Defeating radical Islam
Boston Globe ^ | March 21, 2007 | Jeff Jacoby
boston.com
INTIMIDATING critics through trumped-up litigation and claims of "discrimination" is something of the house specialty at the Council on American-Islamic Relations. No surprise, then, that CAIR is involved in the lawsuit filed against US Airways by six imams who were kicked off a Minneapolis-Phoenix flight after their disruptive behavior alarmed other passengers.
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What the release didn't mention, but the Minneapolis Star-Tribune's Katherine Kersten discovered in the complaint, is that CAIR and the imams are also targeting as-yet unnamed "John Does" -- the "passengers
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"The imams' attempt to bully ordinary passengers marks an alarming new front in the war on airline security," Kersten writes. "Average folks, 'John Does' like you and me . . . are our 'first responders' against terrorism. But the imams' suit may frighten such individuals into silence ."
Over the years, CAIR and other Islamist groups have gotten much mileage out of such strong-arm tactics . But there is good news: Some Americans are pushing back. And even better news: Some of the push-back is coming from Muslims who forcefully reject the Islamist project.
One of the most impressive of these anti-Islamist moderates is Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, an Arizona physician, US Navy veteran, and devout Sunni Muslim. In 2003 he founded the American Islamic Forum for Democracy to "stand against the religious fanatics who exploit the religion of Islam for a nihilistic, anti-American, anti-Western war." On the day that CAIR and the imams trumpeted their lawsuit, Jasser and AIFD issued a statement supporting US Airways and denouncing the litigation as "wrong for American Muslims, wrong for American security, and wrong for American freedoms." Last week Jasser went further: He offered to raise money for the legal defense of any passengers sued by the imams.
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