Film: The Karachi Kids

“A breeding ground for terrorists.”

“University of Jihad.”

Those are just some of the phrases used to described the Pakistani madrassa system, a network of Islamic schools where children as young as six are taught to memorize every verse and phrase of the Koran.

The Karachi Kids takes the viewer behind the shrouded curtain of a Pakistani madrassa to show a world of abuse, loneliness and transformation into radical Islam.

Filmed over the course of years, the Karachi Kids tracks the changes of two middle class brothers from Atlanta whose father, a Pakistani taxi driver enraged at the influence of American culture on his children, into a madrassa with instructions that they must memorize the Koran before they are allowed home — a process which takes about seven years.

A story of personal tragedy with national security implications, the Karachi Kids promises to create a national debate about the true nature of radical Islam in ways that have never before been told.

Ties to Terror

Madrassas have come under intense international scrutiny for their anti-Western sentiment and links to terrorism since 9/11, and since the London subway bombings three years ago today, July 7, 2005. Three of the four suicide bombers who carried out the London plot were British nationals of Pakistani descent. Two attended madrassas inPakistan. The Binoria madrassa is known to recruit Americans most aggressively. It prominently displays a banner supporting the Taliban. And it is documented that Osama bin Laden spoke to students at Binoria before the 9/11 attacks.

While these religious schools purport to serve a purpose and educate Islamic children, great concern has grown over the increasing number of "political" madrassas. They mass-produce extremists with a political agenda, including a narrow view of society and no tolerance of Western culture. They radicalize Muslims and are seminaries for jihad.

"Most disturbing is that Americans and other westerners who are trained in these madrassas to hate America, have unfettered access to the United States. They leave the madrassas with intent to come back home to spread their message of hatred toward our country. Worst case they intend to kill us," Congressman McCaul said.

"The 9/11 terrorists had to work to infiltrate the United States to plan their attack. These madrassas are creating a new breed of terrorist that can come back to our country, work in our businesses, live next door, and teach our children with no questions asked. They are potential time bombs planted in our communities waiting to explode."

Background

Documentary filmmaker Imran Raza, who is of Pakistani descent, discovered the Khans in the Binoria madrassa in 2005. He embarked on his documentary "Karachi Kids", http://www.karachikids.com/, immediately after the London subway bombings. Raza has spearheaded the effort to remove the Khans from Binoria and bring them back to America.

Congressman McCaul just returned from an official visit to the Middle East with U.S. Representatives Gene Green and Henry Cuellar. They also visited wounded U.S.military personnel at Landstuhl Medical Center in Ramstein, Germany. And they toured the front line of the war on terror with U.S. troops in Afghanistan charged with rooting out Taliban and al Qaeda terrorist cells which have sought safe haven in that region. Congressman McCaul is a member of the House Homeland Security and Foreign Affairs committees. Before he was elected to Congress, McCaul served as chief of Counter-Terrorism and National Security in the U.S. Attorney's Office in Texas, and led the Joint Terrorism Task Force charged with detecting, deterring and preventing terrorist activity.

Maryland historian links roots of radical Islam with Nazi propaganda

No doubt. Mohammedans were firmly in love with Hitler, so much so, that 20,000 Muslims volunteered to fight in the Muslim S.S. division named the Handzar" (scimitar) division, which was brutal in the ethnic cleansing of the Serbian regions in eastern Bosnia. The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Amin el Husseini, in addition to the carnage he engineered against Jews during the murderous campaign against them in 1920, 1929 and 1936, willfully planned, assembled, organized, and killed Jews in Hungary and Croatia with the assistance of those 20,000 Muslims during World War II with Hitler's assistance. Via JPost:

"A confluence of Nazi anti-Semitism and Muslim fundamentalism did take place during the war which was a mixture of ideological affinity and shared political interests," said Prof. Jeffrey Herf of the University of Maryland during a recent lecture at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism.

"Though Nazi Germany failed in its military and propaganda advances in the Middle East, the ideas it conveyed to the Arabs found adherence," Herf said, pointing to the charter of Hamas, which was established in 1987 and grew out of the Muslim Brotherhood, as well as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad repeated calls for the destruction of Israel.

Herf, whose forthcoming book deals with Nazi Germany's propaganda aimed at the Middle East, said that while Islamic extremism could have emerged without Nazism it played an important role in its development.

Spencer Blogging the Qur’an: Sura 19, “Mary”

Christians need to read how Islam has abrogated the holiness of Jesus and Mary. Robert Spencer breaks it down for you. Via Jihad Watch:

In this latest installment of my Blogging the Qur'an series at Hot Air (many links in the original), Jesus the slave of Allah is born:

This is another Meccan sura. In the first part of Muhammad’s career, a group of Muslims migrated from Arabia to Abyssinia. One of the Muslims recited the material here about Mary and Jesus to the Christian ruler of Abyssinia, showing him that Muslims believed in Jesus, but not as the Son of God.

After the mysterious letters in v. 1, verses 2-40 retell the story told in Luke 1:5-80 – with some important differences, of course. Vv. 2-15 begin, as does Luke’s account, with the story of Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, encountering an angel (Luke 1:11; v. 9 of this chapter of the Qur’an establishes that Allah is not speaking directly with Zechariah). The angel tells him he will become a father despite his old age and his wife’s barrenness (v. 8). In the Qur’an, unlike in the Gospel, this comes as an answer to his prayer for a son (vv. 4-6). In both the Gospel (Luke 1:20) and the Qur’an (v. 10) he is unable to speak after this vision, although the Qur’an, unlike the Gospel, does not present this as punishment for his unbelief, but only as a sign of Allah’s power.

Continue reading "Spencer Blogging the Qur’an: Sura 19, “Mary”"

Massacre Images from Photo Journalist Shlomo Wollins

Warning: Discretion advised. These are extremely graphic photos of the aftermath of the slaughter and mutilation of Jews by a Muslim barbarian at Jerusalem's Merkaz HaRav Yeshiva, taken by photo journalist Shlomo Wollins. These photos demonstrate once again what Muslims are capable of when they escape from their cages, are let loose into civilization, and attack their prey.

Warning: Graphic photos.

Resource: Refuting the claim that the Koran doesn’t teach violence any more than the "Bible or Torah"

Excellent talking points are identified below for readers who are in a situation where you have to debate someone who proclaims that the Koran doesn’t teach violence any more than the "Bible or Torah". Excerpted from Jihad Watch, written by the expert Robert Spencer:

I discuss this very common argument at length in my book Religion of Peace?; suffice it to say here that van der Galiën's statement, that the Qur'an doesn’t teach violence any more than the "Bible or Torah" is flatly false. For while the Bible contains descriptions of violent acts committed in the name of God, nowhere does it teach believers to imitate that violence. Where people are commanded to commit acts of violence, these are commands directed to specific individuals or groups in particular situations; they are not universal commands.

The Qur'an, on the other hand, quite clearly does teach believers to commit acts of violence against unbelievers -- see 2:190-193, 9:5, 9:29, 47:4, etc. There are no equivalents to such open-ended and universal commands, addressed to all believers to fight unbelievers, in the Bible.

Unfortunately for van der Galiën, there is not a single traditional school of Islamic jurisprudence that would agree with his assessment here, for all of the schools that are considered orthodox teach, as part of the obligation of the Muslim community, warfare against and the subjugation of unbelievers.

Shafi'i school: A Shafi'i manual of Islamic law that was certified in 1991 by the clerics at Al-Azhar University, one of the leading authorities in the Islamic world, as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy, stipulates that “the caliph makes war upon Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians...until they become Muslim or pay the non-Muslim poll tax.” It adds a comment by Sheikh Nuh ‘Ali Salman, a Jordanian expert on Islamic jurisprudence: the caliph wages this war only “provided that he has first invited [Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians] to enter Islam in faith and practice, and if they will not, then invited them to enter the social order of Islam by paying the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya)...while remaining in their ancestral religions.” ('Umdat al-Salik, o9.8).

Of course, there is no caliph today, and hence the oft-repeated claim that Osama et al are waging jihad illegitimately, as no state authority has authorized their jihad. But they explain their actions in terms of defensive jihad, which needs no state authority to call it, and becomes "obligatory for everyone" ('Umdat al-Salik, o9.3) if a Muslim land is attacked. The end of the defensive jihad, however, is not peaceful coexistence with non-Muslims as equals: 'Umdat al-Salik specifies that the warfare against non-Muslims must continue until "the final descent of Jesus." After that, "nothing but Islam will be accepted from them, for taking the poll tax is only effective until Jesus' descent" (o9.8).

Hanafi school: A Hanafi manual of Islamic law repeats the same injunctions. It insists that people must be called to embrace Islam before being fought, “because the Prophet so instructed his commanders, directing them to call the infidels to the faith.” It emphasizes that jihad must not be waged for economic gain, but solely for religious reasons: from the call to Islam “the people will hence perceive that they are attacked for the sake of religion, and not for the sake of taking their property, or making slaves of their children, and on this consideration it is possible that they may be induced to agree to the call, in order to save themselves from the troubles of war.”

However, “if the infidels, upon receiving the call, neither consent to it nor agree to pay capitation tax [jizya], it is then incumbent on the Muslims to call upon God for assistance, and to make war upon them, because God is the assistant of those who serve Him, and the destroyer of His enemies, the infidels, and it is necessary to implore His aid upon every occasion; the Prophet, moreover, commands us so to do.” (Al-Hidayah, II.140)

Maliki school: Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), a pioneering historian and philosopher, was also a Maliki legal theorist. In his renowned Muqaddimah, the first work of historical theory, he notes that “in the Muslim community, the holy war is a religious duty, because of the universalism of the Muslim mission and (the obligation to) convert everybody to Islam either by persuasion or by force.” In Islam, the person in charge of religious affairs is concerned with “power politics,” because Islam is “under obligation to gain power over other nations.”

For this to end, peaceful Muslims around the world would have to confront the fact that bin Laden and other jihad terrorists are regularly justifying their violence by reference to passages of the Qur’an and the words and deeds of Muhammad. If they don’t acknowledge this and formulate new and non-literalist ways of understanding this material, it will continue to be used to incite violence. In other words, the use that jihadists make of elements of the Qur’an and Muhammad’s teaching makes it incumbent upon peaceful Muslims to perform a searching reevaluation of how they understand those elements, so as to neutralize their capacity to set Muslims against non-Muslims.

People will do evil in all kinds of circumstances, and use all manner of justification for it; but the violent passages in the Bible are not equivalent to those in the Qur’an in content, in mainstream interpretation, or in the effect they have had on believers through the ages. The fact that in Islam violence against unbelievers has divine sanction in a way that it does not in Christianity makes religious violence more prevalent and harder to eradicate in Islam than it has ever been in Christianity. To equate it to a jumble of passages from the Bible to which no one would otherwise be paying any attention at all, at least as direct marching orders for twenty-first century warriors, is specious and dangerously misleading.

Books: How to Understand Islam

If you want to understand how the enemy of G-d thinks. From How to Understand Islam:

A review of Arguing the Just War in Islam by John Kelsay, Islam: Past, Present and Future by Hans Kung, Jihad in Islamic History: Doctrines and Practice by Michael Bonner, Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, and Secularism Confronts Islam by Olivier Roy.

Muzzling in the Name of Islam

From Muzzling in the Name of Islam:

In August, Swedish artist Lars Vilks drew a cartoon with Mohammed's head on a dog's body. He is now in hiding after al-Qaeda in Iraq placed a bounty of $100,000 on his head (with a $50,000 bonus if his throat is slit).

Some of the world's most repressive governments are attempting to use the controversy to provide legitimacy for their suppression of their critics in the name of respect for Islam. In particular, the Organization of the Islamic Conference is seeking to rewrite international human rights standards to curtail any freedom of expression that threatens their more authoritarian members.

The issues here go beyond the right of cartoonists to offend people. They go to the heart of repression in much of the Muslim world. Islamists and authoritarian governments now routinely use accusations of blasphemy to repress writers, journalists, political dissidents, and religious reformers. Saudi teacher Mohammad al-Harbi was sentenced to 40 months in jail and 750 lashes for "mocking religion" after discussing the Bible in class and saying that the Jews were right.

When politics and religion are intertwined, there can be no political freedom without religious freedom, including the right to criticize religious ideas. Hence, removing legal bans on blasphemy and "insulting Islam" is vital to protecting an open debate that could lead to other reforms.

If, in the name of false toleration and religious sensitivity, free nations do not firmly condemn and resist these totalitarian strictures, we will abet the isolation of reformist Muslims and condemn them to silence.

The writer is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute's Center for Religious Freedom.

h/t to Daily Alert

Never forget that Palestinian Arabs kill innocent Jews

Almost seven years ago to the day, IDF soldiers have arrested the last of the Palestinian Authority (PA) terrorists responsible for the brutal lynching of two IDF reservists in Ramallah seven years ago.

Soldiers apprehended 36-year-old Tanzim terrorist Hayman Zaben in Shechem early Wednesday. Zaben was one of those responsible for bludgeoning to death IDF reservists Vadim Nurzitz and Yossi Avrahami in a PA police station in Ramallah in October, 2000.

The two Israeli reserve soldiers had accidentally entered PA-controlled Ramallah, just six miles north of Jerusalem, and were arrested by PA police. It was once they were in custody that the lynch occurred.
TV images of the lynching show a body of one of the two Israelis being tossed from the police station window to a mob of local Arabs who beat the soldiers’ bodies with anything they could get their hands on. The mob is seen waving body parts in the air and proudly displaying their blood-soaked hands to their comrades.

Zaben is the seventeenth terrorist to be arrested in the murder, though a huge mob had assembled and took part. In 2001, fifteen men were arrested in connection to the lynching, including Aziz Salha, the man photographed displaying his blood-soaked hands out the window of the PA police station. From the nearby village of Deir Jarir, he was in Ramallah that day and admitted running to the police station once he heard that Jews had been apprehended. He said he took part in strangling the men to death while others beat them.

The following video is of the celebration of the Muslims of the death and brutalization of the dead Jewish soldiers. It is an extremely graphic video. In it, Muslims parade while holding the brains of one of the dead Jews. If you can tolerate Muslim cannibalism, proceed with the video.

May the deaths of the innocent Jews by Muslim murderers be avenged.

The Islamic duty to respect Israel

Via Melanie Phillips:

A reader wonders why more is not made of the fact that in several verses the Koran declares that Israel is the divinely appointed homeland of the Jews. The relevant verses are provided on the Arabs for Israel website and read thus:

2:47 Children of Israel! call to mind the favour which I bestowed upon you, and that I preferred you to all other nations.

2:122 O Children of Israel! call to mind the favor which I bestowed upon you, and that I preferred you to all other nations.

7:137 And We made the children of Israel, who were considered weak (and of no account), inheritors of lands in both east and west, - lands whereon We sent down Our blessings. The fair promise of thy Lord was fulfilled for the Children of Israel, because they had patience and constancy, and We leveled to the ground the great works and fine buildings which Pharaoh and his people erected (with such pride).

17:104 And We said thereafter to the Children of Israel, "Dwell securely in the land of promise":

10:93 We settled the Children of Israel in a beautiful dwelling-place, and provided for them sustenance of the best: it was after knowledge had been granted to them.

20:80 O ye Children of Israel! We delivered you from your enemy, and We made a Covenant with you to give you the right side (the blessed side) of Mount Sinai, and We sent down to you Manna (special food) and quails.

26:59 Thus it was, but We made the Children of Israel inheritors of such things (the promised land)

45:16 We did aforetime grant to the Children of Israel the Book the Power of Command, and Prophet hood; We gave them, for Sustenance, things good and pure; and We favored them above all other nations.

44: 32 And We have chosen them (the Children of Israel) above the 'Alamîn (mankind, and jinns) and our choice was based on a deep knowledge.

32.23] And certainly We gave the Book to Moses, so be not in doubt concerning the receiving of it, and We made it a guide for the children of Israel.

[32.24] And We made of them Guiding Lights and leaders to guide by Our command as they were patient, and they were certain of Our communications.

[17:104] And we said to the Children of Israel afterwards, " scatter and live all over the world.and when the end of the world is near we will gather you again into the Promised Land".

The interpretation of these verses, which is believed by a handful of Muslims around the world, is that no Muslim can interfere with the ingathering of the Jews to Israel since this is the word of the Almighty himself.

Curious indeed that we don't hear anyone else referring to this particular interesting theological insight.

Palestinian Infiltration Attempts from Gaza Increasing

The palestinian barbarians are getting hungry for more Jewish blood. Makes sense, considering its almost Ramadan, a symbolic time for Muslims to spill the blood of their enemies. Typically, most Ramadan celebrations begin with gunshots and celebrations inside cemetaries, so it's no surprise that guns and death are two of the most favorite cards in Islam's danse macabre.

From Palestinian Infiltration Attempts from Gaza Increasing:

The IDF Saturday identified three Palestinians advancing towards the Gaza security fence and behaving in a suspicious manner. One of the men was killed and the other two were wounded. Earlier in the day five Palestinians infiltrated Israel near Kibbutz Be'eri but were eventually caught.

Over the past three weeks, 10 gunmen have been killed while trying to plant bombs alongside the security fence. "Our goal is to stop anyone who approaches the fence; sometimes it's civilians, sometimes it's terrorists and sometimes it's terrorists pretending to be civilians," said a military official. "We have no intention of harming civilians, but it's often impossible to ascertain the intent of each individual infiltrator."

Hamas Sets Standards for Music in Gaza

I really have to shake my head because there is no end to the stupidity and ignorance of the Hamas bastards. From Hamas Sets Standards for Music in Gaza:

Salaheddin, a musician from Gaza City in his 50s, said: "I lead a group of 26 musicians - we play traditional Palestinian music. But for the last two months we haven't been able to work."

"This group, Hamas, believes they are the leaders of Islam. The violin, piano, flute, all these instruments are banned. Only the drum is allowed. They say any other instrument is not mentioned in the Koran."

"Hamas has already beaten one of my singers for singing for Fatah. He was attacked at the wedding where he went to perform."

Muslims Silence Critics

In an update on the murder of Chauncy Bailey, bakery employee Devaughndre Broussard admitted to murdering him. Bailey was writing a series of investigative articles about the Bakery – and that’s why, according to police, Broussard killed him. Your Black Muslim Bakery is an outpost of the Nation of Islam, not of any orthodox Islamic sect, but in this murder Devaughndre Broussard has followed a pattern that some orthodox Muslims have also followed. Violent reprisal has long been an occupational hazard of those who dare to question or investigate Islamic groups or criticize Islamic practices. Filmmaker Theo van Gogh was brutally murdered in November 2004 by a Muslim who took exception to his criticism of the oppression of women in Islamic societies. In 1947, the Iranian lawyer Ahmad Kasravi was murdered in court by Islamic jihadists; Kasravi was there to defend himself against charges that he had attacked Islam.

For more on how Muslims silence their critics, read this, from Robert Spencer.

24 Koranic verses

24 Koranic verses that command the believers (Muslims) to fight against followers of other faiths. From USC-Muslim Student Association Compendium of Muslim Texts, Pickthall Translation:

(9:5) Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them (captive), and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush. But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then leave their way free. Lo! Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.;

(9:28) O ye who believe! The idolaters only are unclean. So let them not come near the Inviolable Place of Worship after this their year. If ye fear poverty (from the loss of their merchandise) Allah shall preserve you of His bounty if He will. Lo! Allah is Knower, Wise.;

(4:101) And when ye go forth in the land, it is no sin for you to curtail (your) worship if ye fear that those who disbelieve may attack you. In truth the disbelievers are an open enemy to you.;

(9:123) O ye who believe! Fight those of the disbelievers who are near to you, and let them find harshness in you, and know that Allah is with those who keep their duty (unto Him).;

(4:56) Lo! Those who disbelieve Our revelations, We shall expose them to the Fire. As often as their skins are consumed We shall exchange them for fresh skins that they may taste the torment. Lo! Allah is ever Mighty, Wise.;

(9:23) O ye who believe! Choose not your fathers nor your brethren for friends if they take pleasure in disbelief rather than faith. Whoso of you taketh them for friends, such are wrong-doers.;

(9:37) Postponement (of a sacred month) is only an excess of disbelief whereby those who disbelieve are misled; they allow it one year and forbid it (another) year, that they may make up the number of the months which Allah hath hallowed, so that they allow that which Allah hath forbidden. The evil of their deeds is made fairseeming unto them. Allah guideth not the disbelieving folk;

(5:57) O Ye who believe! Choose not for guardians such of those who received the Scripture before you, and of the disbelievers, as make a jest and sport of your religion. But keep your duty to Allah if ye are true believers.;

(33:61) Accursed, they will be seized wherever found and slain with a (fierce) slaughter.;

(21:98) Lo! ye (idolaters) and that which ye worship beside Allah are fuel of hell. Thereunto ye will come.;

(32:22) And who doth greater wrong than he who is reminded of the revelations of his Lord, then turneth from them. Lo! We shall requite the guilty.;

(48:20) Allah promiseth you much booty that ye will capture, and hath given you this in advance, and hath withheld men's hands from you, that it may be a token for the believers, and that He may guide you on a right path.;

(8:69) Now enjoy what ye have won [in war], as lawful and good, and keep your duty to Allah. Lo! Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.;

(66:9) O Prophet! Strive against the disbelievers and the hypocrites, and be stern with them. Hell will be their home, a hapless journey's end.;

(41:27) But verily We shall cause those who disbelieve to taste an awful doom, and verily We shall requite them the worst of what they used to do.;

(41:28) That is the reward of Allah's enemies: the Fire. Therein is their immortal home, payment for as much as they denied Our revelations.;

(9:111) Lo! Allah hath bought from the believers their lives and their wealth because the Garden will be theirs: they shall fight in the way of Allah and shall slay and be slain. It is a promise which is binding on Him in the Torah and the Gospel and the Qur'an. Who fulfilleth His covenant better than Allah? Rejoice then in your bargain that ye have made, for that is the supreme triumph.;

(9:68) Allah promiseth the hypocrites, both men and women, and the disbelievers fire of hell for their abode. It will suffice them. Allah curseth them, and theirs is lasting torment.;

(8:65) O Prophet! Exhort the believers to fight. If there be of you twenty steadfast they shall overcome two hundred, and if there be of you a hundred (steadfast) they shall overcome a thousand of those who disbelieve, because they (the disbelievers) are a folk without intelligence.;

(5:51) O ye who believe! Take not the Jews and the Christians for friends. They are friends one to another. He among you who taketh them for friends is (one) of them. Lo! Allah guideth not wrongdoing folk.;

(9:29) Fight against such of those who have been given the Scripture as believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, and forbid not that which Allah hath forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth, until they pay the tribute readily, being brought low.;

(5:14) And with those who say: "Lo! we are Christians," We made a covenant, but they forgot a part of that whereof they were admonished. Therefore We have stirred up enmity and hatred among them till the Day of Resurrection, when Allah will inform them of their handiwork.;

(4:89) They long that ye should disbelieve even as they disbelieve, that ye may be upon a level (with them). So choose not friends from them till they forsake their homes in the way of Allah; if they turn back (to enmity) then take them and kill them wherever ye find them, and choose no friend nor helper from among them;

(9:14) Fight them! Allah will chastise them at your hands, and He will lay them low and give you victory over them, and He will heal the breasts of folk who are believers.

West Bank Scholars Push for Spiritual Reply to Hamas Extremism

Islam is 1,400 years old and it still hasn't evolved and it will take another 1,400 years for it to digest this new concept. From West Bank Scholars Push for Spiritual Reply to Hamas Extremism:

As Fatah struggles to contain the spread of Hamas in the West Bank, some Palestinians are pushing for an Islamic critique to compete with the militant brand of religion practiced by the new rulers of Gaza. Some advocate a liberal brand of Islamic politics that would support territorial compromise, while those with a strict interpretation of the Koran are attacking Hamas for straying too far by mixing religion and politics. But most agree that any challenge to Hamas must include a new spiritual formula. The recent dominance of Islamic politics in Palestinian life is part of a pan-Arab trend in which religious parties have become the main opposition to regimes perceived as corrupt and undemocratic, says Hanna Siniora, codirector of the Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information in Jerusalem. "Thirty or 40 years ago, it was fashionable to be leftist and socialist. Now it is becoming fashionable in the Arab world to be an Islamist," he said. Recognizing Palestinian society's traditionalist leanings, Mohammed Dajani, a political science professor at Al Quds University, argues that the only way to challenge Hamas is by setting up a separate religious party that will push interpretations of Islam that back non-violence and tolerance. Dajani named his party Wasatia - a term used in the Koran that means moderation. "What we want to do is change the culture of the people," he says. "Our goal is to teach youth that suicide bombing is not Islam."

More Muslim mythology

Keep moving folks, nothing to see here but more mendacity and stupidity from the Arab world.

What is it this time?

Sudan's defense minister, Abdel Rahim Mohamed Hussein, has accused "24 Jewish organizations" of "fueling the conflict in Darfur" last week in an interview with a Saudi newspaper. Hussein was interviewed during an official state-visit to the Saudi kingdom last week. "The Darfur issue is being fuelled by 24 Jewish organizations, who are making the largest amount of noise over the issue, and using the Holocaust in their campaigning," the Sudanese defense minister replied. We already know that lying is not prohibited in Islam and in fact, may be used as a weapon in order to defeat one's enemy.

The Arabic word, "Takeyya", means "to prevent," or guard against. The principle of Al Takeyya conveys the understanding that Muslims are permitted to lie as a preventive measure against anticipated harm to one's self or fellow Muslims. This principle gives Muslims the liberty to lie under circumstances that they perceive as life threatening. They can even deny the faith, if they do not mean it in their hearts. Al-Takeyya is based on the following Quranic verse:

"Let not the believers Take for friends or helpers Unbelievers rather than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from Allah: except by way of precaution (prevention), that ye may Guard yourselves from them (prevent them from harming you.) But Allah cautions you (To remember) Himself; for the final goal is to Allah." Surah 3: 28

Regardless of this verse, the fact of the matter is that the International Criminal Court recently issued warrants for the arrest of Ahmed Haroun, the minister for humanitarian affairs of Sudan, and Ali Kosheib, a leader of that country’s notorious janjaweed militia. The Sudanese government has refused to hand over the two for prosecution. Charges include murder, rape, torture and "imprisonment or severe deprivation of liberty." Severe deprivation of liberty is a euphemism for slavery. Egypt’s Al-Ahram Weekly observed not long ago that in Sudan, "slavery, sanctioned by religious zealots, ravaged the southern parts of the country and much of the west as well."

The government of Sudan and allied Arab militia, called Janjaweed, are implementing a strategy of ethnic-based murder, rape and forcible displacement of civilians. The victims of the ongoing war crimes are non-Arab African people who have lived in the Darfur region for centuries.

To be sure, there is no doubt that Islam's selective indignation and projection (mostly toward Israel) on the matter of terror and mass murder is hypocritical. The same Muslims that complain that Arabs are victimized by Israel are totally silent with regard to the Arab Muslim extermination of mostly indigent Africans in Sudan.

Maybe because there are no Westerners or Israelis to be blamed, the crisis in Darfur, in northwestern Sudan, has commanded little international attention - until now. But the proof is in the pudding because the latest word out is that Ahmed Haroun and Ali Kosheib didn't work for any Jewish organizations and they are Janjaweed inspired Muslims and - well, 'nuff said.

For more information on what else Islam says, see this.

How Do Terrorist Attacks Advance the Islamic Cause?

By MEMRI

On July 2, 2007, a participant on the Islamist forum www al-ommh net/vb calling himself "Al-Mustaqim" posted the following question [1]: "My brothers... I wish to hear your opinion about the London operation: [2] Did it advance our cause or [intensify] the anger against our ummah?"

The next day, the forum webmaster posted a reply in which he enumerated Britain's "crimes" and explained how the operation benefited the Muslims.

Below are excerpts from his reply: [3]

England Has Been Fighting the Muslims Since Before the Days of Our Grandfathers

"The Crusaders do not need a reason to show hostility to our Islamic nation. They have been fighting Islam... since the dawn of history. They have been fighting it since the [days of the] Crusaders' military campaign against the land of Islam. At that time, England became the [main] base of this military campaign, and in our modern era, it occupied Muslim countries such as Egypt, Palestine and others."

"England handed Palestine to the Jews on a golden platter, so they could build a terrible state exclusively for themselves. At this time, English forces besieged the mujahid Sheikh 'Izz Al-Din Al-Qassam [d. 1935]... and his followers... and he became a martyr... After the [1917] Balfour Declaration, that terrible state was established in Palestine, and the Jews ruled Palestine with the financial, moral and political support of England."

"[In 1956,] England took part in the 'tripartite aggression' against Egypt, along with France and the Jews... [England] was [also] part of the military force which attacked Bosnia, not [in order to assist] the Muslims there but in order to... prevent the establishment of an Islamic state there in the wake of the overwhelming victory of the mujahideen... [In addition,] England joined the Crusader forces which attacked Afghanistan and... Iraq... [In sum,] England has been fighting the Muslims since before the birth of our grandfathers and until today.

"The benefit of the attack on the London Underground is [that] it brought home [to the British people] that they are no longer [immune] to the [attacks] of the mujahideen. Just as they kill our people, so will they be killed; just as they kill our children, so will their children be killed; and just as they destroy our cities, so will their cities be destroyed. We have [finally] become equals... after they made us feel, [for many years,] like lambs who go to the slaughter without resisting, because they [i.e. the English] were the masters."

The Attack Harmed Their Economy

"Another benefit [of the attack] is that it was [a blow to] England's infrastructure and harmed it economically... [In addition,] the attack delivered a severe blow to the global stock market: The index lost 200 points in less than 30 minutes, which caused them great economic harm, and prompted them to spend millions in order to increase their level of [security]... Not to mention the [considerable] number of people who converted to Islam after 9/11 and the London bombings."

[1] The www al-ommh net forum is hosted by Interserver Inc., located in New Jersey, U.S.

[2] It is not clear whether this refers to the 2005 London Tube bombings or to the June 2007 bombing attempt in Piccadilly.

[3] www al-ommh net/vb/showthread.php?t=19229

Losing My Jihadism

From Losing My Jihadism:

Once, I was a jihadist. I grew up in Saudi Arabia. When I was 16, I joined a hard-line Salafi group. In 1991, I took part in firebombing video stores in Riyadh and a women's center in my home town of Buraidah, seeing them as symbols of sin in a society that was marching rapidly toward modernization. After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, I criticized al-Qaeda's school of thought, which considers everyone who isn't a Salafi Muslim the enemy, and wrote that Islam calls for friendship among all faiths. I lost a lot of friends after that and was eventually fired from the newspaper I wrote for. In December 2002, in a Web site interview, I criticized al-Qaeda and declared that some of the Friday sermons were loathsome because of their attacks against non-Muslims. Within days, a fatwa was posted online, calling me an infidel and saying that I should be killed.

The unexpected profile of the modern terrorist: 26, from a caring family, married, with children, graduate

Via Jihad Watch.

The mainstream continues to awaken to the fact that jihad terrorism is not a product of poverty, and that it is ideologically driven. The Times mentions in this article that it is just now picking up on a three-year-old study; you might have read about it at this site when it first came out.
By Andrew Norfolk in The Times:

...If someone hates us so much that he is prepared to sacrifice his own life in order to commit mass murder, then we want to find a rational explanation in his personality or his background to separate him from the rest of us.
He would ideally have grown up in deprivation, with a dysfunctional family, few friends, minimal education, a poverty of expectation and a world view that can be easily moulded by the Islamist zealots whose nihilistic creed offers a simple, deadly solution to all of life’s problems.

The reality, disturbingly, is very different. A study of 172 al-Qaeda terrorists conducted four years ago by Marc Sageman, a forensic psychiatrist and former CIA case officer in Pakistan, found that 90 per cent came from a relatively stable, secure background.

Three quarters were from middle-class or upper-class families, two thirds went to college and two thirds were professionals or semi-professionals, often engineers, physicians, architects or scientists. The average age for making an active commitment to violent jihad was 26, and three quarters of the terrorists were married, most of them with children. Only one in a hundred had shown any form of psychotic disorder. Two thirds became drawn towards a terror group while living in a country that was not their homeland.

Dr Sageman’s findings, published in 2004 in Understanding Terrorist Networks, led him to conclude that “most of these men were upwardly and geographically mobile”. He wrote: “Because they were the best and brightest, they were sent abroad to study. They came from moderately religious, caring, middle-class families. They spoke three, four, five, six languages.”

Unlike the lone serial killer, these men functioned well in groups. Indeed they depended, isolated as they were in a foreign country, on a close circle of friends who reinforced and legitimised their beliefs. “You could almost say that those least likely to cause harm individually are most likely to do so collectively,” Dr Sageman wrote. Yesterday he told The Times that the existence of a terror plot involving foreign doctors should surprise no one.

[...]

Those searching for an identity that is neither Western, nor the passive Islam of their parents, are presented with a seductive call to duty, and a ready-made sense of belonging, by those espousing the Manichean tenets of radical Islam.

Here is a black and white world of good, the global ummah, and evil, in the form of everyone and everything nonMuslim. Because the West is seen as engaged in a global war against Islam, jihad in the name of Allah is seen as the duty of every Muslim.

That jihadist terrorism is abhorrent to the vast majority of Muslims, and Muslim doctors, living in Britain was emphasised yesterday when a coalition of groups calling itself Muslims United took out advertisements in national newspapers to condemn the car bomb attacks.

“Not in our name,” they said, quoting a verse from the Koran: “Whoever kills an innocent soul, it is as if he killed the whole of mankind. And whoever saves one, it is as if he saved the whole of mankind.” Your educated, middle-class jihadist will point out that the full verse actually prohibits the killing of another human being “except as a punishment for murder and other villainy in the land”.

The Koran’s fifth chapter continues: “Those that make war against God and his apostle and spread disorder in the land shall be slain . . .” For some Muslims, especially those who have lived in or near Iraq, it does not demand a great leap of faith, whatever their profession, to include the United States and Britain among those “that make war against God”.

Astonishing to see a mainstream publication quote Qur'an 5:33, which in full is rather gruesome, even in part, after noting the misleading use of 5:32 by self-proclaimed moderate groups.

Anyway, read it all.

Fact or “Islamophobia”?

Stop protecting the murderers, folks. An excerpt from Robert Spencer's Fact or “Islamophobia”?:

When he spoke this week at the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the opening of the Islamic Center of Washington, President Bush said: “In the Middle East, we have seen instead the rise of a group of extremists who seek to use religion as a path to power and a means of domination. This self-appointed vanguard presumes to speak for Muslims. They do not.”

There we are again. The Administration and the mainstream media (both Left and Right) take it as axiomatic that the jihad we see all over the world today represents a perversion of Islam, repudiated by the vast majority of Muslims.

...The vision of Islam and jihad that the “hatemongers” present today is identical to the one that was universally accepted by academics, including Muslim ones, up until the age of political correctness and Said’s Left-McCarthyite Orientalism swept propagandists like Carl Ernst, Omid Safi, Rashid Khalidi and others into our universities. If this is an unfair picture of Islam, motivated by hatred and powered by selection bias involving the ignoring of peaceful Muslim authorities, that is an exceedingly strange fact. But fact it is. Let us examine, to take just one example, the work of the great Islamic scholar Majid Khadduri, who died earlier this year at the age of 98.

Khadduri was an Iraqi and a scholar of Islamic law of international renown. I’ve lately been revisiting his book War and Peace in the Law of Islam, which was published in 1955 and remains one of the most lucid and illuminating works on the subject. Khadduri says this about jihad:

The state which is regarded as the instrument for universalizing a certain religion must perforce be an ever expanding state. The Islamic state, whose principal function was to put God’s law into practice, sought to establish Islam as the dominant reigning ideology over the entire world. It refused to recognize the coexistence of non-Muslim communities, except perhaps as subordinate entities, because by its very nature a universal state tolerates the existence of no other state than itself. Although it was not a consciously formulated policy, Muhammad’s early successors, after Islam became supreme in Arabia, were determined to embark on a ceaseless war of conquest in the name of Islam. The jihad was therefore employed as an instrument for both the universalization of religion and the establishment of an imperial world state. (P. 51)

And:

Thus the jihad may be regarded as Islam’s instrument or carrying out its ultimate objective by turning all people into believers, if not in the prophethood of Muhammad (as in the case of the dhimmis), at least in the belief in God. The Prophet Muhammad is reported to have declared “some of my people will continue to fight victoriously for the sake of the truth until the last one of them will combat the anti-Christ.” Until that moment is reached the jihad, in one form or another, will remain as a permanent obligation upon the entire Muslim community. It follows that the existence of a dar al-harb is ultimately outlawed under the Islamic jural order; that the dar al-Islam is permanently under jihad obligation until the dar al-harb is reduced to non-existence; and that any community which prefers to remain non-Islamic -- in the status of a tolerated religious community accepting certain disabilities -- must submit to Islamic rule and reside in the dar al-Islam or be bound as clients to the Muslim community. (Page 64)

Khadduri is, in Bush’s words, explaining a doctrine that uses “religion as a path to power and a means of domination.” Was Khadduri an “Islamophobe”? A “propangandist”? A practitioner of “selection bias”? A diabolical character misrepresenting the testimony of the texts? Did he ignore Islam’s peacefulness and moderation? Those who level such charges at those who discuss the jihad ideology of Islamic supremacism today should kindly explain how it is that a scholar like Khadduri (and there are others like him, which I will discuss at another time) could have come to the same conclusions as the “venomous Orientalists” of the 1950s and the “Islamophobic propagandists” of today.

Click here to read the complete article by Robert Spencer and wake up out of your stupor, America. You're not helping your fellow Americans by denying that the Muslim enemy in Syria is the same as the Muslim enemy in Iraq which is the same as the Muslim enemy in Gaza which is the same as the Muslim enemy in Darfur which is the same as the Muslim enemy that flew planes into the Twin Towers. Who are you protecting? Why do you want to protect adherents to a culture that wants to dominate you, seek you out and kill you and your traditions?

Robert Spencer: Blogging the Qur’an

Starting Sunday, May 27, 2007 Michelle Malkin's Hot Air has been sponsoring a new series to foster discussion as well as become a resource for anyone who wants to know more about the Qur’an (or Koran) and its role in the Islamic world and in the ideology of al Qaeda and other terrorist groups, as well as its place in the lives of a billion Muslims worldwide.

Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch blogs the Qur’an as he reads through it, bringing the Hadiths and Islamic teachings and traditions into the discussion. Robert engages readers’ questions and responses in the comments.

Robert Spencer read the Qur’an for the first time in 1981 and has been studying it and the Islamic traditions and teachings that inform students of the Qur’an ever since.

Highlights this week include why the life of a Jew or a Christian is worth less than that of a Muslim, and the endpoint of jihad warfare.

Earlier segments:

Introduction by Bryan Preston

Introduction by Robert Spencer

Sura 1, "The Opening"

Sura 2, "The Cow," verses 1-39

Sura 2, "The Cow," verses 40-75

Sura 2, "The Cow," verses 75-140