* MY COMMENTS IN GREEN
Fighting For And Freeing Muslims Is Nothing To Be Apologizing For
CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER | 2 February 2009 | I.B.D
Every new president flatters himself that he, kinder and gentler, is beginning the world anew. Yet, when Barack Obama in his inaugural address reached out to Muslims with “to the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect,” his formulation was needlessly defensive and apologetic.
* Americans are quickly learning that Obama has a different loyalty.
Is it “new” to acknowledge Muslim interests and show respect to the Muslim world? Obama doesn’t just think so, he said so again to millions in his al-Arabiya interview, (His first interview – His FIRST PRIORITY?!) insisting on the need to “restore” the “same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago.”
Astonishing!! In these most recent 20 years — the alleged winter of our disrespect of the Islamic world — America did not just respect Muslims, it bled for them. It engaged in five military campaigns, every one of which involved — and resulted in — the liberation of a Muslim people: Bosnia, Kosovo, Kuwait, Afghanistan and Iraq.
* Has any American ever heard one thank you or compliment for our effort?
The two Balkan interventions — as well as the failed 1992-93 Somali intervention to feed starving African Muslims (43 Americans were killed) — were humanitarian exercises of the highest order, there being no significant U.S. strategic interest at stake.
In these 20 years, this nation has done more for suffering and oppressed Muslims than any nation, Muslim or non-Muslim, anywhere on earth. Why are we apologizing? [???] * Has any Muslim shown any appreciation? I don’t think so.
And what of that happy U.S.-Muslim relationship that Obama imagines existed “as recently as 20 or 30 years ago” that he has now come to restore? Thirty years ago, 1979, saw the greatest U.S.-Muslim rupture in our 233-year history: Iran’s radical Islamic revolution, the seizure of the U.S. embassy, the 14 months of America held hostage.
* Don’t forget that America’s FIRST THIRTY YEARS of our existence required our founders and leaders to fight radical Islam, to learn about the Qur’an and it’s plan for world conquest. That’s why President Jefferson had to read the Qur’an. Those Barbary Pirates were the radical Muslims – that’s where our “leathernecks” come from – to fight sword wielding Muslims of that day.
Which came just a few years after the Arab oil embargo that sent the United States into a long and punishing recession. Which, in turn, was preceded by the kidnapping and cold-blooded execution by Arab terrorists of the U.S. ambassador in Sudan and his charge d’affaires.
This is to say nothing of the Marine barracks massacre of 1983, and the innumerable attacks on U.S. embassies and installations around the world during what Obama now characterizes as the halcyon days of U.S.-Islamic relations. [!!]
Look. If Barack Obama wants to say, as he said to al-Arabiya, “I have Muslim roots, Muslim family members, have lived in a Muslim country” — implying a special affinity that uniquely positions him to establish good relations — that’s fine. * He’s telling this to his supporters – who are (many of them) hearing it for the first time.
But it is both false and deeply injurious to this country to draw a historical line dividing America under Obama from a benighted past when Islam was supposedly disrespected and demonized.
As in Obama’s grand admonition: “We cannot paint with a broad brush a faith as a consequence of the violence that is done in that faith’s name.” Have “we” been doing that, smearing Islam due to a small minority? * Has any of us heard a Muslim criticizing Islamic attacks on American interests? You will never hear that.
George Bush went to the Islamic Center in Washington six days after 9/11, when the fires of Ground Zero were still smoldering, to declare “Islam is peace,” * (that was naïve and the Hadiths clearly tell us that for Islam – the only peace that we can expect is when they control the whole world) to extend fellowship and friendship to Muslims, to insist that Americans treat them with respect and generosity of spirit.
And America listened. In these seven years since 9/11 — seven years during which thousands of Muslims rioted all over the world (resulting in the death of more than 100) to avenge a bunch of cartoons — there’s not been a single anti-Muslim riot in the United States to avenge the greatest massacre in U.S. history.
On the contrary. In its aftermath, we elected our first Muslim member of Congress and our first president of Muslim parentage.
“My job,” says Obama, “is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives.”
* Has anyone read or heard any such statements(?) that the Muslim world is filled with – “extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives”- The only Muslim I know who says that is Dr. Zuhdi Jasser – a Muslim American and former physician to the U.S. Congress. He is the only person I know who is not afraid to tell you the truth about Islam – Interested? Write for ‘THE THIRD JIHAD’ – Radical Islam’s Vision For America DVD. Rudy Giuliani: called the DVD “A wake-up call for America” – Jim Woolsey, CIA Director; Senator Joe Lieberman, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge – all appear in the production.
That’s his job? [?]
* His job is to do all that he can to protect America from an attack by an enemy. Let’s pray that he will get his act together and do this.
Do Americans think otherwise? Does he think he is bravely breaking new ground? George Bush, Condoleezza Rice and countless other leaders offered myriad expressions of that same universalist sentiment.
Every president has the right to portray himself as ushering in a new era of this or that. Obama wants to pursue new ties with Muslim nations, drawing on his own identity and associations. Good.
But when his self-inflation as redeemer of U.S.-Muslim relations leads him to suggest that pre-Obama America was disrespectful or insensitive or uncaring of Muslims, he is engaging not just in fiction but in gratuitous disparagement of the country he is now privileged to lead.
* We know Obama is no Messiah – far from that – He does deal in fiction – just read his book (that he didn’t write.)
BIJENKORF:beehive 