The predictable reaction to Bruce Tefft’s address. A CAIR press release:
ANAHEIM, Calif., Dec. 9 /PRNewswire/ — The Southern California office of Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA) today called on the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles to repudiate Islamophobic comments blaming the faith of Islam for terror made at a recent conference sponsored by the center’s Canadian branch.
The comments were reportedly made by Bruce Tefft, a former CIA official, in a panel discussion on “jihad and global terrorism” co-sponsored by the Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Center at the University of Toronto….Tefft reportedly made the following statements:
“Islamic terrorism is based on Islam as revealed through the Qu’ran.”
“To pretend that Islam has nothing to do with Sept. 11 is to willfully ignore the obvious and to forever misinterpret events.”
“There is no difference between Islam and Islamic fundamentalism, which is a totalitarian construct.”…
In a statement issued today, CAIR-LA wrote:
“We call on the Simon Wiesenthal Center to condemn these Islamophobic remarks in the strongest possible terms. Characterizing Islam and its revealed text as promoting terrorism can only lead to increased anti-Muslim prejudice and intolerance.
“As an organization that says it is committed to ‘fostering tolerance and understanding,’ the Simon Wiesenthal Center must immediately repudiate all Islamophobic rhetoric and hold its Canadian office accountable for failing to challenge the speaker’s hate-filled views.”
Just this week, CAIR representatives attended a U.N. conference on the negative impact of Islamophobia.
CAIR won’t answer these questions, of course, but here goes anyway:
1. What steps have you taken to keep jihad terrorists from “characterizing Islam and its revealed text as promoting terrorism”? In light of the fact that many Muslims advocate jihad as warfare against unbelievers, and base their arguments on the Qur’an and Sunnah, it isn’t as if Tefft invented this connection himself. So what are you doing to refute it at its actual source, which is within the Islamic community worldwide?
2. Do you deny that there was any actual connection between Islam and September 11? What, then, do you make of Osama bin Laden’s own statements to the contrary? Please provide, for the reassurance of the American people, a detailed refutation of Osama’s Islamic arguments, showing us how you keep such ideas from spreading among American Muslims.
3. Please explain the difference that you see between Islam and Islamic fundamentalism. Please explain how you intend to stop the spread of Qur’anic literalism in the Islamic community, and how you intend to blunt the force among Muslims of such verses as 9:29, 9:5, and many others.
This is really the same question from three different angles, but it is the only important question when “Islamophobia” is equated with examining the real source of jihad terrorism.