Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald discusses the need felt by so many Western politicians to court approval among Muslims by disclaiming any connection between Islam and terrorist violence:
There is no need to curry favor with those whose immutable holy text contains Quran 9.29, or indeed all of Sura 9, received as the last in time, and therefore the most authoritative Sura, nor a book which contains Quran 8.12, or 33.61, or 47.4 or 5.51, or 9.30, or 3.110. And of course there are hundreds of Hadith to quote, and the details of Muhammad's life.Are the political leaders of the Western world going to continue to tip-toe around these texts? Are they going, by remaining silent about them, to let Muslims think that they never need address them, or that it is sufficient to reply that some texts of other religions are disturbing? To that transparent bit of Tu-Quoque one has to answer: 1) any passages that are to be found, say, in Leviticus, in which bloody battles are described, have no relevance and no authority today; they are historical or pseudo-historical descriptions and not considered to be models or tenets which have been faithfully followed. There is nothing like Jihad in Leviticus or elsewhere in the Jewish or Christian Scriptures -- that is, nothing like jihad in its truthful main meaning, not the meaning dragged up by apologists, relying in the main on a single "unauthentic" Hadith not even to be found in the collections of Al-Bukhari and Muslim.
Western leaders should take every occasion to ask Muslims to explain not only these texts, but the entire worldview that requires loyalty to the umma al-islamiyya alone. They should take every occasion to quote all of the many statements by Muslims expressing such solidarity, and denying the possibility of true (as opposed to feigned) loyalty to the Infidel nation-state, and to Infidels in that state. They should raise the issue of how one can be fully loyal to a Complete System that is far more than what we in the modern world mean when we use the word "religion" -- a religio-political system, in which the rituals of worship (the Five Pillars) do not begin to exhaust the duties of Believers in the task of spreading Islam everywhere. This is because "Islam is to dominate and is not to be dominated."
Does Alexander Downer know the Quran and Sunnah? Does George Bush? Does Condoleeza Rice? Have they thoroughly studied the history of Islam, and not with apologists who have managed to infiltrate in so many places (from the down-market aarmstrongs, to the espositos and, at only a slightly higher level, the olivier-roys of Europe)? The scholarly work exists, the testimony of people born into Islam exists, the clear meaning of the texts can be found on Muslim websites, in Muslim literature and propaganda. Start with the texts, as offered in Spencer's books, and with those texts, a history of the treatment of non-Muslims (several books by Bat Ye'or), and then the history of Jihad as a doctrine, set out by the most celebrated Muslim commentators and scholars, collected in The Legacy of Jihad. In that book can also be found a selection of Western scholars -- the real, pre-esposito, pre-MESA-Nostra thing -- on Jihad in practice as well as in theory.To make a distinction between "Islam" and the "war on terror" appears to make a disconnect between what prompts Muslims all over either to participate, or to support, the "terror" which is conducted by others. And of course, it is not always and everywhere a collective requirement to participate in aggressive Jihad. It depends on the circumstances. But even those who are not active participants (i.e. running off to join Al Qaeda, setting off bombs) are expected in their own way to support Jihad to spread Islam, to strike fear into the hearts of Infidels, so as to force them to remove any obstacles to the spread of Islam. This is a duty that all Muslims have. That some may be bad Muslims and not entirely agree does not change this fact. And we Infidels have no way of knowing how many do not agree, or for how many that disagreement is stated but not felt, or perhaps felt at the moment but will no longer be felt in a week or a year or five years.
A few weeks ago Bush quoted, quite misleadingly, Quran 5.32. It was one of the two passages that Muslim apologists always like to quote. (The other, the real meaning of which they know Infidels will not comprehend, is that phrase which does not mean what Infidels take it to mean: "There is no compulsion in religion," Quran 2:256). This verse comes from a Jewish source: "He who kills a person, it is as if he has killed the whole world." Sounds good. Sounds very good. What Bush did not recite, did not tell us, perhaps did not even know himself, was Quran 5.33, which follows and clearly modifies, and changes entirely, the meaning of 5.32.Why didn't Bush do this? There are two possible explanations. One is: he doesn't read, or doesn't read closely, or cannot make sense of the Qur'an. It is not easy to make sense of, and it takes time and much re-reading. The second is: he was handed that passage by advisers, perhaps an "adviser on Islam," who either did not understand the passage himself, or thought no one would notice. He thought that Bush could slip it in, and who would be the spoilsport in the press, in this collective atmosphere of not wanting ever to quote truthfully, or have the public confront the actual texts of Qur'an and Hadith, or what Muhammad did? Have you seen, once, in major newspapers or on television ever, a single mention of Asma bint Marwan, Abu Afak, the Khaybar Oasis, the Banu Qurayza, little Aisha? You haven't? Of course you haven't.
The excellent French website www.france-echos.com records the slow, day-by-day assault on French liberties, French laws, customs, manners, and the slow day-by-day nonsense and lies that are offered not only by official Muslim spokesmen, but by successive French governments. These liars are manipulating, and in some cases suppressing, the reality of daily life in France (including reports from all over the country about attacks on Christians and Jews). There was posted there yesterday a furious denunciation of Boubakeur, the Algerian-connected imam of the main Paris mosque. He is regarded by the French government as okay, a "moderate." His "moderation" presumably comes from that Algerian connection, for everyone knows the government of Algeria faces its own fight with so-called Muslim "extremists." And the fury expressed by visitors to www.france-echos.com was that Boubakeur, on television, had quoted that Qur'anic verse 5.32, but had failed to add 5.33, leaving an entirely false impression on viewers.
In this way did the imam of Paris, a sinister figure, do exactly what George Bush, not sinister but sly, had done a few weeks before. Highly selective and misleading quotation.
And when Alexander Downer and so many others tell us that there is no connection between the "war on terror" and Islam, they are wrong. They are quite wrong. It is the instrument of "terror" that is given far too much attention, as if it stood alone. In fact, it is merely one instrument, and not the most effective, of all the instruments of Jihad. One can find all of these weapons of Jihad discussed endlessly by Muslims themselves, in their newspapers, in the sermons of clerics, in the radio and television, at Muslim websites you are all capable of visiting. What do Muslims say are the instruments of Jihad? They talk and write and point with great satisfaction to the "money" weapon. That is, to the use of the trillions in OPEC revenue, or some of it, to bully and cudgel and buy favor in the West. Arab oil wealth gives force to their economic boycotts of countries or companies. The continued misunderstanding in the West of Arab and Muslim reliance on oil revenues has also led some, no matter how often things are explained, to believe in an "oil weapon" that does not exist. There is the use of money for bribery. After 1967, bribes were paid to certain black African diplomats and government officials to compel them to completely turn away from Israel, and to shut down Israel's extensive and effective aid program in sub-Saharan Africa. There is money that can pay for "academic centers" for the study of "Muslim-Christian Understanding," or Islamic studies, or "Contemporary Arab Studies" -- at Exeter, at Durham, at Georgetown. There is money for the setting up of King Abdul Aziz Professorships here and there. When Reagan was President, a California school received the honor. When Clinton was president, it was suddenly the turn the University or Arkansas.Money can buy a stake, and has bought stakes, in major media. It can buy public relations efforts -- remember Fred Dutton? It can buy a host ex-diplomats to the Arab countries, all now dutifully offering their unsolicited and "disinterested" advice to governments about how important it is to "keep the Saudis on our side" and in other ways do nothing to offend either Saudi Arabia, or the world's Muslims (google "Jihad Watch" and "financial dhimmitude" for more). Not merely ex-diplomats, but ex-intelligence agents (google "Raymond Close" and "Jihad Watch"). Not merely ex-diplomats and ex-intelligence agents, but all sorts of former government officials, back in their law firms or "consulting" operations, know that Arab money is there for those who exhibit good behavior, or are careful what they say. So many of both parties are involved, that perhaps this explains why the 9/11 Commission never made the study of Arab, and especially Saudi, propaganda which helped create the climate in which dangers were not foreseen, visa policies not changed. And for all I know, a variant of that pollyannish view helps to explain the lack of any official alarm about the U.A.E. ports deal.
Along with "terror" and conventional military combat ("qital" mentioned dozens of times in the Qur'an) and the "wealth" weapon, there is Da'wa, or rather, all the kinds of activities, the propaganda, to spread Islam. In the Western world, targeted populations of those deemed ready for conversion ("reversion") are to be found among the alienated, those who might be seeking a vehicle of protest -- and Islam is a vehicle of protest against everything that is not Islam. Prisoners -- truly, a captive audience -- have been targeted by busy Muslim missionaries. And all over the Western world, Infidel governments have noted this but done nothing. They justify this inaction because they say "What can we do? It's freedom of religion." They fail, that is, to see into the heart of the thing, to view Islam clearly, and to accept, or pretend to accept, in order not to make waves, that Islam really is just one more "religion" like all the others. It isn't.And then there is the newest instrument of Jihad. Of course this is not in the Qur'an or Hadith. No one thought in such terms in 630 or 660 or 720 A.D. Indeed, Muslims for years were taught never to live under the rule of non-Muslims, for it would be impossible. But now there are millions of Muslims living in the Lands of the Infidels. They are quite unlike the other immigrants -- from Indian Hindus, to Vietnamese Buddhists, to Ecuadorians or Tibetans, Christians from Nigeria or Uganda, who may be living in the Western world, and who do not carry in their mental baggage not merely non-Western ways, or perhaps what might once have been called an alien creed. Islam is not a religion that calls for genuine, Western-style pluralism. It calls for Muslims to rule. And in that Western world, behind what are regarded as enemy lines by Muslims themselves, it is not possible to offer support to the Infidel nation-state, its laws, customs, manners, if one is to remain a fully believing Muslim. A bad Muslim, one who has jettisoned much or all of Islam, can adapt -- can offer real, as opposed to feigned, loyalty -- but only to the extent that he loses his loyalty to Islam.
Demographic conquest is discussed everywhere in the Muslim world, on Muslim websites, within Muslim communities smack in France, or Belgium, or England. Yet the West continues to ignore these plans, these comments. It continues to ignore even the anecdotal evidence of individual Infidels who have been startled to be told by a Muslim in France, as one lady testifies at www.france-echos.com, pointing to her own swollen belly, that "this is why we will take over." And why not? It is all a question of numbers, and of doing the math. Do the math. Extrapolate. In Holland in 1970 there were 15,000 Muslims. There are 1,000,000 today. Many live on the dole supplied by the Infidel taxpayers. Many families have ten or more children. In Holland, as in Italy and France, the non-Muslim population is at or below the level of reproducing itself. What will be the percentage of the French, Dutch, Spanish, Italian populations if things continue in the future this way, with no one allowed to worry, much less to change immigration and naturalization policies, because the "only" thing to worry about is that "war on terror"?
Bernard Lewis, among many others, has predicted the complete islamization of Europe by the end of the century. He was wrong -- he was wrong to place it so far ahead. Long before that, long before there is an absolute majority, aggressive Muslim tactics will force the issue and cause "Islam to dominate" and "not to be dominated." Look at what Muslims do now, in countries where they have the rest of us tied in knots to avoid offending them or taking reasonable actions. The lack of common sense, of foreseeing the foreseeable, the willingness to engage in ostrich-avoidance, is common. It has happened with environmental degradation, and atmospheric changes that may become irreversible. But few ruling anywhere can face up to this. And it is the same with Islam.
Appeasement will simply confuse the Infidels, and make the mujahedin more determined and heartened then ever -- when one wishes them to be disheartened, demoralized, and perhaps even to come to the melancholy conclusion that they will have to fully accept Infidel laws, customs, and manners, and give up their campaign to slowly undermine them and to islamize, through demographic conquest, the Infidel lands -- or remove themselves from those lands altogether.
All speeches that would reduce the defense by Infidels against the Jihad in all of its instruments merely to this "war on terror," simply mimic the awful and dangerous confusion that we have seen elsewhere -- not least from official, tongue-tied, confused members of the current Administration, and all those others, so silent on the subject, of both parties, within Congress, and without.
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Very interestng. Thanks.
And finally, someone (you) offers a clear simple program: engage and challenge Moslems in conversation to explain/defend their stance. Treat them like adults. Deal with moiderates as if they are indeed moderate and we are able to have what diplomats call 'frank but cordial' discussions.
I think it will be hard, at first, to have serious conversation and maybe for quite a while as my own little experience with very dogmatic people is that they answer mostly in cant and cliche. Moslems seem to be so programmed that any discussion on anything will end up in a discussion of Israel and Palestine etc etc. As well, many truly moderate Moslems may be scared of the fanatics in their mdst.
But is there any alternative to engagement? Obviously, you are correct that our leaders -- Peter Costello of Australia as one example, aside -- are talking pablum. But your job is to give them the words, the verbal riffs, so that they can have real conversation.