Professor Bennoune Comments for Media on Obama Speech and ISIL
Professor Karima Bennoune commented for national and local media including the Christian Science Monitor, radio stations WDEL, KFBK, and KXJZ, and CBS television affiliate KOVR on President Obama's recent speech regarding the need "to degrade and ultimately destroy" the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant or "ISIL."
While welcoming certain aspects of the President's statements, Professor Bennoune talked about the need for a long-range plan to address Muslim fundamentalism as a whole, and the importance of supporting people of Muslim heritage who have been working to oppose extremism.
"This is an ideological battle against Muslim fundamentalism and radical jihadism, so it's not just important to fight the terrorists but to take on the fundamentalist ideology," Bennoune said in an interview with the Christian Science Monitor. "To get the support of war-weary Americans, [Obama] has to play up the terrorist threat, but the real need is to address this by strengthening Muslim communities."
In an interview on the Capital Public Radio program Insight, Professor Bennoune said she was impressed by the international focus of the President's plan and by his willingness to draw a distinction between ISIL and Islam. "I think it is so positive that the President said ‘ISIL is not Islamic' and made the clear distinction between the great Muslim tradition, which has absolutely nothing to do with this extremist movement, but I would like to have heard more from him about fighting the underlying ideology of Muslim fundamentalism, which is the set of ideas that motivates this violence," she said. She also noted the need for the response to be both robust, and to respect international law.
Karima Bennoune is a lecturer, teacher, and international law scholar as well as the first Arab-American to be honored with the Derrick A. Bell Award from the Section on Minority Groups of the Association of American Law Schools. She joined the King Hall faculty from Rutgers School of Law-Newark in 2012. Her book, Your Fatwa Does Not Apply Here: Untold Stories from the Fight Against Muslim Fundamentalism has just been nominated for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize.