Why Muslims Should Thank NYPD for teaching "The Third Jihad"

الثلاثاء ٢٣ - ديسمبر - ٢٠٢٥ ١٠:٠٤ صباحاً

اضيف الخبر في يوم الإثنين ٢٠ - فبراير - ٢٠١٢ ١٢:٠٠ صباحاً.

The New York Times has sharply criticized the New York Police Department (NYPD) for using the critically-acclaimed documentary The Third Jihad: Radical Islam's Vision for America in counterterrorism training.

The New York Times has published two news articles (first, second), as well as an editorial entitled "Hateful Film" about the topic.

In response, film producer Raphael Shore has issued a statement.

An analysis of the issue from a different angle can reveal a dimension that has been ignored in the current debate. This dimension is that Muslims should be thankful to the NYPD for teaching this video rather than scorning them.

The first reason that should make Muslims thankful for the NYPD for using this documentary is that by shedding light on and focusing attention to Radical Islam - which ultimately leads to fighting it - they actually protect more Muslims than anyone else since the majority of victims of Radical Islam are actually Muslims.

The second reason why Muslim should thank the NYPD for using the documentary is that it proves beyond doubt that moderate Muslims do exist. Many people after September 11 and after the repeated attempts to attack the U.S. by home grown Islamist terrorists have wrongly concluded that All Muslims are radicals. The inhumane practices of Sharia Law in different parts of the world just added more salt to the wound and further supported this view about Muslims. The presence of some moderate Muslims like Dr. Zuhdi Jasser proved this view to be wrong and provided concrete evidence for the existence of true moderate Muslims.

Standing against the documentary is actually counterproductive for Muslims as it can support the above view that most Muslims are supportive of Radicalism rather than the other way around. By supporting the use of the documentary, moderate Muslims could have proven that they -among the others - also stand against radical Islam. This could have had a very strong negative impact on the rising hatred toward Muslims or the so called Islamophobia - as it would have provided clear evidence that most Muslims are truly against radicalism (1).

The other reason that should make Muslims thankful to the NYPD is that the outcome of their training that included the documentary was excellent since NY City has not been attacked since September 11 despite the fact that several Islamist terrorists attempted to attack it. Had the NYPD used Politically Correct teachings that ignored the threat of Radical Islam, terrorists could have succeeded in conducting another major attack on the city. This -if it happened- could have had devastating consequences to Muslims in the US. Evaluation of the teachings at NYPD must depend on its outcome and effectiveness in preventing crimes including terrorist acts. The outcome of education at NYPD is simply that despite being the main target of many terrorists both domestically and globally, these terrorists have failed for more than ten years to hurt the city.

To conclude, statistical evidence shows clearly that Islamist terrorism does exist. Ignoring its existence is a form of dishonesty that can end in disasters. The more that Muslims stand against the radicalism in their society the more they can prove that moderate Islam does exist and the more they can actually decrease the so called 'Islamophobia'. Muslims need to see criticism of Radical Islam as their opportunity to prove that they are moderates - by simply standing against it as Dr. Jasser, who is a practicing Muslim, did.

(1)According to the Pew Foundation Poll on Muslim Americans http://people-press.org/files/2011/08/muslim-american-report.pdf 48% of Muslims acknowledge (see p.1) that their leaders have not done enough to speak out against extremism.

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