THERE HAS been relentless pressure on Muslims to condemn Sept. 11. They have done so, of course, repeatedly. But that does not seem to suffice. There's always the latest report of someone somewhere celebrating Osama bin Laden that has to be waved in front of Muslims to berate them some more that they have not taken full responsibility for the evil within.

The grand mufti of Al Azhar in Cairo, Islam's oldest seat of learning, along with the leading scholars in Saudi Arabia and other majority Sunni nations, as well as the supreme religious leader of minority Shi'ite Iran, have denounced terrorism. So have the heads of Arab League and the Islamic Conference, as also leaders of Muslim states, many of whom have joined the war in Afghanistan.

All major organizations representing Muslim immigrant communities in Canada, the United States and Europe have spoken out as well.

So overwhelming has been the response that it is hard to recall when there was such theological unity on a contemporary issue among Muslims who, unlike Christians but like their Jewish cousins, lack a central religious authority and are given to much debate and dissent.

Acknowledging little or none of the above, anti-Muslim ideologues proceed to accuse Muslims of silence against terrorism and of producing few "moderates."

The latter are generally defined as those who not only condemn terrorism, which almost all do, but who can confirm prevailing prejudices against Islam and exonerate American foreign policy, which few can. This, then, is offered as further proof that Islam is crawling with militants.

This is a game Muslims cannot win.

That other minorities have been subjected to similar group guilt throughout North American immigrant history is a lesson that has been forgotten. It also does not seem to matter that this narrative is totally at odds with the mantra of George W. Bush and his allies that we are at war against terrorism, not any religion.

The polemic poses two dangers: one for the West, the other for the Muslim world.

By holding up Islam as the sole or chief culprit for terrorism, America risks remaining in a state of denial about the political frustrations that bin Laden and his ilk have tapped into: American support for the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the unconscionable American-led economic sanctions on Iraq, the genocidal Russian war on Chechnya, the unending tragedy in Kashmir, along with long-standing American backing for oppressive and corrupt monarchical or military governments in the Muslim world.

Some people just do not want to hear any of this. But what has emerged post-Sept. 11 with terrifying clarity is that we will ignore these grievances at our peril, even as we liquidate bin Laden and his Al Qaeda network, as we must. Demonizing Yasser Arafat or Saddam Hussein will only obscure reality briefly. Relying on puppet regimes to keep a lid on boiling public anger will offer no guarantees against future bin Ladens from some other "hatchery for human missiles," in the scary phrase of Lebanese writer Saad Mehio.

Equally, Muslims are in danger of prolonging their own state of denial by blaming America, Israel and others for all their problems.

Internal decay is all around them: little or no democracy, or even Islamic accountability through shura, consultation, ijma, consensus, and ijtehad, innovation; entanglement in too many conflicts, 28 of the world's top 30, according to one account; two-thirds of the world's political prisoners and two-thirds of state executions; a majority of the world's refugees; a majority of the world's youth, most of whom have few prospects of good jobs and a decent life; and oppression against women and non-Muslims, even Muslim minorities.

These problems long pre-date Sept. 11, but have been brought into sharper focus since and can no longer be ignored.

There are severe limitations to how much ordinary people can change tyrannical states that jail or kill dissenters. But they can work on their own psychological and social malaise.

Far too many believe in conspiracy theories, especially anti-Semitic ones. Far too many take comfort in numbers and population projections, as though adding a few more millions to their 1.2 billion total would make much of a difference; if anything, it might exacerbate their problems. Far too many are mired in theological minutiae at the expense of the larger challenges facing them.

Typical traits these may be of a helpless people with little hope and much sadness borne too long under cruel conditions. But if introspection is the first step to self-healing, the process must begin.

Back to Features page