Unable To Define the Enemy

Faisal Shahzad is suspected of driving a bomb-laden vehicle into New York's Time Square. Photograph: Orkut.com/Reuters

Times Square Suspect: The ‘Foreclosure Terrorist’?

Faisal Shahzad is a Muslim terrorist motivated to kill by his religion, not by the loss of his house to the bank.

It is fascinating to see how the authorities and the major media outlets avoid the words “Islam” and “Muslim” in connection to the failed Times Square bombing. In both this piece in Time and in this piece in the New York Times the word “Islam” is only used in the name of the city of Islamabad in Pakistan.

The Times uses the word “Muslim” once: “At his news conference, Mr. Bloomberg warned against any backlash against Pakistanis or Muslims in New York, saying, ‘We will not tolerate any bias.’”

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My Comment: Being a Canadian with European roots, I have a non-American perspective on seeing how different Governments and the media define Islamic radicalism and Islamic terrorism. For example, in Eastern Europe everyone knows that Islamic terrorism and Islamic radicalism is done using Islam as the moral justification for their actions. Western Europe is now also the same, with places like Britain sometimes splitting hairs on defining Islamic radicalism. Asia holds no punches when it comes to this issue .... with countries like China and India being blunt on what is Islamic radicalism, and even more forceful in their response to it.

The U.S. and (to a lesser extent) Canada are completely blinded to defining Islamic radicalism and the jihad that they follow. If there was ever a case of political correctness running amok .... this will be exhibit A. Fortunately .... unlike the U.S. government and much of the main stream media .... the American public (by vast majorities) do not share this point of view.