US "Friendliness with Islam?"

Submitted by Maurice Picow (Israel), Nov 9, 2006 at 16:28

"From the Halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli" So is sung the first part of the U.S. Marine Hymn.

The 'shores of Tripoli' denotes the conflict with the Barbary Pirates during the Presidency of Thomas Jefferson, when a number of U.S. Navy vessels and a small contingent of Marines defeated these brigands and opened up the sealanes into the Mediterranean.

Early America' s relationaship with Islam was not great simply because Islam was not a threat to the fledgling democracy, except in the above incident . It must be remembered, however, that many of the Africans captured and brought to the Americas as slaves were originally Muslims. Forced against their will to convert to Christianity, they eventually forgot their Islamic roots, as was noted in the historically famous novel, Roots, by Alex Haley. Haley himself was descended from an African Muslim named Kunta Kinte, from the village of Jefuree in what is now the country called The Gambia, in Western Africa.

The slavers were definitely not 'freinds of Islam', and neither were the plantation owners who forced the "heathen Nigras" to become baptised and accept a strange and very different religion, complete with the eating of pork - expressly forbidden in Islam.

Perhaps what is happening now is a "backlash" against what happened in those early years of America's not-so-colorful history.

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".