I don't hate Muslims, I hate what they believe

Hate. It's a strong word and one I don't throw around lightly unless I'm really, really frustrated or really, really angry. I don't let my children use the word and I try very hard to never utter it in their presence. Fortunately, none of them has access to a computer or this 'blog so I am free to speak plainly.

I hate it that Islam teaches hatred of others based solely on their religion.

There, it's out. I've said it and I'm not taking it back.

Islam teaches hatred of Jews just becaues they are Jewish. It teaches hatred of Christians just because they are Christian. I'm assuming they probably hate Buddhists and Hindus for similar reasons.

That adds up to a lot of hatred, dear readers.

How then, are we supposed to accept this as a religion of peace? In what sense? To what end?

World Net Daily, an online news source with an admittedly conservative bent, reports tonight on an Egyptian Muslim cleric whose televised plea to our president elect to convert to Islam and get his armies out of the Midde East includes the following comments. They were translated from the Arabic by the Middle East Media Research Institute, an independent non-partisan research group.

Cleric Hassan Abu al-Ashbal says:

"In religions other than Islam there is utter humiliation, even if you are the president of the entire world."

He also says: "Know that the true religion is the religion of Islam, and all other religions are fabricated religions, which are null and void – religions that were abrogated by the shari'a of Muhammad."

How nice.

I'm not up to speed on who this guy is in terms of his geopolitical significance, but I use his remarks to illustrate my earlier gripe about hatred spewing forth from a religion that its apologists shrug off as being just like any other.

Will our new president take the bait and conver to Islam? I doubt it. I doubt it because he doesn't strike me as the type who would want to ascribe to a faith that denegrates women and girls -- his wife and two daughters.

No, I think Obama has more sense than that.

What a pity, though, that too many others do not.