I think it is ridiculous to suggest that Islam cannot be a peaceful religion because what is in the Quaran. Equally bloody and genocidal chapters are in the old testament, yet you don't hear (mainstream/not fuckwit) people suggesting that Judaism is inherently violent and redeemable.
But I'm sure this sort of attitude makes sure that muslims don't feel isolated from the rest of the community and therefore more prone to radicalization.
Read the Torah. Then look at modern Judaism. You'll be shocked by how different the two are. It was Jewish theologians who came up with the Documentary Hypothesis for the origins of the Torah. Furthermore, many Jewish religious schools emphasize critical thinking and debate, even against God himself. Just imagine how that would fly in an American Christian Sunday School!
That's kind of the point. The argument that Islam is inherently violent because of the Quran implies that Christianity and Judaism should also be inherently violent because of the Old Testament. Since people can take a look at a bloody and violent holy texts and then reinterpret the fuck out of it in Judaism and Christianity, we should assume Muslims also have that same ability and look for explanations of violence elsewhere.
I hate to say something that you could hear any amateur Christian apologist say, but the New Testament clumsily retcons the violence out. Jesus often changes the subject when asked about putting people to death, and in some cases outright condemns the practice. And so you can have a Christian fundamentalist who is functionally a pacifist, and that person can base their pacifism on the Bible. The same is
not true of Islam. Muhammad, unlike Jesus and Moses, is uncontroversially acknowledged to have existed, and to have been a brutal warlord as described by the Quran. For a peaceful person who identifies as a Muslim to claim they are emulating Muhammad, they
must willfully distort history.
