Get your FREE pdf copy of the "The Sharia'h Bomb: How Islamic Law can Destroy American Freedom."

go to www.abuelias.org Wage Peace Project

A Moral Mission and Moral Vision for America

by Darrell W. Pack

The U.S. State Department now claims that forces loyal to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad have recently used chemical weapons. The information comes via the U.S. consul in Istanbul and based on interviews with doctors, Syrian defectors from the Syrian Army, and activists, who together make a compelling case that the Syrian military had used Agent 15, or BZ gas, in Homs last month against the Sunni-majority opposition. Then again the State Department challenges the report and conclusion, stating that it “found no credible evidence to corroborate or to confirm that chemical weapons were used.” Is anyone getting confused here?

Last August Obama pledged that “seeing movement on the chemical weapons front, or the use of chemical weapons” by Assad would mean the Syrian dictator had crossed a “red line” and would trigger a U.S. response. But what kind of response? Our officials and the administration is making significant errors on every Muslims world issue. Why? How?

Myopic fixation on their image as the liberal radical who is standing against “The Man” has kept them from seeing and facing the complicated realities in the Muslim world. They have been desperate to say that the bad guys in the Muslim world are al-Qaeda and little else; further, they say we’ve nearly got those bad guys whipped. Wrong on both counts. The liberal political and media elites are philosophically and dispositionally inclined to dislike those leaders in the Arab world that conservative American administrations worked with and whom they see as the establishment. This often pushes them to being overly sympathetic to the worst of the worst as long as these are the (in their view) anti-establishment. The result is that they tend to paint those groups and individuals in much too nice of colors if they are outsiders.

Of course I am being simplistic here, but it is a real issue and one that they keep getting wrong. Mr. President, Sir. You are the very center of the establishment now. You are the establishment. You are “The Man.” Face facts and get past the adolescent desire to “burn in all down.” The anti-establishment groups you tend to like are often morally bankrupt and even more despicable than the tyrants who have been in power.

We must find the moral center of our message and our mission. Simple slogans like “supporting democracy” are meaningless. What is the core of our moral message to the Muslim world? What is the mission we will struggle for? Why will we struggle for this? How does it further our nation’s best interests? How does it promote what is actually good? These questions cannot be left unanswered. This administration has lost its message to the Middle East, simple because it has not clarified its moral center. Not more theater and optics, more reflection, honesty, and communication of a message based on a moral reality are what is needed. 

FREE PDF Book "The Sharia'h Bomb: law Islamic Law can Destroy American Freedom." click this link, read, tell a friend or two about it, pray.

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9BpTJmtP7GzRGhMLVUtQ2lpTk0/edit

Needed in the Middle East:
A Message and Mission for the United States

by Darrell W. Pack

The U.S. State Department now claims that forces loyal to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad have recently used chemical weapons. The information comes via the U.S. consul in Istanbul and based on interviews with doctors, Syrian defectors from the Syrian Army, and activists, who together make a compelling case that the Syrian military had used Agent 15, or BZ gas, in Homs last month against the Sunni-majority opposition. Then again the State Department challenges the report and conclusion, stating that it “found no credible evidence to corroborate or to confirm that chemical weapons were used.” Is anyone getting confused here?

Last August Obama pledged that “seeing movement on the chemical weapons front, or the use of chemical weapons” by Assad would mean the Syrian dictator had crossed a “red line” and would trigger a U.S. response. But what kind of response? Our officials and the administration is making significant errors on every Muslims world issue. Why? How?

Myopic fixation on their image as the liberal radical who is standing against “The Man” has kept them from seeing and facing the complicated realities in the Muslim world. They have been desperate to say that the bad guys in the Muslim world are al-Qaeda and little else; further, they say we’ve nearly got those bad guys whipped. Wrong on both counts. The liberal political and media elites are philosophically and dispositionally inclined to dislike those leaders in the Arab world that conservative American administrations worked with and whom they see as the establishment. This often pushes them to being overly sympathetic to the worst of the worst as long as these are the (in their view) anti-establishment. The result is that they tend to paint those groups and individuals in much too nice of colors if they are outsiders.

Of course I am being simplistic here, but it is a real issue and one that they keep getting wrong. Mr. President, Sir. You are the very center of the establishment now. You are the establishment. You are “The Man.” Face facts and get past the adolescent desire to “burn in all down.” The anti-establishment groups you tend to like are often morally bankrupt and even more despicable than the tyrants who have been in power.

We must find the moral center of our message and our mission. Simple slogans like “supporting democracy” are meaningless. What is the core of our moral message to the Muslim world? What is the mission we will struggle for? Why will we struggle for this? How does it further our nation’s best interests? How does it promote what is actually good? These questions cannot be left unanswered. This administration has lost its message to the Middle East, simple because it has not clarified its moral center. Not more theater and optics, more reflection, honesty, and communication of a message based on a moral reality are what is needed. 

Rebranding Violence, Repression, and Death: the My Jihad Movement
by Darrell W. Pack


Not all of you will remember when Seven-Up soft drink advertised itself a the "Uncola" with a cool bald guy that had a cool Jamacan-style accent. It was a great branding move. Many of us thought about that soft drink in a new light. Recently, a group of Muslims who are concerned with the image of their religion have decided to try one of history's most challenging re-branding efforts. In this case I don't think that a cool accept will be enough because they are trying to re-brand Jihad.

The MyJihad effort (www.myjihad.org) is an effort to wrest from the hands of extremist Ideological Muslims the term "jihad". They also wish to preemptively strike--rhetorically, of course--at the so-called Western extremists who decry Jihad as an evil. In the writings of so-called or extremists, Western or Muslim, Jihad is a call to violence and armed struggle against Allah's enemies. It speaks of terror and oppression. But in the context of MyJihad the term becomes the kinder and gentler face of jihad. He is part of the MyJihad website description of the word and concept of Jihad.

Jihad is a central tenet of the Islamic creed which means “struggling in the way of God“. The way of God, being goodness, justice, passion, compassion, etc (not forcible conversion as wrongly claimed by some).

As Muslims, we are taught to put forth a concerted and noble effort against injustice, hate, misunderstanding, war, violence, poverty, hunger, abuse or whatever challenge big or small we face in daily life, with the purpose of getting to  a better place.

Jihad is a personal commitment to service, patience, determination, and taking the higher road, as such, it tasks us with confronting our own weaknesses, vices, and shortcomings; it is about taking personal responsibility.

Can I just say, "awesome!" I so hope that this works. It would be great for planet earth if every Muslim embraced this excellent vision of jihad. It would make Muslims great citizens and neighbors and friends. But of course there is a real challenge here. Namely, those mean Muslims who kill and blow stuff up for Allah and his prophet claim to know the true meaning of Jihad and would see this as a watering down of a holy tenet of their faith. In fact, they are so sure of this that some of them would blow up our intrepid re-branders and their chic Modbook Pro Tablets.

For the next number of posts I will present the basis in the Quran and the life and Traditions of Muhammad the prophet of Islam (hadith) of the violent jihadist. A nice, shiny and pleasant re-branded Jihad carries with it an inherent danger: it can lessen our vigilance in opposing Jihad. In that way it can turn into something like re-branded Nazism. Nicely dressed, well-spoken, clean-cut little Aryan boys wearing little swastikas still represent a truly dangerous movement even if they are only picking up garbage in a public park to serve their community. Nice MyJihad can become just a cover for the growth of Mean TheirJihad.