To our fellow Americans,

AIFD takes this sacred day, Memorial Day, to remember those who have given their life for this country. As a former Navy Lieutenant-Commander, and founder and president of AIFD I often reflect on my days in service and the reality that I agreed to defend our country and the freedoms and liberties it stood for, even if that means to my death. It was not an oath that I took lightly but one that I took willingly and an idea that I still hold as strongly if not greater every day.

It is upon the lives of those lost that this country has been built dating back to the Civil War and continuing through to present day.

As our nation prays on this Memorial Day for an end to war and conflict, let us also pray for those in the field who put their life on the line for our country every day. Those who are away from loved ones, in strange and tumultuous surroundings and those who are here in the US working to keep our land safe from those who wish us harm.

As an American and as a Muslim, to see lost souls troubled with doubt and indecision drawn into global Islamism and making horrific incomprehensible decisions to take their life and the lives of innocent people in the name of a religion, the same religion, we believe in is an even clearer sign that we as Americans, as parents and counselors and as concerned citizens need to do far more to educate our communities that the only idea worth dying for is your country, your freedoms, your liberties. Not your religion. Not Islam.

No other day of remembrance today boils down what we are fighting for or against better than Memorial Day.

All those in uniform who are in service to our country are in our daily prayers.

We also pray for those who have lost their way into the abyss of global Islamism and its jihad, and are heading down a path of destruction. May you quickly abandon the failed ideas and loyalties of Islamism and all its forms of jihad, and may you find the answers you seek instead through service to your country, your community and your family. However, if you cannot see straight to abandon Islamism, then we pray for your defeat on the battlefields of life.