<http://muslimmatters.org/wp-content/uploads/Imam-Zaid-Shakir.jpg>Cross-posted
from New Islamic Directions <http://www.zaidshakir.com/> *
http://muslimmatters.org/2010/12/16/letter-to-would-be-mujahid-imam-zaid-shakir/
*


Recent developments have forced me to put some things on hold to write you
this letter.  You might ask how I know you. I have met you at student
events, in mosques, and at conferences. I have listened to your arguments
and I have made my counter arguments. Oftentimes, my arguments have been
somewhat formal. I figured I would write you a letter, since that is a lot
more personal and less formal. Perhaps this way you will be more inclined to
listen.

To begin with, whenever you are criticized for your bloody, anarchistic
ideology, you point to the bloody abuses of the American war machine or
their Zionist accomplices. This diversionary tactic on your part does not
impress serious and thoughtful people. It is simply an abdication of your
moral responsibility. It is as if you are saying you reserve the right to
violate established Islamic principles, such as those guaranteeing the
protection of innocent life, because the American military or the IDF do no
respect innocent Muslim life. That would be a credible argument if the
American military or the IDF claimed to be operating on the basis of Islamic
principles. They don’t, but you do. I hope, without further elaboration, you
can immediately sense the moral dilemma you are creating for yourself.

Along those lines, please allow me to remind you of something else. Your
misguided attempts to kill and maim innocent Americans only make it easier
for the American military to kill more Muslims with greater impunity. Your
actions help to create a political climate that removes any moral restraint
from the actions of the American military, the IDF and soon the forces of
India’s increasingly Hindu nationalist armed forces. You see, fear is a very
potent emotion and when it is carefully manipulated it can lead to very
irrational politics. That most extreme form of those politics is called
genocide.

Fear can be especially dangerous when it is combined with another emotion,
insecurity. You are so divorced from reality that you probably haven’t
noticed that a lot of Americans are extremely insecure right now.
Especially, the white middle class or what is left of it. They don’t know if
they will soon lose their homes, if they will have a job tomorrow, if their
money will be in the bank next week, if they will be able to send their
children to college or if their retirement funds will be stolen or totally
devalued. Those insecurities combined with the spectre of the “Muslim
terrorist next door” are a lethal combination that a group of people called
demagogues is exploiting to justify an all out war on Muslims.

Those demagogues use the fear of you to prevent people from building the
kind of grassroots, popular, movements that are necessary to challenge the
corporate rape of our society and from challenging the destructive logic of
permanent war. For example, remember the growing movement to challenge the
new invasive TSA screening procedures at airports? Did you notice how it
disappeared after the would-be mujahid in Portland allowed himself to be
trapped into the scheme to blow up the Christmas tree ceremony? Do you think
the timing was accidental? It is a shame that you and your ilk are so
mindlessly complicit in such schemes.

Now you think the mujahideen can win an all out war against the Americans.
Look at what the mujahideen are doing to them in Afghanistan. Sorry, but
Afghanistan is not what all out war looks like. I’ll give you a clue what
all out war looks like. Remember a couple years ago when the Israelis were
bombarding the Gaza Strip and the Palestinian Muslims, for all of their
courage, couldn’t do anything except appeal to outside powers to stop the
carnage? Or a few years before that when Jenin was flattened? Think of the
scale of that devastation expanded to encompass all of the major cities of
the Muslim world. Imagine America unleashing a new generation of “tactical”
nuclear weapons being designed to be used specifically against Muslims
targets raining down on Muslim capitals and there is no Muslim strategic
deterrent available to stop it. AK-47s and RPGs will be of no avail. Imagine
the calls to human rights organizations to stop the slaughter finding no
ears to hear them because the neo-fascist forces your stupidity has helped
to unleash have swept those organizations away in its maddening torrent.

I have heard you counter that such an argument is a manifestation of a lack
of faith. God has promised the believers victory. Indeed, He has. However,
it is very pretentious of you to assume that someone who murders women,
children and innocents with blazon impunity in the Name of God are the
believers that victory has been promised to. He has promised the believers
victory, but that promise is not unconditional. God is not going to give
victory to people who murder in His Holy Name.

I applaud your courage, but how it manifests itself puzzles me. You have the
courage to fly halfway around to world to engage in an armed struggle, but
you do not have the courage to knock on your neighbor’s door to explain
Islam to him or to give him your take on world affairs. I am also baffled at
how you can smile in his face, but are ready to blow him up if he happens to
be at the wrong place at the wrong time. What calculus do you use to assume
he would not be amenable to your message? What has he done to you to be the
target of your bloodlust?

You claim a refined understanding of Islam, so refined that you can make
grave decisions concerning life and death, decisions with huge strategic
implications –yet you seem to perceive nothing of the divine wisdom of your
being in this country. You have an opportunity to be an educator at a time
people are looking for a new way. You have an opportunity to be a guide at a
time people are looking for a new direction. You have an opportunity to
provide a source of spiritual solace at a time people are confused, angry
and afraid. You have an opportunity to be a fierce advocate for truth at a
time when lies are transforming the image of your religion and the direction
of your country. You have the skills, the command of the language, the
knowledge of the people to do all of that and more, but you choose to run
away from this battle to join one you do not even know who the commander is.

Did I say that? “To join a battle you do not even know who the commander
is.” No! I didn’t say that. Do you think that if the FBI can send fake
mujahids into mosques all around America to find confused, vulnerable
Muslims, develop fake bomb plots, with fake bombs, for very real political
objectives, the CIA couldn’t do the same thing abroad? No, wait a minute.
Didn’t the CIA build the Afghan mujahideen network? Didn’t what’s his name,
Zbigniew Brzezinski, describe the Afghan operation as the CIA’s finest hour?

They would never use fake mujahids, operating through fake websites, to
recruit confused and desperate Muslim youth to engage in operations that
keep the climate of fear alive, would they? They wouldn’t do that to keep
support for bloodsucking, treasury-draining wars alive at a time when there
is no money for the poor, the elderly, health-care, education,
infrastructure or investment in the green economy. No! It’s preposterous.
Those would be psychological operations (psych ops) and that would be
cheating. America never cheats, we’re the good guys!

I apologize, I’m tripping. On a serious note, I hope you don’t one day end
up feeling as stupid and abused as young Antonio Martinez or Mahomed Osman
Mohamud, the Somali kid in Oregon, are probably feeling right now. They have
been tricked, deceived, used, and abused by fake mujahids and then thrown in
a dungeon to rot for the rest of their lives. Do you think your fate will be
any different? Don’t be a fool.

Sincerely,

Imam Zaid Shakir


-- 
Surah- Ar-Rum 30-22
"And among His signs is the creation of heavens and the earth, and the
difference of your languages and colours. Verily, in that are indeed signs
for men of sound knowledge." Qu'ran

www.suntoumana.blogspot.com


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