As a summer resident of Breezy Point, I have been a devoted reader of the Country Echo (Echo Journal) for decades. I love the detail about local matters, and I was deeply moved by last week's range of reactions to the horrors of Sept. 11, 2001.
Then I reached the latest "Abler-minded" column, where I read of the collapse of American values and his disdain for one of the world's great religions. Of Muslims, we are told that "their culture and religion virtually permit them to lie, cheat and steal if that leads to achieving their goals."
As an American who has lived among Muslims and who counts many Muslims as friends and some as family members, I want to assure you that while there are among 1.7 billion Muslims (or 2 billion Christians) a few who are doing truly evil things, I have found murderous hatred no more common among my Muslim than among my Jewish or Christian friends (my wife and I are Quakers).
Immediately after 9/11 I had anguished messages from Muslim friends in Morocco about my own welfare (Haverford College, where I taught, is 92 miles from ground zero). One of my closest Muslim friends was in tears as he assured me that for a real Muslim "to kill one innocent person is to kill the world."
Please stop the hateful nonsense.
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Douglas Davis,
Breezy Point
