The Huffington Post - "We Can Keep America Safe Without Sacrificing Our Core Values"

Op-Ed

By Chris Coons

Earlier this week, Senator Ted Cruz chaired a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing titled "Willful Blindness: Consequences of Agency Efforts to Deemphasize Radical Islam in Combatting Terrorism." As the senior Democrat on the subcommittee, I used the hearing to push back on this misleading rhetoric, much of which was willfully reckless.

Several witnesses suggested that if only our President and his administration would use the words "radical Islam," we would be a safer nation. This theory is not only false -- it is dangerous.

Here are the facts. We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with ISIS. Rhetoric that confuses this issue plays into the hands of ISIS, which itself accuses the United States and our allies of being at war with Islam. ISIS is not Islamic. It is a death cult that has killed more Muslims than Christians. When a deranged murderer invokes Islam, it is a hollow attempt to justify his rampage by cloaking it in religion.

This hearing was also troubling because it presented the American people with a false choice: we can either keep America safe or preserve our fundamental values. I reject this premise.

We can and must defeat terrorism without sacrificing our constitutional principles of openness, tolerance, and freedom. To compromise these principles, and to blame over a billion Muslims for the twisted actions of an extremist few, only serves to divide Americans, alienate the Muslim world, and legitimize the murderous groups who falsely claim to speak for Islam.

This makes us less safe.

Some prominent Republicans have offered a number of dangerous proposals. One calls on the U.S. to "patrol and secure" so-called "Muslim neighborhoods;" another would simply ban all Muslims from entering the United States. But we can't fight radicalization with radical proposals.

Whether you call it "radical Islamism" or "Islamic extremism," spending hours debating semantics doesn't get us any closer to developing new ways to combat terror and defeat ISIS.

Instead of quibbling about a few words, we should be discussing a strategy to defeat ISIS. Here's what I propose:

First, around the world and throughout cyberspace, we must intensify our military and online campaigns against ISIS. We should do everything we can to support our allies by strengthening intelligence sharing and improving security screening and border management.

We must also build upon the progress made so far by the American-led anti-ISIS coalition. Together, the 66-nation coalition assembled by President Obama and his administration has retaken nearly half of the territory ISIS held in Iraq, and more than 20 percent of its territory in Syria. The U.S. alone has carried out more than 13,200 airstrikes and killed more than 25,000 ISIS fighters and more than 120 ISIS leaders. While we have more work to do, the success and cohesion of this coalition so far shows we're making progress.

Second, here at home, we have to harden our domestic defenses, strengthen our border security, and work to prevent the radicalization of any potential homegrown terrorists. Congress should help equip state and local law enforcement with the tools required to reduce the threat of terrorism. That includes empowering law enforcement to stop known and suspected terrorists from acquiring dangerous weapons.

But these tasks, while critical, aren't sufficient by themselves.

Our success fighting terrorism depends in large part on making clear to the 1.7 billion Muslims around the world -- including millions who are proud citizens of this country -- that the United States supports their right to worship and live their faith freely, openly, and peacefully. Faithful Muslims around the world have denounced ISIS as the terror group that it is, and disclaimed its deviant interpretation of their religion.

Defeating terrorism means undertaking consistent, genuine outreach to the American Muslim community to promote full integration into civic and political life. Only then will we be able to achieve our shared goals of defeating the scourge of terrorism.

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