Islamophobia

Magdi Khalil writes about "Islamophobia and the Islamist Scarecrow" in the American Thinker:

"According to the ["Global Patterns of Terrorism"] report, 14,352 terrorist operations took place across the world in 2006, and as a result 74545 military persons and 20,570 civilians were killed; 1800 children were wounded and killed, 430 students, 215 teachers and 129 reporters lost their lives; 8,200 policemen were wounded and killed, in addition to 1300 public leaders and guards. The number of individuals abducted during 2006 is estimated to be around 15,855; and the number of buildings, schools and governmental institutions targeted amounted to 19,500; 300 terrorist groups took responsibility for these operations, in addition to the individual incidents of terrorism.

"The report indicates that at least 50% of those operations targeted Muslims and were carried out by Muslims as well, and during that same period, 350 mosques were subject to terrorist attacks. When so much death and destruction takes place during a single year, and given that 90% of that horror was unleashed by Muslim terrorists, it is highly absurd to talk about Islamophobia in relation to the current state of affairs. Fear and misgivings are completely warranted in this situation. People are entitled to react in fear when they face a lethal situation, otherwise they would be lacking sensibility and good judgement.

"The term "Islamophobia" is a tool of deception that serves to mislead the world, blackmail the West, terrorize whoever dares to criticize Islam, fuel the anger of Muslim youth, and minimize the danger of Islamic terrorism, in addition to being a threat to the freedoms of thought, creativity and criticism in the West, ultimately the term can serve the interests of the terrorists."

Muslims rarely address criticism rationally or directly. Most usually, they respond to criticism, however valid, with wild counter-accusations. It's a form of fallacious reasoning called "ignoratio elenchi" where the rebuttal has no logical connection to the argument made. If you assert the violent nature of Islam by pointing out the plethora of terrorist attacks in its name, a Muslim is most likely to say Hiroshima proves America is the greatest terrorist.

The charge of "Islamophobia" is another form of ignoratio elenchi. It's pretty foolish to claim that the thousands killed on Sep 11 by Muslim terrorists are not a primary reason for the bad reputation of Islam nor the train bombings nor the snuff videos nor the new terror plots uncovered every month, but rather that the West simply has an irrational aversion to Islam with no basis in fact. You would have to overlook a lot to reduce it down to simple bigotry. Islamophobia is a red herring meant to divert the argument against Islam away from the painful truth that Islam is a bad and backward religion.