Moderate Islam?

Hal G.P. Colebatch has an essay on The American Spectator which is highly instructive in how the so called "moderate Muslims" think.

So, surprise! Surprise! Islamic terrorism is the West's fault. In Britain it is also, it seems, Tony Blair's fault for being insufficiently opposed to Israel. Mr. Miraj continues: "There is no doubt that all British Muslims, not just their self-proclaimed leaders, must to do more to combat intolerance in their midst. That task is made more difficult when, despite all the mass protests against the war in Iraq, the Government is seen not to have listened."

[Snip]

Shortly after this, James Chapman reported in the Daily Mail on the outcome of talks between about 30 prominent moderate Muslim leaders and British Communities Secretary" Ruth Kelly aimed at defusing extremism and ncouraging Muslim moderation. Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott also attended. Some of the Muslim leaders at this meeting of minds, for their part, made a series of demands including official Muslim religious holidays in ritain and Sharia law.

Chapman reported: "Dr. Syed Aziz Pasha, secretary general of the Union of Muslim Organizations of the UK and Ireland, said: 'We told her if you give us religious rights, we will be in a better position to convince young people that they are being treated equally along with other citizens.'"

This of course implies that Moslems are not being given religious rights at present, though how this fits in with "Mosques up and down the country" (there are now several thousand) I am not sure. I have written elsewhere of such bizarre recent cases as an English lady being forced by police to remove a collection of toy china pigs from her front window in case passing Muslims saw them and were offended, and prison officers being prohibited from wearing Cross of St. George badges because of alleged Crusader associations -- I have a thick file of things like this.

Some of the moderate Muslim leaders told Miss Kelly that important days in Ramadan and Eid-ul-Adha should be made public holidays for Muslims. Some (not all) the Muslim leaders attending also said Sharia law should also be introduced in Britain. While this specifies stonings and amputations as criminal punishments, Dr Pasha said moderately that he wanted it only for family, not criminal, law.

[Snip]

In another development, Britain's most senior Muslim police officer, Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Tarique Ghaffur, has blamed racial profiling at airports for adding to tensions and Muslim resentment -- this at a time when, according to the Telegraph, British police are involved in more than 70 anti-terrorist investigations involving more than 100 suspected Islamic extremists.

Let us step back and consider briefly what Britain has apparently done in the way of foreign policy to earn the homicidal, suicidal hatred of so many Moslems who have been born in Britain and lived their lives with the protection, benefits, and opportunities it has provided.

Well, Britain has supported the U.S. in Iraq in overthrowing Saddam Hussein, a ruthless, aggressive dictator who threatened to destabilize the whole region. Since then it has, like the U.S., spent lives and treasure keeping the peace and preventing or attempting to prevent massacres and genocide between Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds, and in trying to build a more normal civil society. Many Iraqis have expressed very emphatic thanks.

[Snip]

No, the real point is that they -- or at least many of them -- claim or imply that the only way to stop Islamic terrorism in Britain is for Britain to very largely surrender, to abandon its friends and allies and those who share its values and share a willingness to defend them, and to move a long way towards becoming a quasi-Islamic State, allowing its policies to be determined by threat.

Given all of this I am prompted to wonder if there is really any such thing as a "moderate" Muslim.