January 2005 Archives

A close friend of Hossam Armanious and relatives of the family murdered in New Jersey have revealed the following:

Shortly after the murders, members of the Egyptian consulate went to visit the family to encourage them to keep quiet. And many family members have obeyed, saying nothing to reporters or anyone else. However, two family members and another Copt viewed the bodies at the funeral home. One of these eyewitnesses said that he clearly saw that the family members had not suffered “stab wounds to the throat,” as the prosecutor’s report states, but rather the following:

A. Both adults, Hossam and Amal, had a horizontal slit across the throat. Below the slit, on the left, right and middle of the throat were three holes, big enough so that one could place a finger in each hole. According to the eyewitness, it was as if the assailant(s) took a knife and turned it repeatedly in a circular fashion, as if to screw holes into the victims’ necks.

B. The two young girls, Sylvia (15) and Monica (8), also had a horizontal slits in their throats, along with two holes bored below the slits, one on the right and one on the left sides of their necks. The holes were similar to those on their parents’ necks.

C. The eyewitness said although the bodies of the victims were all covered, he was able to see the arms of the little girl Monica. Although the tattoo of the cross inside Monica’s wrist was not defaced, he saw that her wrists were cut. He was not able to see the wrists of the other victims to see if the crosses on their wrists were defaced.

D. Though the family wants to reserve judgment until the results of the case are released, they did say that the way the four family members were bound and gagged and the way their throats were slit with holes carved is similar to executions that are shown on al-Jazeera. The American public is not aware of this because the details of the executions are not often described in news accounts.

Amal Garas’s father said that (contrary to many news reports and CAIR’s press release) none of the family’s jewelry was taken, and that Amal owned some quite expensive pieces that were not touched. At the time of her murder, Amal was wearing a ring worth $3,500 that was not taken.

Garas’s father also has been speaking with the detectives and the prosecutor on the case. He was told that the results of the autopsy would not be ready until March 14. However, an inside source in one of New Jersey’s police departments said that the results of autopsy and toxicology reports are known within 48 hours after the bodies are discovered. This source has worked on such cases for many years. He said that the department knows the results, but as in similar cases intends to wait a month or two before they release them to the family. During that time long reports are written to cross the t’s and dot the i’s for the family, but the final results are not much different from what is discovered within the first 48 hours. So all of the press reports about waiting for the prosecutor’s findings on the autopsies are nonsense. Though the investigators are looking at Sylvia’s computer and other evidence, the findings on the autopsy for the most part are already in.

A reporter who is closely following this case said that this delay was because the police and prosecutor want this case to go away. They want things to cool down. That’s why they set the autopsy date as March 14, two months after the murders.

It is still possible that this wasn’t a Muslim hate crime. The problem is that investigators have not taken the necessary steps to ensure a fair review of the evidence. There are too many holes here, too many inconsistencies in the official story. Too many obvious tasks have not been done: an Armanious family friend with whom I spoke, who gave me names and motives of possible perpetrators, is still waiting for a call from investigators.

Investigators seem to be following dead ends more assiduously than live leads. A Muslim has told police in Jersey City that there is an Islamic custom in Egypt: a life for a life. He said that is what may have happened in this case. Some news reports are referring to this when they say they’re looking into the family’s activities in Egypt before they came to the U.S. in 1997. Said prosecutor Edward DeFazio, “It could be that it's a vendetta that might go back to the old country. We’re going to try to look into that.” However, those close to Hossam Armanious maintain that he didn’t have any enemies, and certainly never took anyone’s life in Egypt or here; nor did anyone in his family.

This background information may illuminate why this investigation has been so curiously lacking:

There are a number of clergy in the Coptic community who are in bed with the Egyptian government. Some even act as agents for the Mubarak regime. Coptic clergy who won’t cooperate are often exiled into the Egyptian desert, where they live a very difficult life.

Many Coptic women have been kidnapped by Muslims. Some of these women are being kidnapped with the help of the compromised clergy. The priest hears a girl’s confession and then passes on information he hears there to Muslim kidnappers, who decide which girls they want to take. Many of these women are forced to marry Muslim men and are never seen again.

A number of Muslims have infiltrated the Coptic community, pretending to be Christians in order to gather information. Jersey City has a large number of Copts. Some of this infiltration has taken place there; some of the Coptic clergy there are also compromised. However, most Copts trust their clergy wholeheartedly, making it easy for the moles to operate.

What do those compromised clergymen want? The answer possibly has to do with a fact revealed by a number of other sources, including one within a New Jersey police department: the Egyptian government is pressuring the police and prosecutor to make this case disappear. Where are the mainstream media reporters contacting the Egyptian consulate to find out whether or not this is true?

One poster at barsomyat.com placed a photo of a Christian target between cartoon characters with mallets. (I have removed the image of the man targeted.)

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross says in his article "Christians on PalTalk Chat Service Tracked by Radical Islamic Web Site":

A radical Islamic Web site systematically tracks Christians on PalTalk.com, an Internet chat service on which a New Jersey man received a death threat two months before he and his family were murdered. The password protected Arabic Web site, at the address www.barsomyat.com, features pictures and information about Christians who have been particularly active in debating Muslims on PalTalk.

Here are some translations of these conversations. It is clear that the personal information is being exchanged in order to facilitate the murders of the people discussed ("After he is finished, the isolation of the Christian lady will be completed.") I have removed their names for obvious reasons.

Bibo 117: Allah bless you brothers!

Here is the surprise you’ve all been waiting for and we haven’t published yet due to a certain reason. The damned Muhammad-cursing dog "[NAME REMOVED]" is the big brother of "[NAME REMOVED]" and their little brother is the one called "[NAME REMOVED]."

"[NAME REMOVED]" the dog is married to the daughter of one of the Muhammad-cursing Christians from paltalk. We have postponed publishing this information because there is a lot more to be revealed when the time is right. These are the pictures of the "devil triangle."

[Photos of the people mentioned were then posted.]

Bibo 117: For you my brothers I now present the second photo collection of the Muhammad-cursing paltalk pigs. Wait a little for the rest of the pictures. The first photo is that of the foul smelling ugly pig "[NAME REMOVED]."

Anti Christians: [Posts Photos:] "The deceitful [NAME REMOVED]" and "The liar [NAME REMOVED]." [In green in the middle:] "Beware!"

Bibo 117: Fellow brothers this is the picture of one of the most Muhammad-cursing Christians. It was taken as he was opening a camera with one of the young Christian ladies from Paltalk.

*After he is finished, the isolation of the Christian lady will be completed.

This idiot’s name on paltalk: [NAME REMOVED]
His real name is: [NAME REMOVED]
He lives in [NAME REMOVED].

Titles of Threads at barsomyat.com:
A Pig Christian Soldier
Pigs of America
Blood Victims of Jesus
Destruction Perpetrated by the Love of Jesus
All this for innocent civilians?
You are digging your graves in your own hands
Because of America, Cancer Spreads in Egypt

A photo of Hossam Armanious and his wife, Amal Garas, posted at the jihadist website barsomyat.com

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross's article "Christians on PalTalk Chat Service Tracked by Radical Islamic Web Site" says this:

One user posted a photograph of Hossam Armanious and wrote, "This is a picture of the filthy dog, curser of Muhammad, and a photo of his filthy wife, curser of Muhammad. They got what they deserved for their actions in America."

Here is a full transcript:

Bibo 117: This is a picture of the filthy dog, curser of Muhammad (Hissam Armanios) and a photo of his filthy wife, curser of Muhammad (Amal Jaras). They got what they deserved for their actions in America. They were slaughtered along with their children as a punishment from the heavens to those who curse the most divine of all who were created.

Exception one: Allah bless you all! I read about this incident on the news websites, but how do you know they were cursers of Muhammad and that they were murdered by Muslims? Why were the children killed as well? I never thought this was the act of Muslims -- maybe there had been another reason for their murder? Oh well, Allah knows! Had they indeed been cursers of Muhammad this was a powerful punishment from Allah. We should ask Allah to let all their dog brothers who curse Muhammad and harm him to join their fate!

Mostafahamed: Beware brothers of the plot attempting to blame Muslims for the incident, or maybe attempting to worsen their situation in America and Europe even more. We don’t need to speculate assumptions that may infer that we Muslims are behind it.

Bibo 117: (is asked to elaborate on his sources) My beloved sister FTAT UAE, I don’t know anything about the subject other than what has been published in the NYPOST. The above excerpt from the paper points out that he (Hissam) was one of the most prominent participants in the Christian chat rooms of the Middle East section of paltalk. As to he killed him and what were his motives that I don’t know till this very day. What I said in the message I posted was that there is a punishment from Allah to all who offend Muhammad!

From Daveed Gartenstein-Ross' piece "Christians on PalTalk Chat Service Tracked by Radical Islamic Web Site":

Even barsomyat.com's banner displays its hatred of Christians. The banner displays a crucifix crossed out by a violent red "X," and the main heading reads in Arabic, "Christians: Revealing the Truth Behind Our Belief."

It also depicts a sheep getting its throat slit. The sheep is obviously a symbol of Christianity. It is saying, "Don't I have seven lives?"

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross at FrontPage says what must be said about dhimmi Western silence regarding Islamic apostasy law:

Last month, Britain’s Daily Telegraph reported that Prince Charles was leading efforts to combat the Islamic law of apostasy, under which leaving the Muslim religion is at the very least illegal and is often punishable by death. Charles had held a private summit of Christian and Muslim leaders at Clarence House to discuss the issue. There was, however, one hitch: The Muslim delegation at the summit cautioned the prince and other non-Muslims not to speak publicly about apostasy laws, and some of the Christian leaders in attendance were reportedly “sympathetic” to this concern.

Although the proffered reason that non-Muslims should not speak publicly about apostasy laws was that Muslim moderates could better influence the debate without outside intervention, this argument does not stand up to scrutiny. After all, virtually every observer agrees that the West cannot prevail in the war on terror unless Muslim moderates can counter their co-religionists’ more militant outlook, yet Westerners do publicly criticize Islamic terrorism, loudly and repeatedly. Western silence on the apostasy issue will not help Islamic moderates; rather, silence is more likely to make both Muslims and also converts out of Islam believe that the issue is unimportant to the outside world.

Many Westerners, however, appear hesitant to speak out on the issue of religious freedom for converts out of Islam. There are two apparent reasons for this hesitation. First, in our multiculturalist society, many feel awkward about speaking up on behalf of those who leave Islam out of concern that attacks on apostasy laws could be seen as criticism of Islam itself. Moreover, apostasy laws affect small numbers in comparison to the large-scale threat of terrorism. Thus, many people may believe that it is not worth making waves over the issue.

This base view should be rejected. In pursuing interfaith dialogue, the treatment of apostates from Islam is one of the crucial issues that Prince Charles and other Westerners should address because the ability to change one’s faith is a fundamental right. Freedom of belief lies at the very heart of an individual’s identity because one’s theological outlook is central to one’s moral and philosophical understanding of the world. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights thus proclaims that everybody should have the “freedom to change his religion or belief.”

Read it all.

Joel Mowbray on media dhimmitude in reference to the New Jersey murders at FrontPage:

When a family of Egyptian immigrants was murdered in Jersey City recently, the media’s response was to wring its hands about anti-Muslim bias. But the truth is more complicated, and reveals the media’s own bias--against America.

Anti-Muslim bias had nothing to do the killing of the Armanious family; they were Coptic Christians. It wasn’t the religion of the victims that concerned the press; it was the religion of the suspected murderers.

Over the weekend, the Associated Press wrote of the “dirty looks and shouted slurs” directed at Muslims in Jersey City following the slaughter of an Egyptian Christian man, his wife, and two young daughters, which many reports attribute to local radical Islamists upset about something the man wrote in an Internet chat room.

The AP followed in predictable fashion: “The strife is particularly distressing in light of efforts the area’s Muslim community made to reach out to other faiths and strengthen ties after the 9/11 attacks.”

What the AP conveniently ignored, however, was known and suspected radical activity in northern New Jersey's Muslim community.

The former imam at the El Tawheed Islamic Center of Jersey City, Alaa Al-Sadawi, was convicted in July 2003 of attempting to smuggle more than $650,000 in cash to the terrorist Global Relief Fund in Egypt in April 2002.

One of Al-Sadawi’s former mosque-goers was convicted last March of murdering in the name of Islam. Alim Hassan, then 31, killed his pregnant wife, her mother, and her sister on July 30, 2002. He reportedly stabbed the women more than 20 times each because they refused to convert to Islam. According to reports, Hassan prayed regularly at El-Tawheed.

Al-Sadawi and Hassan were hardly the first Muslims in the area, though, to appear on authorities’ radar.

Read it all.

An explosive New York Sun article reprinted at the Counterterrorism blog. As you can see, I was consulted on this story, and I will be posting more about it momentarily:

A radical Islamic Web site systematically tracks Christians on PalTalk.com, an Internet chat service on which a New Jersey man received a death threat two months before he and his family were murdered. The password protected Arabic Web site, at the address www.barsomyat.com, features pictures and information about Christians who have been particularly active in debating Muslims on PalTalk.

One page from barsomyat.com features a group of photographs of a Syrian Christian, "Joseph," who now lives in Canada. Barsomyat.com's users have posted personal information about Joseph, including his brother's parole status, and make clear that they are actively trying to track down his current address.

Subscribers also post explicit warnings to Joseph. One comment states, "Know, oh Christian, that you are not far from us and you are under our watchful eyes!" Another user remarks, "Laugh, oh Chrisitan, and soon you will see a big hit."

Ahmed Paul, an Egyptian Christian and a theology student in America, said he believes Joseph was targeted because he frequently engaged in debates with Muslims on PalTalk. The Internet chat service attracts up to 3 million users a month, and subjects range from movies to music to religion to adult topics -- and some Arabic-speaking users of PalTalk have reported that contentious debates between Christians and Muslims are common in certain chat rooms.

Hossam Armanious, a Coptic Christian from Jersey City, N.J., who was found murdered earlier this month, frequently debated with Muslims on PalTalk. Two months before Armanious's murder, authorities said he received a death threat from a Muslim PalTalk user: "You'd better stop this bull ... or we are going to track you down like a chicken and kill you." On January 14, Armanious and his family -- including two daughters, ages 15 and 8 -- were found killed in their Jersey City home, bound and gagged with their throats slashed.

Authorities have not determined whehter Islamic extremists are to blame for the Armanious family's murder, nor is there any apparent link between the murder and barsomyat.com's tracking of Christians on PalTalk. However, many barsomyat.com users expressed jubilation at the deaths.

One user posted a photograph of Hossam Armanious and wrote, "This is a picture of the filthy dog, curser of Muhammad, and a photo of his filthy wife, curser of Muhammad. They got what they deserved for their actions in America."

In all, about 40 different discussion threads on barsomyat.com berate the Christians of PalTalk, and there are at least seven collections of photographs of PalTalk Christians. The barsomyat.com discussion threads seem to focus on Arabic-speaking Christians rather than those who speak English.

Barsomyat.com features not only photographs of the targeted Christians, but also attempts to track down their addresses. A post about a Christian man whose computer was apparently hacked to obtain his photograph includes the man's PalTalk name, his real name, and the city where he resides in Lebanon.

Another barsomyat.com entry outlines the relations (both blood and marital) between four Christians who are apparently PalTalk users, posts photographs of them, and then states, "We have postponed publishing this information because there is a lot more to be revealed when the time is right."

Even barsomyat.com's banner displays its hatred of Christians. The banner displays a crucifix crossed out by a violent red "X," and the main heading reads in Arabic, "Christians: Revealing the Truth Behind Our Belief."

Judging by the posts, almost all of barsomyat.com's users are Middle Eastern, and they are predominantly Egyptian. Mr. Paul said that's significant because the extremists on barsomyat.com live in societies where people simply do not challenge Islam and would never dream of insulting Prophet Muhammad.

Mr. Paul, who is an Islamic convert to Christianity, said when Islamic radicals from such societies participate in Internet debates with Christians who live in societies that promote free speech, they are often shocked by the Christians' arguments and view their debating opponents as blasphemers. And in the eyes of Islamic extremists, blasphemers are worhty of death.

Author Robert Spencer, who has been following the Armanious case for his Web site Jihad Watch, described barsomyat.com as "extremely important" after it was shown to him.

"I have never seen anything like this before," Mr. Spencer said. "It's chilling to see photographs of people who probably have no idea that they're on the Web site. Hamas's Web site would post self-congratulatory accounts of their attacks on civilians, but barsomyat.com's users are telegraphiing their intended victims in advance."

Mr. Spencer added that barsomyat.com is a "prime example" of how some Islamic extremists can utilize technology to attempt to bring Islamic religious law to the West.

"We saw in the Theo van Gogh murders that some Muslims will take these kinds of matters into their own hands," Mr. Spencer said. "The Internet makes it easier for them to do so by disseminating this kind of information. You could imagine 15 years ago how hard it would be for people to get this much information on people who they believe should be killed."

Barsomyat.com is registered to Viza-Web Inc., a Web hosting company based in Woodbury, Minn.

Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald comments on the Saudi hate literature being distributed from American mosques, and the energetic Saudi madrasa-building in Asia:

Saudi Arabia needs to understand that it has to stop this. No more hate tracts in American mosques. No more funding of madrasas world-wide. Otherwise, the royal family may find that all the information that has been collected about its decadent doings will find its way to the Internet, for the delectation of Saudis who, of course, in deploring their rulers, will first identify them as Infidels. And it can't be much fun to be a member of the Al-Saud family once those palaces start being attacked, and even those villas, and country estates, in Western Europe. Even Bandar's Plantagenet hunting lodge in England, or that house in Aspen where he had the mountain removed so as to get a better view -- all of that can be most unpleasant.

And then of course there are the oilfields of Al-Haza, not to mention the recent explorations by -- was it Elf or Total Fina that signed the contracts -- in the Rub al-Khali. The former are right on the Persian Gulf, and unlike Iraq, there are not long distances for the oil to travel or to be sabotaged. And as for the natural gas in the Rub al-Khali -- the natural point of exit is Oman, and for the right cut Sultan Qaboos, who doesn't much are for Saudi Arabia anyway (remember the Dhofar rebellion, aided and abetted by Saudi Arabia?), might strike a deal. Oh, there is a good deal that can be done to Saudi Arabia. And that will be, if it doesn't stop that funding.

What's that, you say? Saudi Arabia has always been a "staunch ally"? How, exactly? Tell us how, tell us what Saudi Arabia has done by way of curbing the threat posed by its very own ideology to the entire Infidel world?

We can't appeal to the wisdom or goodness of Saudis. We can only threaten them, either the ruling family itself -- in other words, instead of protecting them, throwing them to the wolves, and seizing all of their overseas assets for they, in this war, are enemy aliens and their property can be seized (go back and see what happened to German-owned property during World War II). There are so many ways to make Saudi Arabia behave, if only we stopped pretending.

As I explained in Islam Unveiled, when Muslims suffer disaster, the solution is almost always more Islam. From the Telegraph, with thanks to Jeremy Langton:

Islamic militants in Morocco defied King Mohammed VI at the weekend by rallying behind claims that the country faced an Asian-style tsunami as punishment for immorality. Thousands of extremists took to the streets in support of the newspaper Attajdid, which called last month's disaster "an act of divine retribution" for South-East Asia's sex-tourism industry.

The paper also outraged moderates by implying that Morocco risked the same fate because of a growth of prostitution and sex tourism in the kingdom, a phenomenon it described as a "calamity".

Demonstrators rushed to the defence of the newspaper, which is believed to be close to the Islamic-oriented Justice and Development Party, after it was savaged in the pro-government media.

Even the New York Times (Walter Duranty, Executive Editor) can't help but take notice. From "Militant Muslims Act to Suppress Dutch Film and Art Show" (thanks to Anthony for the link):

PARIS, Jan. 30 - Can angry young Muslims dictate what is and is not acceptable in the traditionally open-minded world of Dutch arts? In the last few weeks, it appears, the answer has been yes.

The Netherlands' main film festival, now going on in Rotterdam, canceled a showing of a short documentary denouncing violence against Muslim women that was made by Theo van Gogh, who was killed 10 weeks ago. An Islamic militant is accused of the crime.

The film's producer said he had pulled the film on the advice of the police after receiving threats.

At about the same time, a Moroccan-Dutch painter went into hiding after a show of his work opened on Jan. 15 at a modern art museum in Amsterdam. The museum director said the painter, Rachid Ben Ali, had received death threats linked to his satirical work critical of violence by Islamic militants.

The two incidents have reinforced fears among many Dutch that fast-growing non-Western immigration is having a negative impact on social attitudes in the Netherlands. Newspaper columnists and members of Parliament have warned in recent days that if people capitulated to intimidation, they would only encourage Islamic militants.

Some have pointed to the recent events as signs that militants are trying to impose their agenda and are undermining the constitutional right to free speech in the Netherlands. A few people have quietly asked if self-censorship might be acceptable to keep the social peace.

A series of links from Ali Dashti tells an appalling story from Norway. First, a story about an asylum seeker who planned to carry out a suicide mission:

http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article946717.ece

In 2003 an asylum seeker was prepared to carry out a suicide mission on a domestic Norwegian flight. Police revealed the man's intentions. When they intervened, the refugee's bags were packed and plans were found, along with a farewell note to his family. The Norwegian Police Security Service believe the man was capable of taking down a commuter plane in the northern Norway network. In the man's suicide note to his family police said that the act was planned as part of "the struggle against the USA and Norway". Upon his arrest the man was considered psychotic and put under constant medical attention, rather than going through criminal process.

And from Ali Dashti, some comments and brief summaries of related articles:

According to reports on national Norwegian TV (TV2) the man has applied for asylum in Norway no less than seven times. The asylum reception center where he was arrested the last time had not received any information about his past involvement in planning a terror attack and allegedly being psychotic. The Norwegian Pilot's Association is quite upset over the whole story.

http://pub.tv2.no/nettavisen/innenriks/article335477.ece

Nettavisen reported that the man was back again in Norway, for the eighth time. After being deported to Germany a few days ago he made his way back to Norway by bus. In the interview with TV2 he insisted he would keep coming back to Norway seeking asylum, because "he likes Norway so much." Mr Sandberg, immigration spokesman for the Progress Party, and member of the parliament, demanded he be placed on a military flight and transported directly to Kabul, Afghanistan, rather than just being deported to Germany again.

Newspaper VG claims that this man alone has cost Norwegian tax payers about $100,000 (US dollars):

http://www.vg.no/pub/vgart.hbs?artid=264348

My comments: What makes matters even worse is that only a few months ago, another Muslim asylum seeker almost managed to crash a plane by entering the cockpit and attacking the pilots with an axe:

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/003394.php

Euro Socialist politician beats up Jihadist axeman!

Most of the media, with a few exceptions, and the political establishment immediately blamed the incident on "insanity." It has recently been revealed that the psychiatrists who have evaluated the man thought he was perfectly sane:

http://www.nrk.no/nyheter/distrikt/nrk_nordland/4450948.html

My comment: The police also claim the attack was planned. The man was a very devout, religious Muslim who wanted to become an imam. Still, it is not acknowledged here that it most likely was a Jihadist terror attack and attempted suicide mission, despite the fact that Norway has been mentioned twice by Al-Qaida number two as a potential target:

http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article882192.ece

An audio tape said to be from senior al-Qaida official Ayman al-Zawahri called for organized resistance against invading "crusaders" in the Muslim world. The tape, aired by Al Jazeera satellite television on Friday, mentioned Norway as a US ally.

Shades of Jersey City. "Suspected militants in Kashmir kill four in midnight grenade attack," from China Post, with thanks to Anthony:

Suspected Islamic militants killed four members of a family and injured two others during a midnight grenade attack in a remote village in Indian-controlled Kashmir, police said Monday.

The family was attacked overnight in Nashla village in the Doda district of India's Jammu-Kashmir state, said Shakeel Baig, a police officer in the state's winter capital of Jammu.

Details about the family and the reasons for the attack were not immediately available.

Militants often attack people they suspect are police informants.

"Why are these people who are not even from Iraq protesting against these elections?" Because Hizb-ut-Tahrir wants to see Sharia instituted in Iraq -- and everywhere else. Since it see Sharia as the law of Allah, it will never accept democracy in its place.

From the BBC, with thanks to Granny Weatherwax:

Iraqis have clashed with demonstrators against the election outside a polling station in Manchester.

About 200 demonstrators were chased by another group who burned their flags, while other Iraqis clashed with police....

The demonstrators were from Hizb-ut-Tahrir - an Islamic group which is against the elections in Iraq.

David Kahrmann, from the Iraq Election Team, said the protesters "were not even Iraqis".

"The Iraqi community here were saying, 'Why are these people who are not even from Iraq protesting against these elections?'," he said.

Dr Abdul Wahid, of Hizb-ut-Tahrir, said his demonstrators had begun walking away from the scene after election organisers said they were worried their presence could prove trouble.

Christians denied voting rights in Iraq. After all, what rights do dhimmis have to determine the fate of a Muslim state? From the Assyrian International News Agency, with thanks to the Center for Religious Freedom:

(AINA) -- In a brazen and nearly unbelievable move, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) headed by warlord Masoud Barzani has prevented voting by Assyrian (also known as Chaldean and Syriac) Christians of the Nineveh Plain in northern Iraq. According to a series of reports from inside Iraq, the KDP effectively blocked the delivery of ballot boxes to six major Assyrian towns and villages in the Plains around Mosul including Baghdeda, Bartilla, Karemlesh, Shekhan, Ain Sifne and Bahzan.

Thousands of would be voters were left stranded outside polling places awaiting an opportunity to cast their ballots. Inquiries to voting authorities brought frequent promises that the ballot boxes were en route only to result in a series of disappointments throughout the day. Infuriated Assyrians filled the streets of Baghdeda- the largest Assyrian town in the Nineveh Plain-and demonstrated against the KDP's overt disenfranchisement of Assyrians.

According to Iraq sources, the ballot boxes had been stored in Arbil, the stronghold of the KDP. The resulting unavailability of ballot boxes affected up to 100,000 Assyrian voters and tens of thousands of Yezidis, Shabak, and Turkman voters. The outright denial of voting rights to Assyrians and other non-Kurdish minorities culminates several months of intimidation, beatings, beheadings, burnings, and mutilations of Assyrian Christians in the Nineveh Plain. Just two weeks before the elections, Archbishop Basil George Casmusa of the Syriac Catholic church was also kidnapped. Although he was released one day later, his abduction and the series of escalating attacks were earlier reported by numerous sources (AINA, 09-13-2004, 08-07-2004, 06-20-2004) as an attempt to drive out Assyrians from their homes and to intimidate potential remaining voters into staying home on election day.

However, to the KDP's dismay, thousands of Iraqi Assyrians defied the KDP's terror tactics and ventured out to vote only to discover that ballot boxes never arrived. Assyrians in other areas of Iraq such as Mosul, Baghdad, and Karkuk were not expected to turn out in large numbers due to threats and a deteriorating security situation. The lack of voting in the Nineveh Plain has left Assyrians worldwide reeling. As one observer summarized "Not only was the in country vote prevented to a large extent by the KDP and the overall security situation, but the out of country voting was abysmal due to discriminatory placement of polling places by the IOM (International Organization for Migration) in areas favoring Kurds and others at the expense of Assyrians (AINA, 01-18-2005). In the US, less than 10% of eligible voters were registered by the IOM, a complete failure on their part."

In Arab News today (thanks to Know Islam), Adil Salahi asserts that the Muslim Prophet Muhammad never fought against unbelievers without first inviting them to accept Islam:

Never during the Prophet’s time did the Muslim community plan to attack any group or to take them unawares. Only when the Prophet received intelligence that a particular tribe or grouping were planning to attack the Muslims did he take countermeasures to ensure that the danger they represented is forestalled. But even when he took such measures, he would not launch an attack without alerting the enemy and calling on them to accept Islam and live in peace with the Muslim state.

Evidence for this is plentiful. However, we will concentrate today on a particular situation involving one of the main army commanders during the Prophet’s lifetime: Ali, his cousin and son-in-law. Let us consider first this report by Anas ibn Malik: “The Prophet sent Ali ibn Abi Talib to fight a certain people. He then dispatched someone after him. He told the man: ‘Do not call out to him (i.e. to Ali) from his rear, and tell him not to fight them before he has called on them (to accept Islam).’” (Related by Al-Tabarani)....

This is then the right approach and the only one that Islam accepts. The issues must be clear before engaging in any fight. The enemy must be made aware of Islam and what it calls for before the Muslims could fight them.

This is in accord with a key hadith that I have cited here many times. The Prophet Muhammad emphasizes that those to be fought must first be "invited" to accept Islam:

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)

And from Osama bin Laden's November 2002 letter to America:

What are we calling you to, and what do we want from you?

(1) The first thing that we are calling you to is Islam.

(a) The religion of the Unification of God; of freedom from associating partners with Him, and rejection of this; of complete love of Him, the Exalted; of complete submission to His Laws; and of the discarding of all the opinions, orders, theories and religions which contradict with the religion He sent down to His Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). Islam is the religion of all the prophets, and makes no distinction between them - peace be upon them all.

It is to this religion that we call you; the seal of all the previous religions. It is the religion of Unification of God, sincerity, the best of manners, righteousness, mercy, honour, purity, and piety. It is the religion of showing kindness to others, establishing justice between them, granting them their rights, and defending the oppressed and the persecuted. It is the religion of enjoining the good and forbidding the evil with the hand, tongue and heart. It is the religion of Jihad in the way of Allah so that Allah's Word and religion reign Supreme....

Indeed. And since America did not accept, the jihad continues.

"Islamic extremists trash Pakistani TV offices after Peres interview," from AFP, with thanks to Ali Dashti:

KARACHI (AFP) - Islamic extremists ransacked the offices of a private Pakistani television channel the day after it broadcast an interview with Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shimon Peres, police said.

A Geo television official said the incident appeared to be a reaction to an interview in which Peres called on Pakistan to establish diplomatic contacts with Tel Aviv.

"We don't yet know the reasons behind the attack, but we suspect it could be a reaction to Mr Peres' interview," Geo TV chief Imran Aslam told AFP on Saturday.

Police said around 40 men armed with sticks, some of them carrying pistols, barged into the building which also houses the mass circulation daily Jang and the English-language newspaper The News.

During the attack, which occured around 2:20 am local time (2120 GMT), the men smashed window panes, broke the furniture and torched newspapers' files, witnesses said....

Islamist parties in overwhelmingly Muslim Pakistan have frequently warned the government against establishing any contacts with the Jewish state.

They get 150 hours of community service. Hirsi Ali gets a lifetime of hiding and anxiety. From Reuters, with thanks to Ali Dashti:

AMSTERDAM, Jan 27 (Reuters) - A Dutch court sentenced two members of a rap group to 150 hours community service on Thursday for writing a rap song with lyrics threatening a prominent politician critical of Islam.

The two members of rap group DHC were also given a two-month suspended jail sentence by a court in The Hague after they were found guilty of writing a threatening rap song about Somali-born Dutch politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

Hirsi Ali, 37, returned to public life last week after she went into hiding following the November murder of film maker Theo van Gogh with whom she made a film about violence against women in Islamic societies which angered many Muslims.

The two rappers were found guilty of making "serious threats" and insulting Hirsi Ali, a prominent member of the VVD liberal party, the court said....

The defence said the rappers were exercising their freedom of expression and had intended to keep the song private and that it had been put on the Internet without their permission by someone else.

The defendant gets to walk out in protest? What kind of a trial is this? Abu Bakar Bashir (Baasyir) update, from "Baasyir Walks Out of Terror Trial," from Laksamana.Net, with thanks to Ali Dashti:

Laksamana.Net - Radical Islamic cleric Abu Bakar Baasyir walked out of his terrorism trial in Jakarta on Thursday (27/1/05) to protest the reading of witness interrogation records identifying him as the leader of regional terrorism network Jemaah Islamiyah.

Baasyir is charged with inciting his followers to carry out the October 2002 Bali nightclub bombings that killed 202 people and the August 2003 blast that killed 12 people at Jakarta’s JW Marriott Hotel.

Prosecutors also say he visited a Jemaah Islamiyah military training camp in the southern Philippines in April 2000 and passed on an edict from Osama bin Laden calling for killings of Americans and their allies. The cleric could face the death penalty if found guilty of terrorism.

Proceedings at Thursday’s trial session started smoothly, but Baasyir’s lawyers immediately protested when the prosecution tried to read out the interrogation records of terror suspects being detained in Singapore and Malaysia.

"In accordance with the prevailing regulations, the witnesses from Singapore cannot leave the country because they are still being detained. We request the permission of the panel of judges to read out the witnesses' interrogation records,” chief prosecutor Salman Maryadi was quoted as saying by detikcom online news portal.

Baasyir’s lawyers vehemently opposed the request, insisting that Indonesian regulations require witnesses to be present when their interrogation records are read out in court.

"If the witness is not put forward before the court and only his police interrogation record is read out, then how can we lawyers conduct a cross examination of the testimony?” asked chief defense lawyer Mohammad Assegaf.

The prosecution and the defense then bickered over the matter for about 10 minutes. Presiding judge Sudarto thereafter ruled that the interrogation records could be read out without the presence of the witnesses, as they could not be brought to the court because they were being detained abroad.

"This obstacle is a valid obstacle that prevents these witnesses from appearing before the court," said the judge.

Assegaf was not impressed by the decision. "We have decided to leave the trial because do not want to share responsibility for the reading of these interrogation records. So we, the team of lawyers, will stage a walkout… With all due respect to this court, we are withdrawing ourselves from this trial," he said.

Not wanting to be left behind, Baasyir requested permission to join his lawyers. “The head of my defense team has left the court and because I must be accompanied by my lawyers during my trial, I therefore request permission to also go out," he said.

"All right, I give my permission,” replied Sudarto. Baasyir and his 10-member defense team then got up and left the courtroom.

The defendant and his lawyers sat in a nearby room while the trial continued.

"Anti-terrorist authorities in Sydney," from AAP, with thanks to Danlew:

Counter terrorism authorities have descended on Sydney's west after a shooting linked to the Iraqi election added to tensions heightened by the historic ballot.

Witnesses said two men with guns aimed at a number of cars and shops, and fired five shots during a melee involving 100 people on the main street of Auburn, about 11pm (AEDT) on Sunday.

Police said four men, including one hurt by a ricocheting shotgun pellet, were treated for minor injuries.

They said the shooting followed a clash on Saturday involving protesters from an anti-election group and voters outside a polling booth in Auburn - one of Australia's nine out-of-country polling stations for Iraq's first election in 50 years.

But NSW police Superintendent Allan Harding said he was satisfied it was an isolated act committed by criminally motivated people.

On what basis did he arrive at this satisfaction?

Beila Rabinowitz, the director of Militant Islam Monitor, has made a translation of this Dutch piece from Algemeen Dagblad. (Thanks to Anthony for the link.)

Moroccan Youth will shortly be able to follow a course in how to pick up women. The city district center is offering a 'pick up' course, according to the Algemeen Dagblad newspaper.

The holder of the youth portfolio of the district Beatrijs Tolk, thinks that the atmosphere in the city center will improve if Moroccan youths learn how to pick up women. "The boys just don't know what to do."

This leads to problems , especially on the "shopping evenings," explained Tolk.

Many youth from the African side of the Mediterranean Sea are very awkward when it comes to picking up girls. It is more harassment and molesting then trying to pick them up. That can lead to a very nasty atmosphere."

Comments Rabinowitz:

Theo van Gogh wrote an about the Moroccan's view of Dutch women in an article entitled "How Come?" and said that he would not even consider forbidding his son to play with the Moroccan children on his street despite a series of vicious incidents involving Muslims and rhetorically asked :

"...Should I remind him about how his mother was continually cursed at by Moroccan girls and called a 'Dutch whore' ?

Should I remind him of the dyed in the wool, no prejudices against anyone, Green Left neighbor, who very soon after the events in New York, had a friend over to visit who told her, "I came to you by bicycle".On the corner there were several Moroccan youths of about fourteen or fifteen. One biked next to me and said ; "What do you think we can do with you, whore?..."

The piercingly insightful Nidra Poller draws some logical conclusions from the Jersey City murders and some recent killings in France in "Quelling Racist Murder in France," from the New York Sun, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

Jersey City, N.J., January 14: The four members of the Armanious family are discovered in a state that no normal human being would even want to imagine, let alone see - bound and gagged, their throats slit, their faces mutilated, their blood spilled, their torment ineffaceable. The voice-of-reason respectable press, quoting police officials, reports that the most likely motives are robbery or a dispute with a former tenant. Yes, of course, anything is possible. An easily identifiable disgruntled tenant could descend to the sub-lower depths and buy himself a one-way ticket to jail. A disappointed thief might have wreaked bloody murder on an entire family instead of learning how to pick wealthier victims. But it would take a nearly fatal dose of invention to make those characters stand up on their own two feet and go into action.

The Armanious execution has all the hallmarks of ritual murder. Members of the Egyptian Copt community in America know this custom too well to ignore the telltale signs. A small handful of courageous community leaders, specialists, and journalists have come forth to soberly present the case for ritual murder as a serious hypothesis that should not be excluded. Are they motivated by hatred of Islam? What then of the champions of Islam as a religion of peace? Since it is impossible to deny the precept of ritual murder, its history and widespread current practice, the primary concern of a religion of peace would be to explain to the faithful, and especially the faithful living in Western democracies, that ritual murder is forbidden. One does not smite infidels in America. Blasphemers are not punished by throat-slitting in Holland. Jews are not upstart dhimmis, fair game for slaughter in France.

What if some wayward creatures mistakenly believed that shariah should be imposed in Jersey City? Who will set them straight?

The slaughter of the Armanious family has been widely reported in the American press; it has not been mentioned in France. The ritual murder of Theo van Gogh caused a strong backlash in Holland. The beheading of Daniel Pearl was an introduction to the methods of 21st-century jihad.

The murder of Sebastien Selam, one of the most popular DJs in France, has been widely ignored. Sebastien lived with his widowed mother in a modest but comfortable low-rent apartment building in the 10th arrondissement, a half hour from the Place de la Republique. In November 2003, during the month of Ramadan, Sebastien was murdered by a neighbor, Adel Boumedienne. The Selams are Jewish, of Algerian origin; the Boumediennes are Muslims from Morocco. Relations between Jews and Muslims in the neighborhood, which had been normal or even cordial, radically deteriorated in the fall of 2000.There were incidents, anti-Semitic graffiti, ominous signs of violent hostility. And yet Sebastien let Adel get into his car as he was going into the underground garage to park. There, Adel slashed Sebastien's throat almost severing his head, and mutilated his face beyond recognition with a carving fork. The coroner states in his report that he had never seen such severe mutilation in all his decades of practice.

Aside from a brief article filled with factual errors in the tabloid Le Parisien and an equally incompetent article in a Jewish weekly paper, there was hardly any press coverage of the Selam murder. When Israeli photographer Avi Rosen, who was in Paris at the time, heard what happened to the DJ, he immediately recognized the hallmarks of ritual murder. He took photos of the crime scene, interviewed the Selam family, and has stood by them ever since in their almost hopeless efforts to bring the murderer to justice and expose the true nature of the crime not only for the honor of Sebastien, but to warn others of the danger that confronts them.

Adel's mother saw her son take the carving knife and fork from the kitchen; he came back a short time later, covered in blood, and told her, "I've killed my Jew, I can go to paradise." He told the police that he had no remorse, no regrets, because Allah told him to kill Sebastien. They transferred him from the police station to a general hospital and from there to a psychiatric hospital. As of this writing, the Selam family lawyer is playing his last card; he has one last chance to convince the court to open an investigation. If the request is denied, the case will be closed. No investigation, no arrest, no trial. The murderer will some day be released from the mental hospital. The Selam family is sentenced to a life of mourning.

Read it all.

More on the Saudi hate material noted in the Freedom House report, from the New York Sun, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

Just three miles from the site of the World Trade Center, the government of Saudi Arabia is distributing hate materials expounding an extremist Wahhabi ideology, according to a new report by the Center for Religious Freedom....

The literature also promotes Wahhabism, the version of Islam officially embraced by the Saudi kingdom and adhered to by several of the September 11 hijackers, as the only true Islam, and it denounces more moderate Muslims who advocate tolerance as apostates. In Saudi Arabia, Ms. Shea said, apostasy is a capital crime. "If you're a Muslim and you become an infidel," she said, "you're put to death."

According to the report, one of the strongest denunciations of so-called apostasy was issued in Brooklyn's Al-Farooq mosque, on Atlantic Avenue.

"In a book published by the Saudi Ministry of Islamic Affairs, and collected from the Al-Farouq Mosque in Brooklyn, New York, Saudi Arabia's official religious leader, the late Bin Baz, authorizes Muslims to kill converts to Islam who violate sexual mores on adultery and homosexuality," the report said.

According to the report's translation, Al-Farooq worshipers are told: "If a person said: I believe in Allah alone and confirm the truth of everything from Muhammed, except in his forbidding fornication, he becomes a disbeliever. For that, it would be lawful for Muslims to spill his blood and to take his money."

This is not the first time Al-Farooq has been cited in conjunction with terrorism and terrorist ideology. Friday marked the beginning of the trial in Brooklyn federal court of a Yemeni sheik, Mohammed Ali Hasan al-Moayad, who stands accused of conspiring to raise millions of dollars for Hamas and Al Qaeda. Some of the fund-raising activity was allegedly undertaken at the Al-Farooq Mosque.

From Breakingnews.ie, with thanks to Twostellas:

Bosnian Muslim commander Sefer Halilovic went on trial for murder at the UN war crimes tribunal today for the massacres of dozens of Croat civilians.

Halilovic, 53, is the highest-ranking Muslim army official to be tried for alleged crimes during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war. He has been accused of senior responsibility for massacres in the villages of Grabovica and Uzdol, Bosnia, in 1993.

A total of 62 people were killed and many of their bodies were dumped in the Neretva river.

In opening arguments, prosecutors in The Hague showed horrific amateur video footage of murdered children and elderly people, allegedly massacred by Halilovic’s men.

“The murdered Croat civilians were not combatants, nor were they taking part in military action, nor were they killed as the result of combat” said prosecutor Sureta Chana. “They were either in their beds or were attempting to flee in fear of the fighting.”

"Terrorists Claim U.K. Plane Attack," from AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Britain's government said Monday that 10 of its military personnel were missing and presumed dead following the downing of a military transport plane north of Baghdad on Iraq's election day.

An Iraqi militant group claimed responsibility for shooting down the plane in an Internet statement.

If the deaths are confirmed, it would be the biggest single loss of British lives since the start of the Iraq war. The previous highest number was eight.

In a statement on an Islamic Web site, Ansar al-Islam claimed its fighters tracked the aircraft, "which was flying at a low altitude, and fired an anti-tank missile at it." The plane was flying from Baghdad to the town of Balad, where the U.S. military has an air base.

"Thanks be to God, the plane was downed and a huge fire and black clouds of smoke were seen rising from the location of the crash," said the statement posted Sunday.

We should not have to sacrifice our principles and the rule of law in order to defend ourselves against the jihad. But cases like this present a difficult dilemma. If it can be definitively established that he made public threats and was involved with associates of Osama, at very least he should lose his refugee status -- and more, depending on how seriously he was involved in jihadist activity. From the Times Online, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

The first of 12 foreign terrorist suspects held in British custody for years without charge learned today that he would soon be released on bail, following a ruling that indefinitely detaining the men was unlawful. Mahmoud Abu Rideh, a Palestinian, was granted bail by the Special Immigration Appeals Commission, the court set up to hear applications from terrorist suspects.

Mr Rideh was arrested soon after the terrorist attacks attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001. He was detained without charge or trial under the provisions of the Terrorism Act 2001.

Last month, however, a landmark legal ruling by the Law Lords declared it discriminatory and against human rights law to hold foreign suspects in this way.

Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, responded last week by announcing a new anti-terror policy, under which both foreign and British suspects could have their movements restricted without charge or trial.

The new measures would be provided for in "control orders", which will replace indefinite detention in jail. The orders will be determined by the Home Secretary and could include house arrest or curfews imposed on suspects.

Mr Rideh came to Britain in 1995 and was granted refugee status. A father-of-five in his early thirties, he was one of the first to be detained under the Anti-Terrorism Crime and Security Act before the courts prevented identification of the detainees.

Claims against him included that he made public threats to carry out a bombing and that he was involved with associates of Osama bin Laden in Britain and abroad.

He claims the allegations are "lies" and that, when he was in Afghanistan, he was setting up a charitable school for children rather than meeting terrorists. He also claims to have been tortured in Israel.

Taking a page from Turkey's memory-hole treatment of the Armenian genocide, Egypt is about to prosecute Saad Eddin Ibrahim for daring to note that Christians have a tough time there. From Deutsche Presse Agentur, with thanks to Twostellas:

CAIRO — A Cairo court is to investigate claims that a renowned professor of political sociology at the American University in Cairo used his academic status to attack the Egyptian regime and damage Egypt’s international reputation, the daily Al Akhbar reported yesterday.

Dr Saaddin Ibrahim, who is director of Ibn Khaldon Centre for Development Studies, is accused of using his role at the centre to insult Egypt and brand the grand Imam of Al Azhar a terrorist. Lawyer Samir Shehata, who filed the report against Ibrahim, claims that Ibrahim used his centre to issue statements claiming that Christians in Egypt are oppressed.

Some links for Ibrahim's defense team:

Egypt: Muslims throw stones at church building site; riot ensues

Egyptian Authorities Refuse to Charge Christian Prisoner

Scathing Egyptian Movie About Copts Draws Street Protests

Egyptian police drive vehicle into canal, killing 3 Copts, including priest

There are more in the archives here.

From Islam Q & A (thanks to Goon) comes this "Ruling on Jihad and kinds of Jihad." It is quite lengthy and revealing, and accords with traditional Islamic theology on jihad. The different stages of revelations to Muhammad about jihad are explained, concluding with this:

After jihad was enjoined upon him, the kaafirs [unbelievers] then fell into three categories: those with whom there was a truce or peace treaty; those with whom he was at war; and those who lived under the rule and protection of the Islamic state.”

The truce is temporary, so there are really only two choices for unbelievers: war, or subjugation. This is the ideology motivating jihadists around the world today.

Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald on why the media's most commonly-used word for the American presence in Iraq is misapplied:

I would never use the word "quagmire" about the American effort in Iraq. Iraq is not Vietnam; there is no quagmire, and many important things have been achieved. To wit: the disruption of major weapons programs, the destruction of major weaponry, the uncovering of networks of people who received money and oil vouchers from Saddam Hussein (the whole oil-for-food business). The Americans have, heroically, done fantastic things. Thousands of schools repaired (but what will be taught in those schools once the Americans leave?), a hundred hospitals refurbished, oil pipelines and oil fields constantly being repaired, power grids, etc.

That this has received almost no attention in the world press, when it ought to be the constant subject on the nightly news everywhere, says a lot about the distortions in the press. That the Civil Affairs soldiers have to work as hard as they can merely to convince some American journalist to please, please just tell a little about what we are doing, is a scandal. The American press has not distinguished itself, and the soldiers have a right to be resentful (if they are).

A misallocation of resources is quite different from a "quagmire." We can stay, and do all sorts of things. But then we will not be able to do all sorts of other things. And those other things need to be done. The other day a major weapons project -- a plane -- was cancelled for lack of money. If tomorrow the Chinese began to do something with Taiwan, could American forces handle it? Not everything can be done. How does improving lives in Iraq make it more likely that Iraq will be less Muslim in the future, when everything we know about Islam suggests that it is a resilient and permanent and powerful force, and can only be constrained when its own adherents come to see that has, in some ways, failed (the Ataturk example)?

The invasion, the disruption, the deposing of Saddam, were completely justified. The nonsensical business of spending time arguing about or wondering about or second-guessing about whether there was, wasn't, was, wasn't, an "Al Qaeda" connection shows just how silly people can be. What connection, other than that of Islam, need there be? If Egypt were to be acquiring major weaponry (you know, that "WMD"), could that be permitted, knowing the likelihood that Muslims in the government, or Muslims outside the government, might pass that weaponry on to others? Do we need to know anything more, such as whether or not some Iraqi met with Mohammed Atta in Prague? No, we don't.

The "freedom-isn't-free" and "everyone wants democracy" and "democratization should be our after-school and summer project for the next five or ten years" is nonsense. A sentimental substitute for coming to grips with the ideology of Islam. This is something no one in power in the Western world wants to do, not least because there are plenty of people around in think-tanks who, often Muslms themselves, or those who think that they because they were so tough-minded with the Soviets they have, in some sense, "given at the office" and are exempted from any need to show the same hardheadedness about another ideology, or those who get all respectful when they hear the word "religion" -- well, you can see the size of the problem.

Less sentimentalism, more stratagems, less Family-of-Man, more Halford Mackinder.

Morally, we are invincible. Mentally? I am not so sure.

From AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

Washington (AP) -- A federal judge has ordered the government to turn over classified information about a Missouri charity accused of ties with terrorism....

His order came yesterday after the Islamic American Relief Agency asked that its assets be unfrozen.

The federal government raided the agency's Columbia headquarters in October, claiming the agency was a branch of a Sudanese relief agency tied to Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaida.

This seems quite likely. From the Telegraph, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

The controversial policy of detaining foreign terrorist suspects without trial was a key tool in preventing Britain from being attacked by al-Qa'eda militants, senior security officials believe. The officials say that the emergency measure, introduced after the September 11 attacks on America, deterred scores of terrorists from entering the United Kingdom, and they fear that ending the policy will increase the chances of an attack here.

Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, told the Commons last week that he was bowing to a law lords ruling to end the detention of foreign nationals suspected of threatening national security.

In future terrorist suspects, including those with British nationality, would be subject to a wide range of "executive control" orders, including house arrest and electronic tagging. The officials said they would have to "wait and see" whether the powers would be as effective.

One security official added, however, that the threat from terrorism was as "real today as it was in the immediate aftermath" of the World Trade Center attacks. He said: "The terrorists knew that they could be detained indefinitely and so in many cases they stopped entering the country. It was simple but effective."

Mahmood Mamdani is Herbert Lehman Professor of Government, Department of Anthropology and School of International Affairs, Columbia University, New York. Here are some salient extracts from his piece called "Inventing political violence" in a publication named Global Agenda, which also boasts Kofi Annan, Karen Armstrong, and Seif al Islam Qaddafi among its authors. (Thanks to RG for the link.)

I was in New York City on 9/11. In the weeks that followed, newspapers reported that the Koran had become one of the biggest-selling books in American bookshops. Astonishingly, Americans seemed to think that reading the Koran might give them a clue to the motivation of those who carried out the suicide attacks on the World Trade Center. Recently, I have wondered whether the people of Falluja have taken to reading the Bible to understand the motivation for American bombings. I doubt it.

Astonishing indeed, that the editors (and presumably the readers) of Global Agenda still think this is a cogent argument. Astonishing that Americans would read the Qur'an to discover the motivation of men who cited the Qur'an repeatedly in their communiques and justifications for their actions. Astonishing that Mahmood Mamdani would think that Fallujans reading the Bible was an appropriate reductio ad absurdum to dispose of this, despite the readily demonstrable fact that for all the dark suspicions about Bush's Christianity, American policy has never proceeded according to Biblical or Christian precepts, either explicitly or implicitly. The contrast with Osama bin Laden's Qur'an-quote-filled messages should be immediately obvious -- except to all who don't wish to see it, or who wish to obscure it.

The post-9/11 public debate in the US has been inspired by two Ivy League intellectuals – Samuel Huntington at Harvard and Bernard Lewis at Princeton. From Huntington’s point of view, the Cold War was a civil war within the west. He says the real war is yet to come. That real war will be a civilizational war, at its core a war with Islam. From this point of view, all Muslims are bad.

No, Mahmood. To point out Islam's political agenda, which jihadist groups are pressing forward with acts of violence worldwide today, is not to say "all Muslims are bad." Here your Cold War reference is actually useful: in 1956, it was not saying "all Russians are bad" to say that Communism was a totalitarian system with an expansionist agenda. However, both must be resisted in order to defend human rights and human dignity.

Their differences aside, Lewis and Huntington share two assumptions. The first is that the world is divided into two – modern and pre-modern. Modern peoples make their own culture; their culture is a creative act and it changes historically. In contrast, they assume that pre-modern peoples have an unchanging, ahistorical culture, one they carry along with them; they wear their culture as a kind of badge, and sometimes suffer from it like a collective twitch. The second assumption is that you can read people’s politics from their culture. I call these two assumptions Culture Talk.

All this is just academic jawing. Mahmood, you're just setting up a straw man. The problem with Islam and jihad is not about being modern and pre-modern. The jihadists, as I have pointed out here many times, have no trouble using modern technology to achieve their ends. The problem is that they are fighting -- by their own account -- to impose Sharia wherever they can, and Sharia denies basic rights to non-Muslims and women. That's why they must be resisted, not because they're "pre-modern."

The aftermath of the Iraq War has turned into a crisis for theory. It is increasingly clear that the designation of some Muslims as good and others as bad has little to do with their orientation to Islam, and everything to do with their orientation to America. Simply put, good Muslim is a label for those who are deemed pro-American and bad Muslims are those reckoned anti-American. Culture Talk is not only wrong, it is also self-serving. How convenient it is to see political violence as something wrong with the culture of one party rather than an indication that something has gone wrong in the relationship between two parties.

Once again, Mahmood, you're in denial (or practicing deception). A "bad Muslim" is not by definition one who is anti-American, although that will likely be the case these days. A "bad Muslim," in the view of anyone who believes that women should not be chattel and non-Muslims should not be relegated to despised second-class status, is one who believes the dictum of the Pakistani Islamic leader Syed Abul Ala Mawdudi that non-Muslims have "absolutely no right to seize the reins of power in any part of God's earth nor to direct the collective affairs of human beings according to their own misconceived doctrines." If they do, "the believers would be under an obligation to do their utmost to dislodge them from political power and to make them live in subservience to the Islamic way of life."

Actually, in light of the Qur'an, Hadith, Islamic law, Islamic theology, and Islamic history, one who believes that Mawdudi (whom Mahmood mentions below) is right would be a "good Muslim." But whatever one wishes to call him, he is the foe of the equality of dignity of all people.

Contemporary, modern political Islam developed as a response to colonialism. Colonialism posed a double challenge, that of foreign domination and of the need for internal reform to address weaknesses exposed by external aggression.

Early political Islam grappled with such questions in an attempt to modernize and reform Islamic societies. Then came Pakistani thinker Abu ala Mawdudi, who placed political violence at the centre of political action, and Egyptian thinker Sayyed Qutb, who argued that it was necessary to distinguish between friends and enemies, for with friends you use reason and persuasion, but with enemies you use force.

The terrorist tendency in political Islam is not a pre-modern carry-over but a very modern development.

Radical political Islam is not a development of the ulama (legal scholars), not even of mullahs or imams (prayer leaders). It is mainly the work of non-religious political intellectuals. Mawdudi was a journalist and Qutb a literary theorist. It has developed through a set of debates, but these cannot be understood as a linear development inside political Islam. Waged inside and outside political Islam, they are both a critique of reformist political Islam and an engagement with competing political ideologies, particularly Marxism-Leninism.

Of course, none of this takes into account the fact that Hassan Al-Banna founded the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928 as a direct response to the abolition of the caliphate in 1924. "The terrorist tendency in political Islam" may not be a "pre-modern carry-over," but political Islam itself is. Of course, that depends on what Mahmood means by "the terrorist tendency." Islam was political from the time of the Hijra. For centuries Muslims pressed forward an agenda of conquest and subjugation, which modern terrorist groups have taken up today. Mahmood breezily dismisses the possibility of any continuity, but offers no evidence of this beyond bare assertions.

Why does this point matter? Because if modern political Islam is really a reaction to colonialism and an engagement with Marxism-Leninism, etc., then presumably it will disappear as soon as the elements that Mamdani no doubt considers neo-colonialist -- Iraq, Israel -- themselves disappear. His entire paper is designed to elicit that conclusion. But the 800-pound gorilla in the living room is the presence of pre-colonial political Islam: its existence, and the repeated invocation by jihadists today of a continuity between it and what they are doing now, indicates that if the so-called neo-colonialism that Mamdani detests really did disappear, the jihad would not.

That said, we are confronted with a singular question: How did Islamist terror, a theoretical tendency that preoccupied a few intellectuals and was of marginal political significance in the 1970s, become part of the political mainstream in only a few decades?

The real answers: Saudi oil money and the success of Khomeini.

But Mamdani instead recites a litany of dubious historical value, recounting "American terror" and its roots in the Reagan Administration.

The Afghan war was the prime example of “rollback”. In the history of terror during the last phase of the Cold War, the Afghan war was important for two reasons. First, the Reagan administration ideologized the war as a religious war against the evil empire, rather than styling it a war of national liberation such as that it claimed the Contras were fighting in Nicaragua. In the process, the CIA marginalized every Islamist group that had a nationalist orientation, fearing that these groups might be tempted to negotiate with the Soviet Union, and brought centre-stage the most extreme Islamists in a partnership that would “bleed the Soviet Union white”.

Second, the Reagan administration privatized war in the course of recruiting, training and organizing a global network of Islamic fighters against the Soviet Union. The recruitment was done through Islamic charities, and the training through militarized madrasahs. Unlike the historical madrasah, which taught a range of subjects, secular and religious, from theology and jurisprudence to history and medicine, the Afghan madrasah taught a narrow curriculum dedicated to a narrow theology (jihadi Islam) and gave a complementary military training.

The narrow theology recast Islam around a single institution, the jihad; it redefined the jihad as exclusively military and claimed the military jihad to be an offensive war entered into by individual born-again devotees as opposed to defence by an Islamic community under threat. The jihadi madrasahs in Pakistan trained both the Afghan refugee children who were later recruited into the Taliban and the Arab-Afghans who were later networked by the organization called al-Qaeda (“the Base”). If national liberation wars created proto-state apparatuses, the international jihad created a private network of specialists in violence.

America did not create right-wing Islam, a tendency that came into being through intellectual debates, both inside political Islam and with competing secular ideologies, such as Marxism-Leninism. America’s responsibility was to turn this ideological tendency into a political organization – by incorporating it into America’s Cold War strategy in the closing phase of the Cold War.

Before the Afghan jihad, right-wing political Islam was an ideological tendency with little organization and muscle on the ground. The Afghan jihad gave it numbers, organization, skills, reach, confidence and a coherent objective. America created an infrastructure of terror but heralded it as an infrastructure of liberation.

This all sounds convincing, but once again it is historical fantasy. "Before the Afghan jihad, right-wing political Islam was an ideological tendency with little organization and muscle on the ground"? Apparently Mamdani has not heard of a fellow named Khomeini. And the Afghan madrassas did not redefine the jihad "as exclusively military"; Al-Banna had argued that jihad was primarily, if not solely, military decades before the Afghan jihad began. He pointed out the fact that the spiritual "greater jihad" was based on a weak hadith, and thus could not take precedence over military action.

Much more than Ronald Reagan or the Afghan jihad, it has been the Saudis who have given mujahedin worldwide "numbers, organization, skills, reach, confidence and a coherent objective." Mamdani also misstates and exaggerates the extent of American support for the Afghan jihadists. But the bottom line is that as long as the "ideological tendency" remains, this threat will recur, for new powers will always find new excuses to encourage it. That is the core of the problem.

The Obsidian Order (thanks to LGF) has a very intriguing analysis of a series of photos of a bomb exploding a car in Iraq. It strongly suggests that AFP, AP, and Reuters had photographers ready to capture the event, which contains a number of questionable elements. How did the three photographers know the car was going to explode at that particular place and time? What kind of connections do they have to the mujahedin?

As if "Islamophobia" is created ex nihilo, or from the febrile imaginations of hatemongers. Why aren't there any international conferences to discuss rising levels of Buddhismophobia and distorted images of Buddhism? Why is it only Islam that seems to have this problem? Of course, some groups really are the victims of irrational prejudices, but in this case that is an unproven assumption -- and the one thing we can be virtually certain will not happen at this Cairo conference is an honest self-examination. No one will confront the fact that Islam has doctrines mandating warfare against unbelievers, and that Muslims worldwide are acting upon those doctrines today. If those Muslims are mentioned at all at this conference, it will be to claim, with no explanation or justification whatsoever, that they are twisting Islam.

From IslamOnline, with thanks to Twostellas:

CAIRO, January 28 (IslamOnline.net) – In an effort to confront rising Islamophobia worldwide, Cairo is to host a conference on the humanity of Islam and how to clear distorted images of the religion.

The conference, slated for April 17, is to be attended by a cohort of Islamic affairs and waqfs (religious endowment) ministers, muftis and representatives of Muslim and international organizations.

Muslim and western scholars from 80 countries would show up for the event, under the title, “Humanity of Islamic Civilization” and organized by the Higher Council on Islamic Affairs in Egypt.

The main purpose of the gathering is to highlight the Islamic values and civilization in order to stand up to the ferocious international campaign against Muslims, said Egyptian Waqfs Minister Mahmoud Hamdy Zaqzouq Thursday, January 27.

The title reflects two main calls, the first for Muslims to abide by the true values of their religion and the second for the world to reverse attitudes towards Islam, he said.

Four Pivots

The conference is to touch on four pivots during the four day of discussions, according to Zaqzouq.

The first is “Islam's stance on the other”, as well as principles of equality and multiplicity in the religion.

The second is Islam’s relation to other civilizations. Claims on clash of civilizations, along with the influence of Islam on western civilizations, will be tackled by the participants.

The humanity of Islam, abhorrence of hatred and racism, respect for prophets, in addition to the world’s need to highlight Islamic values would make up the third pivot.

The fourth probes Islam’s views on woman, discusses the honoring of women by Islam, legal personality of women, marriage contracts and political role, in addition to inheritance, testimony and polygamy issues.

The full 95-page Freedom House report, "Saudi publications on Hate Ideology Fill American Mosques," is now available here in pdf form.

Read it all. The venom directed toward Christians, Jews, Muslims deemed not Islamic enough, and America is breathtaking. There is also a healthy helping of jihad ideology and material advising the oppression of women. And remember, this material is being spread in mosques all over the United States: in 1999, the Naqshbandi Sufi Sheikh Muhammad Hisham Kabbani testified before a State Department open forum that eighty percent of American mosques had extremist leadership. His assertion has never been convincingly refuted.

Noting that Muslims who attend Saudi-funded mosques are advised not to become naturalized citizens of the U.S., Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald has uncovered another nugget of wisdom from South African Mufti Ebrahim Desai, the Answer Man who advocates offensive jihad against non-Muslim countries:

Wahhabi Muslims may be commanded not to become naturalized citizens, but to study in the Infidel lands only in order to acquire the tools with which to fight Infidels later. There is also another approach, which is to become a “naturalized citizen” of the United States, or of other Infidel countries. Indeed, many Muslims wonder about whether taking an oath of allegiance to an Infidel nation-state is permissible. On Islamic websites various experts offer answers to this question. They do not differ in the slightest from the answer offered here by the Mufti (expert in law) Ebrahim Desai, of Capetown, South Africa.

Here is the question he was asked:

To become a citizen of US one has to take an oath of allegiance. is it ok to take the oath. The oath of allegiance is as follows: I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform noncombatant service in the Armed Forces of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform work of national importance under civilian direction when required by the law; and that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God.

They also ask on the citizenship form the following questions: If the law requires it, are you willing to bear arms on behalf of US? If the law requires it, are you willing to perform noncombatant service in the US Armed Forces? If the law requires it, are you willing to perform work of national importance under civilian direction? My question is can we answer yes to these questions? is there anything wrong in doing that. what should the answer be: yes or no? could you please kindly give an urgent answer. jazakallah.

And here is Mufti Ebrahim Desai’s response:

Answer 8471 2003-04-25 As Muslims, we are duty bound to follow our lives strictly according to Shari’ah. Whatever Shari’ah allows us to do, we will abide by that and whatever Shari’ah has restricted us from, we will refrain from it. Hence, we are not allowed to obey anybody if it is resulting in the disobedience of the Creator, Allah. Nabi (Sallallaahu Alayhi Wasallam) said, ‘There is no obedience for the creation by disobeying the Creator.’ (Mirqaat vol.7 pg217; Imdadiyyah).

Hence, keeping this in mind if one is forced to sign the above in order to become a citizen or the only way of attaining citizenship is by acknowledging the above, then one may sign it with the intention that Shari’ah and Deen will always be his yardstick and that he will never sacrifice any of the teachings of Deen.

and Allah Ta'ala Knows Best

Mufti Ebrahim Desai

To sum up: Wahhabis are encouraged to go to the West, and conduct Da'wa where possible among Infidels, and also to exploit whatever they manage to learn later on, the better to fight the Infidels. But they should not become "naturalized citizens."

Non-Wahhabis, on the other hand, may become "naturalized citizens" as long as they keep in mind that "if one is forced to sign the above [oath of allegiance] in order to become a citizen or the only way of attaining citizenship is by acknowledging the above [the oath of allegiance] then one may sign it with the intention [i.e. "mental reservation" or "kitman"] that Shariah and Deen [the religion]will always be his yardstick and that he will never sacrifice any of the teachings of Deen."

And to think I was worried there for a minute.

More jihadist disruption of Iraqi voting. From AP, with thanks to Xliberty:

An Australian polling station for Iraqi exiles voting in their homeland's historic election was closed for an hour on Saturday after a riot broke out and a suspicious bag prompted a bomb scare.

Bernie Hogan, the head of Australia's overseas voting program, said the riot erupted when a group of some 20 protesters started yelling insults at voters leaving the polling center, which is in a Sydney neighborhood dominated by Iraqi Shi'ites.

Hogan said the protesters - who had been granted a permit to stage their action - were holding up the same black flag with white lettering that has appeared as a backdrop in videos released by Iraqi insurgents featuring foreign hostages begging for their lives.

That would be the battle flag of jihad, the black flag of Islam.

More on the four British Muslims freed from Gitmo. Are their activities being monitored in Britain? After all, there are precedents: other freed Guatanamo prisoners have returned to the jihad. From The Scotsman, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

A DOSSIER gathered by US officials against the four British men freed this week from Guantanamo Bay alleges they all received military training in al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan, it emerged today.

The US Justice Department documents include claims that at least one of the men was taught how a jihad group works and was given instructions on how to use weapons and destroy vehicles.

Similar allegations have previously been denied by the lawyers and families of the former prisoners, who were held for up to three years at the Cuban naval base as suspected terrorists.

Martin Mubanga, Feroz Abbasi, Richard Belmar and Moazzam Begg say they were tortured while in captivity. The Pentagon describes the four men as a continuing security threat, but they were freed without charge after being questioned on their return to Britain.

Explosive revelations from a Russian parliamentary commission. But no word in this report as to the nationality or religion of the officers. From ABCNews Online, with thanks to Anthony:

The chair of the commission says two highly-ranked military officials have been arrested after allegations they provided assistance to the gunmen.

He says other officials, who are ranked major and above, may also be charged.

It is speculated that they could have helped the gunmen indirectly by allowing them to pass through police checkpoints.

Jihad recruitment in Germany: "Authorities believe the terms refer to the recruitment and placement of volunteers for Jihad." From Reuters, with thanks to Anthony:

BERLIN (Reuters) - An Iraqi arrested in Germany on suspicion of plotting an al Qaeda suicide attack in Iraq said he was sent on his mission by Osama bin Laden himself, a German magazine reported Saturday.

German state prosecutors believe Ibrahim Mohammed K., a 29-year-old Iraqi believed to be a high-ranking al Qaeda figure, recruited Yasser Abu S., a 31-year-old stateless Palestinian from Libya, as a future suicide bomber in Iraq.

The two men were arrested last Sunday in the western city of Mainz, which President Bush is due to visit next month. However, prosecutors said there was no indication the two had planned an attack in Germany.

Der Spiegel magazine said the Iraqi had told the other man he had been sent by bin Laden personally to Germany. It gave no details on the date or location of the meeting.

"Yes, he sent me to work, to sell and buy," the magazine quoted him as saying, citing a conversation from their Mainz apartment that investigating authorities recorded.

Authorities believe the terms refer to the recruitment and placement of volunteers for Jihad, or "holy war," the magazine said in a preview of an article due to appear Monday.

Once again, the misapprehension that this is a racial issue. And once again, no sign of awareness among Danish officials that Islam is any different from Christianity in its relation to the political sphere. Prime Minister Fogh Rasmussen has a lot to learn, and chances are that in the coming years, he'll learn it. From Financial Times, with thanks to Anthony:

A vitriolic row over race relations erupted into the heart of Denmark's general election campaign yesterday when Islamic leaders urged the country's 170,000 Muslims to vote against the ruling centre-right coalition.... However, the race row erupted after Kasem Said Ahmad, a prominent Muslim community spokesman, said he advised all Muslims to oppose the government in next month's vote. Mr Ahmad said he was organising a gathering of 25 imams (Muslim clerics), who plan to issue an anti-government message at next week's Friday prayers.

Mr Fogh Rasmussen responded angrily and immediately to the proposed intervention of Denmark's imams: "They should keep their fingers out of politics," Mr Fogh Rasmussen said. "In Denmark we keep politics and religion separate. Imagine if Danish priests were to use church pulpits to urge people to vote for particular parties," he said.

The jihad against democracy in Iraq continues. "Insurgents Bomb Polling Places in Iraq," from AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A suicide bomber detonated explosives strapped to his body in front of a police station in a Kurdish town near the Iranian border, killing eight people on the eve of Iraq's crucial national election, Iraqi and U.S. officials said. Insurgents blasted polling places in at least eight cities.

Signs are already emerging that Turkey's entrance into the EU will not change Turkey as much as it will change Europe. And look: it was half a sentence. Someone in Turkey is paying very, very close attention to these matters. From Deutsche Presse Agentur (DPA), with thanks to Kemaste:

(dpa) - Pressure from Turkey has resulted in the removal of a reference to the Armenian genocide from a German school curriculum, reports said Wednesday.

The eastern German state of Brandenburg has eliminated half a sentence on the Armenians included in ninth and tenth grade history classes after a Turkish diplomat complained to state Prime Minister Matthias Platzeck, the newspaper Die Welt reported.

In a chapter entitled "War, Technology and Civilian Populations" the school book text said "for example, the genocide of the Armenians population of Anatolia." That passage has now been removed from school textbooks, the newspaper said.

Platzeck met regularly with Turkish diplomats and was "steeled" against their influence, the newspaper quoted him as saying. The prime minister added that genocide was too important an issue to be dealt with in just half a sentence. "Brandenburg's curriculum was the only one in Germany which up until now included a reference to the murder of the Armenians," said Die Welt.

Most historians say that between 600,000 and 1.5 million Armenians were killed in 1915 and 1916 under the Ottoman Turks during World War I. The Turkish government, which denies that a genocide took place, speaks of 200,000 dead.

A Turkish embassy spokesman in Berlin declined to comment directly on the report, but noted the initiative had come from the Turkish consulate responsible for Berlin and Brandenburg - not from the embassy itself.

Here, from September 2000, is "'Genocide? What genocide?'," David Kupelian's account of how the Armenian genocide affected his family. (Thanks again to Kemaste.) It begins:

When my father was three years old, he was sentenced to a brutal death, along with his mother and infant sister, by the Turkish government. Along with hundreds of thousands of other Armenians, they were earmarked to be herded into the Syrian desert where they would die of starvation, disease, or worse -- torture and death at the hands of brutal soldiers or hordes of roving bandits.

Read it all. When I hear Islamic apologists speak of the "illustrious Ottoman Empire," it is hard for me to take them seriously, knowing so many stories like Kupelian's of exile and murder.

Left: Elvis impersonator and Iraqi Benjamin Nissan votes in Skokie, Illinois. Right: Iraqi expatriate Abbis Kadhen votes in Nashville, Tennessee. (Both photos Reuters)

And people say there's no clash of civilizations. I just hope this vote doesn't lead Iraq to Heartbreak Hotel.

The print edition of the Wall Street Journal today carries on pg. B5 an advance report of a Freedom House study on Saudi mosques in the U.S.

WASHINGTON -- Mosques across the U.S. continue to carry books and pamphlets describing non-Muslims as "infidels" and promoting intolerance against Western society, according to a forthcoming study by Freedom House, a U.S. human-rights group.

Despite vows from American Islamic leaders after Sept. 11, 2001, to proselytize peacefully, New York based Freedom House researchers found 57 documents with incendiary material in more than a dozen mosques and Islamic centers in six states and Washington, D.C., visited over the past year.

The materials "demonstrate the ongoing indoctrination of Muslims in the United States in the hostility and belligerence of Saudi Arabia's hardline Wahhabi sect of Islam," says the report, an advance copy of which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

No one should be surprised by this. The Saudis can't stop teaching such things without compromising their core principles.

And here are findings from the Freedom House press release:

Various Saudi government publications gathered for this study, most of which are in Arabic, assert that it is a religious obligation for Muslims to hate Christians and Jews and warn against imitating, befriending, or helping them in any way, or taking part in their festivities and celebrations;

· The documents promote contempt for the United States because it is ruled by legislated civil law rather than by totalitarian Wahhabi-style Islamic law. They condemn democracy as un-Islamic;

· The documents stress that when Muslims are in the lands of the unbelievers, they must behave as if on a mission behind enemy lines. Either they are there to acquire new knowledge and make money to be later employed in the jihad against the infidels, or they are there to proselytize the infidels until at least some convert to Islam. Any other reason for lingering among the unbelievers in their lands is illegitimate, and unless a Muslim leaves as quickly as possible, he or she is not a true Muslim and so too must be condemned. For example, a document in the collection for the “Immigrant Muslim” bears the words “Greetings from the Cultural Attache in Washington, D.C.” of the Embassy of Saudi Arabia, and is published by the government of Saudi Arabia. In an authoritative religious voice, it gives detailed instructions on how to “hate” the Christian and Jew: Never greet them first. Never congratulate the infidel on his holiday. Never imitate the infidel. Do not become a naturalized citizen of the United States. Do not wear a graduation gown because this imitates the infidel;

· One insidious aspect of the Saudi propaganda examined is its aim to replace traditional and moderate interpretations of Islam with extremist Wahhabism, the officially-established religion of Saudi Arabia. In these documents, other Muslims, especially those who advocate tolerance, are condemned as infidels. The opening fatwa in one Saudi embassy-distributed book, published by the Saudi Air Force, responds to a question about a Muslim preacher in a European mosque who taught that it is not right to condemn Jews and Christians as infidels. The Saudi state cleric’s reply rebukes the Muslim cleric: “He who casts doubts about their infidelity leaves no doubt about his.” Since, under Saudi law, “apostates” from Islam can be sentenced to death, this is an implied death threat against the tolerant Muslim imam, as well as an incitement to vigilante violence;

· Sufi and Shiite Muslims are viciously condemned;

· For a Muslim who fails to uphold the Saudi Wahhabi sect’s sexual mores (i.e. through homosexual activity or heterosexual activity outside of marriage), the edicts published by the Saudi government’s Ministry of Islamic Affairs, and found in American mosques advise, “it would be lawful for Muslims to spill his blood and to take his money;”

· Regarding those who convert out of Islam, the Saudi Ministry of Islamic Affairs explicitly asserts, they “should be killed;”

· Saudi textbooks and other publications in the collection, propagate a Nazi-like hatred for Jews, treat the forged Protocols of the Elders of Zion as historical fact, and avow that the Muslim’s duty is to eliminate the state of Israel;

· Regarding women, the Saudi publications instruct that they should be veiled, segregated from men and barred from certain employment and roles;

The report states: “While the government of Saudi Arabia claims to be ‘updating’ or reforming its textbooks and study materials within the Kingdom, its publications propagating an ideology of hatred remain plentiful in some prominent American mosques and Islamic centers, and continue to be a principal resource available to students of Islam within the United States.”

From WND, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

As the Iraqi national election approaches, terrorist insurgents and Kurdish paramilitary groups continue to target the ChaldoAssyrian Christian minority, trying to prevent them from freely participating in the vote, according to a human rights group.

"These Christians have endured suicide bombings at their churches, acid thrown on women for not wearing the hijab, kidnappings for profit and the murder of store owners," says Washington, D.C.-based International Christian Concern.

ICC says that in addition, the Kurdish authority has withheld crucial funding and has been linked to paramilitary groups targeting the ChaldoAssyrian villages in the Assyrian Administrative Region east of Mosul.

Out of $20 billion designated and distributed to rebuild Iraq, the Kurdish administrators have released no money for reconstruction in ChaldoAssyrian areas, the group said.

I also received this most interesting email. I have been unable to verify its assertions, but they are worth noting in light of the above:

You probably don't know this, but the muslims that are running the Iraq elections have offically stole it from us Christians.

First with San Diego, with about 70,000 Chaldeans/Assyrians there, they have forced them to go to LA to vote. Hmmm. Do you think they will drive all the way there twice? (Once for registration, once for voting.)

They tried to take it away from the 100,000 Assyrians living in Chicago. They planned not to have a voting booth there, but after massive protests, they finally gave in.

As for Detroit, well, everyone knowns this is the single largest Iraq
community here living in Sterling Heights. Guess where they made the
single voting booth at? 40 miles away at a city that has nobody ever
heard of called Southgate. Go look up the map at yahoo and see how far it is.

Me here in Detroit, was so excited about these elections and was hoping to give some voice for our people. But now everyone here in our community is so saddened with this issue. They know not more then 10% of Chaldeans in Detroit now will vote. How are we to convince the old men and women to drive 1 hour back and forth twice if they don't know how to use the highways?

January 30 has offically become the saddest day for the Christians of
Iraq. Every one of the Christians from Detroit to Iraq are devastated.

ADDENDUM: Of course, inconvenient polling places are no comparison to what Christians are suffering in Iraq. But the possibility that the same forces trying to keep Christians from voting in Iraq are doing it here is certainly raised by this email, whatever its merits.

"Nicaraguans seize missile during sting," from the Washington Times, with thanks to Radwick:

Nicaraguan police, with U.S. assistance in a sting operation, thwarted black marketeers trying to sell SA-7 shoulder-fired missiles capable of downing commercial aircraft earlier this month, raising fears that some missiles already have been sold to terrorists, The Washington Times has learned....

"This is a very, very serious threat," said the U.S. official. "This is what makes me stay up at night. Civilian aviation is at stake."

The official said one Soviet-made SA-7 was confiscated at an air conditioning repair shop, the site of the sting in Managua, Nicaragua, where three Nicaraguans tried to sell the missile and offered more to undercover Nicaraguan police.

"This shows that such missiles can be bought on the open market, and it highlights the need for strong international cooperation to get rid of them," a second official said in a government statement issued to The Times.

The sting has sounded alarm bells through the Bush administration for a number of reasons. The arrested men thought they were selling missiles to terrorists in Colombia and were willing to sell to Islamic terrorists, the official said. Also, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in November had won what he believed was a firm agreement from Nicaraguan President Enrique Bolanos to destroy about 1,000 remaining SA-7s. Some in the Bush administration now suspect the military is double-crossing Mr. Bolanos.

Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda and other terrorist groups are known to be seeking portable missiles capable of bringing down a commercial airliner. The 20-pound SA-7 has a range up to 15,000 feet. In the wrong hands, a missile could down an airliner on its airport takeoff or approach.

"Duke is under fire for comments he made about Islam not being a peaceful religion." Times are exceedingly tough when you can come "under fire" for telling the truth. From WND, with thanks to all who sent this in:

The dean of a Bible college has stirred up a controversy in Tennessee after challenging a neighboring school's class on Islam and declaring that the religion is not peaceful.

Kerry Duke is dean of Tennessee Bible College in Cookeville, Tenn. After hearing about a plan for Tennessee State University to host members of the Islamic Center of Nashville for a free course on Islam, Duke sent a letter to TSU President James Hefner questioning the use of a government-funded university for a course on religion, reported the Nashville Tennessean.

''Are you not using government money to promote religion – a single religion?'' Duke wrote in his Jan. 14 letter. ''Would you allow me to lecture at TSU on Christianity?''

Soon after the letter was received, TSU canceled the class on Islam without much of an explanation....

Besides the letter, Duke is under fire for comments he made about Islam not being a peaceful religion.

''I've been to the mosque several times and I'm well aware of the teachings of the Quran,'' Duke said. ''I disagree with their claims that their religion does not promote violence, and I can show there are statements in the Quran that encourage violence to non-Muslims.''

Gay Welch is chaplain at Vanderbilt University Divinity School, where the course on Islam will now be held. Welch disputed Duke's charge about the religion.

''A lot of violence has been committed in the name of all religions, and there's no reason to lay it all at the feet of Islam,'' she told the Tennessean. ''If you look deeply into the teachings of Jesus and Muhammad, you find that both promoted benevolence, peace and unity.''

I challenge Gay Welch to show from the Qur'an and Hadith that Muhammad promoted benevolence, peace, and unity for anyone but Muslims, and to find anywhere in his teachings anything comparable to Jesus' "love your enemies."

The Vice President of the Jihad Watch Board, Hugh Fitzgerald, considers the wisdom of a continued American presence in Iraq:

The adventure in Iraq, which in its First Stage (the war to locate and destroy major weaponry and arms stores, and to overthrow one of the most sinister dictators around) was justified, in its Second Stage (bringing "democracy" defined merely as a counting of heads, which in turn will inevitably lead to --- what, exactly?) of the "Light-Unto-the-Muslim-Nations Project is a colossal misallocation of men, materiel, money, and may do severe and long-lasting damage to morale of both the citizen-army (Reserves and National Guard), the regular army, and the citizens themselves, at the very moment when the utmost resolve is called for, because as there is no end to the Jihad, there can be no end to defenses against the Jihad, in all of its expressions, using all of its varied armory.

The bill for Iraq is now $300 billion. Well, long-suffering American taxpayers, suppose after the initial invasion and overthrow and discovery of weapons-caches that needed to be destroyed, American troops had left. American airpower (planes and missiles) could still be used as "equalizers" in order to protect, for example, the Kurds. Ammunition and weaponry could be selectively supplied. If the Sunni Sunni and Shi'a went at it (the former better trained and armed, the latter more numerous) -- so what? Eventually some kind of modus vivendi would have been established, without Americans taking the casualties. In any case, I will ask again a pointed question:

Was the Iran-Iraq War a good thing, from the viewpoint of Infidels, or was it not? It was, of course, a very good thing, and should have gone on forever. The Saudis mistreat the Shi'a in al-Hasa (right where the oilfields are located); the Wahhabi doctrine views Shi'a as practically Infidels (Zarqawi, the "Palestinian" Jordanian, is hardly alone in his views); the Shi'a are killed by Sunnis all over Pakistan (many of the large landholders are Shi'a, so resentment is also class resentment, decked out in Islamic garb); the old Sunni elite in Lebanon does not look with favor on the upstart Shi'a. All of this could be brough into play if there is a kind of permanent jostling between Sunni and Shi'a in Iraq.

Suppose we had left a year ago. Internecine fighting. Eventually someone wins. That will happen in any case. Those who think that al-Sistani is a great democrat and the Shi'a are wonderful have another think coming. Al-Sistani supports elections because the Shi'a are 65% of the population. End of story. He is as much a Muslim, with the same views of Infidels (he will not, for example, meet with any for they are "unclean") as the mullahs next door. The fact that he prefers that he, and other religious figures, remain outside the government does not make him a secularist. Islam must still be reflected in everything that is thought or said or done. He is not the Great Hope of Iraq's Christians -- they are more likely to find what solace they can in the old Ba'athists. The failure to understand all this is extraordinary. So much money, so much effort, so much heroism and sacrifice by American soldiers, and all based on a failure to analyze correctly what it is we should worry about (Islam, not the absence of "democracy" in the Middle East), and the necessary husbanding of resources -- material and moral and intellectual -- that will be required if, in the first place, Europe is to be rescued from islamization. This is not a fantasy.

Suppose of the $200 billion saved (and add to that another $100 billion for the next few years), that had all been put into energy projects, designed to take away from the Arab oil states the unmerited wealth that has allowed them to build and sustain mosques and madrassas all over the Western world, to buy up many diplomats, intelligence agents, journalists, and media outlets (or shares in major media companies) all over the world. Isn't that more important than sticking around -- certainly after the election next week -- to do what? To train "Iraqi" forces? Will American soldiers be asked to live cheek-by-jowl with those forces in order to better "train" them -- and how many will be treacherously slain by those whom they are training? What a nightmare for security. Would you like to be one of those American soldiers bedding down for the night in the tent next to all those nice Iraqis you are training? Would you like your husband, brother, son to do it? And which Iraqis? Will Kurds and Arabs fight together, or Sunni and Shi'a? How naive, how crazy, how oblivious not only to reality, but to the much larger question. This war, truly, is too important to be left to the generals, but also too important to be left to any civilians who, out of sheer laziness or complacency with clichés about "what all people want," refuse to see, to plan, to do what should be done.

And the usual crew of phony "experts" at think-tanks, including such apologists as Shireen Hunter (for god's sake, she is billed as the Director of "Islamic Studies" at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, which explains a lot, in the same way that the Middle Eastern wing at St. Antony's in Oxford has managed to muddy the thinking of the other, less idiotic, "East European and Russian" wing of the same St. Antony's -- just look at how little Timothy Garton Ash understands Islam, or even thinks he needs to understand) do not help either.

And, to come to my main point, if only 1% of that money -- say, $1 billion a year, were spent on anti-Jihad propaganda, in which Islam and its adherents are put on the defensive, constantly being asked to explain the teachings and tenets of Islam, what would that do to help educate the people in the Western world? But it is not happening.

Okay, deep-pocketed readers. Kindly think clearly the next time you are about to give money to some university, museum, hospital or anything else. Consider carefully what that art museum, hospital, or university will be like if Islam takes over Europe, and if the forces of Islam become more powerful everywhere. Then direct that check you were about to send elsewhere to the right address at Jihadwatch. And mention my name.

Gaza votes for jihad terror. From AFP, with thanks to Teri:

GAZA CITY (AFP) - The radical Islamist movement Hamas was celebrating a landslide victory in the first ever local elections in the Gaza Strip, winning 77 out of the 118 seats up for grabs, election commission sources said.

The mainstream Fatah faction of Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas won just 26 seats while independents and minor parties won the remaining 15 slots in 10 municipalities across the territory in Thursday's election....

Hamas had campaigned on a strong anti-corruption ticket, amid widespread disillusionment among voters about the incompetence and cronyism which has characterised many councils.

Abbas has vowed a crackdown on corruption and to implement sweeping reforms of the Palestinian institutions but the results in Gaza appear to indicate that voters do not trust the establishment party to put its own house in order.

Mushir al-Masri, a spokesman for Hamas, said the results were a damning indictment of the levels of institutional corruption.

"This means that the Palestinian people reject corruption and hope for change to protect its interests," he told AFP.

Reject corruption, choose jihad.

Little Green Footballs has a review from The Claremont Review of Books of The Palestinian Authority by Edward Said. This is the last book by the man who, in Charles' words, "did more to intellectualize and legitimize the Arab world’s hatred of the Western world than any other human being."

From the review by James Panero:

In November 1993, the New York Times Magazine featured a remarkably unprescient essay by Edward Said titled “The Phony Islamic Threat.” He charged the media, government bureaucrats, and Middle East experts with conjuring an Islamic bogeyman to demonize at home and abroad. Coming only a few months after the first attack on the World Trade Center, the piece dismissed all talk of an Islamist threat as a reflection of American prejudice and insecurity. Then, in the 1997 revised edition of his book Covering Islam, Said ridiculed “speculations about the latest conspiracy to blow up buildings, sabotage commercial airlines,” as inventions of racist Westerners.

Said never wised up. Read it all.

Death is the traditional penalty for blasphemy, as well as the current penalty in Pakistani law. Such laws are frequently used against Christians and other religious minorities there -- which is why State ought to make their repeal the price of friendship with the United States. From AP, "Militants threaten Christian man in Pakistan after his acquittal in blasphemy case," with thanks to Susan:

Anwar Masih, 28, received the threats from Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, in the eastern city of Lahore, said Joseph Francis, coordinator with the Center for Legal Aid, Assistance and Settlement, a Christian rights group.

Last month a court exonerated Masih of the charge that he had insulted Islam and ordered the man to be freed, Francis said.

Masih had been arrested in July after a Christian convert to Islam allegedly reported to police that Masih insulted his Islamic beard.

On Thursday, Francis said Masih was in hiding and his life was in danger.

"The people from the militant organization frequently visit his family and demand that he (Masih) be handed over to them," he said.

Under Pakistan's harsh blasphemy laws, insulting Islam or its prophet Muhammad is an offense and the offender can be punished by death.

Local and international human right groups and Christian right activists in Pakistan have demanded that the country's blasphemy laws be scrapped. They say the laws have been abused to prosecute Christians, who are a minority in Pakistan.

Hundreds of people are believed to be in jail in Pakistan under the blasphemy laws, most of them Christians.

Lawrence Auster challenges Daniel Pipes' view of Islam at FrontPage today, and Pipes responds. It is in some spots worthwhile reading, although in many ways they're talking past each other.

My own position on all this I have made clear many times, although it has been rather cravenly misrepresented by those with their own agenda. There are moderate Muslims, but Islam itself is not moderate. The prospects for reform in Islam are exceedingly dim. I agree with Auster (as does Pipes, who also quotes this sentence) that "the West must confront Islam as Islam and so reduce its power to the point where Muslims have no opportunity to wage jihad campaigns against us. Under such circumstances a more decent type of Islam may arise." Or at least one that is easier to deal with. I expanded on this in a recent article.

Says the AMW website (thanks to Chris):

Hossam Armanious, his wife Amal and their daughters, Sylvia, 15 and Monica, 9 were found murdered in their Jersey City, New Jersey home. They had been tied up, gagged and stabbed to death. Police are trying to determine if this was a hate crime, as the family were devout Coptic Christians.

This is likely to generate more heat than light, but at least it will keep some attention focused on this case, in which there are still many more questions than answers, and a great many troubling elements that seem to be getting short shrift. If you doubt that, just imagine what the press coverage would be like if a Muslim who regularly debated with Christians in a chat room was threatened and then murdered along with his family.

...with the prosecution's hands tied. From AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

NEW YORK (AP) -- A judge earlier this week refused to let federal prosecutors present some of the most potentially damaging evidence against a Yemeni sheik charged with funneling millions of dollars to terrorists.

Prosecutors will not be able to present documents allegedly linking Sheik Mohammed Ali Hasan al-Moayad to suspected al Qaeda militants in Afghanistan and Croatia, Judge Sterling Johnson Jr. ruled....

If convicted, al-Moayad, 56, could face more than 60 years in prison. Zayed, 31, could face more than 30 years.

The government had hoped to prove al-Moayad's ties to Osama bin Laden with address books containing al-Moayad's name and phone number, which were confiscated from suspected al Qaeda fighters being expelled from the former Yugoslavia. The government also planned to introduce an admission form for an al Qaeda Afghan training camp that used al-Moayad as a reference.

The judge called the Croatian evidence "so remote, I am going to preclude the government from using it."

He went on to exclude the Afghan evidence, apparently agreeing with a defense argument that the presence of al-Moayad's name on the form was not sufficient proof of wrongdoing. "We don't know who put this name in," the judge said.

He also ruled a videotape showing al-Moayad with a high-ranking Hamas official on the day of an Israeli suicide bombing could not be introduced without the testimony of Mohamed Alanssi, an FBI informant who recorded it.

Dawa, Taliban style: this is the story of Zablon Simintov, the last Jew in Afghanistan, from "Afghan Jew Becomes Country's One and Only" in the Washington Post, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

Moreover, the former carpet trader said he had spent years watching Afghanistan's once vibrant Jewish populace shrink to virtually nothing. The community dated back 800 years and still numbered 5,000 in 1948, but most remaining families fled the violence and repression that followed the Soviet invasion of 1979....

The Taliban government, which was in power when Simintov returned to Kabul in 1998 after working for several years in Turkmenistan, did not look kindly on his faith. On many occasions, he said, Taliban officials carted him and Levin off to jail, where they were beaten with electric cables and rifle butts for days.

"The Taliban would shout at me, 'Why don't you convert to Islam?' And I would say, 'Not if you paid me one million dollars,' " Simintov recalled.

The Taliban was ousted by U.S.-led forces in 2001. The fact that both remaining Jews survived the Taliban's five-year reign is something of a miracle. Taliban authorities, determined to stamp out practices they considered un-Islamic, outlawed music, whipped men who failed to grow long beards and demolished two enormous Buddha statues that were carved into a cliff 13 centuries ago.

Kabul's synagogue, an unassuming, white-washed building that was erected around a small courtyard on Flower Street 40 years ago, may have escaped a similar fate because it was so modest, and also because it was deserted and in disrepair when the militia came to power after a four-year civil war that virtually destroyed Kabul.

Still, in 1998, after Levin and Simintov were released from their first detention, they found the Taliban had ransacked the synagogue for almost all items of value it still contained, including a silver pointer and four tiny silver bells. A few months later, a Taliban commander confiscated its last, most precious treasure: a handwritten Torah scroll that Simintov estimates was about 400 years old....

"I didn't want anyone to finish the Jewish name in Afghanistan," he said. So he stayed on, trading carpets and handicrafts to support the wife and two daughters he had sent to Israel. But in 2001, he said, Taliban customs officials robbed his warehouses of all his supplies.

"I have nothing. I live like a dog," he complained. Now, having resisted leaving Afghanistan for so long, Simintov said he may consider joining his family in Israel. "This is the last house of the Jews," he said.

It's contest time at Jihad Watch, with our TaqiyyaFest still open for entries, and now a new offer from the Vice President of our Board, Hugh Fitzgerald:

Readers of JihadWatch are aware that MESA Nostra is the professional organization in which, in order to become a uomo d’onore, or a donna d’onore for that matter, no kneecaps need be broken, no nightclubs broken up, no trucks hijacked, no girls put on the streets, no cocaine contraband prescribed by “los medicos” of Medellin be distributed. No, there are only two requirements to become a Made Man in MESA Nostra. The first is easy: you must view the entire Middle East through ideological blinkers, in which Islam scarcely matters, and in which, whatever happens, Jihad-conquest and dhimmitude will be ignored, so that contemporary expressions of millennium-old doctrines, attitudes, impulses will be interpreted without the slightest reference to those doctrines, attitudes, impulses.

That is content.

There is also form.

What would Shakespeare have been like had he not forced himself to squeeze his dramatic verse into the Elizabethan doublet of iambic pentameter? Or Spenser, without the Spenserian stanza? It is not only writers in Elizabethan England who found such constraints productive. How impressive that 20th century French writer who managed to produce a novel without using the letter “e,” or that other one who composed a series of works based on a single device: the beginning and the final sentences of whatever he wrote were phonetically identical, though semantically wildly different, and he assigned himself the writerly task of beating a plausible path through the overgrown jungle of language, a path that led ineluctably from that first sentence to the same-sounding, but different-meaning, last sentence.

Many of those in MESA Nostra may not realize it, but they are akin to Shakespeare and Spenser, Georges Perec and Raymond Roussel. For them it is not a question of verse-forms, or lipograms, or homophonic puns. Their self-imposed constraint consists in limiting their scholarly lexicon to fewer than fifty nouns, and two-dozen verbs. They harness these exhausted nouns, these over-worked verbs, and put them to work, no matter the subject. No matter the subject.

Thus the prose produced by one member of MESA Nostra will sound remarkably like that of another. Here we mean the enthusiastic, full-throated members of MESA Nostra, those whose interests do not stray very far from “Iraq” and “Palestine” and “colonialism” and “empire,” and the obvious ring-changing variants: “occupied Iraq/Palestine,” “Iraqi/Palestinian people,” “Israeli colonialism,” “American empire.” Many members of MESA Nostra membership have a deep and abiding personal and professional interest in these matters, as they do in little else. They can do no other.

But a few members of MESA Nostra are members-in-name-only, who remain different in mental makeup, and distant from the bureaucratic intrigues, the political tendentiousness, the anti-American,anti-Israel, anti-Western themes and variations. These “non-member” members do not write about the “construction of Palestinian identity” nor the “(de)construction of Israeli identity.” Rather, they write about “The Methods of the Mudaddithin,” or “Ephraim of Edessa,” or “Xavier de Planhol and Agricultural Desolation in the Berber Heartland,” or “Yemeni Jews as Chattel Slaves” or “The Destruction of the Coptic Churches of Upper Egypt,” or “Schacht, Jeffery, Gottheil: Three Masters of Morningside Heights” or “Arabic but not Quran’ic: The Evidence of Numismatics” or “Twelver-Shi’ism in Mevlevistan” or “Ibn Battuta, the Rihla, and the Destruction of Hindustan” or “Why There Was No Arab Copernicus or Vesalius: An Inquiry” or “Aisha and Marriage in the Islamic Republic of Iran” or “Quran’ic Memorization and Comparative I.Q. Levels in Post-Independence India” or “Sir William Jones and the Re-Discovery of India” or “The Role of Hadrami Traders in the Muslim Conquest of the East Indies” or “The Story of Thomas Pellow” or “Indo-Persian Miniatures of Jihad-Conquest in the British Museum Collections: A Catalogue Raisonee” or “Table-Talk of a Mesopotamian Judge: A Critical Edition” or “Book-Binding at the Abbasid Court” or “The Role of Hungarian Converts in Ottoman History” or “The War Within Islam: Universalist Claims, Arab Supremacist Doctrine” or “The Treaty of Al-Hudaibiyya and Pacta Sunt Servanda: Muhammad and Grotius on the Law of War and Peace” or …well, you get the idea. But these are not the people whom we have in mind when we discuss MESA Nostra at JihadWatch. We are talking about the other kind.

And it was with that other kind in mind – the card-carrying careerists, the blurb-and-reference swappers, the runners-for-office, the risers-high, the much-interviewed, the solemn dispensers of wisdom to the unwary, the True Believers – that we created the MESA Nostra Contest.

The contest is simple. Below is a single paragraph, itself consisting of a single sentence, transparently written in Mesanostran. Contestants are asked to identify the author.

“In conclusion, I feel that this work of analysis, by focusing on the implications of the phallic hegemony of Wehrmacht-helmeted Israeli troops and their supporters throughout the American empire, both equally unappeasable in their demonstrable need for “the Other,” does what in a quasi-heuristic sense it was intended to do, as it manages to break away from all Eurocentric approaches to discourses of postcolonial subalternity, or even of meta-alterity, and comes so subversively close in its disjunctive interrogation of the counter- or, more exactly, anti-mimesis which is inherently essential to Mesopotamian or indeed to Cairene, Abbasid, Jordanian or Palestinian thought for, as a native of (Amman, Baghdad, Beirut, Cairo, Damascus, Islamabad, Ramallah, Teheran, etc. – choose one) and hence a non-European, I am of necessity self-assigned to that category of people best placed to perform such a mission of interrogating all postcolonialist as well as narrativised specificity, but of equal necessity, not as one obviously intent on de-undermining or rather meta-determining the poststructuralist or post-postmodern universalism, with its customary relativised discourse analysis which seldom lends itself to anticipatory prolepsis, but on the other hand my critique is quite meta-consciously deeply para-rooted within, as well as up-rooted out of, and obviously from, Western thought with its inalienably alien constructions of meta-identity and hypersexuality, which necessarily give rise to post-essentialism which, in a larger sense, serves merely to violate all the strategic critiques of hegemonic historiographical constructions of essences, whether of the Orient or of scholars who deny the self-referentiality of all postcolonialist essentializing.”

The prize for the first correct entry emailed to director@jihadwatch.org will be a nicely framed copy of Professor Hamid Dabashi’s celebrated Poem in Prose to Edward Said, which you may read now by googling “Hamid Dabashi” and “Edward Said.” For many, that will be prize enough.

The other shoe drops in the story of the cemetery desecrated by Somali Muslims. From Reuters, with thanks to Twostellas:

Mogadishu - Somali militiamen on Wednesday began building a mosque over an Italian colonial-era cemetery where they prompted outrage by unearthing hundreds of skeletons last week.

The militia, allied with Mogadishu's Islamic courts, brought in construction workers and building materials, and encouraged area residents to come to the site to pray, residents said.

"We are not ready to pray at the location of dead bodies that human beings are harming," resident Abdinasir Hussien said.

The militia dug up hundreds of corpses last week and threw them into a dump near a Mogadishu airport, drawing a strongly worded protest from the Italian government and from residents of the Somali capital....

Some analysts have speculated that the exhumations were a mesage of opposition to the new government, which has warm relations with Rome and is disliked by the Muslim militants who control the courts.

Most of those disinterred were former Italian colonial officials and soldiers.

In Islam, the emphasis is on purity. The emphasis here is not so much on the fact that this poor woman is a victim, but that she sullies the purity of the community. It is a positive development at least that the PMA official has called for the jirga to be arrested. From the Daily Times of Pakistan, "‘Jirga wants doctor killed,’" with thanks to Twostellas:

PESHAWAR: A tribal jirga in Sindh has decided to kill a woman doctor who was allegedly gang raped in Sui to restore the “lost honour” of her tribe, a Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) official told a press conference on Wednesday. PMA President Dr Umer Ayub said the husband and in-laws of the doctor had told him of the jirga or local council’s decision in Gumbat Khairpur. He demanded the members of the jirga be arrested, and the alleged rapists of the doctor be hanged at Minar-e-Pakistan to deter such crimes. He criticised the federal interior minister for not visiting the woman doctor and her family. He also slammed the NWFP Assembly for not condemning the alleged rape.

From Fox, with thanks to Richard:

LONDON — It's not as if her look or her act are that shocking, but her moves have brought the wrath of Islamic fundamentalists upon her.

Deepika Thathaal, or Deeyah, was born in Norway of mixed Asian roots. Her father got her into music and has supported her throughout her career. All was going well until she dared to show a little skin — and that’s when the threats started.

"I would get very abusive phone calls," she said. "I would get abused as I walked down the street. I would have people spit at me."

At a concert in Norway, she was attacked on stage by angry Muslim men who thought she was degrading their culture.

From AFP, with thanks to Kemaste:

THE HAGUE (AFP) - The producers of "Submission", a film about Islam by the murdered Dutch movie director Theo van Gogh, have cancelled plans to show the film at this week's Rotterdam film festival due to security fears, organisers said.

"The festival will respect the decision by Column Producties," the organisers of the 34th International Film Festival Rotterdam, which opens on Wednesday, said in a statement.

The film, which deals with Islam and the abuse of women, was due to have been shown amid tight security on January 30 on the sidelines of a major debate about freedom of expression in filmmaking.

A hard-hitting look inside the bloody mullahocracy in Iran from the superb Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi at FrontPage:

Given Iran’s incessant foreign policy saber-rattling—including its continued development of nuclear weapons, support for Islamist terrorist groups, and facilitation of the terrorism in Iraq—it’s easy to lose sight of the horrifying domestic situation within the Islamic Republic. The mullahs have not only destroyed the lives of countless foreigners through their worldwide export of Islamic terror and extremism; they’ve also plunged the Iranian people into a violent, hellish abyss of torture, repression, hopelessness, drug addiction and despair.

Conservative estimates by Iranian opposition movements and various human rights organizations, such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, put the number of women stoned to death in Iran since the establishment of the Islamic Republic in the neighborhood of fifty. One can only imagine the cases that have gone undetected -- as many Islamic "punishments" are carried out in small and remote villages.

Women sentenced to death by stoning are buried in the ground up to their necks. Iranian law regulates the size of the stones used by the executioner crowd; stones cannot be big enough to kill the sentenced woman too quickly, as the purpose of this barbaric ritual is to inflict as much pain as possible before death. On the other hand, stones cannot be too small, as each blow must be dramatically painful.

Such rules and regulations are quite ephemeral in the Islamic Republic. In a particularly gruesome execution carried out in 1993 in the city of Arak, a woman was to be stoned to death in front of her husband and two young children. After the stoning began, the woman was able to free herself from the hole in the ground, escaping death. According to Shariah laws, in such cases the woman must be let go, as her death sentence was revoked by divine intervention. Ten minutes after the failed stoning, however, the poor woman was chased down, apprehended and summarily executed anyway, by a firing squad.

Read it all.

Then why were they freed? Because of increasing political pressure on Guantanamo. From the Times Online, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

The four Britons sent home from Guantanamo Bay on Tuesday and set free from police custody last night still pose a terrorist threat, the United States said. Lieutenant Commander Flex Plexico, a Pentagon spokesman, said: "We continue to believe that these individuals pose a significant threat. British authorities have assured us that they will take the necessary steps to address the threat posed by these individuals."

Iraq is not the only place where jihadists are trying to derail elections with violence. Also, note the throat-slitting -- a remarkably common practice (cf. Qur'an 47:4 and 8:12) among Muslims for something that is supposed to be "against Islam." From AFP, with thanks to Twostellas:

SRINAGAR, India (AFP) - Twenty-six people were hurt when suspected Muslim rebels hurled grenades at an election office in a new bid to derail next month's civic polls in Indian Kashmir, police said....

Militants have killed one candidate and two senior ruling party officials and bombed an election rally, killing three and injuring a dozen. They have also launched suicide raids on federal income tax and passport offices and attacked several security patrols....

In the other violence, suspected Muslim rebels killed an elderly Muslim man and his son overnight by slitting their throats in central Budgam district, police said.

"They were suspected of being police informers," a police spokesman said.

From the Times-Picayune, "Workshop focuses on Muslim culture: Session designed to aid understanding," with thanks to Twostellas:

If a Muslim or Arab family is slow to respond to a note sent home by a school or is running late for a teacher conference, school officials should not feel snubbed but should understand the cultural influences behind that behavior.

That's been the message delivered this week to about 250 Jefferson Parish public school teachers and administrators as part of a four-day workshop designed to help them work better with Muslim and Arab families in the school system.

The seminar, which comes after an incident last year in which a teacher was accused of using religious slurs against a Muslim high school student, focused not only on religious tenets but also on the geographical and cultural aspects of Muslim life.

"I want them to be able to better understand their Arab and Muslim students and their families," said Audrey Sabbas, a nationally known speaker on Middle Eastern culture who ran the workshop Wednesday for about 50 teachers and principals.

Sabbas, who is married to an Arab man and converted to Islam decades ago, discussed a list of values that guide Muslim life, including family-based support systems, a need to build trust with those with whom they work and a strong respect for authorities, especially educators and doctors.

Those values can affect practical, everyday matters, Sabbas said.

Because Muslims like to build trust, verbal communication tends to get better results than written documents, she said. Correspondence sent home by schools is the "least effective" way to communicate as opposed to a phone call or visit, Sabbas said.

"They want to develop a sense of you before getting down to business," she said.

In addition, Muslims have a different "time orientation," she said. Immediate matters, such as a family member stopping at their house unexpectedly, take precedence over previously scheduled events, Sabbas said.

That can lead to a parent missing, canceling or running late for appointments, including teacher conferences, she said, prompting some grumbling from the audience.

One educator asked how she could better stress the need for Muslim families to keep their appointments. "You just have to keep delivering that verbal message," Sabbas said.

At the suggestion of visiting families' homes, a principal quietly complained about giving that kind of attention to one student in a school that serves hundreds.

Indeed.

One would think, if all the "This is Not Islam" talk is to be believed, that somewhere along this man's pilgrimage to Mecca or in his work at the Islamic Affairs Ministry he might have picked up the idea that he shouldn't do this sort of thing. But Islam's fundamental ideal is purity: anything that sullies that purity must be destroyed. From the BBC, "Kuwaiti 'slit daughter's throat'," with thanks to all who sent this in:

A Kuwaiti man has reportedly confessed to killing his 14-year-old daughter because he believed she was having sex.

Adnan Enezi - an employee in the Islamic Affairs ministry - had just returned from the pilgrimage to Mecca.

He allegedly bound and blindfolded his daughter, Haifa, knelt her down in front of her two brothers and sister and then cut her throat.

Forensic tests showed Haifa was still a virgin, police sources said. Mr Enezi is being questioned about the case.

Thousands of women are killed by relatives each year in the Middle East and Asia in so-called honour crimes - usually over suspected adultery, pre-marital sex or after having being raped, or marrying without family consent....

The daily said that after cutting Haifa's throat the first time, he swapped the knife for one with a sharper blade as she bled and screamed in front of her siblings.

It is interesting that Badawi too departs from the tiny-minority-of-extremists propaganda and acknowledges that jihad as warfare is the "only meaning commonly understood by the general public." However, in light of the fact that theorists as eminent among jihadists as Al-Banna (founder of the Muslim Brotherhood) and Azzam (founder of Al-Qaeda) argue that the idea that jihad is anything but fighting is founded on a weak hadith, it will be interesting to see exactly how he expects his views to gain currency among Muslims. From WebIndia123.com, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

Asking the Muslim world to seriously address the issue of jihad, Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi today told a gathering of scholars and academics from 16 Islamic countries to combat extremism and catch up with the advanced world.

"It is most unfortunate that some have narrowed down the concept of jihad to qatal, which concerns physical fighting," he said inaugurating a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) Commission of Eminent Persons here.

The Chairman of the 57-member OIC said it was even more unfortunate that this was the only meaning commonly understood by the general public.

"If Muslims themselves can make this mistake, what more can we expect from others," he asked and added that Muslims therefore were as much to blame for this distortion of the meaning of jihad.

Sharia alert. From IranFocus, with thanks to Kemaste:

Tehran, Jan. 26 – A seventeen-year-old boy was sentenced to execution by a Tehran court. The boy, only identified by his first name Sattar, was accused of murder.

Sattar allegedly stabbed to death a man by the name of Mahmoud a few months ago after a scuffle at a phone booth in Islamshahr (southern Tehran)....

Last week a young man who was accused of killing a member of Iran’s security forces when he was a minor was hanged in the notorious Evin prison in Tehran.

Iman Farrokhi who was 17 at the time of the offence was on death row in the Tehran Centre for Reform and Education (Juvenile Prison).

Mohammad T., another teenager currently in one of Iran’s Centers for Reform and Education, is to also be hanged to death in the coming weeks for allegedly stabbing someone when he was 14.

His sentence was approved by Iran’s Supreme Court.

Under Iranian law, girls above the age of nine and boys above the age of fifteen are considered as adults and could be executed for capital offences.

Why is the age so low for girls? Probably because of the example of Muhammad's marriage to Aisha when she was nine and he was 52.

From the No-Kidding Department. But note that he and his fellows dreamed of establishing a Sharia state in Holland: if anyone suggests that any Muslim dreams of doing that here, the "Islamophobia" charges fly thick and fast. From AP, with thanks to Anthony:

Amsterdam -- The man accused of murdering filmmaker Theo van Gogh on Nov. 2 dreamed of replacing the Dutch government with an Islamic theocracy, and was supported by a network of like-minded fanatics, prosecutors said yesterday at his first public hearing.

The suspect, Amsterdam native Mohammed Bouyeri, 26, did not appear at the pretrial hearing, but his lawyer said Mr. Bouyeri wants to "be held accountable for his actions" and sees them as part of a religious war.

Rewrite a nation's history and you can control its future. From Israel National News, with thanks to Kemaste:

(IsraelNN.com) An Egyptian newspaper, Al-Ahram Al-Messa'i, commented today on what it called Israel's "investment" in "the so-called holocaust" and the United Nations session commemorating the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

The newspaper complained that, in hosting the memorial session, "the UN adopted the Israeli standpoint, paying no heed to the sufferings of the Palestinians under the Israeli occupation."

A strange story. Would they really have a patch in English? Is this just someone's idea of a joke? Or is there more to it? From WND, with thanks to Ruth King:

The discovery in Texas of a jacket featuring an Arabic military badge and an airplane headed toward a tower with the words "Midnight Mission" is fueling fears of a possible connection to terrorism.

According to a Department of Homeland Security morning brief marked "For official use only," a report from Customs and Border Protection noted that on Dec. 23, Border Patrol agents stationed in Hebbronville, Texas, found a jacket with an Arabic patch in a lay-up area on Highway 285.

The jacket is said to have a total of three patches, two sewn on the back, and one on the inside.

The two patches on the back were an Arabic military badge and one with the letters "Daiwa," while the patch on the inside read "Midnight Mission."

This "Midnight Mission" patch features a logo depicting "an airplane flying over a building and headed towards a tower," according to the brief.

The military patch with the Arabic writing shows the image of a lion's head, with wings and a parachute emanating from the animal.

The report notes, "DHS translators concluded that the patch read, 'Defense Center,' 'Ministry of Defense,' or 'Defense Headquarters.' The bottom of the patch read 'Martyr,' 'Way to Eternal Life' or 'Way to Immortality.'"

The brief also states, "The 'Daiwa' patch stands for a corporate company which sells sport fishing products with corporate offices in eight countries including Japan, the U.S., Australia, France, Germany, Taiwan, Thailand, and the UK."

They are already agitating for some aspects of Islamic law. What will keep them from the rest? How can the reporter be so sure that they have little interest in holy war -- or even if they don't now, how can be be sure what they will think in 10 years? From Reuters, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

SAN CRISTOBAL DE LAS CASAS, Mexico (Reuters) - Islam has joined a battle for the hearts and minds of Mexico's volatile Tzotzil Indians in Chiapas state, home of Zapatista rebels and a hotbed of sectarian strife between Christians.

In an unlikely meeting of two worlds, an idealistic Muslim sect has converted some 300 Tzotzils, a Maya Indian group known for drink-fueled fiestas and religious fervor.

"It was difficult to learn the prayers in Arabic at first but now I have them in my heart," said Muhammad Emin Lopez, 46, a Tzotzil fruit merchant who boasts that his conversion to Islam in 1995 was the state's first.

He prays five times a day as required in Islam, has gone on the obligatory "haj" pilgrimage to Mecca and attends a small mosque in a cornfield on the outskirts of the hill town of San Cristobal de las Casas.

Beside the mosque, a Tzotzil woman dressed in colorful Indian garb and known by the Muslim name Karima washes clothes in a stream near ramshackle wooden houses.

The growth of Islam in such a restive area has raised the eyebrows of Mexico's intelligence agency, wary of possible terrorist activity aimed at the neighboring United States.

But the Tzotzil Muslims have little interest in holy war, having seen religious and political conflict close up....

They are highly critical of the charging of interest rates as un-Islamic and advocate scrapping currencies, taxes and the nation state, to be replaced with Islamic emirates trading in gold coins.

"Our model is not ideological or utopian but is based on the life of our Prophet Mohammad," reads a statement on the group's Mexican web site, http://www.islammexico.org.mx.

A press release from the American Coptic Union:

The American Coptic Union, and Egyptian Coptic Christians are shocked and disturbed by the latest Jersey City Police, and Hudson County Prosecutor Office report, “No Proof of Religious Hatred in JC Family Slay “ that was the report title by 1010 WINS.

The report denied the religion factor of the massacre, despite the fact that the Cross-Tattoo was cut, and slashed, on the late martyr Sylvia’s hand. In addition, Mr. Edward DeFazio, Hudson County Prosecutor’s report, never mentioned the facts that Egyptian Christians are facing a vicious terror campaign from the Arab-Islamic government of Egypt, and terrorists. In this case the massacre would be a perfect terror message to intimidate the Coptic Christian Community in Jersey City, and USA. To keep their mouth shut is a good prime motivation.

According to our information, Money, and Gold, were not robbed, so robbery was not the ultimate goal of the perpetrators, and may be happened to cover up the real motivation, which would be a terror message. We have all reasons to believe that religion hatred is behind the carnage, because the way the family slain is the same as the Middle East style, oftenly, watched, in “Aljazeera Channel”. We should look at it from this angle as well.

The American Coptic Union on behalf of the Coptic Community would like addressing the following issues:

• We call upon Hudson County Prosecutor Office not to rushing, and exclude religion hatred, or terrorism. This time the massacre is rehearsal targeted a Christian family, member of a small community, next time would be against any other community.
• This massacre should be seen as a wake up call for all American. Terror is knocking the door, thus we seek the support of Christian, Jewish, and Islamic organizations, as well as Human Rights organizations requesting Hudson County Prosecutor Office an independent investigation.
• We request the Newspapers, TV stations, and all news media, keep asking questions, and follow up with the investigations.
• We request more involvement from the Federal Government in the case.

Sneer quotes in the original AP headline. (Thanks to Kemaste for the link.) Anyway, so much for the idea that there are no more secret cells in the U.S. (Of course, it may be that the spokesman in that story was using "Al-Qaeda" in a restricted sense, contrary to the common tendency to use it in a very broad way.)

PORTLAND — The FBI knows of "jihadists" who have trained in terrorist camps in Afghanistan and are now living in Oregon, the agency's Oregon chief said in an interview with The Associated Press yesterday.

"We don't have an imminent threat that we're aware of. But I will say this: We have people here in Oregon that have trained in jihadist camps in bad areas. In the bad neighborhoods of the world," said FBI Special Agent in Charge Robert Jordan.

Asked what he meant by "bad neighborhoods," he said Afghanistan, as well as several other countries he would not specify....

Jordan refused to say how many "jihadists" live in Oregon.

He said the FBI knows "they've trained overseas, taken oaths to kill Americans and engage in jihad," but the challenge is "to prove those things."

Jordan contrasted the known "jihadists" living in Oregon with the so-called "Portland Seven," a group of seven Portland-area people accused of plotting to wage war against U.S. troops in Afghanistan. One of them was killed in combat; the six others returned to Oregon, where they eventually pleaded guilty to all the charges against them.

Busy tourist update. Of course, here is another innocent Muslim engaging in innocent activities and wrongfully arrested. I would find such assertions more credible if law enforcement officials had ever arrested and tried a Muslim that Islamic advocacy groups acknowledged was guilty. From the Charlotte Observer, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

Kamran Akhtar, suspected of having ties to terrorism after a police officer spotted him videotaping Charlotte's skyscrapers in July, was sentenced Monday to six months in prison.

Chief Judge Graham Mullen of the U.S. District Court in Charlotte gave the 36-year-old Pakistan native credit for the time he's already served in jail. That means Akhtar will now be turned over to immigration officials for deportation.

Akhtar has not been charged with any terrorism-related offenses, but he pleaded guilty in October to failing to leave the United States, possessing false identification documents and making false statements to investigators....

When Akhtar was detained in July, authorities announced that they had found a videotape in Akhtar's camera that showed the 60-story Bank of America tower and the former Wachovia Center, which houses the FBI's offices in Charlotte.

Authorities said Akhtar also had tapes showing buildings in the downtown areas of Atlanta, New Orleans, Dallas, Houston and Austin, Texas.

Akhtar's brother, Irfan Akhtar, told the Observer that Kamran Akhtar has been wrongfully accused and portrayed in the media as a terrorist. He said his brother is not a terrorist.

Irfan Akhtar, 33, said his older brother likes to take pictures of tourists spots and buildings and had been traveling the country after losing his job at a New York photo store....

The indictment accused Akhtar of making false statements to investigators that he was in the United States legally, had a green card and had never been ordered deported. He also was charged with possession of false documents -- a New York driver's license and a Social Security card.

Federal prosecutors have said the investigation into Akhtar's activities is continuing.

What kind of grudge? What kind of vendetta? No word here. From the New York Post, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

January 25, 2005 -- Investigators probing the slaughter of a family of devout Egyptian Christians believe they may have been victims of a bloody vendetta that predates their immigration to the United States 10 years ago, The Post has learned.

"We're trying to develop their history right now," Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio said yesterday of the brutal quadruple slaying.

Al-Moayad and Zayed walk watch. Some of the evidence dates from the time before Al-Qaeda was designated a terrorist group, so it is inadmissable, you see. From the New York Times, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

In an important victory for a Yemeni sheik charged with financing terrorism, a federal judge yesterday prevented prosecutors from introducing what they have described as vital evidence during their initial presentation to the jury.

The judge in federal court in Brooklyn, Sterling Johnson Jr., ruled that the prosecutors cannot display three items they have said are their only corroboration for secretly recorded conversations in which they say the sheik and an aide plotted to take money for terrorist organizations....

The ruling was important because the items the judge banned were the prosecutors' only way of proving that the defendants' supposed plan to take money for Al Qaeda and Hamas was part of a long-running effort to provide financial support to terrorist organizations.

The sheik, Mohammed Ali Hassan al-Moayad, 56, and his aide, Mohammed Mohsen Yahya Zayed, 31 are charged with conspiracy and providing financial support for Al Qaeda and Hamas.

The ruling, which created palpable anxiety among the prosecutors, said the prosecutors cannot show jurors an application of a mujahedeen fighter for entry into an Al Qaeda training camp. The prosecutors said the application, found in Afghanistan in 2001, listed Sheik Moayad as the fighter's sponsor.

The ruling also stopped prosecutors from introducing into evidence address books taken from two Muslim fighters in Bosnia in 1996. The prosecutors said the books included entries for Sheik Moayad.

Judge Johnson said that "we don't know what the source" of the Al Qaeda application was and that the address books were from a time too remote from the alleged fund-raising by the sheik in 2003. Judge Johnson said they dated back to before Al Qaeda was listed as a terrorist organization by the United States government.

The third item he banned during the prosecution's initial presentation was a videotape of a wedding in Yemen that the prosecutors said included images of Sheik Moayad cheering about the death of Jews in a Hamas terrorist attack in Israel.

Focusing on a central vulnerability for the prosecutors, Judge Johnson noted that the videotape was taken by the prosecution's main informer, Mohamed Alanssi. Mr. Alanssi drew attention to a history that included bad debts and legal troubles when he set himself on fire outside the White House in November.

After that act, the prosecutors suggested they would not call Mr. Alanssi as a witness. Yesterday, Judge Johnson said the prosecutors could not show the wedding videotape unless Mr. Alanssi testified.

"If the informant wants to come in and testify as to what he saw and observed, I'll allow it," Judge Johnson said from the bench.

We have noted similar findings here many times. From MEMRI, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

Saudi Columnist: 'The Only Way to End Violence and Terrorism Is to Fight a Cultural and Ideological Battle'

In an article published in the Saudi Gazette, columnist Muhammad Mahfouz, who is also editor of the cultural magazine Al-Kalima, published in Lebanon, wrote: [1]

"It is an undeniable fact that social problems and phenomena [that] are ignored without determining their root causes will proliferate and surface repeatedly. But … their re-emergence will be associated with more complications and grow to the extent that they become incurable…

"This brings me to the phenomenon of terrorism, which is oneof the most dangerous problems encountered [in] recent times, for it undermines the stability and security of all human societies. This shows that [an] external and superficial probing of the problem will not be effective until [we] delve deeply into its cultural and ideological roots…

"Of course the security efforts [are] one of the tools to fight terrorism … [but] the security efforts always need to be associated and supported with national, cultural, political, and socioeconomic efforts…

"The relationship between the phenomenon of terrorism in our society and culture is like the relationship betweenthe cause and consequence. A thorough study of this phenomenon shows that the … real reason behind the mobilization of a handful of young men by this deviant group is purely cultural. This means that these youths were brought up in a special cultural atmosphere which finds its roots in a stereotyped understanding of religion. This understanding serves as a basic incubator to this group. This may explain the reason why some youths belonging to rich families and others who are well positioned in the state's civil service hierarchy are implicated in terrorist crimes.

"This [means] that financial and economic factors can not be associated with this group. Therefore, it is a cultural and religious factor that motivated them [to kill] innocent people and destroy the country's infrastructure.

"Thus, the only way to put an end to the wave of violence and terrorism is to fight a cultural and ideological battle against terrorism as well as [against] its direct and indirect causes. Without fighting this fateful battle, we will never succeed in eliminating this menace, and thus our country will suffer from this phenomenon from time to time.

"In my opinion, [any] delay in fighting this ideological cultural battle against terrorism will drag our country to abyss of instability. We need more than ever to … expose the phenomenon of terrorism and dismantle the cultural and ideological incubators which feed this phenomenon and mold it socially and culturally.

"This brings me again to the point that the elimination of terrorism and violence are associated with uprooting the culture of violence which promotes killing, justifies terrorism, and provides it with a legitimate cover.

"[On the other hand,] the security battle will not help much in putting an end to this phenomenon. On the contrary, it may give it a justification [to continue].

"Thus, I find it necessary to elaborate on these points: The phenomenon of terrorism and violence we are facing can be classified as religious violence carried out by a group of brain-washed youth influenced by glamorous slogans. Thisrequires us to re-formulate the prevailing religious concepts and implant in their minds other religious values, such as the values of dialogue and religious tolerance, as well as recognizing pluralism. Thus … we need to formulate a new religious vision isolating and freeing it of all the facets of extremism and fundamentalism.

Read it all.

The truth is beginning to get out. From David Penberthy in the Daily Telegraph, with thanks to JS:

HERE'S a challenge for swimwear designers. Britain's advertising watchdog last week banned a series of television commercials featuring bikini-clad women because they were offensive to Muslims.

Stand by for the burqini, a fetching one-piece ensemble made entirely of black hessian, measuring 2m in length and equipped with a small vent through which women can stick their snorkel.

Also in Britain, the Fox network has agreed to demands from the Muslim Council of Britain for talks over a BSkyB drama depicting middle class Muslims as members of a terrorist sleeper cell. Just where do television executives dream up such fantasy?

Unless they were aiming for an accurate account of that September 11 hiccup, where middle class Muslims who were members of a terrorist sleeper cell murdered 3000 innocent people....

In Britain, the cancer of political correctness seems all the more malignant, fuelled perhaps by the fabled determination of the Brits to be unfailingly polite.

As a result, the country looks through Australian eyes like a multicultural worst-case scenario, where befuddled Poms tie themselves up in knots to address all sorts of ludicrous grievances and in doing so undermine the values which have made this country a beacon for democracy and free expression throughout the civilised world.

The above cases are almost comical. The biggest story of this past week involves a particularly nasty scumbag by the name of Omar Bakri Mohammed.

Read it all. It's a good take on the infamous Bakri.

Here and here are two confirmations of this story, one of which is mentioned in its first line.

From MSNBC, with thanks to all who sent this in:

In France, Tuesday, security agents detained seven people suspected of helping funnel Islamic militants into Iraq. In Mainz, Germany, this weekend, police arrested an alleged al-Qaida operative who is also accused of recruiting for Iraq. He is alleged to be a key al-Qaida recruiter who was living in an apartment building on a quiet street. Also arrested: a Palestinian allegedly headed to fight in Iraq.

U.S. officials tell NBC News that the recruiter, Ibrahim Mohammed Khalil, is an al-Qaida facilitator who trained in camps in Afghanistan, fought there after 9/11 and was sent back to Germany. There, both U.S. and German intelligence monitored him.

"He also had contact to the leadership of al-Qaida, including Osama bin Laden," says Kay Nehm, the German federal prosecutor working the case.

Experts say the arrest underscores al-Qaida's interest in the war in Iraq.

"It demonstrates that Europe is the central recruitment ground for al-Qaida when it comes to finding jihadists to fight in Iraq," says NBC terror analyst Roger Cressey.

More evidence of how Muslims in Europe are aiding the global jihad. From the Jerusalem Post, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

The Danish citizen of Lebanese origin currently the focus of a joint Police-Shin Bet investigation was identified Wednesday as a Hizbullah recruited agent by the name of Iyad al Ashwah, 39, after a gag order on the investigation was lifted.

Al Ashwah, originally born in Lebanon moved to Denmark in 1986 and received Danish citizenship six years later.

Al Ashwah was arrested on January 6 while he was on a train from Nahariya to Haifa after he raised a security officer's suspicions by videotaping the passing scenery through the train window.

He was arrested by police and confessed that in July 2004 he had been recruited into Hizbullah by relatives living in Lebanon. In his interrogation, al Ashwah told police that he was ordered to travel to Israel disguised as a tourist to collect security information and most importantly to recruit Israeli-Arabs into the terror organization.

"War is deceit."

Get written up in the New York Times, and the next thing you know, the authorities have to notice you're there. It seems that "security forces" "clashed" with "Islamic militants," although Bangladesh's "Director General of the External Publicity Wing" (now there's a sinecure) termed the NYT report "unfortunate and politically motivated." So are the jihadists, of course. From "'Militants' held in Bangladesh," in the BBC, with thanks to Nicolei:

Trouble broke out in the western district of Rajshahi after three members of a banned Muslim group were lynched by villagers on Saturday.

Supporters of the Jagrata Muslim Janata tried to hold protests. The group is blamed for several vigilante killings.

Its leader, Siddiqul Islam, known also as Bangla Bai, is wanted by the authorities.

"War is deceit," said the Prophet Muhammad (see, for example, Bukhari, vol. 4, book 52, no. 267). Of course, no one in government or law enforcement in the U.S. seems to have any idea that any Muslim here could be taking that statement seriously. But in the Philippines, they're starting to get the idea. From the Manila Times, with thanks to Nicolei:

GENERAL SANTOS CITY: Indonesian and Malaysian mem­bers of the militant Je­maah Islamiah are posing as fishermen to enter into the Philippines, Malaysian intelligence said.

In a report sent to the military, the Malaysian intelligence service said the militants were arrested aboard Philippine-registered fishing boats off the coast of Indonesia’s Sumatra Island.

The boat carried registration documents issued by the maritime office in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.

“At least two had figured in the Bali incident and bomb attacks in Indonesia last year,” a ranking military official told The Manila Times Tuesday.

A wise column by Geoffrey Robertson in The Scotsman (thanks to Teri), although I doubt that his prediction that a Muslim cleric will fall victim to the statute will prove true in the current climate:

TODAY, my friend Salman Rushdie - whose life is still under threat from Islamic extremists - will lead a delegation of writers to ask the Home Office to abandon its plans for a new offence of "inciting religious hatred". The proposed offence has nothing to do with combating terrorism or crime: it is an entirely unnecessary restriction on a freedom to criticise religion that is more necessary now than ever....

"Religious hatred" is defined as widely as possible: it means "hatred against a group of persons defined by reference to religious belief or lack of religious belief". Incredibly, this would include Satanists and secularists as well as Rastafarians, Sikhs and children of God.

The offence is committed if religious "hatred" (ie intense dislike of its dogma) is likely to be "stirred up" (whatever that colloquial phrase may mean).

This clumsy drafting has produced a very serious offence - seven years’ imprisonment is also the maximum sentence for arms smuggling - which can be committed by harsh but truthful attacks on the most unprepossessing people, merely if they belong to a group "defined by reference to religious beliefs" and are likely to take offence, for reasons that may be paranoid or vicious....

False hopes seem to have been raised in Muslim communities that critics and apostates will be jailed for blaspheming against Islam.

But the real victims of the new law will be those very people whose punitive expectations have been raised so high. Just as the black power advocate Michael X was the first to be jailed for "incitement to racial hatred", back in 1968, so I expect that it will be a Muslim cleric who has railed against Christianity who will be the first to suffer prosecution for inciting religious hatred. The law will serve to create martyrs - laws which criminalise free speech always do - and jury acquittals of offensive speech will serve as public relations triumphs for bigots and fanatics.

Guerrillas, not terrorists. And of course the judge has probably no idea what a "mujahid" is. From Reuters, with thanks to Teri:

MILAN, Italy (Reuters) -- An Italian judge has dropped terrorism charges against five North Africans accused of sending suicide bombers to Iraq, saying they were guerrillas, not terrorists -- a ruling that drew a fierce government reaction.

The five men were charged with sending militants to Iraq and planning attacks in Europe, but the judge said Monday there was no evidence of plans to bomb Europe and that sending fighters or funds to Iraq did not amount to terrorism.

In documents seen by Reuters, Judge Clementina Forleo said there was no evidence the four Tunisians and one Moroccan were involved in anything beyond what might be considered "guerrilla" activities and which could be defined as "terrorism."

Didn't the local imam tell them Islam was a religion of peace?

(Yes, for all you unblinking literalists out there, that was sarcasm.)

From "France detains 7 terror suspects," an AFP story, with thanks to M. Gozlan:

FRANCE'S domestic counter-espionage service (DST) detained seven people, including two women, who were allegedly seeking to go to Iraq to fight United States-led forces there, sources close to the case said today....

The article also contains some information about French Muslims already killed in Iraq:

The first French citizen reported to have been killed was Redouane El-Hakim, 19, who went to Iraq via Syria and was caught in a US air bombardment of Fallujah last July.

Hakim and his brothers were known to frequent a radical Islamic prayer centre in the Paris suburb of Levallois Perret, which was investigated and closed early last year....

The Paris raids focused on the Adda'Wa mosque in the city's 19th arrondisement, which was described as a recruitment centre for the Iraq campaign.

The Vice President of the Jihad Watch Board of Directors, Hugh Fitzgerald, observes that the reaction of the Coptic community in America to the murders of the Armanious family is extremely telling in itself:

Surely what is of note in this case is that the Copts in Jersey City seem to have little doubt as to who carried out, or was behind, the murder. Consider the fury expressed against Muslims and against Islam at the funeral, a fury heightened by what the Copts in attendance took to be a transparent attempt by one Muslim cleric to make an appearance not out of any real sympathy, but only, the Copts believed, to shore up the Muslim position with the American media.

That suspicion, that fury, tells us a good deal about what the Copts must have suffered at the hands of Muslims, in Egypt and even here. And that remains true, no matter who committed the murder, though we are entitled to speculate reasonably. If the Louvre were bombed tomorrow, it would -- given what we know about the Islamic attitude toward almost all art, reasonably believe that Muslims were behind it, even if in the end it turned out to be someone else.

Furthermore, the statements quoted in the press by Muslims in Jersey City are entirely full of self-pity ("Why does everyone blame us?" "We are 'sick of this crap' about Islam") and noticeably devoid of any expressed pity for the murdered family of Copts.

Finally, one can find expressions of satisfaction about the murder at Muslim websites about the murder. Those remarks should not be forgotten.

All of these -- the suspicions of the Copts, based on their felt history of persecution, and their belief that Muslims are quite capable of such actions (now, where would they get such ideas, if not from their entire life experience?), and the behavior of Muslim neighbors devoid of sympathy, and of other Muslims crowing at the event -- remain true no matter who committed the murders.

But the point remains: the father and the older daughter were too proud, too unapologetic, too enthusiastic, about their Christian beliefs, and this infuriated Muslims who believe that once a dhimmi, always a dhimmi (one wonders about the Chaldean Christians out in Dearborn, as they worry over their relatives subject to Muslim attack in Iraq). It is hardly unreasonable to conclude, at this point, that it was for that they were killed. And if it should prove otherwise, there is still this matter of how the Copts have reacted, and how the Muslims have also. Both reactions tell us a good deal.

If The New York Times and the rest of the media would give greater attention to this story, and at least try to make people understand why the Copts in Jersey City have no doubts about who committed the crime, by finding out what it is in the experience of those Copts that makes them come to that conclusion, instead of vague allusions to "communal strife" and so on -- if, in other words, the persecution of the Copts in the land of which they are the descendants of the original inhabitants, and not those who call themselves Muslim Arabs (most of whom, no doubt, are themselves the descendants of Copts as well, if they only realized it, their ancestors over the centuries having concluded that it was easier to convert ("revert") to Islam.

More seriousness please, less frivolity by the media. Less about the Armani fashion empire, more about the Armanious family murder, is called for.

Any attempt to "insabbiare" (sand over) the results of the investigation will not work for this case. Nor would it something to be forgotten or overlooked. It would be likely, in fact, to get more and more attention, and to become a "teaching moment" on the inculcated murderous hostility that can be found in many passages in Qur'an and Hadith. If the police in Jersey City are unaware of those passages, they -- and the police everywhere in the West, as well as the other security services -- need to learn about what Islam teaches. Repetition of pious phrases, pretense that it is only a "handful of crazies," (akin to those Muslims who think that by constantly repeating that no Muslims cheered on the afternoon of September 11, we will simply forget the reports from Cairo, from Baghdad, from Riyadh and Jeddah, from Ramallah and Nablus and Gaza, from Amman, even from Hamza Street in Beirut -- not to mention the reports from Pakistan, Indonesia, indeed everywhere except, of course, Tehran, where many are now heartily sick of the mullahs, and the Islamic Republic for which they stand), is accompanied by continued seeming unawareness of why it would be perfectly plausible that, for the sins of having promoted Christianity, the Armanious family would be killed.

Still more disturbing is the reliance, in the American armed services as well as in some of its police forces, on Muslims to come in and teach about "what Islam teaches." The naivete here is the stuff of schoolgirls, and beyond belief.

Joseph Farah at WND asks the right questions about the investigation of the murders of the Coptic family in Jersey City:

I want you to try to imagine how the major media might cover the following story.

A Muslim family of four, known for boldly proselytizing the Islamic faith in the shadow of where the World Trade Center stood before Sept. 11, 2001, is bound, gagged and murdered execution-style, throats slit, jewelry left behind.

I don't know about you, but I can almost envision the Page 1 New York Times coverage of this apparent "hate crime." I can almost hear the hand-wringing pundits fretting about this undeserved, unwarranted backlash against innocent Muslims. I am almost certain a week after such an attack there would be calls for new sensitivity in the way Muslims are portrayed in newscasts and entertainment programming. You can be certain the self-appointed Muslim-American and Arab-American spokesmen would be getting maximum face time brining international attention to America's intolerance toward Islam.

Tragically, an attack like this actually took place last week in Jersey City, N.J. – though it wasn't a Muslim family, it was a family of Egyptian Coptic Christians who fled persecution in their homeland for the safety and security and freedom of the USA.

Yet, the media's focus hasn't been the horror of this kind of centuries-old anti-Christian persecution apparently coming to America. Instead, there has been a concerted effort, it seems, to downplay this gruesome slaughter as some kind of anomaly, to search desperately for motives other than religious hatred – in effect, to ignore the kind of oppression that Christians and Jews in the Middle East have been experiencing since Islam became dominant in that part of the world more than 1,300 years ago....

Rush to judgment? No.

But good detective work requires that we don't allow political correctness to lead an investigation. And so should good media work.

An informed source close to the investigation of the murders of the Coptic family in New Jersey has given me some more information:

The police and prosecutor are "very scared" of this case. The Muslim community in Jersey City is putting enormous pressure on City Hall to softpedal the case. Says my source: "They [police and prosecutor] want this case to go away quickly because of that."

Both press and prosecutor are hampered by general ignorance of Islamic teaching on proselytizing and conversion, and of how jihadists operate.

Of course, my problem with the police and prosecutor's reaction is that if this really was a Sharia-inspired killing, they are opening the door to more of the same if they do not handle this case carefully and thoroughly.

My source went to the Armanious house after the murders. The house does not appear to be of a wealthy family, and does not stand out in the poor neighborhood where it is located; this makes it more difficult to sustain the notion that the primary motive was robbery. My source saw that there was no sign of forced entry.

There are indications that Sylvia, the 15-year-old, innocently let one of the perpetrators know where she lived.

From AP, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

LONDON - After enduring up to three years of imprisonment and interrogation at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, four Britons returned to England on Tuesday and were immediately arrested by antiterrorist police.

Moazzam Begg, Feroz Abbasi, Martin Mubanga and Richard Belmar were arrested under a provision of the Terrorism Act dealing with "involvement in the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism," London's Metropolitan Police said.

"What sort of homecoming is this? They are innocent people," said Massoud Shadjareh, one of a group of protesters who assembled outside the high-security Paddington Green police station where the men were held.

Maybe they are innocent people, but in light of the return of some released Gitmo prisoners to the jihad, there is every reason for caution.

Late last night I posted some new information on the case of the Coptic family murdered in New Jersey. In case you missed it, it is here.

Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald introduces you to the Middle East Studies Association:

"Mesa" or "MESA" is the acronym of the Middle East Studies Association, the professional group of those who at American universities and colleges are charged with the responsibility of teaching the American young, those trusting, innocent, infinitely malleable young, with learning about the Middle East -- which is to say, about Islam.

As an organization, MESA has over the past two decades slowly but surely been taken over by apologists for Islam. Many of these are Muslims, and many are non-Muslims. The latter includes quite a few people who are married to Muslims, or who, to get along with their colleagues (and remember, the most political place in the entire universe is a university faculty, and that institution which, alas, Randall Jarrell failed to immortalize (if memory serves), the Departmental Meeting. Junior faculty owe everything to, and therefore must curry favor with, senior faculty. If that means signing an anti-divestment petition that has the mighty empire of Israel, fons et origo of everything that has ever gone wrong with the Muslim and Arab states and peoples, then so be it. Funny thing about being a trimmer, however, is that the mere act of signing something you really don't believe helps to convince you that you really do believe it, otherwise you would have to come to terms with your own cravenness, your own pusillanimity. And no one wants to do that.

The method of apologetics is simple: concentrate on Israel, or the more tendentious reification of an alternative state, "Israel/Palestine," keep clear of such topics as land ownership under the Ottoman Empire, the actual demographics of the Ottoman vilayets and sanjak that made up what became Mandatory Palestine, don't even whisper that more than half of the Jews in Israel had never left the Middle East but lived as dhimmis in the Yemen (virtual chattel slaves), in Iraq, in North Africa, in Syria and Egypt -- because officially, all Israeli Jews are "European colonialists"; finally, do not under any conditions mention that a goodly number of the ancient "Palestinian people" (invented post-1967) are the descendants of Arabs and Berbers who were veterans of Abd el-Kader's campaign, Egyptians who came with Mehmet Ali, Muslims from the Balkans and Bulgaria and other Ottoman territories in Europe who were transferred, en masse, by the Turkish government as the high tide of Islam receded -- for that area (a/k/a in the West as "Palestine") was by far the most desolate and under-populated in the Ottoman Empire, always excepting the Empty Quarter of Arabia).

The apologetics consists in hardly ever discussing Jihad, dhimmitude, or indeed even introducing the students to Qur'an, Hadith, and Sira. Sometimes an expurgated version -- the Michael Sells horror -- is assigned to students The Hadith and Sira are never mentioned. Books on the level of Armstrong and Esposito are assigned, and feelgood nonsense like Maria Rosa Menocal's The Ornament of the World.

But not everyone who is a member of MESA is completely awful. There are a few reasonable people, some of the Ottomanists and suchlike. MESA is a little like the Soviet Union of Writers, which had thousands of members and hardly a real writer. When one considers Michael Cook, Patricia Crone, Bernard Lewis, and a few others, on one scale, and the assorted Khalidis and Dabashis and Massads and Bahranis in the other, you can guess which side kicks the beam. No member of MESA has done as much to make available to a wide public important new work on Muhammad, on the origins of the Qur'an, and on the history of early Islam, as that lone wolf, Ibn Warraq. No one has done such work on the institution of the dhimmi as that lone louve, Bat Ye'or. It is an astounding situation, where much of the most important work is not being done in universities, because many university centers have been seized by a kind of Islamintern International. Willy Munzenberg could have learned a lot from Edward Said, who was only begetter, with his Orientalism for a good deal of this "post-colonial hegemonic discourse" stuff that permanently stunts the mental growth.

Recent presidents of MESA have included Lisa Anderson, the well-versed and compleat academic (and beyond, what with the Councils on this and the Committees on that, all very impressive if you are impressed with that sort of thing) operator, Dean of the School of International Blah, and Joel Beinin and Laurie Brand, about whom you may google, and Rashid Khalidi, and -- has Juan Cole served his term, or is that coming up? Well, you get the dreary picture

In any case, even MESA has its constraints. For example a few years ago it had to award, it could not avoid awarding, a prize for the best book of the year to Michael Cook for his 720-page Commanding Right and Prohibiting Wrong in Islam, even though Cook is suspiciously learned and has written a book, perhaps too warily not permitted to be reprinted, with Patricia Crone (who herself is very good, but also, at times, as in her treatment of Christoph Luxenberg, not quite as brave as she should be).

Why do I refer to MESA as "Mesa Nostra"? Because it is a kind of "Our Thing" conspiracy, but not nearly as appealing, as folkloric, as the Mafia, or the 'ndrangheta, or the camorra, for in Italy the malavita has three main components. Everyone knows everyone else; the maneuvering, the politicking, the fear that the hot breath of Campus Watch, and perhaps even Congress, will take away all that government money that the Khalidis and the Dabashis et al. wanted to use to spread their anti-Israel anti-American and "why-do-they-hate-us?" and "it is only a handful-of-extremists" message, and how can that mean old U.S. government not want to fund that, huh?

"Mesa Nostra" is my little invention. It communicates the doubtfulness, and more, of the enterprise. It has nothing to do with real scholarship. Ask yourself this: could Joseph Schacht, the great authority on Mohammedan law, or Arthur Jeffery, an authority on Islam, on Muhammad, even on aspects of the lexicon of the early Qur'an, both of them once stars in Columbia's middle-eastern firmament, have been hired today -- at Columbia, or indeed, anywhere that the plotters of Mesa Nostra rule the roost?

The Arabs have poured money into various Georgetown Centers for this and that (because that's where the power is, that's where the foreign service officers are trained, that's where Peter Bechtold, who gave a cheerleading address to the last meeting of Mesa, heads the "Foreign Policy Institute" and was so instrumental in drawing up that farcical list for General Vines). They have also bought up chairs: the nice "Guardian of the Two Holy Places" professorship of law that Frank Vogel holds, and a King Abdul Aziz Thisorthat, and so on. Oh, they get their money's worth. They do, indeed they do.

So that's why I call it "Mesa Nostra." Everybody should.

Sharia alert. From "Saudi Court in Makkah Lashes 12-Year-Old Boy 80 Times," from the Saudi Institute, with thanks to Ali Dashti:

(Washington DC- January 24, 2005) … A 12 year old boy was lashed 80 times in the street by a Saudi court hours after he was arrested at the annual Muslim pilgrimage (Hajj), Saudi newspaper Okaz reported Monday.

The paper said the boy who is from Bangladesh was arrested in Mena, three miles outside the holy city of Makkah, where two million Muslims gathered for the annual pilgrimage after he was allegedly caught pick pocketing pilgrims.

The paper said an AdHoc court that operates during the annual pilgrimage sentenced the boy only hours after his arrest, and applied the punishment on the street outside the court. No lawyers or family members were present during the process, but the boy was later handed to his family.

And a wildly successful one indeed. No tiny minority of extremists here: the Islamic reformer Saad Eddin Ibrahim complains that 150,000 mosques in Egypt are against him. In the words of the Tunisian human rights activist Abu Khawla (Muhammad Bechri) in MEMRI, with thanks to Romy:

"The mosque (especially the Friday prayer sermon) is particularly used by Islamists to spread their message. [Egyptian progressive] Saadeddine Ibrahim recently lamented how he would face a propaganda machine that uses a network of 150,000 mosques in Egypt. In many countries, Fatwas issued by the Mullahs could be binding on social and political matters, and the religious authorities are granted wide powers for censorship of whatever they consider to be blasphemous...."

About time. From the New York Times, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

LONDON, Jan. 24 - In nightly sermons broadcast on the Internet, Sheik Omar Bakri Muhammad, a 46-year-old Syrian-born cleric, has urged young Muslim men all over the world to support the Iraq insurgency on the front line of "the global jihad," investigators say.

In an amazing display of brazen deception, one Islamic apologist claimed that I had fabricated this when I posted it here a couple of weeks ago. I suppose the Times picked it up from me, eh?

He struck a similarly defiant tone this month at a rally attended by 500 people at a central London meeting hall, where a giant screen behind him showed images of the World Trade Center falling. "Allah akbar!" - "God is great" - some audience members shouted at the images.

After eavesdropping for months on his nightly praise of the Sept. 11 hijackers and of suicide bombings, Scotland Yard said last week that it was investigating Sheik Omar, the leader of Al Muhajiroun, Britain's largest Muslim group, and officials are exploring whether they can deport him. "We're fed up with him," said a senior British official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "He needs to be stopped, or he needs to go."

Britain's largest Muslim group? But, but, isn't it a tiny minority of extremists??

Read it all.

Can Islam reform? Despite my respect for some of those making the attempt, I have expressed my doubts many times. This story illustrates one reason why: the jihad ideology that fuels violence by Muslims against non-Muslims in Iraq and elsewhere is not only not the province of a tiny minority of extremists, but is so deeply embedded in the Islamic consciousness that when reformers try to move away from its violent manifestations, they're accused of disloyalty. Of course, this tendency is even stronger in Saudi Arabia, where these clerics are reaping what they have sown for decades.

From AP, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

LONDON—Fundamentalist Islamic leaders in Saudi Arabia are telling militants intent on fighting "infidels" to join the insurgency in Iraq instead of taking up Osama bin Laden's call to oust the Saudi royal family at home, say Saudi dissidents who monitor theological edicts coming out of the kingdom.

Iraq as a battleground offers the solution to a quandary facing Saudi clerics who have to both placate the kingdom's rulers and keep their radical base happy.

"If they preach that there ought to be absolutely no jihad (holy war), they would lose credibility and support among their followers. So what they do is preach jihad — not in Saudi Arabia, but in Iraq," said Abdul-Aziz Khamis, a Saudi rights activist in London. "To them, Iraq is the answer to their dilemma."

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 gave the Saudi government the opportunity to send men there to wage holy war against communism.

It also opened the field for the Saudi regime to spread a rigid form of Sunni Islam known as Wahhabism. The royal Al Saud family adheres to it, as do Saudi-born bin Laden and his Al Qaeda followers.

This is nonsense. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan led to the Afghan jihad, which the Saudis of course supported, but it is not at all true that they weren't spreading Wahhabism before that.

Natan Sharansky says that nothing has changed with the coming of Abbas. All this is a manifestation of the jihad ideology that teaches that, in the words of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad, "the Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say: 'O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him'" (Sahih Bukhari, IV:52:177).

From the Jerusalem Post, with thanks to Enzo:

The "Kill a Jew – Go to Heaven" presentation, compiled by Palestinian Media Watch, an Israel-based organization that monitors incitement in Palestinian society, and distributed under Sharansky's auspices, accuses the Palestinian media of dehumanizing Jews similar to ways the Nazis did.

A fundamental message broadcast in sermons, academic discourse and even children's shows, according to report co-author Itamar Marcus, is that "the Jews are an evil force, and it's inherent to the Jews, and therefore they have to be killed."...

It is important to document this phenomenon, he said, because many people view the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as centered on political issues, when the Palestinians have tied redemption to killing Jews. "It's not connected to borders, it's not connected to compromise, and no compromise will be reached [once] it's a battle of God against the Jews."...

"The whole world has to be aware of anti-Semitism, because it isn't just the problem of the Jews. It's the problem of any democratic society," a Sharansky aide said. "The world has to understand what we are dealing with. It's not only whether there was a bombing yesterday or not. If you don't change the atmosphere in books or on TV, it won't be enough."

At Jihad Watch we have received a large number of inquiries, both sober and frenzied, about the Coptic family found murdered in Jersey City last week.

As is well known, the Copts in Jersey City and elsewhere have many suspicions about this crime. But when they have voiced these suspicions, they have been frequently denounced as “Islamophobes” – an all-purpose term of abuse used to silence criticism of Islam and of Muslims. And Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio is dismissive of the idea that the killings were religiously motivated: “Is it possible? Yes. Do we have anything that gives us reason to believe this is what it was, factually? No. Nothing indicates that was the prime motivation for this. That we can clearly say.”

Nothing? Law enforcement officials have received information from at least one Copt — a close friend of the Armanious family — indicating that the crime was indeed religiously motivated. This family friend has said that an imam in Jersey City declared this Christian family’s blood “halal,” (i.e., licit to shed), because of their proselytizing activities among Muslims. He has named — by name — a suspect in this crime, whose motive was religious and who has fled the country.

Perhaps there is nothing to this. Perhaps the man who has fled is innocent. But even if he is, the Copts have had perfectly cogent reasons for their suspicions. The Armanious family was outspoken in trying to convert Muslims to Christianity. Hossam Armanious vigorously spread his faith at PalTalk, and his 15-year-old daughter Sylvia displayed similar zeal at Dickinson High School. There is credible evidence that for this activity the family received a death threat. In light of all that, it may be that what needs to be justified is the idea that their deaths were in fact unrelated to that proselytizing activity. Islamic law, the Sharia, has traditionally made it a capital offense both for a Muslim to leave Islam, and for a non-Muslim to attempt to convert a Muslim. Many Muslims take such laws very seriously. The Theo van Gogh murder in the Netherlands indicates that at least some will not hesitate to enforce Sharia penalties even in the lands of the infidels.

But if the killer is never caught, which is a distinct possibility since he could be half a world away by now, Muslim spokesmen will attribute the suspicions of the Copts to a “climate of hysteria” against Muslims, and portray themselves — as they do so often — as victims.

Still, a larger question remains. If the Armanious family did in fact receive a death threat related to their proselytizing on Pal Talk, what are the implications for our free society? If the murders were indeed, as many Copts suspect, a warning to them not to proselytize among Muslims, what does that mean for the free exchange of ideas that has always been one of the central values – perhaps the central value – of the American polity?

The mainstream media has done a poor job of covering this case. It has not bothered to explain that the difficulties Copts experience in Egypt are not “old” or even “centuries-old” (as the New York Times put it) — they are as old as when the Muslim invaders first conquered Coptic Christian Egypt. They don’t come from anything Copts have said or done to Muslims, but from the supremacist nature of Islamic beliefs. But in the media in general there has been no understanding of this and no discussion of the Sharia — or of how apostates in Islam are to be treated, or of what punishment is to be meted out to those who dare (as the Armanious family dared) not to act as the despised and cowed minority they were in Egypt, but as free and equal and proud citizens of this country.

No statement has come from the Hudson County Prosecutors Office that shows any sign that that Office has considered these questions, or fully investigated the Copts’ suspicions and allegations. This may not have been a Sharia-inspired killing on American soil, but nothing that has yet come from Edward DeFazio or anyone else seems to deal adequately with the indications that it was. White House Wilsonians seem intent on bringing “democracy” to Iraq, as if that will somehow solve the problem of Islam, and of the jihad that they persist in identifying solely by one of its tools, terrorism. Meanwhile, an unknown number of Muslims in the United States — possibly including the killer of the Armanious family — are working to solve the problems of Islam by laboring, in one way or another, to bring Sharia to this country.

But few are paying attention to that.

Could this possibly be true? Unfortunately, given the shifting and shadowy nature of loyalties among Iraqi officials, it most certainly could. From VOANews, with thanks to Rebecca Bynum:

A suicide bomber from Saudi Arabia, who survived a failed attempt to blow up the Jordanian mission Baghdad in December, alleges that Iraqi police may have captured, and then released, the most wanted terrorist in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, two months ago. Both U.S. and Iraqi officials could not confirm the claims made by the suicide bomber.

On a video disk provided by Iraq's interior ministry, the badly-burned man, identified as Ahmed Abdullah al-Shaiyah, tells Iraqi interrogators about his journey from Saudi Arabia to Baghdad between late October and December to volunteer for suicide missions....

"Do you know what has happened to Zarqawi and where he is?" an Iraqi investigator asked Mr. Shaiyah.

He answered, "I don't know, but I heard from some of my mujahadeen brothers that Iraqi police had captured Zarqawi in Fallujah." Mr. Shaiyah says he then heard that the police let the terrorist go because they had failed to recognize him.

A U.S. military official in Baghdad said he had no evidence to corroborate the allegations from the suicide bomber.

And, during a press conference Saturday, Iraq's interior minister, Falah al-Naqib declined to answer a reporter's question about the allegation and rumors that Zarqawi had been arrested.

REPORTER: "Can you just clarify a bit what you were just saying or not saying about Zarqawi?"

NAQIB: "I wouldn't like to comment for the time being. Let us see."

REPORTER: "Does that mean you have him in custody?"

NAQIB: "Pardon?"

REPORTER: "Does that mean he is in custody?"

NAQIB: "No comments."

That's almost two million dollars. I have no problem with their spending money to have people there to monitor what he was saying, but that doesn't seem to be what it was spent for. From the Times Online, with thanks to all who sent this in:

The Metropolitan Police has disclosed, after a successful Freedom of Information Act request by The Times, that the cost of supervising weekly gatherings outside Finsbury Park Mosque, North London, was £874,387. The figure is far in excess of previous estimates for the 22-month police operation....

Patrick Mercer, the Conservative frontbench spokesman on homeland security, said the taxpayer was facing a huge bill for allowing an extremist message to be preached on the streets of the capital.

“The effect of the police action was to make it easier for poison and subversion to be preached openly on our streets,” Mr Mercer said.

The open-air meetings began in January 2003 after the mosque, where Hamza had been the imam, was closed. The Egyptian-born cleric gave his sermons in St Thomas’s Road, close to Highbury stadium.

Initially large numbers of officers were involved in policing the events at which Hamza, 47, would deliver lectures in Arabic and English.

Tarpaulins were spread on the road, on which his congregation, often numbering 150 or more, would pray before listening to Hamza speak.

Between 12 and 18 uniformed officers were deployed to the site of the meetings for up to two hours each week. More police were required when counter-demonstrators threatened to disrupt an event.

This article shows the self-contradiction of the position that still prevails in the mainstream media: if the jihadists are really a tiny minority of extremists whose understanding of Islam is rejected by the great majority, then why should anyone be concerned about an Islamic revival in Syria? But this article is closer to the truth: the resurgence of Islam itself makes for a revival of jihadist sentiment, and that's why secular Syrians are worried.

From the Washington Post, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

NASIRIYAH, Syria -- A religious revival is sweeping Syria, challenging the secular, ruling Baath Party to allow more Muslim influence in government and frightening many Syrians schooled for decades to fear political Islam.

Growing religious feeling can be seen across the landscape, from the proliferation of head scarves worn by young women in Damascus to an enormous privately funded mosque nearing completion in downtown Aleppo, Syria's second city. Muslim clerics, meanwhile, are growing increasingly bold in asking for democratic political reforms that could give them a larger role in government.

Alarmed by the trend, some within Syria's secular intelligentsia and middle class have begun writing and organizing against it. From his airy home in Nasiriyah, a town 35 miles northeast of Damascus, Nabil Fayyad, a secular writer, accused the government in print last September of softening its stand against the increasingly popular Islamic movement, its chief rival for power, amid pressure from the United States to reform.

Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald considers the implications of the possibility that the charges are true that the Armanious family murders were religiously motivated:

To understand better what is not only past in Islam, but also passing and, most importantly, to come, members of the security services in the Western world should learn what Islam teaches its adherents, whether they ignore most of those teachings and in fact dissent (and do not do so merely for the sake of infidel good will), from them (the so-called “moderates”) or whether they choose to follow those teachings in a more observant fashion (what we may call the “rigorist” or “immoderate” Muslims, of whom there are a great many).

Islam is based on divisions, or perhaps one should say polarities. And these polarities explain the widespread bipolar disorder of Muslim peoples, swinging from gloom (as in June, 1967) to elation (as on the afternoon of September 11, 2001). For Infidels, the main polarity to be aware of in Islam is the absolute divide between the Believer and the Unbeliever. Fellow Believers must be supported, must never have war made upon them in the service of Unbelievers (or Infidels). Unbelievers, on the other hand, must not be taken as friends (“Christians and Jews are friends with each other”), not be treated as equals but subject to all sorts of disabilities, and while they may be exploited in every possible way, that exploitation should not lead to any felt gratitude toward the Infidels. The Iraqi who told an NPR interviewer (Deborah Amos) on Jan. 22 that the Americans “must leave” but only after they “stop terrorism” and “fix everything,” was perfectly willing to have American soldiers fight and die to end terrorism by some Muslims, for the sake of other Muslims who apparently disagree with the President’s notion that “freedom isn’t free” (they are quite content, at least, to pay for that “freedom” not out of their own pockets, but to pick the pockets of the obliging, trusting, ever-generous and hopeful Americans). If the Shi’a are now “supporting the elections, it is only because they know they will win those elections, and not because they have, all of a sudden, become staunch democrats and great readers of The Federalist and John Stuart Mill. They will bide their time, take power, and continue to regard all Infidels as “najis” or unclean. Despite the opinions expressed by some, including the convert to Sufi Islam Stephen Schwartz, or Reuel Gerecht, who assured a CNN audience that the Islamic Republic of Iran had “run its course” more than a decade ago, and therefore presumably, we can stop worrying about it – unfortunately someone forgot to tell the Teheran regime that it had “run its course” and its time was up, and that it really should stop constructing those nuclear weapons. Shi’a as compared to Sunni may in Iraq, as in Saudi Arabia or Pakistan, be slightly more sinned against than sinning, but this does not make them the friends of Infidels. Americans should expect no gratitude for having rescued them from the monstrous regime of Saddam Hussein, which had lasted for 35 years, and was prepared to last for another 35.

The division between Believer and Infidel in the world is mirrored in how the world itself is divided, between Dar al-Islam, the lands were Islam rules and Muslims dominate (though they need not be a majority of the population), and dar al-harb, the House of War, where Infidels, for now, have not yet been conquered, by whatever means, and subjugated to Islam.

The divisions of the great world are mirrored in the divisions that rule all of life. Everything one does is either halal (permited, licit) or haram (prohibited, illicit). It is all laid down, or if not laid down in some book, then a fatwa or opinion may serve as the final guide of how a Muslim should act. Muslims living in the Lands of the Infidels face new questions. May they, for example, obey Infidel laws? (Answer: Only to the extent that those laws do not contravene Islam.) Now a good guide to what is halal and what is haram is Al-Halal wal Haram fil Islam by the well-known Qaradawi, who now lives in Qatar (also the home of Al-Jazeera). Hairdos in the shape of a camel’s hump? Haram. Statues that have not been vandalized or defaced? Haram. A nice glass of fruit juice? Halal. A leg of lamb, from a lamb that has been killed in the Halal manner (oops, this is a trick question). Halal.

A few years ago Michael Cook wrote his Commanding Right and Prohibiting Wrong in Islam. In Christianity, one is expected to promote what is “right”, and to discourage people from doing “wrong.” The Christian version of Cook’s book would be Commending Right and Discouraging Wrong. What a difference a vowel makes. Islam is all about power; Islam commands, Islam forbids, Islam demands of Believers absolute slavish submissiveness to the Rules of Islam. And Unbelievers, too, must obey the rules of the game, for if they are allowed to live, they owe their very lives to Muslims who have generously permitted that – in return for behaving as dhimmis, and for not putting up resistance to the spread of Islam.

The Armanious family had overstepped those rules. The father, who defended the Copts and attacked the treatment they had historically received from Muslims, expressed these views on Muslim websites. Sylvia the 15-year-old daughter, was proud to defend, even to promote among others, her own faith. Either the father, or Sylvia, or perhaps both of them, had violated what is demanded of dhimmis.

By all the laws of civilization and of the United States of America, the butchery that followed was strictly wrong, forbidden, prohibited, haram. According, however, to the fanatical views of the “immoderate” Muslims (as opposed the other kind about which he hear so much, but from whom we hear so little), this family of Copts, the descendants of the original inhabitants of Egypt and ever since the arrival of Islam, a group persecuted in their own country, had come from Egypt, and knew the Muslim rules. Yet here in America, members of this family made the mistake of thinking they were free to act as free Americans, and had dared to violate those rules. According, however, to the fanatical views of the “immoderate” Muslims (as opposed the other kind, about which we hear so much, and from whom we hear so little), the whole Armanious family deserved what they got (as part of “an intense Islamic revolution all across America that holds the right and bring down [sic] the falsehood that they’ve created” as someone says at an Islamic website), for in the eyes of their killers and those killers’ open or secret supporters, they should have behaved in America just as Copts are made to behave in Egypt. To many Muslims, the Christians of the Middle East are supposed to carry their dhimmitude with them, and these Copts violated their pact. They owed everything, the celebrated kindness of Islam, which allowed them to live as long as they strictly adhered to the rules of dhimmitude. This they failed to do. They may have been butchered, but it was strictly according to the rules. They violated their agreement, and lost the right to live. Whoever killed them acted, it would seem, in defense of Islam and against these Copts who had forgotten their place. Que voulez-vous, monsieur? Don’t worry. It was all strictly halal.

In Onward Muslim Soldiers I discuss the phenomenon of jihad fighters traveling from one country to another to fight in the latest jihad. It appears from this New York Times story, "The Next Islamist Revolution?" (thanks to Nicolei), that the latest stop is Bangladesh.

Last spring, Bangla Bhai, whose followers probably number around 10,000, decided to try an Islamist revolution in several provinces of Bangladesh that border on India. His name means ''Bangladeshi brother.'' (At one point he said his real name was Azizur Rahman and more recently claimed it was Siddiqul Islam.) He has said that he acquired this nom de guerre while waging jihad in Afghanistan and that he was now going to bring about the Talibanization of his part of Bangladesh. Men were to grow beards, women to wear burkas. This was all rather new to the area, which was religiously diverse. But Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh, as Bangla Bhai's group is called (the name means Awakened Muslim Masses of Bangladesh), was determined and violent and seemed to have enough lightly armed adherents to make its rule stick.

The schizophrenia in American foreign policy continues, but this is a positive step. From AFP, with thanks to Twostellas:

MANILA - The United States will back President Gloria Arroyo in the fight against breakaway Muslim militant groups threatening fragile peace talks in the southern Philippines, its envoy to Manila said on Monday.

US ambassador Francis Ricciardone said negotiations between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the government were being made difficult by many groups claiming to be legitimate separatist rebels.

While the ongoing peace negotiations brokered by Malaysia to end the MILF’s 28-year insurgency were welcome, Ricciardone said Washington would provide military support against those continuing to carry out attacks.

He said 70 US military personnel were training troops in the southern Philippines in intelligence gathering, leading to the arrest or killing of “25 identified, known, no-doubt-about it terrorist leaders” last year.

Development assistance would also continue in the mostly poverty-stricken southern Mindanao island and in Muslim areas, he said.

“Our concern is not merely to get a piece of paper ... a peace accord. What we want to see is a peace (agreement) that will be durable and that will permit development to go ahead,” Ricciardone told foreign correspondents.

But if certain elements of the MILF were “going to hide bombers from Bali, or train bombers or hide kidnappers, or get involved in the drug trade, the law enforcement and security forces of the Philippines are going to go after them and we are going to help them,” Ricciardone said.

Details of the Contest at Dhimmi Watch.

Details of taqiyya here.

The Muslim Student Association at UCLA is holding Taqiyya Awareness Week -- I mean, that is, Islamic Awareness Week: "Muslims hope to educate with awareness week," from the Daily Bruin (thanks to Anthony).

Friends, I thought that rather than answer all the distortions and dissimulations in this article, which I have answered on this site and in my books a hundred times before, I'd throw open the floor to you. That's right: let's play Spot the Taqiyya! You answer the assertions made in this article.

Feel free to make use of the Jihad Watch and Dhimmi Watch archives, and note that for some reason some searches will search both, but sometimes only one. So search in both places. And please, no "Muzzies" talk or other speech that is not only objectively offensive but also plays into the hands of those who would destroy us.

The prize: an autographed copy of my book Onward Muslim Soldiers, suitable for light reading, reference on Islam, and doorstop use. Winners, will be announced later. It is best if you don't just quote Qur'an verses to the contrary, unless the claim is explicitly one about Islamic scripture only, as is Malcolm Clark's claim about women's rights in Islam. Anyone can pile up mountains of passages from the Qur'an and Hadith, but in my books and articles I generally go farther: your rebuttal will be more effective if you show some evidence that the verses are understood by mainstream Muslims in the way you are using them.

Post your entries as comments on this thread. Show your awareness of the threat of Islamic jihad -- and have fun.

An inadequate article, in that it doesn't say anything about with what groups they were affiliated. Still, it vividly demonstrates that the threat to Western societies has not dissipated. From AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

LONDON, England (AP) -- Three terror suspects have pleaded innocent to charges that they conspired to possess a radioactive substance and entered into funding arrangements linked to terrorism.

Roque Flaviano Fernandes, 43, Dominic Agnello Martins, 44, and Abdurahman Kanyare all denied that they conspired to possess a "radioactive mercury-based substance" for terrorist purposes between July 1 and September 25, 2004.

The three men appeared at the Old Bailey criminal court by video-link from Belmarsh high-security prison in the southeast of the capital.

They all denied another two charges each of "conspiracy to enter into a funding arrangement for purposes of terrorism" between July 1 and Sept. 25.

The Baltimore Sun has an interview with Malcolm Clark, author of Islam for Dummies: "Required reading for American officers: 'Islam for Dummies' author hopes to dispel, correct misconceptions." (Thanks to Anthony for the link.) The deathless classic Islam for Dummies, of course, has made it to General Vines' infamous reading list.

Predictably, Clark seems to have a few misconceptions of his own.

I think of the way women are regarded in Islam. That's an area I might have trouble with. To see women heavily veiled - this varies greatly from one Islamic context to another, from the head scarves that cover almost nothing to cloaks that cover the whole body - usually causes a negative reaction. Or seeing a woman walk behind her husband. This subject is a matter of debate within Islam. Muslim feminists say repression of women is cultural and has nothing to do with Islam. There's scriptural support for that view.

I wonder if Malcolm Clark has been discussing this with Julia Roach. But in any case, whatever scriptural support he might have in mind for the idea that the repression of women in cultural, there is also considerable scriptural support for the repression of women itself. How many of these do you think he quotes in Islam for Dummies?

1. The Qur’an likens a woman to a field (tilth), to be used by a man as he wills: “Your women are a tilth for you (to cultivate) so go to your tilth as ye will” (2:223);
2. It declares that a woman’s testimony is worth half that of a man: “Get two witnesses, out of your own men, and if there are not two men, then a man and two women, such as ye choose, for witnesses, so that if one of them errs, the other can remind her” (2:282);
3. It allows men to marry up to four wives, and have sex with slave girls also: “If ye fear that ye shall not be able to deal justly with the orphans, marry women of your choice, two or three or four; but if ye fear that ye shall not be able to deal justly (with them), then only one, or (a captive) that your right hands possess, that will be more suitable, to prevent you from doing injustice” (4:3);
4. It rules that a son’s inheritance should be twice the size of that of a daughter: “Allah (thus) directs you as regards your children’s (inheritance): to the male, a portion equal to that of two females” (4:11);
5. It tells husbands to beat their disobedient wives: “Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the support of women). So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them” (4:34).

Clark also says:

Many Americans equate Islam and terrorism. That's not historically true. Go back 20 years; the majority of terrorist acts against America happened in South America and came from a leftist ideology. Still, there's a feeling that Muslim groups in the U.S. haven't been forthcoming enough about condemning Islamic terrorism. In fact, all the major Islamic organizations in the U.S., such as the Islamic Society of North America, unequivocally condemned the [9/11] attacks.

Yes, ISNA did condemn the attacks. I wonder if Clark knows that the Senate Finance Committee in January 2004 included ISNA on a list of groups that "finance terrorism and perpetuate violence"? Does Clark know that ISNA has received funding from the Saudis -- that's right, the Wahhabi bogeymen that Islamic apologists and their allies try to convince us are responsible for all Islamic terror?

When asked by the interviewer if the Qur'an permits Muslims to lie to non-Muslims, Clark answers:

I don't recall the specific passage that gets cited to that effect. But no, it's not a general notion that it's OK to deceive others.

I'll refresh Clark's memory: the Qur'an verses referring to religious deception (taqiyya and kitman) are 3:28 and 16:106. I have made frequent reference to these on this site, and have been criticized by some for applying what they think is solely a Shi'ite concept to all of Islam. In the first place, there is abundant evidence that taqiyya is practiced today by Sunni Salafis; I discuss some of it in Onward Muslim Soldiers. Here also is an extended and extremely revealing argument by a Shi'ite that taqiyya attempts to "demonstrate and prove that the concept of "al-Taqiyya" is an integral part of Islam, and that it is NOT a Shi'ite concoction." It contains numerous important hadith references.

Finally, it turns out that Clark, like the Saudi interior minister and the tinfoil hat crowd, believes that the West created jihadist Islam. I guess that means that he doesn't realize that any jihads were fought before the existence of the United States:

Do you agree with President Bush that Islam is a peaceful religion that has been "hijacked" by extremists?

Generally, yes, but "hijacked by fanatics" suggests the fault lies completely with that group. Western and American actions have created a climate ... for that hijacking to occur.

Could the Internet bring down the mullahocracy? The mullahs are trying to make sure there's plenty of harm in trying. And note well: these guys were the "children of the revolution." From the LA Times, with thanks to Anthony:

After toiling for years to silence dissent within the Iranian republic, the mullahs have turned their war against free press to the last reserve of open political debate: the Internet. Since the summer, Iran's Web loggers, or bloggers, and online journalists have been demonized as CIA collaborators, their work whitewashed from many Iranian computers with filters....

"They suddenly felt that we were using the Internet as an alternative to the papers they'd shut down," said Hossein Derakhshan, a 28-year-old Iranian pioneer who took the groundbreaking step of publishing online instructions in Persian to teach Iranians how to post Web logs. He moved to Toronto five years ago with his wife, a Canadian citizen. "Blogs are the only uncontrolled and totally free medium, so they have the potential to attract many people, even people who are apathetic."

The arrest of online journalists and bloggers began last fall. The writers say they were tortured and forced to publicly denounce their work. Even technicians who worked on Web pages have been imprisoned. President Khatami has ordered an investigation into the reports of torture.

"They think that now that they've closed the papers they should concentrate on the Web logs," said Ali Mazroui, Hanif's father and a former reformist lawmaker. "They think if they close this new source of information, they'll have control."...

Another Internet writer, who agreed to an interview shortly after his release on the condition that neither his name nor any revealing details be given, said he'd been interrogated mercilessly, beaten and held in solitary confinement until he became suicidal.

Remembering it, his features twisted together, and his eyes brimmed with tears that soon spilled over....

"We were the children of the revolution," he said. "We weren't asking for radical change. We wanted to work within the system."

Jihad Watch director Robert Spencer writes in the Washington Times about a curious omission during the Rice hearings:

During her Senate confirmation hearings, Secretary of State-designate Condoleezza Rice was grilled about Iraq, weapons of mass destruction and how long the troops would be there. But no one asked her anything about the most important question of all: when, and how, American foreign policy will be adjusted to bring it into line with the goals of the war on terror.

Three years after September 11, this has not been done. It should have been the first task of the new conflict. Other nations take this as axiomatic — including those on the other side of the current alignments. Article 3 of the Iranian Constitution stipulates that Iran must base its foreign policy on "Islamic criteria, fraternal commitment to all Muslims, and unsparing support to the freedom fighters of the world."

It is reasonable for any state to base its foreign policy on its overall goals and interests. In fact, I recommend that the United States do the same thing. In regard to the global jihad, this would involve a serious re-evaluation of the American posture around the globe.

A few modest proposals to this end: In the first place, it is scandalous that so many years after President Bush announced that you're either with the terrorists or with us, the United States still counts as friends and allies — or at least recipients of its largesse — so many states where jihadist activity is widespread.

A State Department that really had America's interests at heart would immediately terminate all aid to Egypt, Indonesia, the Palestinians, Jordan, Somalia, Algeria,Sudan,Pakistan, Kosovo, Albania — and even Iraq and Afghanistan, and any other state — until each demonstrably ends all support — material, educational, religious — for jihad warfare, and grants full equality of rights to any non-Muslim citizens.

It should also reconfigure our global alliances on the same basis. Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the rest should be put on notice that continued friendly relations with the United States absolutely depend on an immediate and comprehensive renunciation of the jihad, including a reformation of their schools to end the teaching of jihad warfare. It cannot be enough for a state to denounce and renounce terror; each must renounce Islamic jihad as a means of undermining the integrity of other states.

To be a friend of the United States, each must renounce entirely any intention to make good on the Islamic goals and responsibilities enunciated by the Pakistani Islamic leader Syed Abul Ala Maududi, who declared that non-Muslims have "absolutely no right to seize the reins of power in any part of God's earth nor to direct the collective affairs of human beings according to their own misconceived doctrines." If they do, "the believers would be under an obligation to do their utmost to dislodge them from political power and to make them live in subservience to the Islamic way of life."

His comments were in full accord with Islamic theology and history, as well as with the Koran as it has been read and understood by Muslims for centuries. This is the goal of the jihadists today; it should be the fundamental defining point of U.S. alliances with Muslim states.

The United States should also immediately initiate a full-scale Manhattan Project to find new energy sources, so that the needed reconfiguration of our alliances can be more than just words.

But does anyone in the State Department have the will to advocate these and other measures? Or is it only regimes like the bloody mullahocracy in Tehran that are allowed to speak openly about their principles and goals, and take all the necessary measures for their own defense?

Miss Rice needs to ask and answer these questions. The State Department's bureaucracy has been playing realpolitik for so long that it reflexively thinks it can play ball with the Islamic jihadists — as if dropping care packages into Indonesia will somehow blunt the force of the Maududi dictum that "non-Muslims have absolutely no right to seize the reins of power."

The State Department needs to come to grips with the fact that it is facing a totalitarian, supremacist, expansionist ideology, and plan accordingly. Not only has it not been done, but it is so far off the table that it never even occurred to the most rabidly partisan Democratic senator, Barbara Boxer, to use it as another stick with which to batter Miss Rice's competence and veracity.

Now it is up to Miss Rice herself to demonstrate whether she has the vision to do what needs to be done.

The idea that Osama bin Laden is an agent of some sinister power is no longer confined to the lunatic fringe; it has been taken up by the Saudi Interior Minister. From the Washington Times, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Jan. 24 (UPI) -- The Saudi interior minister has said the world's most wanted terrorist, Osama bin Laden, is an agent of an enemy of the oil-rich kingdom. Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz said, "Bin Laden is the agent of a certain party, no doubt."

Nayef did not identify the suspected party, the daily newspaper Okaz reported Monday.

Hmmm. Whom do you think he might mean?

And Nayef has the nerve to say this despite the fact that as late as November 2003, you could find this sort of thing on the website of the Saudi Embassy in Washington:

The Muslims are Required to Raise the Banner of Jihad in Order to Make the Word of Allah Supreme in this World. . . . The Muslims are required to raise the banner of Jihad in order to make the Word of Allah supreme in this world, to remove all forms of injustice and oppression, and to defend the Muslims. If Muslims do not take up the sword, the evil tyrants of this earth will be able to continue oppressing the weak and [the] helpless…

Osama bin Laden, webmaster?

The message below has appeared in Arabic on a Muslim bulletin board. (Thanks to Kemaste for the link, and Ali Sina for arranging for the translation.)

In The Name Of Allah the Most Gracious The Most Merciful

The Honourable Brothers/ Peace upon You

Under the title “Muslim-Christian boil over N.J”

The Associated Press wrote about the incidents that happened in the New Jersey of America after the Muslims killed a Christian American family from an Egyptian origin after an article wrote by the deceased on the internet that demonized Islam.

The heads of the family have been separated from their bodies (they have been beheaded) at their home at Jersey.

The father Hosam Armanosy 47
The mother Amal Qaras 37
Their daughters Silvia 15 and Monica 8

During the funeral yesterday the Christians carried banners that condemn the operation and demonize Islam which led to clashes between Christians and Muslims, estimated at 35 people by the police and the police separated between the two parties for fear of injuries.

Under the banner “Welcome Bin Laden” carried by a Christian, it praised Christians of more bloodshed at the hands of Bin Laden Supporters of Muslim Americans.

The good planting has started to yield thank Allah and soon, Allah willing, an intense Islamic revolution all across America that holds the right and bring down the falsehood that they’ve created.

“Bushie Bushie” you have no exit, you’re surrounded with the hatred that you’ve planted.

Allah, please, bring victory to Muslims on earth east and west oh your almighty and wisdom…amen.”

Plus a summary of reply messages:

The remaining messages support the slaughter, except for one that asked if the daughters deserved the same and was answered by the writer of the main message by saying that she was one of the worst on Pal Talk.

Another reply said that they should wait for the head of Al-Azhar University in Cairo to say his word about the daughters (ironically after the massacre took place.

All this supports the idea, for which evidence is mounting (in complete contrast to published reports), that this was a religiously motivated crime.

In late 2003, Paul Weyrich of the Free Congress Foundation, of which I am an Adjunct Fellow, offered an alternative book list on Islam to the package CAIR was offering to libraries. Of course, FCF didn't have the funding CAIR did, so these books didn't make it into many libraries. Nevertheless, I thought that in light of General Vines' reading list, it would be useful to supply a corrective.

This is not by any means meant as a comprehensive list, but it is a start. And you can order the books here.

The recent attacks in Baghdad in which suicide car bombings killed at least 34 people no doubt will strike many Americans as disruptive of a major Islamic holiday, coming as they did during the start of Ramadan, the holiest holiday for Muslims. Fasting is required of adult Muslims to instill piety.

Right now, American officials believe that the planning of such attacks takes place after the mosque prayers held on Friday.

No doubt many Americans, viewing Islam through the prism of the mores that comprise our Judeo-Christian civilization, view such attacks as if they had been launched by Christians or Jews during Christmas or Passover, undermining the very nature of the religious holiday and the religion itself.

This is a misleading view of what truly constitutes the Islamic religion, a misconception that can not only be attributed to the naïveté of Americans but also the efforts of well-funded Islamic groups such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

CAIR and its allies like to gloss over the fact that the Qur'an's Sura 9:29 implores devout Muslims to "Fight against such of those to whom the Scriptures were given [i.e., Jews and Christians] as believe neither in Allah nor the Last Day, who do not forbid what Allah and His Apostle have forbidden, and do not embrace the true Faith, until they pay tribute out of hand and are utterly subdued." Yet Muslims worldwide are taking such verses as marching orders right now.

CAIR also prefers to ignore urgings such as that presented by Sura 48:29 which declares, "Muhammad is Allah's Apostle. Those who follow him are ruthless to the unbelievers but merciful to one another." Yet in Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan and elsewhere today, Muslims are being "ruthless to the unbelievers."

Muslims accept the Qur'an as the direct words of Allah. Many passages preach violence against non-believers. As long as the Qur'an is held to be words dictated by God Himself, some Muslims will be motivated to carry out the urgings of Allah to commit violence against unbelievers, including Christians and Jews.

Right now CAIR is engaged in a campaign to stock the shelves of public libraries with books and videos maintaining that at heart Islam is a religion of peace and tolerance. Undoubtedly, this is reassuring to the portion of the American public that accepts multiculturalism, and which refuses to accept the reality that there are many people in this world who do not share the post-modern, secular worldview that has come to define Western civilization.

The books that CAIR is placing on library shelves include The Islamic
Threat: Myth or Reality by John L. Esposito. An online review on Amazon.com tellingly describes Esposito as a "nice guy" whose overwhelming desire for peace between the Islamic and Judeo-Christian worlds has turned him into "an apologist for the worst excesses of political Islam." Indeed, Esposito contends that jihad is a misunderstood concept and does not mean "holy war." True, the word "jihad" doesn't translate as "holy war," but to say that it hasn't meant holy war from time to time throughout history is simply fantasy.

Another book that is part of the CAIR packages is The Complete Idiot's Guide to Islam, which also makes the misleading assertion that Islam is at heart peaceful and misunderstood.

No doubt the message presented by the books and videos that comprise the CAIR packages will be comforting to many Americans who are very eager not to accept the truth about Islam. But it is not the whole story by any means. America's libraries have a responsibility to the public to ensure that their shelves contain a balanced view of Islam. They should make an effort to explain the context of the debate fairly, accurately, and in full context.

To balance the CAIR library package, at the Free Congress Foundation we've decided to offer libraries suggestions of our own, having compiled a list of twelve books.

Three of those books that deserve prominent places on the shelves of your public library - because they offer a frank discussion of Islam and how its radical believers view the West: Onward Muslim Soldiers: How Jihad Still Threatens America and the West by Robert Spencer, Adjunct Fellow at the Free Congress Foundation; American Jihad: The Terrorists Living Among Us by Steven Emerson; and Sword of the Prophet by Serge Trifkovic.

Spencer's Onward Muslim Soldiers (Regnery Publishing) contains numerous quotes from terrorists and Muslim radicals (including many in the United States) citing Islamic theology to justify violence. This is information that all Americans should know, given the current geopolitical climate. Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, has proclaimed: "Jihad and killing is the head of Islam. If you take it out, you cut off the head of Islam." What makes Spencer's book also valuable is his willingness to explore how the West's commendable quality of tolerance has been taken so far by some that it has blinded them to the true threat that we confront. It is too easy to write off 9/11 as the work of a marginal gang of terrorists, not a global movement of determined extremists who harbor a deep-seated hatred for our society. Extreme as the viewpoints of Muslim terrorists are, Americans also need to understand that the violent actions and words of members of al Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah are welcomed by many Muslims. Spencer's book shows why that is so.

Steven Emerson's American Jihad: The Terrorists Living Among Us (Free Press) details the effort of Islamic terrorists to bring our country to its knees, and exposes their extensive networks. The mainstream news media still has not paid enough attention to the network that the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas has been able to build in the United States. Emerson's book compensates for the lack of coverage we see in newspapers and on television.

Serge Trifkovic's The Sword of the Prophet: History, Theology, Impact on the World (BHB International) examines, among many illuminating topics, the powerful anti-Semitism that is constantly promoted in the Islamic press. Like Americans willing to overlook the imagery promoted by the Nazi propagandists, today's establishment media largely gives the Islamist media a pass. Trifkovic is no more a saber rattler than are Emerson or Spencer. He endorses ideas such as more careful immigration policies as vital steps to help defend us from the radical Islamists.

These three books take a tough-minded look at the ideology driving the Islamic extremists and our unwillingness to confront the reality of the situation. It has been two years since the 9/11 attack and the lack of any major terrorists incidents on American soil since then has allowed many Americans to view the world as if 9/11 was an isolated incident.

I would like to think so. But our involvement in the Middle East and the continuing effort to "globalize" American cultural and economic relationships with Islamic countries makes it unwise for us to expect that Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations are willing to let bygones be bygones. They are willing to be patient, waiting to strike when we least expect it.

The first step to defending ourselves is to know our enemy. Indeed, for many Americans, that means recognizing that we do indeed confront an enemy in radical Islamists who hate our country and the West and the very freedom that defines our societies. In America, CAIR is free to try to place their books on the shelves of libraries. (Something that Christians or Jews would not be permitted to do in many Islamic societies.) But the library owes it to their patrons to inform them of the source of the donation and to ensure that other books with a different point of view are available too. The books by Spencer, Emerson, and Trifkovic represent a needed balance to the CAIR packages. They are more than deserving of space on the shelves of public libraries. Americans need to read these books and think hard about their unflinching portrayal of a religion whose central tenets are unlikely to let America and the West live in peace.

The Free Congress Foundation Islamic Books for Libraries Kit: we may not endorse everything in these books, but they provide a needed corrective to CAIR's list, and stand as monuments of courage in the face of jihad terrorism. Besides the three above, here are more suggested books to counterbalance the CAIR list:

Why I Am Not A Muslim by Ibn Warraq (Prometheus Books)

What the Koran Really Says: Language, Text, and Commentary by Ibn Warraq (Prometheus Books)

Leaving Islam: Apostates Speak Out by Ibn Warraq (Prometheus Books)

Islam and Dhimmitude: Where Civilizations Collide by Bat Ye'or (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press)

The Decline of Eastern Christianity Under Islam: From Jihad To Dhimmitude by Bat Ye'or (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press)

Jihad In The West: Muslim Conquests From The 7th To The 21st Century by Paul Fregosi (Prometheus Books)

Escape From Slavery: The True Story Of My Ten Years In Captivity And My Journey To Freedom by Francis Bok (St. Martin's Press)

The Early Development of Mohammedanism by David S. Margoliouth (Simon Publications)

Mohammed and the Rise of Islam by David Margoliouth (reprint publisher: AMS Press)

This has been eminently predictable for several years now. From Reuters, with thanks to Nicolei:

DUBAI - Al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi declared a “bitter war” on Iraq’s parliamentary elections next Sunday, in an audiotape purporting to come from the Jordanian militant and posted on the Internet.The speaker urged Sunni Muslims to fight against the vote, which he said was a plot against them by Washington and its ”infidel” Shia Muslim allies.

“We have declared a bitter war against the principle of democracy and all those who seek to enact it,” the speaker, who was identified as Zarqawi, said in the tape posted on Sunday.

“Candidates in elections are seeking to become demi-gods while those who vote for them are infidels. And with God as my witness, I have informed them (of our intentions).”

I don't like it either, but the question is: will Muslims in the UK and other Western countries live peacefully in a pluralistic society, without acting unilaterally (or violently) against things of which they disapprove? There are peaceful and orderly ways for them to register their disapproval of such things, and in the UK they will probably find officials ready to bend over backwards to please them.

From the Times Online, with thanks to all who sent this in:

A website giving advice on how to vandalise billboards and listing potential targets has been set up by a group calling themselves Muslims Against Advertising (MAAD).

The campaign has gathered momentum since the Advertising Standards Authority banned an underwear advert from being sited near mosques.

Advertisements for perfume, hair dye, bras and television programmes are among those that have been attacked. Photographs of semi-dressed women are the most frequently targeted, with the offending body parts painted over or ripped off.

A poster advertising the Channel 4 programme Desperate Housewives is the most recent target; the images of two scantily-clad actresses have been torn from an East London billboard but three fully-dressed characters were left intact. Adverts bearing Dove’s “Real Women” adverts — six ordinary women pictured in their underwear — were painted over at several locations last year.

MAAD, based in Birmingham, gives an index of defaced adverts in the city, including Levi’s, Wonderbra, PaddyPower, a radio station and a strip club. It says on its website that it believes in “direct action” and “has paint and isn’t afraid to use it”, adding: “There is no longer any need to cringe as you walk past a sleazy poster, we’ll improve it.”

Advice on how to attack posters is also given: “The procedures outlined here are based on our six months’ experience of executing poster attacks professionally, safely and without injury or arrest.

“A paint roller, a blithe spirit and a balmy night are all you really need.

“After choosing your board, be sure to inspect it both during the day and at night. Take note of all activities in the area. Who is about at 2am? How visible will you be?

“Bring a camera — it’s a good cover for doing anything you’re not supposed to. Check your escape routes.

“For work on larger boards we recommend walkie-talkies . . . the ground crew should monitor oncoming traffic and maintain radio contact with the lookout on the board.”

I wrote in a recent column that the tsunami was likely to make Muslims in the afflicted areas think that it had come because they weren't Islamic enough, and thus lead to greater fervor and in due course to more jihad. Here is confirmation of this from Malaysia. "Seeing red over JAWI raid...," from the Malay Mail Online, with thanks to Nicolei:

POUNCED upon, abused and rounded up like juvenile delinquents, several Muslim youths have filed a complaint against officers of Pusat Agama Islam for the high-handed manner in which they were treated following a raid at a club in Kuala Lumpur recently....

"Most of the time they just ogled us," said the female celebrity who, together with another friend, was wearing a tank top and jeans. "My friend shielded her chest with her handbag but was asked to lower it so that the ‘jury' could have a good look. She felt so humiliated as one of the officers commented on her nipples, suggesting that perhaps she might be feeling cold." Those deemed to be wearing sexy clothes had their pictures taken. A 22-year-old student who had metal piercings on her chin and belly button was asked by a JAWI officer if she also pierced her private parts. "The man remarked that it was because of people like her that God punished the world with the tsunami," the celebrity said. The women were only allowed out after some parents turned up and gave written guarantees that those charged would attend a court hearing at the Federal Territory Syariah Court in April.

All Muslims in Western countries peacefully accept pluralism and have no attachment to Sharia or violent jihad -- or so American Muslim advocacy groups would have us believe, on pain of being called "racist" or "Islamophobic." But alas, reality is different. A Muslim in Toronto recently posted this at the Islamic Forum bulletin boards (thanks to Jeff Lastname for the link):

Are you planning to participate in Jihad to do service to Allah's Religion?

Tell us how you will go about doing this.

For me personally, I wanna get a basic job and save up money (About $35 grand CDN)...and go to Iran to get military training at the same time educating myself in deen and memorizing Quran. Because it's taqwa and niyyah that would get me accepted by Allah and assist me in Jihad. Then after completing the training in Iran I will go to Chechnya to assist the Mujahideen there.

Subsequent posters admonish this fellow not to speak so openly about his plans on the Internet. One tells him:

The Post-9/11 world is different. The different Western intelligence agencies are putting pressure on their respective muslim populations. They are out to stop people trying to go to jihad so you dont watn them to make your plans anymore difficult

The original poster, "MedinaMuniwara," makes his intentions quite clear:

Bro there is a need. The need to fight the oppressors. There are so many able muslims that can go for Jihad, if we just didnt intend and DID ......those Russians woulda been slaughtered by now.

A poster identifying himself as "Greek Cypriot" says to him:

Anyway, I don't have any problem with what you want to do - So long as you abide by the rules of Jihad (Don't kill innocents e.t.c.) and don't attack any Greeks. :)

MedinaMuniwara responds:

Greek: If there are any Greek-Russians in the occupation of Chechnya....I will have to kill them. lmao

He is contemptuous of the idea that unbelievers might see this discussion and disapprove:

Are u scared to fight? I hope not. You scared of being harrassed at skool cuz of ur deen [religion]? Was Bilal (ra) scared of being harrassed by Mushrikeen Makkah? He took boulders on his stomach ....this is #### compared to them. They just said "One God" and lost their lives.

I cant believe why would anyone say "OHh look what the kuffar think of us..they think we are savages ...lets stop fighting.....they think we oppress women...lets get rid of the hijabs...n khimars....." thats total B-S!

What would a kuffar think if you told them Rasool (SAW) [that's the Muslim prophet Muhammad] had 12 wives? You know exactly what they would think. Would u stop saying it? No.

The discussion goes on for pages and contains much of interest. Greek Cypriot comes back later to tell the would-be mujahid:

THIS FORUM MUST BE MONITORED BY THE FBI OR SOME OTHER GROUP! Don't you realise how dangerous it is to post things like that? Don't you realise they will probably start reading all your mail, bugging your phones e.t.c?!!!

Or at least posting what you say on Jihad Watch.

Don't miss a revealing debate that is posted late in the thread. It is between a Sheikh Al-Albani (probably Imam Muhammad Naasir ud-Din Al-Albani (1914-1999), who taught for a time at the University of Medina in Saudi Arabia) and a jihadi. They are discussing whether a caliph is needed to declare jihad fard ayn -- that is, obligatory on all Muslims, as opposed to fard kifaya, which is an obligation from which one is released if another takes it up. The fact that this is debated at all is one indicates why jihadists worldwide are so anxious to reestablish the caliphate. If there were a caliph, these questions would not need to be raised.

Lt. Gen. John H. Vines, who is set to take command of American ground forces in Iraq, has assigned a series of books on Islam to his staff members. Here are comments on Vines' choices from Jihad Watch Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald:

The Reading List of General Vines deserves further detailed study. There are two books by Esposito. There is one by Karen Armstrong, whom, one would have thought, is by now regarded as a complete buffoon. There is something about Islam for Dummies. There is a book by the jejune Sandra Mackey on Iraq, when either the Letters of Gertrude Bell (those from Baghdad up to 1927, when she killed herself), or Philip Ireland's book published in 1939 would have helped -- and best of all would have been the essay on Iraq by the native of Baghdad, Elie Kedourie, published in Islam in the Modern World.

Nothing by Lewis. Nothing by Kedourie. Nothing by J. B. Kelly, not even that essay "Of Valuable Oil and Worthless Policies" which, while it dates in the section on the Soviet threat, does not date as a description of the misperception of Saudi Arabia. The spirit of ARAMCO propagandists still lives.

What is good about the Reading List is that it is so bad, so truly bad, that eyebrows should be raised all over Washington. Who compiled this list? Who carefully allowed in, as the single sop, the Naipaul, but left out the Lewis, the Kedourie, the Kelly? Who left out any serious essays on the nature of Islam, on Jihad? How are the Infidel soldiers supposed to comprehend the hostility that is felt towards them, even though they are only there to "rebuild" Iraq? For if they cannot understand that hostility -- which is in every textbook, every mosque, every madrassa, every Arab satellite channel, every Qur'an and volume of the Hadith and every life of Muhammad, they will be eternally confused. And confusion and incomprehension, or miscomprehension, leads to demoralization.

Here is an example of a little colloquy reported by NPR Correspondent Deborah Amos this morning. She was reporting from Basra. She interviewed a man, asking him as follows:

Amos: "Do you want foreign troops to leave?"
Iraqi: "Would you want your country to be occupied?" (Iraqis, she said, and soldiers know, tend to reply to questions cannily, warily, with questions of their own, and almost never give a straight answer to anything).

When Amos then presses him if he wants the Americans to leave, he answers:

"Yes, I do. But not before they fix everything, and stop terrorism."

How nice. I hate you, and I want you to leave. But first you have to "stop terrorism" and, oh by the way, "fix everything."

That kind of attitude will not be understood by reading Karen Armstrong, who describes Muhammad as the man who "brought peace" to the Arabian Peninsula. It will not be understood by reading John Esposito, author of The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? (we know which he chose), a man who in previous editions of his books does not give more than a single mention of the word "Jihad" and has never treated of the dhimmi.

How can American officers figure out why the Christians are being terrorized, if they know nothing about the 1350 year history of Jihad-conquest and of the imposition of dhimmitude? How?

How can American officers understand what is going on if the inculcated hostility toward them is not understood?

The greatest Intelligence Failure of the Iraq War was not about WMD. It was about Islam, its tenets, its nature, the attitudes and atmospherics it engenders. It was an intelligence failure that continues as long as we prate about how everyone wants freedom (nonsense), that "democracy" will lessen the threat in the Middle East (double-nonsense), that the best way to limit a threat based entirely on the classic ideology of Islam is to say nothing, to learn nothing, to hint at nothing, about Islam itself.

Supposedly, the "faculty at Yale" and people at the "Foreign Service Institute" were responsible for this list. Let's find out something more about precisely who was involved in the selection of the final group of eight books. What are their names? What are their own interests?

Note to Hollywood: it is time for movies and television stories, not about Muslim terrorists, but about those who are apologists for Islam, and who are determined to keep certain truths from getting out, in very high places indeed. One need not be of a conspiratorial frame of mind to see that with such a Reading List, something is very amiss -- and very high up.

This has to be thoroughly investigated.

More from the Nothing Is Sacred Except Jihad Warfare Department: "Algerian rebels kill women in cemetery," from Reuters, with thanks to Nicolei:

ALGIERS (Reuters) - A bomb placed by Islamic rebels exploded at a cemetery south of the Algerian capital, killing three women and injuring five others visiting loved ones during the Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday, newspapers say.

The home-made bomb blew up at the entrance of a mausoleum in Ain Romana some 50 km (30 miles) south of Algiers on Friday, the second day of the Muslim feast, newspaper El Khabar said.

The area has traditionally been a hotbed for rebel activity, particularly by the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), which authorities said last week was dismantled after years of deadly attacks.

From the Times Online, with thanks to Jeremy Langton, the deliberate confusion of a historical event with a highly tendentious political assertion:

BRITISH Muslims are to boycott this week’s commemoration of the liberation of Auschwitz because they claim it is not racially inclusive and does not commemorate the victims of the Palestinian conflict.

Iqbal Sacranie, secretary-general of the Muslim Council of Britain, has written to Charles Clarke, the home secretary, saying the body will not attend the event unless it includes the “holocaust” of the Palestinian intifada.

He said similar events held in other European countries was an “inclusive day” that commemorated deaths in Palestine, Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, as well as the former Nazi death camps.

“We wrote to the Home Office three or four weeks ago. We said the issue of the Holocaust is not really the concern. But we have now expressed our unwillingness to attend the ceremony because it excludes ongoing genocide and human rights abuses around the world and in the occupied territories of Palestine,” he said.

I don't usually find much that is useful in the writings of Thomas L. Friedman, but here he seems to be getting an inkling of what is happening in Europe. From "Divided We Stand" in the New York Times, with thanks to Nicolei:

I spent Friday morning interviewing two 18-year-old French Muslim girls in the Paris immigrant district of St.-Ouen. (It is about a mile from the school where in March 2003 a French Muslim girl, who had refused the veil and rebuffed the advances of a Muslim boy, was thrown into a garbage can by three Muslim teenagers, who then tossed lighted cigarette butts into the can and closed the lid.)

Both girls I interviewed wore veils and one also wore a full Afghan-like head-to-toe covering; one was of Egyptian parents, the other of Tunisian parents, but both were born and raised in France. What did I learn from them? That they got all their news from Al Jazeera TV, because they did not believe French TV, that the person they admired most in the world was Osama bin Laden, because he was defending Islam, that suicide "martyrdom" was justified because there was no greater glory than dying in defense of Islam, that they saw themselves as Muslims first and French citizens last, and that all their friends felt pretty much the same.

We were not in Kabul. We were standing outside their French public high school - a short ride from the Eiffel Tower.

Maybe this has nothing to do with the jihad. But the hostility of Muslims to Christian missionaries is well-established -- look at the threats in Indonesia.

From Reuters, with thanks to Jeff Lastname:

An American Christian pastor has been stabbed in the Algerian capital, prompting security services to investigate any possible link to Islamist rebels.

According to diplomatic sources, Hugh Johnson of the Protestant Church of Algeria was stabbed by an unknown assailant in downtown Algiers and later underwent surgery.

His condition was not life-threatening, diplomats said.

Police said the investigation to determine any link with terrorism was under way.

This is a somewhat older story, but it is enormously significant: these are likely to be 4,500 centers to spread the jihad ideology and the idea that Muslims must wage war in order to impose Sharia everywhere they can. The implications for the future of South Asia are obvious.

From "Saudis for 4,500 madrasas in South Asia" in the Public Affairs magazine, with thanks to Tushar:

The Saudi royal family has cleared plans to construct 4,500 madrasas in India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka at a cost of $ 35 million to promote “modern and liberal education with Islamic values”, and the Saudi embassy in New Delhi is pushing this somewhat tentatively with the Union HRD ministry and Minorities Commission....

Saudi Arabia but particularly the ruling family has come for severe attack in the West, with a class-action suit filed against for 9/ 11, while the Nobel laureate, V.S.Naipaul, has called for the destruction of the kingdom for promoting jihad.

Sorry for the late notice. I am just about to go on KSFO Talk Radio 560 out of San Francisco, the David Gold Show. You can listen online at the KSFO site. We're scheduled to be talking about the murder of the Coptic family in New Jersey.

Jihad Watch Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald reflects on recent Muslim complaints that they are unfairly suspected and discriminated against: "We Muslims living in America are getting sick of this crap."

There is no Muslim contribution to the American polity, not to the entire edifice of the American political system. The Shari'a flatly contradicts, in every way, the American Constitution. The economic views encouraged by Islam -- a combination of relying on booty from the conquered Unbelievers (attacked purely for that booty, beginning with the inoffensive Jewish farmers of the Khaybar Oasis), and on jizyah (or disguised "jizyah" as in the Bumiputra system in Malaysia, or the way in which non-oil Muslim states such as Egypt have managed to extract from the endlessly naive Western world tens of billions of dollars in Infidel aid, repaid not with gratitude but with ratcheting up the level of hate), and with a heavy dose of inshallah-fatalism, is completely the opposite of American notions of self-reliance, individual effort and achievement.

In social matters, Islam is as absurdly reactionary -- "honor" killings, the oppression of women, the Total Reliance on the Authority of Books Concocted between the 7th and 9th centuries (Qur'an, Hadith, and Sira) possibly in Arabia, possibly to its north, in present-day Iraq, Syria, or Jordan. which, as an ideal to be encouraged, even if it is hardly the whole story -- as it is possible to be. That some people who claim to be Muslims still function in the modern world is a tribute only to their ability to ignore much of Islam.

In intellectual matters, no sculpture, no painting of living creatures save for Mughal miniatures, that were despite, not because, of Islam, no music (hence the attacks in Algeria on those singers of Rai), no real science (weapons technology -- ah, that's a different thing).

And yet this primitive system, simply by dint of the utter foolishness, sentimentality, mental laziness, and above all ingratitude of the inhabitants of the Western world for what they have inherited as a civilizational legacy, could by force of numbers -- sheer overbreeding -- and Da’wa appeals to the psychically and economically marginal (always ready to try on anything that may Explain The Universe and Get Back at The System) -– conceivably prevail.

Look at how, in the last two days, all sorts of newspapers have fallen all over themselves with pictures of Muslims sweetly celebrated the Eid al-Adha -- in North Dakota, for god's sake, not to mention elsewhere. The word seems to have gone out to the American press: Make Islam Look Good.

And since what is Bad about Islam are the actual tenets, and those, assimilated into the brain, cannot be shown in pictures -- though the murderous results of Islamic beliefs, and the results, too, of Islamic practices over 1400 years, can be seen in the reduction of ancient Mesopotamia, and its once-entirely non-Muslim population to what is now an almost entirely Muslim population -- like what you see? would you like America or Europe to turn into that, over time? it won't take 1400 years, but less than a century to throw out all of Western civilization because "we all want the same thing" and "we all share the faith of Abraham, Sarah, and Hagar" and...oh good god, fill in the rest of the nonsense yourself, culled from the paper, or some idiotic NPR news program, or something on the Lord Haw Haw broadcasts from the BBC, where the likes of Judy Swallow or Robin Lustig, marionetted from above by the sinister John Simpson (#3 at Bush House), have created a special BBC house blend of anti-Americanism, antisemitism, and therefore, of course, islamophilia, that has by degrees helped to mentally disarm tens of millions of listeners.

No, it is we Infidels who are getting "sick of this crap."

The Taliban justified the opium trade by noting that Muslims didn't use the stuff, only unbelievers; I discuss that in Islam Unveiled. Other scholars have said that such trade is prohibited in Islam. Mufti Munir Shakir, in contrast, seems to be saying that it has beneficial uses.

That, of course, plays into the hands of the Taliban and others who continue to attempt to victimize, and profit from, unbelievers in this way. It's no wonder, seeing the money that comes from drugs, that jihadists look upon the West with contempt. From the Daily Times of Pakistan, with thanks to EPG:

BARA: Mufti Munir Shakir, a renowned religious scholar, has declared the trade of opium “halal,” legitimate, in the light of Islamic teachings during his routine sermon on an unlicensed FM radio station operating in Bara tehsil of Khyber Agency the other day....

Munir Shakir declared the cultivation and trade of opium legitimate on the grounds that it was mostly used in about 98 percent medication. He said the use of anything that had the potential of having a positive impact and benifit on human beings could not be declared illegitimate and prohibited in Islam.

It looks as if German patience is running out with liberal laws that have allowed jihadists to operate in the country, possibly even with welfare support from the German government. How long will it be before other countries — notably Britain — follow suit? "Germany to Deport Hundreds of Islamists - Magazine," from Reuters, with thanks to Louise:

BERLIN (Reuters) - German officials are drawing up lists of hundreds of Islamic militants to be deported from the country under a new law making expulsions easier, the German weekly magazine Der Spiegel said on Saturday....

Since the revelations in 2001 that Arab students who had lived for years in Hamburg led the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, Germans have questioned their liberal laws under which some suspected militants even draw welfare benefits.

Interior Minister Otto Schily has suggested that evidence of training at an al Qaeda camp should be clear grounds for expelling a foreign national. Distributing videos calling for "holy war" could also be punished the same way.

Two collaborators with the "American enemy" beheaded on video. Note below: The "Al-Qaeda Group of Jihad." "Allahu akbar." "The implementation of God's ruling." Yet American Muslims, with increasing irritation ("We Muslims living in America are getting sick of this crap"), continue to insist that all this has nothing to do with Islam. If they devoted even half of the energy that they expend on enforcing political correctness in America to making it impossible for people like Zarqawi to act within the Islamic community worldwide, their protestations might be worth taking seriously. But since they don't do this, their complaints are essentially just a smokescreen. (And of course, they no doubt know that people like Zarqawi have the texts of Islam on their side.) From AFP, with thanks to JE:

After making their "confessions" in front of a banner carrying the name of Zarqawi's al-Qaeda Group of Jihad in the Land of Two Rivers, the video showed each man having his head cut off.

The severed heads were held aloft by the men's slaughterers and put on their backs to shouts of Allahu Akbar, or God is greatest....

Zarqawi is Iraq's most-wanted man and his group has repeatedly posted such videos showing what it calls "the implementation of God's ruling" against Iraqi "apostates" or foreign hostages.

Here is a new piece by DC Watson, on "Islamophobia":

Merriam-Webster: “pho-bia”: an exaggerated, usually inexplicable and illogical fear.

In January 2005, Muslim groups reportedly met with U.S. State Department officials to discuss issues related to American foreign policy.

They presented State Department officials with a proposal for cooperative efforts to challenge both “Islamophobia” and anti-Americanism.

The proposal stated that "by challenging anti-Muslim bigotry, we can help reduce anti-American attitudes in the Islamic world."

Certainly the Muslim world takes issue with the United States over many aspects of our foreign policy, particularly the Israeli-Palestinian situation. But what will changing our policies on these issues accomplish, either internationally or domestically? Have we somehow missed another low budget bin Laden video, telling Americans to be kind to Muslims, and in return, he’ll command the Islamic world to love the United States? No. For the record, Muslim Americans' median household income of about $70,000 is comfortably above the national average. If "anti-Muslim bigotry" were as rampant as is claimed by these groups, how did American Muslims attain to this comfortable standard of living? Several Muslim physicians I work with will attest that "anti-Muslim bigotry" is actually at quite a low level in the United States.

Could the true reason for this State Department meeting be stemming from the recent Cornell University survey, which reported that 44% of Americans would curtail Muslim civil liberties?

http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Dec04/Muslim.Poll.bpf.html

The following statements have been extracted from published columns. They were made by prominent so-called moderate Muslims living in the United States of America. Some of these same prominent so-called moderate Muslims attended this meeting with the U.S. State Department, or are involved with groups that were represented there.

Some of these same prominent so-called moderate Muslims are on record labeling millions of Americans as ignorant, biased, bigoted, hateful “Islamophobes,” incapable of understanding Islam.

This is an open invitation for the peaceful and decent people among the Muslims in America to consider this question: do you realize who is speaking on your behalf?

We’ve all heard a radical statement here, or a threatening statement there. But the comments below are tied together by an obvious common agenda -- an agenda that calls for the destruction of this nation as a philosophical, economic, and legal entity.

1992. Siraj Wahaj, New Jersey: “If only Muslims were more clever politically, they would take over the United States and replace its constitutional government with a Caliphate” [Islamic leadership body]. “If we were united and strong, we would elect our own leader and give allegiance to him. Take my word, if the 6 to 8 million Muslims unite in America, the country will come to us.”

http://www.blessedcause.org/Antichrist%20ID/ACLU%20attacks%20Constitution.htm

1994. Nihad Awad, at a Barry University forum: “I am in support of the Hamas movement.”

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=6473

1998. Omar Ahmad, at a Flamingo Palace Banquet Hall event in California: “Muslim institutions, schools and economic power should be strengthened in America.” “Those who stay in America should be “open to society without melting (into it)”

“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.”

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/888598/posts
Look for the reference to a newspaper article entitled “American Muslim Leader Urges Faithful to Spread Word,” by Lisa Gardiner, San Ramon Valley Herald, July 4, 1998. Five years after this story appeared, Ahmad denied saying this, but Gardiner sticks by the accuracy of her reporting.

November 2000. Abdurrahman Alamoudi, at a rally against Israel, Lafayette Park, across from the White House: “Hear that, Bill Clinton! We are all supporters of Hamas. I wish they added that I am also a supporter of Hezbollah. Anybody support Hezbollah here?”

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/commentprint110500e.html

1993. Ibrahim Hooper, Minneapolis Star Tribune: “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....But I’m not going to do anything violent to promote that. I’m going to do it through education.”

Omar M. Ahmad: Suicide bombers “kill themselves for Islam” and so are not terrorists”.

http://www.apologeticsindex.org/c172.html

Nihad Awad also wrote in the Muslim World Monitor that the World Trade Center trial, which resulted in the 1994 conviction of four Islamic terrorists, was "a travesty of justice." That's despite the fact that some of the perpetrators confessed to involvement in the 1993 attack.

http://www.apologeticsindex.org/news1/an010929-14.html

Anis Shorrosh, author of Islam Revealed, has published an "analysis of the Islamic invasion of America, the agenda of Islamists and visible methods to take over America by the year 2020." He asks: "Will Americans continue to sleep through this invasion as they did when we were attacked on 9/11?"

Method number 1: Terminate America's freedom of speech by replacing it with statewide and nationwide hate-crime bills.

Method number 4: Nominate Muslim sympathizers to political office to bring about favorable legislation toward Islam and support potential sympathizers by block voting.

Method number 5: Take control of as much of Hollywood, the press, TV, radio and the Internet as possible by buying the related corporations or a controlling stock.

Method number 7: Yell "Foul, out-of-context, personal interpretation, hate crime, Zionist, un-American, inaccurate interpretation of the Qur’an" anytime Islam is criticized or the Qur’an is analyzed in the public arena.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=33898

Imam Siraj Wahaj calls for the replacing the American government with a caliphate, warning that America will crumble unless it “accepts the Islamic agenda.”

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=6473

August 2003: Ibrahim Hooper on President Bush’s appointment of Dr. Daniel Pipes to the United States Institute of Peace: “This back-door move by the president is a defeat for democracy and an affront to all those who seek peace. Pipe’s appointment calls into question all of President Bush’s previous statements claiming that the war on terrorism is not an attack on Islam and shows disdain for the democratic process.”

http://www.anti-cair-net.org/press_021_03

Other Muslims, however, expressed an opposite point of view regarding Pipes’ appointment:

Ms. Fatima Sayyed: “Many moderate American Muslims, frustrated by and angry at the extremist policies of militant Islamist organizations in the US and their efforts to portray themselves as the sole voice of Islam, have welcomed the nomination of Daniel Pipes.”

Tashbih Sayyed, President of Council for Democracy and Tolerance: “The United States of America has welcomed Muslims with open arms, irrespective of their sect and ethnicity, and it is the duty of all American Muslims to condemn these representatives of Islamist extremism.”

Dr. Younus Mansour, an Egyptian scholar and author: “Daniel Pipes is doing a service for the Muslims by warning America against the designs of CAIR, MPAC, and their ilk. These organizations want to divide American society. Any country that supports freedoms and democratic values is our friend and all those who work against the American interests are the enemies of American Muslims.”

April 2004: UC Berkeley Lecturer Hatem Bazian calls for an Intifada in the United States during a San Francisco Peace Rally: “We’re sitting here and watching the world pass by, people are being bombed, and it’s about time that we have an Intifada (uprising) in this country that change fundamentally the political dynamics in here”. “They’re gonna say some Palestinian being too radical, well, you haven’t seen radicalism yet!”

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/2004_05.php

And yet after all this, American Muslim advocacy group leaders still have the audacity to talk about "Islamophobia." In December 2004, Nihad Awad said: "Elected representatives, government officials and other opinion leaders must finally recognize that Islamophobia is a growing phenomenon in American society that must be urgently addressed"

http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/12-17-2004/0002639656&EDATE=

It's true: there are issues that must be urgently addressed. The statements I have quoted above confirm that. Those statements should be addressed by our elected officials, and by anyone who shares a deep respect for this nation, its culture, and all it offers.

If the individuals who made the statements above while on American soil are wondering why so many Americans have negative views of Islam, all they have to do is look at their own words.

These statements must be addressed so that these groups will not succeed in their aim (which they hope to attain by waving a phony race card) of placing limitations on Americans' right to free speech. Americans are free thinkers. The Muslims who made the statements above should have the spine to stop running to the government crying "Islamophobia" when Americans react negatively to such words, and explain their remarks publicly. But of course, crying "Islamophobia" seems to be all part of their plan.