Note that the Indian Mujahideen have accused Khalid Rasheed and his colleagues of apostasy. This is the jihadists’ consistent line: that they represent the truth and purity of Islam, and those Muslims who reject their perspective are, in effect, rejecting Islam. It is a potent appeal in the Islamic world, and one it would behoove us to understand — but instead, the PC straitjacket has both liberals and conservatives ignoring, denying, or downplaying it, and pretending that the battle within Islam has already been won by the “moderates” — who in reality haven’t even articulated an Islamically consistent position that has won any widespread acceptance among Muslims.
Nor do they do so here — just once again the flat and unsupported assertion that “Islam is a religion of peace.”
“Indian Muslim clerics reject terror despite threats,” from Reuters, May 22 (thanks to GM):
LUCKNOW: Senior Muslim clerics in India rejected terrorism as anti-Islamic on Wednesday.
Khalid Rasheed, the head of the oldest madrasa in the northern city of Lucknow, said the militant group Indian Mujahideen had accused him and his colleagues of apostasy over their pacifist stance.
Indian Mujahideen threatened Rasheed last week in an email sent to local media channels in which they also claimed responsibility for last week’s blasts in Jaipur that killed 63 people.
“The reaction of terrorists to our stand against terror has shown that we are moving in the right direction,” Rasheed told reporters. “We will continue not only to raise our voice against terror but also educate Muslim masses about the grossly un-Islamic practices adopted by terrorist bodies.”Rasheed said they had received support from the influential radical Darool-Uloom Deoband madrasa in northern India. “Islam is a religion of peace,” madrasa vice chancellor Ahmad Khazir Shah said in a statement on Wednesday.