Exposing the role that Islamic jihad theology and ideology play in the modern global conflicts
Hugh Fitzgerald: Pope Francis and Imam Drouiche on the Strasbourg Attack (Part Three)
“I am sad – he concludes – for the victims, but also because my religion is hostage in the hands of ignorant people full of hatred.”
Imam Drouiche insists that Islam itself is innocent of hatred and violence. His religion is held “hostage” by these crazy extremists — “ignorant people full of hatred.” He doesn’t dare permit himself to study the remarks made by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the self-described caliph of the Islamic State, or the broadcasts of Anwar al-Awlaki, on the Qur’anic commands that they urged their followers to carry out. That would upset him too much, and he wants to continue to believe that his religion “is hostage in the hands of ignorant people full of hatred.” But those “ignorant people” he deplores are not ignorant of the Qur’an; they know it very well. And they are “full of hatred” toward Unbelievers because the Qur’an has instructed them to be so. In how many verses are Muslims instructed to fight against Christians and Jews, to “smite the necks” of the Unbelievers, to “fight them” wherever Muslims find them, to “strike terror” in their hearts? Muslims are instructed, too, not to take Christians and Jews as friends, for they are friends only with each other. And when Muslims are told, in the Qur’an, that they are the “best of people” and non-Muslims are “the most vile of created beings,” why would they not believe it? It’s the word of God.
Pope Francis appears to be moving, glacially, almost imperceptibly, toward the recognition that Islam is not quite as peaceful as he has claimed in the past. He has suggested this by failing to mention, and exculpating, Islam, as he usually does, in his statement about the Strasbourg Christmas Market attacks. He still has a long way to go to undo the remarkable series of misstatements about the faith he has previously made. Whether he will finally begin to grasp the essential nature of Islam, as terrorist attack follows attack, or whether he will revert to his previous position as Defender of the Faith[of Islam], remains to be seen.
As for Imam Drouiche, he’s the embodiment of the Good Muslim, who wants so much to believe that these Muslim terrorists are “ignorant people full of hatred.” But they are not “ignorant” of what is to be found in the Qur’an — they are very aware of its contents, and of their duty to follow it — and as a consequence, they are “full of hatred” toward all non-Muslims. Imam Drouiche can’t allow himself to believe this, much less to admit it publicly. He senses that deep trouble is coming because “Islam is going through a profound crisis worldwide.” It needs “a new wise and intelligent elite to be free and humanized. We can still save the situation in Europe, but I’m not too optimistic.”
But the “profound crisis” is that there is no “crisis” for most Muslims. They reject all criticism of Islam as “racism” and “Islamophobia.” They dismiss Unbelievers who dare to suggest that some parts of the Qur’an, denouncing Jews and Christians, should be rendered “obsolete.” When 300 French intellectuals and political figures wrote an open letter this spring requesting just that, Muslims all over France reacted with rage. They do not seem inclined to agree with Imam Drouiche that Islam is in a state of crisis.
And who would select this “new wise and intelligent elite” that Imam Drouiche suggests needs to be established among Muslims? Imam Drouiche gives no clue. And how exactly would this Muslim “elite” help Islam to become “free and humanized”? What do such words mean, if not that this elite should have the ability to remove, or abrogate, or contextualize so that they apply only to enemies in 7th century Arabia, the many verses in the Qur’an that command hatred of, and Jihad against, Infidels? And how does Imam Drouiche propose to convince 1.5 billion Muslims, many of them deeply reactionary, to accept these textual changes to the Qur’an? And when he says “we can still save the situation in Europe, but I’m not too optimistic,” what does this mean? I take it to mean that Muslims in Europe will have to change their attitudes and their behavior if they wish to continue to be endured by the non-Muslims whose countries they have entered by the millions, and that if they do not do so, large-scale violence — a civil war between Muslims and Unbelievers — might eventually ensue.
It’s a grim prediction. But we are already part-way there. Isn’t Europe, right now, already in thrall in many ways to Muslims and their duplicitous defenders, who have managed to label rational islamocriticism as “racism” and “Islamophobia”? How, in such an atmosphere that stifles all dissent, can anyone believe that Islam,the religion of 1.5 billion people, can be reformed by a self-appointed Muslim “elite,” its members akin to Imam Drouiche, who deplores Muslim attitudes and behavior but cannot allow himself to put the blame where it belongs, and has belonged for 1,400 years, on the texts of Islam itself?
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