Ahmad Al-Sarraf

Writing is kind of telling what must be told, and alarm, and also a way to express what is going on in our minds and that includes ideas too. I and hundreds of others had warned leniency shown to the religious extremism. I had also demanded a lot of science subjects to be included in the curriculum and not the theoretical subjects, including religion, which has become a common factor in all theoretical subjects including languages, reading, history, geography.

No one listened, either due to ignorance of the seriousness of the case, or to keep pace with religious partisan forces such as the Muslim Brotherhood and others.I also wrote about the complacency of our governments with issues of religious extremism and the serious consequences that accompany this ideology and the impact on our interests, and even on Arabs and Muslims living in the Western countries.I had said the world’s patience will run out one day and a time will come when the developed countries will be under obligation to prevent the entry of Muslims in their countries, or put those who are already living in these countries under surveillance or send them back to where they came from.But things seem to have evolved faster than we expected, the US Congress has recently approved a law ‘Frank Wolf’ International Religious Freedom Act, which will entitle America to force various countries of the world to allow its citizens and residents to exercise their religious rituals freely and establish places of worship as they want, and prevent these governments from punishing its citizens or any person due to change in religion or for his or her religious beliefs whatever they are.The law became effective with the signing of President Barack Obama on the bill. This measure means we in the Islamic countries, and particularly the Arab states, will be exposed to more than the others to be ‘haunted’ by the US authorities and that means unsustainable action will be taken against us if we show obstinacy and insist not to fall in line or change for the better.Sanctions shall be imposed at a time when we experience all this disgraceful industrial and commercial and medical weaknesses.There is no doubt that this new law will contribute to the support of religious freedoms around the world and enhance the status of the minorities, and put an end to religious extremism and reduce sectarianism, albeit gradually.This law will also save the Muslims, Christians, Hindus, Jews and others from persecution and prevent them from oppressing the others because murder, displacement and religious abuse have become widespread in many countries where extremism was unknown before.The issue is serious, it is absurd to respond to the law by saying that we will starve but we will not succumb to it, or we will go back to the desert and live on milk and dates.We must contemplate profoundly and admit that the world is tired of us, of our extremism, and of our role in most of the terrorist attacks that happen every day. A time has come when there must be an end to all this madness.This law would not have been issued in this manner, which some may consider a blatant interference in the peculiarities of other countries, if we had truly understood the nature of human rights in our countries, and applied the principles on everyone, without discrimination,.email: [email protected]By Ahmad Al-Sarraf