The Islamic State is beheading Christians and sex trafficking young girls as it ruthlessly consumes everyone in its path. The Islamic group Boko Haram is wreaking havoc across Nigeria. An Islamic terrorist murdered Charlie Hebdo staff over cartoons. But Newsweek -- or the wandering ghost of the old Newsweek brand, now owned by IBT Media -- has identified a much graver threat than Islamic terrorism: Islamophobia.
On the Opinion section of Newsweek.com last week, an article explored a Center for American Progress report called “Fear 2.0" which explored “The Islamophobia Network’s Efforts to Manufacture Hate in America.” But in fact, the article was simply a reprint directly from the CAP website!
The article's four authors -- Ken Gude and Ken Sofer of American Progress, Matthew Duss of the President of Foundation for Middle East Peace, and attorney Yasmine Taeb -- contend that our attention should be directed to this ‘Islamophobia network’ that is attempting “spread misinformation and hateful propaganda about American Muslims and Islam.”
As they decry “misinformation and propaganda," they insist this “network” must be stopped, or we may repeat the injustice of World War II, in which “Japanese Americans were unjustly interned because they were seen as ‘others.’”
This right-wing conspiracy of hate is allegedly a “small cadre of funders and misinformation experts” whose views and influence are “amplified by an echo chamber of the religious right, conservative media, grassroots organizations and politicians who sought to introduce a fringe perspective on American Muslims into the public discourse.” It is so vast that it includes an “anti-Muslim caucus in Congress,” of which former Congressman Allen West and Congresswoman Michele Bachmann were “some of its loudest members,” and at least “seven charitable foundations” that spent “$42.6 million between 2001 and 2009 to support the spread of anti-Muslim rhetoric.”
How one can call West – who fought, bled, and put himself in harm’s way to protect Muslim lives in Iraq – “Islamophobic” is unexplained.
The authors define “Islamophobia” very broadly; manifested in a "general climate of fear and anger toward American Muslims, as seen in the ‘civilization jihad’ narrative, the religious right’s rhetoric and the biased media coverage of the Boston Marathon bombing. It comes out in cynical political efforts to capitalize on this climate of fear, as seen in state-level anti-Sharia bills introduced across the country and in far-right politicians’ grandstanding. And perhaps most dangerously, it manifests itself in institutional policies that view American Muslims as a threat, as seen in the FBI training manuals that profile Islam as a religion of violence."
Under this logic, one could theoretically say that mere criticism of Islam is born of a “general climate of fear and anger toward American Muslims.”
How exactly was the Boston Marathon bombing coverage “biased?” It’s unfair to point out two Muslim brothers set bombs to kill civilians? There is not much more tell.
As for the condemnation of “anti-Sharia bills” as “Islamophobic,” one wonders how Newsweek would react if lawmakers tried to pass legislation to stop Christian theocrats from subverting American law with Biblical law. Would that be Christian-phobic?
The authors take comfort in the fact that “the general public has also been more vigilant,” and has thus far succeeded in “keeping the Islamophobia network where it belongs—on the fringes of American society.”
It's nice to know that we can rest easy on the Islamophobia front by merely marginalizing those critical of Islam. It is much easier to do that than to actually rid the world of the root cause of “Islamophobia”: Islamic terrorism.
Earlier: George Soros Gave $10 Million to Group Slamming ‘Islamophobia’
