Newt Gingrich on Friday blasted the Obama administration for what he labels a refusal to confront radical Islam.
“Until you replace this president and until you have the Congress and the new president replace large parts of our bureaucracies, we’re going to continue to be dominated by a secular, anti-Christian and anti-Jewish elite, which is seeking to impose on us rules that make zero sense,” he told religious conservatives at the American Family Association’s pastors’ policy briefing in Iowa.
Gingrich, answering a question about challenging Sharia law on U.S. soil, said the country’s leadership was “so afraid to tell the truth” and “timid” that it didn’t swiftly prosecute the Pakistani immigrant who was sentenced to life in prison last year for planting a bomb in Times Square. And he pointed out that the federal government has sued a school district for denying a Muslim middle school teacher unpaid leave to make a pilgrimage to Mecca.
“I simply suggest that every church in the country announce there is a new principle that visiting Bethlehem every year for three weeks is an important part of your devotion,” he said to applause.
“The whole thing collapses,” he added. “It’s an absurdity. It’s part of this desperation of our secular elites to do everything they can to prove they are not anti-Muslim.”
Gingrich insisted that he’s not anti-Muslim himself, but that he is “deeply opposed” to the religion’s radical wing that represses women, homosexuals and Christians.
“I think it’s time to have the courage to stand up and say that we represent an insistence on modernity,” he said. “And we represent a decisive opposition to those who would kill us for the purpose of imposing our beliefs on the rest of us. And we are prepared to say an act of terrorism is an act of jihadism.”