Fox News Host: "All Terrorists Are Muslims"

Fox News' analysis and thoughtful commentary.

Of course, this is Fox News and prejudice against Muslims, Hispanics, Blacks, gays...in fact against any non-white, non-Christian, non-straight males is a trademark for this far-right propaganda shop.

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But prejudice against Muslims receives a special designation on Fox. It is something they all can agree all: that Muslims are just awful. Fox employs a typical House Negro and a few dump blondes, so they cannot be expected to harp on blacks and women. But hate against Muslims unites them all.

So it is no surprise that recently Fox & Friends idiot host Brian Kilmeade recently said: "not all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslims." He later went on his radio show to add, "you can't avoid" that 'fact'.

This is oft-repeated amongst the right-wing to justify prejudice against all Muslims and call for particularly violation of the rights of Muslims in America. But let's consider this absurd premise. It is sad that I'd even have to rewrite this post, but here it goes. First of, thanks to the heroes at LoonWatch for compiling this data:

CNN recently published an article entitled Study: Threat of Muslim-American terrorism in U.S. exaggerated; according to a study released by Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, “the terrorist threat posed by radicalized Muslim-Americans has been exaggerated.”

Yet, Americans continue to live in mortal fear of radical Islam, a fear propagated and inflamed by right wing Islamophobes. If one follows the cable news networks, it seems as if all terrorists are Muslims. It has even become axiomatic in some circles to chant: “Not all Muslims are terrorists, but nearly all terrorists are Muslims.” Muslims and their “leftist dhimmi allies” respond feebly, mentioning Waco as the one counter example, unwittingly affirming the belief that “nearly all terrorists are Muslims.”

But perception is not reality. The data simply does not support such a hasty conclusion. On the FBI’s official website, there exists a chronological list of all terrorist attacks committed on U.S. soil from the year 1980 all the way to 2005. That list can be accessed here (scroll down all the way to the bottom).

According to this data, there were more Jewish acts of terrorism within the United States than Islamic (7% vs 6%). These radical Jews committed acts of terrorism in the name of their religion. These were not terrorists who happened to be Jews; rather, they were extremist Jews who committed acts of terrorism based on their religious passions, just like Al-Qaeda and company.

The Islamophobes claim that Islam is intrinsically a terrorist religion. The proof? Well, just about every terrorist attack is Islamic, they retort. Unfortunately for them, that’s not quite true. More like six percent. Using their defunct logic, these right wingers ought now to conclude that nearly all acts of terrorism are committed by Latinos (or Jews). Let them dare say it…they couldn’t; it would be political and social suicide to say such a thing. Most Americans would shut down such talk as bigoted; yet, similar statements continue to be said of Islam, without any repercussions.

So we clearly now, according to the F.B.I., that, of course, not all - not nearly all - terrorist acts are by Muslims. But this is common "wisdom" here in America.

Surprising, Fox executives made the idiot host apology this morning. Here was his forced "apology": "On the show on Friday, I was talking about Bill O'Reilly appearance on 'The View' and I said this: 'Not all Muslims are terrorists but all terrorists are Muslims.' Well, I misspoke. I don't believe all terrorists are Muslims. I'm sorry about that if I offended or hurt anybody's feelings. But that's it."

But that's it!, he assures us. This is clearly not a sincere apology but, as Glenn Greenwald notes, a "proudly begrudging non-apology, with more emphasis on defiance than regret." He's still a racist. Surprising that Fox even bothered with an apology since anti-Islam bigotry is routine for that channel and part of their effort to engage viewers. They thrive off of it!

And, finally, there is the question of double-standards. If anyone dared to make a statement even remotely offense toward Jews as this guy did toward Muslims they'd be out on their ass. Just ask Octavia Nasr, Helen Thomas and - new inductee! - Rick Sanchez.