Author and Islamic critic Robert Spencer has some concerns about a Muslim who has been hired to teach at the U.S Naval Academy.
Akbar Ahmed is a cultural anthropologist and former Pakistani official who will fill a new chair for Middle East Studies at Annapolis. He will teach courses, advise midshipmen and faculty, and assist in research projects. Robert Spencer, the director Jihad Watch, a project of the David Horowitz Freedom Center, says Ahmed is a "moderate Muslim" who has refused to debate him.
"Akbar Ahmed is somebody who is certainly on record as opposing the jihad violence that is advocated by Osama bin Laden, but nobody has asked him -- and I haven't had a chance to ask him myself because he won't debate me -- where he stands on non-violent encroachments of Islamic provisions in the United States and on the ultimate adoption of Islamic law in the United States," Spencer contends.
Spencer questions the motivation behind the Annapolis appointment.
"I don't think he's any kind of espionage risk or something like that," he adds. "At the same time, however, the appointment itself is just another example of the general anxiety to show oneself not be anti-Muslim, such that they're not nearly as vigilant as they should be against Islamic supremacists and those who are pursuing the jihad agenda, not necessarily by violent means."