'an and those under the influence of other forces, like the Gospels and the Hebrew bible, cannot be overemphasized.
Fox show "24" producers should surprise us one evening with an hour of Fox News footage depicting terroristic acts,war footage,hostage killings?,destruction of sacred articles by....yeah, you guessed it,moslems.
Now how would that be for a public awareness message.
Why dont they help the feds catch up with the perpatrators of the ARMONIOUS FAMILY,FAMILY,FAMILY murders in NJ, an hour of that would suffice.
Yeah and the dish ran away with the spoon!
Maybe we should Mother Goose for a credibility check on the Qur'an!
Yeah and the dish ran away with the spoon!
Maybe we should consult Mother Goose for a credibility check on the Qur'an!
Shucks, you mean to tell me after all these years that the dish did not run away with the spoon?...Oh boy