Muslims often complain that Islam is misrepresented in the foreign, especially Western, media. There is no doubt that this claim is, to a certain extent, justified. Political, economic and cultural rivalry between the Muslim and non-Muslim worlds, stretching from the time of the Crusades, through the colonial period, to the present day, had made non-Muslims wary of Islam, and led them to paint a distorted picture of it.

In modern times this apprehension of Islam has grown to unprecedented levels due to the spread in the Muslim world of militant political organizations bent on the establishment—at the expense of the existing order—of Islamic states. At the same time the increasing economic clout wielded by oil-producing nations has created tremors in the industrial world. The old custodians of economic and political power have thus come to think of Islam, not just as a rival, but as a positive threat. Naturally, they have made stringent efforts to ward off this threat.

These sentiments were expressed by Alain Woodrow in an article in the French newspaper Le Monde, later published in English in the Manchester Guardian Weekly. According to Mr. Woodrow, the fear of Islam resurfacing in France is due to the “twin resurgence of Islam, both on an economic front, thanks to its oil resources, and on a political front, in the form of militant fundamentalism.”

(Guardian Weekly, July 31, 1983)

This, of course, is a misrepresentation of Islam, for as the President of the Islamic Centre, Maulana Wahiduddin Khan, wrote in reply to Alain Woodrow’s article, “neither of these cause that are cited have anything to do with Islam. The fear generated by these factors is not a fear of Islam. It can only be said to be either of some Muslim nations or some movements launched by Muslim extremists. Islam and Muslims are not equal to each other.”

Maulana Wahiduddin Khan’s reply to Alain Woodrow’s article, reprinted in full on the opposite page, was given due prominence in The Guardian Weekly (September 4, 1983) and accorded the headline “Islam per se is not a threat.”

This shows that, if the Western media has been used by anti-Islamic forces to paint a distorted picture of Islam, it can be used just as well by Islamic forces to correct that picture. What the Muslims must do is ensure that a correct picture of Islam reaches the West, for if Muslims do not convey a true impression of Islam, then how can they except others to do so?