M. Akhtar, Ph.D; President, Muslim Council of America Lately Muslims have become like a political football for the players who like to win the Super Bowl, sometime by hook or by crook. Thank God, there are rules and laws in America, that makes us feel to be proud of American heritage. Dr. Ben Carson in the presidential race for 2016 took a shot at American Muslims, saying that Muslims cannot become US President. Doesn’t Dr. Carson know that the Article VI of the US Constitution specifically forbids a religious test as a requirement for holding a governmental position? Does it prohibit Muslims to aspire for President’s job, simply based on one’s religion? No, that did not go very far. Sensing the wind flow, he shifted his attack and took another shot at Muslims,...

Aslam Abdullah, Ph.D; Director of Islamic Center, Las Vegas, Vice president of Muslim Council of America Will the US train Muslim Americans to take on ISIS The (Un) Islamic state of Iraq and Syria is an organization of individuals who coul easily put even beasts to shame. They belong to league of Hitler, ben Ladens and many more who promoted terror and murder for reasons they could not explain to themselves. They are against Christians, Jews, secularists and even Muslims. They are fighting a war they claim religious, which is overtly Satanic. Where do they get monetary support? Who supplies them weapons and ammunition? Who helps them in Europe and USA to recruit young Muslims who are usually unknown in their own communities for their commitment to Islam. The ISIS i...

Jaseem Pasha, MD. No Muslim is born Jihadi or has any genetic predisposition to turn into a Jihadi. Having a pre-Jihadi state of mind is not a mental illness. It is a ‘learned mindset’ with a significant religious overlay that gradually surfaces and evolves when the young Muslims are exposed to an ongoing organized theological indoctrination, which routinely takes place in madrasas and other religious institutions in every Muslim country. Such a theological drilling, with distorted religious concepts labeled as “Islamic” imparts a pre-Jihadi mindset, which in turn primes the apparently harmless naive Muslim youth to become a potential target to be lured by the recruiters of terrorist organizations and turn them into a walking, talking time bombs. Predis...

Saleem Ahmed, Ph.D. President, Pacific Institute of Islamic Studies, Honolulu, Hawaii The Qur’an declares: Nothing is said to you (O Muhammad) except what was said to messengers before you (verse 41.43). Revealed in Islam’s earlier years when the prophet lived in Mecca, this informed all -- Jews, Christians, Muslims, and pagans alike -- that the message of monotheism and righteous living, conveyed earlier by Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and other prophets and messengers via the Torah and the Bible, was reinforced by the Qur’an. However, while there was nothing “new” in the crux of the message Muhammad brought – monotheism and righteous living – the “newness” was that it expanded significantly the geographical area in which God’s messengers repo...

Dalia Mogahed and John L. Esposito While the world mourned the savage and senseless loss of innocent life, some capitalized on the attacks in Paris to score political points. Within hours, Rep. Jeff Duncan, R-S.C., tweeted: “How’s that Syrian refugee resettlement look now? How about that mass migration into Europe? Terrorism is alive & well in the world. #No” Such refrains are more than emotional eruptions. They are manifestations of a deeply rooted narrative that casts Muslims as a foreign “growth” in the body of the West. The resulting debate is then framed something like this: Is this tumor benign or is it carcinogenic? When Donald Trump says he’ll consider closing mosques, he is operating from this framework. When Ben Carson declares a Muslim ...