Tuesday, May 09, 2006

Where Islam is

not anti-western. A couple of good examples to show that not all Muslim countries are out to get us or cause general trouble. Or harbor terrorists.
Morocco has been campaining against radical Islamicists ever since 9/11.
They helped mobilize more than one million Moroccans to take to the streets of Casablanca in May 2003 to denounce radical Islamic terrorism'—a march in which 1,000 Moroccan Jews openly participated and were warmly embraced by the Muslim community. They launched a theological training program for Imams to teach them how to promote moderation within Islam, to teach them more about Western history and the importance of Christianity and Judaism to Western social and political development, and to help them identify and oppose extremist forces and trends within Islam. Participants take 32 hours of instruction per week for a full year. The first class of 210 just graduated, and included 55 women.

Among other things. I've only copied the tip of theicebergg in that story. Read the whole thing and be encouraged. Certainly, Morocco isn't a bastion of Democracy and tolerance. Christians still find it difficult to reach out there. But the tolerance they do show stands out in the region.
Hat tip to Instapundit for that one.

Perhaps you'd like to notice the past few years in Indonesia.
One, Indonesia is a Muslim country and unfortunately, that sometimes conjures up the belief that it is widely Islamofascist. This really isn't true. Only a tiny number of people subscribe to Islamofascism - when I was in Indonesia, I had to go looking hard for them, because nobody liked it. Most Indonesians, instead, are syncretic, a combination of their own religions - a layering of Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Christian and animist tradition - the evidence is below in the pictures. Two, Amid all this very slow moving traditionalism, Indonesia is a real and true democracy. Despite the country'’s reputation for corruption, this country has serious, pro-democracy voters as any in the world. They have give and take. They forgive their enemies. They compromise. They talk to each other, even if they are on other sides of the fence. These are significantly critical elements for making a democracy work.
He has some great pictures of peoples and the volcano, Mount Merapi.

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