Stand With Us extols Muslim reformer, Christian director

By Donald H. Harrison

LA JOLLA, California – – The spotlight of the pro-Israel organization, StandWithUs, shone brightly Tuesday night, Dec. 11, on a Muslim reformer and a Christian evangelist.  Both Shireen Qudosi, a national correspondent for the Clarion Project, and Sara Miller, the outgoing San Diego regional director of the StandWithUs organization, personify the message that you don’t have to be Jewish to want a secure, safe Israel and a peaceful Middle East.

Qudosi was the featured speaker at a meeting of major contributors to StandWithUs, the organization that counters anti-Israel propaganda and engages in pro-Israel advocacy at schools and campuses from middle school to university.  She spoke in behalf of the Clarion Project, a non-profit organization that seeks to counter Islamic extremists by emphasizing Islam’s traditions of peace rather than of war.

The child of an Afghan mother and a Pakistani father, Qudosi, 32, moved during her grade school years to Germany, where to experience the religions of the west, her parents had her attend Christian church services, and then later in her life moved to the United States, where she experienced an identity crisis that led her to inquire deeply into the tenets of many religions, especially Islam.

Qudosi’s search for theological answers led the UC Irvine graduate to set aside her plans to go to law school.  The more she questioned, the more uncomfortable her parents became with her, eventually telling her it was time for her to leave their home.  Since then, she has reconciled with her Afghan mother, but she said relations with her Pakistani father are more problematic.

There have always been competing versions of Islam, she said.  While this dichotomy is not clear cut, those who favor the warlike teachings that can be found in the Hadith—a commentary on the Koran written many years later – engage in Jew hatred.  Other Muslims, who dismiss the Hadith as the writings of ordinary and fallible men, argue that based on the Koran, the true teaching of Islam is to seek peace among the peoples of the world.

She said the Clarion Project attempts to expose the false teachings of “hate imams” and their political followers.  She said many in the Muslim world reject the idea that the Palestinian-Israeli struggle is a religious issue between Islam and Judaism.  Instead, she said, it was a territorial struggle, which she said the Israelis won, and which Muslims should accept, and move on with their lives.  There are many important issues, such as women’s rights, that are being ignored in the Muslim world because of the unnecessary focus on Israel, she said.

Qudosi said while imams are portrayed in the western media as religious authorities, in fact most of them are not.  Instead, she said, many are simply prayer leaders who have not studied the Koran or Islamic history deeply, and whose diatribes against Israel and Judaism need to be challenged by genuine Muslim scholars.

A problem in the Muslim community, she said, is that many people are reluctant, even afraid, to speak up against the hate imams, even though they fundamentally disagree with them.  She said that was why she started a podcast which fellow Muslims may call into anonymously to express their feelings about controversies.

Qudosi warned that Islamic extremists, through the process of “lane changing,” have managed to convince advocates of other causes—such as those pressing for the rights of women, gays, and such ethnicities as Native Americans and African-Americans — that their causes are linked, and that to succeed in any, they all should stand together – against Israel.

Only recently in her life did she begin to learn about Judaism, Qudosi said.  Among the Jewish religious tenets with which she was most impressed was the sanctity of Shabbat – the idea of unplugging for a full day in order to contemplate and recharge one’s batteries.

As Sara Miller began to call the meeting in the recreation room of a seaside La Jolla condominium to a close, she was interrupted by StandWithUs board members Micah “Mitch” Danzig and Jenny Josephson so that they could honor her before she ends her service with the organization on Friday to take a national position with a Christian political group that will advocate for Israel both in national and international forums.

Presenting her with a medallion engraved with the Hebrew words of the shm’a – “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One” – Josephson said that Miller in the more than four years she had led the regional organization, helped to grow it, and in the process grew herself.  She predicted that Miller would remain an important pro-Zionist force, and “maybe sometime you’ll go into politics and be the President!”

Josephson, a member of La Jolla’s South African Jewish community, said Miller has “been like a daughter to me,” and that she was in awe of the way Miller had taken the challenge to build up the StandWithUs organization in San Diego County.

Danzig, an Israeli-American, said Miller had done “amazing things,” and was such a strong director, that he, as president of the regional chapter, “really didn’t have to do anything.”

Although she is a Christian, not a Jew, Danzig told her, “you fight hard against the demonization of Israel, and you are one of us!”

Miller, visibly touched by the tributes, told the StandWithUs attendees: “I am forever your ally, forever your friend. … We are in this for the long haul!”

While there will be a national search for Miller’s successor, Yael Steinberg, the associate director who joined the San Diego regional StandWithUs earlier this year, will serve as the region’s acting director.

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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World.  He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com