Israel Matzav

Ground Zero victory mosque imam on peace with Israel

Anyone want to take bets on the likelihood that the views of the Ground Zero victory mosque imam on the possibility of peace between Jews and Muslims mirror the views of most 'moderate Muslims.'

Much has already been made of the imam's comments on "60 Minutes" following 9/11, when he called America an "accessory to the crime" and announced that "Osama bin Laden is made in the USA." He has also refused to call Hamas a terrorist organization. We've now come across two letters to the New York Times that reveal more about the imam's worldview.

In a letter published on November 27, 1977, Mr. Rauf commented on Egyptian President Anwar Sadat's historic trip to Israel and encouraged his fellow Muslims to "give peace a chance." That John Lennon lyric sounds good. But he added: "For my fellow Arabs I have the following special message: Learn from the example of the Prophet Mohammed, your greatest historical personality. After a state of war with the Meccan unbelievers that lasted for many years, he acceded, in the Treaty of Hudaybiyah, to demands that his closest companions considered utterly humiliating. Yet peace turned out to be a most effective weapon against the unbelievers."

He's referring to a treaty in the year 628 that established a 10-year truce between the Prophet Muhammad and Meccan leaders and was viewed by Muslims at the time as a defeat. But Muhammad used that period to consolidate his ranks and re-arm, eventually leading to his conquest of Mecca. Imam Rauf seems to be saying that Muslims should understand Sadat's olive branch in the same way, as a short-term respite leading to ultimate conquest.

To drive that point home, he added in the same letter that "In a true peace it is impossible that a purely Jewish state of Palestine can endure. . . . In a true peace, Israel will, in our lifetimes, become one more Arab country, with a Jewish minority."

Sounds just like Yasser Arafat or Abu Mazen, doesn't he?

The Wall Street Journal asked the imam to explain whether his views had changed.

We asked Imam Rauf if his views had changed since the 1970s. His complete response: "It is amusing that journalists are combing through letters-to-the-editor that I wrote more than 30 years ago, when I was a young man, for clues to my evolution. As I re-read those letters now, I see that they express the same concerns—a desire for peaceful solutions in Israel, and for a humane understanding of Iran—that I have maintained, and worked hard on, in the years since those letters were published."

That sure doesn't sound like a 'peaceful solution with Israel to me unless you assume that the Jews will just pick up and move away.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:38 AM