I don't think anyone, certainly not me, has ever denied that there is an extremist element in modern Islam that is a menace. My concern, my argument has always been that you cannot tar all Muslims with the same brush. I have always maintained that the extremists are the minority. But it is their actions that grab the headlines while the moderates who quietly go about making their contribution to society are ignored in the media.....and many white Australians are stupid enough to allow themselves to be hypnotized by this lopsided reporting.
The question always gets asked "Oh yeah if they are so moderate then why don't they speak out against extremism". The answer to that question is that they are. Again and again and again. But no one is listening. Either that or they choose not to hear so that they have an excuse to maintain their own rage.
Here is yet another example of local Muslim leaders hitting back. They have spoken out against comments made by Hizb ut-Tahrir and have spoken in support of the Australian way of life. They even played the Australian national anthem a couple of times this week on their Arabic radio program.
But let me make a prediction here. Their will be a parade of haters who will follow on from my post this morning and give me a dozen pee week answers are to why they are insincere or why they are just covering their own butts and how Muslims are obliged to lie to infidels (we know they are obliged to lie to us because we read this on some obscure neo Nazi white supremacist website and why would they say that if it wasn't true). It will be like the time I tried to post about Muhammad Hisham Kabban, the Sufi cleric who spoke at a US state department conference in 1999 warning of the dangers Osama Bin Laden posed to the US. He was dismissed by US authorities as an alarmist. So in frustration he began to confront the extremists himself only to have his own life threatened. No one remembers him speaking out. Instead we conveniently sweep this away like it never happened. I am sure it will be the same for the local Muslim leaders who have made a stand against the Hizb ut-Tahrir comments. We will quickly sweep this all away and within the hour the cliched question will once again echo through the halls of HC......"Why is moderate Islam not speaking out against the extremists"
