The terrorists who call themselves the “Islamic State” are abusing the name of a religion that teaches peace and tolerance, creating a cycle of misunderstanding and fear that only feeds the violence, Muslim leaders and federal law enforcement officials said in a forum Tuesday night at Loyola University. The “True Islam and the Extremists” forum at Loyola was organized by the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, a reform branch of Islam with more than 10 million adherents worldwide, estimated to represent about 1 percent of the Muslims in the world. The Ahmadiyya are known for their longstanding condemnation of terrorism and support for religious freedom, and have embarked on a new publicity campaign to educate the American public about “True Islam” — with assistance Tuesday night from U.S. Attorney Kenneth Polite and Jeffrey Sallet, the FBI Special Agent in Charge in New Orleans. “Groups like ISIS and other terrorist organizations perpetuate falsehoods, perpetuate false stereotypes about America, that we are engaged in a war against Islam, all with the goal of recruiting individuals to engage in terrorism,” Polite said. “The response, unfortunately, domestically is an increase in anti-Muslim rhetoric which plays directly into the hands of those terrorist organizations.
