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Special Report
Abandoned Under Obama
Persecuted Bangladeshi journalist Salah Choudhury goes before a court tomorrow, his case no longer monitored by U.S. diplomats.
(Page 2 of 2)
As he explained during his visit to the U.S. this month, during which he addressed groups including the American Jewish Committee in New York and graduate students of the Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of ant-Semitism, he won't stop fighting jihadism or, as he terms it, "political Islam." He will continue to expose the brainwashing of innocent children, to support Israel, to promote interfaith cooperation -- and to remain a Muslim.
"Only a person who is a Muslim can reform Islamic laws," he explained. "To reform something you have to remain in that society, correct? If you are an outsider, you can criticize, but… you are not part of the society who can do something to change it."
He won't leave Bangladesh, either, despite offers of asylum, because he believes that would hand the Islamists and their apologists a victory. He refuses to give them free reign to radicalize his country.
Choudhury is risking his life for a free press, religious pluralism, and human rights -- the very values that U.S. service members are fighting to uphold in Afghanistan and Iraq. As Americans concerned with defending those values and winning the war of ideas, his fate should be of utmost concern to us.
And yet, this Wednesday November 11, Choudhury will appear in a Dhaka courtroom without so much as a word of encouragement from the U.S. government. International human rights advocate and former Attorney General of Canada Irwin Kotler has filed an amicus curiae brief identifying almost two dozen ways the case against Choudhury violates both Bangladeshi and international law. But there will be no U.S. monitors. In fact, according to Benkin, the U.S. embassy in Dhaka no longer even returns Choudhury's phone calls.
This seeming abandonment of a defender of freedom in the Muslim world is disturbing, especially in light of a larger pattern on the part of the Obama Administration. While peaceful protestors in Iran are shot and beaten by baton-wielding Basijis, President Obama stays silent as long as possible in deference to Iran's mullahs, and then offers only tepid words of support for the protestors, while simultaneously de-funding U.S. groups promoting human rights in Iran.
(An argument can be made that in remaining silent during the initial days of last June's protests, President Obama was denying the mullahs ammunition to delegitimize the protestors. But those freedom-fighters disagree: just this week, thousands took to the streets, again risking their lives and shouting: "Obama! Obama! Either with them or with us!")
And in a stunning act of pre-emptive appeasement, Mr. Obama became first U.S. President since 1991 to decline to meet with the Dalai Lama when the man came to Washington D.C. last month (no doubt the Chinese were delighted to be thus accommodated, having assumed, according to the Washington Post, that Mr. Obama would continue the Presidential tradition of meeting with the exiled leader of Tibet).
When does tolerance become tolerance of tyranny? And when does diplomacy become a euphemism for lack of moral conviction and courage?
At a certain point, refusal to take a side in the great ideological battles of our time becomes counterproductive to our efforts to uphold freedom and human rights worldwide. Continued, this policy of appeasement will weaken the United States.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (40) | Leave a comment
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Pingback| 11.10.09 @ 7:25AM
The American Spectator : Abandoned Under Obama links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Alan Brooks| 11.10.09 @ 1:30PM
It never ends-- 20 yrs ago it was Salman Rushdie.
Pingback| 11.10.09 @ 8:27AM
The American Spectator : Abandoned Under Obama : PlanetTalk.net - Learn the truth , links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
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American Experience: Two Days in October | eCheapPrice.com links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Carpenter| 11.10.09 @ 1:20PM
Does the Obama administration value freedom of speech?
Or freedom at all?
Is the US Bangladesh legation too busy?
Pingback| 11.10.09 @ 1:45PM
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Ken (Old Texican)| 11.10.09 @ 3:50PM
I'm sorry, Heather
I am so busy battling for the life of our country...I cannot embrace a single guy a world away.
Mo| 11.10.09 @ 5:54PM
So, we're basically letting this guy go to his death? Just like we did the 13 soldiers murdered at Ft. Hood.
And I just read a pro-Iranian regime guy has been put in charge of Iranian affairs by the Obama admin?
Have we lost our minds? Does anyone care?
I'm sorry, the bow to the Saudi King told it all. We have a president who is bought and paid for by jihadis, or worse, maybe just ideologically goes that direction even without the money.
We're SO screwed.
Choudry is a brave man, that he will go back. Obama once again shows, as does the entire admin, that it doesn't give one iota of care about freedom.
DaveS| 11.10.09 @ 7:41PM
Speaking of sedition, who's occupying the White House?
Abul Hashem Khan| 11.10.09 @ 9:55PM
Thanks to American Spectator and Heather Robinson for this important article on Muslim Hero Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury, who battles against radical Islam and promotes inter-faith harmony as well freedom of press and expression. I was completely shocked to witness that major U.S. media totally ignored Choudhury during his trip during October 27-November 4, 2009. Obama, for obvious reason has abandoned him, because, the U.S. President is no more interested in annoying his Iranian or Islamist counterparts by extending support to such voices of moderatios. But, why the U.S. media are also ignoring him and not defending a fellow journalist? Are they also willing to see Choudhury killed by the Kangaroo court in Bangladesh or Islamist militants?
Abul Hashem Khan| 11.10.09 @ 10:20PM
We need to support this extremely courageous man of today's world. His newspaper, Weekly Blitz, with print and online edition, though is the largest circulated English language periodical in Bangladesh, does not receive advertisement from Bangladeshi entrepreneurs, as they are affraid of placing advertisement in it fearing negative reaction from the radical forces. Online edition of Weekly Blitz is available on www.weeklyblitz.net. People can also buy a copy of INSIDE MADRASSA, an investigative book on madrassa education as well spread of militant Islam. Purchasing a copy of Choudhury's book or placing advertisements in Weekly Blitz will be of great help to this man in running his publication as well as ongoing heavy legal expenditures.
jennifer www.angstmom.com| 11.11.09 @ 9:45AM
thank you heather for this thought provoking piece! it is important to remember that there are people on all sides of the idealogic fence who value truth, justice, and democracy.
DaveS| 11.11.09 @ 11:05AM
...all sides except the liberal one.
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