View From a Height

Community

Parvez Ahmen, board chairman of the execrable CAIR, takes the CAIR party line today in the Powerline Guys' favorite newspaper, the Strib. For the moment, it's not worth fisking the whole article, except to note that the tune is pretty much the same one we're used to: no matter how noble the cause, no matter how deep the grievances, you can't kill civilians. (Are there Israeli civilians? Who knows?)

Most importantly, he claims that the fatwa, and a massive Islamic education program from "moderates" is the best way to combat terrorist impulses.

Allow me to suggest another.

The Islamic community that neither teaches radical Islam, nor sympathizes or identifies with it, needs to ostracize and isolate those who do within their community. Being an Orthodox Jew, I know a little something about how religious communities enforce their norms without benefit of police powers. Sharia operates in much the same way, aside from burying women up to their necks in sand and stoning them.

So here are concrete steps the Mullahs need to take, need to call for others to take, and need to stick to, in the longer-term interests of their own faith.

They need to ban, or ostracize Muslims who teach these things.

They need to tell businessmen in their congregations, the ones who run the groceries and newsstands, not to sell video games where the heroes are looking to blow themselves up, or where the player gets to blow away Jews and Americans like insects in Galaga.

They need to tell their congregations not to patronize shops who sell video games like that, or the Protocols.

They need to refuse money from these people, no matter where they come from, no matter what holy sites their countries contain.

They need to refuse Halal certification to eateries where this drek is distributed.

In short, they need to make it completely impossible for radicals to function in communities other than those completely dominated by their own kind, thus limiting them to an ever-shrinking circle of operation.

This is how religions function, and enforce their own standards.

Don't hold your breath.