Mozlem to Muslim and Brother to Brother Building bridges between Muslims and America

No images in this presentation are of or reflect the Prophet Muhammad, his family or his companions.

Who am I?

I am an AmericanI am also a Muslim

Who are you?

Also a Muslim.Perhaps in a countrywhere you are angry at America

Maybe you hate

Americans

First a disclaimer. I

am not paid by the American

government to say this.

I want to acknowledge first that not everything

America does on the world

stage is good or right.

What you experience of

American foreign policy is one aspect of America.

When you hate America,

what does that mean?

Did you know most

Americans compared to

other cultures are very open

minded?

Over ~20,000 Americans convert to

Islam every year.

America in spite of being unpopular

in the world is the number one

destination for people in the

world.

Most Americans consider them

selves to be religious, patriotic,

charitable. Doesn’t that

sound like you and me?

Americans have values that we believe are the

envy of the world like

Freedom and Justice?

When you hate Americans, do you know that there are 2-8

Million Muslims in America?

Did you know most

Americans who have contact with Muslims

have a positive view of them?

Did you know America is a big country. It has

over 300 Million people,

that’s larger than western

Europe.

Because America is so big, the

average American has

less understanding of

the rest of the world than do Europeans and other cultures.

After 9/11 American-

Muslims have faced many challenges.

The American-Muslim community has tried to

open up our homes and mosques, so our

neighbors, and co-workers, and

community have a better understanding

of who we are.

If we are to build bridges

of understandingwe need your

help.

We can’t say in our mosques, Islam means

peace, and when they go home

and turn on the news they see

Muslim violence.

An embassy or consulate

of any country has a special

protected space in all societies.

If you kill an Ambassador or

other US representative,

you are breaking the sanctity of not only human life but the rules by which we humans live. The

Prophet never allowed this.

If you destroy an embassy

or consulate, who pays the bills to rebuild

it?It’s you.

As a society we may not agree with all laws, but if we do

not obey laws, the result is

anarchy.

Extremists of all faiths, try to

trigger conflict between us and

in our communities. Don’t take the

bait!

If you are unhappy with my

government or yours, setting

McDonalds or KFC or other American icons on fire, will help no one and

only hurt everyone.

Uprooting railway lines,

and other infrastructure will only harm

your community. Who pays? you

do.

If you put a bounty on a author or

film-makers head, or have them

killed, who pays the price?We all do.

All Muslims get a bad rap.

You have to understand that in America and

Western Europe, “Freedom of

Speech” is a deep value that society

believes in.

In most cases it is the right of everyone to

express themselves and

censorship is viewed in a bad

light.

You may say America does not always live up to its ideal.

Sadly we Muslims also have double standards.

The Prophet told us to follow the

middle pathi.e. avoid

extremism.

And what does the

Quran say that we all

follow?

“Fight in the way of Allah against those who fight against you, but begin not

hostilities. Lo! Allah loveth not

aggressors.” Quran (2:190)

“And dispute ye not with the People of the Book (Jews and Christians), save in the most courteous manner and say,

"We believe in the revelation which has come down to us

and in that which came down to you; Our God and your God is one; and it is to

Him we bow (in Islam).“ (29:46)

Just as the Quran is a sacred book for Muslims, to

Americans the flag is sacred. Burning

it is against the law, and for

Americans to see Muslims burning it, is provoking

them.

What about Palestine, Kashmir, Iraq, Afghanistan,

America’s invasions and occupations or

interference and the drone attacks?

I like other Muslims care

about the suffering about

our Muslim brothers and

sisters through out the world.

There are no easy answers. But there is a

common denominator,

besides America, or

Israel and Jews.

There are many lessons that can

be obtained from 9/11. For those like Osama Bin Laden, and Al-

Qaida it is that you cannot defeat

America militarily.

America is the current world’s

only Super-power. What that means

is militarily, economically, media-wise,

socially it is by far today the most

powerful nation on earth.

If you want America to change it’s

foreign policy, it has to be done

through political means and from

within.

The success of American-Jews

and then eg Indian-

Americans in influencing

foreign policy is legendary.

Soft power, through

politics, media and other

ways is more influential than

hard power.

What this means is Muslim countries and the people

who want a change in course of the US have to rethink how they

engage with America.

Think about it, all Israeli’s or Indians do not necessarily love America, but

you never see them or their

leaders denouncing

America. They are less emotional and

more pragmatic.

Muslims have valid grievances but we are very emotional and by in large non-

pragmatic.

Let me make a thought provoking

statement for you.

My father when he emigrated to

the UK in the sixties said he learnt “true

humanity” by going there.

“Americans and their West

European peers are more just or have a sense of

justice than pretty much all the

Muslim countries combined.” Why is

that?

Muslims have many issues,

and we cannot blame

it all on America, or the Jews,…

In Islam you cannot try to

reach just ends by unjust means.

How about preserving the

sanctity of life? In Quran (5:32) we find reference to

that if one saves a life he saves all

humanity and if he takes a life unjustly

he has killed all humanity.

After claiming to be Muslim how can you take the

life of others through suicide

bombing etc. Most of the

people killed are innocent

bystanders.

Remember we are not on the battlefield.

If someone puts a bomb near an

American post, a church, synagogue,

Sunni or Shia mosque, 99.999% of

the time innocent human beings are

being killed.

These are not acts of martyrs but

misguided cowards and Jihadis. Suicide is

forbidden in Islam. Anarchy is forbidden in Islam. Taking the

Lives of innocent people is forbidden in

Islam.

If you are sick, you try to find the best

doctor, not a quack. Why in your

religion/deen would you go to people whose scholarship is

questionable and follow them when

it clearly contradicts our

faith?

So where do we go from

here?

If as Muslims we are angry about a book, or film

or cartoon about the

Prophet (PBUH), think how would

he behave?

Interestingly the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) was

mocked and blasphemed in his time.

What did he do?

In different situations he responded in

different ways.

Sometimes he ignored it.

Other times, like when

they made bad poetry,

about him, he laughed it off.

At other times he

recruited the best poets to avenge the sayings of

others.

But and this is worth noting he never started a war or started

attacking others because of this

mockery.

Let’s go back to basics.

The Prophet Muhammad after

returning from a war said “We have come back from the lesser jihad to the greater

jihad.” Meaning jihad al-nafs (jihad against

the self)

Note: some folks claim this is a weak hadith, but even if it isThere is a valuable lesson in it for us.

We must acknowledge

our own faults, and get

our own house in

order.

This doesn’t mean

Muslims have to become

passive.

Movies, books,

cartoons are all ideas. This

is a war of ideas.

You can vent and vent more

productively, by getting a better understanding

of the situation.

You can help to calm your

and your communities emotions, by being a voice

of reason.

You can write, blog, speak out,

pray, without a call to arms.

Please share this with your friends

• All images are from public domain and copyright of respective owners.

• If there are any mistakes (and I am confident there are), they are mine please overlook them. This is one little Muslim’s attempt to bring a voice of reason to a highly ignited world. It is not definitive or the last word. If you have better insights rather than criticizing this presentation, create one of your own. Muslims and America can co-exist, we just have to work our way towards it patiently and with prayers.

• Thank you God Bless and JazakAllahkher

A K2 Vista Project