Friday, September 24, 2010
Collision between Islam and the West?
Paraphrasing Daniel Greenfield's article in Right Side News, "Mohammad's Ghost and the Incompatibility of Islam and the West," he notes that historically, Islam conquered infidels by the sword. He also notes that Muslims are currently sweeping across Europe to create what some call "Eurabia;" enabled by Saudi wealth, a non-normal high birth rate among Muslims, and a decaying Western world. As the fanatical determinism of the Muslim world collides with the secularized West, there seems to be only two ways for this clash to end -- will it be liberty and freedom, or subjugation and Sharia? We, by our words and deeds, will help determine which will stand and which will fall.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Waking up to Radical Islam
The following article addresses the issue of America being "asleep" when it comes to the dangers posed by radical Islam and creeping Sharia Law. The highlighting provided by the author.
The original article is posted in HumanEvents at:
by Brigitte Gabriel (more by this author)
Posted 09/16/2010 ET
In spite of Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf’s recent New York Times op-ed written to calm American concerns about the Ground Zero mosque, as the bright light of public scrutiny shines on this proposed mosque, Americans are discovering elements of radical Islam previously unknown to them.
The controversy has led countless Americans, puzzled and disturbed by the motivation and insensitivity of Imam Rauf and his backers, to begin evaluating the threat of radical Islam beyond the isolated context of terrorism.
Islam’s history has shown, for example, there is powerful symbolism in choosing where to construct mosques. Built on sites of military victories, mosques have traditionally symbolized the triumph and supremacy of Islam over all other religions and people: Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem was built on top of Solomon’s Temple; the Umayyad mosque in Damascus is over the church of St. John the Baptist; more than 2,000 mosques are on the footprints of Hindu Temples in India.
While America does not have a religious center per se, in the eyes of radical Islam our “religion” is capitalism and the destruction of the World Trade Center was like the sack of Constantinople.
Does Ground Zero mosque Imam Rauf view his proposed mosque through this lens? Honestly, we can’t know for sure.
But even if he doesn’t, there is no doubt that many in the Muslim world will regard the construction of a mosque at Ground Zero as a tribute to Islamic victory over “infidel” America. Islamist leaders worldwide will employ the symbolism of a mosque at Ground Zero as a recruiting tool to jihad, swelling their ranks and escalating the threat against America.
This debate is forcing the American people to take a long- overdue look at the harsh reality of a political ideology which is in its very nature antithetical to the fundamental values of liberty and justice as practiced in America and Western societies.
People are asking the kinds of questions I had to confront decades ago: What exactly is “sharia law?” Why is there such an increase in homegrown jihadists today than ten or even five years ago? Who are the “moderate” Muslims, and why aren’t they speaking out more aggressively against the “radicals?”
Rauf and his supporters certainly did not anticipate the degree and intensity of the blowback they are getting. On the contrary, he quietly greased the skids for this project, meeting behind the scenes with various elected officials and opinion leaders to get their blessing.
Unfortunately, those he met with failed to do the due diligence that would have exposed his real agenda. They accepted at face value his soothing platitudes of tolerance and interfaith dialogue, platitudes for which he has shown contempt in writings and statements in the Arabic world.
Imam Rauf repeats these platitudes in his lengthy New York Times op-ed, clearly hoping that Americans will believe him. But thanks to probing investigations done by investigative reporters, bloggers and watchdog organizations, a robust debate has surrounded the proposed mosque.
More Americans now know that Rauf, as recently as March, said in Arabic that he opposes interfaith dialogue. They know he is a vocal supporter of sharia law, that he says governments which do not employ sharia law are “unjust” and that he has refused to label Hamas a terrorist organization. They know he has refused to sign the “Freedom Pledge,” issued by Former Muslims United, which pledges to oppose retaliation and punishment toward Muslims who leave Islam. The more Americans learn, the more concerned they become.
As a Lebanese immigrant I am as proud to be an American as at any time since I arrived in this great nation. Grassroots America is rising up in opposition to this symbol of Islamist victory, ignoring the hectoring and name-calling of our politically-correct “elites.”
Undoubtedly there are different reasons for why 70% of Americans oppose the building of the mosque. But whether the motivation is concern for the 9/11 victims or concern about the advance of sharia law that Imam Rauf advocates, the American people are saying “enough is enough.”
That is the only language Islamists understand.
Terrorists are only one manifestation of radical Islam. As Americans look even closer they will come to realize that the same ideology that produces a terrorist also produces a seemingly moderate Muslim who is dedicated to the advancement and imposition of sharia law. They will learn that the Islamist in a suit and tie, who wants to replace the Constitution with sharia law, differs from the terrorist only in the means to the end, not the end itself.
Brigitte Gabriel is an international terrorism analyst and a two-time New York Times best-selling author of Because They Hate and They Must Be Stopped. She is the president of ACT for America.org, the largest national security grassroots movement in the U.S.
Conflict Between Sharia and US State & Federal Laws
The following information has been paraphrased from an article on Sept 21, 2010 by William Kilpatrick called “The Road to Sharia.” He notes that U.S. law already prohibits the free exercise of Islam because it encompasses a complete political, legal, and moral system called “Sharia law.” Devout Muslims believe these laws are divine commandments and must be complied with without question; full practice of Islam requires compliance with them. Problem is, many shariah laws violate state and federal laws.
1. Under shariah law a Muslim girl can be contracted for marriage at any age. The marriage can be consummated when she is eight or nine. The laws of the United States frown upon such arrangements.
2. Under Sharia a man may marry up to four wives (simultaneously). U.S. law prohibits the practice of polygamy.
3. Under Sharia law, a man can easily divorce his wife, but a woman cannot divorce her husband without his consent. U.S. divorce courts don’t see things in quite the same way.
4. Sharia law: Muslim women are forbidden from marrying a non-Muslim. U.S. law: In this, as in so many other respects, Islamic law is null and void. American citizens are free to marry outside their religion.
5. Sharia law: the testimony of a woman in court is worth half the value of a man’s testimony. U.S. law: “Tell it to the judge!”
6. Sharia law: Muslim men have permission to beat their wives for disobedience. U.S. law: In U.S. law this Sharia provision is referred to as “domestic abuse battery.”
7. Sharia law: adultery is punishable by lashing and stoning to death. U.S. law: “Let he who throws the first stone be prepared for life behind bars.”
8. Sharia law: homosexuality is punishable by death. U.S. law: “Abdul, meet your cellmate, Butch.”
9. Sharia law: thieves may be punished with amputation. U.S. law: the Eighth Amendment prohibits “cruel and unusual punishments.”
10. Sharia law: a Muslim who rejects Islam must be killed. U.S. law: under U.S. laws this form of Islamic justice is referred to as “first- degree murder.”
11. Sharia law: non-Muslims are not equal to Muslims under the law. U.S. law: “all men are created equal.”
12. Sharia law: Sharia law supersedes any system of man-made laws. U.S. law: Article VI. “This Constitution shall be…the supreme law of the land.”
Because of these and other conflicts, the free exercise of Islam is prohibited in America. To allow full practice Islam, the U.S. Constitution and Criminal Code would have to be re-written to make them Sharia compliant. Thus, to allow free exercise of religion for Muslims would necessitate the abrogation of constitutional rights for U.S. citizens—including the right to freedom of religion.
[Source: http://frontpagemag.com/2010/09/21/the-road-to-sharia/?utm_source=FrontPage+Magazine&utm_campaign=6c58bc156e-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email]
Saturday, September 11, 2010
The Political Violence of the Bible and the Koran
A good article is provided below that details a word-count analytical comparison of political violence advocated by the Bible and the Koran; conducted by Bill Warner of the Center For The Study Of Political Islam. Among other interesting topics, note that Islam grew by about 10 converts per year during the first 13 years of Mohammad's peaceful ministry, and then grew by about 10,000 converts per year during the next ten years when politics and violence was used. In my opinion, this latter process is still at work throughout the USA and other parts of the world, as evidenced by the destruction of the Twin Towers in NYC on 9/11/01 and numerous other attrocities by radical Islamist Fundamentalists who follow Mohammad's "perfect" model as spelled out in the Islamic Triology (the Koran, Sira and Hadith). Following Mohammad's model, these Islamists are masters of violent and non-violent jihad, with deceit and use of taqiyya (lying to non-Muslims), to advance their vision of Islam over us infidels (kafirs); they smile to our faces while stabbing us in the back.
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The Political Violence of the Bible and the Koran
By Bill WarnerOne of the most frequently used arguments in the defense of Islam is that the Bible is just as violent as the Koran. The logic goes like this. If the Koran is no more violent than the Bible, then why should we worry about Islam? This argument suggests that Islam is the same as Christianity and Judaism. This is false, but the analogy is very popular since it allows someone who knows nothing about the actual doctrine of Islam to talk about it. "See, Islam is like Christianity; Christians are just as violent as Muslims." If this is true, then you don't have to learn anything about the actual Islamic doctrine.
However, this is not a theological argument. It is a political one. This argument is not about what goes on in a house of worship, but what goes on the in the marketplace of ideas.
Now, is the doctrine of Islam more violent than the Koran? There is only one way to prove or disprove the comparison, and that is to measure the differences in violence in the Koran and the Bible.
The first item is to define violence. The only violence that matters to someone outside of Islam, Christianity, or Judaism is what they do to the "other," or political violence. Cain killing Abel is not political violence. Political violence is not killing a lamb for a meal or making an animal sacrifice. Note that regardless of whether a vegan or a PETA member considers both of these actions violent, neither constitutes violence against vegans or PETA members.
The next item is to compare the doctrines both quantitatively and qualitatively. The political violence of the Koran is called "fighting in Allah's cause," or jihad.
We must do more than measure the jihad in the Koran. Islam has three sacred texts: Koran, Sira, and Hadith, or the Islamic Trilogy. The Sira is Mohammed's biography. The Hadith are his traditions -- what he did and said. Sira and Hadith form the Sunna, the perfect pattern of all Islamic behavior.
The Koran is the smallest of the three books, also called the Trilogy. It is only 16% of the Trilogy text[1]. This means that the Sunna is 84% of the word content of Islam's sacred texts. This statistic alone has large implications. Most of the Islamic doctrine is about Mohammed, not Allah. The Koran says 91 different times that Mohammed's is the perfect pattern of life. It is much more important to know Mohammed than the Koran. This is very good news. It is easy to understand a biography about a man. To know Islam, know Mohammed.
It turns out that jihad occurs in large proportion in all three texts. Here is a chart about the results:
It is very significant that the Sira devotes 67% of its text to jihad. Mohammed averaged an event of violence every six weeks for the last nine years of his life. Jihad was what made Mohammed successful. Here is a chart of the growth of Islam.
Basically, when Mohammed was a preacher of religion, Islam grew at the rate of ten new Muslims per year. But when he turned to jihad, Islam grew at an average rate of ten thousand per year. All the details of how to wage jihad are recorded in great detail. The Koran gives the great vision of jihad -- world conquest by the political process. The Sira is a strategic manual, and the Hadith is a tactical manual, of jihad.
Now let's go to the Hebrew Bible. When we count all the political violence, we find that 5.6% of the text is devoted to it. There is no admonition towards political violence in the New Testament.
When we count the magnitude of words devoted to political violence, we have 327,547 words in the Trilogy[2] and 34,039 words in the Hebrew Bible[3]. The Trilogy has 9.6 times as much wordage devoted to political violence as the Hebrew Bible.
The real problem goes far beyond the quantitative measurement of ten times as much violent material; there is also the qualitative measurement. The political violence of the Koran is eternal and universal. The political violence of the Bible was for that particular historical time and place. This is the vast difference between Islam and other ideologies. The violence remains a constant threat to all non-Islamic cultures, now and into the future. Islam is not analogous to Christianity and Judaism in any practical way. Beyond the one-god doctrine, Islam is unique unto itself.
Another measurement of the difference between the violence found in the Judeo/Christian texts and that of Islam is found in the use of fear of violence against artists, critics, and intellectuals. What artist, critic, or intellectual ever feels a twinge of fear if condemning anything Christian or Jewish? However, look at the examples of the violent political threats against and/or murders of Salman Rushdie, Theo van Gogh, Pim Fortune, Kurt Westergaard of the Danish Mohammed cartoons, and many others. What artist, critic, or intellectual has not had a twinge of fear about Islam when it comes to free expression? The political difference in the responses to the two different doctrines is enormous. The political fruits from the two trees are as different as night and day.
It is time for so-called intellectuals to get down to the basics of judging Islam by its actual doctrine, not making lame analogies that are sophomoric assertions. Fact-based reasoning should replace fantasies that are based upon political correctness and multiculturalism.
- Bill Warner, Director of the Center for the Study of Political Islam
[2] http://cspipublishing.com/statistical/TrilogyStats/Percentage_of_Trilogy_Text_Devoted_to_Jihad.html
Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/09/the_political_violence_of_the.html at September 11, 2010 - 12:01:03 PM CDT
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