The Fort Hood shooting hit pretty close to home for me. I was stationed at Fort Hood for 6 years and had been in that building many times. I still have many friends there. It is very unfortunate that there are people such as MAJ Nidal Malik Hasan who would commit such atrocious acts of violence. My prayers are certainly with those who have been affected by this tragedy.
Now that I have calmed down a bit, I would like to cover a couple of things relating to this incident. The President’s actions as well as how the media responds to violent acts in the name of Islam.
On the day of the shooting, President Obama was to attend a Tribal Nations conference hosted by the Department of Interior’s Bureau of Indian affairs. He was there, of course, to promote the health care plan that would come to a vote over the weekend. Many, including myself, thought that the President should have canceled this appearance because of the Fort Hood incident, but Obama did not. He instead decided to address the American people from this scheduled event. I can understand this logic, but I cannot understand the insensitive and detached way the President addressed the public. Here is the video of his remarks.
Obama Comments on Fort Hood Incident
You will notice that he opens by casually expressing his greetings to the people attending the conference instead of addressing the nation. He then gives a “shout out” to Congressional Medal of Honor recipient Dr. Joe Medicine Crow. Dr. Crow was a recipient of the Medal of Freedom, not the Congressional Medal of Honor. Obama then spent the next 2 minutes making general comments about the conference and health care before even bringing up the topic of the Fort Hood shooting. At this time he finally made some appropriate comments about the incident.
All I can say is that I was extremely disappointed in the Commander in Chief’s response to this tragedy.
The President is scheduled to attend a memorial today at the base. Again I think he should already be there. He spent Saturday trying to convince those in his own party to vote along party lines in favor of Pelosi’s legislation. He should have been on his way to Fort Hood. He is the Commander in Chief. He should have been with the troops. If he needed time to pressure his comrades to pass his agenda, he could have told Pelosi to hold the vote later this week instead of rushing it through around midnight on Saturday. Once again his actions were inappropriate.
I also find issue with the media and their PC response to incidents of violence in the name of Islam. Violence that the Koran teaches. Just like everyone else, I was reading the updates at work. I read on Fox News hours after the attack that the FBI had ruled out terrorism. This despite the fact that MAJ Hasan was shouting “Allahu Akbar” (God is great). The same phrase shouted by many suicide bombers and also by Iranians recently celebrating the anniversary of the US embassy seizure. Of course their chants of Allahu Akbar were combined with chants of death to America. By now we do know that Islam had something to do with this incident. MAJ Hasan recently started wearing traditional Arabic garb during off hours. He also was under investigation for some radical internet postings and on numerous occasions made very disturbing comments to his co-workers about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. These comments included calling these conflicts wars against Islam and saying that Muslims should stand up and fight against the aggressor. I think the problem may be that Islam is at war against us. We just refuse to believe it. Apologists exist everywhere. The media will point out these troubling things about Hasan, but they will also be quick to point out that Islam does not teach violence.
I saw in one article that Iman Mohammed Abdullahi from Hasan’s Mosque in Washington D.C. stressed that “Islam is not responsible”. Another Sheikh from the same mosque said that “Islam does not command anybody to do something like that”. The majority of the time these statements go unquestioned. I even saw a news story here in Houston on Channel 13 News where a reporter passed on from her interviewee that Islam does not teach this kind of violence. No questions asked. While many mosques probably do not teach violence and many Muslims do not advocate it, it does exist, and it is based on the teachings of the Koran.
“When you meet the unbelievers in the battlefield, strike off their heads, and when you have laid them low, bind your captives firmly” Qur’an 47:4
“Prophet, make war on the unbelievers and the hypocrites and deal rigorously with them. Hell shall be their home: an evil fate” Qur’an 9:73
There are over a hundred more verses calling on Muslims to make war against the unbelievers. What is their response to these teachings as well as many others. These are the questions that need to be asked of those who proclaim a peaceful and tolerant religion. We need to be honest and upfront about what is going on here; not PC a problem into non-existence.
Comments on this entry are closed.