Fitzgerald: Just do it: end the jizyah

And there was something else. Until the last one-third of a century, Arabs and Muslims lacked the wherewithal, the ability, to conduct worldwide Jihad to spread Islam.

Three things changed that. The most important was the most obvious: the quadrupuling of oil prices and the continued ability of OPEC, until recently, to manipulate prices both up and down so as to maximize total revenues of the major producers, and especially to charge oligopolistic rents. This was made easier by the capture by the Saudis of the American government's foreign policy and energy establishment, that continued to insist, and even to believe, that our "staunch ally" Saudi Arabia would exercise a "moderating" influence on prices, so that there was no urgency -- not political, not geopolitical, not environmental -- to discuss energy policy and the need to reduce the use of oil and gas.

The second thing that happened, and at the same time, was the negligent, even criminally negligent, behavior of Western governments in first allowing in large numbers of Arab and Muslim males, and then in allowing them to bring what were optimistically called their "families" -- which often meant a very large number of wives and quasi-wives and children. In Germany it started with Turks who were thought would come, work, and return home -- the Gastarbeiter. It did not happen; they stayed. They were ultimately permitted to bring their families, and more than their families, and today there are more than 3 million Muslims in Germany. In England, it was Pakistanis who came to work, but then their families were allowed in (and what soft-hearted Western government could resist the idea of allowing the "family" to come, unaware of what that concept meant in Muslim terms, and unwilling to study, very closely, what the belief-system of Islam clearly -- not ambiguously, but clearly – teaches). In France, single men came from North Africa. The French thought that their behavior, regarded as sociopathic but in fact merely that of Muslims on the loose in a society of Infidel victims, would be less menacing if they were allowed to "bring their wives." Giscard d'Estaing fell for this. The policy began of allowing that "wife" (i.e., 1, 2, 3, 4 wives) and "children" to come to France also. Who in the French immigration services was going to look closely -- especially since those services were necessarily staffed by those who could speak Arabic, and therefore, just as necessarily, the very people entrusted with monitoring and checking were often Arab Muslims themselves -- not exactly a prescription for a wary, rigorously monitored program, is it?

Now there are millions of Muslims all over Europe. The demographic trends are clear. While in Italy and France the Infidel indigenes are not even replacing themselves, the Muslims are more than doing so. And many of them have managed to take full advantage of everything the welfare states of Western Europe, built and paid for by Infidel taxpayers, provide. In France, where Muslims have rioted, they receive free education, free health care, free or low-cost housing. Any American can see the benefits that are received by these Muslim immigrants, and the fact that they do not exactly appear to be trying very hard either to make a living or to express any gratitude for the chance to live in such an advanced and civilized society. They are indifferent, or hostile, to much of that civilization. Why should they care what is in the Louvre, or what the symphony orchestras have to offer, or what goes on at the Institut Pasteur, or what non-Muslim histories and literatures are preserved in the Bibliotheque Nationale?

The third development is the existence of new technologies, created by Infidels but enthusiastically exploited by Muslims to disseminate the full message of Islam and of those who embody or promote it. Khomeini finally returned to Tehran on February 1, 1979 (the Shah had left the country on January 19), after years of exile in France. But before that he had been making audiocassettes in Neauphle-le-chateau, and those audiocassettes were important in whipping up enthusiasm for his return and rule. Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, and other groups have found videocassettes of their deeds quite effective. They depict suicide bombers preparing for their mission and uttering their usual Islamic mumbo-jumbo, taped bombings with martial Muslim theme music playing, as American convoys are attacked, and then the hysterical dragging of American corpses, or the decapitations of Berg and Bigley and other Westerners. These grotesque recruitment videos apparently work, which tells us all we need to know about the mental makeup of all too many Muslims. And then there are the propagandists of Al-Jazeera, Al-Manar, and other satellite channels. And of course, the Internet. None of these was created by the Muslims, but all of it can be and is exploited by Muslims eager to promote Jihad -- that is, the spread of Islam, the removal of all perceived barriers to Islam, and to its dominance, everywhere in the world.

It is of course tempting to believe that "if only" we give and give and give, or "if only" we throw Israel (or Kashmir, or the Christians of Iraq or Indonesia or the Sudan) to the wolves, things will die down. It won't happen. The psychology of the jihad is the reverse: it is only when firm and informed opposition appears, that suddenly Muslims will take a different tone -- "at your feet, or at your throat." The smiling, affable, sudden desire to make friends is not an end, but a means. See, for example, Professor Ahmed Afzaal's comments about his own, un-detailed, changes of mind and heart (what changes?) to Robert Spencer -- apparently stemming only from Afzaal’s desperation either to hide or to somehow give a different gloss on his incredible writings and his history of support for and involvement with Tanzeem-e-Islami.

The Europeans cannot afford the Jizyah. Let Arab Musliims, let Hamas, go to the Saudis and the others. That transfer will not be Jizyah, with all that the continued payment of such tribute implies both for the craven donor and the demanding donee.

End the Jizyah. Nothing will so clear the air, or feel so good, for Infidels, than if their governments stop funding Hamas, the "Palestinians," and all the Arab and Muslim governments and groups they have been led to believe that they have some kind of duty to support -- a duty, that is, to pay the Jizyah.

Call it what it is. Tom Tancredo -- start calling it the Jizyah, on the floor of Congress. Get others, in both parties. to do so. Philippe de Villiers -- do the same in France. Fini -- the same in Italy. Ex-Muslims -- sign a joint letter and demand that the non-Muslims of this world stop paying the Jizyah.

Just do it.