Imams point out that earlier this year a school attempted to ban the wearing of the jilbab, a long and loose-fit coat or garment worn by Muslim women, and had to back down after appeals from parents.
Most are not extremists; fewer still support violence, as mainstream French imams swiftly pointed out.The terrorists themselves, of course, are often keen to prove that the West does indeed anathematise all Muslims.
In a sermon in Najaf on Friday, Sadr al-Din al-Qabani, an influential imam, addressed the point directly, suggesting that some Sunni politicians were trying to sow antagonism toward Iraqi Shites by summoning the specter of an Iranian-dominated Shiite government.
One Southeast Asian imam made a point to say that the anti-Muslim hatred and violence is not the ideal of America that they immigrated to.
A graduate of the local Imam University, he pointed proudly to a mosque also under construction next to his father's home, with his father's patronage.
"See, in this regime, anytime they want to talk of standing in the face of tyranny, they point to Imam Hossein, and whenever they are seeking moderation and consensus, they recall Imam Hassan.
As Diderot (1746) puts the point: "An Imam could reason just as well this way".[8] Since then, the point has been presented again and refined in various ways.
Most of the imam's remarks echoed points he had made in an op-ed article published on Wednesday in The New York Times.
"I was getting reports every 10 minutes from one of the imams: 'They're at this point.
In this vein, I can also point to Muslim imams and other Muslim American leaders to stand up against this same kind of bigotry and discrimination in their own culture.
