from The Wall Street Journal
Mosques across the U.S. continue to carry books and pamphlets describing non-Muslims as "infidels" and promoting intolerance against Western society, according to a forthcoming study by Freedom House, a U.S. human-rights group.
Despite vows from American Islamic leaders after Sept. 11, 2001 to proselytize peacefully, New York based Freedom House researchers found 57 documents with incendiary material in more than a dozen mosques and Islamic centers in six states and Washington, D.C., visited over the past year.
The materials "demonstrate the ongoing indoctrination of Muslims in the United States in the hostility and belligerence of Saudi Arabia's hardline Wahhabi sect of Islam," says the report, an advance copy of which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
The report presents a challenge to the approximately 2,000 Islamic institutions in the U.S., some of which say they now screen publications for extremist messages. The Freedom House researchers say they found in December 2003 seven publications with what they deemed intolerant messages at the Islamic Center of Washington D.C., which President Bush visited days after the 2001 terror attacks. One, titled "Loyalty and Dissociation In Islam," advises Muslims to "be dissociated from the infidels, hate them for their religion . . . and always oppose them in every way, according to Islamic law," according to a translation by Freedom House.
2 comments:
Mosques across the U.S. continue to carry books and pamphlets describing non-Muslims as "infidels" and promoting intolerance against Western society, according to a forthcoming study by Freedom House, a U.S. human-rights group.
Despite vows from American Islamic leaders after Sept. 11, 2001 to proselytize peacefully, New York based Freedom House researchers found 57 documents with incendiary material in more than a dozen mosques and Islamic centers in six states and Washington, D.C., visited over the past year.
The materials "demonstrate the ongoing indoctrination of Muslims in the United States in the hostility and belligerence of Saudi Arabia's hardline Wahhabi sect of Islam," says the report, an advance copy of which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
The report presents a challenge to the approximately 2,000 Islamic institutions in the U.S., some of which say they now screen publications for extremist messages. The Freedom House researchers say they found in December 2003 seven publications with what they deemed intolerant messages at the Islamic Center of Washington D.C., which President Bush visited days after the 2001 terror attacks. One, titled "Loyalty and Dissociation In Islam," advises Muslims to "be dissociated from the infidels, hate them for their religion . . . and always oppose them in every way, according to Islamic law," according to a translation by Freedom House.
Farzad Darui, manager of the center, denied in a phone interview carrying the publications, saying, "we don't have these books; we have not distributed these books." He said that the mosque has a library of 15,000 books and acknowledged that he couldn't be sure some volumes cited by Freedom House weren't somewhere in the collection. But, he added, criticizing the mosque for having controversial publications in its library was akin to criticizing the Library of Congress for the content of a handful of books in its collection.
New York-based Freedom House, which was founded in 1941 to oppose Nazism and communism in Europe, bills itself as the oldest human rights group in the U.S. It lists among its major donors the Ford Foundation and other large givers as well as the U.S. State Department and other government agencies. None of the funding for this study came from U.S. government sources, according to Freedom House lawyer Nina Shea.
Ms. Shea, who directed the study, said the findings also raised questions about the Saudi kingdom's claims that it is purging its religious establishment of extremism. Most of the materials covered in the study come from Saudi Arabia, either as official publications of a Saudi government ministry and distributed by the Saudi embassy in Washington, or published privately but with pronouncements of clerics appointed by the Saudi monarchy. Some mosques with the materials receive funding from Saudi royal family members.
Nail Al-Jubeir, spokesman for the Saudi embassy in Washington, said he hadn't seen the full Freedom House report, but rejected the assertion that his government was promulgating offensive materials. "Saudi Arabia recognizes that extremism is part of a larger worldwide problem that all nations must work on diligently to bring to an end," said Mr. Al-Jubeir. "Saudi Arabia condemns extremism, terrorism or hateful expression among any people, anywhere in the world."
It is unclear from the study whether the Saudi government or top Saudi officials have continued to publish the types of materials cited in the study after the World Trade Center attack, or whether Freedom House researchers had come across publications sent to American mosques before Sept. 2001, which the mosques hadn't since removed.
For the study, Freedom House researchers recruited volunteers to go to more than a dozen mosques, mostly in December 2003, to search for Saudi-published material. In most cases, a researcher involved said books deemed objectionable were found in mosque libraries or reading rooms, not handed out to visitors who asked for basic texts on Islam. But some were found for sale in mosque bookstores. Researchers returned to certain mosques last month, and they confirmed some of the material was still available, Ms. Shea said.
-Some American Mosques Carry Extremist Tracts, Study Says; The Wall Street Journal; Jan 28, 05
Something about a group that calls itself "Freedom House" sends off warning bells in terms of objectivity.
Post a Comment