"You can't say you are against tyranny, and then have the despots from Saudi Arabia in your house," remarks one attendee at an Islamic tsunami benefit.

01:00 AM EST on Sunday, January 23, 2005
BY RICHARD C. DUJARDIN
Journal Religion Writer


WEST WARWICK -- President Bush's inaugural vow to transform U.S. foreign policy so as to bring freedom and liberty to the darkest corners of the world is drawing praise from many in Rhode Island's Muslim community.

But if remarks by some of the more than 100 people who turned out Friday for a dinner at the state's first Islamic day school for children are any indication, that support is tempered by skepticism over how far Mr. Bush is really willing to go to combat tyranny and spread liberty in the Middle East.

"It's an issue of credibility," said Nasser Zawia, a professor of pharmacy at the University of Rhode Island, who hails from Yemen.

"You can't say you are against tyranny, and then have the despots from Saudi Arabia in your house in Texas.

"If you say you are for liberty and freedom, you have to be for it everywhere," Zawia continued. "It has to be uniform and consistent."

Many of those who attended the dinner -- part of an effort by Muslim communities across the United States to raise $10 million for those devastated by the tsunami -- had been skeptical two years ago about the reasons Mr. Bush gave for going to war in Iraq. Now, they are wondering if the United States knows how to bring democracy to that part of the world.

"I'm a strong believer in democracy," said Naeem Siddiqi, an Indian-born urologist of Pakistani ancestry. "But do you know how to start democracy? You have to let it evolve.

"We look at democracy as one man, one vote. But in the tribal cultures, in olden times, the tribe controlled human life, and you had government by consensus. That's where it must start. Don't impose. Let it evolve -- but be sure you put in the seeds, so it will come up."

Mustafa Surti, also Pakistani, who is a psychiatrist at Butler Hospital and a member of the faculty at Brown University, said that he believes he is in the minority when he says he agrees with Mr. Bush. At the same time, he said, the responsibility for bringing democracy to Iraq and other countries in the Middle East cannot rest entirely on the United States.

"It's good to have democracy over there," Surti said, "But I think the people in those countries need to come forward and take it. In Iraq, if they want it, they can get it. But will they?

"It's like teaching a child to do what is right. You can keep teaching a child what you think is right, but the child has to be willing to learn it, also."

Aftab Khan, an assistant administrator for Johnson & Wales University, said that he, personally, has "no quarrel" with the ideals that the president express in his inaugural address, but said he sees a disconnect between what is being said and what is being done, particularly since the passage of the Patriot Act.

"I think, in America, we used too have much freedom," Khan said. "But now, since 9/11, the law-enforcement agencies can come into your house without a warrant. It's not as good as it used to be."