Resources for Understanding Islam and Middle East Conflicts

Open Letter to ISIS from Muslim Scholars

You don’t have to buy this one, it’s online. To think ISIS fighters are Muslims who actually obey their Qurans and the moderates don’t is a view of Islam similar to that of ISIS, and just as perverted. The summary of the Open Letter to the leader of ISIS is a short and concise treatise which reveals how polar opposite radical Islam is to the faith. It provides a few of the many reasons radicals should not be considered Muslim.

Each point in the summary is explained in more detail in the body of the letter and will serve as a good introduction to why the many sweeping generalizations made about Islam just don’t do it justice.

Many people on social media will post a list of Quranic verses that seem to support the idea that Islam is an evil religion hell bent on taking over the world by force and forcing everyone to convert. Though this letter doesn’t dive into Quranic interpretation it should be evident that these scholars, and the vast majority of Muslims, come to a different conclusion because quoting ancient text out of context doesn’t work any better in Islam than it does in Christianity.

This letter was written by over 120 Muslim scholars from around the world who hold esteemed positions within the Muslim community. This is a part of the great body of Islamic scholars that your Muslim neighbors and imams look to for how to understand their faith.

When imperial religions clash like they did during the Crusades about 500 years after Mohammad it’s no surprise that the members of those religions find theological reasons to consider the others to be from the pit of Hell. Objectivity gets tossed in favor of creating intellectual discord. We still operate with those historic biases today.

Mark Siljander, in his book A Deadly Misunderstanding – A Congressman’s Quest to Bridge the Muslim-Christian Divide, explores the areas of greatest theological tensions between Islam and Christianity, and based on linguistic analysis of the texts offers a way to reconcile those differences.

This isn’t hippy-dippy peace-no-matter-what-the-texts-say ecumenism, this is real theological work that the former congressman has run past experts in both Christianity and Islam. I wished more of the Christians we send to Washington could engage scriptures to this level.

The issues Mark dives into include our ideas about conversion, the crucifixion, Jesus being the Son of God, the Five Pillars of Islam, what it means to be “Muslim”, the doctrine of the Trinity, and others. But this is much more than theology, this book is filled with amazing and heartwarming true stories of reconciliation between world leaders which serves as a pattern for how we can make peace with each other. Like with PLO chairman Yasser Araffat who had put out a contract for his life, and others.

These two topics, what Islam is really about, and what American foreign policy is really about, could take volumes to explain in order to answer the question Why Do They Hate Us?, yet Steve has done a yeoman’s job in condensing it all into one very readable and informative paperback.

Steve and I have travelled on similar spiritual journeys. I have been a missionary minded Evangelical Christian. I didn’t have the opportunity to spend 5 years immersed in Muslim culture like Steve did but I had noticed that Muslims were against two very common theologies in the Church that I have come to oppose and wondered what else Mohammad got right. So began my own investigation.

I have come to see Mohammad as an ally in my quest to see believers return to the original Apostolic paradigms for salvation and Christology before later innovations became “orthodoxy”. Though Steve’s book does not touch on theological issues since they don’t really answer the Question, his own journey has brought him to many of the same conclusions I have come to in answer of his Question, which is that both Jesus and Mohammad are both prophets of God who are worthy of great respect for their integrity and the social justice they promoted, and Muslims already have profound respect for Jesus. The problems with our two religions can’t be blamed on the prophets but can be blamed on the ones to follow them after their departures.

In addition, I have found peace with Islam knowing that the Ulama, the body of religious scholars that the vast majority of Muslims follow, are dead set against radical Islam, being victims of it themselves.  They are much less missionary minded about spreading Islam than either Steve or I had been about spreading Christianity. Except for the Wahhabi (Saudi Arabian) brand, which is universally despised amongst Muslims in general. Steve helps to explain this, though I think an explanation of how we unwittingly support radical Islam every time we fill up our gas tanks would have been insightful as well.

I also deeply appreciate Steve’s treatment of American (and Western) foreign policy, which really is what us Americans should be worried about if we ever hope to live in safety in the West. We shall reap what we sow. When will we stop sowing destruction – and the hatred that follows – for the sake of natural resources? That is the Question that is yet to be answered.

Michael Scheuer was the former head of the CIA’s Bin Laden Unit, who resigned in 2004 after nearly two decades of experience in national security issues related to Afghanistan and South Asia. He is the author of Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror. As “Anonymous,” he is also the author of Through Our Enemies Eyes: Osama Bin Laden, Radical Islam, and the Future of America. Scheuer has been featured on many national and international television news programs, has been interviewed for broadcast media and documentaries, and has been the focus of print media worldwide.

He is no doubt the West’s foremost expert on al-Qaeda who spent most of a decade gathering and analyzing the intelligence that, had it been used fully and honestly, would have allowed all U.S. leaders to know what sort of storm was approaching before 9/11. Today that intelligence should be used to inform us of why matters have gotten worse and what we need to stop doing to make it so, but sadly it is not.

Michael Scheuer’s Imperial Hubris presents overwhelmingly persuasive evidence to buttress a host of significant and controversial arguments. It pulls few punches and gives us a fascinating window on America’s war with al-Qaeda and its offshoots like ISIS and Boka Haram. No serious observer of the war on terrorism can ignore this scathing critique of the Bush administration’s policies, many of which are being repeated by the Obama administration. As Richard Clarke, former national coordinator for security and counterterrorism said, it’s “a powerful, persuasive analysis of the terrorist threat and the Bush administration’s failed efforts to fight it.”

Eric is a journalist and foreign policy expert with more on-the-ground experience in the Middle East than anybody I’m aware of. He even fought the Russian occupation of Afghanistan alongside the mujaheddin. He answers the most pressing questions we in the West confront: Why does the Muslim world distrust us? Is the idea of a secular Muslim world – especially one based on the Western model – realistic? Has ideology blinded Western powers to both political and historical reality? Is accommodation between these two ideological adversaries possible? What can be done to prevent a clash of civilizations?

In his book American Raj: Liberation or Domination? Resolving the Conflict Between the West and the Muslim World, he takes you behind the conventional headlines and into the thinking and world view of anti-Western Islamic radicals throughout the Muslim world, and identifies the historical, political and religious factors that have played such a huge role in generating Islamic hostility towards the West.

As a war correspondent Eric has covered conflicts in Angola, Namibia, South Africa, Mozambique, Sinai, Afghanistan, Kashmir, India, Pakistan, El Salvador and Nicaragua. As an award-winning, internationally syndicated columnist his articles appear in major publications and appears as an expert on foreign affairs on major news networks.

His internet column ericmargolis.com reaches 100,000 readers a day.

Karen Armstrong’s Islam: A Short History demonstrates that the world’s fastest-growing faith is a much more complex phenomenon than its modern fundamentalist strain might suggest. The picture of Islam as a violent, backward, and insular tradition should be laid to rest, says Karen Armstrong, bestselling author of Muhammad and A History of God.

Delving deep into Islamic history, Armstrong sketches the arc of a story that begins with the stirring of revelation in an Arab businessman named Muhammad. His concern with the poor who were being left behind in the blush of his society’s new prosperity sets the tone for the tale of a culture that values community as a manifestation of God.

Muhammad’s ideas catch fire, quickly blossoming into a political empire. As the empire expands and the once fractured Arabs subdue and overtake the vast Persian domain, the story of a community becomes a panoramic drama.

With great dexterity, Armstrong narrates the Sunni-Shi’ite schism, the rise of Persian influence, the clashes with Western crusaders and Mongolian conquerors, and the spiritual explorations that traced the route to God. Armstrong brings us through the debacle of European colonialism right up to the present day, putting Islamic fundamentalism into context as part of a worldwide phenomenon.

Jonathan A.C. Brown teaches a simple, if vital, lesson: “Authenticity is elusive in religion, and those who claim it tend not to be searching for the truth but grasping for power.” 

Brown possesses formidable knowledge of pre-modern Muslim scholars who sought to preserve accounts of Muhammad’s teachings and practices. Misquoting Muhammad: The Challenge and Choices of Interpreting the Prophet’s Legacy sheds light on the considerable dynamism and sophistication within the Sunni tradition as he identifies and contextualizes the larger interpretive issues at stake in the global competition between diverse traditional and Salafi Sunni voices. He ably navigates the cutting edge of Hadith studies while offering his able insight, encyclopedic knowledge of Muslim textual traditions, and awareness of the political contentiousness of scholarship in Islamic studies. 

Brown is among the most talented and productive scholars in the field of Islamic Studies today. He is also a practicing Muslim who has the rare ability to sit at the feet of traditional scholars from Egypt to Malaysia for hours on end and translate that knowledge into something beneficial for his American audiences. Misquoting Muhammad makes the important point that what many Muslims believe to be essential tenets of their faith are often nothing of the sort.

One of the biggest questions in the minds of Westerners is whether extremist Muslims do what they do because they are the most dedicated to their religion, while the peaceful Muslims are the half-hearted ones. Or is there another way to look at it?

In Islam Without Extremes: A Muslim Case for Liberty Turkish journalist Mustafa Akyol makes a case for an interpretation of the Quran put forth by dedicated Muslims since its inception that supports Western values of personal liberty. He chronicles movements within Islam from the beginning that have reflected a more liberal interpretation, and why those movements have either fizzled out, or have been snuffed out by political and illiberal social forces from within and interference from without. There are three extremes that have haunted the Muslim world, secular authoritarianism, Islamic authoritarianism, and Western interventionism, which often leads to the first two. There is a fourth, and promising, way: Islamic liberalism.

For those curious about where extremism took its ugly roots in Islam, this book provides a detailed explanation. Further, it dares to provide a solution to the problem of extremism.

Sometimes it takes a Canadian to tell it straight regarding the actions of the US government. The Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG) is an independent research and media organization based in Montreal. Their website www.globalresearch.ca publishes news articles, commentary, background research and analysis on a broad range of issues, focusing on social, economic, strategic and environmental issues.

The CRG website was established on the 9th of September 2001, two days before the tragic events of September 11. Barely a few days later, CRG had become a major news source on the New World Order and Washington’s “war on terrorism”. Since then they have established an extensive archive of news articles, in-depth reports and analysis on issues which are barely covered by the mainstream media.

In an era of media disinformation, their focus has essentially been to center on the “unspoken truth”.

During the invasion of Iraq (March-April 2003), CRG published, on a daily basis, independent reports from the Middle East, which provided an alternative to the news emanating from the “embedded” journalists reporting from the war theater. Since 2004, CRG has provided detailed analysis and coverage of US-NATO-Israel preparations to wage a pre-emptive nuclear attack on Iran. Starting in 2011, CRG has developed dossiers on the US-NATO led wars on Libya and Syria, the Arab Protest movement, the environmental impacts of the Fukushima disaster, the ongoing crisis in Ukraine, the militarization of the African continent, and the development of the police state in North America and Western Europe, among other important topics.

Ron Paul is someone most of us have actually heard of. He has been a member of Congress and has run for president on both the Libertarian and Republican tickets.

Only two years old, the Ron Paul Institute mobilizes colleagues and collaborators of Dr. Paul’s to participate in a broad coalition to educate and advocate for fundamental changes in our foreign and domestic policy.

A prosperous America is profoundly linked to a foreign policy rooted in peaceful relations and trade with all. With peace, comes real prosperity.

One of my blog posts is titled We Should Have Listened to the Libertarians About the Middle East. Sometimes Libertarians are like a voice crying in the wilderness but when they prove themselves to be right while the rest dismissed their opinions as being naive you tend to want to listen to them more.

Among the institutes board members include former Congressman Dennis Kucinich who introduced a bill to create a Department of Peace, as well a Michael Scheuer and Eric Margolis who I list on this page as resources.