A recent interview
I found a very recent radio interview, dated September 25, 2008, at World Net Daily of Brigitte Gabriel by WND regular Barbara Simpson. Scroll down to find the embedded audio.
Around the 43 minute point, when asked about moderate Muslims, Gabriel rightly says that the moderate Muslims are "truly irrelevant." But continues to say that "it is the radicals who are driving the agenda...and this is the only group we need to be focused on..." This is the perennial discussion regarding Muslims. And I am resigning myself to thinking that it will always be the argument.
Admittedly monitoring mosques, universities and other centers of congregation for radical activity are ways to decrease what could be potential attacks. This is essentially Gabriel's position, and I have to acknowledge that it is an important one.
By the way, I should add that I much prefer Jihadi rather than radical to describe this violent expression of Muslims since any Muslim can be a potential Jihadi, as mandated by the Koran and Islam. Radical has a more arbitrary association to Islam, putting it outside the periphery of the religion.
Therefore, I wonder if Gabriel remembers the July 2005 London Subway bombings, where 3 out of 4 of the bombers were British born Muslims, with seemingly normal lives, one even running a fish-and-chips shop with his parents? How could the British authorities have ever known that these were "radical" young men? How about the homegrown "terrorists" of Brampton (from the Greater Toronto Area) Ontario in 2006?
Are our lives going to be overwhelmed by endlessly monitoring and reporting on suspicious "radial" activity? How do we know that the corner store doesn't have a basement of Jihadi American or Canadian citizens?
On what basis can we say that Muslims are not allowed to practice their religion? How can we refuse them foot-washing stalls if we have already allowed them their presence here, and that one of our mandates is freedom of religion?
The problem is not radicals, the problem is Islam. And that problem will not go away as long as we keep admitting "peaceful" Muslims, and maintaining the large, vocal and now extremely dexterous Muslim population - with its own "peaceful" lawyers, "peaceful" politicians (elected by their large "peaceful" Muslim constituencies), "peaceful" real estate agents buying up all those buildings for their "peaceful" Madrassas and Islamic centers, out of which come young subway bombers.
So, we are still stuck with "radical" Muslims, even coming from an astute and experienced Gabriel. The other telling thing is that Robert Spencer has also written a new book which he calls: "Stealth Jihad: How Radical Islam is Subverting American Without Guns or Bombs."
As my blog "Our Changing Landscape" shows, as does my article - "Stealthy Islamic Inroads into our Culture" which I had published at Chronwatch.com elucidates, there is nothing radical about these stealthy maneuvers.
They are just the normal, expected behavior of a population which wants to practice its religion and live as it sees fit. With the extra mandate that everyone else do the same.