A woman with cojones. Refreshing.

From the New York Times online, an article about a news broadcast via Al Jazeera of an American-Syrian psychologist voicing her opinions of violence invoked in the name of Islam:

Dr. Sultan said the world was not witnessing a clash of religions or cultures, but a battle between modernity and barbarism, a battle that the forces of violent, reactionary Islam are destined to lose.

In response, clerics throughout the Muslim world have condemned her, and her telephone answering machine has filled with dark threats. But Islamic reformers have praised her for saying out loud, in Arabic and on the most widely seen television network in the Arab world, what few Muslims dare to say even in private.

“I believe our people are hostages to our own beliefs and teachings,” she said in an interview this week in her home in a Los Angeles suburb.

Very interesting article. And here’s the interview shown on Al Jazeera. Because of which she is now receiving numerous death threats, by the way. I hope nothing happens to her, ala the Dutch filmmaker.

I found it pretty enlightening what she said about the Jewish reaction to the Holocaust. How Jewish leaders never encouraged young Jewish men to go into German cities and blow themselves up, or burn churches and embassies in retaliation; choosing instead to earn the world’s respect via education and rational thinking rather than trying to coerce it via anger and violence. And she’s right. The actions of some modern-day Muslims can only be described as barbaric. And if the moderate sector feels angry that the entire Muslim world is being lumped together with these fanatics, then they need to muster the courage to speak up against it as she has.