Sam Ghandchiسام قندچيTrump, Islam and US Foreign Policy
Sam Ghandchi
http://www.ghandchi.com/1128-islam-and-us-english.htm


ترامپ، اسلام و سیاست خارجی آمریکا
http://www.ghandchi.com/1128-islam-and-us.htm

 

Yesterday, Mr. Donald Trump in an interview with CNN said "I think Islam hates us" and noted that it is "hard to separate" Islam from its radical adherents (1). Mr. Trump's views regarding Islam and Muslims were discussed extensively three months ago (2).

 

Nonetheless, Mr. Trump is right that if US Foreign Policy is based on condoning Islam and rejecting human rights violations by Islamists, it will fail. He is also right that the passive support of many Muslims about anti-Western actions of Islamists in the Middle East and elsewhere is not acceptable. Yet rejecting Islam as the culprit will equally fail because more than a billion people in the world identify with Islam as their religion.

 

Islam is not like Communism with a small number of believers where focusing on human rights violations was a successful strategy for the West. Islam has a huge number of religious followers, although in the hands of Islamists it is used as a totalitarian ideology.  And United States trying to decide what is a good Islam from what is a bad Islam has been an approach that has failed. On the other hand, the solution is not to attack Muslims either.

 

We should support secularism which means the business of deciding bad and good of any religion is not the business of the state. As a modern state, US should support separation of state and religion, whether stateside or abroad. We have had 15 years since Sept 11, 2001 atrocities, to see that other approaches have not worked, whether by the Democratic Party presidents or Republicans. The solution is to start a global secular initiative (3).

Hoping for a democratic and secular futurist republic in Iran,

Sam Ghandchi, Editor/Publisher
IRANSCOPE
http://www.ghandchi.com
http://www.iranscope.com
March 10, 2016

Footnotes:

1. Donald Trump: 'I think Islam hates us'
http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/09/politics/donald-trump-islam-hates-us/

 

2. Mr. Trump and the New Muslim Reality
http://www.ghandchi.com/1059-trump-muslims-english.htm

آقای ترامپ و واقعیت تازه مسلمانان
http://www.ghandchi.com/1059-trump-muslims.htm

 

3. Time for a Global Secular Initiative
http://www.ghandchi.com/871-global-secular-initiative-english.htm

وقت تشکیل "ابتکار گلوبال برای سکولاریسم" است
http://www.ghandchi.com/871-global-secular-initiative.htm 



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