JN Thoughts
A MONTHLY MIX OF IDEAS
Bolstering Moderate Muslims
Philadelphia
W
hat moderate Muslims?" is
the near-inevitable retort to
my stating that radical Islam
is the problem and moderate Islam the
solution.
Where are the anti-Islamists' demon-
strations against terror, their combating of
Islamists, their reassessments of Islamic
law?
Moderate Muslims do exist, I reply.
Admittedly, they do not constitute a
movement but represent mere wisps in
the face of the Islamist onslaught. This
means, I argue, that the U.S. government
and other powerful institutions should
give priority to locating, meeting with,
funding, forwarding, empowering and
celebrating those brave Muslims who, at
personal risk, stand up and confront the
totalitarians.
A just-published study from the RAND
Corporation, Building Moderate Muslim
Networks, methodically takes up and
thinks through this concept. Angel Rabasa,
Cheryl Benard, Lowell H. Schwartz and
Peter Sickle grapple intelligently with
the innovative issue of helping moderate
Muslims to grow and prosper.
They start with the argument that
"structural reasons play a large part"
in the rise of radical and dogmatic
interpretations of Islam in recent years
— one of those reasons being the Saudi
government's generous funding over the
last three decades for the export of the
Wahhabi version of Islam. Saudi efforts
have promoted "the growth of religious
extremism throughout the Muslim world:'
permitting the Islamists to develop power-
ful intellectual, political, and other net-
works. "This asymmetry in organization
and resources explains why radicals, a
small minority in almost all Muslim coun-
tries, have influence disproportionate to
their numbers!'
The study posits a key role for Western
countries here: "Moderates will not be able
to successfully challenge radicals until the
playing field is leveled, which the West can
help accomplish by promoting the creation
of moderate Muslim networks."
Does this sound familiar? It resembles
the late 1940s, when Soviet-backed orga-
nizations threatened Europe. The four
authors provide a helpful potted history of
American network-building in the early
Cold War years, in part to show that such
an effort can succeed against a totalitar-
ian enemy, in part to glean ideas for use
at present. (One example: "A left hook to
the Kremlin is the best blow:' implying
that Muslims can most effectively batter
Islamism.)
Reviewing American efforts to fight
Islamism, the authors find these lacking,
at least with regard to strengthening mod-
erates. Washington, they find, "does not
have a consistent view on who the moder-
ates are, where the opportu-
nities for building networks
among them lie, and how best
to build the networks."
They are only too right. The
U.S. government has a disas-
trously poor record in this
regard, with an embarrass-
ing history of twin delusions:
either thinking Islamists are
moderates or hoping to win them over.
Such government figures as FBI Director
Robert S. Mueller III, State Department
Undersecretary Karen Hughes and
National Endowment for Democracy head
Carl Gershman wrong-headedly insist on
consorting with the enemy.
Instead, the RAND study promotes four
partners: secularists, liberal Muslims,
moderate traditionalists and some Sufis.
It particularly emphasizes the "emerg-
ing transnational network of laicist and
secularist individuals, groups, and move-
ments," and correctly urges cooperation
with these neglected friends.
In contrast, the study proposes de-
emphasizing the Middle East, and par-
ticularly the Arab world. Because this area
"offers less fertile ground for moderate
network and institution building than
other regions of the Muslim world;' it
wants Western governments to focus on
Muslims in Southeast Asia, the Balkans
and in the Western diaspora, and to help
make available their ideas in Arabic. This
novel stratagem defies a cen-
turies-old pattern of influence
emanating from the Middle
East, but it is well worth a try.
Even the generally hard-head-
ed RAND study sometimes lets
down its guard. Dismayingly, the
quartet refrains from condemn-
ing Washington for dialoguing
with lawful Islamists even as
it cautiously endorses European govern-
ments treating some Islamists as partners.
It mistakenly characterizes the U.S.-
based "Progressive Muslim Union" as pro-
moting secular Islam, when it was really
another Islamist organization, but with a
hip tone. (No other Islamists dared host a
feature called "Sex and the Umma.")
Building Moderate Muslim Networks
is not the final word on its subject but it
marks a major step toward the system-
atic reconfiguring of how to implement
Washington's policy to combat Islamism.
The study's meaty contents, clear analysis
and bold recommendations usefully move
the debate forward, offering precisely the
in-depth strategizing Westerners urgently
need. ri
Daniel Pipes (www.DanielPipes.org ), director
of the Middle East Forum, resumes his col-
umn after teaching on "Islam and Politics" at
Pepperdine University in Malibu, Calif., the past
semester.
I Am Israel
I Asher Zeliq Fried
Yom HaAtzmaut, Israel Independence
Day, was 6 Iyar, this year April 23-24.
I
am Israel. I am the homeland, an ever-
lasting heritage to the nation of Israel.
I am the Nation. I am the fathers
who first settled this land 4,000 years ago. I
am the tribes who inherited this land and
who returned from bondage to repossess
this land. I am every Jewish soul that stood
with Moses at Sinai and accepted the ever-
lasting covenant. I am the judges and the
prophets, and I am the great kings of Israel,
David and Solomon who ruled this land in
42
April 26 • 2007
its greatest glory
I am the ancient Israelites, who lived
on this land for a thousand years. Though
carried off to a distant land, my eyes
never veered from Zion. "By the rivers
of Babylon, there we sat and also wept
when we remembered Zion." And again I
returned and resettled this land, and rebuilt
Jerusalem and the holy Temple.
I am the warriors that fought with Joshua
to subdue this land. I am the warriors that
fought with David to defend this land. I am
the Macabees that fought with Judah to free
this land, and I am the heroes of the Israel
Defense Force, that today protects this land.
I am the precious few, the pious that
never left this land. I am the sages that
preserved the holiness of this land. I am the
pioneers that dared reclaim this land. I am
a sabra and I am a settler. I am from Russia,
and I am from America. I am from Africa,
and I am from Australia. I am Ashkanazi,
and I am Sephardi. I am Taimani, and I am
Buchari, and now together Yisraeli, bound
by souls forever Yehudi.
I am the exiled of 2000 years, the rem-
nant returned, joined at last, a multitude
of millions. Dispersed among the nations,
persecuted and murdered, my Jewish heart
never stopped longing for Jerusalem. And
now, as if in a dream, in a miracle hardly
recognized, Zion has been reborn.
I am the State of Israel. Attacked at birth,
raised in fire, I have known only war all of
my days. I extended my hand in peace to all
who sojourned here, and they responded
with hatred and terror. I extended my hand
in peace to the nations that surround me,
and they responded with war, and a vow
to destroy me. With sacrifices unbearable,
I prevailed in battle, and yet again in each
generation. And today I pray, as I pray every
day, that "He grant might unto His nation,
and bless His nation with peace!'
I am Israel, a modern day marvel. I
made the desert bloom. I make seawater
sweet. I am a scientific wonder. I am a
miracle of medical breakthroughs. I am a
treasure of biological research. I am world-
class in technological innovation. I am an
entrepreneurial tour-de-force, challenging
dominance in every industry. I am the most
literate and the most highly educated soci-
ety on earth. And yet I have never known a
day of peace.
I am Israel, the destiny. I am the dream of
millennia come true. I am a light unto the
nations. I am the world's moral standard.
I am religions' focal point. I am Jerusalem,
both the old and the new I am Jewish sov-
ereignty, from Jordan to the Great Sea, and
from the hills of Lebanon to the beaches of
Eilat. I am Israel the promised land. I am
Israel the homeland. I am Israel the eternal
Jewish land. I am Israel.
Asher Zelig Fried is author of The Israel
Narrative, an online commentary on Israeli and
Jewish affairs, and is a contributor to Jewish
publications in Israel, the U.S. and Canada. His
e-mail address is Lonez555@aol.com.