Blogs > FRIEDMAN TO GREGORY: ISLAM NEEDS A CIVIL WAR

Dec 7, 2009

FRIEDMAN TO GREGORY: ISLAM NEEDS A CIVIL WAR



Sometimes I love Tom Friedman. Especially when he uses an appearance on national TV to remind us of some essential, if unwanted truths, even if I disagree with his conclusion. There is something we can do. At the very least we can focus world attention and shame as he did on Sunday on MEET THE PRESS, Dec. 6, 2009 (I added the paragraphs):

MR. FRIEDMAN: . . . let's widen the aperture a little bit.

What's, what's been going on since 9/11?

What's been going on since 9/11 is a war within Islam, a war within this great faith community over whether, how, to what degree it should embrace modernity. That's what's actually going on. And we've been dragged into it and, and dived into it, to some degree.

There's a minority, a violent, Jihadist minority, that wants to take Islam back to the 12th century. There is a quiet, silent majority that wants to go into the future. Unfortunately, David, they need to have their own civil war. We had a civil war in this country some 150 years ago. We had some people who believed some really bad stuff. They believed we could discriminate against people because of the color of their skin. We defeated those people so badly that three generations later their offspring haven't forgotten it.

If they don't have that war within Islam, nothing changes. That's why the most important story of the week was the one Secretary of State Clinton referred to. There was a bombing in Rawalpindi Friday (see, 366 killed in 7 attacks targeting mosques in 2009. The Friday, day of prayer, week after the eve, OK? A suicide bomber walked into a mosque and blew it up in the middle of Friday prayer. Where was the mass protest in the Muslim world against that?

In Pakistan, we saw a million people take to the streets to protest Danish cartoons that insulted the profit Muhammad. Tens of people killed in a mosque, real people created in the image of God? And unless you get millions of people protesting that, saying that is haraam, that is forbidden, that is not on, there is nothing we can do to win this war.



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