NEW YORK – President Barack Obama has extended an open hand of
friendship in his landmark Cairo speech to the Muslim world –
seeking to engage Muslims with a commitment of mutual respect.
No one can doubt his sincerity. From his first days in office,
he has emphasized the importance of embarking on a new chapter
in relations between the United States and the world’s Muslims.
But this aspiration will remain elusive without acknowledging
the sad fact that most Americans remain woefully ignorant about
the basic facts of Islam, and about the broad geographic and
cultural diversity of Muslim cultures. A majority of public
opinion polls taken in the last four years show that the views
of Americans about Islam continue to be a casualty of the
attacks of September 11, 2001. Washington Post/ABC News polls
from 2006, for example, found that nearly half of Americans
regard Islam “unfavorably,” while one in four admits to
prejudicial feelings against Muslims. American views of the
Muslim world are so colored by the confl