[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 132 (Tuesday, October 2, 2012)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1675]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        BACKLASH TO THE BACKLASH

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. BARNEY FRANK

                            of massachusetts

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, October 2, 2012

  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, previously I submitted an 
extraordinary, eloquent and thoughtful column by Thomas Friedman of The 
New York Times on the essentiality of free speech, the absolutely 
unjustified nature of violence and the hypocrisy involved when many of 
those who declaim what they found insulting are themselves guilty of 
equal vituperation of other religions and ethnic groups. Mr. Friedman 
has subsequently written a follow up to that column, which I found 
equally compelling. I submit this excellent column as well as it 
deserves to be widely read.

               [From the New York Times, Sept. 25, 2012]

                        Backlash to the Backlash

                        (By Thomas L. Friedman)

       One of the iron laws of Middle East politics for the last 
     half-century has been that extremists go all the way and 
     moderates tend to just go away. That is what made the march 
     in Benghazi, Libya, so unusual last Friday. This time, the 
     moderates did not just go away. They got together and stormed 
     the headquarters of the Islamist militia Ansar al-Sharia, 
     whose members are suspected of carrying out the attack on the 
     U.S. Consulate in Benghazi that resulted in the death of four 
     Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens.
       It is not clear whether this trend can spread or be 
     sustained. But having decried the voices of intolerance that 
     so often intimidate everyone in that region, I find it 
     heartening to see Libyans carrying signs like ``We want 
     justice for Chris'' and ``No more Al Qaeda''--and demanding 
     that armed militias disband. This coincides with some 
     brutally honest articles in the Arab/Muslim press--in 
     response to rioting triggered by the idiotic YouTube video 
     insulting the Prophet Muhammad--that are not the usual ``What 
     is wrong with America?'' but, rather, ``What is wrong with 
     us, and how do we fix it?''
       On Monday, the Middle East Media Research Institute, or 
     Memri, which tracks the Arab/Muslim press, translated a 
     searing critique written by Imad al-Din Hussein, a columnist 
     for Al Shorouk, Cairo's best daily newspaper: ``We curse the 
     West day and night, and criticize its [moral] disintegration 
     and shamelessness, while relying on it for everything. . . . 
     We import, mostly from the West, cars, trains, planes . . . 
     refrigerators, and washing machines. . . . We are a nation 
     that contributes nothing to human civilization in the current 
     era. . . . We have become a burden on [other] nations. . . . 
     Had we truly implemented the essence of the directives of 
     Islam and all [other] religions, we would have been at the 
     forefront of the nations. The world will respect us when we 
     return to being people who take part in human civilization, 
     instead of [being] parasites who are spread out over the map 
     of the advanced world, feeding off its production and later 
     attacking it from morning until night. . . . The West is not 
     an oasis of idealism. It also contains exploitation in many 
     areas. But at least it is not sunk in delusions, trivialities 
     and external appearances, as we are. . . . Therefore, 
     supporting Islam and the prophet of the Muslims should be 
     done through work, production, values, and culture, not by 
     storming embassies and murdering diplomats.''
       Mohammad Taqi, a liberal Pakistani columnist, writing in 
     the Lahore-based Daily Times on Sept. 20, argued that ``there 
     is absolutely no excuse for violence and indeed murder most 
     foul, as committed in Benghazi. Fighting hate with hate is 
     sure to beget more hate. The way out is drowning the odious 
     voices with voices of sanity, not curbing free speech and 
     calls for murder.''
       Khaled al-Hroub, a professor at Cambridge University, 
     writing in Jordan's Al Dustour newspaper on Sept. 17, 
     translated by Memri, argued that the most ``frightening 
     aspect of what we see today in the streets of Arab and 
     Islamic cities is the disaster of extremism that is flooding 
     our societies and cultures, as well as our behavior. . . . 
     This [represents] a total atrophy of thought among wide 
     sectors [of society], as a result of the culture of religious 
     zealotry that was imposed on people for over 50 years, and 
     which brought forth what we witness'' today.
       The Egyptian comedian Bassem Youssef wrote in Al Shorouk, 
     translated by Memri, on Sept. 23: ``We demand that the world 
     respect our feelings, yet we do not respect the feelings of 
     others. We scream blue murder when they outlaw the niqab in 
     some European country or prevent [Muslims] from building 
     minarets in another [European] country--even though these 
     countries continue to allow freedom of religion, as manifest 
     in the building of mosques and in the preaching [activity] 
     that takes place in their courtyards. Yet, in our countries, 
     we do not allow others to publicly preach their beliefs. 
     Maybe we should examine ourselves before [criticizing] 
     others.''
       Whenever I was asked during the Iraq war, ``How will you 
     know when we've won?'' I gave the same answer: When Salman 
     Rushdie can give a lecture in Baghdad; when there is real 
     freedom of speech in the heart of the Arab Muslim world. 
     There is no question that we need a respectful dialogue 
     between Islam and the West, but, even more, we need a 
     respectful dialogue between Muslims and Muslims. What matters 
     is not what Arab Muslim political parties and groupings tell 
     us they stand for. What matters is what they tell themselves, 
     in their own languages, about what they stand for and what 
     excesses they will not tolerate.
       This internal debate had long been stifled by Arab 
     autocrats whose regimes traditionally suppressed extremist 
     Islamist parties, but never really permitted their ideas to 
     be countered with free speech--with independent, modernist, 
     progressive interpretations of Islam or by truly legitimate, 
     secular political parties and institutions. Are we seeing the 
     start of that now with the emergence of free spaces and 
     legitimate parties in the Arab world? Again, too early to 
     say, but this moderate backlash to the extremist backlash is 
     worth hailing--and watching.

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