In promotion of Islam, children are taught that "jihad" to Muslims means "doing good works"
UPDATE 8/3/13: Islam Favored over Christianity in Florida Textbook
-- From "History textbooks promoting Islam" By Bob Unruh © WorldNetDaily 5/10/08
The new report is from the American Textbook Council, which was established in 1989 as an independent national research organization to review social studies textbooks and advance the quality of instructional materials in history.
In the two-year project, whose report was authored by Gilbert T. Sewall, the ATC reviewed five junior and five high school world and American history texts, concluding:
"Many political and religious groups try to use the textbook process to their advantage, but the deficiencies in Islam-related lessons are uniquely disturbing. History textbooks present an incomplete and confected view of Islam that misrepresents its foundations and challenges to international security."
"The upsetting part is not only do they go into the history (which would be acceptable) but also the teaching of Islam," [a parent] said. "This book does not really go into Christianity or the teachings of Christ, nor does it address religious doctrine elsewhere to the degree it does Islam."
[The parent continued saying] the book's one page referencing Jews "is only to convey that they were tortured by Crusaders to get them to convert to 'Christianity.' (It fails to mention that the biggest persecutors of Jews throughout history and still today are Arab Muslims). It gives four other one-liner references to the Jews being blamed for the plagues and problems in the land. It does not talk about the Jews as making a significant impact on the culture at large."
"In a passage meant to explain jihad, they encountered this: 'Muslims should fulfill jihad with the heart, tongue, and hand. Muslims use the heart in their struggle to resist evil. The tongue may convince others to take up worthy causes, such as funding medical research. Hands may perform good works and correct wrongs,'" the new report said.
The ATC report noted a complicating factor is a ban in California, to whose standards most textbook publishers align their work, on "adverse reflection" on religion in school.
"Whatever 'adverse reflection' is, such a mandate may be conceptually at odds with historical and geopolitical actuality," the study said.
"None of this is accidental. Islamic organizations, willing to [provide] misinformation, are active in curriculum politics. These activists are eager to expunge any critical thought about Islam from textbook and all public discourse. They are succeeding, assisted by partisan scholars and associations… It is alarming that so many individuals with the power to shape the curriculum are willfully blind to or openly sympathetic to these efforts," the report said.
Regarding the TCI book, the report said its lessons contain "stilted language that seem scripted or borrowed from devotional, not historical, material." Also, the "Medieval to Early Modern Times" book features a two-page prayer to Allah "the Merciful."
Glossing over the actual physical conquering of some peoples, the "World History: Medieval and Early Modern Times" says people were converted to Islam because they were "attracted by Islam's message of equality and hope for salvation," the report said.
Another book teaches: "Q: How did the caliphs who expanded the Muslim Empire treat those they conquered? A: They treated them with tolerance."
"At a time when intolerance marks Islamic cultures worldwide and multiculturalism is a ruling idea in U.S. schools, these 'wonderland-of-tolerance' tropes constitute a major content distortion," the report said.
"When … Muslims groups attack Christian peoples, kill them, and take their lands, the process is referred to as 'building' an empire. Christian attempts to restore those lands are labeled as 'violent attacks' or 'massacres,'" the report said.
To read the entire article, CLICK HERE.
See also recent post of Islam in public school HERE.
