The only problem is, if Allah and his false prophet require the enslavement or murder of all who refuse the "invitation" to Islam, what is the difference between "radical" Islam and Islam, between "Islamicists" and moderate Muslims?
The only Muslims of whom I'm aware who explicitly reject offensive jihad against, and oppression of, non-Muslims are the Ahmadiyya (persecuted by the devout) and Muslims Against Sharia.
While Mr. Jasser's piece rightly distinguishes between peaceful, apolitical Muslims and terrorists and their supporters, he offers no reliable method of distinguishing between those among his coreligionists who reject permanently the subjugation of and warfare against non-Muslims and those who will do as their god and prophet commanded and practiced.
Even worse, he offers up the false distinction between "radical" Islam and Islam, as if there's an original, peaceful version of the Great World Religion Hijacked by a Tiny Minority of Extremists.
(On a side note, I wish that the President had been making a sly jab with that line; considering that he's defiled the White House with his iftar dinners and his female associates with hijabs, it seems the joke's on us).
There is no conflict between "Islamism" and Islam. To claim one is suicidally-ignorant or maliciously-deceitful. But I do agree with his last line. It is time to discern where Muslims in America stand.
Unfortunately, since our leadership appears clueless about jihad (or in collusion with its agents), time is not on our side.
John Welter, Chief of the anaheim Police Department recently said this to Washington Post reporter, Karen De Young:"Most people are very ignorant of what the Muslim faith is about, including me," Welter said. "I've got a book on Muslims for dummies; I can't be an expert on all the religions and cults and cultures in the world. But what I can do is be an expert in behavior that terrorists engage in prior to an attack."This type of naiveté illustrates the basic problem in our current approach to engagement of the Muslim community. Our current national security problem with terrorism is not about finding behavior. That is only the most basic part of law enforcement. At the core of our national counterterrorism strategy should be a solid understanding of the ideologies and state of mind which precedes the radicalization and the motivation of terrorist behaviors.
Our security agencies understood the ideology of communism as we protected our nation during the Cold War. We should do so with even more sophistication and clarity now when it comes to the relationship of political Islam (Islamism) to militant Islamism and how they both differ from the spiritual path of Islam. The longer we avoid the centrality of political Islam in this equation, the longer it is going to take to win the war of ideas and preserve our security.
It is time for a national education and discussion on the conflict between Islamism and Islam. It is time to learn where national Muslim organizations and more importantly where the greater American Muslim population finds itself in that conflict.