"Catholic Priest Shot, Killed at Church in Turkey," from AP, with thanks to all who sent this in:
ANKARA, Turkey — A teenage boy shot and killed the Italian Roman Catholic priest of a church in the Black Sea port city of Trabzon on Sunday, shouting "God is great" as he escaped, according to police and witnesses.Officers were searching for the boy aged around 14 or 15, according to a police official who declined to be identified because of rules that bar Turkish civil servants from speaking to journalists without prior authorization.
The police official would not say if the attack might be linked to the printing in European newspapers of caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, which has caused anger in Muslim countries. Earlier Sunday, hundreds of Turks protested in Istanbul against the cartoons.
"Whether the killing is linked to the caricatures will emerge when the culprit has been caught," Trabzon's Gov. Huseyin Yavuzdemir said.
The priest, 60-year-old Andrea Santoro, was shot hours after Mass at Santa Maria Church.
A woman who answered the telephone at the church said the priest was inside when he was attacked, and prosecutor Burhan Cobanoglu said he was shot twice from behind, with bullets ripping through his heart and liver.
Pope Benedict XVI's envoy in Turkey, Monsignor Antonio Lucibello, said he had spoken by telephone with a witness who said she saw the attacker fleeing and "heard the young man shout 'Allah Akbar' (God is Great)."'
More news from Politiken, http://politiken.dk/ newspaper in Denmark
- Danish Embassy in Indonesia and Thailand close.
_ Danish representation in Brussels, Belgium closed today. There was a peaceful demonstration here on Sunday, attended by 4000 muslims, but the Danish representation decided to close dsiregarding.
- Lebanon apologizes to Denmark over riots in Beirut.
- Sterling airline stops flying from Denmark to Egypt.
- Pakistan refuses to use Danish medicine.
- At least one person killed in the Beirut riots.
The Danish foreign ministry advises against travel in Marocco, Algeria, Tunesia, Libya, Egypt, Sudan, Oman, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kuwait.
http://www.petitiononline.com/danmark/petition.html
come on, I mean is anyone surprised?
This is what valuless, illiterate, rabidly angry muslims are EXPECTED to do.....Now, let's respond how leftists always respond - It must be our fault, wait no, its Israel's fault, see, thats, er , the real root of the problem, uh, right?
I just would love to get a crwd of tough guys and go to my local mosque (where several prior Imams are in federal prison on terror changes)and shout- Allah takes it up the A$$.
Danish Cartoon= free speech and refusal to be intimidated by these illiterate mongrels. Its about time those Euros grew some balls. Hooray cartoons!!
Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan today is reported by Zaman Online to have said:
"Killing a priest in a holy place can't be approved."
Something may have been lost in the translation, but there are too many "outs" here for this to be considered condemnation.
Killing a priest ... is it OK to kill anyone else?
Killing in a holy place ... is it OK to kill in a non-holy site?
Can't be approved ... Why not say, "This is wrong."
Why the passive voice here? Why is he seeimingly reluctant to take a stand? Why not a strong statement such as, "I condemn this absolutely"?
It's possible that the translation of his comments may have been slanted by Zaman's anti-West stance (and this story with its implications for Islamic motivation isn't given real prominence by Zaman) but Erdogan's statements should have left no doubt as to his meaning.
The great British philosopher John Stuart Mill wrote in On Liberty, "Strange it is, that men should admit the validity of the arguments for free discussion, but object to their being 'pushed to an extreme'; not seeing that unless the reasons are good for an extreme case, they are not good for any case."
The cartoons in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten raise the most important question of our times: freedom of expression. Are we in the west going to cave into pressure from societies with a medieval mindset, or are we going to defend our most precious freedom -- freedom of expression, a freedom for which thousands of people sacrificed their lives?
A democracy cannot survive long without freedom of expression, the freedom to argue, to dissent, even to insult and offend. It is a freedom sorely lacking in the Islamic world, and without it Islam will remain unassailed in its dogmatic, fanatical, medieval fortress; ossified, totalitarian and intolerant. Without this fundamental freedom, Islam will continue to stifle thought, human rights, individuality; originality and truth.
Unless, we show some solidarity, unashamed, noisy, public solidarity with the Danish cartoonists, then the forces that are trying to impose on the Free West a totalitarian ideology will have won; the Islamization of Europe will have begun in earnest. Do not apologize.
This raises another more general problem: the inability of the West to defend itself intellectually and culturally. Be proud, do not apologize. Do we have to go on apologizing for the sins our fathers? Do we still have to apologize, for example, for the British Empire, when, in fact, the British presence in India led to the Indian Renaissance, resulted in famine relief, railways, roads and irrigation schemes, eradication of cholera, the civil service, the establishment of a universal educational system where none existed before, the institution of elected parliamentary democracy and the rule of law? What of the British architecture of Bombay and Calcutta? The British even gave back to the Indians their own past: it was European scholarship, archaeology and research that uncovered the greatness that was India; it was British government that did its best to save and conserve the monuments that were a witness to that past glory. British Imperialism preserved where earlier Islamic Imperialism destroyed thousands of Hindu temples.
On the world stage, should we really apologize for Dante, Shakespeare, and Goethe? Mozart, Beethoven and Bach? Rembrandt, Vermeer, Van Gogh, Breughel, Ter Borch? Galileo, Huygens, Copernicus, Newton and Darwin? Penicillin and computers? The Olympic Games and Football? Human rights and parliamentary democracy? The west is the source of the liberating ideas of individual liberty, political democracy, the rule of law, human rights and cultural freedom. It is the west that has raised the status of women, fought against slavery, defended freedom of enquiry, expression and conscience. No, the west needs no lectures on the superior virtue of societies who keep their women in subjection, cut off their clitorises, stone them to death for alleged adultery, throw acid on their faces, or deny the human rights of those considered to belong to lower castes.
How can we expect immigrants to integrate into western society when they are at the same time being taught that the west is decadent, a den of iniquity, the source of all evil, racist, imperialist and to be despised? Why should they, in the words of the African-American writer James Baldwin, want to integrate into a sinking ship? Why do they all want to immigrate to the west and not Saudi Arabia? They should be taught about the centuries of struggle that resulted in the freedoms that they and everyone else for that matter, cherish, enjoy, and avail themselves of; of the individuals and groups who fought for these freedoms and who are despised and forgotten today; the freedoms that the much of the rest of world envies, admires and tries to emulate." When the Chinese students cried and died for democracy in Tiananmen Square (in 1989) , they brought with them not representations of Confucius or Buddha but a model of the Statue of Liberty."
Freedom of expression is our western heritage and we must defend it or it will die from totalitarian attacks. It is also much needed in the Islamic world. By defending our values, we are teaching the Islamic world a valuable lesson, we are helping them by submitting their cherished traditions to Enlightenment values.
Born in 1946 in India and raised in Pakistan, Ibn Warraq was educated in Koran schools in Pakistan and later in England. He currently lives in the United States and writes under the pseudonym Ibn Warraq, a pen name traditionally used by dissidents in Islam. He is the author of the best- seller "Why I am Not a Muslim" and the editor of "The Origins of the Koran" and "The Quest for the Historical Muhammad."
That the Lebanese government apologized is Meaningless.
They don't represent islam.
If it were a strictly islamic government, then and Only then would it be a real apology.
Cartoon Kristallnact-
Re the shooting of the priest: Not long ago, listing to the radio as I worked, I heard the report of an elderly Jewish man who recalled the Nazis in Germany, how he witnessed their rise and the brutal personal violence of Brownshirt thugs there, how later he lost his family in the death camps, and was liberated by the Russians in early 1945. He was asked, "What was the lesson of the Holocaust?" He replied "When people tell you that they intend to exterminate you, you better believe them. Its not rhetoric."
What has been said by the New Brownshirts in Europe and the Mideast, what is being done by the New Brownshirts during this Cartoon Kristallnact, is not rhetoric.
This just proves who the Turks really are.
Scrat a bit the surface of pretended Europeanness and what you got is a bunch of Muslim fanatics.
Nooo! This isn't true. Islam is a "noble great religion of peace." No way would Muslims kill another human being. No way!!! Muslims respect other religions. Don't they? These had to be insurgents. They came over from Iraq to incite violence. But then, aren't the insurgents Muslims to? Okay, Islam has been hijacked by Islamic extremists. But, aren't the extremists Muslims?
To qoute John Travolta from the movie "Face Off,"
Wheeee!! What a predicament!!!
"Are we in the west going to cave into pressure from societies with a medieval mindset, or are we going to defend our most precious freedom -- freedom of expression, a freedom for which thousands of people sacrificed their lives?"
On the basis of demographics, they apparently think and expect that will we cave in.
The president of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, Dr Ameer Ali: "Which is more important - to preserve the freedom of speech or to antagonise one fifth of humanity," he said.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/items/200602/1562800.htm?brisbane
If you want to get a shock, do a google news search on "free speech." At this moment, what comes to the top is mostly criticism of free speech. Criticism of free speech by news organizations? Talk about the suicide of the West!
Truth4u -
I agree with every word you wrote (above).
Further, in ALMOST all the countries of the former British Empire the average wage, in real terms (and in many countries, in absolute terms also) is lower today than on the last day that those countries enjoyed colonial status. In many of those countries Government corruption has surged ahead unchecked, civil rights have suffered badly, health services are worse than when we left, much of the infrastructure hasn't been touched since we left (resulting in many people not even having clean drinking water - a situation that we had mostly solved by 1947) and Government red-tape has burgeoned.
Small wonder that surveys reveal that up to 74% of the inhabitants of most of these countries wish to emigrate to Britain. Small wonder that Africans will walk thousands of miles across the Sahara in the pitiful hope that they will manage to sneak into Europe. Small wonder that there is hardly a bank in the first world that doesn't suspect that a small but significant portion of its deposits come from the oppression of people and the graft and corruption of the third world.
When one looks out from the first world at the rest of the globe what one sees is a sea of human misery, violence and crime and on top of all that we now have to fight a battle against one of the most pernicious cults ever to walk onto the stage of human history. It is a small wonder that some of us feel tired and confused and ready to give up but an even bigger wonder that many of us don't.
Gary wrote;
"That the Lebanese government apologized is Meaningless.
They don't represent islam.
If it were a strictly islamic government, then and Only then would it be a real apology."
The lebanese government does not represent islam and islam does not represent lebanon. So therefore the government cannot apologise for islam and I must also disagree that the apology was meaningless. In apologising the lebanese government has;
1. done more than any other arab muslim country experienceing the same violence will do EVER.
2. taken responsibility for the actions of its people and for the inability of its security forces to stop the rampage.
3. also taken steps to round up and arrest some of the main trouble makers, which I might add were outside provocateurs from neihbouring Syria and palestinaians from the refugee camps.
4. the minister responsible for internal security has resigned
5. offered to pay compensation to the Danish government for the damage to the embassy building
I think you should take the apology...it was genuine.
Regards
Shunkleash (PBUH)
How about all those Christians rioting because of this murder? Oh yes, it didn't happen. Hey LLL's, funny how Christians don't try to burn down the world when we are attacked, isn't it? Your mantra about Christians being "as bad" doesn't hold water.
The latest news from Italian news agencies is that the priest's murderer was not in fact a teen-ager. And in fact, the typically gutless way in which he martyred him, shooting from a distance and running away, suggests an older person with something to lose if he is caught. Which, of course, makes the whole thing only scarier - kids do indeed do crazy, violent and pointless things, but adults ought to have more sense.
Shot a priest from behind in a Church.
Typical mohammadan. I bet their worthless prophet
would approve.
I'm going to go desecrate a few korans. Well,
it's hard to desecrate something so vile to begin
withbut I'll try.
If "God" (Allah) is so "great" why doesn't he (it?) shoot priests in the back himself (itself)?
No bullets available in Muslim heaven?
Virgins using them for something else*?
(*Since they're probably about the same size as the virile members of the suicide bombers arriving.)
One more cowar4d for Mohammad.
American
How about replacing all those out of date Sears catalogues in the outhouses.
I am very sad, this is depressing, the muslims are caving up their hole. The christians are peaceful people and we can´t answer, but like almost all western and non-western are non-christians the wrath against islam will be strong, and they are going to suffer. They are spreading their hate to non muslims and all porks arrive their Saint Martin.
-Paolo-
You assume that there is such a things as Adults in Islam. When something traumatic happens to children such as sexual abuse or physical abuse allot of children cease to develop psychologically, one must be allowed to develop into an adult by growing mentally this will never occur by any follower who truly believes in Islam as it is a traumatic event to rip the veil of childhood by revealing the brutality of Islam.
Rape, child molestation, murder, genocidal teachings and general violence are happening worldwide but rampant in Islamic countries. Its any wonder the world is as peaceful in spite of 1.4 billion lunatics following the prophet May pigs be upon him(mpbuh).
In the case of Father Andrea Santoro, the word "martyr" comes to mind. Not the type of "martyr" who is snuffed out while actively attempting to kill others or in performing other acts of mischief and mayhem. Rather, this type of martyr peacefully lives his faith and refuses to renounce it, at all times reaching out to his God and his neighbor even to the point of death. I hope for the sake of the people living in the Turkish city of Trabzon that another priest as dedicated as Father Santoro steps forward.
For those who call themselves Believers, enforcing the Almighty's will through violence is not just unnecessary (if God is great, why can't He fight His own fights?) or unholy (if God is merciful, why does He seem to revel in bloodshed?). Enforcement of the Almighty's will through violence exposes the bankruptcy of a religion whose power to persuade depends upon hitmen.
When I read these comments by British posters who think they are so wise I have to wonder if they read at all about what is happening in the world. Maybe Brighton needs to be renamed Dumbton.
http://comment.independent.co.uk/letters/article343414.ece
My Fellow freedom Lovers,
We must be sensitive to the feelings of the Islamofeces as far as their pedeophile prophet is concerned. I understand why they riot in the streets. They're stupid. But then, they are proof of "necessity is the mother of invention." How do they always manage to find flags to burn? On my best day, I couldn't find a Danish flag to save my life. But yet, the Islamofeces always manage to do just that. I mean, If I were on the Gaza Strip, where would I get the flag of a foriegn conutry to burn? I guess that hate can do great things with willing idiots (or idits).
What gets me is the sensitivity our own media has towards us.
i quote Mark Steyn:
When Tony-award winning author, Terence McNally writes a Broadway play in which Jesus has gay sex with Judas, the New York/Jihad Times,(I added the jihad) and Co. rush to garland him with praise for how "brave and challenging" he is. The rule for "brave" "transgressive" "artists" is a simple one: If you're going to be provocative, it's best to do it with people who can't be provoked.
Mark goes on to say,
Thus, NBC is celibrating Easter this year with a special edition of the gay sitcom "Will & Grace" in which a Christian conservitive cooking show host played by the popular singing slattern Britney Spears, offers seasonal recipes-
"Cruci-fixin's." On the other hand, the same network, in its coverage of the global riots over the Danish cartoons, has declined to show any of the offending artwork out of "respect" for the Muslim Faith.
Which means out of respect for their ability to to locate the executive vice president's home in the suburbs and firebomb his garage.
What Mark says about Christian who can't provoked is true. Our faith stands on its own merit. Leftists and Muslims attack our beliefs and values everyday. but yet our system still stands up to the scrutiny. The Arabs even have a claymation program geared towards children, that has Jews turning into pigs. And here we have a preist slain for no reason other than he wasn't Muslim!!!
With all the ridicule that we as Christians indure, you'd think that it would be Christians that riot, burn, flog, and murder leftists and Muslims. Our streets should run red with the blood of leftists and Islamics. But yet, all is quiet. You see when NBC aired that travesty called "the Book of Daniel," we Christians responded by not watching the program and changing the channel. Oh yeah, there where some protests, but they were peaceful. You see, Christian dollars are just as good as gay and secular dollars. Funny how the network saw that and cancelled "Daniel."
But they're worried about the feelings of Muslims and offending them. I guess that if I were a cowardly network executive, I'd be worried about losing my head. Or having my house blown up. So much for freedom of the press.
Muslims are immature children that don't like it when the tables are turned on them. They can dish it out but they can't take it when their on the recieving end.
The Danish press was testing the weakness of societies in the face of intimidation by the militant Islamofeces. Multiculturalism is killing the west. And it is being played out right before our eyes!!! Multi-culturalism killed that Catholic priest. Being sensitive caused the Madrid train bombings and the bombing of the British transportation system!!! Being sensitive caused the September 11th, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center!!!
The press here in the United States is quick to jump on the anti-Christian. "Lets rake Jesus over the coals." "Hey!!! How about we make him GAY!!!" Hey!!! Lets have him in a sexual relationship with Mary Magdaline!!!" Or, "How can we screw with the Christians today?"
But the Islamics, "We don't want offend Muslims and their faith." They might bomb us or take our heads. Ooow, the prophet is off limits. Don't bad mouth Islam.
Nuts to that!!! The Muslims are getting what they deserve. They kill hundreds and in some cases, thousands of innocent civilians with either a push of a button on a homicide bombers vest or hijacking a phene and flying it into a building, but yet there's no condemnation of them by them. I've yet to hear an iman or any other Islamofeces cleric denounce any terrorist act upon unarmed people!!! They kidnap and behead journalist but yet the press seems to give them a pass. How often do you hear Daniel Pearl's name mentioned in relation to being murdered by the Islamofeces? When the journalist in the Valerie Plame case was jailed, you heard about it almost every night that she in jail. And she was jailed for being in "Contempt of Court!!!" The press was all over this judge. Saying that he was "violating her right to privacy," and that's if I'm remembering correctly. And isn't it funny how the Islamofeces kidnap the very journalist that claim to be "helping to get their (the Islamofeces)point of view out?" But "They are the ones that they don't want to offend."
Fox News Channel aired the cartoons over the weekend. The cartoon that depicted Muhammad with the turban bomb. Brit Hume even commented on the Muslims and their reaction to the cartoons. The program was FOX News Sunday.
"This is really a disgrace." Brit said, "And it is a disgrace because of the obvious, howling double standard involved here."
Brit also added,
"What is striking about this is what offends these Muslims who are protesting and these imans, Hume continued, "Does the slaugther of innocent people in many parts of he world in the name of Allah offend them? Is that a sacrilege worthy of protest? No not in the least."
Hume noted that there has also been no outrage on the Arab street over "the kinds of slurs against Christians and against the Jewish faith that are regularly spread abroad in the Arab world by the mass media and by many of the imans themselves."
CNN on the other hand only broadcast the cartoons with digital distortions. But then CNN is the Clinton News Network.(CNN, Get it?)
Muslims have killed for their "religion of peace" and it won't stop at this priest. But yet, Catholics have not risen up in protest. Not even the pope. And I'm not really a big fan of the pope. But I've got to give it to him. Knowing the history of the popes, he could very easily call for a crusade against the Islamofeces and many would answer the clarion call. But yet, here he is calling for peace from all Catholics. And for the record, I'm not Catholic. But I was taught in the Catholic school system.
When was the last time an ayatolla called for all Muslims to stop and desist from jihad? The answer may take a century to answer so here it is, NEVER!!!
Thank God for News Networks like FOX Channel that has the guts to be what the mainstream media claims to be, Fair and Balanced. Thus why the MSM is having a hard time with credibility with the American viewer and losing it's audience.
"May God Bless the FOX News Channel and God Bless America!!!" "God Bless all the Free Press in the World that has the courage to stand in the Face of the Islamic Invasion and print the truth to spite dhimmi!!!"
I've speculated before -- but no response ---
Doesn't "Allahuakbar" translate directly as "Allah is Greater?
If so, is it reasonable to understand this favorite arabic phrase reveals that the Muslims don't consider Allah to be one and the same as the God of the Christians and the Jews?
If it is "greater" and not "great", if the name "Allah" is not the same as saying "God" (and thereby negating the notion that Allah and the Christian God is one and the same) and if this favorite phrase might connotate "Allah is greater than your God..." wouldn't that difference be significant? It would remove much of the stultifying confusion which confronts Westerners when the Muslim spokepeople begin to spout their verminous propaganda...
JSLA,
Akbar is Arabic superlative for kebir (great) and means 'greatest.'
Thanks much, fang...!
"Greatest" - does it connote a comparison? Is it a self-contained notion with no regard to another "god"? Does it connote that among all the things in the world Allah is greatest, or does it connote that among the various Gods and beliefs of various religions of Earth, that the Islamic God Allah is greatest?
It's always difficult to convey the nuance of connotation in a translation -- but surely it is wrong to translate "ALLAH IS GREATEST" into "GOD IS GREAT". Even in literal translation, the two phrases are evidently and factually completely different...
"GOD IS GREAT" seems like a highly sanitized and euphemized translation of what the Muslim is saying, and, I would also surmise, what the Muslim is implying through the exact phrasing. Does the name "Allah" and the superlative version of "great" have significance to you? To them?
I am no etymologist, nor am I an entomologist! I certainly have little knowledge about the Arabic language... Just a guy who is intrigued with words and wondering about these specific words...
Any additional thoughts -- anyone?
Mr Spencer,
I respectfully request that jihad watch post the danish cartoons in their entirety. What better way to show solidarity with our european allies?
Ironman Hondo,
You are my hero!
The reason the priest was murdered is because he could be. The "Noble Religion" mantra has helped brainwash many an otherwise rational person into not believing what they actually see. The Muslim emperor is not only naked but he stinks to high heaven.
There will be many more Catholic priests murdered in the name of Islam, just like they were murdered in the name of Communism and Nazism. How long will it take the people of the world to wake up? How long did it take the Germans?
But they didn't have an Internet. I think the M's are so P.O.'d because we are telling everyone faster than they can kill people. I like these odds.
Truth4U
Excellent post
Here is an excerpt from an article in the Times of London
In recent years governments have repeatedly come up against these limits. Locke did not believe that governments could always tolerate “opinions contrary to human society, such as manifestly undermine the foundations of society”. It is not clear what Locke had specifically in mind, but terrorism would surely be covered. In the 20th century both Nazism and Leninism were “opinions contrary to human society” in this sense — they were simply intolerable. He also warned against trying to tolerate certain doctrines that 17th-century Protestants attributed to the Jesuits. These included the teaching that “faith is not to be kept with heretics”, and that “kings excommunicated forfeit their crowns and kingdoms”.
Locke thought that “a Church has no right to be tolerated” whose members have to obey a foreign prince because that would mean that the ruler allowed “his own people to be listed, as it were, as soldiers against his own Government”. Seventeenth-century Islam was included in the criticism. “It is ridiculous for anyone to profess himself to be a Mohametan (sic) only in his religion, but in everything else a faithful subject to a Christian magistrate, while at the same time he acknowledges himself bound to yield blind obedience to the Mufti of Constantinople, who himself is entirely obedient to the Ottoman Emperor.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1052-2026548,00.html
___
You will note that a figure no less then John Locke, the very man who invented liberalism, thinks that there is no question of tolerating within the nation the presence of those who have allegiance to another king. The "king" here is any power that it outside the realm.
Mr Spencer,I respectfully request that jihad watch post the danish cartoons in their entirety. What better way to show solidarity with our european allies?
JW posted all the Danish cartoons a few days ago, there were about 150 comments on that thread.Mr. Spencer has also received hate mail in response to his posting the cartoons.