Well said, Babette.

I wish that all Australian Christians were as concerned as you are about the plight of their persecuted brothers and sisters.

A former deputy leader of the Liberal Party of Australia, the Hon. Neil Brown QC, has castigated Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull for using ASIO director-general Duncan Lewis to phone Coalition backbench MPs to discourage them from "blaspheming" Islam.

Mr Brown wrote: "So now we know what life is really to be like under the Turnbull government.

"If MPs fall out of line with the government, they can expect a call from ASIO and if they still refuse to get into line after that warning, the implied threat is that they will have been noticed by ASIO and may be noticed in the future. To help ASIO along in this work, Malcolm Turnbull will apparently snitch on his colleagues and hand out their phone numbers.

"This must limit debate and severely diminish the proper role of members of parliament — to form their own opinions, speak freely and let the people judge them at the following election. The intervention of the PM is a serious breach of that convention and of our rights. It is alarming to see a prime minister using the security service in this manner and even more alarming that ASIO should allow itself to be so used." [Extract from Neil Brown's letter to The Australian, Dec 22, 2015].

There's a balance. A Labor MP commented about Tony Abbott not being a good example of his Church and was howled down. That's a personal attack on adherence to faith.
'I think it behoves Australians to recognise the backlash is something very, very dangerous … we need to be very temperate,' Mr Lewis said.
--
That is correct and lawful.

Mr Lewis also said: 'I don’t buy the notion the issue of Islamic ­extremism is in some way fostered or sponsored or supported by the Muslim religion. I think it’s blasphemous to the extent I can comment on someone else’s religion.'
----
Incorrect both times. Blasphemy is a subjective opinion not illegal.
If intemperate ,a comment is unlawful for incitement . And it's not for outsiders to compel Islam to change it's beliefs of conscience.
But "parliament" means "speak the mind" and the public service has no right to intrude on rational discussion , particularly with ASIO's $billions in clout of our funds.

Thank you Babette, you have given me the opportunity to once again completely disagree with a post of yours. In this case it is not just because you have distorted the facts as you do on all your anti-abortion posts, but because this particular piece is small-minded and derogatory.

Why do you think you have the right to tell people from another religion what they should believe and how they should act?

Actually, I can answer that question myself. You have obviously appointed yourself as the arbiter of how young women should live their lives, so extending this to the Muslim community should come as no surprise.

In terms of dealing with radical Islam, yelling at the community from the sidelines and disparaging their religion is unlikely to be a useful tactic.

Perhaps some thought should be given to why young people are allowing themselves to be radicalised by groups such as IS? The answer has precious little to do with religion.

In fact , Mahommad's doctrines survived because he won his swordfights. He planned major invasions prior to his death. The ambit was the world and those refusing submission to the god of great deaths were to be killed. The application to today's world can be discussed just as Luther and the popes held discussions, sometimes diverting into Olympic bloodbaths. The Koran is so ambiguous that Sunni faith needs libraries of commentaries to plug the gaps. So comment is familiar to ISIS. Constructive inter-facing with the network of war-workers is kosher

thanks Babette

Barnabas do a great job. Unfortunately Turnbull is a regressive and very cowardly when it comes to facing the truth on Islam. Those conservatives like Morrison need to grow a backbone. He for one knows the truth. Others like Bishop are only interested in their own careers. I dare say its going to take a France like incident (God forbid) to wake up the consciences of the self seekers.

Unless both sides of politics come to grips with the real causes of Islamic violence there will be more incidents. I can only beg our political leaders to quietly recognise that these problems are intrinsic to Islam. When this is recognised some progress will be made in dealing with the problems logically and effectively.