Western commentators, including me, have been wondering for a long time when the much-acclaimed "moderate" Muslims were going to step up and actively oppose Islamist killers. Here's two examples.
The Lebanon Daily Star reports of a recent event in Beirut:
Residents and witnesses spoke of the heroics of “Abu Ali” Issa Khaddour Saturday night. After a suicide bomber detonated his vest outside a cafe in the predominantly Alawite neighborhood of Jabal Mohsen, the 60-year-old father of seven rushed with locals to the scene, a mere hundred meters from his house.And in Turkey, "A newspaper in Turkey whose roots stretch to the founding of the modern republic will truly live the words “je suis Charlie” on Wednesday when it publishes the new Charlie Hebdo issue in Turkish despite threats."
But five minutes after the first bombing, he noticed another man walking toward the crowd shouting “Allahu akbar.”
Residents and witnesses said Abu Ali then tackled the suicide bomber before he could reach the crowd, perishing alongside him and preventing an even greater massacre.
“Do not give me condolences, congratulate me,” Khoder Khadour told The Daily Star. “Our traditions and our faith tell us to give martyrs, and my father was a hero and a martyr.”
“We are proud of him, and he is the martyr of all of Jabal Mohsen and Lebanon,” he added.
Abu Ali died with at least eight others in Lebanon’s first suicide attack of 2015, after a lull that lasted nearly a year.
Its editors have already received death threats from other Turks and the police have already tried to shut it down.
Update: And let us praise the Muslim mayor of Rotterdam!
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