Many points raised by the author are very valid and there is a need for such Islamic civilians/scholars to come forward and express their views in public.... however, let us also face the fact that holy Quraan like may other religious texts, does contain parts where violence is justified and killing of \"infidels\" is justified. I think Muslims need to do exactly what Christians did in 17th-18th century; to extract out what is not valid in today\'s world. Violence in Quraan is not contextual, to my understanding, the whole Quraan is contextual. When Prophet did not a huge army and he was not in a position to fight the jews and arab pagans, the Quraanic verses say,\"Live amongst them in harmony\" and when the army was built up, even killing of civilians and innocent people of the city was justified by,\"Look! what we have done to the non-believers\".... The fundamental difficulty is that no muslim is ever ready to accept that Quraan could be the words of human beings and not Allah Him/Herself! Anyways, hope some of the moderates will come forward and initiate some discussion on the verses and take some of the \"contextual\" ones out so that they are not misused by the extremists.
