“At the public hearing in Sacramento on July 14, the Board of Education responded positively to a letter by the Muslim Studies Faculty Group, a formidable collective of 25 scholars on Islam and Muslim Civilization from premier institutions such as Harvard, UCLA, Georgetown University and Berkeley.” Harvard and Georgetown and probably the others are heavily Saudi-funded and thoroughly compromised.
“These edits comprised of painting Islamic history in the Indian subcontinent as one of forced conversions, and projecting Islam as an inherently war-mongering religion.” Historian Koenraad Elst says: “Since about 1920 an effort has been going on in India to rewrite history and to deny the millennium-long attack of Islam on Hinduism.” Elst quotes the American historian Will Durant, who wrote in the days before the present-day politically correct stranglehold: “The Islamic conquest of India is probably the bloodiest story in history.”
“The hearing witnessed a large turnout from the American Muslim community, who were motivated by the desire to ensure that their faith was not misrepresented in order to serve an Islamophobic and Hindu supremacist narrative.” It sounds as if the Board of Education conducted this hearing in a highly intimidating atmosphere.
“It is ironic that while publicly claiming to seek a fair portrayal of Hinduism, Hindu nationalist organizations expended considerable resources in order to inject Islamophobia into the California curriculum.” This is projection: in reality, Islamic groups expend considerable resources to whitewash Islam in public school textbooks all over the country.
“California removes Islamophobic contents from syllabus and corrects Islamic history,” TwoCircles.net, July 17, 2016:
California: In a significant move State Board of Education has reversed some of the Islamophobic content that had been earlier injected into the California curriculum and corrected history of Islam in South Asia.
The Indian American Muslim Council (IAMC), an advocacy group dedicated to safeguarding India’s pluralist and tolerant ethos, has expressed satisfaction that progress was made in reversing Islam phobic content from the curriculum.
At the public hearing in Sacramento on July 14, the Board of Education responded positively to a letter by the Muslim Studies Faculty Group, a formidable collective of 25 scholars on Islam and Muslim Civilization from premier institutions such as Harvard, UCLA, Georgetown University and Berkeley. The scholars had called on the Board to delete Islamophobic content from the curriculum, while also urging a reversal of false and malicious statements on Islamic history introduced by the Hindu nationalist lobby in the US.
Adding to the weight of scholarship represented by the letter from the Muslim Studies Faculty Group, was a letter from the major American Muslim organizations, urging the State Board of Education to reverse the factually incorrect and biased edits that had made their way into the curriculum framework during the review process. These edits comprised of painting Islamic history in the Indian subcontinent as one of forced conversions, and projecting Islam as an inherently war-mongering religion. The hearing witnessed a large turnout from the American Muslim community, who were motivated by the desire to ensure that their faith was not misrepresented in order to serve an Islamophobic and Hindu supremacist narrative.
Essentially, the State Board of Education accepted three of the five edits recommended by the Muslim Studies Faculty Group, and overturned several edits proposed by the alliance of Hindu nationalist organizations comprising of Hindu American Foundation (HAF), Uberoi Foundation and the Hindu Education Foundation (HEF).
IAMC has expressed its sincere appreciation for all the coalition partners in the “South Asian Histories For All” (SAHFA) coalition, a broad-based interfaith and inter-caste alliance comprising of Dalits, Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christians, as well as the American Muslim organizations whose support was instrumental in achieving this progress.
Despite much pressure brought upon the State Board of Education (SBE) by the Hindu nationalist groups, the SBE accepted alternative language recommended by the Muslim Studies Faculty Group that represent a more accurate and balanced portrayal of the faith and its complex history.
“It is ironic that while publicly claiming to seek a fair portrayal of Hinduism, Hindu nationalist organizations expended considerable resources in order to inject Islamophobia into the California curriculum,” said Umar Malick, President of the IAMC.
“The State Board of Education’s courageous stance in resisting political pressure and a well-funded PR machinery demonstrates that those seeking to normalize anti-Muslim bigotry are running a fool’s errand,” added Malick.