AL-HUDA
Foundation, NJ U. S. A
Muslims distance selves from rioting
VIOLENCE CONDEMNED IN OPEN
FORUM
By Truong Phuoc Khánh
Distancing themselves from the bloody riots that have rocked
cities around the Muslim world following the now-infamous Danish
cartoon defamation of the Islamic prophet, moderate Muslims from
the Bay Area held a forum on Sunday to reaffirm their faith's
tenets: love and peace in the name of Allah.
The open house at the Muslim Community Association in Santa
Clara was aimed at educating Muslims and non-Muslims alike on
``how Muhammad would have responded through education and
rejected violence,'' said Safaa Ibrahim, executive director of
the Northern California chapter of Council on American-Islamic
Relations.
The forum, called ``Explore the Life of Muhammad,'' drew a
multiethnic crowd of several hundred people. It was sponsored by
CAIR, the Muslim Community Association and American Muslim.
Organizers weren't naive about why their open-house attracted
the public and media attention. ``It's not us,'' Ibrahim said.
``It's the controversy.''
The controversy was lit more than six months ago when a Danish
newspaper published caricatures of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad
in derogatory cartoons, with one depicting him wearing a
bomb-shaped turban.
Dennis Fox of Willow Glen remembers seeing the images in the
fall in the foreign press. Since then, the murder and mayhem
that continues to spill forth from certain segments of the
Islamic world has troubled him, Fox said.
``I strongly believe in freedom of the press; it's one of the
most important tenets of a free society,'' said Fox, who also
attended a community meeting sponsored by the Muslim Community
Association after the Sept. 11 attacks.
He said he attends the forums ``to try to understand why they're
so angry with the West,'' adding that he finds the cartoons
``reprehensible.''
``I understand the anger and the hurt,'' Fox, 43, said. ``But I
don't understand the murders and violence.''
Unequivocal condemnation of the violence was the message of the
day from Muslim community leaders.
``This is an issue that has nothing to do with freedom of
speech. It's a question of intentional provocation,'' said Iman
Zaid Shakir, of Hayward's Zaytuna Institute. ``As Muslims, we
should understand that and not be provoked to responding. Let us
take the high ground as our prophet did.''
Since January's republication of the cartoons by European
newspapers, a small Danish political brouhaha escalated into an
international crisis that has left at least 45 people dead. Tens
of thousands of militant Muslims have taken to the streets of
Cape Town, South Africa, Gaza and the West Bank. Last weekend in
Indonesia, the world's largest Muslim nation, several hundred
Islamist activists tried to storm the U.S. embassy.
Rashid Kaddoura, a Muslim from Santa Clara, said such extremist
violence is driven by political motivation or ignorance. It is
committed only by a small segment of the world's 1 billion
Muslims, he said.
``We are a peaceful people; we live peacefully next to our
neighbors,'' Kaddoura said. ``But some people try to instigate
things. The violent reaction is wrong. We support peaceful
protests.''
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