“Mustafa…said she is deeply disturbed by Parrish’s comments, saying they demonstrate a lack of understanding about Islam. She said Muslims in America have demonstrated a respect for both the U.S. Constitution and their religion and his comments are unfair to the Muslim men and women who have served in the U.S. armed forces.”

Note the sleight of hand. Parrish said that “Islam, Sharia and the Quran are the antithesis of the U.S. Constitution.” In response, Mustafa “said Muslims in America have demonstrated a respect for both the U.S. Constitution and their religion and his comments are unfair to the Muslim men and women who have served in the U.S. armed forces.”

Parrish wasn’t talking about Muslims, he was talking about Islam. The two are conflated endlessly, but they are not the same, any more than Christians and Christianity are the same. Any given Christian may not love his neighbor and turn the other cheek, but Christianity nonetheless still teaches that they should. Any given Muslim, like any other human being of any faith or no faith, will have a variety of priorities, perspectives, influences, etc. He or she will not necessarily live 100% in accord with everything that Islam teaches, but that does not change what Islam teaches. The central question here, of whether or not Islam is compatible with the U.S. Constitution, is not answered by what some or even many Muslims do or do not do. It can only be answered by examining the teachings of the Qur’an and Sunnah.

In those sources, we find a denial of the freedom of speech in the prohibition of criticism of Islam, a denial of equality of rights for women, and a call for violence against and the subjugation under the hegemony of Islamic law of those who are non-Muslims, denying them basic rights. Regina Mustafa should explain whether or not these teachings are compatible with the U.S. Constitution. But an establishment media that invokes the hard-Left smear group the Southern Poverty Law Center as if it were a neutral and reliable source is never going to ask Mustafa such questions.

“Candidate under fire for calling Islam ‘antithesis of Constitution,’” by Heather J. Carlson, PostBulletin, January 19, 2018: