Opinion Editorials, February 2011

Anti-Muslim Brainwashing

By Paul J Balles

Redress, Al-Jazeerah, CCUN, February 15, 2011

Paul J. Balles looks at how key opinion formers in the United States, from the media to politicians, are brainwashing the public into anti-Muslim hysteria by labelling as “Muslim or Islamic extremists” anyone who refuses to cow-tow to Israel, America or their stooges.

At least seven times today [12 February] I heard TV newscasters refer to Muslim or Islamic extremists.

The amount and level of this kind of fraudulent suggestiveness has been increasing almost daily.

I call it fraudulent because people hearing this mix of Muslim with extremist repeated often enough become brainwashed into thinking that all Muslims are extremists.

The reference to Islamic extremists is frequently made on Fox News by Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity.

A headline on MMTV asserts that "O'Reilly supports Rep. King's Islamic Extremism Hearings: 'you've got to get a handle on it’”. The language of Islamic extremist has infected the US congress.

For years, since he was on CNN, Glenn Beck has made wild false claims, like, "Islamic extremism is the biggest threat to our way of life since World War II and we'll never be able to fight it – if we can't see it".

Now, as chief Fox propagandist, Glenn Beck has the American left wing collaborating with his paranoid vision: “Believe what you want but the left is working hand-in-hand with the Muslim Brotherhood and Muslim extremists... Hand-in-hand"...

Sean Hannity isn't much better, saying things like, "It seems to me that Islamic extremism is the 21st century threat that (communism) posed in the last century..."

Similar Islamophobic references have been heard on CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC and other networks in the USA. 

Even reporters on the liberal MSNBC have been guilty of falsely connecting Islam and extremism.

The Associated Press says: "A Senate report on the Fort Hood shooting is sharply critical of the FBI's failure to recognize warning signs that an army psychiatrist had become an Islamist extremist..."

Do lunatics who commit wanton killings need to be identified according to their religious affiliations? 

If so why weren't the killers at Columbine and in Arizona recently referred to as Christian extremists?

That is if indeed they were Christians. The media only seems interested in making the religious connection when the mad murderer also happens to be a Muslim.

A Senate committee, headed by Joe Lieberman, asserted that "The enemy – Islamist extremists – must be labelled correctly and explicitly ... in order for the military to counter the extremism."

Recently, while commenting on the protesters in Egypt, several reporters referred to the Muslim Brotherhood as extremists.

Professor Sami Hamod says that the Muslim Brotherhood originated as a tool of America. How can they be extremists?

It seems that members of groups opposed to US interference in the Middle East get labelled Islamic extremists.

Palestinians trying to protect their property have been dubbed Muslim extremists, even when they're Christians.

According to Western broadcasters, all members of Hamas and Hezbollah automatically qualify as Islamic extremists.

The entire population of Iran seems to have qualified as Islamic extremists because Iran refuses to cow-tow to Israel and America.

Syria and Lebanon, despite non-Muslim populations, have been dubbed Islamist extremists because they have failed to sign peace treaties with Israel.

So-called Islamic extremists have forced the king of Jordan to fire his entire cabinet. 

In Yemen, they provided the impetus for Ali Abdullah Saleh to announce that he won't run for re-election. Both instances were obviously meant to stave off popular rebellions.

Despite the fact that Hosni Mubarak and Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the departed president of Tunisia, were both dictators hated by their publics, the rebellions have been referred to as the work of Islamic terrorists.

Recently Tony Blair warned the West that it must abandon its "wretched posture of apology" towards Islamic extremism.

Newscasters, reporters, commentators, politicians and leaders, infected with religious bigotry, need urgent rehabilitation.!

Opinions expressed in various sections are the sole responsibility of their authors and they may not represent Al-Jazeerah & ccun.org.

editor@aljazeerah.info & editor@ccun.org