He was echoed by others, including the tireless Muslim propagandist Haroon Moghul, who wrote that the “Medina attack is an assault on Islam itself.” Still others have lumped the Saudi attacks in with those in Baghdad and Dhaka, claiming that in these attacks of the last few weeks “Muslims have been the main victims.” (In a purely arithmetical sense, given the 200 killed in Baghdad, that may be – misleadingly – true).

My, how quick so many of us are to sow or reap confusion. Let’s try to keep clear and distinct what each of these attacks was targeting. The first thing to do is not to allow ourselves to forget what the attack on the Holey Artisan Bakery in Dhaka was all about. Beyond any confusion or doubt, it was an attack solely on non-Muslims. These were selected, by their killers, through the administration of a macabre quiz about the Qur’an.

Those who, among the patrons and staff, showed sufficient knowledge of the Qur’an, were spared, and were even treated solicitously by the attackers, who made sure they were fed, while those who could not pass it were identified as non-Muslims, and tortured and killed. Indeed, the attackers appear to have suggested to those they had spared that they should try to be just like themselves, they who had been busily torturing and killing 20 men and women, as the very models of “good Muslims” that others should emulate:

“When they realised that troops might storm the building, they came to our room one last time and told us not to tarnish the name of Islam, be a good Muslim and uphold the pride of Islam. They said they had no intention of hurting us as we were Muslims.” Whatever place it may have attained in the annals of grotesque cruelty, what happened at the Holey Artisan restaurant did not constitute an “attack on Muslims.”