After the London blasts, Jeff Jarvis said he is not sure if the Western world is dealing with the problem of terrorism directly. However, he thinks that Tom Friedmanhas made it clearer when he said, “it’s a Muslim problem, it needs a Muslim solution.” Humoud Abu-Talib, writing for Al-Watan daily, has quoted these words of Friedman:
Either the Muslim world begins to really restrain, inhibit and denounce its own extremists – if it turns out that they are behind the London bombings – or the West is going to do it for them. And the West will do it in a rough, crude way – by simply shutting them out, denying them visas and making every Muslim in its midst guilty until proven innocent.
Abu-Talib wrote: “It is sad that Friedman said ‘every Muslim in its midst guilty until proven innocent’, and it seems that this is what is going to happen.” He also blames the British authorities for being indulgent with the extremists. Abdul Rahman al-Rashed expressed the same idea. “Not only are they admitted to the country, they are also provided with accommodation, a monthly salary, and free legal advice for those who want to prosecute the British government,” he wrote for the English edition of Asharq al-Awsat.
Abu-Talib thinks that what happened will open the gates of hell on Muslims, especially Arab Muslims. “Muslims in Europe will pay the price for the idiocy of lunatics who commit crimes in the name of Islam.”
UPDATE: I reposted this to the GVO blog because I thought the subject worth further discussion. Is it a Muslim problems so Muslims have to solve it themselves, or is it a global problem and the whole world is responsible to find the solution?
Saudi Jeans 
Hi ahmed!
I read that article by Thomas Freidman. He said nothing new. In fact he just proved that he is not willing to listen to moderates among us and continues to have a myopic view, like when he says, ” To this day – to this day – no major Muslim cleric or religious body has ever issued a fatwa condemning Osama bin Laden.”
I for one can’t fathom why these people do not see when we do condemn Osama bin laden or other terrorist activities. For more info please read, http://avari.blogs.com/weblog/2005/07/tom_friedman_is.html
And if you want to read a good book about the world of OBL, read
“Imperial Hubris: Why the west is losing the war on terror?” by an influential former CIA agent, Micheal Schuere.
Hi, Ahmed. I am writing from London, though I am a Brazilian. I am a Christian, but with much respect for Muslims. I have been reading quite a bit recently about what some call “Islamic Revival” or “Radical Muslims”. I was close to London when the attacks on the underground took place. The British people reacted with their normal fleuma, but the government is taking hard measures. As to your question of whether the problem is a Muslim one or Global, I suppose it is global, as long as it is affecting the day to day lives of people outside the Muslim world. Or not?
im a christian and im writnig from philippines.but i’ve lived in uae for almost seven years and my experience there has thought me invaluable things.it has also deepened my understanding with muslims and i hold them in high regard, arab or not..let me just say that i totally agree with marcos and i sympathize with the victims of terrorism on both sides. by ‘sides’ i mean- muslims and non muslims. it seems that these terrorist acts and the current iraqi situation has divided peoples and countries. i completely disagree with thomas friedman.i believe we need more moderate voices from both sides and i believe that we should take a step back from our current hardcore stance.what will happen when all moderate voices are shut out?what will be left are hardliners who are too quick with their guns and too eager for blood. the result will be a defragmented society with blood and loss on both sides and an insatiable thirst for vengeance.in the end when both sides are too weak to fight or too weak to kill, then only will we realize we were wrong to hate.
I AGREE 100% WITH THOMAS FRIEDMAN,
BECAUSE HE KNOWS MORE THAN OTHERS
ABOUT ISLAM. I’M SAUDI, AND WHAT I KNOW FROM ISLAM: THERE IS NO MODERATE MUSLIMS.
IN ISLAM THERE IS TWO SIDES
1- ‘WEAK MUSLIMS’ WHICH NO BODY WILL TAKE CARE OR LISTEN TO THEM.
2- STRONG MUSLIMS(TERRORISTS) WHICH ACCORDING TO QURAN AND HADITH ARE BETTER, THESE PEOPLE WHO LEAD THE ISLAMIC PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD.
IF WESTERN SERIOUS ABOUT STOPPING ISLAM, THEY HAVE TO STOP ISLAM IN THEIR COUNTRIES, AND HELP US TO REALESE FROM THIS EVIL.
well to the one above IF you agree with this man in what he says in his ludicris statement then you are not different from him. Just because you say that your from Saudi does not mean that your a scholar in this deen. And obviously you have not done much reading or even having any type of understand about islaam becoz if you did then you would not side with those who HATE muslims, no matter what race they are and who MOCK the religion. If you read any ahadeeth then you will see that islaam is not harsh nor is it soft it’s muwaasitah. Those who cause problems around the world and putting the name of Islaam on it are JUHOOL(Ignorant) and don’t know anything about islaam and are puppets to the Western countries. I live in a western country and I embraced Islaam and proud to be a muslim. But it’s just sad to see those who don’t understand islaam and ruin it to call ppl to this beautiful deen and then those who make their comments and side with those who HATE the DEEN of Allaah and HATE Muslims who are following the deen and asking questions to the ppl of knowledge. Seek knowledge in Islaam and ask Allaah to guide you out of the darkness. Nowadays you have those muslims who are arab who try and immatate the westerners and try to ignore the fact that no matter how hard they try to look like them or act like them or speak like them at the end of the day you are NOT them. And you are being mocked by them JUST for TRYING to be like them. So before you agree with someone who knows NOTHING about islaam as he only knows about his religion(look at the last name) please do research about Islaam and ask those if you don’t know as Allaah states in the qur’aan.
Allaaya dih
hello, i am a saudi female student living in the UK, i was deeply saddened by the london bombings as i was by any other bombings that have taken place around the world, regardless of who is held responsible, be it the arab extremists or those of the rest of the wrold. terrorism is not a new phenomena, it has been around for ages. however, in the world we live in today, it is mostly associated with Islam. i disagree with Ahmad when he says that Islam preaches violence, because this is certainly not true. to the very core of it islam is a peaceful religion up to its name. However, the interpretation of some scholars is what should be criticised..
moreover, terrorism in my view is definitly a global concern. as it does effect the globe. we must keep in mind that opression from the west or even from the muslim world will not solve anything. more dialogue is needed in order to reach the root of this problem from all sides of thw world.
all i am trying to say is that it effects the whole world, and therefore the whole world should try to deal with it in the most peaceful way possible. aggression does not work! even if it does, it never lasts.
poet
Ladies and gentlemen, this is the 21st century, and religion should not have the protagonism it has today. I, having grown in the west, am lucky enough not to have had a brainwashing religious influence and do not believe in the existence of any god. Why should the existence of the muslim god be more true than the existence of some other gods in Africa or Asia or wherever? Some people even believe in horoscopes… The only safe option is to reject all these lunacies as what they are, outdated answers to old questions that science has answered long ago. And about Islam, you get the feeling it is only used to keep people quiet under the tyranny of middle eastern rulers.
Sadly, the world’s dependence on oil has given conservative Islam an economic protagonism out of proportion with its depth, pushing an irrational agenda based on some old book . Just remember not long ago the people of Arabia where mostly illiterate camel traders, and one day, when the oil is over, they will have to deal with the crisis of their failure to modernize, and we, will live in a more peaceful, rational world.
Save the planet from ecologic disaster and ideological craziness: Use your bike more often!
I write with reference to Anonymous’ comment on 15th June.
You write about the prevalence of science. Do you not think that this unwavering faith you hold in science is equal to the faith held by devoted followers of any religion?
There are many ways to look at the world, and science is only one of those ways. Do not accept it as superior to any other way of thinking simply because it claims to be objective, and rational.
We live in this world. The world is as we know it because of the way we look at it. It is SUBJECTIVE! Just as no two people see a colour as exactly the same, the world is not seen as one way by everyone. How can science be objective when its experiments are conducted by human beings, who are open to making mistakes and imprinting their own subjective views on their experiements albeit subconsciously.
You talk of Islam being followed to the ignorance of other ideals. Are you not doing this with science?
You speak of the middle eastern tyrannys. Have you ever been to the middle east? Which tyranny’s are you talking about? I have grown up in the middle east and I have yet to come across any of these tyranny’s you speak so knowledgably about!
You say that until a few years ago Arabs were nothing more than illiterate camel owners. Think again, because if it wasn’t for the Arabs, there would be no letters for you to write your all-knowing opinions! The Arabs were, and still are, a people of character, integrity, intelligence, morality and values. As with people all over the world, there are some who come no where near fitting this description, but if we’re going to start talking in generalities, which it seems you are prone to doing, then I think this is an adequate description.
It is people like you, who spout opinions and are not brave enough to put your name, that are the ignorant ones. Begin by looking at the FLAWS in science before you fully accept its assets. It is only when you look at yourself and your beliefs and find the parts where they fall short, that you can better understand the beliefs of others.
Zena
oh, and I’m signing my name.
We all know the problem, thank you.
Everybody almost could be a nice person, just searching his/her own happyness not violent pride or hatred…Muslim must understant it.
Why is it so hard to admit that Islam is a religion of war? Why don’t Muslims leave Islam?
Mankind has cried too much,so feel free to leave Islam.
DEAR “ANONAMOUS”
THE ISLAMIC WORLD WAS A PEACFUL WORLD UNTIL THERE WAS CRUSADORS THAT WERE JEALOUS AND ENVIOUS OF OUR CIVILISATIONS, AND UNTIL THE JEWISH ZIONISTS INVADED OUR WORLD TO CREATE THEMSELVES A RILIGIOUS STATE…YET WE DO NOT HEAR OF YOU CONDEMMING THE ZIONISTS, WHICH, INFACT IS THE ROOT CAUSE OF ALL TERRORISM AROUND THE WORLD.
REMEMBER, THE MUSLIMS OR ARABS DIDNT INVADE THE WEST, ITS THE OPPOSITE, OPEN YOUR EYES, DONT BE BLIND TO THE OBVIOUS!
FOR YOU INFORMATION: MUSLIMS CHRISTIANS AND JEWS LIVED SIDE BY SIDE IN IRAQ AND ALL OVER THE MIDDLE EAST, IN EVEN THE SAME NEIGHBOURHOOD, BEFORE THE ZIONISTS MADE THE WORLD RESENT ALL JEWS BY CREATING THE TERRORIST STATE OF ISRAEL.
Islamic world was never a peacful one whom are you tryin to Bluff, It started with Mohammad raidign carvans and increased in force to conquering nation,. First it was nearby Persian Empire which brutually slain and converted by the Caliphs and then the Muslims went on a killing spree to occupy Spain. Neither it was peaceful to the East. the muslims slaughtered the peacful Hindus which became so reputed that an entire mountain range has become to be known as (HIndukush-menaing Hindukilling). Every temple was raged to the gorund by the the truthful and innocent muslimsm converting whole of Afghanisthan and Pakisthan.
The veidence is their to see for everyone the peaceful nature of muslims
Take out the self righteous spects that you wear and see around the World it would be quite evident.
The Saudi, by the grace of oil they have quite fortunate otherwise no person would have cared a damn about you, why would anybody care if their is not oil, You neither are rich nor are you good person(becoz of ur beleif in ISlam which says to kill the non beleivers).
And The Prophet yur prophet is a chld rapist who married aisha at the age of 53 and has sex with here. HE murderd and massacred the whole tribe of Ben Quriza. He too 11 women in name of mariage to satisfy his lust.
By arab tradition a dughter in law is equivalne tto a daughter, but becoz of his lust, he had to reval a verse for Allah to satisfy his lust for his daughter in law, maried her and cahged the arab tradition.
this alll show all the verses he revealed were for the purpose of his self service…
This man over qaulifies for a war criminal more than a good person forget aboput Prophet hood.
He enslaved the weekest and inocent of all minds. The arabs are not know for their intelligence those days, so it was easy to capture their minds. but even then they didnt beleive himm instantly, they gave a good fight to the evil cult of Mohammad but by the treacharious nature of Mohamamd and his ruthlessness led the peacful Meccnas to surrender and hand over the pagan structure of kaaba to Mohammad and Mohmammad turned it in to a Muslim structure.
I disagree with Ahmed, bcoz it seems that he knows nothing about Islam, even being a Muslim.Ahmed is only one of the thousands of young people who was trapped by Zionist media war
It is not a Muslim problem it is linked to oppression and injustice. Solve the Palestinian problem give them a homeland and freedom , help the Kashmriris , free the Chechens from the claws of russia and im sure there will be peace in the world .
I condemn violence but violence with F16 , Apaches and cluster bombs is a lot worse.
the guy who calls himself Ahamed (instead of Ahmed ) and says he is saudi is NO saudi . In islam there is peace and there is compassion , obviously you have never read a koran in your life to know what fighing in islam (according to the holy book ) is only in self defense. Find out more about islam before you call yourself a saudi.
fatima
this is the 21st century and we have people voicing narrow minded opinions under the freedom of speech.
There is a key criteria for freedom. That is responsibility. Whether that responsibility is to a system or by way of religion, as is with Islam. There needs to be responsibility.
Freedom depends on clarity of judgement and responsibility of expression. If we are talking about “freedom” as per the dictionary, than why can a naked person walk into the Manhattan Bank?
Why cant a nake person walk past the white house or capital hill?
If we are to take the west as example of freedom, than there are things you cant do here, which by definition of freedom you should be able to do. However, there is an element of dependence on a system, a culture that also guides the type of ‘freedom’ one can have.
In a Islamic environment, you are free, but not free to break the laws of Allah. I am not refering to saudi, as saudi is way distant from an Islamic system. Saudi is a royal system, where the royals have moulded a form of religion that allows them to fly in whores from france.
Islam has never been the issue, the issue has always been, the people. It is saudi culture that women cant drive, it is saudi culture that the women are oppressed.
Allot of the problems from the middle east are heavily affect by the local cultures.
Today we have been subject to allot of people from outside telling us how Islam should be. However there is only one Islam. The Islam of the Quran and Sunnah. That was the same Islam that pulled out europe from her dark ages.
So let us not dump our short comings on the religion.
If there is no freedom of expression in saudi, it is because the saudi system fears that if the people start speaking about the short comings in the system, that soon public opinion will roll it over.
So how does that system blind its subjects? it does ‘big’ things, like build big mosques. But a mosque is only a building, if the saudis the youth are running away from islam, because of what the see as freedom in their satellite tvs. Soon al saud will have a problem on its hands bigger than any ‘fundamentalism’ it has ever faced.
AIDS is on the rise in the kingdom, why?
The problem has never been Islam, it is the people, whether kings or servants, you are the problem….
yes, its a purely muslim problem. How come no mullah so far has issued a fatwa against OBL. There has been surely acts of violence involving other religions, like the Srilankan Tamil problem, but they dont relate it to religion. Same is it for the Kashmir. If Muslims live in higher numbers, does it mean they should have a separate nation? Why are there very few secular countries in the majorly muslim dominated countries? & these countries have no or little democracy? Isn`t it radical Islam? Why should the governence be under control/Guidance of Islam? Why cant Politics be separated from Islam? Surely, only Moslems have to provide the solution!! Isn`t it a fact every small issue is blown out of preparations with Fatwa`s & Jehad declared every other day with Violent Demonstration!! For Example, the Pope`s comments or the Protest against the viel etc. I think the clash of the civilisation is up on the cards. Its just a matter of time.
Only just found this blog, I was happy to see many different opinions represented. The only Muslims we normally hear about here in London are the angry shouting ones, and I’m sure that’s not really representative of all Muslims.
I think this is both a global and a particularly Muslim problem. At the moment, the most noticeable acts of terrorism aimed at western targets are being committed by Muslims, neatly involving both of us. I can sympathise (to a limited degree) with the OBL position, if my city was invaded I’d be pretty pissed off too, and if my friends who asked me to put my life on the line against a shared enemy ignored me as soon as the enemy went away I’d be ringing them up asking why they don’t call, they don’t write etc. I wouldn’t decide I needed to crash planes into their houses. On the other hand, one thing I know of many Arabs is that they’re pretty shrewd traders, as are Americans. Why not see that dealing with the US over Afghanistan was anything other than “just business” and when the desired outcome had been achieved, that was the end of the arrangement?
Who knows what the solution is? Not me, my country successfully made a mess of relations with our next door neighbours (Scotland, France & Ireland) for the best part of the last 600 years so I doubt we’ll sort it out any time soon.
Sadly “Think”‘s post, and the comment “look at the last name” re T Friedman is soooo last century. Or 14 centuries ago. Just because he’s a Jew makes his opinions worthless does it? Well done, you exponent of a tolerant and understanding religion.
Like I said, I’m a Londoner and I’ve never been to the middle east and I’ve never been in a mosque (although if I did I’d know enough to make sure I was wearing new socks so I didn’t look a mess when I took my shoes off). For Zena to say there aren’t any tyrannies in the middle east is a bit strange. I’ve spent the day (since coming across a story about Saudi Jeans and Mystiquesa’s blogs on the BBCs website) reading blogs and comments from many Saudi’s that talk about the censorship of media and press in the Kingdom and how they’d like it to end. Does that count as tyranny? Ever read “The Religious Policeman”‘s blog? I think he knows more of middle eastern life than me… Not being free to say, think, read, hear, wear or eat what you want sounds pretty tyrannical to me. And the whole reason science has reached a level of acceptance in “the west” is not because we’re fallible human beings (although, why would any god create something that didn’t work properly, isn’t that evidence of god’s fallibility?) but because for a new theory of anything to become accepted fact it has to be published so that anyone, anywhere can try to reproduce the experiment. If no-one (whether professional or amateur scientist) can dispute or disPROVE the theory it becomes accepted. Do you still think the world is flat? Do you still believe a giant beetle hauls the sun up into the sky every morning? Has the world moved on and people learned a whole lot more about it since the quran, bible, torah etc etc were written? 1400 years ago horses & camels were the height of modern transport. How many people drive a car now, or fly in a plane? Do they travel safely from A-B because God makes it so, or because people tried, through the practical application of trial and error (yes, Zena, errors do occur sometimes – the trick is to be able to spot the mistake, learn from it and not do it again and again) and using the intelligence we’re all born with to observe the problems we face and come up with solutions?
Hayhatta had an interesting understanding of freedom. It’s not total freedom, of course there has to be laws. Should I have the freedom to stand outside your house and shoot your family as they walk out in the morning, or should you have the freedom to do the same at my house? Or should we both have the freedom to walk down the street in safety? I know what I’d prefer. How did Islam pull Europe out of the dark ages? I believe either the horse or the printing press did that.
If Islam is so peaceful, what’s the deal with Sunni and Shi’aa in Iraq ambushing one another outside (and sometimes inside) a mosque or anywhere else for that matter??
I think part of the problem westerners see with Muslims is that the actions of the “extremists” also advance the cause of the “moderate” Muslims. By not speaking out as loudly against extremists as extremists do about everything else you become associated with them by implication.
To be honest, I’ve heard plenty of criticism about negative British attitudes toward Muslims living here, (lots of current debate in the UK about niqab/burqa with Jack Straw & Tony B Liar etc wading in) but I’ve never heard of a Muslim cleric pronouncing a fatwah on bin Laden either.
Response to “A concerned Indian”
From an equally concerned Scotsman.
I spent 2 years in Riyadh in the 90’s so know a bit of politics / religion etc. It is wrong to describe Islan as peaceful, it was established on the battlefield then ruthlessly spread. The crusades are often compared…the difference Mohammed was responsible for his battles, Jesus would totally reject the crusades. If he had taken up arms against the Romans then Christianity would never be as it is. It was mankind who decided on the crusades.
Today, Islam is being spread by oil funds. Most mosques in the UK are funded by Saudi Arabia, why are there no Church’s in SA? The west requires to spell out to Islam that we require equal treatment and Churches should be built. My last point is that I am aware of Mohammeds wives, (an article in The Arab News in 1994) where his marriage’s including to Aisha, age 8 is justified, he was 53, the marriage was not consumated till after some battles. That says a lot. I am thankful to God for Jesus Christ.