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There is much to dislike, even loathe, about the Islamic cleric known as Abu Qatada. But whether or not jailing him, as the British government has just done, will accomplish anything is unclear. It's true that it will keep him from fleeing Great Britain before being tried on a variety of charges. But it will not keep him, or anyone else, from spreading the hatful views which he teaches. For better or for worse, ideas cannot be put in prison - even ugly ones.

The only way to strip a teacher's power is to convince his potential audience to shun his teachings. It's not that we should give up on law enforcement. But do we imagine that there are not ten imams waiting to take Abu Qatada's place?

Only when religious leaders like Abu Qatada are preaching to empty halls, will we be successful. And that demands more than reactive prosecution. It requires proactive initiatives which provide equally compelling alternatives to those over whom Abu Qatada currently holds sway.

If this man, who entered Great Britain on a forged passport and may have been raising funds for terrorists in places like Chechnya, goes to prison for these actions, none of us should lose any sleep. If we think that jailing people for teaching dangerous ideas will keep us safe, we need to wake up.

Double the number killed in Nigeria as those murdered in Mumbai, and many more refuges in light of the mayhem, and yet the response to this past week's events in Nigeria is relatively muted. Why is that?

Could it be that we are fascinated by the attacks in Mumbai because we identify more with those victims? Is it because the victims in the attacks in India appear more innocent and therefore make them more appealing to us? Is it that Mumbai affirms a wide-spread fear about the growing threat of terror, especially terror sponsored by Islamist organizations, while in Africa Christians spilled as much blood as their Muslim neighbors?

Do we simply care less about Africa than we do about India? Is it because Mumbai is a cosmopolitan city, important to the global economy? Perhaps it is because westerners were victimized in India but not in Nigeria.

Perhaps we simply suffer from what the experts call "compassion fatigue". Perhaps we are simply overloaded by the coincidence of these horrific events and most of us simply cannot find the space in our hearts to carry so much pain.

Whatever the reasons, we need to pay close attention to both tragedies and how they are unfolding. Why? If for no other reason, pure self interest. The events in Nigeria may be the pre-cursor to Mumbai-like terror in Africa as well. Every cause that spawns global terror began with a local conflict to which little attention was paid.

Perhaps by paying real attention to an "unimportant" city like Jos in Nigeria today, we can both heal the suffering of at least as many people as were effected in India and even preclude the kind of organized terror which accomplished 200 murders in Mumbai.

President-elect Obama hasn't been to church in weeks, saying he doesn't want to disrupt the service for others. I find that rationale a little tough to swallow, but wish that he would share his real thoughts on the matter. As with so many other large cultural issues, he could move forward an important conversation about faith in our nation.

Of course, if President-elect Obama chooses not to attend church, that's his business. And he owes no explanation for making that choice. The idea that our president must attend church, flies in the face the very religious liberty upon which our nation is founded. But telling us that he has made that choice because he "doesn't want to disrupt the service for others" stretches even this supporter's ability to trust his answer on this issue.

For starters, my guess is that while his attendance at a church of his choosing would cause some logistical challenges, on balance, most worshippers would be delighted share a pew with the president-elect. Far from disrupting the service, I imagine it would affirm the faith of those who worship alongside him.

And even if one accepts his rationale for not attending church with others, it does not explain why the president-elect has not made alternative arrangements for formal prayer in a more private setting. He would be far from the first public figure to do so. So that cannot be it either.

It would be quite interesting to here from him why he chooses not to engage in any kind of public worship at this time, especially after so many years of regular church attendance. But whatever the real answer is, the inability to share it has as much to do with the American public as it does with President-elect Obama.

Are we really ready to hear our president say that public prayer is simply not that important to him?

Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg and his wife Rivki were murdered, along with three other hostages, at the Chabad community center which they ran in Mumbai. And as much as I am hurting over their deaths, I am more devastated by the scope of the terror (over 160 dead and more than 350 wounded) than the fact that among them was a rabbi.

Even the fact that some appear to have been targeted because they were Jews does not make me so profoundly angry and sad. What is going on in Mumbai is bigger than that. And while I appreciate that fellow-blogger, Rod Dreher, focuses our attention on those victims who were probably killed because of their religion, that is not the point upon which to focus today. Nor is any broadside about Islamic Terrorism. Why? I'll tell you.

Even if such analyses are correct, and in my opinion they are less correct than those who publish them believe them to be, and more correct than those who need to hear them will admit. But that's the point. What good is accomplished with harangues that can not be meaningfully heard by those who may need to hear them most? And if they can not be hear they are nothing more than angry posturing - hardly what is needed at this moment.

As I wrote yesterday:

Now is not the time to justify, politic, or rationalize anything. But too many people seem not to know that. English newspapers repeatedly remind readers that the Rabbi is Israeli, as if that fact somehow mitigates the horror of his fate or lends some justification to the terrorists' actions. Jihad Watch managed to post a headline which "explains" the events as a "natural outgrowth" of the deep hatred that is "intrinsic" to Islam. And multiple Muslim advocacy groups have sent out press releases calling on us to pay less attention to the dead and wounded and focus instead on the "root causes" of global terror in the name of Islam. It's a real race to the bottom.

Now is the time for all of us watching these events from afar to do three things: pray for the safety of all people still involved in the Mumbai attacks, the full and speedy recovery of the injured and that all those burying their dead, find consolation in the face of their loss.

With most of the Hostages freed this morning at the Taj Hotel and over 100 dead following the terror attacks begun yesterday in Mumbai, Rabbi Gabriel Holtzberg, his wife Rivki, and six others remain hostages in their community center. Upon opening my e-mail this morning, I was inundated by messages asking me if I was going to address this in Windows and Doors. So I will, even though my response may upset some of those who requested it.

I admit to an initial surge of special interest and concern in this Jewish/Rabbi angle on the story, but actually think that we need to worry more about how this episode will end for all of those affected regardless of their religious or national identity. That may sound obvious, but much of the coverage of this story uses these terrible events to further specific ideological goals in ways that prove otherwise.

English newspapers repeatedly remind readers that the Rabbi is Israeli, as if that fact somehow mitigates the horror of his fate or lends some justification to the terrorists' actions. Jihad Watch managed to post a headline which "explains" the events as a "natural outgrowth" of the deep hatred that is "intrinsic" to Islam. And multiple Muslim advocacy groups have sent out press releases calling on us to pay less attention to the dead and wounded and focus instead on the "root causes" of global terror in the name of Islam. It's a real race to the bottom.

Now is not the time to justify, politic, or rationalize anything. Now is the time for all of us watching these events from afar to do three things: pray for the safety of all people still involved in the Mumbai attacks, the full and speedy recovery of the injured and that all those burying their dead, find consolation in the face of their loss.

At the end of day, Rabbi Holtzberg, his attackers, and all the other hostages are somebody's child. And while there is no moral equivalence between the perpetrators and their victims, remembering that fact may help us all to behave a little better in the face of this tragedy. Who knows, it may even be a part of the solution to keeping them from occurring again.