While many applaud the creation of Islamic superheroes by Kuwaiti psychologist Naif Al-Mutawa, criticized question whether the comics are in fact a form of propaganda, reports Rick Schindler for MSNBC.

The 99 is a team of young superheroes created to suit a Middle Eastern audience and to provide positive role models for Muslim children, claims creator Al-Mutawa.

Al-Mutawa’s crime-fighting Muslim superheroes quickly gained a following throughout the Middle East, Asia, and the United States, Schindler explains. DC Comics, home of comic icons Superman and Batman, struck a deal with Teshkeel Comics, Al-Mutawa’s company, to publish a miniseries in which The 99 and the DC Justice League would work together. Additionally, President Barack Obama commended Al-Mutawa for creating “superheroes who embody the teachings and tolerance of Islam.”

Adrian Morgan of the conservative right-wing website Family Security Matters criticizes Obama’s support of the comic, and expresses his concern with the potential of an animated show based on the comic book to air on The Hub, as Teshkeel Comics works on a deal with Discovery Communications.

“It seems like indoctrination, an indoctrination made more blatant by Obama’s totally inappropriate promotion of The Ninety-Nine,” opines Morgan.

In his defense, Al-Mutawa tells MSNBC, “What I wanted to do was reposition Islam to Muslims--secularize some of the content...The only way to tame extremism is through art and culture.”

Meanwhile in Arab News, Farha Khaled mentions the 130-page report released by the Center for American Progress, which offers the findings of an investigation of Islamophobia in the US.

The report, entitled Fear, Inc.: The Roots Of the Islamophobia Network In America, found that seven foundations have contributed $42 million in the past 10 years in support of Islamophobic rhetoric. Khaled observes: “The global economy may be suffering but the Islamophobia industry proves to be resilient in weathering the recession.”

In other news, Ryan Mauro of the conservative online FrontPage Magazine writes that the Obama administration unexpectedly rejected Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, an anti-Islamist Muslim, from becoming part of the State Department’s Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy.

Jasser is the president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, an anti-Islamist activist group that has been criticized by organizations that back the Muslim Brotherhood, such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Jasser’s organization claims to “advocate for the ideas of gender equality, genuine religious pluralism, and an unwavering preference of the secular state and a secular law over the Islamic state.”

As such, Mauro observes that it would seem Jasser’s secular outlook on Islam would appeal to the Obama administration at a time when the Arab world is being reshaped.

Contrary to Jasser’s viewpoint, Turkish journalist Mustafa Akyol has published a book claiming that Islam is in fact compatible with democracy, Daniel Bentson points out in The Spectator.

In Islam Without Extremes, Akyol writes that moderate Islam is the way to achieve a democratic Middle East. He concludes: "The Arab Spring is taking us to a new phase where the democratically-minded can enter government...The trend [in the Muslim world] is not toward radicalism.”