Challenging the candidates on Islam

From January 13, 2003 through August 22, 2008, Robert Spencer, America’s most important Islam critic, published 292 articles at FrontPage Magazine on the jihadist teachings and practices of Islam and the deadly threat that the religion of Muhammad poses to our society and to the non-Muslim world generally. In those 292 articles, he never once mentioned the obvious and logically inevitable expedient of defending America from Islam by restricting or stopping Muslim immigration, though he has, especially over the last year, occasionally broached the desirability of immigration restrictions in remarks made in blog entries at Jihad Watch. I have written that Spencer’s total avoidance of the Muslim immigration issue at FrontPage undermined his claim to being a supporter of restrictions, or at best showed a lack of seriousness and reliability on the issue, since articles at FrontPage would have far more impact on public opinion than passing comments in Jihad Watch blog entries.

Today, in his 293rd article at FrontPage about Islam, Spencer for the first time has said something at FP about restricting Muslim immigration. It’s only one paragraph, and it’s in the interrogatory rather than the declaratory form, but at least he has said something. In the article, he poses a series of questions about America’s Islam policy which he says ought to be asked of the presidential candidates. Here is the first set of questions:

1. What would you do to deal with the national security aspect of immigration? With plans afoot to bring large groups of Iraqis, including Iraqi Muslims, into the United States, what kind of screening will you implement to try to ensure that we are not importing jihad terrorists into the country? Will you reevaluate immigration levels from Muslim countries based on recognition of the fact that there is no reliable way to distinguish a peaceful Muslim from a jihadist sympathizer or potential jihadist?

Posted by Lawrence Auster at August 26, 2008 10:13 PM | Send