Appeasement is global

By Ravi Shanker Kapoor

Obama reaches out, but would Muslim world respond?

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been consistently bemoaning the phenomenon of Muslim appeasement in India. The phenomenon has just gone global, as evident from US President Barack Hussein Obama’s speech at Cairo University, Egypt.

The best thing that can be said about US President Barack Hussein Obama’s speech at Cairo University, Egypt, is that his intentions are indeed noble. He ended the address, saying, “The people of the world can live together in peace. We know that is God’s vision. Now that must be our work here on earth... And may God’s peace be upon you.”

But, unfortunately, the noble intentions have been ambushed by his faith in the dogmas of contemporary American liberalism. One of these is that it is not the ideology of terrorists which is the prime mover; it is ‘socio-economic’ root causes which give rise to terrorism. As the US President said in his outreach endeavour: “Now, we also know that military power alone is not going to solve the problems in Afghanistan and Pakistan. That’s why we plan to invest $ 1.5 billion each year over the next five years to partner with Pakistanis to build schools and hospitals, roads and businesses.”

Such views underline Obama’s—and liberals’—dogged refusal to acknowledge the reality as it exists; this doggedness is the result of moral cowardice and intellectual laziness to give up the mendacious postulates of contemporary liberalism.

We need to ask Obama how would schools and hospitals, roads and infrastructure help in the war on terror if the Taliban are allowed to go berserk—and Islamabad prefers to look the other way, as evident from its recent pact with the Taliban? It is also a well-known fact that it was the Pakistani elite which created the Taliban in the first place. But why slam the Pakistanis when Obama himself is not unwilling to do business with what is fashionably called ‘moderate Taliban’? It may appear odd that Obama, an educated and polished man, could believe that such an oxymoronic entity could exist, but then the canons of liberal orthodoxy can be congruous with any incongruity. For the normal human beings, though, the entity ‘moderate Taliban’ is as impossible as a ‘merciful rapist.’

This theology of liberalism also inspired Obama to make an all-out effort to woo Muslims. He quoted from the Quran. “The holy Quran teaches that whoever kills an innocent is like he has killed all mankind,” the US President said.

But the Quran also says, “They [the unbelievers] are the worst of creatures” (98.6). Sura 8 goes even farther, denouncing unbelievers of misguiding and killing the faithful: “Remember how the Unbelievers plotted against thee, to keep thee in bonds, or slay thee, to get thee out (of thy homes). They plot and plan, and Allah too plans; but the best of planners is Allah.” (8:30)

Again, “The Unbelievers spend their wealth to hinder (men) from the path of Allah, and so will they continue to spend; but in the end they will have (only) regrets and sighs; at length they will be overcome; and the Unbelievers will be gathered together to Hell.” (8:36)

And again, “Say to the Unbelievers, if (now) they desist (from Unbelief), their past would be forgiven them; but if they persist, the punishment of those before them is already (a matter of warning for them).” (8:38)

The Quran reminds and exhorts: “Remember the Lord inspired the angels (with the message): ‘I am with you: give firmness to the Believers: I will instil terror into the hearts of the Unbelievers; smite ye above their necks and smite all their fingertips off them.” (8:12)

An ardent Muslim appeaser, Obama did not quote these lines from the Quran.

On the issue of scripture-sanctioned maltreatment of women in Islamic countries, too, Obama was vague at best and prevaricative at worst. He said, “[The] issues of women’s equality are by no means simply an issue for Islam. In Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, we’ve seen Muslim-majority countries elect a woman to lead. Meanwhile, the struggle for women’s equality continues in many aspects of American life and in countries around the world. I am convinced that our daughters can contribute just as much to society as our sons.”

He took care to mention the feminists’ phony “struggle for women’s equality” in the US and other non-Muslim countries, but did not have the moral courage and intellectual integrity to tell the Muslims about the iniquities half of the population faces in the Islamic world.

It is worth stating here that most of the iniquities are related to Islamic scriptures. For instance, the Quran says, “Righteous women are therefore obedient, guarding the secret for Allah’s guarding. And those you fear may be rebellious, admonish them; banish them to their couches; and beat them.”

This is not to say that only the Islamic religious texts have injunctions which militate against the humanist ethos. The scriptures of other religions also exhort the faithful to do things which would be frowned upon in today’s world. But other religions do not have fundamentalists who are powerful enough to implement their religious texts in letter and spirit.

But it is a well-known fact that Wahhabism—the ideology of Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and other terrorist groups—continues to attract many in the Islamic world. And these are committed people, determined to enforce medieval barbarity, as evident in the Swat Valley.

It is unfortunate that Obama did not hold a mirror up to the Muslims; quite the contrary, he merely reinforced their irrationality and biases. It appeared that the US had something wrong to the Muslims for which its head of the state had to offer an explanation, if not an apology. The tone and tenor, the allusions and quotations—everything about the speech was apologetic.

The truth, however, is that the US merely retaliated to the mass murder perpetrated by extremist Muslims on the American soil. It is a testimony to the pervasive virulence of liberal dogmas that the acts of self-defence of the world’s most powerful nation have to be explained in an apologetic manner by its President.

By the way, where is the outreach from the Muslim world? Why is it that no Muslim leader or seminary has been as vehement in slamming the violence perpetrated by the jehadis as they are vehement in castigating the real and imaginary atrocities on their brethren? The spectre of jehad today haunts the entire world, from Bali in Indonesia to New York in the US. What are the Muslims doing to stall the menace of Islamic terror?

These are the questions Obama, his liberal cheerleaders, and the mullahs of multiculturalism need to answer.