"I think this event will only strengthen the relationship between the United States and the Muslim world," said Mohamed Elsanousi of the Islamic Society of North America.
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Haris Tarin of the Muslim Public Affairs Council hoped that this will be a new chapter in how the US is able to engage the Muslim world. "Osama bin Laden and his ideology had become increasingly irrelevant in the Muslim-majority countries, and we had seen this over the past few months with the Arab Spring," he said.
"We hope that today this will be a new chapter in our country's moving forward in terms of our national security and our relationship with the Muslim-majority countries and ensuring that we no longer completely securitise that relationship, and are engaged, as the President had said, in our mutual understanding and mutual respect of one another," he added.
Tarin agreed that bin Laden's death is not going to end terrorism; it's not going to end terror tomorrow. "Bin Ladin represented a binary view of the world, that the world is split between those who think like him and those who are other than him. It wasn't just between Muslims and non-Muslims. It was between those who think like him and those who think other than him," he observed.
Elsanousi said the relationship between the US and Pakistan, after this event, would only be stronger because the US president is very consistent in his remark -- not only on this occasion, even actually previously, he always differentiates between the act of terrorists like bin Laden and the Al Qaeda and the Muslim communities. "He repeatedly said that America is not in war with Islam or Muslims," he said.
Tarin said it is time for the US to have a more constructive conversation as it relates to its relationship, whether it be with Pakistan or Afghanistan. "The people who are suffering in Afghanistan, the people who are suffering in Pakistan, could probably care less about bin Laden. There is a human side to this conversation that needs to be had," he said.
"Whether we want to continue to invest in a securitised relationship focused on our military approach, or a civil relationship where we're able to invest in the civil society, we're able to invest in education, we're able to have a relationship beyond the terrorism and the security lens that we've unfortunately developed over the past decade. And I think this is an opportunity to have that conversation," Tarin concluded.
