Source: washingtonpost.com
Is there a tougher job description than Shaarik Zafar’s?
Shaarik Zafar, State Department’s new special representative for Muslim communities
As the State Department’s new special representative for Muslim communities, the boyish-looking Texas lawyer is America’s ambassador to Muslims around the world during a summer of nonstop grim headlines from Gaza, Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq… All are places where his brand is not, let’s say, wildly popular.
Having just spent a decade working for domestic federal agencies, primarily with fellow Muslims, on topics that include civil rights violations, police surveillance and Transportation Security Administration screening, Zafar knows the deal.
His work will be done, often, through others.
“It has to be a bank shot,” says Zafar, whose appointment will be formally announced Wednesday. “A Muslim guy with the U.S. government is going to have limited credibility.”
The sensitivity of the topic — how Muslims interact with the U.S. government — flared just this month. Prominent Swiss celeb-professor Tariq Ramadan announced that he would skip the biggest annual gathering of U.S. Muslims — the conference of the Islamic Society of North America in Detroit this weekend — to protest what he sees as a Muslim-American leadership silent or deferential to U.S. power brokers on domestic and foreign issues.
“In bending over backwards, in saying ‘Yes sir!’ they sacrifice not only their …read more at washingtonpost.com
Categories: Ahmadiyyat: True Islam, Americas, Islam, United States
As an American, I don’t have a problem with this concept in principle. Do we not have an ambassador to the Vatican which is, in fact, one to the Roman Catholic Church? The issues I foresee are that with the present, ever-growing schisms within Islam, Mr. Zafar will be faced with prospects of being accused of favoring one sect over another, neglecting minority sects, or spending much of his time being a ‘peacemaker’ between sects instead of representing the interests of the US to Muslims which is, after all, the role of an ambassador. That said, I do wish him success.
A.A.WAR,
ITS GREAT AND GOOD NEWS TO ALL MUSLIMS ALL OVER THE WORLD.WE WSH HIM ALL THE BEST.REPRESENT US AND THEM IN ALL MATTERS FOR PEACE TO PREVAIL IN ALL OUR WORLD COMMUNITIES-YOUR FLAG SHOULD BE PEACE=ISLAM.ITS ENOUGH.SAY THE SALAM AND ITS ALL OVER.THE U S A HAS DONE A GREAT JOB ON THIS.GREAT AND CONGRATULATIONS TO THE USA AND HER PEOPLES.MAY ALLAH HELP HIM.