When Bill O’Reilly told the ladies of The View last
Thursday morning that he opposed the construction of the Ground
Zero Mosque because “Muslims killed us on 9/11” they reacted as if
he had committed an act of blasphemy.
Now anyone with a scintilla of common sense knows that
O’Reilly didn’t claim every Muslim on the planet was responsible
for the September 11 attacks. But alas common sense and liberalism
seldom meet. Indeed, when most liberals see common sense coming
towards them they cross the street to avoid it. How else to explain
the sight of Joy Behar and Whoopi Goldberg walking off the
set of their own show?
Given the rancor that had ensued, it was only natural that
much of that evening’s edition of The O’Reilly Factor was
devoted to what had occurred a few hours earlier. Fortunately,
there was none of the hysterical histrionics that were on display
on The View.
One of O’Reilly’s guests that evening was Alicia Menendez, a senior advisor at
the New Democratic Network (NDN), a liberal think tank. Menendez,
who is also the daughter of New Jersey Democratic Senator Bob
Menendez, was considerably more mature when conversing with
O’Reilly than either Behar or Goldberg. Yet despite Menendez’s
even tempered disposition I found this particular observation to be
rather question begging:
I feel like you and I could get into the semantics of this when
really this is a much bigger question. You and I both know it’s a
much bigger question about how we talk about September 11th. How
much politics we want involved in September 11th? I don’t want any.
I think this is supposed to be a day of remembrance and
resolve for America and should have nothing to do with
politics.
September 11, of course, must be a day of remembrance for
those who were killed in the World Trade Center, in the Pentagon
and those who were aboard American Airlines Flight 11, United
Airlines Flight 175, American Airlines Flight 77 and United
Airlines Flight 93. Yet how can September 11 be a day of
remembrance if we are unwilling to remember who was responsible for
killing nearly 3,000 people? How can September 11th be a
day of resolve if we are unwilling to come to the resolution that
nearly 3,000 people were killed in the name of Islamic
fundamentalism? How can September 11 be either a day of remembrance
or resolve if we are unable to recall the
words of Osama bin Laden in his 1998 fatwa ordering Muslims to
murder Americans and our allies?
The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies — civilians
and military — is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do
it in any country in which it is possible to do it, in order to
liberate the al-Aqsa Mosque and the holy mosque [Mecca] from their
grip, and in order for their armies to move out of all the lands of
Islam, defeated and unable to threaten any Muslim.
All of which brings me back to Menendez. After stating
that September 11 should be “a day of remembrance and resolve for
America,” she went on to observe:
Furthermore, it concerns me when religion is used as a wedge
issue between people and that’s why we need to be careful here
because when religion is used to drive people apart; that’s an
abuse of religion.
Once again this begs more questions. Are we using religion
as a “wedge” if we ask ourselves if nearly 3,000 people would still
be alive if bin Laden did not tell his Muslim brethren it was their
duty to kill Americans? Is it an “abuse of religion” if we
accurately document the statements and actions of Muslim clerics
and their followers who want to visit grievous harm upon America?
Are we to throw away our tradition of free speech and freedom of
thought because a small minority of Muslims might not like what
they hear? If reasonable American liberals like Menendez object to
this line of inquiry, then how can we properly remember September
11, 2001, much less resolve that it never happen again?
Well, at least Menendez did not accuse O’Reilly of
bigotry. The same could not be said of Joy Behar. In
Behar’s eyes, it is O’Reilly, not Osama, who is engaging in
“hate speech.” Well, I suppose it could be worse. At least O’Reilly
isn’t in the shoes of Geert Wilders and Behar isn’t a member of the
Dutch judiciary bent on putting him in jail for making “illegal
observations.” But when one considers the Obama
Administration’s support of the efforts of the Organization of the
Islamic Conference to make criticism of Islam a violation of
international law at the UN, one then must wonder if in a few short
years O’Reilly’s observations, however accurate,
could become illegal.
No wonder then that Nidal Malik Hasan could walk into a
room on an American military base shouting “Allahu Akbar” while
carrying a business card which read “Soldier of Allah” before
proceeding to kill a dozen U.S. soldiers and a civilian in cold
blood. After all, when the Pentagon released its report on the
terrorist attack at Fort Hood last January there was no
mention made of either Hasan or how his religion motivated his
actions. If our own military cannot bring itself to publicly state
that a Muslim soldier killed his fellow soldiers in the name of
Islam should it really come as any surprise that Behar and Goldberg
would have such a visceral reaction when O’Reilly said “Muslims
killed us on 9/11”?
Remembering September 11, 2001 is not only about those who
perished. It is also about why they perished. And how can
we remember why they perished if we stand up and walk out of the
room?
