Jihad Watch

Let us see if the Norwegians will blame these Muslims' manual for terror as much as they blamed anti-jihadists for Breivik's murders. Translated from Jyllands-Posten, January 30: "Seven years in prison for terror plans against Jyllands-Posten":

The case has been called historical in Norway, because it is the first time that someone has been convicted for planning terror.

The Chinese Uighur and Norwegian citizen Mikael Davud was the main man behind the terror plans against Jyllands-Posten's premises at the Town Hall Square in Copenhagen. So he got a sentence of seven years in prison.

"The Court finds no doubt that Davud took the initiative and that he also was the main man. He was himself responsible for the implementation of the terrorist attack," said Judge Oddmund Black Berg.

It was ruled that the preparations were characterized by professionalism, but that the attack was not imminent. It appeared that there would only have been a small bomb, which probably would not cost lives. The defenders demanded acquittal. ...

According to the indictment, Mikael Davud was acting on behalf of Al Qaida. He admitted in court that he received bomb training from a terrorist group in Iran. The prosecutor argued that Davud instead traveled across the border into Pakistan, where he trained with Al Qaeda. Mikael Davud acknowledged that he had contacts with Al Qaida, but not that he was on a mission for the terrorist network. He acted on his own, he said. ...

The Iraqi Kurd Shawan Sadek Saeed Bujak has argued that the goal was Jyllands-Posten and Kurt Westergaard, a goal that both he and Davud allegedly agreed on. And this was the charge that the court found was proven.

I recently posted a couple of articles about the Muslim area Vollsmose in Odense, Denmark ("Denmark: More Muslim violence against non-Muslims" and "Danish police: Immigrant criminals target Danes to make them move out of the (Muslim) area").

The latest development is that the major Danish insurance company GF-Insurance no longer offers comprehensive insurance on cars in the area. Translated from Fyens Stiftstidende (notice the newspaper's use of "discriminate" in the header), January 30, 2012: "GF-Insurance discriminate against Vollsmose citizens":

GF will no longer insure cars if the owners live in zip code Odense NE. ... Chairman of the GF-Insurance on Funen, Knud Nielsen confirms that the company will no longer offer comprehensive insurance for cars that are located in 5240 NE.

"We have found that there are more burglaries and burned cars in Vollsmose than other places. Therefore we will not insure cars hull in Vollsmose," he says to Fyens Stiftstidende.

Other big insurance companies may well have comprehensive car insurance, even if you live in NE 5240, but the price may vary compared to other areas.

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 29 — Datuk Seri Anifah Aman insisted tonight that despite supporting a “two-state solution,” Malaysia has never supported Israel in its conflict with Palestine.

The foreign minister said this differed from Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, who said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal that he “supports all efforts to protect the security of the state of Israel.”

“His statement clearly shows his acceptance and support for actions taken by Israel against Palestinians up to now.

“Actions interpreted as security measures by Israel include military attacks on Gaza causing the death of thousands of innocent Palestinians including women and children,” the Kimanis MP said in a statement sent to The Malaysian Insider.

Anifah stressed that Malaysia has never supported these actions but joined the global community in condemning Israel that clearly breaches international law.

“Malaysia calls for all parties to find a comprehensive solution that is fair and just based on the ‘Roadmap’ and United Nations (UN) Security Council resolutions whereby both nations can live side-by-side in a peaceful and safe manner,” he added.

Anwar came under heavy fire from Umno and its media after his statement was published by the Wall Street Journal on Thursday.

But the international business daily said Anwar stopped short of saying he would open diplomatic ties with the Jewish state, a step the former deputy prime minister said remains contingent on Israel respecting the aspirations of Palestinians.

And we should all well and truly know by now what those 'aspirations' are.

The opposition leader was forced to defend himself last night by stressing that his remarks in the newspaper meant that he supported a two-state solution as mentioned by Anifah when the latter addressed the UN general assembly in September last year.

But Anifah said today Anwar’s interview “clearly shows full support for all actions taken by Israel to protect its security, unless he is accusing the Wall Street Journal of making a mistake.”

Muslim-majority Malaysia is a staunch supporter of Palestine and has no diplomatic ties with Israel.

Muslim politicians have long vied for support from Malays by denouncing what they say are inhumane acts of aggression by Israel towards its neighbour.

Anwar has previously been attacked as a supporter of the Zionist movement due to his interaction with prominent Jewish figures in the West.

When we look closely at the current situation in the Middle East and the Iranian issue, we can see some parallels with the situation of the world community before the Second World War.

At that time, the Nazis, without any significant resistance, had seized power in Germany and Austria, and Italy was their Fascist ally. Islamic supremacists are now also easily seizing power in North Africa, Afghanistan and elsewhere.

Then, and today, Turkey adopted a wait-and-see attitude. During World War II, Turkey signed a non-aggression treaty with Hitler, and only in 1945, when it was clear that the Nazis were defeated, did it declare war on Germany. Today, Turkey is friendly with Iran and the jihadists, as if she is waiting to share in Ahmadinejad's nuclear achievements.

The proof of Turkey's loyalty to Iran and the jihadists is the recent speech of the Prime Minister of that country, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, about the State of Israel. In addition to denouncing Israel for possessing a nuclear bomb, he accused Israel of state terrorism.

Also noteworthy were his words about the Armenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire. Erdogan, foaming at the mouth, insisted before the global community that the killing and expulsion of 1.5-million Armenians in modern Turkey was not an act of genocide.

Long ago, after the Islamic revolution in Iran, its leaders chose the path of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, the Koran and Sharia. They are threatening to destroy the U.S., Israel and the Jewish people. If we compare the Ayatollah Khamenei and other leaders of Iran to Adolf Hitler and other Nazis, we will find similar words and phrases -- and not only similar words, but similar actions.

Many of us ask ourselves: when will the war start? Is it even going to begin? Maybe the international sanctions will help the world and civilization, and bring the Iranian mullahs and president to their senses, so that they will give up their nuclear ambitions. Maybe they will move jihad terrorist organizations to take up the path of the genuinely righteous, such that they will renounce violence.

Those were the same kinds of things that our ancestors were thinking in the thirties, when the Nazis gained power in Europe. And we all know what sacrifices humanity had to make in order to eradicate Nazism.

Do we really need to wait for the coming of the new Fuehrer, the caliph, to understand what is wrong with our analyses and hopes today?

It is certain that the leaders of Muslims worldwide, a significant number of them, are praying and working for one and the same goal: a jihad against the infidels. The Mufti of Jerusalem during World War II called for the destruction of Israel and Jews. Abu Mazen wants to expel Jews from the so-called east Jerusalem, and from Judea and Samaria. Muslim leaders around the world supported the Mufti and support the "Palestinians" now.

Once, at a regular meeting with the leader of the Jihad in the Caucasus, I asked the question: how are you going to win the war, when there are so many differences among various sects in Islam? He replied: "Allah loves diversity. We have our differences, but we all believe in Allah and the Prophet Muhammad and recognize Sharia, and we know that we are waiting for the terrible meal, if we abandon jihad." He was referring to the Koran's description of the people in hell being tortured with, among other things, food that is disgusting and painful to eat.

I hope that the administration of President Barack Hussein Obama will remember the story of Pearl Harbor: that slowness and hesitancy in the face of a regime that is willing to use brutal force, such as the Iranian regime, only plays into the hands of the enemy.

There are many means of jihad, they note. Or in other words, a way to stick it to the infidel is a way to stick it to the infidel.

Scholars differ on circumstances for acceptable use, and its position in the pecking order of means of jihad, but are in agreement in principle that it can and ought to be used as a weapon of war. Electronic jihad is ultimately familiar destructive behavior, only applied to an electronic medium instead of detonating a truck bomb. Imagine if that ingenuity, resourcefulness, and planning were actually applied to something constructive. "Scholars speak out in favor of “electronic Jihad” against the enemy," from Al Arabiya, January 29:

In light of the increasing support of “the electronic Jihad” and the divergence of views regarding this subject, Islamic scholars have underlined their support for this new phenomenon, arguing that “any attempt to spite the enemy and endorse religion is legitimate”. They consider that Muslim youth involved in this phenomenon are in fact leading a jihad”.

But what do those who refuse to support this phenomenon have to say? They believe that “bringing down the enemy’s electronic devices could help in realizing certain objectives in some instances, but it can also be harmful if done at the wrong time.”

They noted that there is “a large number of people in the world who sympathize with Israel and might get involved in this battle, which would widen the circle of damage.”

On the other hand, Sheikh Fahd Bin Saad Al Jahni, a professor of sharia graduate studies, says that “in Islam, the Jihad is a broad concept that could be defined according to the interpretation of the and texts that cite the jihad. There are many types of jihad: the personal jihad, the jihad by money, and verbal Jihad. The last type includes the intellectual jihad, jihad by composition and by the call to God”.

Al Jahni added that “any attempt to spite the enemy and empower the religion must be conducted by legitimate means and according to Muslim rules. Therefore, religion could be widely empowered through electronic websites. This is what some people call “the electronic Jihad”. Thus, the terminology is correct, but it is the definition that matters as well as the extent to which the concept respects the legitimate procedure.”

“Therefore, I believe that the young Muslims who are striving to take advantage of this wide electronic window and fight the perverted ideology or shut down obscene websites and the websites of those who offended and dishonored the people of Islam and put hand on their holy sites like the Zionist aggressors, are using all legitimate means and are indeed leading a jihad provided they don’t exceed the limit of God in their rivalry,” Al Jahni said.

Moreover, Abdullah Al Aalwit, a Muslim law researcher, pointed to the fact that electronic jihad means “destroying the enemy’s electronic devices or surreptitiously taking valuable information from these devices.” He confirmed that “the electronic jihad, like any other type of ihad, is legitimate in determined instances and might be harmful if used at the wrong time and in the wrong circumstances.”

“However, it is clear that the nation’s condition does not allow any type of Jihad against any of its enemies because our enemies are way more advanced than we are in all kinds of fields. If an electronic war shall erupt, it is expected to have serious repercussions due to the big number of those who sympathize with Israel in the world and who might enter this battle, which would widen the circle of damage,” he added.

Al Aalwit advised that people should “take this factor in consideration because sympathizers with Israel exceed us in number and in their scientific and technological skills. We are not discouraging this type of jihad because the true original jihad is led by fight and struggle and any other attempt is simply a means to exert pressure and strangle the enemy rather than a jihad. The term “jihad” here is used as a metaphor, and since electronic wars are means of pressure, they do not conform to the known provisions of jihad”.

“In addition, the electronic Jihad is immoral because it is similar to theft, spying and embezzlement. Jihad is not fought in this manner, as if we are spreading drugs in the enemy’s society. Electronic jihad only serves in times of war when fighters want to disrupt the enemy’s communication devices. However, we are not in war and electronic battles under these circumstances are considered as a type of corruption.”

The Saudis in particular know they can only encourage freelance jihad so much, lest it be turned against the Saudi establishment, electronic jihad included.

On a larger scale, supporters of the electronic jihad have raised their tone. Newspapers reported the announcement of Sheikh Jamal Kotb, chairman of the Fatwa Committee in Al Azhar, who advocated for the confrontation of the Israeli piracy “to prevent them from attacking us,” although he refused “to harm them if they did not attack first”. Dr. Mustafa Mourad, professor at Al Azhar University, said that “the electronic jihad is a type of jihad because jihad is not limited to military weapons or any other type of painful means. Under jihad, it is possible to use any tool that might fulfill the goal behind the attack against the enemies of God in response to their attempts to violate our rights and seize our holy sites.”...

Mohammad Shafia has previously said: "I would do it again 100 times"; "May the devil shit on their graves. Is that what a daughter should be? Would a daughter be such a whore?" And "God's curse on them for generations. ... They betrayed Islam."

"Shafias all found guilty of first-degree murder," by Timothy Appleby for the Globe and Mail, January 29 (thanks to Mark):

Three Afghan-Canadians charged with murdering four relatives in a so-called "honour killing" have been convicted on all charges.

The verdict was reached shortly after 1 pm Sunday afternoon and delivered about an hour later to a packed courtroom.

In all, the seven-woman, five-man jury had deliberated just over 15 hours, spread over two days, sequestered on the second floor of the historic Frontenac County Court House in downtown Kingston.‬

Tooba Mohammad Yahya, husband Mohammad Shafia and son Hamed Mohammed Shafia are escorted to court in Kinston last month.

A police officer stands outside the Frontenac County Courthouse, where Mohammad Shafia, his wife Tooba Mohammad Yahya and their son Hamed were undergoing trial for the murder of four family members, in Kingston, Ontario January 26, 2012.

‪The defendants face an automatic penalty of life imprisonment with no chance of parole for at least 25 years.

There have been other murder charges involving so-called "honour killings" – homicides of women slain out of a perverse desire to "purify" families of disgrace created by supposedly immoral conduct – but not on this scale, and not involving parents who were willing to wipe out half their family for the sake of their honour, and then lie about it.‬

‪Charged with four counts of first-degree murder were businessman Mohammad Shafia, 59, his second wife Tooba Mohammad Yahya, 42, and their eldest son, Hamed, 21.‬

‪They stood accused of drowning sisters Zainab, Sahar and Geeti Shafia, aged 19, 17 and 13, whose bodies were found in a submerged car at a Rideau Canal lock, just east of Kingston, in June, 2009.‬

The fourth person in the vehicle was Mr. Shafia’s first wife, Rona Amir Mohammad, 53, who had entered Canada illegally, posing as his cousin, but who in fact was part of a polygamous marriage and who by every indication wanted to escape from it.

‪ All three defendants briefly addressed the court and proclaimed their innocence in what Mr. Justice Robert Maranger described as a “heinous crime.”

“We are not criminal, we are not murderer, we didn't commit the murder and this is unjust,” Mr. Mohammad said through a translater.

Ms.Yahya responded: “Your honourable justice, this is not just. I am not a murderer, and I am a mother, a mother.”

Their son said, in English: “Sir, I did not drown my sisters anywhere.”

But the judge was unmoved.

“You have each been convicted of the planned and deliberate murder of four members of your family...(A verdict) clearly supported by the evidence presented at this trial,” said Judge Maranger.

“It is difficult to conceive of a more despicable, more heinous crime...the apparent reason behind these cold-blooded, shameful murders was that the four completely innocent victims offended your completely twisted concept of honour ... that has absolutely no place in any civilized society.”...

Shakila, the ex-Muslim living in a Muslim country who blogs at Liberated, has a new post up about Muslim men, Muslim women, and marriage:

Each time I see a Muslim woman dressed up in the complete Islamic burqa with only her dead expressionless eyes piercing through the black face veil, I cannot but help feel extremely helpless and distressed. It breaks my heart to see a woman being treated worse than an animal. On top of that, they actually feel they are doing the right thing by subjugating themselves to the tyranny of their husbands or fathers.

Read it all.

If this is true, for the parties they are trying not to offend, anything short of Islam -- of professing that there is no god but Allah, and that Muhammad is his messenger -- would be "offensive." This is not making Christianity more palatable. It is de-Christianizing it. It is manufacturing yet another Christian heresy.

Indeed, for many denominations, the validity of baptism depends on the words used: "I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." No euphemisms, no nicknames: for example, trial balloons aiming to portray a more gender-neutral God have already been burst: the use of "Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier" in baptism has been rejected by the Catholic Church, if not others.

Those who truly believe they are winning souls for Christ would not risk the validity of baptism, and those who are genuinely convinced that they possess the truth will not apologize or worry it is offensive.

As a technical matter, one wonders how the translators handle the words: "Who is a liar but he that denies that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denies the Father and the Son" (1 John 2:22). And "But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 10:33).

One last bit of holy writ: "You might as well fall flat on your face as lean over too far backward." - James Thurber

"'Father' and 'Son' Ousted from the Trinity in New Bible Translations," by Hussein Hajj Wario for the Yahoo! Contributor Network, January 27 (thanks to CGW):

A controversy is brewing over three reputable Christian organizations, which are based in North America, whose efforts have ousted the words "Father" and "Son" from new Bibles. Wycliffe Bible Translators, Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) and Frontiers are under fire for "producing Bibles that remove "Father," "Son" and "Son of God" because these terms are offensive to Muslims." Concerned Christian missionaries, Bible translators, pastors, and national church leaders have come together with a public petition to stop these organizations. They claim a public petition is their last recourse because meetings with these organizations' leaders, staff resignations over this issue and criticism and appeals from native national Christians concerned about the translations "have failed to persuade these agencies to retain "Father" and "Son" in the text of all their translations."

Clearly, they fail to appreciate the far-reaching ramifications that Christians not only may dare, but are commanded to call on the Creator of the Universe as "Father." That fundamentally re-wires one's relationship with God and describes a unique intimacy and bond of love that ought not be squandered to score short-term points.

Biblical Missiology, a ministry of Boulder, Colorado-based Horizon International, is sponsoring the petition.

The main issues of this controversy surround new Arabic and Turkish translations. Here are three examples native speakers give:

First, Wycliffe and SIL have produced Stories of the Prophets, an Arabic Bible that uses an Arabic equivalent of "Lord" instead of "Father" and "Messiah" instead of "Son."
Second, Frontiers and SIL have produced Meaning of the Gospel of Christ , an Arabic translation which removes "Father" in reference to God and replaces it with "Allah," and removes or redefines "Son." For example, the verse which Christians use to justify going all over the world to make disciples, thus fulfilling the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19) reads, "Cleanse them by water in the name of Allah, his Messiah and his Holy Spirit" instead of "baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." Rev. Bassam Madany, an Arab American who runs Middle East Resources, terms these organization's efforts as "a western imperialistic attempt that's inspired by cultural anthropology, and not by biblical theology."

Third, Frontiers and SIL have produced a new Turkish translation of the Gospel of Matthew that uses Turkish equivalents of "guardian" for "Father" and "representative" or "proxy" for "Son." To Turkish church leader Rev. Fikret Böcek, "This translation is 'an all-American idea' with absolutely no respect for the 'sacredness' of Scripture, or even of the growing Turkish church."

SIL has issued a public response stating "all personnel subscribe to a statement of faith which affirms the Trinity, Christ's deity, and the inspiration of Scripture." However, in the same statement, which is similar to Wycliffe's, it claims "word-for-word translation of these titles would communicate an incorrect meaning (i.e. that God had physical, sexual relationships with Mary) [sic]," thus justifying substituting "Father" and "Son" in new translations. Calls and emails to Wycliffe and SIL to clarify their positions were not returned. Frontiers responded to calls with articles that critics have already dismissed as skirting omissions of "Father" and "Son" in new Bible translations.

The point about sexual connotations is baloney. Many of these countries have, or once had indigenous Christian populations with scriptures in indigenous languages where this was not a problem. If they're coming up with something untoward, they need better translators.

Nine. There's that number again. Now, everyone knows only the greasiest of greasy Islamophobes retail the notion that the practice of marrying girls as young as nine has something to do with Muhammad marrying Aisha when she was six and consummating the marriage when she was nine, and he was six times her age at fifty-four. So, all of these people continuing the practice in the remotest, most undeveloped areas Afghanistan and Yemen out of Islamic piety must actually be reading American or European blogs, right?

Wrong. For example, there is Sahih Bukhari 7.62.88: "The Prophet wrote the (marriage contract) with 'Aisha while she was six years old and consummated his marriage with her while she was nine years old and she remained with him for nine years (i.e. till his death)."

It is Islam's own texts and traditions that cause the practice to persist in places far removed from one another, and to appear where it had previously been unimaginable -- for example, Britain. "Islington girls forced into marriage at the age of nine," by Pavan Amara for the Islington Tribune, January 27:

An alarming number of under-age girls – some as young as nine – are being forced into marriage in Islington, according to a leading campaign group.

The Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation (IKWRO) claim that at least 30 girls in the borough were forced into marriage in 2010.

The practice was condemned by the Imam of Finsbury Park Mosque, who said such marriages were against Islam and “unacceptable”.

He pledged to invalidate any marriage which he said were carried out by “back-street Imams”.

IKWRO, which made headlines last month when they revealed there had been almost 3,000 “honour-based” violence cases in 2010, has shown the Tribune records which revealed at least three 11-year-old girls and two nine-year-olds had been forced into marriage with older men within Islington. The oldest girls involved were 16.

They have warned that hundreds of Islington girls could be suffering sexual, emotional and physical scars as a result of the child marriages every year and are calling for teachers, social workers and police to be better trained to spot and manage the abuse.

Information from the Ministry of Justice, following a Freedom of Information request, revealed that 32 Forced Marriage Protection Order applications were made for children under 16 in Britain last year.

Six of these were made for under-16s within Islington at the Royal Courts of Justice, although these were not necessarily made for Islington residents.

At the Islington court, “five or fewer” orders were made to protect children between the ages of 9-11.

The orders are a form of injunction that threaten legal punishment if marriage takes place due to emotional or physical force.

In most cases, the children fear they will be killed if they reveal the truth to anybody, while others believe they will be separated from their families and taken into social services’ care.

Dianna Nammi, director of IKWRO, explained that the girls are married in a mosque’s sharia court. This means they are not legally married according to British law, rendering the Home Office unable to recognise or prove the abuse.

“They are still expected to carry out their wifely duties, though, and that includes sleeping with their husband,” she said.

“They have to cook for them, wash their clothes, everything. They are still attending schools in Islington, struggling to do their primary school homework, and at the same time being practically raped by a middle-aged man regularly and being abused by their families. So they are a wife, but in a primary school uniform.

That's not being "practically" raped. The practice will diminish when the law comes after the "husbands" and families with the force with which they would pursue child molesters and human traffickers. This is rape, and it is human trafficking.

“The reason it doesn’t get out is because they are too terrified to speak out, and also the control their families have over them is impossible to imagine if you’re not going through it. The way it is covered up is so precise, almost unspeakable.”

Ms Nammi said that one 13-year-old had to sneak out of a maths lesson to contact the group, because she was being monitored so closely by her family.

“Her teacher didn’t notice because she said she’d gone to the toilet, but when she got home that day she was beaten,” she said.

“Her father knew she hadn’t been in maths because he had sent an uncle to spy on who she was talking to through the classroom window.”

Ms Nammi said that the girls are married off to family friends or family members to stop them from losing their virginity to anyone not chosen by their father.

As young as nine. Heaven knows they're all going to become wild party animals at age 10.

However, the incentive is also often financial.

The financial aspect supports the human trafficking angle:

“The girl automatically becomes her husband’s property, so he takes financial responsibility for her,” said Ms Nammi.

“In fact, often the husband has to start contributing to the girl’s family, so it becomes a way of bringing in another salary.

“Who are girls going to tell? Often they feel like teachers at school won’t understand what their families are like. They will think they’re like Western families, and won’t understand that if they pass on anything at all that they’ve been told to the family, then the girl will be killed. So they just chose not to tell at all.”....

Indeed. It defies imagination that a secretive group holed up in a meticulously controlled compound in close proximity to the Pakistani military never made them wonder who their neighbors were. Panetta's observations echo what he said after the bin Laden raid in May: either the Pakistanis were incompetent, or complicit, though Panetta now seems to be leaning more toward the latter assessment.

"Pakistan knew where Bin Laden was all along, Leon Panetta admits as he reveals intelligence source for Osama raid," by David Baker for the Daily Mail, January 28:

Pakistan officials must have known that terror chief Bin Laden was holed up in a remote compound in Abbottabad, claims Pentagon chief Leon Panettta.

The Defence Secretary has publicly hit out at the Pakistani government who he says 'must have had some sense' of Osama Bin Laden's whereabouts.

He said he remains convinced they must have known someone of interest was hiding out in the safe-house in an interview for CBS's '60 Minutes', but added he has no proof.

The explosive interview, to be broadcast tomorrow, also saw Panetta acknowledge for the first time that Pakistani doctor Shakil Afridi had provided key information about the former Al Qaeda frontman's whereabouts.

Afridi ran a vaccination program for the CIA to collect DNA and verify Bin Laden's presence in the hideout and Panetta confessed he is 'very concerned' for the doctor who has been charged by Pakistan with treason.

Since the May 2 attack on Bin Laden's compound, last year, Pakistani leaders have continued to deny they had any idea Bin Laden was staying in the city.

This is despite revelations that he had been hiding at the site for as long as five years.

For months the CIA knew of his presence there and spied on him from its own top-secret safe-house next door to the terror leader's fortified compound, before Navy Seals were sent in. [...]

Shortly after the raid security forces announced they had arrested 40 people in Abbottabad, suspected of having connections to Osama Bin Laden.

This gave rise to growing accusations the Pakistani government must have been aware he was using the base as a safe house, given the network of support he had there....

Wherever Sharia experiences a resurgence, the observable effect is an increase in harassment and a decline in tolerance, of human rights, and civil liberties. Note the woman below who even found the grocer scolding her about her jeans. And she observed: "Everything becomes tougher: Going to see a gynaecologist, what to wear, how to talk."

The good news in this story is that not all Tunisians are ready to welcome their new overlords without a fight. What remains to be seen is whether they have the political will and strength in numbers to counter a highly aggressive and well organized campaign for Islamic rule, and a ruling party that will try to play both sides as long as it can, but will throw in its lot with Sharia when push comes to shove.

Younger Tunisian girls may soon have to ask their mothers, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers how things used to be. "Thousands protest conservative Islam in Tunisia," from Agence France-Presse, January 28:

Thousands of Tunisians angered by the increasing prominence of ultra-conservative Islamists in a country only recently freed from dictatorial rule took to the streets in protest Saturday.

An AFP correspondent estimated several thousand activists, professors, artists and other demonstrators flooded the streets of the nation's capital, including along Bourguiba Avenue, a well-known thoroughfare that became a centre for dissent during protests that led to the ouster of dictator Zine el Abidine Ben Ali a year ago.

Some in Tunisia are angry by the growing influence of radical Islamists, known as Salafists, who have dominated headlines in recent weeks.

Police on Tuesday ended a weeks-long sit-in by Salafists at the university in Manouba, about 25 kilometres (15 miles) from Tunis. The Salafists were angry the university had banned the full-face Muslim veil, or niqab, over security concerns if students were concealed from head to toe.

Journalists have also suffered attacks at Salafist protests.

"We are here to speak out against aggression against journalists, activists and academics," said Ahmed Nejib Chebbi, founder of the Democratic Progressive Party.

"And to tell the government that Tunisians' hard-fought freedoms must not be compromised."

Sarah Kalthoum, a retired teacher in her 70s, said she was concerned by what she viewed as regressive ideas from Salafists.

"We spent our lives educating people, and now some want us to go back in time 14 centuries," she said.

Some in the crowd said they are sensing an encroaching religious conservativism in their everyday lives.

"The grocer told me the other day, 'I don't like your jeans,'" said Leila Katech, a retired anaesthesiologist. "I told him I didn't like his beard."

Outstanding.

Through this religious prism, "Everything becomes tougher: Going to see a gynaecologist, what to wear, how to talk," Katech said. Following Ben Ali's ouster, many Tunisians in October voted for the Islamist Ennahda party, which now dominates the government.

Again, when push comes to shove:

Anxious not to alienate its more radical members, the moderate Islamist party has remained quiet or reacted timidly to some Salafist incidents....

Recently a Danish cop broke the taboo and said what many already know: Immigrant criminals target Danes to make them move out of (Muslim) area. As a follow-up, I will here publish a few statements made by a Christian priest, a Danish police officer and a council chairman that confirm this observation:

Translated from Kristeligt Dagblad, January 12, 2011: Christian priest fleeing harassment in Vollsmose

The Iranian-born leader of the Free Church "Church of Love," Massoud Fouroozandeh has moved out of the Odense district Vollsmose with his family to a small town at a secret location. This happens after the family has had two cars smashed because a Christian cross was hanging inside them.

"I was told by young people in Vollsmose that I should not drive into the area with the cross hanging in the car. Then our car was smashed and burned and the seats cut up. Since then the side windows in our new car was smashed three times," he says.

After the vandalism Fouroozandeh Massoud and his wife dare no longer let their children play on the playground in Vollsmose.

"They do not wear a headscarf, which 99 percent of the other children do, so they attracted too much attention, and it was not safe to send them out to play. So we moved very far away from Vollsmose," he says.

Translated from the official Danish Police magazine Dansk Politi, September 1, 2009: It was only a question of time:

Kim Thyssen was one of the two policemen who were shot at in Vollsmose in August. He has worked in the area for ten years and he is not surprised that there has been shooting at police. ...

"They have an extreme hatred towards authority. Moreover, there is also racism here, and it has become more pronounced in recent years. The Danes have a very difficult time here. Their children can not play in the sandbox, it's Danish cars that are set on fire, it is the Danish population's apartments that are broken into, it is the Danes that are shot at with air rifles, and it is the Danes who are exposed to street robberies."...

"We are often called racists, but that's how they look at everyone who enforce the law," says Kim Thyssen.

Translated from Fyens Stiftstidende, October 8, 2010: Violence against Danes in Vollsmose

According to Ra Ranunkel, Chairman of the Cooperation Council in Vollsmose, the situation in Vollsmose is tense and there is racism against the Danes living in the district. ...

"Ethnic conflict is about to be started," he warns. "It is the Danes who are victims of violent assault and it is the Danes' cars that are torched. It's gangs of mainly Palestinian and Somali background who are behind the attacks."...

According to Ra Ranunkel, it is a hardcore gang of Somalis who target their assaults against Danes. And it is mainly Palestinians who burn the Danes' cars ...

"An ethnic conflict, a racial conflict is breaking out, and it's scary," says Ra Ranunkel.

We should stop using Muslims' self-chosen word – “Islamophobia” – by which they paint themselves into a corner of being feared: it destroys communication. Instead of such a divisive term, we should insert a more approachable and factual word that preserves opportunities for bridge-building and learning: “Islamonausea.” This does not render communication impossible, but enables visitors to our Western cultures to notice aspects of their behavior that make us sick.

It's no wonder that Muslims use the word “Islamophobia” so often. Lacking convincing arguments, charm or constructive contributions to their surroundings, being feared is the only way to gain at least some kind of respect. The term Islamophobia, fear of Islam, points to what Muslims want, not to what non-Muslims feel. Who is afraid of Islam, anyway?

“Xenophobia,” an irrational fear of that which is strange or foreign, also doesn't work. Aversion to Islam doesn't come from unfamiliarity with the religion; in fact, it's quite the opposite. There’s no reason to fear being called a racist, either, since neither Islam nor Muslims are a race.

Our language needs a term that describes what many critically thinking people feel about Islam according to their own terms, not according to what Muslims wish us to feel or what the PC establishment diagnoses to scare us into allowing more voters for the Left into our countries. We need a term that simultaneously invites Muslims to realize what they need to change about their behavior and religion if they wish to advance from an embarrassing last place in the evolution of civilizations and to earn some real respect among the world community.

Natural reaction

As in many other nauseating situations, Islamonausea is a normal and natural reaction to something abnormal, not vice versa.

The nausea reflex is innate, and it is biologically natural and healthy to experience emotional and bodily discomfort with anything that is unpleasant, unhealthy or harmful.

There is nothing phobic or racist in feeling nausea when hearing about the Islamic massacres performed by Muhammad and his many devout copycats through history and all over the world today. The same goes for Muhammad's sexual relationship with a nine-year old girl, and the cutting off of limbs and stonings in the name of Allah and his Sharia laws.

Thinking of Muslims’ epidemic practice of forced inbreeding (which damages intelligence and increases the risk of psychiatric diseases) -- often many generations in a row -- one may also experience unpleasant feelings in the abdomen. There is also no shame in feeling nausea when hearing about the extreme social control, violence and murderous examples made to keep and scare hundreds of millions of their women from enjoying their human rights to chose their own sexual partners, clothing and lifestyle.

The many calls for hatred, violence and killing of non-Muslims commanded by the faultless Koran are outright disgusting. Imagining the pinnacle of evolution being a planet-sized Islamic caliphate is not only a complete embarrassment to the human race; it may also make one lose one's appetite.

Examples

The word Islamonausea can be used to describe a feeling of nausea, disgust, displeasure, discomfort or aversion that arises by itself when encountering Islam or Islamic culture, or whatever or whoever represents it.

Examples of use of the word: "I'm not afraid of Islam, I have Islamonausea." "I do not want minarets in my town. They give me Islamonausea." "They got Islamonausea from all the Muslim immigrants and decided to move to another neighbourhood." "Reading the Koran gives me Islamonausea." "He got Islamonausea and decided to quit his job at the prison." "I get Islamonausea hearing about all those honor killings." "I get Islamonausea at the thought of eating Halal." "I get Islamonausea seeing all those Muslims hopping up and down and shooting in the air, trying to scare us into respecting their childish behaviour."

Prevalence

The first use of the word that I have been able to trace, is from 7 July 2005, in a comment on this website, Jihadwatch.org.

Here, a person calling himself Sheik Canuck, writes in a comment to an article on Muslims' positive reaction to the Islamic suicide bombings in London that same day:

"I don't have islamophobia, I have islamoNausea, I'm sick of them all."

The first time it occurred in a Danish newspaper was in a letter by this writer in Nordjyske Stiftstidende on December 30th 2011, entitled "We have nausea."

The term attracted some attention when the comedian, atheist and Islam critic Pat Condell used it in a video from 2009 called "Apologists for evil."

Islamonausea deserves its own article on Wikipedia. Help get Islamonausea into our dictionaries by using the word on blogs, in articles and in Letters to the Editor, and in everyday speech.

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 28 — Former Selangor Islamic affairs executive councillor Datuk Hasan Ali claimed today Christian ministers have resorted to handing out electronic gadgets and wearing kopiah (skullcaps) to mosques in their efforts to convert Muslims.

The Gombak Setia assemblyman, who was sacked from PAS and the state government earlier this month, told an anti-apostasy rally in Kepala Batas, Penang that Muslims in the country were vulnerable to these methods due to their lack of faith.

He said that when he was Selangor executive councillor, he received at least 60 reports of apostasy including how Muslims were enticed with money and given gifts of laptop computers, cameras, cars, monthly food provisions and gadgets like solar-powered bibles.

“There were reports of foreign Christian ministers wearing Muslim skullcaps and attending prayers at a certain mosque in Petaling Jaya to establish a communal relationship with Muslims before converting them.

“I was told these international Christian groups have unlimited funds,” he told a crowd of about 2,000, a tenth of Himpunan Sejuta Umat’s (Himpun) targeted 20,000 attendess.

Unlimited funds? How underhanded and dastardly!

The coalition of Muslim NGOs has organised several such gatherings in response to the “challenge of Christianisation”.

Himpun was mooted following last year’s controversial August 3 raid by Selangor Islamic authorities on the Damansara Utama Methodist Church (DUMC) in Petaling Jaya, where it was alleged that Christians were converting Muslims.

Hasan had backed the raid and said there “could be hundreds, maybe even thousands” of cases of Muslims being converted by Christians.

Last November, the former Selangor PAS chief told the Selangor Legislative Assembly that evangelical Christians are using high-tech devices such as solar-powered talking bibles to proselytise Muslims in the state.

The indomitable Ali Sina of Faith Freedom has been in a discussion of sorts with Sheila Musaji of The American Muslim, who is an established liar. His latest piece addressed to her brilliantly answers the principal charges that Leftists and Islamic supremacists routinely make against Pamela Geller and me, and our organizations.

(I have reproduced it below as it appears in the original; "Namazi" is of course the communist antisemite Maryam Namazie, and "Bari" is Rifqa Bary.)

...Let us continue:

It is both surprising and not surprising that Ali Sina has now been named to the Board of Directors of the newly formed Stop the Islamization of Nations SION which is a coalition SIOA, SIOE, and other hate groups, and which will be led by Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer.  It is not surprising because of the animosity towards Islam that he shares with Geller and Spencer.  It is surprising because of the fact that Geller herself is Jewish, and Ali Sina seems to have as much animosity towards Judaism as he does against Islam.

Perhaps this is above your ken but what unites Pamela Geller (a Jew), Robert Spencer (a Catholic), Wafa Sultan (a secular humanist), Babu Suseelan (a Hindu) ,and yours truly, is our humanity. We have different beliefs, but we don’t allow that to divide us.  To a Muslim this might be incomprehensible. You see the world divided on religious lines.  We don’t see it that way. We see all mankind as members of one gigantic human family.  We have different tastes in politics and in religion. But we never let them come between us and divide us.

I receive many emails from youths who say they no longer believe in Islam and want to become Christian. I never discourage them. Let me quote what I wrote to one such youth yesterday.

This 22 year old Somali woman wrote to Pamela Geller and told her that she wants to be a Christian.  She added, “However, i know that if my family [comes to] know about this they will surely end my life since it will bring them shame in our community. Once my father found a bible in my drawer and he told me that if he founds it there again he will do something to me that i will regret forever. I feel unsafe here and am looking for a way out please help me before it is too late.”

Pamela asked me to reply and here is a few passages from my email to her:

“Faith is a very personal matter. It is a relationship you have with your God.  No one can take it away from you and you don’t have to speak about it to anyone.   Jesus did not start a new religion. He wants to have a personal relationship with you.  As long as you have him in your heart, he is with you even if you don’t attend any church or interact with other Christians.  

If you live in your parent’s home, you need to live by their rules. Don’t keep a Bible at home and don’t have any cross or anything that may make them think you are a Christian.  You don’t need to do any baptism either.  Love of God is your baptism. Soon you will be out of your parent’s home and will be more independent.

…

Meanwhile I suggest you act with caution.  Time will pass fast. Study hard and get the best education you can. Education is your key to freedom. If you have a good education you can get a hired sooner and afford getting out of your parental home faster. You may even go and live in another city or another country.  

If you want to read the Bible you can find it online. If you want to discuss your faith with anyone you can find Christian communities online.  Don’t share your thoughts with anyone. Study, study and study!  This is the fastest way to your freedom.”

Pamela is a Jew and I am a humanist. But neither of us discouraged this girl from following the path that she had chosen for herself.  We don’t care about people’s faiths. We care about their lives.  We don’t divide mankind along religious lines.  There is no such thing as believers/unbelievers, the faithful and the kafir in our lexicon. What matters, is our humanity and what makes us human is not what we believe, but how we live.

You are a Muslim. You are genuinely incapable to see that we are humans first, and religion is nothing compared to the strong string of humanity that runs through the core of all of us and binds us together like the beads in a rosary.  You see the world from the tainted glasses of Islam. What you don’t know is that those glasses come from the mind of a psychopath narcissist.  Islam is insanity.  This is not an insult.  This is my thesis and I have proven it. Read my book and you too will agree.

You then continued:

The Southern Poverty Law Center published a report citing Geller for hate speech.  The AFDI has been named a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.  The American Freedom Defense Initiative is the parent group of the SIOA.  Spencer, Geller, and Yerushalmi are featured in the SPLC reports Jihad Against Islam and The Anti-Muslim Inner Circle.

Yes I know. These traitorous leftist organizations are your lackeys.  What unites them with you Muslims is your common hatred of the Judeo-Christian western values.  But they are stupid.  They think by supporting fellow haters of the western values they will be stronger and you will help them to come to power. All they have to do to see their folly is to talk to fellow commies from Iran. Let them talk with Maryam Namazi from UK.  Namazi and her comrades were instrumental in the revolution of 1979 in Iran. They threw their lot with Islamists. But they were the first who were eliminated when Khomeni took power.  If Islam ever comes to power in Europe or in America, all those left leaning organization that today defend Islam will be the first to be eliminated.  Those who don’t read the history, tend to repeat the same errors.

Pamela Geller and her organizations don’t become hate groups just because a bunch of moon-bats says so.  Pamela has demonstrated her compassion and care for countless hapless and helpless young Muslims whose own families have turned against them.  Young Muslims write to her from all over the world asking for help. This woman should be awarded the Nobel Prize for her humanitarianism and for her compassion.  Alas the Nobel Prize committee is so politicized that they think charlatans like Arafat, Obama and Al Gore are more deserving for that prize than good humans who truly serve mankind.

One of the saddest stories is when Gore was granted the Nobel Prize for lying about global warming there was a 92 years woman named Irene Sendler, who was also a nominee.  She had saved some 2,500 Jewish children from the Nazi Holocaust by smuggling them out of Warsaw Ghetto, in her basket and tool box.  I felt a lump in my throat when I read her story and  that instead of her the committee chose this filty liar.

I don’t give a damn about those organizations calling Pamela Geller a hate monger.  I can see how much she cares about people. I saw how she took to heart the case of Rifqa Bari and protected that beautiful soul when her parents wanted to kill her.

Where were you to protect Rifqa? Why young Muslims don’t write to YOU to protect them from their families and write to Pamela?  Because they know you are a hypocrite Islamist and all you care is your damn religion, but Pamela is a humanitarian who cares about them and is not concerned about what religion they believe.  I have seen people write to her and say they want to stay Muslim but just want to be free from the tyranny of their parents and Pamela still advised them compassionately and tried to help them without ever telling them they should leave Islam first.

 Pay Pal at least temporarily suspended Geller’s site Atlas Shrugs for being a hate site.

Sure! They did it because a bunch of Muslims like you wrote to Pay Pal lied about Pamela and libled her of spreading hate.  When Pay Pal realized they had been duped they reversed their decision.

Actually, Musaji is here lying yet again. PayPal never actually suspended Geller at all.

You then said

Spencer and Geller attempted to patent the SIOA trademark, but were refused by the U.S. patent office The government response, posted on the site, states, “The applied-for mark refers to Muslims in a disparaging manner because by definition it implies that conversion or conformity to Islam is something that needs to be stopped or caused to cease.”

 That is because our Governments are misled. They consider Islam a religion and as such it is protected.  That is why we formed SION (Stop Islamization Of Nations) to educate and to unmask Islam.  Islam is not just a religion. It is more a political ideology of domination. It must be classified as such. It is more akin to communism and Nazism than it is to other faiths. Muhammad said al Islamo deenun wa dawla (Islam is both religion and government.) One cannot be separated from another. This is what people don’t know. It will take some time to make the world aware of it. But we are patient and determined.  More prominent people are joining SION from all over the world. We are poised to become a powerful international force.  And we will go after traitors who sell their country for vote.  We will expose them. We know that anytime a politician supports Islam we have to follow the money trail to find a skeleton in their closet. That is what we intend to do.

 The Center for American Progress released a groundbreaking report Fear Inc.: The Roots of the Islamophobia Network in America.  The key researchers for this report were Wajahat Ali, Eli Clifton, Matthew Duss, Lee Fang, Scott Keyes, and Faiz Shakir.  The report itself is the result of a six month investigative project, and is 132 pages in length.  Geller is cited as part of this network.

Oh really!? So a bunch of Muslims and their minions got together and cited Geller as Islamophobe? And what else is new?  I repeated many times that Islamophobia is a fallacy. Geller is a defender of the Western civilization.

Musaji quotes several other organizations that are either run by Muslims or are sympathetic to Islam that denounce the critics of Islam as “Islamophobe”. In her opinion this is “evidence.”  In Persian we have a saying: They asked the fox who will testify on your behalf, he said my tail. Or better than that is when Allah backs up Muhammad.  Who gives a damn if Muslims and their minions call us hate monger? This is circular reasoning.  I talk about facts and I have shown that we are not hate mongers, but Muslims are.

It is one thing to be unidentifiable in a society where one is always under the control of a male guardian and a perpetual minor, but in a free and open society, full participation requires being identifiable as an individual and not merely in relation to another.

For that matter, in the West, unlike other places where the supposed equivalence has been stated very crassly, the bottom line is that the female face is not a private part.

"Dutch plan ban on Muslim face veils next year," from Reuters, January 27 (thanks to Kenneth):

(Reuters) - The Dutch minority government plans to ban Muslim face veils such as burqas and other forms of clothing that cover the face from next year. The ban would make the Netherlands, where 1 million out of 17 million people are Muslim, the second European Union country to ban the burqa after France, and would apply to face-covering veils if they were worn in public.

"People should be able to look at each other's faces and recognize each other when they meet," the interior affairs ministry said in a statement Friday.

The ban will also apply to balaclavas and motorcycle helmets when worn in inappropriate places, such as inside a store, Deputy Prime Minister Maxime Verhagen told reporters, denying that this was a ban on religious clothing.

Geert Wilders' anti-Islam Freedom Party (PVV), which helps give the Liberal-Christian Democrat coalition a majority in parliament, has set considerable political store on getting the so-called burqa ban passed into law.

Few Muslim women in the Netherlands wear the Arabic-style niqabs which leave the eyes uncovered and Afghan-style burqas that cover the face with a cloth grid. Academics estimate the numbers at between 100 and 400, whereas Muslim headscarves which leave the face exposed are far more common.

The coalition has agreed to submit a new law to parliament next week stipulating that offenders would be fined up to 390 euros ($510), the ministry said.

Verhagen said the ban was intended to ensure that a tradition of open communication cherished in Dutch society was upheld, and to prevent people from concealing their identity in order to do harm....

The organization and transition to violence always seem to happen more than a little too easily, once again suggesting a rampage waiting for an excuse. And any old excuse will do.

These are not the makings of a stable society, and there can be no prosperity if society is so unstable that one fears anything one invests in might be obliterated at the drop of a hat.

Self-government, such as Egypt is said to desire, depends on the government of the self, on the individual level, and in communities. "Over 3000 Muslims Attack Christian Homes and Shops in Egypt, 3 Injured," by Mary Abdelmassih for the Assyrian International News Agency, January 28:

(AINA) -- A mob of over 3000 Muslims attacked Copts in the village of Kobry-el-Sharbat (el-Ameriya), Alexandria this afternoon. Coptic homes and shops were looted before being set ablaze. Two Copts and a Muslim were injured. The violence started after a rumor was spread that a Coptic man had an allegedly intimate photo of a Muslim woman on his mobile phone. The Coptic man, Mourad Samy Guirgis, surrendered to the police this morning morning for his protection.

According to eyewitnesses, the perpetrators were bearded men in white gowns. "They were Salafists, and some of were from the Muslim Brotherhood," according to one witness. It was reported that terrorized women and children who lost their homes were in the streets without any place to go.

According to Father Boktor Nashed from St. George's Church in el-Nahdah, a meeting between Muslim and Christian representatives was supposed to take place in the evening in Kobry-el-Sharbat. But, by 3 P.M. a Muslim mob looted and torched the home of Mourad Samy Guirgis, as well as the home of his family and three homes of Coptic neighbors. A number of Coptic-owned shops and businesses were also looted and torched. "We contacted security forces, but they arrived very, very late," Said Father Nashad. The fire brigade was prevented from going into the village by the Muslims and the fires were left to burn themselves out. "Those who lost their home, left the village," said Father Nashed.

Coptic activist Mariam Ragy, who was covering the violence in Kobry-el-Sharbat , said it took the army 1 hour to drive 2 kilometers to the village. "This happens every time. They wait outside the village until the Muslims have had enough violence, then they appear." She said that she spoke to many Copts from the village this evening who said that although their homes were not attacked, Muslims stood in the street asking them to come to their homes to hide. "They believed that this was a new trick to make them leave, so that Muslims would loot and torch their homes while they were away," said Ragy.

The Gov of Alexandria visited al-Nahda, near Kobry-el-Sharbat, this evening and told elYoum 7 newspaper that the two Copts and one Muslim who were injured were transported to hospital. He said that the family of the Muslim girl whose image was on the Copt's mobile phone wanted revenge from the Coptic man. They broke into his home and torched a furniture factory located in the same building.

Joseph Malak, a lawyer for the Coptic Church in Alexandria, said it is too early to count injuries to Copts or losses to their property.

Mr. Mina Girguis, of the Maspero Youth Union in Alexandria, said that "collective punishment of Copts for someone else's mistake, which is yet to be determined, is completely unacceptable." He believes that the reason for this violence is fabricated, and the military is behind it. "They are trying to divert the attention from the second revolution which is taking place now."

Father Nashed denied that Islamists were present, only ordinary village Muslims, and could not give an explanation as why people who have lived together amicably for years could commit such violence. "Maybe because of lack of security, they think that they can do as they please."

He said that the nearly 65 Coptic families were ordered to stay indoors and not to open their shops and businesses tomorrow. He added that security forces did not arrest any of the perpetrators, "on the contrary, they were begging the mob to go home."

By midnight the violence had subsided.

In a country where the Ikhwan got 47 percent of the vote, that will only go so far, but it does underscore the fact that the group, which knows how to campaign (and how to tamper with voting), now has to figure out how to implement its plans to govern and maintain power.

The Brotherhood built its reputation in part by railing against corruption and cronyism in Mubarak's regime, but has already shown its own ample propensity for the very same.

We tried to tell you. "Some in Egypt Turn Their Anger on Islamists, and the Syrian Embassy Is Attacked," by Liam Stack and David D. Kirkpatrick for the New York Times, January 27:

CAIRO — The resentments of many young political activists toward the Muslim Brotherhood spilled into a public spat on Friday as some demonstrators who came out to mark the first anniversary of the country’s revolution turned on the group.

The protesters, who accuse the popular Islamists of being too accommodating of the military leaders who replaced the ousted president, Hosni Mubarak, surrounded a stage set up by the Brotherhood, jeering and in some cases hurling plastic bottles.

Although the exchange lasted only about a half-hour and was hardly representative of national opinion, some Brotherhood members appeared shocked by the vehemence of the verbal assaults. At one point, protesters who have grumbled privately for weeks that the Brotherhood had made its peace with the military rulers chanted, “You sold out the revolution.”

Adding to the tumult, opponents of another autocratic leader, President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, stormed into that country’s embassy a few blocks from the demonstration and caused some damage. Many Egyptian pro-democracy advocates and Syrians in Cairo believe that Mr. Assad should be overthrown as part of the Arab Spring revolts.

The tactics they first try on non-Muslims, they will eventually also turn on Muslims who for whatever reason are not good enough. Quite literally, first they came for the Jews, and no one cared.

It was the second time in five months that Egyptian security forces failed to prevent an attack on an embassy; the previous attack was at the Israeli Embassy.

The hostility toward the Brotherhood appeared to reflect the Islamist group’s transition from outlawed opposition to part of the political establishment, as well as the frustration of pro-democracy advocates who accuse the military of thwarting revolutionary change.

The dispute broke out around sunset Friday as thousands of people in several anniversary marches converged on the capital’s Tahrir Square, where the Muslim Brotherhood had erected a giant stage.

The marchers were determined to use the anniversary to call for the military council leading the country to exit power immediately. But the members of the Brotherhood, which dominates the newly elected Parliament, came to the square in an attempt to keep the anniversary demonstration upbeat. The Brotherhood has endorsed the generals’ timetable for a handover of power by the end of June.

When the marchers reached the square, some vented at the Brotherhood, both for its approval of the military’s timetable and for the acoustic domination of its stage.

A crowd surrounded the stage, shouting insults and waving their shoes in the air, a grave affront in the Arab world.

The speakers on the stage, including several sheiks from the prestigious Al Azhar College of Islamic Studies, looked stunned. “Please, don’t do this,” one speaker pleaded. “We are all one hand!”

The Brotherhood speakers attempted to join with the crowd by leading chants of “the people want the fall of the regime” and “down with military rule.”

But the protesters appeared unconvinced. The speakers retreated under a hail of insults and an occasional plastic soda bottle.

“Young people made the revolution, but then the army brought us Tantawi,” said Abdelrahman Ahmed, 37, a telecom engineer, referring to Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the top officer of the military council. “And now the Brotherhood mocks us.”...

Will the Islamophobia never end? An update on this story. "Man must stand trial in plot to hire hit man," from Associated Press, January 27 (thanks to Kenneth):

WILMINGTON, N.C. -- A North Carolina man must stand trial in a plot to hire a hit man to behead three witnesses from his brother's terrorism case, a federal magistrate judge ruled on Friday....

Sherifi, 21, was arrested last weekend after FBI agents tracked him to a Jan. 8 meeting in the parking lot of a Wilmington Food Lion grocery store with a government informant posing as the representative of a hit man. He is accused of paying the informant $4,250 toward the first killing while his mother waited nearby in a Honda minivan.

On Jan. 22, prosecutors said Sherifi met with the informant again, this time receiving fake photos that showed the blood-covered witnesses lying in a shallow grave and what appeared to be the man's severed head.

Officials say the plot to execute the witnesses was masterminded by Sherifi's imprisoned brother, Hysen Sherifi, 27. The older Sherifi was sentenced to 45 years earlier this month for his role in what prosecutors described as a conspiracy to attack the Marine base at Quantico, Va., and targets abroad....

Those targeted for death, according to the government, were three confidential informants who testified against Hysen Sherifi and his co-defendants during a lengthy terrorism trial that began in shortly after the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. Hysen Sherifi and two other Raleigh men were found guilty of terrorism related offenses, while three other accused co-conspirators pleaded guilty.

During Friday's hearing, defense lawyer James Payne suggested that Shkumbin Sherifi may have believed that he was providing the money to pay for a lawyer for his brother's appeal and stressed that in hours of phone calls and meetings taped by the FBI he never directly ordered anyone to be killed.

Judge Jones said the government had probable cause to arrest Sherifi, questioning why anyone would hire a lawyer in a clandestine meeting held inside a car.

Good question!

"We have an individual who was in a Food Lion parking lot giving someone $4,000," the judge said.

The Sherifis are naturalized U.S. citizens who emigrated from Kosovo in 1999 following a bloody sectarian war. On Friday, one of their three sisters took the stand as a character witness and asked the judge to let her brother go home. Hylja Sherifi, 24, said her younger sibling was a primary caregiver to their ailing father, who has lung cancer.

Shkumbin Sherifi has also volunteered as a youth soccer coach and is an aspiring songwriter, she said. Several of his rap songs are available online on a website intended to promote his music.

"He has a lot of passion," Hylja Sherifi said, a college student. She added that her family loves the United States.

"I have hope in the American government and support America," she said. "I supported my boyfriend when he was fighting in Iraq for 13 months."

The soldier she spoke of sat with the family in the courtroom, along with about 25 other people who made the two-hour drive from Raleigh to show their support for the defendant. Many were members of the Islamic Association of Raleigh, the city's largest mosque.

Farris Barakat, a 21-year-old college student who attended the hearing, said Elshiekh was his second-grade teacher at the mosque's school. At the time of her arrest, she was also teaching at a secular Montessori academy in suburban Morrisville. Elshiekh is charged with using interstate facilities for murder for hire.

Barakat stressed that he did not in any way support the type of violence of which the Sherifis are accused of plotting. Islam is a religion of peace, he said.

Well, that's obvious. But how did the Sherifis come to misunderstand it so?

However, he questioned whether an overzealous government was seeking to prosecute Muslims for terror offenses using questionable tactics, such as using paid informants with criminal records.

Of course. That must be it. Muslims are always victims. Never perpetrators. Ever. An "overzealous government," drunk with "Islamophobia," is devoting its time to framing innocent, peaceful Muslims. Why didn't I realize this before? After all, "Islamophobia" is so obviously rampant at all levels of government: federal, state and local.

Hylja Sherifi echoed those sentiments, suggesting the full story had not been told in the courtroom.

Asked on the witness stand if any of the evidence presented Friday changed her positive view of her younger brother, she replied: "Not at all."

Of course not. Why should it?

Islamic supremacists and their Leftist allies game the system, get a thug acquitted, and then gloat about it. "'Zionists always lose' chant as SOAS cheekbiter is acquitted of assault," from the Jewish Chronicle, January 26:

A PhD student who bit a pro-Israel campaigner on the cheek at SOAS Israel Apartheid Week has been acquitted of assault.

Mohammed Abdelkarim was accused of biting Dean Gold on the face during a tussle on March 20 last year, smashing his camera to the ground. He was cleared of both assault and criminal damage. Palestine Solidarity Campaign activists in the public gallery cheered and whooped as the verdict was announced, shouting, "Zionists always lose," at Mr Gold's family and friends as they left court.

The scuffle took place as Mr Gold was filming an unidentified man making obscene remarks about the Holocaust.

In footage played to the court, an elderly black man rants to the camera: "Six million Jews lined up outside the gas chambers like lambs to the slaughter." Mr Gold said: "I was very distressed. I thought, this must be illegal. I remembered I had my camera, so I asked him if he minded being filmed."

Mr Abdelkarim is then heard approaching and asking the man if he minds being filmed, telling the man he will "knock it [the camera] off" if he does not wish to be filmed.

But the subject replies: "I have nothing to hide." Mr Gold alleged that Mr Abdelkarim then launched himself at him. "He was growling and my cheek was pinned between his teeth, I felt like he was trying to bite my ear off. I could feel his breath and him moving towards my ear. My cheek was clamped, vice-like, in his teeth."

The defence argued that it was Mr Abdelkarim who had been first punched by Mr Gold, and then pinned in a bear hug, before resorting to biting Mr Gold in order to free himself.

Srikantharajah Nereshraaj, defending, said the pro-Israel activists had been present to "disrupt, antagonise and provoke reactions" at what he described as a "Palestinian cultural event."

Mr Abdelkarim said the Israel campaigners had apparently ignored his requests not to take pictures of his two young children. Israeli film student Roy Goldman, who was called as a witness, agreed that he had been filming and taking pictures at the event.

Mr Abdelkarim told the court he was "not a political person" and had come to the event with his family for food and face-painting. "I did not want my children appearing in any footage at all," he said. He had noticed Mr Gold filming. "I could see they [his children] would appear in the background."...

Islamic supremacists have a thing about filming. At our various AFDI/SIOA rallies, they film all of us incessantly, but when pro-freedom activists try to photograph or film them, they're shouted at, abused, and even attacked.

The fundamental aim of jihad in all its forms is to impose Sharia, and that is why jihadists in supposedly "regional" conflicts find common cause with others far removed from them, as the spokesman here claims support in Saudi Arabia.

Boko Haram has consistently targeted institutions, practices, and people that would stand in the way of their imposition of Sharia, to which the government in Abuja responded this week: but what are your demands?

More on this story. "Boko Haram vows to fight until Nigeria establishes sharia law," by Monica Mark for the Guardian, January 27:

The Islamist group Boko Haram, which has killed almost 1,000 people in Nigeria, will continue its campaign of violence until the country is ruled by sharia law, a senior member has told the Guardian. "We will consider negotiation only when we have brought the government to their knees," the spokesman, Abu Qaqa, said in the group's first major interview with a western newspaper. "Once we see that things are being done according to the dictates of Allah, and our members are released [from prison], we will only put aside our arms – but we will not lay them down. You don't put down your arms in Islam, you only put them aside."

Oh, Qaqa.

Qaqa, whose name is a pseudonym, said the group's members were spiritual followers of al-Qaida, and claimed they had met senior figures in the network founded by Osama bin Laden during visits to Saudia Arabia.

He chose "Qaqa" on purpose?

The interview comes a week after Boko Haram claimed responsibility for Nigeria's single deadliest terrorist attack, which killed 186 people in the northern city of Kano.

In an audio message posted on YouTube on Friday, the group's current leader, Abubakar Shekau, threatened to bomb schools and kidnap family members of government officials.

"If [security forces] are going to places of worship and destroying them, like mosques and Quranic schools, you have primary schools as well, you have secondary schools and universities, and we will start bombing them."

Shekau rejected calls for a negotiated peace from President Goodluck Jonathan, who on Thursday called for the shadowy sect to step out of the shadows and engage in dialogue.

Nigerian officials have voiced hopes for a negotiated settlement with "moderate elements" of the group. "Under the circumstances, if you look hard enough, you can find moderate elements you can communicate with," General Andrew Azazi, the national security adviser to the president, told the Wall Street Journal on Friday. [...]

Qaqa said Shekau and others had travelled to Saudi Arabia for training and funding. "Al-Qaida are our elder brothers. During the lesser Hajj [last August], our leader travelled to Saudi Arabia and met al-Qaida there. We enjoy financial and technical support from them. Anything we want from them we ask them." [...]

But Qaqa said the rights of the country's 70 million Christians, who represent half of Nigeria's population, "would be protected" under the group's envisioned Islamic state. "Even the prophet Mohammed lived with non-Muslims and he gave them their dues." But he said everyone must abide by sharia law: "There are no exceptions. Even if you are a Muslim and you don't abide by sharia, we will kill you. Even if you are my own father, we will kill you."...

That Muslim Brotherhood? The moderate, "largely secular" one? This is, of course, not so much a departure as moving from one department to another: Hamas' charter describes itself as "one of the wings of the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine," and the leader of the Brotherhood in Egypt, Mohammed Badie, has praised Hamas as a role model.

"Source: Hamas' Meshaal Sets Sights on Brotherhood Post," from the Investigative Project on Terrorism, January 27:

Hamas' out-going politburo chairman is leaving the Palestinian terrorist group to take a "high position in the Muslim Brotherhood movement," a "well-informed source in Hamas" told the Nazareth-based Arabic-language Al-Sinnara last week.

The move would see Khaled Meshaal—the longtime Damascus-based leader of Hamas—transition to a new, more international role, as head of the "Supreme Council of the [Brotherhood] movement." The Council is said to be "responsible for political issues," according to the report. It remains to be seen whether the article is referring to the group's Guidance Bureau, which largely deals with the movement's political affairs, or with another body altogether.

If true, the news would help explain why Meshaal has been so adamant about not seeking re-election. Earlier reports noted that the group made an official plea for Meshaal "to reconsider" his stance.

"This is a public matter that the Hamas institutions should decide, and not an individual person," the group said.

Not a day later, an informed Palestinian source told Ynet that Meshaal's request to withdraw from the one-man race was denied by the group's Shura Council, and that he would indeed continue to serve as the politburo chief.

It has been speculated that if Meshaal exits, the post could go to Hamas' Gaza-based Prime Minister, Ismail Haniyeh, or Hamas' original political bureau chief, Mousa Abu Marzook.

Hamas has been in a state of flux in recent months, and unrest in Syria could force the group to find a new home base for its political leadership.

Meshaal's purported move appears to have the blessing of higher-ups in the Brotherhood. According to the Al-Sinnara source, longtime Brotherhood spiritual advisor, Yusuf al-Qaradawi, is in support of the leadership jump.

How is it that Shekau studied Islam at the feet of Islamic clerics and yet did not emerge with the idea that it was a beautiful Religion of Peace? Why is this exact same misunderstanding of Islam so prevalent among Muslims, including clerics, worldwide? Why does no one in the mainstream media ever care to ask such questions of Muslim spokesmen in the U.S.?

"Shekau leading Boko Haram from the shadows," from AFP, January 28 (thanks to Clark):

KANO (AFP) – Abubakar Muhammad Shekau was once thought to have been killed, but has re-emerged to lead Islamist group Boko Haram from the shadows as it carries out a bloody onslaught in northern Nigeria.

Very little is known about Shekau, but this week he appeared on YouTube, threatening more attacks and saying Boko Haram was responsible for the January 20 violence which killed 185 people in Kano in reprisal for the arrest and torture of its members.

Aged 43, he was born in a farming village also called Shekau in northeastern Yobe state.

He moved to the nearby city of Maiduguri, Boko Haram’s base, about a decade ago, according to sources familiar with the group.

Shekau studied theology under local clerics in the Mafoni area of Maiduguri and enrolled in a government-run school for Islamic studies.

He is often shown in photos wearing a keffiyeh and seated next to an AK-47, his face intense....

The voice said to be Shekau in the message posted on YouTube on Thursday said “we attacked the security formations because our members were arrested and tortured. Our women and children have also been arrested.

“They should know that they also have wives and children,” he said. “We can also abduct them. It is not beyond our powers.”

In another part of the message, he says, “I enjoy killing anyone that God commands me to kill the way I enjoy killing chickens and rams.”

Every day my email box is filled with torrents of abuse and threats. There are at least three websites that are almost wholly dedicated to showing what a stupid and evil person I am, and ugly to boot. Opinions I never held and statements I never made, approving of genocide, racism, fascism, etc., are routinely ascribed to me. People I've stood in a room with once or twice, or said something polite about, are in numerous reports my closest collaborators, with my wholehearted approval for every supposedly wicked thing they've ever done. People I've never met claim to know all about my motives, my character, and my innnermost thoughts, and eagerly "expose" just how rotten they are.

All this just comes with the territory. It is by now obvious that the Islamic supremacist machine in the U.S., and the Left as well, doesn't just try to show its enemies to be wrong. In fact, it usually doesn't attempt that at all, or if it does, it does on false pretenses. No, what the Islamic supremacists and the Left do is try to demonize and marginalize their opponents, so that no decent person would dare to be seen with them. And even among cowardly and craven conservatives, this tactic has traction. And so in sum, I am confident that I have been insulted, abused, lied about, and threatened far, far more than Abas Idris ever was. As Pamela Geller says, "I figure I am owed about a trillion bucks, give or take."

"Jury sides with Muslim guard in harassment case," by Bob Egelko in the San Francisco Chronicle via Moonbattery, January 26 (thanks to Pamela Geller):

A San Francisco jury has awarded $465,400 to a Muslim of African descent who quit his job as a security guard after a co-worker called him a "goddamn terrorist," supervisors made racist comments and a top company official endorsed a statement that "Muslims kill people."

The Superior Court jury found Thursday that Abas Idris' employer, Andrews International, was responsible for harassment and a hostile work environment that forced Idris to resign, and awarded him $65,400 for lost wages and emotional distress. On Monday, the jury added $400,000 in punitive damages.

Idris, 27, said Tuesday he's had other security jobs both before and after his 2 1/2-year stint with Andrews, but none in which "co-workers and superiors were referring to me as a terrorist or referring to me as al Qaeda."

He said the court case allowed him to stand up for his rights and to make it clear that "Islam is a religion of peace."

Yes, it certainly establishes that.

Andrews International, a worldwide security company based in Los Angeles, plans to appeal the verdict, attorney Madonna Herman said Tuesday.

"Andrews does not condone discrimination or harassment of any kind," Herman said in a statement. She said the company promoted Idris to a supervisory position and accommodated his requests for schedule changes.

Idris, of Eritrean descent, was brought to the United States from Saudi Arabia by his parents when he was 2. He was hired by Andrews as a security officer at the Letterman Digital Arts Center in the Presidio in September 2010 and made $14 an hour....

Later, Idris said, one supervisor told him that war was one of the "pillars of Islam," and another said that "Muslims kill people," particularly gays.

Idris said a co-worker told him about a January 2010 conversation with a fellow security officer who referred to Idris as a "goddamn terrorist" and added, "You can't trust al Qaeda."

Idris said no one took his complaints seriously. When the incidents were discussed at a supervisors' meeting in February 2010, he said, the company's regional director, Tom Dinnauer, described Idris as "a rat with an agenda" and said his supervisor, who had declared that Muslims kill people, "has a good point."

Idris said he quit his job that month in fear for his safety.

The mainstream media and the Islamic supremacist Hamas-linked hate group CAIR are still doing all they can to whip up a frenzy about the NYPD's showing of the film The Third Jihad to police officers.

Lost in the hysteria is the question of whether there is anything inaccurate or false in the film -- no one who is protesting against this film is going beyond the claim that it is "Islamophobic." In a sane world, Kelly and Bloomberg would not be apologizing at all. They'd be saying, "Yes, we showed the film, and we're going to keep showing it, and what of it? If the Muslims in New York are upset about it being inaccurate, let them demonstrate its inaccuracy by taking positive steps to fight in their own community against the stealth jihad activity that the film documents."

Also, in a sane world, the Mayor and the NYPD would not be expected to reach out to the Muslim community and prove their good will. The Muslim community would be reaching out to the Mayor and the NYPD, eager to prove its good will. And the Mayor and the NYPD would be telling Hamas-linked CAIR that its counterterror cooperation was not enough, instead of letting this execrable Islamic supremacist Hamas front dictate New York City's counterterror operations.

But instead, we get more inverted reality coverage: "Really? Bloomberg Says Anti-Islam Film Flap Hurts NYPD's 'Credibility' With Muslims," from Gothamist, January 27:

Top cop Ray Kelly and his spokesman Paul Browne have been on the defensive all week after they were caught lying, or misremembering, the details of Kelly's involvement in an Islamophobic propaganda film that was screened on a continuous loop for over 1,300 officers. Asked again about the controversy yesterday, Mayor Blooomberg told reporters, "Anything like this doesn’t help credibility. Ray’s got to work at establishing, or re-establishing, or reinforcing the credibility that he does have [with the Muslim community]. In other news, the NYPD has credibility with the Muslim community?

Not so much, says Cyrus McGoldrick of [Hamas-linked] CAIR-NY, a group that advocates for Muslim civil rights and has called for Kelly's ouster. "This controversy has moved beyond an issue of poor judgment in the use of an Islamophobic training film to an issue of the integrity of public officials," McGoldrick said in a statement. CAIR-NY and several other groups also called for Browne's resignation, and even Bloomberg criticized his storytelling abilities. "I keep saying to everybody, ‘Get the whole story out right away,’ and that’s to keep it from going on and on and on, and to give the public the information they need," said Bloomberg. "That wasn’t done as well as we could have done it, and next time we’ll do it a little bit better."...

Sir, yes, sir! We will not offend Muslims by training the NYPD to fight jihad, sir!

Hamas-linked CAIR smells blood, and is going in for the kill. They've eliminated any truth about Islam and jihad from national FBI training, and are now trying to eliminate it everywhere. The outcome will be a cadre of agents and police officers who are full of politically correct nonsense that will render them clueless and complacent in the face of jihad activity. And so the jihad in the U.S. will advance unimpeded.

How, then, pray tell, is Islam so consistently "misunderstood," across geographical areas and schools of jurisprudence, with respect to jihad warfare, and the rights of women and non-Muslims, from Great Britain to Nigeria to Algeria to Tunisia to France to Egypt to Germany to Turkey to the Palestinian territories to Lebanon to Syria to Saudi Arabia to (big breath) Yemen to Iraq to Iran to Afghanistan to Pakistan to Kashmir to the Maldives to Bangladesh to Indonesia to Malaysia?

"Islam 'most misunderstood' religion in world: Hina Rabbani Khar," from the Press Trust of India, January 26 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

DAVOS: Islam is the "most misunderstood" and "misrepresented" faith in the world, Pakistan Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar said today and acknowledged that illiterate and irresponsible people have been allowed to take the religion in their hands.

"In my mind Islam is the most misunderstood and misrepresented religion in the world. For example, Islam is the one religion that reinforces respect for women but we, the entire world must take responsibility because we have let Islam to be misrepresented," Khar said during a debate on Democracy at the World Economic Forum ( WEF) here.

She said Islam supports best of the democracies and her country would become the best example of this fact in ten years of time.

"If you ask whether Islam will come in the way of democracy, it is the other way round. Islam supports best of the democracies. Islam and democracy are not contradictory forces. They are rather supportive forces. Pakistan will become the best example of this fact in ten years of time.

"We have to take Islam away from the hands of the left overs of the society. We have let illiterate and irresponsible people take Islam in their hands. But it is also the duty of the Western world to understand the difference. They have been very biased on various occasions," she added.

"A big bias has been shown say in cases like Palestine and Kashmir," she alleged.

Remember when that "radical fringe" was sure to be a harmless, ineffectual sideshow of a Tiny Minority of Extremists? Not only is the Tiny Minority once again less tiny and inconsequential than advertised, but they do not need to attain absolute power to do very real damage to human rights and civil liberties.

There is also the matter of mixed and ambiguous messages: Tunisia's leaders here are finding it more difficult to uphold the inconsistency of saying the "right" things to different people. "Tunisia's Islamic leaders pressured by radical fringe," from Agence France-Presse, January 26 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

AFP - Tunisia's moderate Islamist leaders are under pressure from a radical Muslim fringe, forcing them to stress their liberal democratic credentials without alienating their base, analysts say.

Ultra-conservative Salafists have in past months launched bold challenges -- demanding full-face veils for female university students, castigating a TV channel for a "blasphemous" film and beating up journalists at a protest.

Their actions have heightened tensions in the north African country that was under secular rule for decades until the overthrow a year ago of strongman Zine El Abidine Ben Ali kicked off the Arab Spring and led to elections in October.

Moderate Islamist Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali, who took power in December, has this week adopted a firmer tone, while his Ennahda party also took unusually clear positions against the extremist religious activists.

On Tuesday, the authorities intervened to end a two months old sit-in protest by Salafists on a university campus, the faculty of letters at Manouba, about 25 kilometres (15 miles) from the capital Tunis.

The students, most of whom were not enrolled at the university, had camped out there since November to demand the right for women students to wear the full veil, known as the niqab, and for a place of prayer on campus.

Police removed them on the first day of delayed exams. The university had banned the niqab citing security concerns if students wore it with a flowing garment, which would conceal them from head to toe.

Also this week, Ennahda in an unprecedented statement affirmed its commitment to free expression and dissociated itself from a legal action lawyers close to Islamist groups launched against the privately-owned Nessma satellite TV station. [...]

The prime minister in a speech to the national assembly this week stressed his determination "to enforce the law" and denounced the beatings of journalists.

"The government is worried," said Ali Laidi Ben Mansour, editor in chief of Nessma and of news site webmanagercenter. "From my point of view, a confrontation is looming between the 'moderate Islamists' of Ennahda and the radical Salafists.

"Until now the Salafists -- who are certainly a minority but capable of mobilizing and acting -- have taken advantage of the government's hesitation."

He said Ennahda has no deep interest in facing up to this problem, which highlights that the party itself is "torn between hawks and doves".

The Salafists have a hard core of about 200 people but 5,000-7,000 supporters, including backers of Ben Ali's dissolved party, according to estimates.

"The fact remains that much of the base for Ennahda is close to that doctrine," said researcher Alaya Allani, specialist in Islamic movements in North Africa.

Suddenly, Tunisia's ruling Islamist party "finds itself in a very difficult situation," said the researcher. "It does not want go to war with the Salafists, because it does not want to lose that base before the next election.

"But it won't be able to maintain its stance of ambiguity much longer."

Across the world, one could argue that the world's biggest Islamophobes are Sunnis attacking Shi'ites, and vice-versa. Where's the outrage for that? "Dozens Killed in Attack on Iraqi Funeral Procession," by Sam Dagher and Ali A. Nabhan for the Wall Street Journal, January 27:

BAGHDAD—Dozens of people were killed and wounded when a suicide car bomber attacked a funeral procession in Baghdad on Friday, days after an al Qaeda-linked insurgent group warned it would step up its fight against Iraq's government, security forces and Shiite majority.

The suicide bomber rammed his explosives-laden vehicle into a crowd that included the pallbearers at a funeral for an Iraqi army commander's brother, according to a Ministry of Interior official. The commander had been assassinated along with three other people on Thursday.

Friday's attack in the predominantly Shiite neighborhood of Zafaraniyah on the capital's southeastern side left at least 31 people dead and another 60 wounded, according to the official.

The explosion happened in a congested section of the working class neighborhood near a hospital, an outdoor food market and an apartment building.

"I saw bodies strewn all over the place," said a witness. "The women fishmongers are all gone, not a single one is left."

Hours after the attack a fire truck was seen hosing down blood and debris at the scene as grieving families waited to receive the bodies of their loved ones from the hospital for burial.

In a separate attack before nightfall, a roadside bomb planted next to an outdoor soccer field in the predominantly Sunni neighborhood of Ghazaliya in western Baghdad killed one person and wounded three, according to the Ministry of Interior official. There was no claim of responsibility for Friday's attacks.

The attacks came after a warning earlier this week of more violence from a group linked to al Qaeda in Iraq.

"Today we have retaken the initiative attacking and appearing whenever and wherever we please," said a man identifying himself as Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, the spokesman for the Islamic State of Iraq, in an audio message posted online this week. The group is typically described as a front for al Qaeda in Iraq. The authenticity of the recording couldn't be independently verified.

Iraq has seen a significant increase over the past few weeks in suicide bombings, the type of violence usually associated with al Qaeda-linked militants.

The Islamic State of Iraq, which was significantly weakened in recent years following the deaths and capture of many of its leaders, appears to be exploiting the end of the U.S. military mission in Iraq last month, the Iraqi government's distraction by a political crisis and a rise in sectarian tensions. The group's goal is to establish a fundamentalist Sunni Islamic state in Iraq. It considers the country's Shiite majority apostates....

And apostates are lawful for slaughter under Islamic law. By the same principle by which Shi'ite Iran wants to execute a Christian pastor who left Islam, al-Qaeda in Iraq wants to execute Shi'ites.

And maybe killing that many people will bring about paradise under Sharia. They keep trying, and it keeps not working. "Gunmen shoot police officers in flashpoint Nigerian city," by Aminu Abubakar for Agence France-Presse, January 27:

Gunmen opened fire on a police station Friday and two officers were feared dead in the Nigerian city of Kano, where attacks claimed by Islamist group Boko Haram left 185 dead last week.

Boko Haram consistently attacks institutions, people, and practices that would stand in the way of their imposition of Sharia.

The latest attack occurred just before 7:00 pm, the start of a nighttime curfew in effect since last week's attacks, residents said.

"Gunmen came on motorcycles and one all-terrain van and opened fire on the police station," a resident said. "It was quite brief, lasting not more than five minutes ... Two policemen lay in pools of blood."

The resident said the officers appeared to have been killed, but their condition could not be immediately confirmed. Another resident reported gunshots but could not say whether any officers had been hit.

Both claimed they heard the gunmen shouting "Allahu Akbar." [...]

The purported head of Boko Haram said in an Internet message that he ordered the gun and bomb attacks that rocked Kano last week, the deadliest assault attributed to the shadowy group.

"We were responsible," said Abubakar Muhammad Shekau in the audio message posted on YouTube. "I ordered it and I will give that order again and again. God gave us victory."
The authenticity of the Hausa language message could not be independently verified but the photo appeared to match others said to be of the Boko Haram leader.

Jihad causes poverty:

The violence sparked fear in the city, the economic heart of Nigeria's mainly Muslim north. [...]

Boko Haram has previously said that it wants to create an Islamic state in Nigeria's deeply impoverished north, and has charged the government with harassing Muslims and raiding Islamic schools....

Greasy Islamophobes in Britain once again impede a Muslim's expression of the beautiful Religion of Peace.

"Asim Kausar jailed over ricin recipe find," from the BBC, January 27 (thanks to David):

A man who downloaded a recipe for the deadly poison ricin and documents about how to make bombs has been jailed for two years and three months.

Asim Kausar, 25, from Bolton, kept the information on a computer pen drive.

The material only came to light after Kausar's family suffered a burglary and the memory stick was handed in to police.

Kausar pleaded guilty to four charges under the Terrorism Act at Manchester Crown Court.

The memory stick contained details about ricin, assassination and torture techniques, and how to construct improvised explosive devices (IEDs).

Police had been given it so officers could view CCTV images of the break-in stored on the device.

They then came across the terror-related information....

Whoops!

The documents were entitled Improvised Munitions Handbook and Unconventional Warfare Devices and Techniques.

Kausar told officers he had downloaded the information out of "curiosity and a thirst for knowledge".

Yeah, sure, that's it. Work on your "war is deceit" act, there, Kausar.

The court heard Kausar had "scoured the internet" between January 2009 and June 2011 and the information he downloaded ran into thousands of pages of documents.

Sentencing him, the Recorder of Manchester Judge Andrew Gilbart QC said there was no evidence that the offending went beyond collecting information.

However he said he was satisfied Kausar's actions "went beyond mere idle curiosity"....

When Kausar's bedroom was searched, police found what appeared to be a "shopping list" of munitions, said Riel Karmy-Jones, prosecuting, with prices marked down next to entries of various weapons and ammunition.

His mobile phone was also seized which contained a photograph of Kausar posing with an AK rifle - believed to have been taken in Pakistan.

The court was also told about a letter written by Kausar in which he said: "I want to fight jihad for Allah".

The letter also asked "whether he would be able to fight and whether his martyrdom would be accepted".

Carrying on (allegedly) with "different men from the neighborhood": haram. Murdering with an axe the person so accused: halal.

It is no accident or coincidence that Muslims commit 91 percent of honor killings worldwide. A manual of Islamic law certified as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy by Al-Azhar University, the most respected authority in Sunni Islam, says that "retaliation is obligatory against anyone who kills a human being purely intentionally and without right." However, "not subject to retaliation" is "a father or mother (or their fathers or mothers) for killing their offspring, or offspring's offspring." ('Umdat al-Salik o1.1-2). In other words, someone who kills his child incurs no legal penalty under Islamic law.

Syria in 2009 scrapped a law limiting the length of sentences for honor killings, but "the new law says a man can still benefit from extenuating circumstances in crimes of passion or honour 'provided he serves a prison term of no less than two years in the case of killing.'" And in 2003 the Jordanian Parliament voted down on Islamic grounds a provision designed to stiffen penalties for honor killings. Al-Jazeera reported that "Islamists and conservatives said the laws violated religious traditions and would destroy families and values."

Nonetheless, the media drumbeat is constant: honor killings have nothing to do with Islam. And so they continue, as no one ever challenges Muslim authorities to do anything to stop them.

"Honour killing: Suspect surrenders, ‘confident of acquittal,’" by Owais Jafferi for the Express Tribune, January 24 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

MUZAFFARGARH: Allah Bachaya has surrendered himself to Rohilanwali police after killing his sister in the name of honour but he is confident that he will be released in a matter of days.

Bachaya gave his arrest on Saturday after killing Alina* in an axe attack for alleged loose morals.

He told The Express Tribune that he was certain his brother-in-law would withdraw the case as it was a matter of family’s honour. “I have killed her because she brought disgrace to the family’s name,” Bachaya said.

“She had become a nuisance. I feel no remorse over my actions. I am backed by the family. They were in favour of my decision to kill her,” he said.

Bachaya said Alina* had eloped more than once with [different] men from the neighbourhood. On Saturday, he said, she had returned home after spending three days with a man.

Alina*, 25, was married to Muhammad Akhtar. The couple had three children.

Akhtar, who is the complainant in the FIR against Bachaya, told The Tribune that while he had filed a complaint in the matter he might withdraw it in a few days.

“I believe he (Bachaya) has not done wrong. Nothing is above honour,” he said. “I would have also taken similar action had my sister left her husband and eloped with someone else,” he said, “I filed the report so that the police are informed of the matter. I don’t plan on prosecuting him (Bachaya),” he said. He said he would soon inform the police in writing that he had pardoned the suspect.

“When she returned home on Saturday, I sat down with her and tried to make her realise the consequences of her actions but she kept straying from the topic,” he said.

Later, he said, Bachaya came over to his house on finding out that Alina* had returned. Following an argument, he said, Bachaya attacked Alina* with an axe, chopping both her legs. She died while she was being taken to hospital....

I tried to tell you. Or maybe Larijani is just a "fearmongering Islamophobe."

"Iranian leader: Egypt’s new parliament a step toward Islamic regime," from Al-Masry Al-Youm's Egypt Independent, January 26 (thanks to Wimpy):

The inauguration of Egypt's new parliament is an important step toward fulfilling public demands for the establishment of a regime based on Islam, said Ali Larijani, speaker of the Iranian parliament, in a letter on Wednesday. The letter was sent to Saad al-Katatny, People's Assembly speaker.

In the letter, Larijani extended his congratulations to Katatny and expressed pleasure that the latter had been elected as parliamentary speaker.

In the message, posted on Al-Alam channel online, Larijani also said he hoped that brotherly ties between the two countries would grow stronger.

Given the importance of parliamentary cooperation in the development of bilateral relations, Iran's parliament is ready to help promote parliamentary collaboration, Larijani said....

In November, Mojtaba Amani, director of the office for Iranian interests in Cairo, said he expected diplomatic relations between Cairo and Tehran to normalize after Egypt's parliamentary elections.

Will the Islamophobia never end? "Md. Man Caught in Sting Pleads Guilty in Bomb Plot," by Sarah Brumfield for the Associated Press, January 26 (thanks to all who sent this in):

A Maryland man pleaded guilty Thursday to trying to detonate what he thought was a car bomb outside a military recruiting center in suburban Baltimore, saying he was motivated by what he saw as an American war on Islam.

Antonio Martinez entered the plea to the charge of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction against federal property. The plot to bomb the Armed Forces Recruiting Center in Catonsville in December 2010 was foiled by an FBI sting.

The 22-year-old had also faced a charge of trying to kill U.S. officers and employees, but prosecutors agreed to drop the second charge at sentencing. The deal calls for a 25-year prison term.

Martinez wore a burgundy jumpsuit and his hair in two braids in court, and he smiled and hugged his defense attorney. The U.S. citizen born who was born abroad preferred to be called Muhammad Hussain after his conversion to Islam and signed the plea using both names.

Public records are unclear about when Martinez, who was born to a Nicaraguan father and an African-American mother, moved to Maryland, but he attended Laurel High School in Prince George's County, a Washington suburb. The former part-time construction worker said in court Thursday that he finished 10th grade.

In the plea agreement, Martinez acknowledges that he wanted to pursue jihad to the United States "to send a message that all American soldiers would be killed so long as the country continued its 'war' against Islam."

An FBI informant first communicated with Martinez on Facebook after seeing public posts "espousing his extremist views" and recognizing him from a mosque he attended, according to court documents. The documents say Martinez later told the informant of his ideas for attacking military-linked sites and said all he thought about was jihad.

Authorities say Martinez' ideas ranged from a bombing and armed attack to burning the building down. He told an undercover FBI agent that he wanted to make jihadist activities his profession, dedicating his life to the cause, according to the plea.

Martinez decided on a car bomb after a discussion with the undercover agent because "using a bomb would allow him to commit further acts here and overseas," prosecutor Christine Manuelian said....

After his arrest, Martinez confessed that the attack was his idea, he wanted to be a martyr and he had expected an explosion that would level the front of the building, according to the plea.

After the hearing, FBI Special Agent in Charge Richard McFeely thanked members of the Muslim community for reaching out to law enforcement and identifying a threat....

What exactly did they do? Will Hamas-linked CAIR upbraid them, in light of the advice they've given out elsewhere, as in this poster?

In FrontPage this morning I discuss the ongoing travesty in New York, as Hamas-linked CAIR shouts "Jump!" and the dhimmi Mayor Bloomberg responds, "How high?"

A controversy has broken out this week that epitomizes how bold the Islamic supremacist forces in the U.S. have become, and how weak and supine those who are charged with protecting the public have become.

The New York Times has run a news story and an indignant unsigned editorial about the showing of The Third Jihad, a relatively tepid anti-jihad film, to New York Police Department personnel. The Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) immediately got into the act, compelling New York’s ever ready to accommodate Mayor Michael Bloomberg to apologize and denounce the film, which he almost certainly has not seen. But that wasn’t enough for Hamas-linked CAIR: they’re calling now for the resignation of New York’s Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.

And that stands to reason, based on the principle that when one’s enemy is down, one should kick him some more. Hamas-linked CAIR sees its chance to end all effective counter-terror measures in New York, and is going for it.

This whole controversy is epitomized by the photo illustration and lead paragraph of the first New York Times story on this issue: “In Police Training, a Dark Film on U.S. Muslims,” which was by Michael Powell and appeared in the January 23 issue. The photo shows the black flag of jihad flying above the White House, with the caption, “An Islamic flag atop the White House in ‘The Third Jihad.’”

Then the lead paragraph says: “Ominous music plays as images appear on the screen: Muslim terrorists shoot Christians in the head, car bombs explode, executed children lie covered by sheets and a doctored photograph shows an Islamic flag flying over the White House.”

Both the Times’ use of the image and its reference to it at the beginning of the story suggest that the producers of The Third Jihad doctored the photo themselves in order to push their cockamamie idea that some Muslims want to “infiltrate and dominate America.” But in reality, Muslims originated this image, as we have reported here several times. Here is a photo of Muslims holding up this photo at a rally in New York in February 2006:

And another:

Yet this whole controversy is predicated on the assumption that The Third Jihad is whipping up hysteria about a non-existent threat. In reality, it covers much the same ground that I cover in my book Stealth Jihad, in which I show that the agenda of infiltration and subversion on the part of the Muslim Brotherhood and its allied groups is very real.

In “An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Brotherhood in North America,” by Mohamed Akram, May 19, 1991, Muslim Brotherhood operatives in the U.S. are told that they “must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and “sabotaging” its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.”

There is more.

From Yahoo News:

NEW YORK, Jan. 26, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A prominent national human rights and advocacy organization is asking New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and city officials to resist efforts by the Hamas-linked Islamic supremacist hate group the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) to dictate the nature and content of anti-terror training for New York Police Department personnel

The request by the American Freedom Defense Initiative (AFDI) and its Stop Islamization of America (SIOA) program comes after Hamas-linked CAIR, one of the nation's most notorious Islamic supremacist hate groups, demanded the resignation of New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly for allowing the counter-jihad film The Third Jihad to be shown to NYPD personnel. AFDI/SIOA respectfully requests that the New York City government repudiate this attempt by Hamas-linked CAIR to interfere with and impede counterterrorism training.

AFDI/SIOA Executive Director Pamela Geller said in a statement: "AFDI/SIOA deplores the attempts by Hamas-linked CAIR and a thoroughly compromised New York Times to undermine the security of New Yorkers by demanding the removal of accurate material about the jihad threat from NYPD training. AFDI/SIOA calls on Mayor Bloomberg to reject the persecution of Police Commissioner Kelly, and to reaffirm him in his position. New York's leaders must not cave in to Hamas-linked CAIR's campaign to outlaw the truth about jihad and Islamic supremacism, thereby making us all more vulnerable to them."

Hamas-linked CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror funding case -- so named by the Justice Department during the trial of the Islamic charity known as the Holy Land Foundation.

CAIR has previously attempted to intimidate numerous government agencies and citizens' groups into dropping events featuring foes of international jihad activity, including SIOA's Executive Director Pamela Geller, SIOA's Associate Director Robert Spencer, ACT for America's Brigitte Gabriel, and others. In the summer of 2010 it has embarked upon a concerted campaign of intimidation and defamation to silence public figures who speak out against jihad and Islamic terrorism, including Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY), the Rev. Franklin Graham, Florida Congressional candidate Dan Fanelli, and Connecticut Congressional candidate Rick Torres.

CAIR's attempt to intimidate the NYPD and dictate its choice of training materials is consistent with its long record of pro-jihad duplicity and deception. Although it has received millions of dollars in donations from foreign Islamic entities, it has not registered as a foreign agent as required by the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), despite spreading Islamic supremacist propaganda within the United States.

Although it presents itself as a civil rights group, CAIR actually has numerous links to Islamic supremacist and jihad groups. CAIR founders Omar Ahmad and Niwad Awad (who still serves as CAIR's executive director) were present at a Hamas planning meeting in Philadelphia in 1993 where they and other Hamas operatives conspired to raise funds for Hamas and to promote jihad in the Middle East. CAIR has steadfastly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups.

Several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror:

-- Ghassan Elashi, founder of CAIR's Texas chapter, in 2009
received a 65-year prison sentence for funneling over $12
million from the Islamic charity known as the Holy Land
Foundation to the jihad terrorist group Hamas, which is
responsible for murdering hundreds of Israeli civilians
-- Mousa Abu Marzook, a former CAIR official, was in 1995
designated by the U.S. government in 1995 as a "terrorist and
Hamas leader." He now is a Hamas leader in Syria.
-- Randall Royer, CAIR's former civil rights coordinator, in 2004
began serving a 20-year prison sentence for aiding al-Qaida and
the Taliban against American troops in Afghanistan and
recruiting for Lashkar e-Taiba, the jihadist group responsible
for the 2008 Mumbai jihad massacres.
-- Bassem Khafagi, CAIR's former community relations director, was
arrested for involvement with the Islamic Assembly of North
America, which was linked to al-Qaida. After pleading guilty to
visa and bank fraud charges, Khafagi was deported.
-- Rabih Haddad, a former CAIR fundraiser, was deported for his
work with the Global Relief Foundation (which he co-founded), a
terror-financing organization.

In 1998 Omar Ahmad, CAIR's co-founder and longtime Board Chairman, said: "Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Koran should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth."

After he received unwelcome publicity as a result of this statement, Ahmad denied saying it, several years after the fact. However, the original reporter, Lisa Gardiner of the Fremont Argus, stands by her story.

CAIR's spokesman Ibrahim Hooper once said: "I wouldn't want to create the impression that I wouldn't like the government of the United States to be Islamic sometime in the future."

SIOA is one of America's foremost organizations defending human rights, religious liberty, and the freedom of speech against Islamic supremacist intimidation and attempts to bring elements of Sharia to the United States.

The jizya tax is a state protection racket. This was a private-enterprise version, of which there are many in Egypt now, as this report describes. "Nag Hammadi: Muslim bandits kill two Copts. Christians live in fear of being kidnapped," from AsiaNews, January 27:

Cairo (AsiaNews / Agencies) - Two Copts, father and son, were killed yesterday in Bahgourah, a suburb of Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt, shot dead by a Muslim bandit, and his accomplices because they refused to pay the money demanded by the racket. Four days ago the head of the gang, Ahmed Saber, asked Moawad Asaad, a Coptic contractor for a large sum of money to enable him to continue working.

Yesterday afternoon Ahmed Saber went to Asaad’s home to demand the money, the Copt refused to get into Saber’s car to speak, for fear of being kidnapped. At that point, four men came out of the car armed with machine guns and opened fire on Moawad and his son Asaad Mowad an engineer. Both were killed instantly. Their deaths have sparked the protest of thousands of Christian Copts outside the government building at Nag Hammadi, demanding protection for the Coptic community, the victim of racketeering and violence by Muslims. A sit-in is taking place in front of police headquarters, attended by four thousand people who have vowed to continue the protest until Ahmed Saber and his accomplices are arrested.

The Bishop of Nag Hammadi, Kyrollos, said since last year Ahmed Saber, well known to the police, has extorted money from members of the Coptic community, and kidnapped the children of Christians to get the ransom money. "Police have received numerous complaints about these crimes. I do not understand why they have not arrested them. I think that the police, and Muslims, are fully responsible for the situation of terror in which the Copts of Bahgourah live." The bishop called the authorities in Cairo, and the Interior Ministry demanding that protection be provided to the Copts living in the Nag Hammadi, "who are constantly subject to kidnappings and terror."

Here is a sterling example of how the mainstream media lies to the American people and misleads them about the nature and breadth of jihad activity in this country as well as elsewhere. "Motive of shooter who targeted military sites is unclear," by Josh White for the Washington Post, January 26:

Yonathan Melaku was sneaking through Fort Myer and Arlington National Cemetery, his backpack filled with plastic bags of ammonium nitrate, a notebook containing jihadist messages, and a can of black spray paint. The 23-year-old former Marine was heading to the graves of the nation’s most recent heroes, aiming to desecrate the stones with Arabic statements and leave handfuls of explosive material nearby as a message.

Before police foiled the plan in June, the vandalism was to be Melaku’s sixth attack, months after he went on a mysterious shooting spree that targeted the Pentagon, the National Museum of the Marine Corps and two other military buildings in Northern Virginia. A video found after Melaku’s arrest showed him wearing a black mask and shooting a 9mm handgun out of his Acura’s passenger window as he drove along Interstate 95, shouting “Allahu Akbar!”

It was all part of a solitary campaign of “fear and terror,” federal prosecutors said. But authorities and Melaku’s defense attorney said no one knows for sure what led Melaku — a naturalized U.S. citizen from Ethi­o­pia, local high school graduate and former Marine Corps Reservist — down that path or what message he was trying to send.

Melaku stood in U.S. District Court in Alexandria on Thursday morning to plead guilty to three counts, including shooting at the Pentagon on Oct. 19, 2010, and attempting to injure veterans’ memorials on U.S. property. As part of a plea agreement, Melaku admitted to using his legally obtained 9mm handgun to shoot the National Museum of the Marine Corps, the Pentagon and two military recruiting offices in October and November 2010.

The agreement calls for Melaku to serve 25 years in prison. Judge Gerald Bruce Lee accepted the plea, and Melaku is scheduled for sentencing on April 27.

Although Melaku acknowledged shooting at the buildings — attacks that did not injure anyone but caused an estimated $111,000 in damage — it still remains unclear why he did it. In a video entered into evidence and released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia, Melaku says that he was targeting the museum as a military building, to “turn it off permanently.”

FBI officials and prosecutors said Melaku was on a personal terror mission. They said he researched jihadism on the Internet and had references to terrorism in a notebook and on his computer. It also seemed like he was gathering materials to make an improvised explosive device, though there was no indication how he would have used it.

Melaku wanted “to create fear and terror, which is what terrorists do,” said Dana Boente, first assistant U.S. Attorney in Alexandria.

Special Agent Jacqueline Maguire, of the FBI’s Washington Field Office, said it was fortunate authorities caught Melaku before anyone was injured. She said it appears Melaku acted alone....

When asked what he wanted to plead to the three counts included in his agreement, Melaku leaned forward to a microphone and said: “Uh, guilty, sir.”

Gregory English, Melaku’s defense lawyer, said after the hearing that Melaku’s family is of the Coptic Christian faith and that they were stunned to learn of his involvement in the crimes and the references to Islamic jihad. English said the shootings were out of character for Melaku, and he wonders whether his client suffers from a psychological problem, which he has asked the court to evaluate.

Or maybe he just converted to Islam, as appears abundantly to be the case.

English said Melaku thought that by shooting at the buildings he did, late at night, no one would get hurt. English said the video was intended for YouTube.

“As bad as it is, this is someone who essentially broke windows,” English said. “It’s vandalism. He has no link to terrorism. . . . He had a message, but I don’t understand what that message was supposed to be.”

He "essentially broke windows," but what if someone had been on the wrong end of the bullets he shot out of his Acura while shouting "Allahu akbar"? "He has no link to terrorism" -- i.e. they didn't find an Al-Qaeda membership card in his wallet. Researching "jihadism" and shouting "Allahu akbar" while shooting a gun out of a car window doesn't count in English's politically correct world.

Poor Mohammad Shafia can't catch a break. First, his first wife and daughters die in a tragic accident that just happens -- pure coincidence! -- to show all the signs of an Islamic honor killing, and now this, which won't help his Poor Victimized Man of Peace act one bit.

"Shafia trial to resume after bomb scare prompts delay," from CTVNews, January 26 (thanks to Pamela Geller):

The Shafia family murder trial in Kingston, Ont. is expected to resume Thursday afternoon with increased security after a bomb scare shut down proceedings earlier in the day.

People have started returning to the courthouse but police procedures, including checking for photo identification and using metal detectors, have made for long waits.

There is only one entry point into the building now.

Earlier Thursday, journalists and spectators who had lined up hours before court was scheduled to begin were suddenly told by police they had to leave and court would resume in the afternoon.

Police would only say there was a "security concern," but a source told The Canadian Press that a bomb threat prompted the evacuation.

"I can neither confirm nor deny in regards to specifically a bomb, but we are just stating at this point in time it is a security concern," Const. Steve Koopman told The Canadian Press. "As you can see we're taking it extremely seriously."

Mohammad Shafia, 58, his wife Tooba Yahya, 42, and their son Hamed, 21, have each pleaded not guilty to four counts of first-degree murder.

They were evacuated from the courthouse Thursday in a police prisoner vehicle.

Koopman couldn't say if the security threat was directly related to the Shafia trial.

The trio is accused of killing teenage Shafia daughters Zainab, 19, Sahar, 17, and Geeti, 13, as well as Shafia's first wife in his polygamous marriage.

The Crown began its final arguments on Wednesday and was expected to wrap up Thursday. It isn't clear whether jury deliberations will still begin on Friday, as originally scheduled.

Three defence lawyers presented their final arguments Tuesday and Wednesday.

The bodies of the four were found in June 2009 in a car at the bottom of a canal in Kingston.

The Montreal family had stopped in Kingston on their way back from a trip to Niagara Falls, Ont.

The Crown has alleged that the girls were murdered by their father, his wife and their brother, and that the killing was then made to look like an accident after the fact.

The Crown's argument is built on the premise that the girls broke the family's moral code and dishonoured their family by wearing clothing that was not conservative and having secret boyfriends.

"Not conservative" is media-speak for "not Islamic." In the media's world, "conservatives" are those who uphold Sharia, and also those who oppose it.

The defence, however, calls the argument preposterous and said the deaths were the result of a tragic accident.

Yeah, and the bomb threat was actually just a harmless movie review. Nothing to see here. Move along.

In 2006 I wrote the book on the right, The Truth About Muhammad, a biography of the prophet of Islam based on the earliest Muslim accounts of his life, in order to illustrate what Muslims generally believe that Muhammad said and did. In my forthcoming book, Did Muhammad Exist? An Inquiry Into Islam's Obscure Origins, which will be published April 23 by ISI, I examine the historical value of those early Muslim accounts. It is an attempt to determine whether what Muslims believe Muhammad said and did, as recounted in The Truth About Muhammad, actually corresponds to historical reality.

There are numerous reasons to question the historicity of the early Muslim accounts of Muhammad's life. Take, for example, an incident I refer to briefly in yet another book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades):

Muhammad already had experience as a warrior before he assumed the role of prophet. He had participated in two local wars between his Quraysh tribe and their neighboring rivals Banu Hawazin.

That he participated in these wars, known collectively as the Fijar War, or Sacrilegious War, is generally agreed upon, but there is no agreement about what he thought later about his role in them. The Egyptian writer Muhammad Hussein Haykal, in his 1933 biography, Hayat Muhammad (translated into English as The Life of Muhammad), quotes Muhammad expressing regret for his participation in this war:

"I had witnessed that war with my uncle and shot a few arrows therein. How I wish I had never done so!" (Pp. 52-3)

However, the ninth-century Muslim historian Ibn Sa'd, in one of the earliest and most important sources for biographical information on Muhammad, Kitab Al-Tabaqat Al-Kabir, directly contradicts Haykal by quoting Muhammad saying this about the Fijar War:

I attended it with my uncles and shot arrows there and I do not repent it. (I.143)

So which is it? Is Haykal right that he really did express regret, or is Ibn Sa'd right that he explicitly ruled out doing so? Haykal doesn't give his source, but it is possible that he had access to a hadith or some Islamic tradition that flatly contradicted the one Ibn Sa'd recorded eleven centuries earlier -- although this is unlikely, since Ibn Sa'd often records variant and contradictory reports and discusses how they can be harmonized, or why one should be accepted and the other rejected. In this case Ibn Sa'd gives no hint of any variants. Haykal may simply have altered this tradition for apologetic purposes. Those who cite him as their source on this, or try to build an argument upon his quotation, do so at their own risk.

Nonetheless, such contradictions abound in the hadith reports. Muhammad can quite often be found saying contradictory things, as I show in Did Muhammad Exist?. In that book also I discuss how this odd situation came about: opposing factions both invoked Muhammad as an authority, and invented traditions to support their point of view.

Of course, they didn't come up with all that many decisive variants on the matter of waging war against and subjugating non-Muslims. That Muhammad was a warrior and taught warfare against non-Muslims is not disputed by any party, regardless of their view of whether or not he regretted his participation in the Fijar War -- unfortunately for infidels. Here are two of the many hadiths in which Muhammad counsels war:

"I have been commanded to fight against people so long as they do not declare that there is no god but Allah, and he who professed it was guaranteed the protection of his property and life on my behalf except for the right affairs rest with Allah." -- Sahih Muslim 30

"Fight in the name of Allah and in the way of Allah. Fight against those who disbelieve in Allah. Make a holy war...When you meet your enemies who are polytheists, invite them to three courses of action. If they respond to any one of these, you also accept it and withhold yourself from doing them any harm. Invite them to (accept) Islam; if they respond to you, accept it from them and desist from fighting against them....If they refuse to accept Islam, demand from them the Jizya. If they agree to pay, accept it from them and hold off your hands. If they refuse to pay the tax, seek Allah's help and fight them." -- Sahih Muslim 4294

UPDATE: I have received an email full of various false statements. I know the claims made about me are false, so it should come as no surprise that their claims about Arabic are false as well.

The email took issue with the points I made here on the basis that the Arabic of the passages from Haykal and Ibn Sa’d is identical. But that was not the issue in my post: the question is whether, as I said Haykal “had access to a hadith or some Islamic tradition that flatly contradicted the one Ibn Sa'd recorded eleven centuries earlier” – in other words, that led him to interpret the passage in the way that he did, such that his translator rendered it in one way, and the translator of Ibn Sa'd translated it in the opposite way.

I was working from the two-volume edition of Ibn Sa'd translated by S. Moinul Haq and published by Kitab Bhavan in New Delhi, which I have here in my office, and which is available at Islamicbookstore.com and numerous other Islamic bookstores. Did S. Moinul Haq, a respected Muslim translator of many Arabic works, really make an elementary error in his translation?

Actually, no. There is a good possibility, obliquely acknowledged in the email attacking my post, that the disputed statement from Muhammad could be translated as "I would not be pleased had I not done so." Although it is not incorrect to say that ما as a negating particle is not commonly used to negate a present tense, it still could be used, and a good majority of Arabophones use ما to negate the present tense in a variety of dialects, albeit not necessarily in written form. But this tradition purports to record what Muhammad said; why wouldn’t it be in Arabic as commonly spoken? So it is entirely possible that it uses ما to negate the present, as in common spoken form. Certainly Gulf-Arabic spoken variants do use ما to negate the present tense even today.

The double negative is not necessarily "nonsensical" here, as the email claims, and it would indeed translate into "I would not be pleased had I not done so," or “I do not repent.” To say that “repent” doesn’t appear in the Arabic is a quibble that betrays that the author of the email does not have even a basic understanding of how translation works.

The Obama administration supports “democracy” and “self determination” in the Middle East—two euphemisms that, in the real world, refer to “mob-rule” and “Islamic radicalization,” respectively. Yet, as Jimmy Carter recently put it: “I don’t have any problem with that [an “Islamist victory” in Egypt], and the U.S. government doesn’t have any problem with that either. We want the will of the Egyptian people to be expressed.”

Sounds fair enough. The problem, however, is that Muslim clerics openly and unequivocally characterize democracy and elections as tools to be discarded once they empower Sharia law. Thus Dr. Talat Zahran holds that it is “obligatory to cheat at elections—a beautiful thing”; and Sheikh Abdel Shahat insists that democracy is not merely forbidden in Islam, but kufr—a great and terrible sin—this even as he competed in Egypt’s elections.

The Obama administration can overlook such election-exploitations because the majority of Muslims are either indifferent or willing to go along with the gag—with only a minority (secularists, Copts, etc.) in Egypt actually objecting to how elections are being used to empower Sharia-enforcing Muslims.

But what if Muslims do not win elections? What if there are equal amounts of non-Muslims voting—and an “infidel” wins? What then? Then we get situations like Nigeria.

While many are aware that Boko Haram and other Islamic elements are waging jihad against the government of Nigeria, specifically targeting Christians, often overlooked is that the jihad was provoked into full-blown activity because a Christian won fair elections (Nigeria is about evenly split between Christians and Muslims).

According to Peter Run, writing back in April 2011

The current wave of riots was triggered by the Independent National Election Commission’s (INEC) announcement on Monday [April 18, 2011] that the incumbent President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, won in the initial round of ballot counts. That there were riots in the largely Muslim inhabited northern states where the defeat of the Muslim candidate Muhammadu Buhari was intolerable, [but] was unsurprising. Northerners [Muslims] felt they were entitled to the presidency for the declared winner, President Jonathan, [who] assumed leadership after the Muslim president, Umaru Yar’Adua died in office last year and radical groups in the north [Boko Haram] had seen his ascent [Christian president] as a temporary matter to be corrected at this year’s election. Now they are angry despite experts and observers concurring that this is the fairest and most independent election in recent Nigerian history.

Note some key words: Muslims felt “entitled” to the presidency and seek to “correct” the fact that a Christian won elections—which they assumed “a temporary matter.”

Of course, had elections empowered a like-minded Muslim, the same jihadis would still be there, would still have the same savage intent for Christians and Westerners—Boko Haram means “Western education is forbidden.” But there would not be a fullblown jihad, and Obama would be singing praises to Nigerian democracy and elections, and the MSM would be boasting images of Nigerians with ink-stained fingers.

Yet the same jihadi intent would be there, only dormant. Like Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood—whose ultimate goal is “mastership of the world”—they would not need to expose themselves via jihad, would be biding their time and consolidating their strength.

Now, back to the Egyptian clerics, specifically Sheikh Yassir al-Burhami—yet another leader in Egypt’s Salafi movement, who teaches that Muslims must preach peace when weak but wage war when strong. Discussing the chances of a fellow Salafi, Burhami asserts:

We say—regardless of the outcome of the elections—whether he [his colleague, the aforementioned al-Shahat] wins or loses, we will not permit an infidel [kafir] to be appointed to a post where he assumes authority over Muslims. This is forbidden. Allah said: “Never will Allah grant to infidels a way [to triumph] over the believers [Koran 4:141].” We are not worried about losing elections or al-Shahat losing votes. We will not flatter or fawn to the people.

What will you and your associates do, Sheikh Burhami—wage jihad? Of course, that will not be necessary: unlike Nigeria, most of Egypt is Muslim; one way or another, “elections” will realize the Islamist agenda.

Thus, whether by word (al-Burhami) or deed (Boko Haram) those who seek to make Islam supreme prove that democracy and elections are acceptable only insofar as they enable Sharia. Conversely, if they lead to something that contradicts Sharia—for instance, by bringing a Christian infidel to power—then the perennial jihad resumes.

Raymond Ibrahim is an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum and a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center.