Editor claims Islam is misunderstood

Washington Post editor claims Islam is misunderstood, and the near-absence of Muslims in the newsroom is to blame.

Alan Blank with the Daily Pilot reported Monday, March 3, on Washington Post managing editor Philip Bennett’s comments to media leaders about changing the public’s perception of Islam by hiring on more Muslim reporters.

As a leader with one of the nation’s largest, most influential newspapers, Bennett carries a lot of weight – and his prescription is to hire on more Muslim reporters.

Bennett’s speech focused on the media’s need to cover issues concerning Islam in an in-depth, long-term manner.

To illustrate this point he drew mainly from quotes of notable colleagues and statistical polls, rarely giving his own opinion directly.

“Six of 10 Americans, according to a 2007 ABC Poll, don’t understand the basic tenets of Islam,” Bennett said.

He attributed this to the lack of Muslims working in American newsrooms.

“At the Post I want more Muslim readers and I want more Muslim journalists,” he said.

Words poorly translated from Arabic to English are a big source of confusion caused by the lack of Muslim voices in the American media, according to Bennett.

Zeyad Maasarani, 22, a Muslim reporter for California’s most circulated Muslim publication, Southern California in Focus, agrees with Bennett that terms like “jihad,” “madrasa” and “hijab” are a big source of the public’s misunderstanding of Islam.

“Jihad means holy war, which is the definition that most Americans know, but it also means struggle, and valiant attempt,” Maasarani said…

Bennett said that in the period following 9/11 there was a lot of uninformed writing about Islam, and that “the best journalism fought against the tide of public perception.”

Isn’t it grand: the Islamist Muslim can walk in and pour on the subterfuge, and may be paid by the infidel while doing so.

This is another reason for alternate media: unless we saw the victims of jihad [the kind that is as jihad does] gaining access against subversive [CAIR?] efforts to make sure only one side of Islam is represented. 

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