An epic of misunderstanding and pollyannish fact evasion from Ralph Peters, who should know better, in USA Today, with thanks to Nicolei:
Suicide bombings. Assassinations. The wholesale murder of prisoners. The mass slaughter of 9/11. Videotaped beheadings and the execution studios recently discovered in Fallujah. We describe it as "Islamic terrorism."And we're wrong.
The hard-core terrorists spawned by the breakdown of the Middle East quote the Koran. They wear Muslim garments. They perform the daily rituals prescribed by the faith into which they were born. But all of us, in the West and the Middle East, have mistaken the identity of these butchers.
For all of their Muslim trappings, the terrorists of al-Qaeda and its affiliates have returned to pre-Islamic practices, to behaviors that Moses, Christ and Mohammed uniformly rejected: They practice human sacrifice.
The grisly decapitations caught on film and the explosives-laden cars driven into crowds, the bombings of schools and the execution of kidnapped women are not sanctioned by a single passage in the Koran. Nor are they political acts committed by freedom fighters. These are the actions of a resurrected blood cult that has nothing to do with the message of the Prophet Mohammed and everything to do with the bloodthirsty winged devils and gory altars that haunted the ancient Middle East.
The terrorists may believe that they're good Muslims — self-awareness is not a widespread human trait — but their deeds are those of the pagans Mohammed condemned....
The attack on 9/11 was not a political act. It was a religious act. But it wasn't Islamic. The Koran forbids the murder of innocents (as well as the taking of hostages and the abuse of prisoners). The 9/11 attacks were cult behavior from the dawn of civilization, employing modern tools.
We must cut through the layers of intellectual nonsense piled up by academics and pundits to get at the essence of this new — and very old — reality. When the terrorists we face invoke the names of "Allah" or "Mohammed," they are blaspheming and corrupting a great faith. The prophet was appalled by the religious practices of the early desert peoples. Those who murder in his name today have rejected his message even as they claim to revere it.
The terrorists we face aren't super-Muslims. They're Islam's worst enemies. They don't seek to turn back the calendar to the 10th century. They're reaching back to the sordid epochs when gods drank human blood.
Along with the link, Nicolei kindly sent a refutation:
"The grisly decapitations caught on film and the explosives-laden cars driven into crowds, the bombings of schools and the execution of kidnapped women are not sanctioned by a single passage in the Koran." - Ralph PetersRalph Peters obviously is not familiar with the Koran and Islamic traditions, nor with the assasination of poetess Asma Bint Marwan ordered by Mohammed.
"So, when you meet (in fight Jihâd in Allâh's Cause), those who disbelieve, smite at their necks till when you have killed and wounded many of them, then bind a bond firmly (on them, i.e. take them as captives). Thereafter (is the time) either for generosity (i.e. free them without ransom), or ransom (according to what benefits Islâm), until the war lays down its burden. Thus [you are ordered by Allâh to continue in carrying out Jihâd against the disbelievers till they embrace Islâm (i.e. are saved from the punishment in the Hell-fire) or at least come under your protection], but if it had been Allâh's Will, He Himself could certainly have punished them (without you). But (He lets you fight), in order to test you, some with others. But those who are killed in the Way of Allâh, He will never let their deeds be lost." - Koran Sura Al-Muhammad 47:4
"(Remember) when your Lord inspired the angels, "Verily, I am with you, so keep firm those who have believed. I will cast terror into the hearts of those who have disbelieved, so strike them over the necks, and smite over all their fingers and toes." - Koran Sura al Anfal 8:12
"As for the captives, the amir [ruler] has the choice of taking the most beneficial action of four possibilities: the first to put them to death by cutting their necks; the second, to enslave them and apply the laws of slavery regarding their sale and manumission; the third, to ransom them in exchange for goods or prisoners; and fourth, to show favor to them and pardon them. Allah, may he be exalted, says, 'When you encounter those [infidels] who deny [the Truth=Islam] then strike [their] necks' (Qur'an sura 47, verse 4)" — Abu’l-Hasan al-Mawardi, al-Ahkam as-Sultaniyyah (The Laws of Islamic Governance), trans. by Dr. Asadullah Yate, (London), Ta-Ha Publishers Ltd., 1996, p. 192.
Ayshah says:
"None of their women were slain, except one woman....she was with me, talking with me....while the Apostle of Allah was killing her men in the market place, when a crier cried out her name.....She said, 'It is I, by God.' I said to her, 'Alas for thee, what is the matter with thee?' She said, 'I shall be killed.'I said, 'And why?' She said, 'For the talk which I talk.' Then she was taken off and beheaded." Ayshah used to say, " By Allah, I do not forget my surprise at her, the godliness of her person...." "Then verily the Apostle of Allah divided the goods of the Banu Quraiza and their wives and children among the Muslims....And the Apostle of God chose for himself of their women Rihânah....and she was with the Apostle of Allah until he died from her, and she was among his concubines." (Siratu'l Rasool vss. 689-693).
Ain't it wunnerful that we live in a day and age when anyone can annoint themselves as experts on whatever and spread all sorts of disinformation, some of which is patently dangerous.
I think that either he has been threatened by militant charity organization members or he is suffering from a bump on the head.
Or else he is a complete ignoramous.
Or else he has just converted to 'Religion' of Submission.
i am a regular reader of ralph's column in the "ny post," and i must say that except for his disdain of donald rumsfeld, i find him to be right on in his assessments. however, as an avid reader of jihadwatch with a reading of the koran and robert spencer's "onward muslim soldiers" under my belt, i must admit that while ralph's assessment of the death cult's derivation from paganism has a ring of truth to it, his denial of the influence of the tenants of islam is in need of constructive criticism. in that spirit, i am taking the liberty of emailing this thread to him care of the "ny post."
Ralph Peters is a retired officer who is often sensible about the uses of military force, and he takes a dim view of the Arabs. He is also said to be a scholarly sort, with books in Russian and German in his library (at least, this is what the articles about him unfailingly convey). So why doesn't he exercise the same caution, and engage in the same kind of mental preparation, in proceeding to make assumptions, and utter pronouncements, about Islam -- especially since, what with the dreamy idea that Occupied Iraq is not a whit different in its prospects from Occupied Germany or Occupied Japan after World War II (and all those who claim differently must either be appeasers, or Nay-Sayers, when in fact some of those Nay-Sayers want the "Light Unto the Muslim Nations" Project stopped not because they do not worry about Islam, but because they really worry about it, and worry most not about the "war on terror" but about the likely islmaization, through Da'wa and demography, of Western Europe, and having studied the history of Islam, agree with Reza Afshari and Ibn Warraq and Ali Sina that the sharia and human rights, are flatly incompatible (free conscience, free speech, equal treatment of women and minorities are all impossible under the Sharia, or under a legal system, that "takes its inspiration" from the sharia, as the Egyptian legal code does, or as the "new" Iraqi Constitution, which gave in so much to the Islamists, infuriating Allawi (he could not have been pleased with the naivete of Noah Feldman et al).
This unwillingness to study Islam -- study first the Qur'an and a few hundred of the hadith, and then the sira, or to immerse oneself in the classic scholarship about Islam ("classic" meaning not the shallow apologetics of the past 40 years, which includes Esposito, Sells, Ernst, et al)--means that no one, and that includes those whose instincts and heart may be in the right place, but who have not permitted their minds to follow -- has a right to utter an opinion about Islam without such study, or at least paying attention to those who have engaged in such study.
One hopes, in the case of Peters, that he will allow himself the leisure to read -- beginning, perhaps, with Bat Ye'or's "The Decline of Eastern Christiantiy Under Islam" and then, perhaps, looking at Muir's biography of Muhammad (not outdated), at Ibn Warraq's "Why I Am Not a Muslim," and at a number of the articles to be found on-line at www.secularislam.org and www.faithfreedom.org. Ibn Warraq's essay on the similarities between "Islam and Fascism" should also be studied.
If Ralph Peters is reading too much Schwartz et al in the pages of The Weekly Standard, that might explain the problem. Amir Taheri is the best of their writers on Islam, but even he has to, at time, pull his punches.
I so glad he confirmed that the God of Christians isn't the same God of Muslims and Islam.
To die in the defence of justice and human rights is the sacrifice I'm willing to make,the slaughtering of God's children for Allah is more in line with Islamic teachings in the Quran.
NO ISLAM - KNOW PEACE
Human sacrifice is UNISLAMIC????
There's more truth to the statement 'the dish ran away with the spoon!'
Apparently, some people aren't aware that reading between the lines applies to Koran as well as the daily newspaper. There's one born every minute...
Islam arose from the human sacrifice sects prevalent in the Middle East and this is the source of islam's determination to slaughter non-Muslims everywhere. There is no other explanation for it. When 'God' commands to kill, there has to be an explanation for it. Either 'God' is a psychotic or 'God' has a justification for it. That would be human sacrifice.
There will never be a solution to Islamic terrorism & atrocities as long as we have people making excuse after excuse after excuse.
Islam is like a juvenile delinquent. These people making the pathetic excuses are like the juvenile delinquent's useless parents. The delinquent is running around breaking things, stealing things, killing, and the parents just stand there making pathetic excuses. Blaming society, the govt, teachers, police, anybody and everything else but the juvenile delinquent. Making excuses only aids and abets the delinquent behaviour. Approving and encouraging it.
Islam is gleefully carrying on with its atrocities worldwide, while useful idiots make excuses and blame others. They go hand in hand. Without the useful idiots, Islam would not be able to get away with a lot of this crap. The West would be able to protect itself and fight back much more effectively.
I would agree that Islamist doctrine doesn't approve of human sacrifice technically (in practice it is different), however it fully approves of the murder of anyone who gets in the way of Islamic totalitarianism and hegemony.
The Islamists are acting according to pagan principles...are you for real!!!
Paganism died out in the Middle East a LONG TIME AGO. Where do the Muslims gets these pagan ideas from? They don't quote from the pagan texts but the Islamic ones when they murder. P.S. the pagans I read about in the hadiths were often more humane than the prophet Mohammad so please stop giving pagans such a bad press.
To Ralph Peters...if someone is offered to Allah and murdered (i.e. their head sawed off) or just murdered without being offered to Allah (i.e. their head sawed off) do you really think the victims cares about the difference?
P.S. I have a theory too...that we in the west are not tolerant due to our humanistic christian heritage but because we worshiped goats 10 000 b.c. Honest!
Actually, Christ endorsed human sacrifice--exactly one time. By giving himself on the cross as atonement for the sins of his people, he offered a human sacrifice. The rejection of the sacrifice of Isaac in Genesis 22, however, and the giving of a ram to Abraham shows the inappropriateness of offering a SINFUL human in sacrifice. The giving of a ram shows that God Himself provides the means of access to Him--ultimately via the once-and-for-all sacrifice of Christ, of which the sacrificial animals of the Old Testament were types.
As for capital punishment in Christian societies, it is simply the removal of especially wicked persons (for murder) for the benefit of the wider society.
About Islam, I defer to those who know it better. However, I cannot help but notice that Islam denies original sin. Could this be why some Muslims have come to ritualize murder?
capital punishment is also based on the existential prinicipal (of which there is Biblical backing) that one who commits a capital crime has forfeited his right to exist
As to the "drinking of human blood" to which Ralph Peters refers, this is still being done by Moslems:
" . . . in November of 1971, . . . Jordan's Prime Minister Wasfi al-Tal, . . . was gunned down [by Arafat's Black September] as he entered the lobby of the Sheraton Hotel in Cairo. While Tal lay dying, one of the assassins knelt and lapped with his tongue the blood flowing across the marble floor. That grisly scene [was] reported in The Times of London and other major newspapers . . . "
When the Wicked Perish
Ellen W. Horowitz, November 16, 2004
Isralert.com
To The editor
USAToday
Novemebr 17, 2004
Col. Ralph Peters is usually of sound mind when it comes to military affairs. However, with this piece in USAToday, "Nothing Islamic about human sacrifice," he's showing his complete ignorance of the Qu'ran and the blood thirsty credo of Mohammed and normative Islam.
He rationalizes the actions of slaughtering terrorists in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle east as simply the reversion to pre-Islamic paganism and practice of human sacrifices to appease the Gods. This commentary belies his ignorance of the excesses of jihad during Islam's explosive infancy and the instructions to kill or subjugate all unbelievers.
Witness the slaughter of Jews at the oasis of Kaibar: 900 men were slaughtered or beheaded, and the women and children enslaved and the Rabbi's wife taken as a concubine by the swaggering Mohammed. Mohammed and succeeding rampaging Arab armies slaughtered millions of Christians, Jews, Zorastrians, Hindus and Buddhists over several centuries. Those who survived became literal fourth class subjects or dhimmis, forced to pay an annual poll tax or jizyeh-protection money for not being slaughtered.
Americans Pearl, Berg, Johnson and dozens of Iraqis, Turks, Koreans, Indians, Italians and now, Irishwoman, Mrs. Hassan were not slaughtered as part of some primordial human sacrifice belief, but as a basic precept of normative Islam.
So Col. Peters before you write a piece like this again check it out with the likes of Robert Spemcer, Bat Ye'or, Ibn Warriq and other credible non-Muslim and apostate scholars of Islam.
does anyone have an e mail address for him ??, a campaign should be started to inform these so called journalists of the true nature of the koran