WASHINGTON: Muslim organisations in the United States have rejected efforts by the Taliban and other extremist groups to hide behind Islam to justify their violent agenda.

“No act of terror will ever serve the cause of Islam,” says the All Dulles Area Muslim Society (ADAMS), a leading Muslim group.

In separate messages, all major Muslim groups in the United States have also rejected the Taliban claim that last week’s brutal attack on a school in Peshawar was jihad.

“The souls of the depraved people who carried out this attack are beyond redemption, and obviously already lost to the evil Darkness that inspired their action,” ADAMS said.

“There can be no justification, religious or otherwise, for the killing of innocent schoolchildren and school staff,” said the Islamic Society of North America, the largest Muslim organisation in the United States and Canada.

“Our deepest condolences and prayers go out to the victims and their families of this senseless attack,” said ISNA president Azhar Azeez.

The Islamic Circle of North America, the second largest Muslim group in the region, described the Peshawar school attack as “senseless and brutal and noted that the Tehreek-i-Taliban was “quick to claim responsibility for the horrifyingly inhumane act.”

“This is a despicable and cowardly act by the TTP. It goes against every human and Islamic value,’ said ICNA president Naeem Baig.

“We demand that the government of Pakistan respond to this ignominious act with the relentless force of law, and hold the criminals to account.”

ICNA called Dec. 16 “a day of anguish and grief for the Pakistani people,” who suffered more than 15 terrorist attacks this year alone.

Ghulam Nabi Fai, the leader of the Kashmiri community in the United States, said the massacre of innocent children in Peshawar was “unmitigated evil, and an earmark of barbarism contemptuous”.

“Terrorism is never acceptable, no matter how seemingly urgent the political objective or how evil the opposition,” he said.

Published in Dawn December 23th , 2014