By John E. Carey
February 9, 2007
Even though I live near and enjoy the friendship of several Muslims, I do not understand the Muslim intolerance for almost all things not their own.
More fairly, I do not understand the extreme intolerance of the radicalized textbooks and teaching aids used in several Muslim nation; Iran chief among them.
The Israel-based Center for Monitoring the Impact of Peace just completed a study that reports on the lack of tolerance in Iran’s school textbooks.
The study analyzed 95 textbooks and 20 teacher’s guides used at Iran’s state-run schools.
The study found a systematic effort to denigrate western culture, traditions and religions.
To he surprise of few who are informed on the topic, the study also found that Iran’s school textbooks repeatedly refer to the United States as the “Great Satan” and to Israel as “the regime that occupies Jerusalem.” In fact, most Americans would call a lot of what can be found in Iran’s school textbooks as “hate speech.”
But there are Muslim believers and academics who a speaking up against these practices.
“I am an Iranian, a practicing Muslim woman, who sees it as her responsibility to stand up to hard-line Muslims who use Islam to brainwash children of that faith, in particular Iranian children, who the Iranian government is turning into ticking bombs,” said Iranian human rights activist Ghazal Omid.
Ghazal says she cherishes the greatness of Persian culture and resists the extremism of Iran’s Muslim teachers today. She is the author of “Living in Hell, A True Odyssey of a Woman’s Struggle in Islamic Iran Against Personal and Political Forces.”
On her outspoken resistance to the Muslim male-dominated leadership of Iran, she cites the Edmond Burke quotation, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing.”
She also says the current government of Iran is working to fulfill its prophesy. “This government can and will work to fulfill its prophecy. A prophecy the government of Iran declares will end in the destruction of the enemies of Islam, starting with Israel and the United States of America.”
She says the Iranian government is turning its children into “ticking bombs.”
This kind of state sponsored “hate speech” inflames the emotions enough to make suicide bombing an acceptable, even a revered, form of striking out at the enemies of the state.
The Israeli academic Yediot Aharonot presents this profile of the typical suicide bomber:
–47% of the suicide bombers have an academic education and an additional 29% have at least a high school education.
–83% of the suicide bombers are single.
–64% of the suicide bombers are between the ages 18-23; most of the rest are under 30.
–68% of the suicide bombers attacking Israel have come from the Gaza Strip.
Author William Safire wrote in The New York Times on June 4, 2001 “the pride and joy of Arafat’s arsenal is a weapon of mass terror that has no known defense: the human missile.”
According to the Center for Monitoring the Impact of Peace the continual re-emphasis on hate speech in many Muslim classrooms contributes to an atmosphere of “intolerance, hatred and insensitivity” toward non-Muslims.
“It is almost as if the children are being brainwashed,” an Israeli academic told us.
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