EFL'd to get to a (not "the") good part. Go read it all, you'll be glad you did.
. . . Freedom of conversion is at the core of freedom of religion -- indeed, at the core of freedom of any kind. If you cannot change your mind, your stated beliefs, and the religious community you choose to associate with, you are not free.
What I find most amusing is the widespread belief among Muslims that this Sharia law is essential in order to preserve Islam.
Don't they see that it is exactly this law that destroys Islam wherever it is enforced?
To the degree that the law demanding the death of anyone who converts away from Islam is actually enforced, to exactly that degree the nation that enforces it is not a Muslim nation.
Indeed, there are no Muslims at all, wherever that law is enforced.
Because religion is absolutely not about mere outward compliance with the law. It is about belief -- it is about what a person believes in his heart. But in a nation where conversion away from Islam means death, then no believer can be sure that his own obedience is purely a matter of conscience.
If a person "believes" in Islam, but there has ever been a moment when he thought, "since I can't convert to another faith anyway, what's the point of learning about any other way of thinking?" then that person is not a Muslim.
There is no faith under compulsion. Any nation where Sharia is enforced is not a Muslim nation, and none of its people are Muslims. If they cannot choose not to be Muslim, then they have not chosen to be Muslim. Without freedom not to believe, faith is a sham even if you think you are sincere. . . .
Posted by: Mike ||
04/06/2006 07:12 ||
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#1
I like OSC but he completely misses the point here. All ideologies are in a Darwinian struggle. In the end it doesn't matter how you win, it only matters that you win. Death to apostates works in maintaining adherents. Why they adhere is immaterial.
As I have said here many times, the issue is winning. How we win doesn't greatly concern me (assuming it works).
#2
There is no faith under compulsion. Any nation where Sharia is enforced is not a Muslim nation, and none of its people are Muslims. If they cannot choose not to be Muslim, then they have not chosen to be Muslim.
There is no Islam without Sharia, and since there cannot be Muslims with Sharia, then neither Islam nor Muslims exist.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
04/06/2006 8:43 Comments ||
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#3
OSC says, "There is no faith under compulsion."
To put it simply, that's not the way Islam looks at it. Allah really doesn't care what you believe as long as you pray, go on the haj, kill infidels, etc.
#4
Sounds like the same things I was saying a while back on my final turn from dislking Islam to my view now that it must either be reformed or eradicated.
Its all about faith and force, beleif and compulsion.
Glad somone in the "public eye" is saying these things.
#7
I think these words are well worth the time and careful consideration.
Card represents my views on faith and force quite well, and the need for an Islamic reformation from within.
The reformation needed is one like the Catholic Church and the Protestant reformation - it ended up saving both the Catholic Church and freeing up protestant Christianity. Islam need to find their Martin Luther and (Pope) St. Pius V. I personally do not hold out much hope that they will.
If you read between the lines, I think you can draw my view that either Islam undergoes a reformation from within, or else we will be forced to destroy Islam as a fascist cancer on the world.
Here are just a select few of the "Money quote" parts...
"Any religion that believes itself entitled to kill anyone who deviates from or stands in the way of their holy law poses a danger to everyone else, until they give up that belief and renounce that entitlement.
...
The truly faithful of any religion will insist on the right of people to lose faith and leave the religion. Any other position is, in fact, a confession of one's own lack of faith.
...
A religion that refuses to compete on a level playing field with other ideologies is a religion that confesses its own inferiority.
...
it is also certain, if history is any teacher, that a failure to resist Islamic terrorist-fundamentalism will have an even more terrible outcome. For, bad as war is, and frightful as a holy war would be, they would pale in comparison with the living hell of being subject to universal Sharia as interpreted by the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
...
But tolerance of other religions does not mean we have to tolerate any religion that claims the right to kill unbelievers. To paraphrase Lincoln, freedom of religion is not a suicide pact. "
You really need to read the whole thing - it is worth making the time to see this and think about it.
#8
Even if Card makes a brilliant point, its not as if the followers of Islam are going to care much. A religion is what the practicioners do, not what the Holy Books say.
The idea of militant Islam is to remove any and all distractions from a pure life because they seem to believe (with some evidence) that the Jihad happy guys can't avoid the stripclub when given a chance. By that same logic removing all other religious options is the only sensible thing to do.
#9
the need for an Islamic reformation from within.
Islam has zero motivation to reform. By its own doctrine, it is far more glorious to die resisting the least alteration of doctrine than to submit to another's vision of their faith. The death cult nature of Islam is precisely what will carry it, lemming like, over the precipice of self-immolation.
When a Muslim accuses another of irreligious conduct, one of them must be guilty of apostasy. So it is that no one (or an extreme few) has any motivated to cause genuine reassessment within Islam. They will see it as better to all join each other as one in hell paradise than tolerate the least erosion of doctrine.
This has already been shown in how very few of the moderate Muslims ever raise a significant voice against their radical imams. Yes, they may parade in public denouncing terrorism, but that amounts to taquiya little if the founts of radicalism remain in full flow. In a through-the-looking-glass version of this, the cartoon jihad's violent outrage completely ignored how the exact same malign portrayal of other cultures and faiths is standard practice within Islam's four walls.
Finally, such demands for preferential treatment give us full view of the lopsided world Islam reserves for itself. It demands full recognition of its tenets, right down to family law courts in non-Islamic countries abiding by sharia law, yet persists in forbidding any other religions to practice in nations where Muslims are in the majority.
This theological one-way street is just that. Not a route to ascension, but an irreversible path to self destruction. It is now a question of whether Western nations will idly sit by and watch their quality of life and overall security crumble at the hands of Islam, or begin to make Islam's dreams of glorious martyrdom come true.
Unless Islam, somehow, finds a path towards reformation, all that awaits them is death. Most likely it will not be their much sought after glorious martyrdom but, instead, perishing en masse upon a nuclear pyre.
#12
OSC is correct in his assessment of what makes a faith vital. I agree with him 100% in that respect.
All the critical commenters are not criticizing Card on what makes a good religion and what constitutes religious freedom: rather, it seems to me that they are evaluating the possiblity of Islam to have it's "reformation" given the dynamics within the religion itself. I feel the problems people talk about are relevant, but not causitory: they are the inevitable results of some core decisions made within the religion that give it its character, and which, in turn, influence people by means of what acts are approved and disapproved.
The core decision I think Islam made was to set up Mohammed as the Ideal Muslum Incarnate, the template all Muslims must fit, as a counter to the Christian core decision to set up Jesus as the Ideal Christian, the template all Christians must fit. (Judaism did not even entertain the decision.)
Now I submit that the Jesus, as depicted in the Gospels, is a pretty nice all-around good guy: he tells stories, he goes to parties whose raucousness makes the Pharisees suggest he's fond of the bottle, can't stand pretentious pricks, and pulls scandalous people out of trouble: If you had the option of choosing him as a neighbor, he'd be on your short list.
More importantly, when one of his pals, in an obvious sign of loyalty, cut a guy's ear off to defend him, Jesus REBUKED him. Forget about patching the ear back miraculously, and realize that the guy was adverse to violence being done on his behalf. The Gospel of Thomas was rejected from the canon partly because his depiction of the Child Jesus is totally unrecognizable: I read it, and I kept thinking, "This is SO wrong." because I was reading about a brat using miracles to zap people who bullied him. Heck, I have a hard time convincing people that Jesus Might, as a child, have punched out some bully's lights for picking on the new kid in the block, but killing the bully for insulting himself. Just. Not. Right. Even if you want to believe everything was forged, the forgery was consistently spun to portray a pacifistic Jesus.
Now, I won't detail what we all know about Mohammed, but just ask yourself this: would you want HIM as your neighbor? Did he PERSONALLY discourage ALL violence done on his behalf?
#13
phil_b got it in one. Doesn't matter if treating your women like livestock is a bad thing. What matters is that it results in a boatload of chilluns.
#14
Besides the fact that nobody could conceive of Mohammed being a nice guy ... nobody can conceive of Islam ever letting a book like LAMB be made about Mohammed.
It would be worse than the explosion about to hit SouthPark.
#15
Not all Muslims demand death for "apostasy." I try to keep abreast of activities of Baptist missionaries in sub-Saharan Africa, some of whom work in Muslim areas. They do not find many converts among Muslim tribes, but they do find some, and the converts survive. Ostracism may feel worse than death, but you live.
The problem is that the speakers for Islam and the suppliers of Imams to the world are the Saudis and Egyptian Qutb-ites and their ilk. And they, as Card says, are too hate-filled and afraid to dream of risking freedom of religion.
If there is going to be any reformation in Islam, where will it start? It can't start in Egypt or Saudi-controlled Arabia anytime soon; they're already swamps where it'd take a lot of courage to stray from the party line. Pakistan and Afghanistan seem to be trying to be more "Muslim" than the Arabs. Turkey seems to be falling into the Muslim Brotherhood camp too. And I'm not aware of any major Muslim theological schools in sub-Saharan Africa any more; certainly nothing as respected as Al-Azhar in Cairo. And scholars from within the "Great Satan" have a hard row to hoe to get respect around the world. They'll be asked why they don't change their own country first: Not a pleasant prospect for the rest of us.
If there is a reformation, it is only going to succeed to the extent that it can convince other Muslims that the new way is holier than the Wahhabi way. And that's a big problem. As long as the debate has to do with how many rules you can keep, the only way to beat the Wahhabis is to be more anal and aggressive than they are.
Even if the reformation is Sufi-type, with a focus on the inner life, there will have to be enough outward expression of this inner life in holiness (as understood by Muslims) to make an impression. We might be able to live with this "holiness as understood by Muslims," but that's not certain either.
I leave out the Shiites because I don't see them transforming the Sunnis; the accumulated differences seem too great.
Posted by: James ||
04/06/2006 17:01 Comments ||
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"We kill the young, along with their mothers and fathers, in acts of terrorism every week. We use 'deadly force' in an ideological battle, just as insurgents and terrorists organizations do. Does it matter to the dead and injured that we claim to do so as 'liberators'?"
Texans for Peace, describing the U.S. military in Iraq
There are, it seems, some things that self-described advocates of peace are willing to fight about. Expose an uncomfortable truth about their beliefs, and the peace brigades are more than happy to go on the warpath.
That's what happened after I wrote a recent column criticizing the organization Christian Peacemaker Teams for its lack of gratitude to coalition forces who rescued three of its members from a terrorist safe house near Baghdad.
As I noted, the original CPT statement was filled with denunciations of British and American forces in Iraq, but contained not a single word of thanks to the individuals who risked their lives to save those of the Christian Peacemakers.
Christian Peacemakers Teams issued an addendum acknowledging, "We have been so overwhelmed and overjoyed ... that we have not adequately thanked the people involved with freeing them." Give the group credit for at least admitting its error.
Texans for Peace, on the other hand, is still clinging to the fantasy that the CPT hostages were "released" presumably by the same kind folks who murdered American hostage Tom Fox rather than freed by American, British and Iraqi troops.
"3 Peacemakers friends released" is the headline Texans for Peace maintains on its Web site. Rather than correct a single word, the peace group went on the attack against me for drawing attention to its misleading headline, labeling me an anti-Muslim bigot and suggesting I should not write about events in Iraq or Sudan.
Why would Texans for Peace be so belligerent about using language that reflects favorably on the hostage-takers while discrediting the role of military rescuers?
It might be because Texans for Peace doesn't want anyone to believe the military is capable of doing anything positive. On the contrary, the American military, indeed all Americans, are guilty of being baby killers. "American soldiers, directed by Commander-in-Chief Bush are killing babies," the group says, "and as citizens of the U.S. we share the blame."
About the "release" of the three CPT hostages, Texans for Peace explains elsewhere: "Details of how they were found, who their captors actually were (none was found at the site), and why they were taken in the first place, and who actually murdered Tom Fox still need to be investigated."
Texans for Peace founder Charles Jackson elaborated the point on the All Things Conservative blog in a discussion about the subsequent release this time the word is accurate of reporter Jill Carroll:
"There are many undercover operations going on in Iraq, by groups from a variety of foreign nations, including the U.S. Since she, and the CPT hostages, were taken by a 'previously unknown group' and no hostage takers were found in either instance, a great deal is still unknown as to the identity and motives of the kidnappers and who, if what, was behind it."
Follow the line of reasoning here. There's no moral difference between terrorists who behead captives and set off bombs to deliberately and ruthlessly murder civilians and American soldiers, Marines and airmen fighting those terrorists who inadvertently and tragically kill civilians.
And don't be so certain those previously unknown "terrorists" are who they say they are. The United States wink, wink has undercover operations going on Iraq.
As I have written for more than three years, there are principled reasons to oppose the use of military force in Iraq. And I admire the dedication of people who are willing to risk their own lives and spend their own money to advance those principles in a war zone.
What's not admirable is an ideological agenda that turns hostage takers into hostage releasers, murderers into martyrs and men and women fighting to save lives into baby killers.
#1
BABY KILLERS?????? Hey Charley J. Crawl back under your rock you peice of SHIT has been.
Texans for peace> Why would Texans for Peace be so belligerent about using language that reflects favorably on the hostage-takers while discrediting the role of military rescuers?
I don't even want to answer this.WHAT A BUNCH OF LOOOOOOOSERS
#2
And I admire the dedication of people who are willing to risk their own lives and spend Saudi, Iranian and other Gulf their own money to advance those principles in a war zone.
#3
Recently the local puppy trainer printed a eulogy of sorts from a personal friend and colleague of Christian Peace Maker activist, Tom Fox. Some may view her lack of denunciations for the barbarians that maliciously slaughtered her friend for headlines as an admirable display of Turn the other Cheek. After all, it appeared that this tribute was a celebration of a heroic friend. And no one should really be surprised, given the stated agenda of CPM; there were no accolades for those responsible for the rescue of the rest of their colleagues. However, the author couldnt resist reserving the last two paragraphs to blame the misguided troops and their psychotic leaders. The pathetic disconnect that these groups display is truly shameless.
#4
IF, the US went so far as to create death squads that would capture NGO idiots and journalists it's unlikely they'd shy away from beheading said captives to make the Jihadists look bad. Win/Win and no risk of the double-dealing getting out.
A lot of conspiracy folks need to look at that next logical step in their arguement from time to time.
A good history lesson on the world view via Islam
Islam's Imperial Dreams
BY EFRAIM KARSH
Tuesday, April 4, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT
When satirical depictions of the prophet Muhammad in a Danish newspaper sparked a worldwide wave of Muslim violence early this year, observers naturally focused on the wanton destruction of Western embassies, businesses, and other institutions. Less attention was paid to the words that often accompanied the riots--words with ominous historical echoes. "Hurry up and apologize to our nation, because if you do not, you will regret it," declared Khaled Mash'al, the leader of Hamas, fresh from the Islamist group's sweeping victory in the Palestinian elections:
This is because our nation is progressing and is victorious. . . . By Allah, you will be defeated. . . . Tomorrow, our nation will sit on the throne of the world. This is not a figment of the imagination but a fact. Tomorrow we will lead the world, Allah willing. Apologize today, before remorse will do you no good.
Among Islamic radicals, such gloating about the prowess and imminent triumph of their "nation" is as commonplace as recitals of the long and bitter catalog of grievances related to the loss of historical Muslim dominion. Osama bin Laden has repeatedly alluded to the collapse of Ottoman power at the end of World War I and, with it, the abolition of the Ottoman caliphate. "What America is tasting now," he declared in the immediate wake of 9/11, "is only a copy of what we have tasted. Our Islamic nation has been tasting the same for more than 80 years, of humiliation and disgrace, its sons killed and their blood spilled, its sanctities desecrated." Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's top deputy, has pointed still farther into the past, lamenting "the tragedy of al-Andalus"--that is, the end of Islamic rule in Spain in 1492.
These historical claims are in turn frequently dismissed by Westerners as delusional, a species of mere self-aggrandizement or propaganda. But the Islamists are perfectly serious, and know what they are doing. Their rhetoric has a millennial warrant, both in doctrine and in fact, and taps into a deep undercurrent that has characterized the political culture of Islam from the beginning. Though tempered and qualified in different places and at different times, the Islamic longing for unfettered suzerainty has never disappeared, and has resurfaced in our own day with a vengeance. It goes by the name of empire.
"I was ordered to fight all men until they say, 'There is no god but Allah.' " With these farewell words, the prophet Muhammad summed up the international vision of the faith he brought to the world. As a universal religion, Islam envisages a global political order in which all humankind will live under Muslim rule as either believers or subject communities. In order to achieve this goal, it is incumbent on all free, male, adult Muslims to carry out an uncompromising "struggle in the path of Allah," or jihad. As the 14th-century historian and philosopher Abdel Rahman ibn Khaldun wrote, "In the Muslim community, the jihad is a religious duty because of the universalism of the Islamic mission and the obligation [to convert] everybody to Islam either by persuasion or by force."
As a historical matter, the birth of Islam was inextricably linked with empire. Unlike Christianity and the Christian kingdoms that once existed under or alongside it, Islam has never distinguished between temporal and religious powers, which were combined in the person of Muhammad. Having fled from his hometown of Mecca to Medina in 622 c.e. to become a political and military leader rather than a private preacher, Muhammad spent the last ten years of his life fighting to unify Arabia under his rule. Indeed, he devised the concept of jihad shortly after his migration to Medina as a means of enticing his local followers to raid Meccan caravans. Had it not been for his sudden death, he probably would have expanded his reign well beyond the peninsula.
The Qur'anic revelations during Muhammad's Medina years abound with verses extolling the virtues of jihad, as do the countless sayings and traditions (hadith) attributed to the prophet. Those who participate in this holy pursuit are to be generously rewarded, both in this life and in the afterworld, where they will reside in shaded and ever-green gardens, indulged by pure women. Accordingly, those killed while waging jihad should not be mourned: "Allah has bought from the believers their soul and their possessions against the gift of Paradise; they fight in the path of Allah; they kill and are killed. . . . So rejoice in the bargain you have made with Him; that is the mighty triumph."
But the doctrine's appeal was not just otherworldly. By forbidding fighting and raiding within the community of believers (the umma), Muhammad had deprived the Arabian tribes of a traditional source of livelihood. For a time, the prophet could rely on booty from non-Muslims as a substitute for the lost war spoils, which is why he never went out of his way to convert all of the tribes seeking a place in his Pax Islamica. Yet given his belief in the supremacy of Islam and his relentless commitment to its widest possible dissemination, he could hardly deny conversion to those wishing to undertake it. Once the whole of Arabia had become Muslim, a new source of wealth and an alternative outlet would have to be found for the aggressive energies of the Arabian tribes, and it was, in the Fertile Crescent and the Levant.
Within twelve years of Muhammad's death, a Middle Eastern empire, stretching from Iran to Egypt and from Yemen to northern Syria, had come into being under the banner of Islam. By the early 8th century, the Muslims had hugely extended their grip to Central Asia and much of the Indian subcontinent, had laid siege to the Byzantine capital of Constantinople, and had overrun North Africa and Spain. Had they not been contained in 732 at the famous battle of Poitiers in west central France, they might well have swept deep into northern Europe.
Though sectarianism and civil war divided the Muslim world in the generations after Muhammad, the basic dynamic of Islam remained expansionist. The short-lived Umayyad dynasty (661-750) gave way to the ostensibly more pious Abbasid caliphs, whose readiness to accept non-Arabs solidified Islam's hold on its far-flung possessions. From their imperial capital of Baghdad, the Abbasids ruled, with waning authority, until the Mongol invasion of 1258. The most powerful of their successors would emerge in Anatolia, among the Ottoman Turks who invaded Europe in the mid-14th century and would conquer Constantinople in 1453, destroying the Byzantine empire and laying claim to virtually all of the Balkan peninsula and the eastern Mediterranean.
Like their Arab predecessors, the Ottomans were energetic empire-builders in the name of jihad. By the early 16th century, they had conquered Syria and Egypt from the Mamluks, the formidable slave soldiers who had contained the Mongols and destroyed the Crusader kingdoms. Under Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, they soon turned northward. By the middle of the 17th century they seemed poised to overrun Christian Europe, only to be turned back in fierce fighting at the gates of Vienna in 1683--on September 11, of all dates. Though already on the defensive by the early 18th century, the Ottoman empire--the proverbial "sick man of Europe"--would endure another 200 years. Its demise at the hands of the victorious European powers of World War I, to say nothing of the work of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the father of modern Turkish nationalism, finally brought an end both to the Ottoman caliphate itself and to Islam's centuries-long imperial reach.
To Islamic historians, the chronicles of Muslim empire represent a model of shining religious zeal and selfless exertion in the cause of Allah. Many Western historians, for their part, have been inclined to marvel at the perceived sophistication and tolerance of Islamic rule, praising the caliphs' cultivation of the arts and sciences and their apparent willingness to accommodate ethnic and religious minorities. There is some truth in both views, but neither captures the deeper and often more callous impulses at work in the expanding umma set in motion by Muhammad. For successive generations of Islamic rulers, imperial dominion was dictated not by universalistic religious principles but by their prophet's vision of conquest and his summons to fight and subjugate unbelievers.
That the worldly aims of Islam might conflict with its moral and spiritual demands was evident from the start of the caliphate. Though the Umayyad monarchs portrayed their constant wars of expansion as "jihad in the path of Allah," this was largely a façade, concealing an increasingly secular and absolutist rule. Lax in their attitude toward Islamic practices and mores, they were said to have set aside special days for drinking alcohol--specifically forbidden by the prophet--and showed little inhibition about appearing nude before their boon companions and female singers.
The coup staged by the Abbasids in 747-49 was intended to restore Islam's true ways and undo the godless practices of their predecessors; but they too, like the Umayyads, were first and foremost imperial monarchs. For the Abbasids, Islam was a means to consolidating their jurisdiction and enjoying the fruits of conquest. They complied with the stipulations of the nascent religious law (shari'a) only to the extent that it served their needs, and indulged in the same vices--wine, singing girls, and sexual license--that had ruined the reputation of the Umayyads.
Of particular importance to the Abbasids was material splendor. On the occasion of his nephew's coronation as the first Abbasid caliph, Dawud ibn Ali had proclaimed, "We did not rebel in order to grow rich in silver and in gold." Yet it was precisely the ever-increasing pomp of the royal court that would underpin Abbasid prestige. The gem-studded dishes of the caliph's table, the gilded curtains of the palace, the golden tree and ruby-eyed golden elephant that adorned the royal courtyard were a few of the opulent possessions that bore witness to this extravagance.
The riches of the empire, moreover, were concentrated in the hands of the few at the expense of the many. While the caliph might bestow thousands of dirhams on a favorite poet for reciting a few lines, ordinary laborers in Baghdad carried home a dirham or two a month. As for the empire's more distant subjects, the caliphs showed little interest in their conversion to the faith, preferring instead to colonize their lands and expropriate their wealth and labor. Not until the third Islamic century did the bulk of these populations embrace the religion of their imperial masters, and this was a process emanating from below--an effort by non-Arabs to escape paying tribute and to remove social barriers to their advancement. To make matters worse, the metropolis plundered the resources of the provinces, a practice inaugurated at the time of Muhammad and reaching its apogee under the Abbasids. Combined with the government's weakening control of the periphery, this shameless exploitation triggered numerous rebellions throughout the empire.
Tension between the center and the periphery was, indeed, to become the hallmark of Islam's imperial experience. Even in its early days, under the Umayyads, the empire was hopelessly overextended, largely because of inadequate means of communication and control. Under the Abbasids, a growing number of provinces fell under the sway of local dynasties. With no effective metropolis, the empire was reduced to an agglomeration of entities united only by the overarching factors of language and religion. Though the Ottomans temporarily reversed the trend, their own imperial ambitions were likewise eventually thwarted by internal fragmentation.
In the long history of Islamic empire, the wide gap between delusions of grandeur and the centrifugal forces of localism would be bridged time and again by force of arms, making violence a key element of Islamic political culture. No sooner had Muhammad died than his successor, Abu Bakr, had to suppress a widespread revolt among the Arabian tribes. Twenty-three years later, the head of the umma, the caliph Uthman ibn Affan, was murdered by disgruntled rebels; his successor, Ali ibn Abi Talib, was confronted for most of his reign with armed insurrections, most notably by the governor of Syria, Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufian, who went on to establish the Umayyad dynasty after Ali's assassination. Mu'awiya's successors managed to hang on to power mainly by relying on physical force, and were consumed for most of their reign with preventing or quelling revolts in the diverse corners of their empire. The same was true for the Abbasids during the long centuries of their sovereignty.
Western academics often hold up the Ottoman empire as an exception to this earlier pattern. In fact the caliphate did deal relatively gently with its vast non-Muslim subject populations--provided that they acquiesced in their legal and institutional inferiority in the Islamic order of things. When these groups dared to question their subordinate status, however, let alone attempt to break free from the Ottoman yoke, they were viciously put down. In the century or so between Napoleon's conquests in the Middle East and World War I, the Ottomans embarked on an orgy of bloodletting in response to the nationalist aspirations of their European subjects. The Greek war of independence of the 1820's, the Danubian uprisings of 1848 and the attendant Crimean war, the Balkan explosion of the 1870's, the Greco-Ottoman war of 1897--all were painful reminders of the costs of resisting Islamic imperial rule.
Nor was such violence confined to Ottoman Europe. Turkey's Afro-Asiatic provinces, though far less infected with the nationalist virus, were also scenes of mayhem and destruction. The Ottoman army or its surrogates brought force to bear against Wahhabi uprisings in Mesopotamia and the Levant in the early 19th century, against civil strife in Lebanon in the 1840's (culminating in the 1860 massacres in Mount Lebanon and Damascus), and against a string of Kurdish rebellions. In response to the national awakening of the Armenians in the 1890's, Constantinople killed tens of thousands--a taste of the horrors that lay ahead for the Armenians during World War I.
The legacy of this imperial experience is not difficult to discern in today's Islamic world. Physical force has remained the main if not the sole instrument of political discourse in the Middle East. Throughout the region, absolute leaders still supersede political institutions, and citizenship is largely synonymous with submission; power is often concentrated in the hands of small, oppressive minorities; religious, ethnic, and tribal conflicts abound; and the overriding preoccupation of sovereigns is with their own survival.
At the domestic level, these circumstances have resulted in the world's most illiberal polities. Political dissent is dealt with by repression, and ethnic and religious differences are settled by internecine strife and murder. One need only mention, among many instances, Syria's massacre of 20,000 of its Muslim activists in the early 1980's, or the brutal treatment of Iraq's Shiite and Kurdish communities until the 2003 war, or the genocidal campaign now being conducted in Darfur by the government of Sudan and its allied militias. As for foreign policy in the Middle East, it too has been pursued by means of crude force, ranging from terrorism and subversion to outright aggression, with examples too numerous and familiar to cite.
Reinforcing these habits is the fact that, to this day, Islam has retained its imperial ambitions. The last great Muslim empire may have been destroyed and the caliphate left vacant, but the dream of regional and world domination has remained very much alive. Even the ostensibly secular doctrine of pan-Arabism has been effectively Islamic in its ethos, worldview, and imperialist vision. In the words of Nuri Said, longtime prime minister of Iraq and a prominent early champion of this doctrine: "Although Arabs are naturally attached to their native land, their nationalism is not confined by boundaries. It is an aspiration to restore the great tolerant civilization of the early caliphate."
That this "great tolerant civilization" reached well beyond today's Middle East is not lost on those who hope for its restoration. Like the leaders of al Qaeda, many Muslims and Arabs unabashedly pine for the reconquest of Spain and consider their 1492 expulsion from the country a grave historical injustice waiting to be undone. Indeed, as immigration and higher rates of childbirth have greatly increased the number of Muslims within Europe itself over the past several decades, countries that were never ruled by the caliphate have become targets of Muslim imperial ambition. Since the late 1980's, Islamists have looked upon the growing population of French Muslims as proof that France, too, has become a part of the House of Islam. In Britain, even the more moderate elements of the Muslim community are candid in setting out their aims. As the late Zaki Badawi, a doyen of interfaith dialogue in the UK, put it, "Islam is a universal religion. It aims to bring its message to all corners of the earth. It hopes that one day the whole of humanity will be one Muslim community."
Whether in its militant or its more benign version, this world-conquering agenda continues to meet with condescension and denial on the part of many educated Westerners. To intellectuals, foreign-policy experts, and politicians alike, "empire" and "imperialism" are categories that apply exclusively to the European powers and, more recently, to the United States. In this view of things, Muslims, whether in the Middle East or elsewhere, are merely objects--the long-suffering victims of the aggressive encroachments of others. Lacking an internal, autonomous dynamic of its own, their history is rather a function of their unhappy interaction with the West, whose obligation it is to make amends. This perspective dominated the widespread explanation of the 9/11 attacks as only a response to America's (allegedly) arrogant and self-serving foreign policy, particularly with respect to the Arab-Israeli conflict.
As we have seen, however, Islamic history has been anything but reactive. From Muhammad to the Ottomans, the story of Islam has been the story of the rise and fall of an often astonishing imperial aggressiveness and, no less important, of never quiescent imperial dreams. Even as these dreams have repeatedly frustrated any possibility for the peaceful social and political development of the Arab-Muslim world, they have given rise to no less repeated fantasies of revenge and restoration and to murderous efforts to transform fantasy into fact. If, today, America is reviled in the Muslim world, it is not because of its specific policies but because, as the preeminent world power, it blocks the final realization of this same age-old dream of regaining, in Zawahiri's words, the "lost glory" of the caliphate.
Nor is the vision confined to a tiny extremist fringe. This we saw in the overwhelming support for the 9/11 attacks throughout the Arab and Islamic worlds, in the admiring evocations of bin Laden's murderous acts during the crisis over the Danish cartoons, and in such recent findings as the poll indicating significant reservoirs of sympathy among Muslims in Britain for the "feelings and motives" of the suicide bombers who attacked London last July. In the historical imagination of many Muslims and Arabs, bin Laden represents nothing short of the new incarnation of Saladin, defeater of the Crusaders and conqueror of Jerusalem. In this sense, the House of Islam's war for world mastery is a traditional, indeed venerable, quest that is far from over.
To the contrary, now that this war has itself met with a so far determined counterattack by the United States and others, and with a Western intervention in the heart of the House of Islam, it has escalated to a new stage of virulence. In many Middle Eastern countries, Islamist movements, and movements appealing to traditionalist Muslims, are now jockeying fiercely for positions of power, both against the Americans and against secular parties. For the Islamists, the stakes are very high indeed, for if the political elites of the Middle East and elsewhere were ever to reconcile themselves to the reality that there is no Arab or Islamic "nation," but only modern Muslim states with destinies and domestic responsibilities of their own, the imperialist dream would die.
It is in recognition of this state of affairs that Zawahiri wrote his now famous letter to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the head of al Qaeda in Iraq, in July 2005. If, Zawahiri instructed his lieutenant, al Qaeda's strategy for Iraq and elsewhere were to succeed, it would have to take into account the growing thirst among many Arabs for democracy and a normal life, and strive not to alienate popular opinion through such polarizing deeds as suicide attacks on fellow Muslims. Only by harnessing popular support, Zawahiri concluded, would it be possible to come to power by means of democracy itself, thereby to establish jihadist rule in Iraq, and then to move onward to conquer still larger and more distant realms and impose the writ of Islam far and wide.
Something of the same logic clearly underlies the carefully plotted rise of Hamas in the Palestinian Authority, the (temporarily thwarted) attempt by the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt to exploit the demand for free elections there, and the accession of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran. Indeed, as reported by Mark MacKinnon in the Toronto Globe & Mail, some analysts now see a new "axis of Islam" arising in the Middle East, uniting Hizballah, Hamas, Iran, Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood, elements of Iraq's Shiites, and others in an anti-American, anti-Israel alliance backed by Russia.
Whether or not any such structure exists or can be forged, the fact is that the fuel of Islamic imperialism remains as volatile as ever, and is very far from having burned itself out. To deny its force is the height of folly, and to imagine that it can be appeased or deflected is to play into its hands. Only when it is defeated, and when the faith of Islam is no longer a tool of Islamic political ambition, will the inhabitants of Muslim lands, and the rest of the world, be able to look forward to a future less burdened by Saladins and their gory dreams.
Mr. Karsh is head of Mediterranean Studies at King's College, University of London, and his new book, "Islamic Imperialism: A History," on which this article is based, is about to be published by Yale. This article originally appeared in the April issue of Commentary.
I know youre still monitoring my Web site. At least you kept monitoring me long after the two of us stopped talking if "talking" is the right word. One of my colleagues said you told him Im blacklisted because of what I wrote about you in the LA Weekly. You wont give me quotes anymore. You wont give him quotes anymore either because hes tainted by his association with me.
What do you people expect? Its one thing when you trot out your impotent Death to America slogans. Its another thing altogether when you threaten and bully us personally. Im not a wire agency reporter. When you talk to me youre on the record. When you say We know who you are, we read everything you write, and we know where you live, youre on the record. Of course Im going to quote you. If you dont want to look like an asshole in print, dont act like an asshole in life.
Some journalists may cave under that kind of pressure. I almost did myself until my Lebanese friends who know you much better than I ever will reminded me that you guys like to puff up your chests to make yourselves look bigger and scarier than you actually are.
It kills me how the job title printed on the business card you gave me says Media Relations. Whoever says Hezbollah has no sense of humor doesnt know you like I do. Youre a real card, Hussein. A regular bucket o laughs.
Ill admit it feels a bit slimy knowing that Im under Internet surveillance by a group listed by the United States government as a terrorist organization. Its nothing, though, compared to the palpable paranoia on the streets of Hezbollah-occupied Lebanon. You guys really need to calm down. Breathe. Take up yoga or Pilates or something. The CIA, the Mossad, and the Lebanese army pretty much know what youre up to all the time as it is. Learn to accept the things you cannot change. Dont stir up too much trouble at any one time and you should be fine, anyway.
Let me give you some personal advice, Hussein. Maybe we can be on the same page for a change. Get out of the suburbs and go hang out in Beirut once in a while. Dont tell people who you work for. Just strike up conversations in restaurants, coffeeshops, and bars. Lebanese are friendly, so thats easy. Ask Sunni, Christians, and Druze what they think of Hezbollah. Listen to what they have to say. Remember that you have to live with these people. I suppose you could turn your guns on them. We all know you can beat the Lebanese military in a one-on-one fight. Who knows, though? There's always a chance the Israeli Defense Forces might intervene against you on Lebanons behalf. How much would that suck?
Youre not doing so well in the PR department these days. And you cant entirely blame people like me who work for the Zionist media. The fact that you take orders from a hostile foreign dictatorship, the very same regime that assassinates Lebanons elected officials and journalists, makes you look, well, a bit on the treasonous side.
Anyhoo, I dont live in Lebanon anymore. I'm back at my house in the United States now. You wont see my face, my camera, or my notepad down in Haret Hreik any time soon. Its time to remove me from your daily routine. There are other journalists who need to be hassled.
Youre a one-man bad press generator, Hussein. If I were your boss, I would fire you.
#2
A better version would have had a guilt ridden time travel explaining how Islam was eradicated and we all felt bad.
"It started with the Iranian nuke strike on Tel Aviv that was followed by retalitory strikes on Damascus, Tehran, Rihad, Qom and Cairo.
The Israeli atack on Mecca failed due to the pilots unwillingness to deploy the bombs. Unfortunately for the Muslim world a terrorist/biologist who had created a particularly nasty strain of Small Pox to attack Israel had accidentally infected himself and visited Mecca for that years Haj and the nuclear fire might have prevented hundreds of thousands of Muslims from returning to their nations and decimated the bulk of the Islamic world.
The West was overloaded taming the Small Pox infection and found it easier to seal the Islamic world off and handle their own problems rather than help the dying masses of the Muslim world. Those of us in the west felt bad about that. Really bad. but what can you do? Islam died in less than two years of the Iranian attack. Well dead is a strong word, but there are more scientologists these days than Muslims so it's about as good as dead."
Posted by: Time Travelor ||
04/06/2006 1:15 Comments ||
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#7
hhhmmm not sure about the three word messege being 'Message from Dan'. He says the messege will be something everyone undrstands and knows what it is. I think its the name of a person who carries out a evil act or the name of 3 places that get detroyed by atomic weapons. Was an amazing read though ty for linking it. heres another guess on the three words 'religion of peace' but even that dosn't really fit. God lets just fckin bombard him with emails saying we demand to know the three words lol.
#11
'I love malteasers' ,no sorry lol that cant be it, another thought though are thier any cities in America or allied Europe that have a three word name? I cant think of any but im no wise head. Now a three worded diesease? again i cant think of one but there must be a few nasty ones that could fit. Sheesh you know this is actually buggin me alot lol.
Nope, already explicitly told in the text, Enjoy these last days and months and years of your slumber, Grandfather, said the scarred old man. Your wake-up call is coming soon.
#15
Nah, the point of the story is that 'Message from Dan' is something everyone in the future knows about, because they read the warning (widely disseminanted by email) and ignored or discounted it and it came true and everyone regrets they didn't do something about it.
#17
so this is the warning yeah - but only a miniscule fraction of people in the west will even read this story as great as it is - pretty pointless if you ask me cos 99.999% of people wouldnt know what the hell 'messege from dan, means. I must say though i have a feeling if someone said to me in a few years time 'messege from dan' i'd remember this story though which is kind of odd i guess but cool. Oh well i'm gonna stop overloading my tiny mind with this stuff now lol.
#30
'kill the orcs' lol, Statford upon Avon - ive been there and thats where my asthma started on holiday at some foul campsite there lol. Never go to Stratford upon Avon unless you want to get ill lol. No its a lovely place though seriously but jihadis attacking it? stranger things have happend i guess.
#36
Somehow I think Dan doesn't know the three words but the intent was to get folks debating exactly that. As he has done. Masterful in that, sort of like the end of Basic Instinct that Esterhoez intentionally left vague to get folks talking the next day and seeing it again. He had to fight producers to keep it vague.
Part of me thinks its brilliant and part of me recoils at the manipulation of an audience.
I like "Exterminate the Brutes" best of all so far. Either that or "Nuke Mecca now!"
Some have suggested that the words were something like "Goodbye, Mr. President". Which would be a good ending if he were not using the conceit that he was the one who received the Time Traveler. As it is, that idea is just a little smarmy.
I cannot see how "Message from Dan" could be the three words. The words would have to be either a farewell or an an injunction, and these are neither. If you're saying that he himself was the Time Traveler -- well, that's what I thought, too, but it seems more likely that the TT is his grandson, as anonymous5089 (#14) has pointed out.
On his website's forum several people have pointed out that this was posted on April 1, and therefore this could be an April Fool's joke. "Great satire!" they say. But satire requires exaggeration.
#42
If the people owned all means of production, then these imperial assaults would be a thing of the past.
Of course Chomsky Tooth Fairy. It all worked so well the last time. I'll go out and give all my mutual funds to the vanguard of the proletariat as soon as I finish typing. Do you have a PO Box I could send them to?
My last nomination for the three words: Love ya gramps!
#44
I see. It was just Stalin. The fact that he stole all of his ideas about collectivization from Trotsky has nothing to do with all of the killing, I'm sure. I'm also certain that you'll agree with me that the GULAG being so similar to Trotsky's Labor Armies was just a coincidence too.
How am I sloganeering? By giving the means of production over to the workers you are disappropriating my wealth, aren't you? How do you propose to do that without violence? Because I'm sure as hell not going to give away my share of the means of production without a fight.
#46
My half-arsed guess is it is another date, like "June twenty-fifth" or something like that, when something as horrible or maybe worse than 9/11 will happen in the future.
Either that or maybe the first words of the Constitution, "We the People", since there is the underlying theme of civil liberties, having the right to vote restricted, etc.
But ultimate nightmare scenario...."President John Kerry".....
#47
I was looking up the ghost of christmas future to see if he left with three words. Couldn't find it, but I did find another future scenario from the SF Chronicle. link
Yes, yes .. we are being deeply oppressed by the heavy hand of the administration. Some no doubt secretly long for the peace and justice offered by the sharp beheading sword and heavy stones of sharia instead, but though that beckons it hasn't quite reached our shores .....
Some believe the infiltration of militant Islamic ideology in Lebanon comes not only from outside sources, but from social conditions of the area as well.
By Murad Al-Shishani for The Jamestown Foundation (6/4/06)
In July 2005, French scholar Olivier Roy argued that Iraq and Palestine are not factors in the prevalence of the Salafi-Jihadist movement. He based his argument on the fact that there are no Iraqi or Palestinian members in the Salafi-Jihadist organizations. Now, however, this argument must be reconsidered. Afghan authorities have expressed their concern over the "hordes of Iraqi suicide bombers" following the arrest of Noman Eddin Majid, aged 35 years, from Diyala governorate as he was trying to sneak into Afghanistan (al-Hayat, 3 February). In addition, the perpetrators of the Amman bombing on 9 November 2005, and most of those in the recent disbanded terrorist cell in Amman as well, were Iraqis (Terrorism Focus, 7 March). As for the Palestinians, the attention is becoming increasingly focused on Lebanon with its Palestinian refugee camps, particularly Ain El-Hilweh, instead of the West Bank. (Approximately 400,000 Palestinian refugees live in Lebanon.)
While the recruitment of Salafi-Jihadists in Lebanon is not restricted to Palestinians and includes some Lebanese nationals, young men from refugee camps are more fertile material for recruitment. Following the news of the arrest of Salafi-Jihadists in Lebanon and the announcement made by the movement of its responsibility for blowing up a location for the Lebanese army on February 1 (the movement delivered the threat through a phone call to the Sada al-Balad newspaper a day before, according to the paper), Lebanese authorities arrested 31 suspected jihadists. In light of this claim of responsibility and the arrests, it is important to examine the forms of recruitment that the Salafi-Jihadists use in Lebanon (al-Watan, 8 February).
It seems that the activities of the Salafi-Jihadist movement focus on the poor Lebanese and Palestinian communities. The increasing connection with the Iraq factor is due to two reasons: the unattractiveness of the secular Palestinian organizations in the refugee camps compared to the increasing attraction of the Islamist groups, and the waning control of the Future/Hariri Party over the Sunni community.
Palestinian refugee camps
Ain El-Hilweh refugee camp was the base for Palestinian President Yasser Arafat in the 1980s. The camp was a stronghold for the "Palestinian revolution" organizations, and it remains to this day under the power of Palestinians to the extent that the Lebanese army does not venture inside it (al-Hayat, 26 February). The power of the secular organizations, however, is moving to the Islamist organizations, especially since the secular organizations have been implicated in cases of corruption and have not met the demands of the Palestinians. The commander of Fatah's militias in Lebanon, Colonel Mounir Maqdah, proposed "forming a Lebanese-Palestinian military force to eradicate this fundamental group [from Ain El-Hilweh]." This clearly indicates the increase in the power of Islamist groups and the Palestinian organizations' fear of losing their control, especially when newspaper sources talk of "returnees from Iraq" who aim at declaring "Lebanon's loyalty" to the "Foundation of Jihad in Iraq" (al-Sharq al-Awsat, 4 February).
An indication of the spread of the influence of the Salafi-Jihadist movements amidst Palestinians in Lebanon, promoted by the "returnees from Iraq," is what Hazem Amin in al-Hayat calls the "al-Qaida terminology." The volunteers in Iraq are in touch with their parents in a way that connects the parents with information about jihad activities. This terminology is so widespread that Shiites are now described as "heretics" (al-Hayat, 25 January), which is a new feature in the Lebanese sectarian system. In addition, death threats were made by the al-Qaida organization in Bilad al-Sham to Shiite Lebanese figures (al-Sharq al-Awsat, 27 July 2005).
While this is the situation of Palestinians in Lebanon, the influence of the Salafi-Jihadist movement is not restricted to them. There are Sunni Lebanese nationals who have headed to Iraq to volunteer in fighting the Americans (al-Hayat, 26 January). Likewise, there was a transformation in the village of Majdal Anjar, which used to be the stronghold of "traditional Salafism," since the arrival of Abu Muhammad al-Lubnani, who later became a close companion of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi after he reached Iraq with his 16-year-old son, and where they both later died. Abu Muhammad al-Lubnani was Mustafa Ramadan. He began to spread his jihadist ideas since his return from Denmark around 2003 (al-Hayat, 26 January), and was able to form a nucleus for the jihadist movement. The influence of those ideas applies to the Sunnis in Lebanon - not just to the Palestinians.
Sunni Lebanese
Lebanon-based Addiyar newspaper indicated on 7 February, following the burning of the Danish Embassy and the riots in Beirut, that Saad Hariri is losing control over the Sunni scene by eliminating the subsidies for the poor among the Sunnis and making the al-Mustaqbal movement exclusive for the rich and powerful. As a result, Salafi-Jihadist movements (al-Qaida, Usbat al-Ansar, Jund al-Sham) and the Islamic Liberation Party are, according to Addiyar, now controlling 90 percent of the Sunni scene (Addiyar, 7 February).
Despite the reliability of the 90 per cent figure, the Salafi-Jihadist movement is attracting a host of poor Sunnis who were badly affected after the death of Rafiq Hariri. The media always spoke of the role Hariri played in restoring the balance between the Sunnis and the other sects in Lebanon. This becomes evident if we review the backgrounds of the people who volunteered in or returned from Iraq; they were mostly poor who did odd jobs like selling coffee and steamed beans in the street, or were unemployed in the first place.
Hezbollah's role
The developments related to the Salafi-Jihadist presence in Lebanon show that those influenced by the ideology will begin to move out of the Palestinian refugee camps and into southern Lebanon. This development means that Hezbollah will be threatened in its historically-controlled region. For Hezbollah, this development comes at a time when the party is under pressure to disarm and to end ties with Syria. This means that Hezbollah will not allow the Salafi-Jihadists to extend into their influenced region. While Salafi-Jihadists consider Shiites as infidels, on 23 February Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah listed, for the first time, the "Jama'at al-Takfeer" (Excommunication Groups, which is how officials in Arab governments describe Salafi-Jihadists), as one of the three beneficiaries of the bombings of Shiite shrines in Iraq, along with the United States and Israel.
Conclusion
The above factors show that the Salafi-Jihadist presence and movement into Lebanon is facing many obstacles, but is also becoming a new force in the country. At the same time, however, the socio-political developments in Lebanon are creating the conditions for that presence.
While Sunnis in Lebanon were historically led by old families like al-Huss, Karami and al-Sulh, from the 1990s until his assassination in 2005, Rafiq al-Hariri became the most prominent leader of Sunnis and enjoyed their support. That is why he was described as the "most Sunni personality" (al-Jazeera, 13 February). One of the most important factors in the popularity of Hariri among Sunnis was his concentration on the grassroots level by helping poor Lebanese.
Among the implications of the assassination was that Sunnis have become prone to polarization by different ideologies, among which is the Salafi-Jihadist ideology. Due to the positions of the above-mentioned political forces - such as the Palestinian organizations and Hezbollah - there will be conflict between them and Salafi-Jihadists. The result will be that the spread of the Salafi-Jihadist ideology in Lebanon will become a destabilizing factor in the country.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/06/2006 10:18 ||
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Suppose, reader, that you were a mad Iranian mullah determined to obtain nuclear weapons at the earliest opportunity. Would you brag and boast and taunt the West--before you had actually finished your work? Or would you keep very still and quiet, denying everything until you had the bomb safely in your clutches?
The choice seems obvious, right? And yet the Iranian mullahs consistently choose option 1--with all the risk of provoking an air war against a nuclear program they must certainly greatly value. Why?
Three possibilities present themselves.
FIRST: The Iranians are so confident in their own defenses that they think they can defeat or deter an allied air strike.
This very week for example they announced that they had obtained a powerful new torpedo from an unnamed second country, presumably Russia--implying that Iran might try to close the Straits of Hormuz if attacked from the air.
But can the Iranians really believe that their capacity to inflict pain on the United States is greater than Americas capacity to inflict pain on them? Their boasts about their torpedo (for example) are hollow, even absurd. They say their torpedo can attack groups of warships--but only a nuclear-tipped weapon could do that, and not even the Russians would sell the Iranians such a thing.
More generally, the more violent any US-Iran conflict becomes, the more certain Iran is to lose. Perhaps Iran can cause even more trouble in Iraq than it is causing now (although it may already have reached its limits). Perhaps it can push up the price of oil. But the US can smash the foundations of Iranian military power and the repressive capacity of the Iranian state. It hardly seems a trade even the most apocalyptic mullah would wish to make.
SECOND: The Iranians believe that American willpower has been so weakened by Iraq that the United States will not dare to attack them, despite American military superiority.
And certainly the Iranians have often professed to believe this. In August 2005, newly elected Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sent the Iranian parliament a policy document that declared Iran a sunrise power and America a sunset power, in its last throes.
But even still--even if the mullahs do believe this--why hasten to a confrontation with the declining power before you can face it on equal terms? Whatever fantasies Ahmadinejad may delude himself with about the world of 10, 20, or 30 years from now, surely even he understands that if conflict erupts tomorrow, the result would be unfavorable to Iran, to put it mildly?
Which leaves this THIRD possibility: The mullahs do not want war--but they do want this confrontation. For some reason of their own, they believe they profit from prolonged, bitter, fruitless negotiations with the West.
If so, we have to wonder--are these endless negotiations truly in the interests of the West. Are we not giving the Iranian rulers all the internal political benefits of intransigence and extremism--without any of the costs?
Is there any reason to think that the Iranian population would welcome a true crisis, with all its attendant hardship and danger? We are often told that in such a crisis, the Iranian people would rally to their corrupt and oppressive leaders--but there is little evidence for such assertions, and much evidence against it.
What we do know is that the current path is working very well for the rulers of Iran. They are moving steadily toward a bomb while impressing the most radical constituencies within their own society.
The present path, however, is signally failing to work for the West.
We are watching Iran move closer to nuclearization--and our restraint is making us no new friends.
#1
The CIA should release (by accident and through secret channels of course) a new map of Iran/Iraq/Pakistan region showing Independent Kurdistan, Independent Shia Arab region, and Independent Baluchistan. This would wake a few people up.
If Iran pushes it will cost them territory before the dust is settled. We don't need to invade, all the good stuff is in the areas likely to go independent.
#2
There is a fourth possibility...the Iranians may have the nukes and the missile systems to deliver them, as well as plenty of suicidal jihadis unconcerned about survival and willing totake the world to hell with them.
The time has come for Americans to wake up and face the facts. Our nation is currently engaged in a bloody war that will last for decades. The outcome of this conflict will not only impact the security and well-being of future generations but will ultimately cost thousands of lives. Yet, little has been done to educate our citizenry with respect to properly identifying the "enemy." In fact, the more "dependable" members of the mainstream media have gone to great lengths to block such disclosure from reaching the general public.
Make no mistake, we are not combating "terrorism" but have been forced into fighting a war that was declared against us by a religious ideology with political aspirations -- against a dangerous enemy that may be fixated in the 7th Century but armed with the modern implements of warfare. Needless to say, it is this same savage ideology that embraces acts of terrorism as an effective tool to undermine the resolve of civilized nations. For a variety of reasons, radical Islam poses a far greater threat to our national security than did the Third Reich. In support of this argument, one must only consider the following:
The Nazis had a homeland or nation, with discernable borders, that could be targeted for counter-attack and invasion.
With the exception of clandestine operations, the majority of Nazis fought in uniform as disciplined soldiers.
Unbridled political correctness has enabled the Islamists to infiltrate our infrastructure to a level far beyond Joseph Goebels wildest dreams.
The emergence of a menacing "fifth column" that is committed to the destruction of our nation.
Terrorist-front organizations are freely operating in at least forty of our states.
Guaranteed constitutional protections have provided the Islamists with opportunities to seek sanctuary behind a "veil" of religious freedom.
For years, American universities, prisons and religious institutions have served as "hotbeds" for recruitment of homegrown terrorists and their sympathizers.
Our enemy's unyielding quest to secure nuclear weaponry for the sole purpose of slaying the "Great Satan."
Many citizens are beginning to question whether we are currently fighting against radicalized fundamentalists or against the very pillars of the religion that these barbarians embrace. The realization that a major world religion would support the long term geo-political objectives of ruthless terrorist organizations -- in particular, advocating world domination through violent conquest and/or genocide against those of other faiths is troubling at best.
As a case in point, attention should be focused on the following statements that were recently asserted by so-called "moderate" Sheik Yousef Al-Qaradhawi:
"We don't disassociate Islam from the war. On the contrary, disassociating Islam from the war is the reason for our defeat. We are fighting in the name of Islam. Religion must lead the war. This is the only way we can win."
"Everything will be on our side and against Jews on [Judgment Day], at that time, even the stones and the trees will speak, with our without words, and say: 'Oh servant of Allah, oh Muslim, there's a Jew behind me, come and kill him.' They will point to the Jews. It says 'servant of Allah' not 'servant of desires,' 'servant of women,' 'servant of the bottle,' 'servant of Marxism,' or "servant of liberalism' . It said servant of Allah."
"When the Muslims, the Arabs, and the Palestinians enter a war, they do it to worship Allah. They enter it as Muslims. The hadith says: 'oh Muslim,' not 'oh Palestinian, Jordanian, Syrian or Arab nationalist.' No, it says: 'Oh Muslim.' When we enter a war under the banner of Islam, and under the banner of serving Allah, we will be victorious."
Indisputably, Islam is on the move. In terms of growth, it is outpacing every other religion on our soil. One must consider the grim reality that fundamental defects may actually be attributable to the religion itself -- a topic of conversation which wouldn't be comfortably undertaken by a majority of Americans. However, ignoring these warning signs could prove far more deadly in the long run.
These issues and more will be discussed at the upcoming symposium being sponsored by America's Truth Forum. With stakes this high, few can afford to not be in attendance.
Excerpt:
Pope John Paul II viewed Islam as a useful ally against Communism and secularism. Front Page Magazine's "The Vatican's Pro-Saddam Tilt?" also chronicled how the late pope sought to engage Islam to promote world peace through ecumenism, even at the expense of Christian minorities in Muslim nations. But Benedict XVI subtly announced a radical change from the outset.
At his installation Mass, the new pope welcomed fellow Catholics, other Christians and Jews in his greeting, but not Muslims. Later, two selected speakers delivered intercessory prayers for oppressed Christians. One prayer was in Arabic.
However, Benedict and his bishops must confront what French historian Alain Besancon called the "indulgent ecumenicism" that dominates the Christian response to Islam
Posted by: ed ||
04/06/2006 07:02 ||
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#1
Coming fromthis Catholic, it looks like many parts of the Church have come awake and are realizing the threat of, and duplicity inherent in, fundamentalist Islam.
#3
I have no problem with a Vatican Swiss Guards manpower plus-up/transformation, ie., providing them a SOF and AC-130 capabilitly, MTT's, etc. Don't be fooled by the pike, XLG black beret and multi-coloured, Michelangelo designed uniform, they are very capable. Louis XI hired some of them as contractors and instructors for the French army as did the King of Spain. At the end of the 15th Century, with Charles VIII the Italian Wars began, the Swiss Guards were described by Italian historian Guicciardini, as "the nerve and hope of the army." In 1495 the life of the King of France was saved thanks to the immovable firmness of his Swiss foot-soldiers.
#4
That proven capability is the reason that the Swiss are not permitted to be mercenaries, excepting serving in the Papal Guard. There are some centuries old treaties that bind the Swiss from letting their citizens serve in any other countries armies, the Swiss pikemen were the elite shock troops that all of Europe feared for a long time.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
