Shame on U.S.: Bigots Blocking Islamic Center Promote Al Qaida Interests

In the aftermath of the 911 terrorist attack on the United States, President George W. Bush said the following before a joint session of Congress:

I also want to speak tonight directly to Muslims throughout the world. We respect your faith. It’s practiced freely by many millions of Americans, and by millions more in countries that America counts as friends. Its teachings are good and peaceful, and those who commit evil in the name of Allah blaspheme the name of Allah. The terrorists are traitors to their own faith, trying, in effect, to hijack Islam itself. The enemy of America is not our many Muslim friends…

The invasion of Iraq and related issues have made us forget how good and wise George W. Bush was with his approach to Islam and Muslims in America in the immediate aftermath of 911.

In opposition to a proposed Islamic community center (not a mosque) a few blocks from Ground Zero, President Bush’s gracious words have recently been matched by Imam Feisal, who can be heard here defending the community-center proposal at  in New York, amid rude catcalls.

President Bush understood, in a way conservatives today obviously do not, that to alienate moderate Muslims is to promote their radicalization.  In an unsightly spectacle,  conservative politicians are falling all over themselves to fan the flames of religious bigotry, presumably for political gain.  Say what you want about George W. Bush, but he usually followed his conscience  - for good or ill – regardless of political considerations.

President Barrack Obama, for his part, quite rightly supported  building the community center, at least at first.  But then, like his conservative adversaries, Obama swayed under popular pressure. He backed off from his initial statement of support, saying that he did not necessarily back the community center after all.  Then the White House felt the heat from the other side, and reversed itself again.  How strange that George W. Bush should be a better defender of Muslims in America than our progressive President, Barrack Hussein Obama.

Former Bush adviser Karl Rove now argues that the President has no business interfering in New York’s local matters and should know better.  But more than likely, his former boss would have understood that how Americans treat Muslims in the United States has an impact on our foreign policy.  It is imperative that the war on terror not be perceived as a war on Islam.

In the online publication Slate, journalist William Saletan brilliantly refutes the arguments of the community center’s critics, and concludes:

This was never a war between us and the Muslim world. It’s a war between us and al-Qaida. The central battleground in this war isn’t Iraq, Afghanistan, or Lower Manhattan. It’s Islam. That’s the ground al-Qaida is fighting for. It’s the ground Imam Rauf wants to take back. He wants to build an Islam that loves America, embraces freedom, and preaches coexistence. Let’s help him.

There could be no greater tribute to American freedom than to encourage the building of that community center near Ground Zero.  It is an opportunity to vividly demonstrate what a free, open and tolerant civilization looks like.  It is a chance to show just how different we are from the terrorist fanatics who want to destroy us.