In a new Jihad Watch videoblog at Hot Air, I discuss the new Newsweek poll on attitudes toward Muslims in America.
Then in a National Review Symposium, I discuss the new Pew poll that shows support for "extremism" dropping among Muslims worldwide:
The poll results are, unfortunately, hard to attribute to a genuine reduction of support for the global jihadist imperative. When support for suicide bombings drops so sharply — from 74 percent to 34 percent — among Muslims in Lebanon in just five years, what catastrophe has there been of sufficient magnitude to have triggered such a massive change? Is it Syria’s ongoing interference in Lebanese affairs? The Israeli move against Hezbollah in the summer of 2006? The standoff between jihadists and the Lebanese Army at the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp? Unlikely: Hezbollah emerged from last summer’s conflict stronger than ever, and Syrian kibitzing and jihadists in refugee camps were as much part of Lebanon’s reality in 2002 as they are in 2007.We haven’t seen in Lebanon or anywhere else in the Islamic world any large-scale initiative to refute the jihad ideology, or to counter jihadist claims to represent true and pure Islam. Accordingly the sharp reduction in support for suicide bombing and other jihadist tactics recorded in the poll may represent little more than a growing awareness of the need to try to contain the damage that jihad terror attacks cause to the image of Islam. Underscoring this is Pew’s attribution of the findings to the fact that “economic growth has surged” — just after the Doctors Plot in Britain definitively refuted the common myth that poverty causes jihadism. Officials should make policy on the basis of this poll only with extreme wariness.
Muslim backlash is indeed happening due to the violent Muslim attacks worldwide....
The answers to this poll amount to damage control, nothing more. The war against the infidel will go on unabated. It will simply be done with more subtle weapons. What's the saying?
"Politics is warfare by other means."
The political battlefield will become the primary staging ground for Islam's war against the West. It's one we'll have a harder time defending.
The focus of the NRO symposium - on suicide bombings - was misplaced, and missed the wood for the trees. Some, like Zuhdi Jasser, rightly pointed out that if the goal - the triumph of political Islam - was coming along swimmingly, the decline in the popularity of suicide bombing means little. Similarly, as Daveed Gartenstein-Ross pointed out, as long as violence in the defense of Islam is justified, the poll results don't have much to commend them.
A very mediocre symposium by NRO.
I think that this guy, Neil Boortz, summed it all up just beautifully about how muslims only care about their image and do nothing to stop the murder of infidels worldwide:
http://sheikyermami.com/2007/07/19/neil-boortz-had-enough-slams-muslim-taqiyya-caller/
Please enjoy - courtesy of the sheik. I do believe that jihadwatch has it somewhere too.
Muslim backlash is indeed happening due to the violent Muslim attacks worldwide....
Logically impossible, since Mohammed and his altar ego [no sic] had from the beginning an impassioned vision just that: violent Moslem attacks worldwide.
610 * 623 * 632 * 1066 * 1215 * 1453 * 1492 * 1683 * 1928 * 1938 * 1948 * 1996 * 2001
The poll, all such polls, are Snake Oil Soup.
First, take a cup of Battle of the Ditch water, add in three tablespoons of Marxism, mix with three tablespoons of Taquiyya, add a quarter cup of myopia, and then a half-quart of 6th Pillar of Islam Terror as a base... and voila!
You've got a recipe for global disaster.
I am sure that there are individual Muslims who reject the violence and want nothing better than to live in peace with their family. On a large scale, I don't believe many 'hearts and minds' have changed at all...Where is the outrage among the liberated Afghani people, where the US has spent billions of dollars and gallons of spilled American blood, that the Tailban has kidnapped a group of So. Korean Christian aid workers? (and already killed one of the group) Would Afghani Muslims march in the streets to support these people, as well as march in support of their own small Christian fellow citizens? I doubt it; if anything, I am certain most approve of harming/killing Christians, whether their fellow countrymen or those from abroad. Sadly, not much has probably changed in the Muslim world; the change has been in the West, as people become more desperate to understand this violent, take-no-prisoners religion that is growing in their midst.
I am sure that there are individual Muslims who reject the violence and want nothing better than to live in peace with their family.
Then by defnition they ain't Moslems; they apostates and deserve to have their heads cut off with dull steak knives.
The idea of reasonable Moslems is itself unbelievable, cuz Islam is by self-definition unreasonable.
Whie the believing in Unicorns is comforting, it is also an extremely dangerous practice.
I'm with Daniel Pipes, the reason why Muslims are not supporting suicide bombings as much is because its counterproductive to Islamic conquest of the west. It alienates westerners and most states find a way of crushing the jihadists.
This is not to say that bombings and attacks will stop - they won't. When the urge to jihad comes, young muslim males are incapable of being reasoned with, all they know is that they must kill the unbelievers.
BTW poverty is no driver of jiahdism. Most jihadis have come from middle-class families and have been well educated(9-11 and 7-22 terrorists for example).
waltc,
I like you do agree with Daniel Pipes, up to a certain point. When it is against other Muslims like in Iraq for example, no, they do believe it is wrong. No problem if it is against infidels, you and I. In other words, A-OK to do.
waltc,
With you I am with Daniel Pipes up to a certain point. When it comes to bombing and killing other Muslims, such as in Iraq, Muslims would find it wrong for Muslims to kill other Muslims. But if it is infidels, you and I, no problem then it is A-OK to do violent jihad.
There was link earlier in the week to a virtual Islamic Kumbaya festival at Newsweek Online On Faith section. http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/projects/muslimsspeakout/index.html
It appears to be an attempt by Newsweek to allow muslims and apologists in America to better explain themselves. Explanations indeed.
There is so much bull and garbage being spread over there it could keep us all busy for weeks rebutting and dispelling the mounds of lies and rubbish. I have spent considerable time commenting to disprove uncountable attempts to promote the notion that islam is misunderstood and jihad means "inner struggle".
Last week there was Ali Gomaa, Tariq Ramadan, Mufti of Lebanon(name escapes) , John Esposito, and a few others spreading the same nonsense. The only critical essayist was Cal Thomas and even his was "meek" and not barely enough to balance the set of presentations. There is no Robert Spencer, Hugh Fitzgerald, Daniel Pipes, Hirsi Ali, or any other willing to critcize the mainstream thinking.
Next week the Da'wa celebration continues. Readers will be treated to essays by Jimmy Carter, Kieth Ellison, more John Esposito, Queen Rania, all telling us how misunderstood Islam is and how WE need to change our thinking.
If you read the comments though, you may see a trend quite unfavorable towards the essayist and the substance of the articles, which is good news for us. The few people that seem to appreciate Newsweek's attempts to keep us all pacified are, well, those whose names are Ahmed, Rashid, Maryam, etc.
I encourage all JW readers to visit that website during the week and post when you can. Let these practicioners of Da'wa and their apologists know we are not fooled by their propaganda.
Damage control, pure and simple.
(And a covert call not to bomb any more Muslim weddings in Jordan, but for the mass-murdering Islamists to direct their explosions at infidels, only, please.)
....and I am hearing of "a Big Bomb Scare in London", as I type...
(Yes, Lions of Allah, that's where the 'infernal devices' should be aimed!...)
The real meaning of this poll is to get their targets right, not a disavowal of Koranically-sanctioned Terror.
It's all in the wording of the questions.
Original question, I guess was, "Do you support suicide bombings of innocent civilians?"
More realistic question "Do you support Martyrdom Operations against Kafur for the furthering the expansion of Dar-Al-Islam?"
After all to Mohammedan only fellow believers are innocent, even the bomber themselves are considered innocent. All Kafur are misguided and evil.
When it come to these polls, it’s all in the question, and you can guarantee that after the alarm from earlier polls the MSM are doing their best to help CAIR to cover previous polls. This is the reason for the vast change of the polling data. They changed the questions to help the image.
Jihad will never not be a feature of Islam. Amounts of it will go up and down depending on many factors, including what several who have already posted here have noted, i.e., Islam's image to the world at large. But what will remain much more of a constant than jihad is the Muslim birthrate worldwide, including in Western countries. Islamic demographics rather than Islamic terror is the sharpest sword pointed at the Western heart. That is why the criminalization of Islam in nations where it is not yet the majority religion may by the only real solution to prevent being taken over, sharia and all.
OT
School Stops Scheduling Class Time For Muslim Prayer
http://www.10news.com/news/13767699/detail.html
SAN DIEGO -- A San Diego school that drew international attention for setting aside time for Muslim students to pray in the classroom will no longer do so, it was reported Friday.
Instead, Carver Elementary's schedule will be reconfigured so students can say their required midday prayers during lunch. Courts have long upheld students' rights to pray on their own during lunch or recess, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported.
When the new school year begins, Carver will have two lunch periods, including one that will fall when Muslims typically say their midday prayer -- between 1 and 2 p.m., the newspaper reported.
Another controversial element of Carver's educational program geared toward Muslim students -- single-gender classes -- will be eliminated, the Union-Tribune reported.
Superintendent Carl Cohn stressed in a July 18 memo that single-gender education is legal under federal law, but at Carver it "has become a serious distraction from learning rather than a vehicle to promote learning," according to the newspaper.
Carver added the single-gender classes and a daily 15-minute in-class break for voluntary prayers last September after it absorbed a failed Arabic language charter school that served primarily Somali Muslims.
Since a substitute teacher publicly complained about Carver's practices in April, the San Diego Unified School District has been inundated by letters and phone calls from as far away as Europe and the United Arab Emirates, according to the Union-Tribune.
Some alleged that the school was violating the separation of church and state by giving Muslims time to pray. The district maintained that it is legally required to approve students' request for religious accommodation.
You are right about this , Mr. Spencer.
Leave Iraq Now:
You are right on the money!
Damage control is the first priority here, and Newsweek, of 'Koran flushing fame'- is definately the preferred organ for the Islamic kumbayah propaganda. I'm afraid there are enough suckers out there to gobble it up.
The list of bullshit artists is extensive, with peanut khadr, Esposito, Queen Rania and the Agha Khan being the big guns of taqiyya...
Not to forget the Mohammed Atta clone Fareed Zakaria, who is a perfect example of how infiltration works...
http://sheikyermami.com/2007/07/27/gaddafis-extortion-racket-is-only-just-beginning/
"You've got a recipe for global disaster.
Posted by: Alarmed Pig Farmer"
...the kettle is boiling over....
Interesting picture, with the contrast in clothing and body language between the girl on the left and on the right. The one on the left is caught looking bright eyed and earnest, and the one on the right is possibly dyed blonde, wearing a tank top, and has a facial expression and posture captured in this photo that looks bored, jaded, and perhaps even a little cynical, bringing to mind Mean Girls.
One could read into it an agenda, aiming to communicate: "Good girl: Muslim girl. Bad (or not as good) girl: stereotyped Non-Muslim girl."
Ya right, definite change in attitude. Sounds like a load of bu.., sorry, taqiya to me.
The only suprising thing is that any of them would be concious enough to realize they may have gone a little bit overboard in believing their own PR and may not be quite ready for the great Jihad push to the Caliphate as they thought.
TAQIYYA - enough said
Simple...
If one is going to base anything on polls (which is stupid anyway), accuracy is critical...
PEW & Newsweek have a history of inaccurate if not downright intentionally misleading poll tactics...NRO does not.
Unless that's realized first, all the bantering in the world is nothing more than sit-n-spin yammering.
Some Muslims can use the excuse that criticism of jihad can get them killed--and, to a point, that's a legitimate excuse. But why, then, don't more Muslims criticise jihad in European countries, where their chances of incurring reprisal are (except maybe in Britain) substantially lower?
GetBornAgain: No devout Muslim (and if you're not going to be devout, what's the point of being Muslim?) can criticize jihad. Jihad is an integral feature of the Islamic faith. Moreover, if you're Muslim, you're already a confused human being. After all, anyone who would look upon Mohammed as the model man (and Muslims most defnitely do, in fact they're obligated to do so) is behind the eight ball in life already. That's all part of the reason why I expect nothing from Muslims which can aid Western Civilization in any tangible way.