Crossroads !

Time is fast running out for Australia's Muslim community to openly state where they stand when it comes to the murderous actions of what is now termed the IS - the Islamic State - that is forming a Caliphate on captured lands in Syria and Iraq.   There is no escaping the intentions of the self proclaimed Caliph, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi who has stated that the forty thousand Yazidi trapped on Sinjar mountain will not be allowed to convert to his form of Sunni Islam.   Many have already been slaughtered and the IS intends to kill the remainder if the west can not manage to mount a rescue.

Choosing sides is an agonising choice when it concerns religion.  The Jihadists claim that Islam is under attack and the ongoing struggle between Israel and the surrounding Palestinian territories lends credence to that claim, but it has to be measured against the all out war being inflicted on innocent people for the crime of simply not willingly adhering to the extreme view of Islam held by the Jihadists.  They gleefully run pictures on social media showing captured soldiers being beheaded - and their women distributed as sexual pawns or sold into slavery.  All who come under their control either convert to their form of Islam - or are brutally killed.

In the past, Australian Muslims have mainly refused to make a choice.   Younger radicals join noisy street parades protesting events they claim dishonours Islam and Islamic leaders try to claim neutrality.   The rank and file are discomforted and avoid comment, which colours the thinking of many ordinary Australians who think that they secretly approve of the Jihadist minority.    When religion is deeply ingrained into a persons faith, it is very difficult to openly voice disapproval.

We have seen this contrast in our own society, where all manner of supposedly honest people have held their silence when it comes to paedophiles molesting children.   Protecting the good name of their church has been deemed more important than the ruined lives that have resulted from the sexual predations of servants of that church.  Such protection was carried to the highest levels.

It is highly likely that the war within Islam is about to increase to a higher notch.   Already the siren call of Jihad is attracting young Australian Islamic men to travel to the Middle East to join the fighting and people like Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi openly schemes to train and return these volunteers to western countries to deliver death and destruction to the home populations by way of bombings.  This holy war will no longer be an event viewed on television, but just drama from a far away land.

The safety of neutrality will no longer be available to Australia's Muslims.   The vast majority of Muslim people living in Australia simply want to live their lives peacefully, earn a living and bring up their children in    peace - and practice their religion without harassment.   That is not possible if others within that same religion are inflicting death and destruction on the wider community - and other Muslims are remaining silent.

The sheer brutality of what is occurring to the victims of IS is sparking change.   The tone of Islamic leaders here is no longer tinged with " acceptable reasons " for why these crimes are committed and the mood has changed.   Islam in Australia has finally found it's voice and this will do much to dispell the suspicion that has riven a deep gulf between our two communities.

The atrocities of the Jihad movement seems to have been the catalyst that is melding diverse religions in Australia more closely together !