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The Koran Burning-Islamic Center Brouhaha
Threats to the First Amendment may be the worst outcome
by Ivan Eland
Antiwar.com
Even in an age of media sensationalism, the intense
coverage of the proposed Islamic center at Ground Zero,
and a shamelessly bigoted Christian minister's threat to
burn the Koran in response to it, are both jolting and
saddening.
Neither of these events merited media coverage at all,
but in today's world controversy brings larger audiences
and thus more revenue through advertisements. The mosque
isn't even the first near the "hallowed ground" of Ground
Zero, cannot even be seen from that site, and, as the imam
of the proposed mosque noted, is in the same neighborhood
as not-so-hallowed strip joints and gambling parlors. More
important, all of the followers of Islam, a religion that
has 1.5 billion adherents worldwide, should not be punished
just because 19 9/11 hijackers just happened to be Muslim.
Christianity is not blamed for the Nazi Holocaust even
though Adolf Hitler was a Catholic, the church looked the
other way during the extermination of Jews, the church
never excommunicated Hitler, Hitler could not have come to
power without the support of the Protestant and Catholic
churches in Germany, and Hitler, in his book Mein Kampf
and in speeches, said that Jesus fought against the "Jewish
poison" and that in "defending" against the Jews he was
doing Jesus's work. Yet no one alleges that all Christians
are bloodthirsty anti-Semites like Hitler, so why should
all Muslims be characterized as terrorists after 9/11?
But inferring from his brazen publicity stunt, apparently
the Koran-burning minister from Gainesville, Fla., thinks
they should be. Yet, with a congregation of only 50, he
is not even a major religious leader and so should have
been marginalized by the media as an extremist crackpot.
Yet ignorance about or bigotry against Muslims may not be
the most troubling aspect of this sorry saga. In fact, the
behavior of the Gainesville fire department, Secretary of
Defense Robert Gates, and Gen. David Petraeus may have
been more dangerous to the principles of the republic.
The Gainesville fire department unconstitutionally
attempted to deny the admittedly obnoxious minister's First
Amendment rights by denying him a permit to have a fire
when no obvious fire hazard existed. Similar rumblings were
heard in New York City about using the zoning laws as an
excuse to unconstitutionally deny Muslims the right to
build the Islamic center near Ground Zero. Fortunately,
that was not done, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg deserves
a pat on the back, for rare principled behavior by a
politician, in standing up for the right to establish the
Islamic center. The Gainesville fire department did not
behave so admirably.
Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. military commander in
Afghanistan, stated publicly that the minister's burning
of the Muslim holy book would endanger U.S. troops, and
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates made a call to the
minister to urge him not to do it for the same reason.
Petraeus and Gates may be correct, but then why didn't
they make similar statements that pressure to move the
proposed Islamic center away from Ground Zero could also
pose a threat to American forces? The minister's Koran
burning can't endanger U.S. troops overseas any more than
repeated non-Muslim U.S. occupation of and intervention in
Muslim lands ? such meddling in such places as Indonesia,
Palestine, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Iran, Lebanon,
Libya, Kuwait, Somalia, and Yemen ? the major reason for
the 9/11 attacks, not Islam.
More important, in a free republic, it is dangerous for
high-level government officials to pressure or intimidate
private citizens, even subtly, into restricting their
constitutionally protected speech (in contrast to laudable
opposition to the minister's bigotry by private religious
and community leaders), no matter how vile and prejudiced
the speech and no matter how laudable the goal (saving the
lives of American troops).
Gates and Petraeus work for President Obama and should have
followed his more restrained example. Obama was criticized
on the Left for not praising the building of the Islamic
center enough. But when Obama said that Muslims had a right
to build the center, but then said that he was not endors-
ing the project, that was about right. Since the U.S.
Declaration of Independence said that government was
supposed to preserve people's rights rather than take them
away and the Constitution's Bill of Rights was designed to
effect this principle, Obama's endorsement of the right of
Muslims to build the center was justified and needed. But
a president's or government's job is not to decide which
type of speech or religious observance is good or bad; in
fact, that itself would set a bad example.
Some people may not like the building of an Islamic center
near Ground Zero or appreciate the political statement of
a bigoted Christian minister, but, in both cases, the First
Amendment rights of freedom of religion and speech need to
be respected.
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