Reply #76: OK, give me some post numbers. Also, did you see this [View All]

[Colorado Blue]

article?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/elsewhere/journalist/story/0,7792,1665471,00%20.html

For Muslim leaders to admit Islam is in crisis is a bold move, to act on it would be revolutionary, writes Brian Whitaker

Monday December 12, 2005


The opening session of the Third Extraordinary Session of the Islamic Summit Conference in Mecca, western Riyadh.

Leaders of more than 50 Muslim countries met in Saudi Arabia last week for an event billed as "The Third Extraordinary Session of the Islamic Summit Conference". The title was quite a mouthful and it failed to set the western media alight with excitement, but the event itself was extraordinary in every sense of the word.

Speaker after speaker acknowledged that the Muslim world is beset with challenges on an ever-widening range of issues. It is suffering from a deep-seated social, economic and religious malaise with which it has so far proved incapable of dealing. In the words of the summit's final communique: "The Islamic nation is in a crisis".

snip

I think this article reflects some of what the author of the Israel article is trying to say. It wasn't at all meant to be "hateful". Rather, in fact, I think it is meant to be hopeful. Certainly I think the advent of the meeting in Saudi Arabia is extremely hopeful. People of good will can overcome political and religious and philosophical differences. Religious and political systems can and must evolve, they must reform.

It is not wrong to admit that there are problems - it is vital. Otherwise we can't go forward.

One of the benefits of living in an open society, such as the US or Israel or Canada or Australia or France, is the ability of people to be self-critical even if it's painful. And in the case of Israel, there is no shortage of vocal criticism from within as well as from outside, the community. That fact is ensured by the very democratic nature of the place, which the article celebrates.

It isn't wrong to celebrate the good things about Israel anymore than it is wrong to criticize her shortcomings.