American Islamic Forum for Democracy
Most Muslims with whom I talk support Islamist terrorism in some way. Sometimes the support is outright, in terms of funding operations or spreading the message of Islamist governance. At other times the support is more guarded, such as blaming every act of Islamist terrorism on the Jews, George Bush, or capitalism. I hope that I just happen to have randomly been introduced to a bad set of Muslims, but I have no reason to believe that. The Muslims with whom I communicate are mostly well educated and relatively wealthy. They aren’t in the field burning school girls with acid, but they are tacitly supporting those who do.
One group of Muslims, however, stands out as not supporting terrorism, whether it is waged upon school girls in Afghanistan or office workers in New York City. The American Islamic Forum for Democracy is an activist group of American Muslims which was formed in 2003 “as an unmistakable expression of American liberty and freedom in an attempt to take back the faith of Islam from the demagoguery of the Islamo-fascists.”
Reading through their principles, I wish them luck. Statements such as “We will promote tolerance in Islam as being a fundamental principle of the Holy Koran” sound reasonable, but are in direct contradiction to the teachings of Muhammad. Likewise, “We believe in the equality of the sexes which is well established in the Koran” makes it sound very much like they are reading a different Quaran than I am reading.
When I read the Quaran, it clearly instructs Muslims not to make friends with non-believers and to fight non-believers until they submit to Islamic rule:
9:23 O ye who believe! Choose not your fathers nor your brethren for friends if they take pleasure in disbelief rather than faith. Whoso of you taketh them for friends, such are wrong-doers.
9:29 Fight against such of those who have been given the Scripture as believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, and forbid not that which Allah hath forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth, until they pay the tribute readily, being brought low.
And, of course, the Koranic rules on wife beating are well known:
4:34 Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the support of women). So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them. Then if they obey you, seek not a way against them. Lo! Allah is ever High, Exalted, Great.
So, while I hope that the brave members of AIFD are able to reform Islam and bring it into the circle of civilized religions, I have little faith that their efforts will be successful. This is one time where I hope to be proven wrong.
