March 2010 Archives

These prisoners have committed crimes. That's why they're in prison. That can tend to lead to a certain curtailing of one's freedoms. Only because they recognize American officials as the hopeless dhimmis that they generally are do they dare to bring such a suit. Courtroom Jihad Update: "Inmates Say Prisons Violate Rights: Inmates In Federal Prisons Seek Added Face Time With Family and Friends," by Adriana Correa for NBC Chicago, March 31 (thanks to Twostellas):

A group of 60 to 70 Muslim prisoners in highly restrictive jail programs, in Terre Haute, Indiana and Marion, Illinois are suing because they don't get enough time to visit with family and friends.

The suit, brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights claims the prisoner's constitutional rights are being violated at the "Communications Managment Units," a set of experimental prison facilities.

They are taking a case to court on behalf of inmates that have been placed in highly secured prisons in the U.S.

The jail birds complain the prisons are not allowing them ample outside contact time with relatives and their buds.

Yes, lots of jihad to plan!

Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, is said to have predicted the Islamic conquest first of Constantinople ("the city of Heraclius" below) and then of Rome. An Islamic conference to be held in London on April 10 boasts about what the conference organizers see as the looming fulfillment of the second part of that prophecy: the Islamic conquest of Rome.

But remember: if you speak about Islamic supremacism and the global jihad aspiration to impose Sharia over the world, you're an "Islamophobe"!

From the Italian Muslims site (thanks to Bat Ye'or):

ISLAM IN ITALY - FULFILLING THE PROPHECY

Date: Saturday 10th April 2010
Time: 1.45 pm - 4.30 pm
Venue: Toynbee Hall, 28 Commercial Street, London, E1 6LS

"Are they waiting for anything except the Hour to come to them suddenly? But its Signs have already come!" (Al-Quran, 47:18)

As one of these signs, Imam Ahmad reports in his Musnad that Abdullah bin Amr bin Al-'As (ra) mentioned: "Whilst we were around the Prophet (saw) writing he was asked, 'Which of the two cities will be opened first, Constantinople or Rome?' He (the Prophet Muhammad) answered, 'The city of Heraclius will be opened first!'"

The Great Ottoman, Sultan Muhammad Fatih (rh) fulfilled the first part of this prophecy by conquering Constantinople. Thus, remains the second part. Having been forced out of
Andalusia, and more recently, dispersed across the Balkan states, the city of Gaius Julius Caesar (Rome) remains. So let the da'wah begin ...

There will be a short presentation on Islam in Italy by the Association of Italian Muslim Sisters with proceeds going towards supporting Italian Muslims. Also, enjoy a 3-course
home made Halal Italian buffet. The menu includes: Crodino, Rustici, Pizza, Spiedini Tricolore, Pomodori al Tonno, Pasta Primavera, Lasagne, Polpettone, Insalata di Patate, Tiramisu. Entrance is by online booking and payment only. Tickets are £20 for adults and £10 for children, but kindly no children under the age of 10 years.

For further information please contact:
Tel: 07880 744 198
E-mail: info@italianmuslims.com
Website: www.italianmuslims.com

Big surprise. Note that he says that these attacks were "revenge." Jihad attacks are always framed as revenge, because from the standpoint of Islamic law only defensive jihad is justified at this point -- also, to frame mass murder in this way helps take the sting out for sympathizers to the cause who may be stopped short by the barbarity of attacks like these. "Islamist group claims Moscow bombings," from World News Australia, April 1 (thanks to Twostellas):

A Chechen militant leader has claimed responsibility for twin suicide bombings on Moscow's Metro that killed 39 and wounded scores of others.

In a video statement recorded on Monday, Dokka Abu Usman, the leader of the Islamist "Emirate of the Caucasus", said the motive for the deadly blasts was revenge.

Usman said the attack was to avenge "the massacre by Russian invaders of the poorest residents of Chechnya and Ingushetia, who were picking wild garlic in the Arshty village on February 11, 2010, to feed their families".

In the clip, published on Chechen Internet site The Kavkaz Centre, he warned of fresh strikes against Russia, saying the troops stabbed their victims to death and then "mocked" their corpses.

He warned Russians that the "war will come to your streets, and you will feel it with your own lives and skins."...

Stubbornly ignorant and unwilling to investigate the jihad doctrine, State Department officials led the U.S. into war to support jihadists in Bosnia and Kosovo. Now the same mistake is being repeated. "U.S. Supports Islamic Terror Against Russia," by Julia Gorin at Republican Riot, March 29 (thanks to Pamela):

We don't yet know the whole story behind the two female suicide bombers who killed 38 people in Moscow and injured scores of others. Although their affiliation is unclear, the working assumption is that the bombers were tied to the Chechen rebel movement in the North Caucasus.

There is, however, something which we do know for sure, and which we paid no attention to despite its clear connection to the kind of terror Moscow witnessed yesterday morning.

There was a little-noted meeting that took place in December 2009, in Tbilisi, the capital of U.S. ally Georgia. That month Georgia hosted a conference of jihadists to plan "operations" against Russia. There was no news coverage of the event, and so it took a paid advertisement in the Washington Times to make it known. Stubbornly, still no news organization or blog picked up on it. And so here we are.

Below are the relevant parts of the paid-for article from last month, titled "The Georgian Imbroglio -- And a Choice for the United States." (Original emphasis preserved.) It was penned by James George Jatras, a former U.S. Foreign Service officer as well as foreign policy analyst for the U.S. Senate Republican Policy Committee.

Americans must be made aware of Saakashvili's extending refuge to jihadists responsible for countless acts of terror in southern Russia and his regime's extraordinary coordination efforts to permit them to step up attacks in the Caucasus region.

Specifically, according to reliable sources [with lines to two foreign intel services], in December 2009 a secret meeting took place in Tbilisi, the Georgian capital, with representatives of numerous jihad groups based in various Islamic and European countries for the purpose of coordinating their activities on Russia's southern flank. The meeting was organized under the auspices of high officials of the Georgian government; while Saakashvili himself was not present, officials of his ministry of internal affairs (allegedly G. Lordkipanidze) and others acted as hosts and coordinators. Georgian Ambassador to Kuwait Mayering-Mikadze purportedly facilitated travel for participants from the Middle East. In addition to "military" operations (i.e., attacks in southern Russia) special attention was given to ideological warfare, for example, the launching of the Russian-language TV station "First Caucasian."

Are we to believe that U.S. intelligence agencies were unaware of this meeting and other similar actions? The question then is unavoidable: has Washington decided to turn a blind eye -- or even worse, to encourage our "ally" Saakashvili to play the "jihad card" against Russia? Could such a thing be possible at a time when the world's media are filled with reports of jihad attacks in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, India, Israel, Philippines, and other countries -- not least the United States (Fort Hood, Fort Dix)? The threat comes from the same ideology that motivated the 9/11 attacks against our country and which seeks to create through violence a worldwide Islamic caliphate governed by Sharia law....

There is much more. Be sure to read it all.

Not "compatible with an open, liberal, tolerant society." Indeed.

"Belgian parliament bans burquas [sic] in public," from AP, March 31:

BRUSSELS-- A vote against wearing face-covering veils in puclic was unanimously established on Wednesday. This legislation represents a major legislative step, which could make Belguim the first European country to impose such a religious prohibition. [...]

The parliamentarians are specifically targeting the body-covering burqa and face-veiling niqab, which are still very rare features in Belgian public life. "We have to act as of today to avoid (its) development," Bacquelaine said.

"Wearing the burqa in public is not compatible with an open, liberal, tolerant society," he said.

In Belgium, the proponents of the ban argue that such all-covering garb poses security issues as well as threatens democratic values. Some feared, however, that the bill would not stand a legal challenge.

In France on Tuesday, the Council of State, the nation's highest administrative body, warned that a prohibition on full-body Islamic veils in public risked being found unconstitutional. President Nicolas Sarkozy said last year that such clothing was "not welcome" in France.

Such a ban could also be challenged at the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights.

And I am certain it will be.

Eric Giunta's Introduction:

Speech in five parts:

Q & A, in 3 parts:

All videos courtesy of Jaime -- many thanks, my friend!

Libelblogger Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs is dead and buried as a source that anyone takes seriously -- even the New York Times did a post-mortem -- but Johnson's latest ridiculous discovery of neo-Nazis warrants a revisit to this whole sad affair.

Weasel Zippers has found the comment above, in which Johnson says that he is "fairly sure" that the Tennessee state flag is a neo-Nazi emblem. Johnson himself is seething and whining about this: "the comments that followed minutes later in the same thread...I clearly concluded that the flag was a Tennessee flag."

Well, that's mighty generous and perspicacious of him, but he only did it after speculating about the Tennessee flag's alleged resemblance to various neo-Nazi insignia:

As Glenn Reynolds says, "you know, seeing neo-Nazis behind every bush deserves a bit of mockery."

Yes, and more than mockery. This incident shows that Charles Johnson wouldn't know a neo-Nazi emblem from a lilac bush, and casts yet more doubt on all his sage analyses about alleged neo-Nazis in Europe -- and yet those analyses were widely accepted by people who should have known better. Late in 2007, when Johnson was still a respected conservative blogger, he began to smear Pamela Geller -- the fearless and passionate Zionist and warrior for freedom -- and others as neo-Nazi sympathizers based on this false analysis. And late in 2008, he began including me in these smears. The point is that other prominent conservative bloggers ran for cover and shunned those whom Johnson victimized, instead of standing up to him and calling him on his character assassination and defamation. Johnson was working hard to destroy the reputations of good people, and other bloggers abetted him in this by cowering before him and severing all relations with his targets.

It wasn't until mid-2009 that Johnson's betrayal of all his principles became clear to everyone, and his support among conservatives began to evanesce. But by then, the damage was done. Those who woke up to him then never revisited the decisions they made earlier and asked themselves if maybe his standards of evidence were just as shoddy in 2007 and 2008 as they were in 2009. His smears and lies follow his targets around on the Internet and will do so forever -- and mainstream conservative bloggers who enjoy a great reputation as fearlessly politically incorrect adopted a cowardly silence in 2007 and 2008, and have shown their cowardice yet again more recently in not revising their former stances.

You know who you are!

UPDATE: The good folks at The Blogmocracy were on this first.

Comments by David G. Littman, NGO Representative at the UN in Geneva:
Association for World Education and World Union for Progressive Judaism

This joint oral statement, on former themes, was drafted on the spur of the moment and delivered hastily by DGL on the last day when NGO representatives could speak at the Human Rights Council, which ended with the usual controversial situation. Our text is a verbatim transcription from the UN website. Some humour was felt to be acceptable -under the grandiose colourful stalactite ceiling - and it provoked gleeful attention. The president had generously allowed the speaker to continue for three minutes (instead of two and a bit), but then the sound mike was cut by Mr. X and the precious advice by Mr. Turgot 200 years ago on how to react when receiving a gracious royal gesture (in this case, at least 30 seconds extra!) was not relayed on the earphone, nor to the president.

However, it was heard by many, as it was delivered somewhat theatrically with a louder and more serious voice, while looking toward the Belgium president on the podium:

La grâce se reçoit avec un mouvement de recul mais ne se refuse jamais. (Grace is welcomed with a respectful bow, but is never refused.)

* * * * *

ASSOCIATION FOR WORLD EDUCATION
WORLD UNION FOR PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM

United Nations Human Rights Council -13th session (1-26 March 2010)
Statement: David G. Littman (38TH meeting) - Tuesday. 16:10 - 23 March 2010
President (Chair): Ambassador Alex Van Meeuwen (Belgium)
Item 9: Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related forms of intolerance,
follow-up and implementation of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action

[The words in square brackets were not pronounced in the extended time of 3 min.]

'Blasphemy' / 'Defamation of Religions - and 'Islamophobia' at the United Nations

Thank you, Mr President.

Sir, delegates now have available, thanks to the Secretariat, our two joint written statements with detailed documentation and notes which say more than we can here in two minutes - A/HRC/13/NGO/135: 'Call to Condemn Judeophobia / Antisemitism in the Middle East' - and A/HRC/13/NGO/139: 'Ad Hoc Committee' [on the Elaboration of Complementary standards] and: 'The Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam & the Universality of Human Rights.'

The links to our UN General Assembly NGO joint written statements are below.

Mr. President, with your indulgence on this sunny day, we wish to state a commonplace without fluffing too many fancy feathers in this palatial domain where real peacocks roam freely, ruling the roost thank to the wish of the former [19th century] Châtelaine whose husband donated the land to Geneva.

Sir, in several published articles my colleague, René Wadlow, and I have carefully chronicled a creeping process - or 'struggle' [Jihad] - by the OIC, led by Pakistan and with several Iranian initiatives from 1997: the first was the "Blasphemy Affair" - based on totally false grounds, which we have demonstrated - that raised its ugly head; [this was] followed in 1999 by the OIC-sponsored "Defamation of Islam" resolution, modified to "Defamation of Religions" to cool tempers; and finally becoming "Combating Defamation of Religions" - although only Islam is mentioned in these non-stop series of resolutions, the latest of which will be adopted automatically this week [by the Council].

Then the "Islamophobia" monster was created here in our Palais des Nations - 180 years after Mary Godwin invented Frankenstein on the other side of the lake at the Villa Diodati during a competition suggested by Lord Byron [on a rainy day in May 1816] - for him, the poet Shelly and his girl friend, later his wife Mary Shelly, who won - with Frankenstein finishing his career by a trek to the north pole and maybe passing by this [palatial] domain.

Curiously enough, the "Islamphobia" monster became a hit with the Special Rapporteur [on Racism Mr. Doudou Diène, 2002-2008] and others worldwide, but not the mounting Christianophobia and galloping Judeophobia - particularly in the Arab-Muslim world where the situation of Christians is regressing daily and the culture of hate against Jews in the media and Judaism is becoming mind-boggling, without any condemnation [here].

M. le Président, Permettez moi de conclure avec les paroles d'un grand home du Siècle des Lumières, M. Turgot : [Mr. President, allow me to conclude with the words of a great man from « Le Siècle des Lumières », Mr. Turgot]

The President: Would you please come to an end now, your speaking time is up.

[The sound mike cut then & the webcast shows the speaker saying: 'Merci, M. le Président," but Mr. Turgot's word were spoken: « La grâce se reçoit avec un mouvement de recul mais ne se refuse jamais. » ('Grace is welcomed with a respectful bow, but is never refused.")]

--------

Joint written statements (AWE and WUPJ): UN General Assembly NGO documents:
A/HRC/13/NGO/135: Call to Condemn Judeophobia / Antisemitism in the Middle East

A/HRC/13/NGO/139: Ad Hoc Committee on the Elaboration of Complementary Standards & The Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam and the Universality of Human Rights.

If you visit this site every day, you know that there are three kinds of news stories related to or about Islam. There are the stories that, within a day or a week, will make it to the New York Times, and NPR, albeit in less intelligible and often tendentious form. Then there are the stories that only appear months later, and you can't quite figure out why it takes so long for the editors at The New York Times or the Washington Post to recognize the significance of such Jihad News. And finally, there is a third kind of story, the kind of story that you read here, that appeared in places quite obscure, and that you will never read again, unless the story put up here is publicized so that others who write online pick it up and force the major news organizations to start reporting about such things.

Here, for example, are two stories about what took place in the Chittagong Hills of Bangladesh recently. The Chittagong Hills (or "Chittagong Hill Tract") have for centuries been lived in by the indigenous Jumma people, who are the last remaining indigenous Buddhists (the Tibetan refugees not being "indigenous") on the entire subcontinent, though it was in India that Gautama Buddha was born and Buddhism first flourished. In 1947, at the time of Partition, 85% of the population was Buddhist and 10% Hindu. Now, in 2010, 50% are Buddhist and 48% are Muslim settlers.

The two stories:

War is deceit, Muhammad said: "As investigators and residents gathered around the scene of the [first] blast, a second bomber wearing a police uniform approached and set off explosives."

"New suicide blasts kill 12 in southern Russia," by Arsen Mollayev for the Associated Press, March 31:

MAKHACHKALA, Russia - Two suicide bombers -- including one impersonating a police officer -- killed 12 people Wednesday in southern Russia. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said the blasts may have been organized by the same militants who attacked the Moscow subway.

The powerful former president had previously vowed to "drag out of the sewer" the terrorists behind the attacks in Moscow, which killed 39 people and injured scores of commuters during Monday's rush hour.

Wednesday's blasts struck in the province of Dagestan. Bombings and other attacks occur almost daily in Dagestan, Chechnya and Ingushetia, provinces in Russia's North Caucasus region where government forces are struggling against a separatist Islamist insurgency.

"I don't rule out that this is one and the same gang," Putin said at a televised Cabinet meeting.

President Dmitry Medvedev said later the attacks were "links of the same chain."

The Moscow subway bombings were the first suicide attacks in the Russian capital in six years and shocked a country that had grown accustomed to having such violence confined to its restive southern corner. Those attacks followed a warning from an Islamic militant leader that the militants would bring their struggle to the heart of Russia.

On Wednesday, a suicide bomber in a car detonated explosives when police tried to stop the car in the town of Kizlyar near Dagestan's border with Chechnya, Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev said.

"Traffic police followed the car and almost caught up -- at that time the blast hit," Nurgaliyev said.

As investigators and residents gathered around the scene of the blast, a second bomber wearing a police uniform approached and set off explosives, killing the town's police chief among others, Nurgaliyev said.

All quite true. This story again demonstrates the uselessness of the "moderate" label. As "moderation" is relative to extremes, all the term can tell us is that the "moderate" is perceived as not being as bad as the next guy. It does not, however, imply a forthright and useful engagement of the many problematic aspects of Islamic texts and laws, hence the disappointment expressed below in the performance of "moderate" Muslim leaders thus far. "Muslim leaders 'failing to tackle extremists'," by Ruth Gledhill for the Times Online, March 30:

Muslim leaders have been criticised by a University of Oxford academic for not doing enough to tackle extremists.

At the same time a parliamentary committee has attacked a central plank of the Government's counter-extremism programme by arguing that its "Prevent" strategy has "stigmatised and alienated" Muslims.

Nick Chatrath, a researcher at Oxford's Faculty of Oriental Studies, claims in a paper to be published this week that in the face of growing radicalisation in Britain, Muslim leaders are ignoring extremists' points of view and glossing over some of the more unsavoury parts of Islam's ancient texts.

In an essay in next month's Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations, Mr Chatrath called for a more open engagement by moderate Muslims with the arguments of extremists.

Based on interviews with Anjem Choudary, of the banned extremist group Islam4UK, and Dr Musharraf Hussain, an adviser to the Muslim Council of Britain, Mr Chatrath said: "Moderate Muslim leaders are doing a poor job of tackling extremism in Britain." He said that extremists such as Mr Choudary, who has argued that democracy should be replaced with obedience to Allah, were using the Koran and other ancient texts to justify their actions. He called on moderate community leaders to do more to counter this.

"This attitude must change, as the best way to extinguish extremist arguments is to deal with them out in the open, not just sweep them under the carpet and hope for the best," he said.

"Some recent polls suggest ordinary British Muslims are becoming more sympathetic to extremists, and this could be related to the way moderate Muslims are ignoring the extremist threat."...

With apologies to Dr. Seuss: Oh, The Places You'll Misunderstand Islam! "Kenyan Police Hunting Australian Terror Suspect," from VOA News, March 30:

Anti-terrorism police units in Kenya are still searching for a Somali-born Australian terror suspect, who escaped earlier this month while in police custody in a town near the Ugandan border. The incident has prompted the Kenyan government to tighten security throughout the country.

Kenyan police spokesman Eric Kiraithe declined to comment on the circumstances that may have led to the escape of the terror suspect Hussein Hashi Farah. But Kiraithe says every effort is being made to find him.

"We are not going to give you that information at this point in time because investigations are going on. We have taken a lot of security measures to re-arrest that man," he said.

Anti-terrorism police units are searching towns in and around the western border town of Busia, and authorities say security in all airports and border points in Kenya has been tightened.

Immigration officials in Busia detained Farah in mid-March, after his name appeared on an international terrorism watch list. According to local media reports, Farah was in police custody for several days and was about to be transferred to Nairobi when he escaped.

The Kenyan police spokesman says the terror suspect may have been released by mistake. He dismissed rumors that Farah had bribed his way out of jail.

The Somali man, who holds an Australian passport, is believed to have been involved in the planning of a suicide attack on an Australian military base last August.

The attack was foiled and Farah evaded capture in Australia. But several other suspects - all Australian citizens of Somali and Lebanese origins - were subsequently arrested and charged. The men are alleged to have ties to the al-Qaida-linked militant group al-Shabab in Somalia, which is listed as a terrorist group by several Western countries, including Australia and the United States.

There has been no official comment from the Australian government about Farah's disappearance. But local media reports say it has privately expressed to the Kenyan government its concern and alarm over the apparent security failure....

"The Association of Muslim Brotherhood of Nigeria, a pro-Sharia group based in the northern city of Kaduna, argued that the forums would mock the Sharia system."

When "government knows best" meets "Allah knows best," this is what happens to a citizen's right to criticize -- or change -- his or her government. And when a system is presumed to be above criticism, it is shielded from calls for reform, and tyranny can flourish. Add to that situation the many abuses of human rights that are enshrined in Sharia, and this is the result. An update on this story. "Nigeria Sharia court confirms Twitter debate ban," from BBC News, March 30:

An Islamic court in Nigeria has permanently banned a rights group from holding an internet debate about amputation as a form of punishment.

This follows a temporary order made last week by a court in northern Nigeria preventing Facebook and Twitter being used to discuss the issue.

The ban was initially sought by a pro-Sharia group which said internet sites would be used to mock Islamic law.

The Sharia code runs alongside secular law in 12 of Nigeria's 36 states.

In 2000, Malam Buba Bello Jangebe was the first person in Nigeria to have an amputation carried out under Islamic law after being found guilty of stealing a cow.

The Civil Rights Congress of Nigeria started a Twitter feed, blog and Facebook debate about it so "Nigerians could air their opinions on Sharia law as a whole".

But the Association of Muslim Brotherhood of Nigeria, a pro-Sharia group based in the northern city of Kaduna, argued that the forums would mock the Sharia system.

The court agreed and issued a temporary ban on the internet discussions last week.

Tuesday's ruling makes the ban permanent.

According to this story, one of the bombers in yesterday's attack in Moscow may also have been mentally retarded. Such gallant mujahedin, pressing the most vulnerable members of society into the business of mass murder. And it would not be the first time we have seen this tactic employed. "Russia hunts 21-strong 'Black Widow' cell as first images of suicide bombers are released," by Will Stewart for the Daily Mail, March 30:

The first images of the 'Black Widow' suicide bombers were released today as Vladimir Putin vowed to 'scrape out the attackers from the bottom of the sewers'.

As Russia held a day of mourning for the 39 people killed in the underground terror attack, the country's prime minister vowed vengeance on those who had helped mount the attack.

The police and security services now believe there are in a desperate race against time to find the gang with fears they could be plotting another outrage.

It was suggested today that some 21 more 'widows' are at large following reports that the women were part of a 30-strong band of suicide bombers trained at a Muslim school in Turkey. Nine have already perished in earlier attacks, Russian media said.

The dead women in Monday's attack are both believed to be aged between 18 and 25 and to have carried the explosives - packed with nails and metal fragments to maximise death and destruction - in shahid belts or handbags.

According to police who have viewed CCTV which has not yet been released, one was said to be mentally retarded.

A source close to the investigators said that the women suicide bombers travelled to Moscow early on Monday by coach from a unnamed Caucasus town, prompting the belief that the attack was by militants from volatile Chechnya.

The women were accompanied by a tall man with Caucasus appearance, dressed in dark blue coat with white marks. He had five days growth of beard. Both women were identified by the driver of the coach.

'One was dressed in black trousers, another in black skirt, black tights and spangled black shoes,' said the Kommersant newspaper. Their appearance indicated they were from the Caucasus region.

The newspaper said the women had been taught by an Islamic militant who had himself being killed last month in an operation by the FSB, which replaced the KGB. 'Around 30 of them were taught in Madrasah (Muslim school) in Turkey and then came back to perform their tasks,' said Kommersant.

'Nine of them have already blown themselves up, the others are being checked now.'...

Long-term economic changes wrought by violence, intimidation and the consequent hostile and uncertain climate for continuing to do business. And it's not the first, and won't be the last source of livelihood to be destroyed by jihad and the imposition of Sharia. "Pakistan: Taliban threat forces cinemas to close," by Syed Saleem Shahzad for AdnKronos International, March 30:

Islamabad, 30 March (AKI) - By Syed Saleem Shahzad - The growing influence of the Taliban has forced cinemas to close in northern Pakistan despite support for the film industry from the secular provincial government in the North West Frontier Province. Many cinema owners are demolishing their theatres and replacing them with multi-storey commercial plazas.

Earlier restrictions imposed by the previous religious coalition Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) government on the display of the female form on cinema billboards have been lifted and cinemas are free to operate.

But most cinema owners are uncertain whether the Taliban might target their businesses or if a new government of any religious party in the future may affect their business.

So several cinema proprietors have moved to demolish their cinemas and are aiming to building multi-storey commercial plazas in and around the provincial capital, Peshawar.

The Falak Sher Cinema in Sadar Peshawar, Tasweer Mahal of Kabuli Bazaar in Peshawar , Novelty and Palwalsha cinemas in Peshawar are among the old cinemas which have been demolished in the last few years and all are being replaced by commercial buildings.

"There was a time in the 1960s and 1970s when cinema was the only entertainment in Peshawar where people used to go with family members or with friends," Peshawar journalist Nasir Dawar told Adnkronos International (AKI).

"However, video cassette recorders and video CD players changed the dynamics. People now prefer to watch the movies at home.

"The Taliban threat was an added woe which further discouraged cinema patrons. So cinema owners chose to demolish the buildings and convert them into commercial plazas.

"Cinemas were lost money for them but now with the commercial buildings they can earn millions of rupees from the rental money," he said.

Despite the Taliban's growing influence and a record number of bomb blasts and suicide attacks in the commercial markets and police posts in Peshawar last year, the famous Shama cinema, owned by a powerful federal minister's family, still shows what are considered to be pornographic English movies.

People flood the cinema every day and it does more business than a commercial market.

During the holy month of Ramadan, however, the Shama Cinema shows only Indian Bollywood movies which attract a comparatively thin crowd. During the sacred month of Muharram, the cinema is closed.

However, obscenity is not the only attraction in the cinema houses.

Well, that's good to know.

The Shabistan Cinema also draws audiences because it screens the latest Pashtu language movies.

Many renowned Pakistani screenwriters believe that cinema patrons lost their enthusiasm for cinema due to unpopular Pakistani films and obsolete cinema technology and the Taliban threat simply forced the cinema owners to switch to another business.

A Conspiracy Caller Confronted by Medved and Spencer from Papa Giorgio on Vimeo.

I was on the Michael Medved Show yesterday, and here (courtesy Religio-Political Talk) is a bit from the end of the show, in which Medved makes short work of a conspiracy fantasist, with a bit from me at the end.

When, oh, when, is Virginia going to institute transparent, honest, comprehensive programs teaching its citizens against jihad violence?

What's that? The problem is not that this guy was from Virginia? The problem is ideas, assumptions and beliefs he learned as a Muslim? What are you, some kind of Islamophobe?

"Carnival Bomb Threat On Cruise: 'We Are Jihad!,'" by Jim Brogan for the Post Chronicle, March 29 (thanks to Pamela):

There has been a bomb threat on board the Carnival Sensation Sunday morning, where a man claimed to be a member of "Jihad."

According to the U.S. Coast Guard, a drunk, 31-year-old Virginia man was heard yelling "We are jihad," and "Come to the top deck and watch the bomb," onboard the Carnival Sensation early Sunday morning.

The man, Ibrahim Khalil Zarou, was arrested and later released on $10,000 bond after his threats were determined to be a hoax.

Zarou, who was on the cruise as member of a party of 12, caused the ship to be held four miles off the coast of Florida for several hours while the Coast Guard, FBI and local sheriff's office officials sweeped the entire boat....

Maybe Zarou was hoping to meet his 72 Virginians.

This story, similar to one that was published in February, describes more cases of violence by Muslims against Jews in Malmo. The logical question, then, is: what are they doing in Malmo to stop this behavior, which is so utterly antithetical to Swedish values? Well, they've appointed an "anti-hate-crimes coordinator." Yeah, that oughtta fix it.

"Hate crimes force Jews out of Malmo," by Karl Ritter for the Associated Press, March 29:

Marcus Eilenberg is a Swedish Jew whose family roots in Malmo run deep. His paternal grandparents were Holocaust survivors who found shelter in this southern Swedish city in 1945. His wife's parents fled to Sweden from communist Poland in the 1960s.

Now the 32-year-old law firm associate feels the welcome for Jews is running out, and he is moving to Israel with his wife and two children in May. He says he knows at least 15 other Jews who are leaving for a similar reason.

That reason, he says, is a rise in hate crimes against Jews in Malmo, and a sense that local authorities have little desire to deal with a problem that has exposed a crack in Sweden's image as a bastion of tolerance and a haven for distressed ethnic groups.

Anti-Semitic crimes in Europe have usually been associated with the far right, but Shneur Kesselman, an Orthodox rabbi, says the threat now comes from Muslims.

"In the past five years I've been here, I think you can count on your hand how many incidents there have been from the extreme right," he said. "In my personal experience, it's 99 percent Muslims."

Sweden prides itself on having taken in tens of thousands of the world's war refugees. About 7 percent of Malmo's 285,000 people were born in the Middle East, according to city statistics, and the city has large numbers from the Balkans, including the Macedonian who heads the city's largest mosque. After the Holocaust, it took in many Jews who survived the World War II Nazi genocide.

Malmo police say that of 115 hate crimes reported in 2009, 52 were anti-Semitic. Bejzat Becirov, the mosque head, estimated there are about 60,000 Muslims in Malmo. But the number of Jews is about 700 and shrinking - it was twice as big two decades ago, according to Fredrik Sieradzki, a spokesman for the Jewish community. [...]

The city recently appointed an anti-hate-crimes coordinator, Bjorn Lagerback, who said Mr. Reepalu has sent a letter to the city's 20,000 employees denouncing all attacks against minorities in Malmo, though without specifically mentioning Jews.

The coordinator's priority seems to be downplaying the severity of the situation and drawing false equivalences with hate crimes and violent intimidation:

Asked whether Jews were particularly targeted by hate crimes in Malmo, Mr. Lagerback said anti-Semitism had become "more explicit." He added that "we also have discrimination against women who wear a hijab. They are also exposed to various kinds of insults."

And no time is ever a bad time to sidestep the issue by playing the victim card:

Mosque leader Mr. Becirov spoke similarly, saying he feels "great sympathy for the Jewish community" and knows what it's going through because "the Muslim community, too, is exposed to Islamophobia."...

Thwarting a new Beslan. "Azerbaijan Says Thwarts Plot to Attack School," from Reuters, March 29:

BAKU (Reuters) - Azerbaijan said on Monday it had detained eight people including a Chechen man on suspicion of planning "terrorist acts" against a school and kindergarten in the capital of the oil-producing Caucasus state.

Secular authorities in mainly Muslim Azerbaijan, a tightly controlled former Soviet republic, are concerned over what they say is the rising influence of radical Islam and the threat posed to the country's oil-fuelled economic growth.

Some analysts warn of potential spillover from an insurgency in neighbouring Russia's mainly Muslim southern republics, where suspicion fell on Monday after two female suicide bombers blew themselves up on the Moscow metro killing 38 people.

Azerbaijan's National Security Ministry said police had arrested eight members of an "organised criminal group, crossing illegally from Georgia into Azerbaijan with the aim of carrying out terrorist acts."

A ministry statement said seven were Azeris, including three women, and the eighth was from Russia's southern Chechnya republic.

It said the group had earlier concealed weapons and ammunition in the roof of a kindergarten and a school in the capital Baku and planned to attack both. The suspected ringleader is still at large, it added....

No worries -- Qaddafi's partition plan will put a stop to all of this, right? "Nigerian Islamist sect threaten to widen attacks," by Aminu Abubakar for Agence France-Presse, March 29:

KANO, Nigeria -- Nigeria's self-styled Taliban militant Islamist sect, whose short-lived uprising was brutally put down by the security forces last year, has threatened to widen its activities beyond the borders.

"Islam doesn't recognise international boundaries, we will carry out our operations anywhere in the world if we can have the chance," said Musa Tanko, spokesman of the Boko Haram sect, in a rare interview given to AFP on Sunday.

"The United States is the number one target for its oppression and aggression against Muslim nations particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan and its blind support to Israel in its killings of our Palestinian brethren," Tanko said, adjusting his starched bottle green kaftan.

Thousands of Boko Haram Islamic sect militia launched an armed insurrection in July 2009 from their enclave in the northern city of Maiduguri and several other cities in the region in a doomed bid to establish an Islamic state.

"We will launch fiercer attacks than Iraqi or Afghan Mujahedeen (Islamic fighters) against our enemies throughout the world, particularly the US, if the chance avails itself within the confines of what Islam prescribes but for now our attention is focused on Nigeria which is our starting point," Tanko said, as he placed a black file folder on his lap.

Slim, dark, chin-bearded and soft-spoken, Tanko, 30, betrayed no emotion as he spoke under a defoliated tree, intermittently wiping sweat off his glistening forehead with a white handkerchief, while his four colleagues nodded in approval between pauses.

The group draws its inspiration from the Afghan Taliban and sees Taliban spiritual leader Mullah Umar and the leader of Al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, as its champions, Tanko said.

"We see Mullah Umar and Osama bin Laden as the true champions of Islam who are fighting Allah' s enemies and our allegiance and support go to them although we don' t have any contact with them yet," Tanko said....

The Fraggle-haired mind behind "Isratine" has another bright idea. Of course, the emergence of parallel Islamic legal systems in Nigeria's northern provinces goes a long way toward placing the country on the slippery slope toward secession or civil war, as no amount of Nigeria under Islamic law will be "enough" of Nigeria under Islamic law. Simply attempting to draw the border could ignite decades of warfare, not unlike the jihad over and against Kashmir.

"Gaddafi says Nigeria should split into several states," from BBC News, March 29:

Libya's Muammar Gaddafi says Nigeria should be divided into several states along ethnic lines - comments which are bound to anger Nigeria's government.

He said Nigeria should follow the model of Yugoslavia, after previously saying it should be divided into two - along the lines of India and Pakistan.

Oh, that just worked great.

He recently said Nigeria should be split into a Muslim and a Christian country to end communal clashes.

That prompted a furious Nigeria to recall its ambassador to Tripoli.

Nigeria's foreign ministry said Col Gaddafi's initial comments were "irresponsible".

"His theatrics and grandstanding at every auspicious occasion have become too numerous to recount," said a foreign ministry statement.

A Nigerian senator called Col Gaddafi, until recently head of the African Union, a "mad man".

Nigeria's government has not yet commented on his latest comments.

The BBC's Rana Jawad in Tripoli says the dispute appears to have become a tit-for-tat game.

'Peaceful secession'

In response to Nigeria's condemnation, Col Gaddafi issued a statement to the state-run news agency, Jana.

"It became clear... that Nigeria does not consist of two parts," he accepted, before adding:

"The Yoruba people in the west and south demand independence, while the Igbo people live in the east and south.

"It became clear that the Ijaw people demand independence and the [Hausa] people in the north call for the establishment of the [Hausa] state."

In his original comments, Col Gaddafi said that Nigeria should be divided into two - comparing it to the partition of British India into Hindu-dominated India and Muslim Pakistan, which led to at least 200,000 deaths and possibly as many as one million.

But the Libyan leader now suggests Nigeria should follow in the footsteps of Yugoslavia.

He says the most bloody conflict in the former-Yugoslavia - in Bosnia - arose because that was a multi-ethnic state, while the other countries seceded "peacefully".

An attempt by Nigeria's Igbo people to gain independence in 1967 sparked a war which left more than one million people dead.

Hundreds have died this year in violence between rival Muslim and Christian groups around the city of Jos.

Nigeria is Africa's most populous nation, with some 130 million people. It has more than 250 different ethnic groups, broadly divided into a largely Muslim north and mainly Christian south.

Wishing a sweet Passover to all Jihad Watch readers tonight.

Yes, all of you. Stand with Israel on the front lines of the defense against the global jihad and Islamic supremacism! Stand for freedom! Stand for humane values! Stand with Israel and all Jews worldwide!

(Above is video of my asking Professor Cute, Rob Atkinson, about his Argument From Nice against the freedom of speech. Video thanks to Jamie.)

(L-R): Eric Giunta with me and my friend Tim

I decided to attend the counter-Spencer meeting at FSU today, and in one sense I was pleasantly surprised. From how it was advertised, it looked as if "The 1st Amendment & Professional Responsibility in a Republic" would be an apologia for the restriction of the freedom of speech. Unexpectedly, however, Professor Nat Stern actually gave a defense of the First Amendment, explicitly ruling out the possibility that a group could restrict free speech on the grounds that it was offensive.

Stern was followed, however, by the clownish and vapid Professor Rob Atkinson, who spent what seemed like hours preening and being cute, but ultimately only making one point: that even though speech that offended others was legal, his mother would tell him to be nice and not to do things that offended other people, and that was a good rule to follow. During the question period I told him that I was offended by attempts to restrict free speech, as they opened the door to tyranny, and so when two parties were offended in contradictory directions, who would play the role of his mother and apply the Argument From Nice to decide who would have to put up with being offended? In response Atkinson said -- amid more billows of nothingness -- that one must consult the founding texts of the great monotheistic religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. He did not address the problem of what to do when those texts contradicted each other, as in the Qur'an's repeated assertion that it was offensive to Allah's transcendent majesty to have a son, and the New Testament's avowal of Jesus as the Son of God.

Atkinson drew a final laugh from the happy and sympathetic crowd when he emphasized that no one among the FSU administration was telling students not to attend my talk tomorrow, but...he himself would not be able to make it. As he was leaving the hall I asked him again to come and have a discussion about these issues, but he screwed up his face and said with palpable insincerity, "I'm busy."

But aside from those unable or unwilling to defend their (indeed untenable) positions, the meeting today wasn't as bad as I expected it to be -- and of course it was attended by the Dean of the Law School and many others who told Eric Giunta, the courageous law student who brought me to the campus, that they somehow had conflicts during my talk tomorrow. What a coincidence!

Anyway, I want to thank all those who wrote to the law school telling them not to cave to intimidation. Dean Wayne Logan of the school told me that he had been getting large numbers of emails lecturing him about the First Amendment, and complained that I shouldn't have said that the administration was trying to block my talk. However, when I asked him if he had read what I had written, he said no. In fact, this is what I wrote: "I'm scheduled to speak at the Florida State University College of Law on March 30 at 12:30PM, but the Leftist and Islamic fascists are working overtime to try to silence me -- and the truth about Islamic jihad, Islamic supremacism, and Sharia." I didn't say anything about the administration trying to cancel the talk. You can read here in detail what Eric Giunta got from the FSU law school administration.

My address is tomorrow at 12:30. All those who are not joining the Muslim students' cowardly boycott are invited to attend and ask me hard questions.

Professor Atkinson wasn't in

Leboon identifies himself as a Shi'ite Muslim -- and certainly his vicious antisemitism is in keeping with Islamic attitudes toward Jews (cf. Qur'an 5:82, 5:59-60, etc.). "Phila. man charged with threatening GOP's No2 in Congress," by Joseph A. Slobodzian for the Philadelphia Inquirer, March 29 (thanks to Pamela):

A Northeast Philadelphia man has been charged with threatening the life of a Virginia Congressman and his family in an Internet video studded with Old Testament references and referring to the "final Yom Kippur."

Norman Leboon, 38, of the 1600 block of Benner Street in Mayfair, was charged by the U.S. Attorney's office in Philadelphia with two counts involving threats against U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor (R., Va.), the Republican House whip.

Leboon was arrested Saturday by the FBI, three days after his YouTube video was seen by someone in San Francisco and reported to the FBI....

But of course, he is crazy -- a claim that would be more convincing if it weren't trotted out virtually every time a Muslim commits a jihad attack:

Reed said Leboon had a history of mental illness and that he would undergo a psychiatric evaluation.

In his YouTube video, Leboon referred to himself as the "son of the God of Enoch," an apparent reference to the character from the biblical Book of Genesis who was the son of Cain and the father of Methusulah.

Referring to the Jewish holy day of atonement, Leboon's video warned Cantor: "Remember, Eric . . . our judgment time, the final Yom Kippur has been given." The video then refers to Cantor as "Lucifer, you're a pig . . . you're an abomination."

Leboon has one prior arrest, an open case in Philadelphia charging him with terroristic threats, assault and recklessly endangering another person....

It's a private school that retains a "covenant" relationship with the Presbyterian Church. But nonetheless, "the year of Our Lord" is an affront to "diversity." While these enterprising students are at it, how about "Trinity" University? They probably didn't name it after the river that traverses eastern Texas. And just for grins, what of "San Antonio," where the school is located?

If one doesn't want to be offended by a private university's religious heritage, it's not as if Texas is exactly lacking in public institutions. If there were ever a case of barking up the wrong tree, this is it, and it should be addressed as such.

"Students want 'Our Lord' phrase off diplomas," by Melissa Ludwig for the Express-News, March 29 (thanks to José):

A group of students at Trinity University is lobbying trustees to drop a reference to "Our Lord" on their diplomas, arguing it does not respect the diversity of religions on campus.

"A diploma is a very personal item, and people want to proudly display it in their offices and homes," said Sidra Qureshi, president of Trinity Diversity Connection. "By having the phrase 'In the Year of Our Lord,' it is directly referencing Jesus Christ, and not everyone believes in Jesus Christ."

Qureshi, who is Muslim, has led the charge to tweak the wording, winning support from student government and a campus commencement committee. Trustees are expected to consider the students' request at a May board meeting.

Other students and President Dennis Ahlburg have defended the wording, arguing that references to the school's Presbyterian roots are appropriate and unobtrusive.

Founded by Presbyterians in 1869, Trinity has been governed by an independent board of trustees since 1969 but maintains a "covenant relationship" with the church.

"Any cultural reference, even if it is religious, our first instinct should not be to remove it, but to accept it and tolerate it," said Brendan McNamara, president of the College Republicans.

McNamara pointed out that Trinity displays other signs of its Christian heritage, including a chapel on campus, a chaplain, Christmas vespers and a Bible etching on the Trinity seal.

"Once you remove that phrase, where do you draw the line?" McNamara asked.

The debate started last year when Isaac Medina, a Muslim convert from Guadalajara, Mexico, noticed the wording while looking at pre-made diploma frames in the Trinity bookstore. When Medina applied to Trinity, university staff told him it wasn't a religious institution and that it maintained only a historical bond to the Presbyterian Church.

So the godly reference "came as a big surprise," said Medina, who graduated in December. "I felt I was a victim of a bait and switch."

At first, Qureshi and Medina sought a change only for students who desired it. But university staff told them the school would not print custom diplomas, so they requested dropping the words "Our Lord" from all diplomas issued.

In January, the student government and the Muslim Student Association co-sponsored a forum to debate the issue. And in February, the Association of Student Representatives and the university's commencement and convocation committee both voted to support the change, Qureshi said.

"I honestly feel like nobody actually noticed it before," Medina said. "Now that it has been brought up, the institution is trying to find its own identity. Are we or are we not a religious institution?"

Though Trinity has historically enrolled mostly Anglo Christians, the university has taken pains to increase diversity in recent years. Since 1999, the share of international students has increased from 1 percent to 9 percent.

Medina, a former international student, said he always has felt welcome at Trinity. The chaplain on campus caters to students of all religions, and the university recently dedicated a Muslim prayer space in Parker Chapel.

"I never had the experience that Trinity was a closeted Christian institution," Medina said.

Ahlburg, who took the helm in January, said Trinity should continue to foster a diverse environment but should not ignore its cultural and religious roots.

"The fundamental issue is not so much what is on the diploma. The fundamental question is, 'Is Trinity a place that is accepting and supportive of all faiths?'" Ahlburg said.

Current students are not Trinity's only stakeholders, Ahlburg said. The university also has thousands of alumni and donors to appease, many of whom have called Ahlburg to tell him they oppose the change.

"Democracy is not letting a small number of people have their way," Ahlburg said. "Democracy is listening to the different voices and making an informed decision."

Jihad in Moscow: an update on this story. "Double suicide bombings kill 37 on Moscow subway," by David Nowak for the Associated Press, March 29:

MOSCOW - Two female suicide bombers blew themselves up on Moscow's subway system as it was jam-packed with rush-hour passengers Monday, killing at least 37 people and wounding 102, officials said.

The head of Russia's main security agency said preliminary investigation places the blame on rebels from the restive Caucasus region that includes Chechnya, where separatists have fought Russian forces since the mid-1990s.

The first explosion took place just before 8 a.m. at the Lubyanka station in central Moscow. The station is underneath the building that houses the main offices of the Federal Security Service, or FSB, the KGB's main successor agency.

A second explosion hit the Park Kultury station about 45 minutes later.

Emergency Minister Sergei Shoigu said the toll was 37 killed and 102 injured, but he did not give a breakdown of casualties at each station, according to Russian news agencies.

"I heard a bang, turned my head and smoke was everywhere. People ran for the exits screaming," said 24-year-old Alexander Vakulov, who said he was on a train on the platform opposite the targeted train at Park Kultury.

"I saw a dead person for the first time in my life," said 19-year-old Valentin Popov, who had just arrived at the station from the opposite direction.

In a televised meeting with President Dmitry Medvedev, Federal Security Service head Alexander Bortnikov said body fragments of the two bombers pointed to a Caucasus connection. He did not elaborate.

"We will continue the fight against terrorism unswervingly and to the end," Medvedev said. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, on an official trip to Siberia, was being kept informed of developments, news reports said.

The blasts practically paralyzed movement in the city center as emergency vehicles sped to the stations.

In the Park Kultury blast, the bomber was wearing a belt packed with plastic explosive and set it off as the train's doors opened, said Vladimir Markin, a spokesman for Russia's top investigative body. The woman has not been identified, he told reporters.

A woman who sells newspapers outside the Lubyanka station, Ludmila Famokatova, said there appeared to be no panic, but that many of the people who streamed out were distraught.

"One man was weeping, crossing himself, saying 'thank God I survived'," she said.

The last confirmed terrorist attack in Moscow was in August 2004, when a suicide bomber blew herself up outside a city subway station, killing 10 people. Responsibility for that blast was claimed by Chechen rebels.

Russian police have killed several Islamic militant leaders in the North Caucasus recently, including one last week in the Kabardino-Balkariya region. The killing of Anzor Astemirov was mourned by contributors to two al-Qaida-affiliated Web sites.

The killings have raised fears of retaliatory strikes by the militants.

In February, Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov warned in an interview on a rebel-affiliated Website that "the zone of military operations will be extended to the territory of Russia ... the war is coming to their cities."

Umarov also claimed his fighters were responsible for the November bombing of the Nevsky Express passenger train that killed 26 people en route from Moscow to St. Petersburg.

Umarov is also implicated in the assassination of a Russian Orthodox priest.

The Moscow subway system is one of the world's busiest, carrying around 7 million passengers on an average workday, and is a key element in running the sprawling and traffic-choked city.

The intrepid mujahedin, bravely outsourcing the jihad to children. "New West Point report details meticulous training Taliban kids go through at Pakistani terror school," by James Gordon Meek for the New York Daily News, March 28:

WASHINGTON - Pakistani terror camps are teaching children the three R's: reading, 'riting and rage.

Taliban suicide schools dotting the Af-Pak tribal belt leave no child behind in the deadly lessons.

Graduates don't go to college - they blow themselves to bits in Afghanistan to find paradise.

Since 2005, when the Haqqani Taliban introduced suicide bombings in the Afghan war, kids have become a messenger of choice.

The suicide schools aren't new, but the processes of recruiting, training and operations are detailed in a grim new report by West Point's Combating Terrorism Center.

The tiny Taliban enrolled in Pakistani camps dotting the battle-scarred landscape go through a curriculum not unlike their American counterparts - but with a violent twist.

A typical day for the mostly Pashtun "fidai" - suicide bombers, who call other jihadis "common mujahids" - begins before dawn in camps numbering no more than 35 "students."

The black-turbaned recruits - typically 12 or 13 years old, with some as young as 7 - recite Koran verses until morning prayers.

They eat together, and then "driver's ed" takes on a sinister new meaning, according to writer S.H. Tajik, a United Nations law enforcement official, in the latest "CTC Sentinel."

Tajik drew his information from Pakistani government interrogations of nabbed jihadis.

"After breakfast, most trainees receive driver's education and practice vehicle maneuvers ... in preparation for vehicle-borne suicide attacks," he explained.

At one school, "six station wagons were available for this," Tajik wrote, citing detainees grilled by officials in Islamabad. The kids clean camp until lunch, take a nap, then take more "outdoor driving lessons after having tea with cookies."

"I want to grow up with military training, to participate in fighting and, Allah willing, to perform a martyrdom operation," said a pint-size wanna-be in a 2008 Islamic Jihad Union video found by the SITE Intelligence Group.

Many never grow up. They are sent to bomb U.S. and coalition targets in neighboring Afghanistan. Other kids are reclaimed by their families - though some run away and return to the Taliban schools.

"There was good food, pocket money, good friends and vehicles for driving," captured trainee Abid Mehsud said in his confession, the report says.

Terror groups on both sides of the border have hardly made the training and use of child suicide bombers a secret and have released videos about them as recently as January.

"Sick bastards," said one U.S. official, who confirmed that the West Point report generally rang true....

The terminology was carefully chosen by the Sharia-inclined parties pushing this law. After all, what kind of person, they could ask, would object to curbing pornography? What kind of religious group would object?

They can thus seize upon objections to portray their opponents as perverts and savages to an inattentive audience that projects their own understanding onto a term that is being used in quite a different context. It's actually quite a common tactic, though usually employing ostensibly positive terms like "peace," "justice," "human rights," "women's rights," and so forth.

The crucial difference occurs when Sharia is the framework in which such terms are defined. Hence, in this case, all freedom of personal and religious expression becomes subject to Sharia. As such, the "pornography" law threatens to become a vehicle for Islamic supremacism and the cultural genocide of non-Islamic traditions, whether Christian, Hindu, or other non-Islamic faiths in Indonesia.

"Christ on cross 'could be porn under Indon law'," from CathNewsAsia, March 29:

Even the naked body of Christ may be considered as pornography after Indonesia's Constitutional Court approved a new anti-porn law, Catholics fear.

The fears arose after the Constitutional Court declared the anti-pornography law (enacted by the Government in 2008) to be compatible with Indonesian public policy, Fides reports.

Fides sources say that in Indonesian civil society, among moderate Muslims, Christians, and Hindu groups, as well as associations dedicated to protecting freedom and human rights - especially in eastern Indonesia- have challenged the document.

"It is not that we are pro-pornography," explained Catholic sources of Fides, "but because it is feared that this law - accepting a controversial generic definition of 'pornography,' which includes 'any attitude and any artistic-cultural form of communication that excites a sexual instinct or is contrary to morality,' lends itself easily to exploitation: the fundamentalist Muslim fringe can use it to penalize non-Muslims and, ultimately, seek to impose strictly traditional customs, even the Sharia."

"Our angels are naked," an Indonesian priest told Fides ironically. "Will they be outlawed? This law comes at a time when the country is also debating the blasphemy law, which carries similar risks.

Many Islamic leaders and intellectuals have called for a review of the measure on blasphemy, saying it is the wrong weapon to leave in the hands of radical Islamic groups.

In the case of the anti-pornography bill, however, threats and insults have hit Catholic Judge Maria Farida, one of the nine judges of the Constitutional Court (the only woman and the only Catholic of the Court) because she courageously voted against this bill. We wish to express our support and our prayers for her."

Even when the text of the law was drafted two years ago, the Indonesian Bishops expressed strong doubts and misgivings, in part because the rules that regulate public morality and decency in Indonesia are already contained in other legislation.

Just the other day, they also ruled that Sharia takes precedence over civil law. That paves the way for rulings like this, which uphold Muhammad's example above those pesky modern Indonesian laws about child welfare and human rights.

"NU rules in favor of underage marriages," by Muhammad Nafik and Andi Hajramurni for the Jakarta Post, March 27:

The minimum age of 16 years to marry under the prevailing 1974 marriage law is not a sharia-binding regulation for Muslims, according to Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) jurists.

The panel of sharia experts announced there was no age limitation for marriage under Islamic law.

They did not cite gender; but the law states that women must be at least 16 to marry, while the minimum age for men to marry is 18.

The experts said Muslim parents can marry off their underage children, but strongly appealed for marriages to only be carried out after the child has reached puberty.

Non-binding. Wink-wink.

The jurists underlined that couples in which both are underage must abstain from sexual intercourse until they are deemed physically and mentally capable of doing so.

In practice, the person making that call will all too likely be the randy old creep who just married a 12-year-old.

The edict was reached at a meeting of jurists at the national leadership conference of NU, the country's largest Muslim organization, in Makassar, South Sulawesi.

"The majority of clerics are of the opinion that there is no minimum age limit in marriage under sharia law," NU jurist Cholil Nafis told a press conference on the sidelines of the congress on Friday.

The edict to allow for underage marriages quickly sparked protests from human rights activists Friday.

"It's a setback and contravenes the 2002 Child Protection Law," National Commission for Child's Protection (Komnas Anak) secretary general Arist Merdeka Sirait said.

Article 48 of the law requires parents to prevent their children from underage marriages, he argued.

"Underage marriages eliminate the rights of children, particularly to determine their future, and encourages sexual exploitation," Arist said....

Noting that Islamic law forbids musical instruments will bring you swift charges of "ignorance" and "Islamophobia," but the "militiamen" in Iraq who believe that music is un-Islamic are not ignorant "Islamophobes":

Hadith Qudsi 19:5: "The Prophet said that Allah commanded him to destroy all the musical instruments, idols, crosses and all the trappings of ignorance." (The Hadith Qudsi, or holy Hadith, are those in which Muhammad transmits the words of Allah, although those words are not in the Qur'an.)

Muhammad also said:

(1) "Allah Mighty and Majestic sent me as a guidance and mercy to believers and commanded me to do away with musical instruments, flutes, strings, crucifixes, and the affair of the pre-Islamic period of ignorance."

(2) "On the Day of Resurrection, Allah will pour molten lead into the ears of whoever sits listening to a songstress."

(3) "Song makes hypocrisy grow in the heart as water does herbage."

(4) "This community will experience the swallowing up of some people by the earth, metamorphosis of some into animals, and being rained upon with stones." Someone asked, "When will this be, O Messenger of Allah?" and he said, "When songstresses and musical instruments appear and wine is held to be lawful."

(5) "There will be peoples of my Community who will hold fornication, silk, wine, and musical instruments to be lawful ...." -- 'Umdat al-Salik r40.0

Sharia Alert from Iraq: "Oud maker labors in secret on Baghdad rooftop," by Hamza Hendawi for AP, March 28:

BAGHDAD -- In a tiny workshop on the roof of his home in a Baghdad slum, Farhan Hassan works in secret, lovingly curving wood and tightening strings to make his ouds -- a traditional Arabic instrument.

Only close family and friends know what he is doing, because the militiamen in his neighborhood frown on such frivolities.

The oud's angst-filled tunes define Iraq's music, the same way the Tigris and Euphrates rivers define its landscape. But nowadays few in the country play or make the oud, a pear-shaped, deep-voiced cousin of the lute. Hundreds of artists fled Iraq during the violence in recent years -- and continued instability and the power of religious hard-liners give them little desire to return....

Now Hassan is also hoping to leave Iraq. Like many of the estimated 2.5 million Shiites who live in Sadr City, he has had to cope with some of the city's worst living conditions. Militiamen have closed music stores, prohibited the mixing of the sexes, banned wedding parties, imposed the Islamic hijab on women and murdered gay men -- all while making a living as hired guns....

"I could have gone out on the streets carrying an RPG or a machine-gun and people would either take no notice or commend me on my courage," he mused. "But I would have probably been killed if I had gone out with an oud in my hand," he said with a laugh tinged with bitterness....

If the Russians are correct that these were suicide attacks, this would be yet another indication that aiding the Iranian jihad is not winning the Russians any points with the Chechen jihadists. "Twin Subway Blasts Kill at Least 20 in Moscow," by Clifford J. Levy in the New York Times, March 29 (thanks to all who sent this in):

MOSCOW -- Huge explosions during morning rush hour in two subway stations in central Moscow killed more than 20 people on Monday, officials said, raising fears of a renewal of terrorism here.

The causes of the blasts were not immediately clear, but the government said it suspected suicide bombers, Russian news agencies reported.

The subway system, one of the world's most extensive, had been subjected to attacks related to the separatist war in Chechnya in the early part of the last decade.

Officials said the first explosion Monday occurred at 7:50 a.m. in the Lubyanka subway station, killing people both on the platform and aboard an incoming train. Numerous others were injured....

About 40 minutes later, another explosion occurred in the second car of a train at the Park Kultury station, officials said. The number of casualties was not immediately known....

CAIR filed the complaint. School district officials uncritically and compliantly turned to CAIR for help. None appear to have dared to question (and probably none even thought to question) the veracity of the reports themselves, despite the Hamas-linked CAIR's track record of publicizing fake hate crimes.

"School leaders, CAIR meet over complaints," by Dave Aeikens for the St. Cloud Times, March 27:

St. Cloud school district and leaders of a Minnesota Islamic civil rights group agreed Friday to continue to work together to make schools safe for all students.

Members of the Council on American-Islamic Relations' Minnesota chapter and St. Cloud school district officials met in St. Cloud for about 90 minutes Friday to discuss the complaint CAIR filed with the U.S. Department of Education claiming that Muslim students confront a hostile learning environment in St. Cloud schools. It is expected to take a month to determine whether there will be an investigation.

The school district has agreed that human resources director and human rights director Tracy Flynn Bowe will serve as the point person for any future complaints CAIR hears from St. Cloud students.

CAIR has also agreed to consider writing a second letter to the Department of Education saying that CAIR and St. Cloud school district have been partners in working through issues in the schools. The two sides are also considering a joint statement to the community saying the same thing. [...]

CAIR and St. Cloud schools have been working through discrimination complaints from Muslim students since June. The relationship has included numerous face-to-face meetings, phone conversations and staff training provided by CAIR.

The district said it was disappointed that CAIR felt the need to take the complaint to the federal government and that the rights group's letter had not included it had been working with St. Cloud schools the past nine months.

But apparently not disappointed enough to grow skeptical about this gang of thugs:

"I hope we continue to use them as a resource. They want that and we want that," Superintendent Steve Jordahl said....

What could go wrong?

These raids and the alleged Christian character of the militia, as well as its targeting Muslims, is a mainstream media dream come true -- a few years back the BBC featured an inversion-of-reality drama about Christians beheading Muslims, and now, lo and behold, it seems to have come to life. For years to come this "Hutaree" will be thrown in the face of anyone who takes note of jihad activity in the United States and around the world, as if this group in itself balances and equals the innumerable Islamic groups that are waging armed jihad all around the world today.

The point will be the same as the one Tim McVeigh has had to shoulder alone all these years (even though he wasn't really a Christian at all, and did not justify the Oklahoma City bombing by reference to Christian teaching): that every religion has its "extremists," and that therefore it would be bad form to subject Islam to greater critical scrutiny, and Muslims to greater law enforcement scrutiny. Everyone does it, don't you see? Al-Qaeda, Hamas, Hizballah, Jemaah Islamiyah, al-Shabaab, and on and on and on -- yes, but the Hutaree!

Meanwhile, why doesn't the Detroit News include in this story quotations from Christian leaders explaining how they condemn this "Christian militia," and that Christianity doesn't condone such violence, and that these militiamen have twisted and hijacked their peaceful faith? After all, they always include such quotes from Muslim leaders in every story about Islamic jihad terror activity. Why is the practice different in this case?

Yet instead of the mainstream moderate Christians (heh) that we would have every reason to expect the Detroit News to feature in this story, Hamas-linked CAIR shows up toward the end of this article, playing the victim card with gusto, so that as the arrests were announced, "audible gaps" (yikes!) sounded in their 10th anniversary banquet hall. The claiming of victim status, complete with gasping prospective victims, is artful -- and of course the Detroit News says nothing about CAIR's links to Hamas, the jihad-related arrests and convictions of several of its officials, and the rest of this group's unsavory record. A responsible reporter might have asked Dawud Walid if he thought this alleged Christian militia group was a "backlash" after the sharp increase in jihad terror activity in the U.S. in the last year, but why should the Detroit News have responsible reporters on staff when no other mainstream media outlet does?

And as for the FBI and the JTTF, are they investigating the Muslim camps around the country where firearms and paramilitary training are known to be going on? Are they doing so with the same energy and resources that they obviously have devoted to the investigation of this Christian militia? If not, why not? If the allegations against this group are true, they richly deserve to be raided and arrested and shut down. But there have been allegations made against Islamic compounds in the U.S. that are quite similar, and nothing has been done. Why is that?

"Seven arrested in FBI raids linked to Christian militia group," by Jennifer Chambers for The Detroit News, March 28 (thanks to all who sent this in):

At least seven people, including some from Michigan, have been arrested in raids by a FBI-led Joint Terrorism Task Force in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana as part of an investigation into an Adrian-based Christian militia group, a person familiar with the matter said. [...]

Lackomar said he heard from other militia members that the FBI targeted the Hutaree after its members made threats of violence against Islamic organizations. [...]

One of the Hutaree members called a Michigan militia leader for assistance Saturday after federal agents had already began their raid, Lackomar said, but the militia member -- who is of Islamic decent and had heard about the threats -- declined to offer help. That Michigan militia leader is now working with federal officials to provide information on the Hutaree member for the investigation, Lackomar said Sunday. [...]

Dawud Walid, executive director of the Council on Islamic-American [sic!] Relations of Michigan, made an announcement Sunday during the group's 10th anniversary banquet about receiving a call from a network journalist about the alleged threat against Muslims.

"Don't allow this news to scare you away from practicing your faith," said Walid.

Audible gaps [sic!] were heard throughout the banquet hall when the news was announced. Walid said he will call local authorities about more information on the allegations. He urged local Muslims to recommitt [sic] themselves to their faith in light of the accusations.

Yes, that will pacify everything.

Once again, Western custom and practice must adapt to Islamic custom and practice. There is never any compromise on the Islamic side, or any adaption, assimilation, or accommodation, when in non-Muslim countries. But no one ever seems to notice.

"Female Muslim doctors allowed to wear disposable sleeves for modesty: official guidance," by Rebecca Smith in the Telegraph, March 27 (thanks to Wally):

Female Muslim doctors and nurses are to be allowed to wear disposable sleeves in order to comply with NHS rules to prevent the spread of hospital superbugs. All staff involved in caring for patients should be 'bare below the elbows' to ensure sleeves do not become contaminated and hands can be washed thoroughly to prevent infections passed around the ward.

However female Muslim staff had been concerned about the rule as exposure of their forearms is seen as immodest.

Staff in several hospitals had reportedly refused to expose their arms for hand washing and 'scrubbing in' procedures before surgery.

New guidance from the Department of Health said staff can wear disposable sleeves which are elasticated at the wrist and elbow when in contact with patients.

The guidance also states that using alcohol gel to cleanse hands between treating patients does not contravene strict Muslim rules on alcohol.

The guidance was drawn up following meetings between the Muslim Spiritual Care Provision in the NHS group and Islamic scholars, chaplains, multi-faith representatives and infection control experts.

It said: "Use of hand disinfection gels containing synthetic alcohol does not fall within the Muslim prohibition against natural alcohol (from fermented fruit or grain)."...

What a relief!

Turning allies into enemies and enemies into allies. It's all explained in my forthcoming book, The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War On America. "US 'may not veto UN resolution on Jerusalem,'" from the BBC, March 28 (thanks to Weasel Zippers):

The US is considering abstaining from a possible UN Security Council resolution against Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem, sources suggest to the BBC.

The possibility surfaced at talks in Paris last week between a senior US official and Qatar's foreign minister.

The official said the US would "seriously consider abstaining" if the issue of Israeli settlements was put to the vote, a diplomat told the BBC.

US officials in Washington have not confirmed the report. [...]

The US usually blocks Security Council resolutions criticising Israel. [...]

The reported exchange between the US official and Qatar's foreign minister came to light during a meeting at an Arab League summit in the Libyan town of Sirte.

A diplomatic source told the BBC that Qatar's Foreign Minister, Sheikh Hamad Bin Jasim Al Thani - who is also the prime minister - had recently met an official high up in the Obama administration during a visit to France.

During their talks, Sheikh Hamad asked the US official whether Washington would guarantee not to veto a UN Security Council resolution that was critical of Israel's ongoing settlement construction in East Jerusalem.

The diplomat said the US official had replied that the current feeling in Washington was that they would "seriously consider abstention".

An Egyptian official is said to have confirmed his knowledge of the US position during a meeting at the Arab League summit, which was held behind closed doors. [...]

The BBC's Rana Jawad, in Sirte, says that many people will see the comments as yet another sign of Washington's recent dispute with Israel....

No kidding, really?

But surely the moderate, peaceful, America-loving Balkan Muslims that we hear so much about will rise up and cast the Saudis and their clients out, won't they? Friend and Ally Update: "Saudis fund Balkan Muslims spreading hate of the West," by Bojan Pancevski in The Sunday Times, March 28 (thanks to Tien):

SAUDI ARABIA is pouring hundreds of millions of pounds into Islamist groups in the Balkans, some of which spread hatred of the West and recruit fighters for jihad in Afghanistan.

According to officials in Macedonia, Islamic fundamentalism threatens to destabilise the Balkans. Strict Wahhabi and Salafi factions funded by Saudi organisations are clashing with traditionally moderate local Muslim communities.

Fundamentalists have financed the construction of scores of mosques and community centres as well as handing some followers up to £225 a month. They are expected not only to grow beards but also to persuade their wives to wear the niqab, or face veil, a custom virtually unknown in the liberal Islamic tradition of the Balkans.

Government sources in traditionally secular Macedonia (official title the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia), said they were monitoring up to 50 Al-Qaeda volunteers recruited to fight in Afghanistan.

Classified documents seen by The Sunday Times reveal that Macedonian officials are also investigating a number of Islamic charities, some in Saudi Arabia, which are active throughout the Balkans and are suspected of spreading extremism and laundering money for terrorist organisations.

One of the groups under scrutiny is the International Islamic Relief Organisation from Saudi Arabia, which is on a United Nations blacklist of organisations backing terrorism. It did not respond to inquiries, but has previously denied involvement in terrorist activities, calling such claims "totally unfounded".

According to its website, it works in 32 countries to provide relief to the victims of natural disasters and to carry out humanitarian, health and educational projects.

"Hundreds of millions have been poured into Macedonia alone in the past decade and most of it comes from Saudi Arabia," said a government source. "The Saudis' main export seems to be ideology, not oil."

Sulejman Rexhepi, leader of the Islamic community in Macedonia, said a number of mosques had been forcibly taken over by radical groups. Four in central Skopje are no longer under the control of the official Islamic authorities. New imams claim they have been "spontaneously" installed by the "people".

"Their so-called Wahhabi teachings are completely alien to our traditions and to the essence of Islam, which is a tolerant and inclusive religion," said Rexhepi.

In some mosques believers are being told that Macedonia, which sent 200 soldiers to Iraq and Afghanistan, has been tricked into supporting a crusade against Islam spearheaded by Britain and America. Radical clerics have shown footage from Afghanistan, Iraq and the Palestinian territories to illustrate their claims that the West is waging war on Islam. [...]

Rahman, a 35-year-old cab driver from Skopje, Macedonia's capital, said he had stopped going to his local mosque since it was taken over by extremists. "Following the Haiti earthquake the new imam said God would punish the West for their wars in Afghanistan and Iraq with natural disasters," he said.

Bekir Halimi, an imam trained in Syria, runs Bamiresia, an Islamic charity that has been investigated for alleged terrorist links and money laundering. Police raided its offices but failed to find any evidence of terrorist links.

"We are fully entitled to receive funding from both governmental and non-governmental organisations from Saudi Arabia," said Halimi, who refuses to name the sources of his funding but rejects any suggestion of criminal activity....

Last month, Bosnian security forces raided a village strongly influenced by Salafi extremists and found a weapons cache.

In raids elsewhere rifles, bombs and rocket-propelled grenades have been uncovered....

Surrender. "'Obama resigned to nuclear Iran,'" from the Jerusalem Post, March 28 (thanks to Alexandre):

Former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton expressed concern Sunday that Washington was coming to terms with a nuclear Iran.

"I very much worry the Obama administration is willing to accept a nuclear Iran, that's why there's this extraordinary pressure on Israel not to attack in Iran," Bolton told Army Radio.

The former envoy claimed that this pressure was the focus of last week's meetings in Washington between Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyhau and US officials, including President Barack Obama.

Bolton said that the Obama administration had embraced the view, prevalent in Europe, that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was the key to the resolution of all other conflicts throughout the Middle East, including the Iranian conflict.

He added that the rift in US-Israel relations stemmed from a fundamental difference in the understanding of the Middle East and Israel's role in the Middle East, and is not really about east Jerusalem at all.

Bolton said that the treatment Netanyahu received during his visit "should tell the people of Israel how difficult it's going to be dealing with Washington for the next couple of years."...

Bashar Assad seems lost, looking for a kind of "Big Brothers, Big Sisters" program to pair him with a mentor in the Islamic world. For a while, it was Iran. At the moment, it's Lionel Richie Muammar Qaddafi. "Assad, Ghaddafi to PA: Quit talks, embrace resistance," from the Associated Press, March 28:

SIRTE, Libya -- Syria and Libya teamed up Sunday to pressure the Palestinian leader to quit peace talks with Israel and return to violence, delegates to an Arab leadership summit said.

An adviser to the US-backed Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, quickly rejected the suggestion, calling for the 22 nations represented at the gathering in Sirte, Libya, to be "realistic." Despite the opposition from two of Israel's longtime foes, the summit was expected Sunday to renew backing for Palestinian peace talks with Israel.

Still, the calls to abandon the effort reflected the depth of frustration and anger over the stalled process and continued Israeli construction in areas claimed by the Palestinians, particularly eastJerusalem.

Syrian President Bashar Assad urged Abbas to withdraw from a US-supported peace plan and resume armed resistance to Israel, according to two delegates who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

They said Assad also urged Arab countries to halt any contacts with Israel, though only Egypt and Jordan have peace deals with the Jewish state.

"The price of resistance is not higher than the price of peace," one delegate quoted Assad as telling Abbas.

Libyan leader and summit host Moammar Ghaddafi warned that his nation may withdraw support for an initiative launched at a 2002 Arab League summit in Beirut calling for an exchange of land for peace with Israel, the delegates said.

Slay you, slay me...

Senior Abbas aide Nabil Abu Rudeineh dismissed the pressure.

"Let us be realistic. We will not follow those who have special agendas," he told Al-Jazeera television.

"We are ready for any Arab option. If they want to go to war let them declare that and mobilize their armies and their people and we will follow suit," Abu Rudeineh said....

And yet it does matter. How can anyone work to prevent this kind of thing from happening again without knowing why it happened in this case? Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad's father says: "I want to know how, who and why this happened to my son. And I say to you, if it happened to my son today, tomorrow it can be your son." Indeed it can -- but to get answers to his questions would entail investigating the Islamic faith and what is going on in mosques inside the United States as well as overseas. And neither Larry Jegley nor anyone else has the stomach for that.

Thus we can be sure: it will happen to more young American men. Because nothing whatsoever is being done to try to make sure that it won't.

"A father grieves for his son -- and the soldiers he's accused of shooting," by Kristina Goetz for the Commercial Appeal, March 28 (thanks to Axel):

Every other Saturday, Melvin Bledsoe makes a two-hour drive from Memphis to visit the son he still calls by his given name. [...]

Bledsoe studies the face of this dark-haired, brown-eyed 24-year-old in blue prison scrubs and sometimes catches a glimpse of the happy-go-lucky Carlos he raised. Other times, it's Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, the Muslim convert charged in a shooting at a Little Rock Army recruiting center last summer that killed one soldier and injured another.

That day, two privates who'd recently completed basic training were taking a cigarette break outside when Muhammad drove in front of the building and allegedly opened fire.

Pvt. Quinton Ezeagwula, 18, of Jacksonville, Ark., was wounded. Pvt. William A. Long, 23, of Conway, Ark., was shot dead. Long's mother was in the parking lot and heard the shots. She looked around and saw her son lying on the ground.

Bledsoe wants to understand how his son turned from middle-class Memphis roots to become a self-described member of al-Qaida who waged what he has described as a "jihadi attack on infidel forces."

"I want to know how, who and why this happened to my son," Bledsoe said. "And I say to you, if it happened to my son today, tomorrow it can be your son. This is something the American people need to wake up to. Tomorrow they could be looking for someone with blond hair and blue eyes."

Muhammad's trial, which is set for June 7, won't likely provide those answers. Pulaski County prosecutors, who are seeking the death penalty in the case in which Muhammad is charged with capital murder, attempted capital murder and 10 counts of unlawful discharge of a firearm from a vehicle, won't explore his religious beliefs or his claimed extremist ties.

"There's just no need for me to worry about what he says or to try to understand his motivation or anything else," said Pulaski County Prosecutor Larry Jegley. "All I care about is what he did and what I think I can prove that he did. Whether he claims to be a Martian who flew in here on a spaceship or whatever doesn't matter."

If we were under Martian attack, that would be a criminally stupid statement. But of course we are under Islamic jihad attack, and no one (except me) will say that Jegley is criminally stupid for ignoring that. Instead, most will hail his freedom from "bigotry" and "Islamophobia."

Bledsoe, 54, says his heart "bleeds for the families of the victims." But he believes the case has broader implications than authorities admit. In the months since the shooting, he has begun his own investigation.

Bledsoe says his son began to change about a year and a half into his studies at Tennessee State University in Nashville, shortly after his first brush with the law.

"He decided to go off to Knoxville one night with a group of other guys and got into some trouble," Bledsoe said. "He was arrested for having illegal guns and a little marijuana."

But the charges were dropped and expunged from his record, according to Bledsoe. The incident "scared him straight." He wanted to change his life but didn't think he was getting enough from the Baptist church. He checked out a synagogue, then a Nashville mosque.

His son started watching Malcolm X movies and read the teachings of Louis Farrakhan but soon became a Sunni Muslim. Bledsoe believes that foreign nationals his son met in Nashville led him to extremist ideas.

Over time, his son became deeply observant, and family members became concerned that he was too focused on religion. But they never heard him talk about extremist ideas or doing harm to anyone. He was "just someone trying to find his way in life," Bledsoe said.

In 2007, Carlos Bledsoe legally changed his name to Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad. In September of that year, he traveled to Yemen to teach English and learn Arabic to better study the Quran. He told his family he wanted to find a wife.

"I did not like it," Bledsoe said. "But, you have a year's contract at this place where you're going to teach. I'm saying to myself, 'You aren't going to like it. In a year's time, you'll be dying to get back.'"

Muhammad kept in touch every so often. Then one night after he'd been in Yemen about a year, Bledsoe got a late-night phone call from a woman whose English was so broken he could hardly understand her. It was Muhammad's wife, Reena. They got disconnected. Bledsoe worried that something was terribly wrong.

A few days later, they reconnected. Reena told Bledsoe that his son was in prison because he'd overstayed his visa. He later learned that Muhammad also had a fake Somali passport. After more than three months in jail, Muhammad was deported.

About four months after his return, he was working at a new office of his father's tour bus company in Little Rock. His family had no sense of what was to come.

On June 1, law enforcement officials say, Muhammad allegedly waged his attack with an assault rifle.

Not long after his arrest, Muhammad made a collect call from jail to The Associated Press to say the killing was justified because of U.S. military action in the Middle East. In January, he wrote a letter to the judge, saying he wanted to plead guilty to all charges and was affiliated with al-Qaida.

"I wasn't insane or post-traumatic, nor was I forced to do this act, which I believe," he wrote, "and it is justified according to Islamic laws and the Islamic religion. Jihad -- to fight those who wage war on Islam and Muslims."...

Bledsoe's questions remain unanswered. He wants to know why his son's case isn't in federal court, and how he was able to buy a gun at a Walmart in Little Rock despite being interviewed previously by the FBI.

Bledsoe said Muhammad was interviewed by a Nashville-based FBI agent during his incarceration in Yemen and that the same agent interviewed him again in Nashville when he returned to the United States. Bledsoe says the FBI should be held accountable for what he believes is negligence in not preventing the attack.

"The FBI knew exactly what the hell was going on and they did nothing to stop it," he said. "No, they did not pull the trigger, but they allowed it to happen."...

Daris Long, father of the Army private killed in the shooting, has his own questions and criticisms. By classifying his son's death as nonhostile, the federal government has, he said, "abandoned my son on the battlefield."

"Being gunned down in uniform by a self-described Islamic warrior obviously does not rise to the level of a terrorist act as far as I can tell under this administration," the retired Marine officer said. "... The failure to include the death of a serving U.S. soldier and the wounding of another outside an Army office in America's heartland as a terrorist act by a home-grown jihadist who has ties to Yemen himself is beyond me."...

Me too, Mr. Long.

An update on this story. "Briton is duped into carrying terror cash," by David Jarvis for the Sunday Express, March 28:

A plot by Al Qaeda to blow up a sports stadium was foiled when a British-based courier was arrested.

The man was held in Chicago as he prepared to board a flight for England carrying cash to buy explosives.

The money, ultimately bound for ­Pakistan, was intercepted after an ­elaborate sting by FBI agents who had penetrated the terror cell. Last week taxi driver Raja Lahrasib Khan, 56, a naturalised US citizen of Pakistani ­origin, was charged with financing ­terror.

He had handed the cash to his unwitting son, who lives in England, to take on a London-bound flight.

Khan originally intended to fly to England with the money himself before heading for Pakistan and handing it to terrorist leader Ilyas Kashmiri, who receives orders from Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden at his base in the tribal areas of western Pakistan.

But he never realised the $1,000 (£672) had been handed to him by an undercover FBI agent, who last week told a court how Khan had claimed he could blow up an unnamed sports arena.

FBI agents who arrested Khan's son last Tuesday discovered he was carrying seven of the ten $100 bills the undercover agent had given to Khan.

Last Friday Khan was ordered to be held in custody after the US District Court in Chicago heard how he told the undercover agent that remote controlled bombs could be placed in a packed stadium and then: "Boom, boom, boom." Khan's son, who has not been named, was ­unaware that he was being used as a terrorist courier and has not been detained.

An update on this story -- and it's great news! The possibility that a Muslim in San Francisco could get involved in jihad terrorism is nil -- it is in fact less than nil, zero minus eight degrees, such that even to suggest the possibility that it could happen is an insult to the area Muslims, each and every one of whom is robustly patriotic!

So now that San Francisco is a Jihad-Free Zone, I guess all the airport security personnel will have to be laid off, eh? And the city probably would benefit from having fewer FBI and JTTF folks on the job. They will certainly be able to find jobs in the industries in the city that start to thrive as people flock there from areas that don't enjoy such assurances!

"San Francisco police chief apologizes for terrorism comments," from Bay City News Service, March 27:

San Francisco Police Chief George Gascon today apologized for remarks he made Thursday on the threat of terrorism that drew criticism from members of the city's Middle Eastern community.

Gascon spoke at a breakfast at San Francisco's Ferry Building before construction and trade groups, at which he discussed a $412 million June 8 bond measure to build a new police headquarters and implement other seismic upgrades citywide.

According to Gascon, he also discussed possible terrorist threats to the headquarters at the Hall of Justice as another reason to support the measure. He said he mentioned domestic terrorism but also the threat of international terrorism from Yemen and Afghanistan, and also noted significant populations from those countries residing in the Bay Area.

Today, his office issued a statement apologizing "to those in the Arab, Middle Eastern, and Muslim communities who were offended by his comments yesterday."

"Chief Gascon did not intend to upset the community and he is mindful of the importance of cultural sensitivity, not only here in San Francisco, but nationally," the statement read.

The San Francisco Bay Area office of the Council on American Islamic Relations said today that it, along with other local Arab and Muslim groups, sent a letter to Gascon in which they expressed disappointment.

The organization said they have asked the police chief to meet with leaders from the Arab and Muslim community in San Francisco to talk about possible negative impacts of his comments.

In a sane world, they would be meeting with him to discuss ways in which they could cooperate openly and fully with anti-terror efforts. But this ain't a sane world by a long shot.

Comments by David G. Littman, NGO Representative to the UN in Geneva for the Association for World Education (AWE) and the World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ)

The following oral statement was prepared and delivered by DGL for the WUPJ; I was stopped by the Chair (a vice-president) after 2 minutes, 16 seconds - the microphone was cut off at 2 min. 26 sec. (two NGOs soon after were allowed 2 min. 33 sec. and 2 min. 37 sec., respectively). Member and Observer States are never stopped when their delegate exceeds the 3 or 2 minute official limit, sometimes taking twice as long when haranguing Israel; NGOs are usually treated very leniently by the Belgium president.

Our two concluding lines, comparing UN treatment of Jewish and Arab Palestinian refugees could have been completed within about 10 seconds (i.e. about 2 min. 25 sec.): They received no international aid, whereas a Palestinian 'refugee' and descendants still do, via UNRWA, if the "normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948 or June 1967" - or that of their grandparents or great grandparents. This is unique in the world.

The Secretariat receives 25 copies of all oral statement for the interpreters and others (including the chairman- mine are always checked by someone on the podium). The four lines that I added after hearing the excellent comments on item 7 by the new U.S. ambassador the day before would have required another 20 secs. All this was visible in my text, available to the chair and the secretary. On this we shall make 'no comment'!

I am scheduled, despite protests and roadblocks, to speak at the Florida State University School of Law on Tuesday, March 30 at 12:30PM. And on Monday, there is this -- from Facebook. Here is the whole announcement first; then I will intersperse some comments:

The 1st Amendment & Professional Responsibility in a Republic!
Type: Education - Lecture
Date: Monday, March 29, 2010
Time: 12:30pm - 1:30pm
Location: Bk Roberts Rm 101
Description MLSA, BLSA, OUTLaw, ACLU, AIRR, JLSA, ACS, and ILSA would like to invite you on Monday, March 29 @12:30 in Rm 101 for a presentation by Professor Nat Stern and Professor Rob Atkinson on the topic of "What we need to remember about: The 1st amendment and Professional responsibility in a Republic!"

***Gourmet food and dessert will be provided.***

Thank you for your support in such an important cause. After speaking to Dean Weidner yesterday, it looks as though the school is going to be developing a policy for regulating what goes up on our campus.

Best thing to do, COME TO OUR EVENT, learn, and ask questions!! It should be great and we're gonna try to get middle-eastern food for our great event :)

**Cultural sensitivity as professionals is a main point that will be addressed. Dean Weidner and many other faculty have accepted our invitation and will be in attendance of our event!**

And now with commentary:

MLSA, BLSA, OUTLaw, ACLU, AIRR, JLSA, and ACS would like to invite you on Monday, March 29 @12:30 in Rm 101 for a presentation by Professor Nat Stern and Professor Rob Atkinson on the topic of "What we need to remember about: The 1st amendment and Professional responsibility in a Republic!"

The drift is clear: this will be about how one has a "professional responsibility," despite the First Amendment, not to insult others, specifically Muslims regarding images and mockery of Muhammad. One has a "professional responsibility" to practice self-censorship. Who gets to determine what constitutes an insult, and on what grounds, and the implications of the power that individual or group will consequently have to control the political and societal discourse, will almost certainly not be considered.

***Gourmet food and dessert will be provided.***

Thank you for your support in such an important cause. I spoke to Dean Weidner yesterday, and he assured me that after this very shocking, hateful, and disrespectful spur of events, the school is going to be developing a policy for regulating what goes up, so at least we're growing out of it!

Dean Weidner assured me that he would enact restrictions on the freedom of speech so that protected classes are not challenged in any way! So at least we're growing out of it! Free inquiry and free thought, that is.

However, the Federalist Society continues to maintain an irritating attachment to the idea that free dissent and free discussion ought to be allowed, and even unpopular views ought to be aired and discussed rather than forcibly suppressed:

Unfortunately though, they are not able to get the Federalist society to take down these fliers. Even though this matter is still extremely offensive in many ways i.e. racist and prejudice [sic], portraying images of Prophet Mohammad for Muslims is beyond taboo but forbidden, so as you can imagine not just is he drawn in the image but portrayed as a terrorist.

Racist? What race is Islam again?

Prejudice? In what regard? Jihadists do invoke Muhammad to justify terrorism. And that is what this cartoon is, quite gently, lampooning. The point is not to insult someone's religious figure gratuitously, but to illustrate the nature of living in a society in which people of good conscience and good will differ on essentials: we all have to put up with certain annoyances. To place any religious figure, or anyone else, beyond criticism, is to establish a protected class that is beyond accountability -- and that's the road to tyranny.

Here are a few old examples from the archives:

• On November 21, 2003, Muslims poured out of the Maiduguri Road Central Mosque after Friday prayers in the Nigerian city of Kaduna, demanding the implementation of Sharia law and distributing flyers stating: "The only solution is Jihad, the type of jihad put into practise by Prophet Muhammed and exemplified by Shehu Usman Dan Fodio and the late Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran. We Muslims should unite and embrace this concept of Jihad that will undoubtedly empower us to destroy oppression and oppressors, and in its place establish Islam."
• In December 2003, an Iraqi jihad warrior explained why he was fighting against the American troops there: "The religious principle is that we cannot accept to live with infidels. The Prophet Muhammad, peace be on him, said, 'Hit the infidels wherever you find them.'" The man was, of course, quoting not a saying of Muhammad but Qur'an 9:5, the "Verse of the Sword" - but it is easy to see why he would confuse the two.
• Fawwaz bin Muhammad Al-Nashami, the commander of the jihad group that killed twenty-two people in a jihad attack in Khobar, Saudi Arabia, on May 29, 2004, said that he acted in accord with Muhammad's wishes for Arabia: "We are Mujahideen, and we want the Americans. We have not come to aim a weapon at the Muslims, but to purge the Arabian Peninsula, according to the will of our Prophet Muhammad, of the infidels and the polytheists who are killing our brothers in Afghanistan and Iraq....We began to comb the site looking for infidels. We found Filipino Christians. We cut their throats and dedicated them to our brothers the Mujahideen in the Philippines. [Likewise], we found Hindu engineers and we cut their throats too, Allah be praised. That same day, we purged Muhammad's land of many Christians and polytheists."
• In the run-up to the 2004 American presidential election, a Muslim preacher invoked Muhammad to denounce democracy: "Our Prophet did not run for office in any election...He did not win any political debate. [Instead] he won the war against the infidel."
• A jihadist explaining that the Israeli/Palestinian struggle was more than just a nationalist conflict over land declared: "But all of these people don't realize that our struggle with the Jews goes way back, ever since the first Islamic state was established in Madeenah with Muhammad (SAWS) the Messenger sent to all of mankind, as its leader. Allaah has related to us in the Qur'ân, the reality of the Jews' malice and hatred for the ummah of Islaam and Tawheed, as he says: 'You will surely find that the people with the most enmity towards the believers are the Jews and the polytheists.' (Surah Al-Maa'idah: 82) [Qur'an 5:82].
• In October 2004, Sheikh Aamer Bin Abdallah Al-Aamer wrote this in the Al-Qaeda online journal Sawt al-Jihad: "Perform the Jihad against your enemies with your [own two] hands, sacrifice your souls and your property in fighting your enemy, as an imitation of [the acts of] your Prophet [Muhammad] in the month of Ramadan [and in order to] enrage your enemies."
• London Muslim leader Hani Al-Sibaai in February 2005 justified the slaughters being perpetrated by Al-Zarqawi's mujahedin in Iraq: "Do these people base themselves on Islamic law or not? They claim that they do, and to support it, they say that slaughtering appeared in a hadith by the Prophet, which was pronounces authentic by Sheik Ahmad Shaker. The Prophet told the Quraysh tribe: 'I have brought slaughter upon you,' making this gesture. But these are religious issues that may be disputed....[T]he Prophet drove nails into and gouged out the eyes of people from the 'Urayna Tribe. They were merely a group of thieves who stole from sheep herders, and the Prophet drove nails into them and threw them into the Al-Hrara area, and left them there to die. He blinded them and cut off their opposite legs and arms. This is what the Prophet did on a trifling matter - let alone in war."

Dean Weidner and Prof Atkinson have been receiving hatemail all day yesterday.

I doubt it, but it is possible. I asked people to "be polite, courteous, respectful, and on-point." A good many people have forwarded me the messages they sent, and the ones I saw all were in this general vein: "I understand that there is considerable protest against the appearance of Robert Spencer scheduled for Tuesday. Robert Spencer is perhaps the leading scholar on the ideology of Islam in America today; and everyone would benefit from hearing what he has to say. Even if some people do not like what he has to say, those people should not be allowed to prevent others from hearing him. The opponents of free discussion must not be allowed to intimidate others or infringe upon the rights of the rest of us. Peaceful protest is one thing, but interference should not be permitted. Please ensure that Mr. Spencer has the opportunity to address his audience without interference."

That doesn't seem like hate mail to me. What do you think?

So we have all realized that there is no reasoning with them.

On the contrary. I'm ready to reason with Weidner, Stern, Atkinson and anyone else. Somehow I doubt, however, that they will be willing to discuss these issues with me.

We do not want to give them the attention they want so we've decided to just ask everyone in our organization (unless they want to go that's up to them) but it would make a stronger statement if we boycott their event all together!

Sure. Witness here again the brittleness of the thought of the Leftists and Islamic supremacists. They can't answer the truth or stand up to it. They can't debate on the facts. And they know it. So instead, they claim victim status and call for a boycott.

Best thing to do, COME TO OUR EVENT, learn, and ask questions!! It should be great and we're gonna try to get middle-eastern food for our great event :)

Sounds great!

*Cultural sensitivity as professionals is a main point that will be addressed. Dean Weidner and many other faculty have accepted our invitation and will be in attendance of our event!**

Of course they will. They wouldn't dare not be there.

"Viewers were told that 'the majority of people in hell will be women'." What kind of rabid extremist would say that? Well, Muhammad. In fact, it comes up more than once. Several times, actually.

More on this story. "UK's Islam Channel under investigation," by David Sapsted for The National, March 28:

London // Britain's most popular Muslim TV channel is to be investigated by the government's broadcasting watchdog after being accused of promoting extremists.

The Office of Communications (Ofcom) took action after an in-depth survey of the programmes on the Islam Channel by the Quilliam Foundation, a moderate Islamic think tank based in London.

After monitoring the output of the satellite channel for three months, the foundation reported: "The gravest concern regarding the Islam Channel is its failure in combating extremism.

"A number of presenters with extremist tendencies were regularly given the opportunity to air their opinions on the network without a challenge from more moderate Islamic voices."

The report also condemned the channel, which is headquartered in London, for being demeaning to women, saying that programmes instructed women that they could not refuse to have sexual relations with their husbands.

Under British law, a husband who forces his wife to have sex with him can be charged with rape.

The report added that on one programme, women were told that they should not leave their homes without their husband's consent and should always have a male escort. Another suggested that women who wore perfume were prostitutes.

Concerns were also raised in the report over a religious advice programme in which viewers were told that "the majority of people in hell will be women" because they are the cause of "calamities, hardship and suffering" in western society."...

Once again, it's not the "interior spiritual struggle" variety of jihad. The good news in this case is that Muslim community members alerted authorities, though Islam's texts and traditions will undoubtedly generate this behavior again unless and until they, too, are addressed forthrightly, and not with evasion and denial. "Radical Islamic elder preaching jihad in Perth's suburbs," from the Sunday Times, March 28 (thanks to Twostellas):

A RADICAL Islamic elder who praises the Taliban and preaches violent jihad to a band of keen followers is being investigated in Perth by WA and Federal police.

Sources confirmed the joint-agency investigation after The Sunday Times revealed to police that the newspaper had infiltrated a group in which the sheik described armed jihad as the "top" ideal for Muslims and likened the Taliban to "angels".

Muslim community members said they warned police weeks ago that the Middle Eastern man was recruiting disaffected young Muslim men at a Perth mosque and spreading dangerous messages - about armed jihad, or holy war, against those fighting Islam; and that he claimed to know, and have trained with, Osama bin Laden.

They stressed that mainstream WA Muslims did not share the views and were concerned police had not acted on their tip-offs.

They alerted The Sunday Times as a last resort "before something really bad happens . . . before this poison spreads".

In an undercover investigation, The Sunday Times obtained information from meetings at the sheik's northern suburbs home where, before a group of young men, he promoted armed jihad as the highest ideal for Muslims, praised the Taliban and said he had fought in Afghanistan against Soviet forces.

In other meetings, he praised bin Laden - and even Hitler, justified the actions of suicide bombers, claimed that US presidents were priests and said that Allah would "get" the US and Jews for their actions.

The man, an Australian citizen whom The Sunday Times has not named under police advice, also said that though Islam forbade killing, people who had tried to stop those bringing the religion to others in the past were killed so that people could receive the word of God.

Muslim community members said they feared police were waiting for the man and his followers to do something "terrible", so they could make a dramatic arrest and then point to "home-grown terrorists" as justification for repressive police measures and surveillance of all Muslims.

But sources confirmed an investigation was under way because of earlier information received. It involved both the WA Police State Security Investigation Group and the Australian Federal Police.

Last Saturday, in front of five men and youths, the man said that jihad, at its "top" end, was to fight those who fought against Islam, and that going into battle and "putting your life on the line" for Islam was the highest ideal.

"I'm not afraid to say that if angels walk this earth, they are the Taliban," he said....

George Gascón ought to be ashamed! Who ever heard of Yemenis or Afghans committing or advocating acts of terrorism against the U.S.! Why, it's a downright fabrication! But fear not: the apologizing and bowing and scraping have already begun. "Police chief's remarks on terrorism anger Arabs," by Heather Knight for the San Francisco Chronicle, March 26 (thanks to Jockaira):

A breakfast to tout the importance of passing an earthquake-safety bond measure on the June ballot wound up sending shock waves through San Francisco's Arab American community after Police Chief George Gascón made controversial remarks about terrorism.

Gascón reportedly said the Hall of Justice at 850 Bryant St. is susceptible not just to an earthquake, but also to members of the city's Middle Eastern community parking a van in front of it and blowing it up.

The chief was addressing a crowd of about 150 City Hall officials and members of the building trades Wednesday and was one of several speakers discussing the $412 million bond to seismically retrofit a number of city buildings, including moving some Police Department functions out of the decrepit Hall of Justice and into a new Mission Bay facility.

Chief cites countries

Despite some reports to the contrary from those in attendance, Gascón on Thursday said he never referred to Middle Easterners or Arab Americans.

He said he instead singled out those from Yemen and Afghanistan as posing potential terrorism risks - especially in an iconic city like San Francisco with large numbers of residents from those countries. He admitted to saying they could park a van in front of the Hall of Justice and blow it up.

"There was no need to single out the two countries, and I recognize that, but it's not because it was not accurate," he said. "The reality is this is the area where we're seeing most of the international terrorism coming from. ... I think certainly in this case, people are reading too much into it."

He gave no specific examples of threats to San Francisco, but did point to the attempted bombing on Christmas Day of a Detroit-bound airplane by a man allegedly trained by an al Qaeda offshoot in Yemen.

Apology expected

Ali Altaha, a member of the Arab American Chamber of Commerce who owns a small engineering firm in the city and was at the breakfast at the Ferry Building's MarketBar, said the chief should be fired.

"He basically said there's a large Arab American community in the Bay Area, a lot of Muslims, and because of terrorism, they need to be very careful," Altaha recalled. "It was very degrading, very inappropriate for a city official to make comments in this manner. ... I felt he was trying to sell terrorism as a commodity to justify his position or funding for his department."

Altaha, who moved from his native Iraq 30 years ago, said he tried to speak with the chief outside afterward.

"I was expecting him to make an apology," Altaha said, noting that didn't happen. "He was very aggressive and very cocky about it."

Mayor Gavin Newsom wasn't at the breakfast, but learned of Gascón's remarks and phoned Altaha on Wednesday.

"He apologized on behalf of his administration," Altaha said. "I told him we don't have a problem with the mayor's office, but clearly this guy needs to be put in check."...

Clearly!

Elwood Blues took umbrage at Illinois Nazis. He wouldn't likely take kindly to Illinois jihadis, either. "Chicago man charged with supporting al Qaeda," from CNN, March 26:

A Chicago, Illinois, man was charged Friday with providing material support to al Qaeda by attempting to send the terrorist group funds overseas, the Department of Justice said.

The man, Raja Lahrasib Khan, also allegedly discussed attacking a stadium in the United States this summer, officials said, though they stressed that there is no imminent domestic danger.

Khan, a Chicago taxi driver who is a naturalized U.S. citizen from Pakistan, was arrested by FBI officials Friday morning.

Oh, well, okay, then! 214 jihadists return to the struggle: "Libya releases 214 Islamic militants," from AP, March 26 (thanks to Kris):

TRIPOLI, Libya -- Libya has released 214 Islamic militants, including senior members of a group accused of plotting to overthrow Moammar Gadhafi, after they renounced violence.

The Libyan leader's son Seif al-Islam Gadhafi said 34 members of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, including its leader, were sent home Tuesday after they affirmed they had broken ties with the organization. The group is suspected of having links to al-Qaida.

"This is an important day for Libya because it is a day of forgiveness and honesty," the younger Gadhafi said at a news conference Tuesday.

Gadhafi's son has been leading a dialogue with militants through a rehabilitation program run by his organization, the Gadhafi Foundation.

The efforts are the latest by Arab governments to address militant movements through rehabilitation programs rather than solely through force. Saudi Arabia and Egypt have both pioneered programs to "deprogram" militants and allow them to rejoin society....

Cosmetic and farcical programs that have been signal failures.

No, not the greasy Islamophobes. The Islamic supremacists and jihadists of Nigeria want to bring the whole country under the sway of Sharia. "Residents of Nigerian village live in fear of renewed massacres," by Jonathan Clayton for The Times, March 26 (thanks to all who sent this in):

A thick, pale scar cuts across Jessica Chuwang's cheek. It slices through a blood-encrusted ear and runs deep down her neck. Jet black eyes, full of fear, dart from her father back to the strangers gathered outside the door of the small tin-roofed home.

"She is very nervous, we all are -- we fear they will be back anytime," her father, Pam Chuwang, tells The Times. "People are receiving text messages saying they are coming back to finish the job."

This Nigerian village, on the outskirts of Jos, the capital of Plateau State, lies on the fault line between Nigeria's predominantly Muslim north and Christian south.

This month it bore the brunt of one of the most brutal attacks the region has witnessed. In an area where thousands have died over the past decade in violence pitching rival Fulani Muslims and Christian Beroms against each other, its ferocity shocked the nation and has ignited fears that ancient disputes over land and cattle are entering a new, bloodier dimension.

On March 7 armed Muslims, some reportedly in army uniforms, entered the village at about 3am. As the shooting began panicked villagers fled for their lives, only to be hacked to death by gangs armed with knives and machetes who were lying in wait. Some even used nets to catch their victims before hacking them to death. [...]

Estimates of the number killed vary enormously but the villagers insist that it is about 500 -- more than double official figures. Two other villages nearby were also attacked but the worst of the violence and the highest death toll took place in Dogon Na Hauwa. [...]

People have returned but no one is working. Instead, they sit around in small groups comparing notes on the attack and the latest rumours. At least 100 Muslim families who lived among the Christians left before the attack. They have yet to return.

"They were warned the attack was coming," said Daniel Jik, assistant village headman, who lost two children and eight grandchildren in the attack. He pointed to the mass grave where they lay together. "They even beheaded one woman and we had to bury her body alone because they took the head as a trophy." Across dusty, sun-baked fields, the village church, now a blackened ruin, still smoulders. [...]

Poverty Causes Terrorism Alert:

Sanusi Mato, a moderate Islamic politician, said that the Government was not tackling the root cause of the rivalries: poverty. "The problem is not religious, but political and economic, but it is allowed to take on religious and ethnic dimension and that is very dangerous."

I.e., pay off the Muslim community and this will stop happening.

Some Christians say, however, that what is happening in Jos is just the tip of the iceberg. Northern Nigeria has become increasingly Islamised over the past decade with most states adopting Islamic law and many Christians fleeing southwards.

"They now want to extend this into the middle belt, but we will never accept it," Toma Jang Davou, head of the parliamentary forum of the Berom Christians, said. "They say they will not be happy until they dip the Koran in the waters of the Atlantic."

Remember: it's a Religion of Peace™. To have denied this jihadist a visa would have been "Islamophobic." "Visa denial was reversed for terrorism suspect in 2004," by John Solomon in the Washington Post, March 25 (thanks to all who sent this in):

A U.S. consular official originally denied terrorism suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab a visa to enter the United States in 2004 after finding false information on his application, but that official was overruled by a supervisor, according to senior government sources.

Because the 2004 situation was considered resolved, it was not revisited in 2008, when Abdulmutallab received a second U.S. visa, which allowed him to board a Detroit-bound airliner on Dec. 25, officials acknowledged. A senior Republican lawmaker said the reversal of the 2004 decision was a missed opportunity to keep him out of the country.

The decision to overrule the visa denial was one of a series of events that preceded Abdulmutallab's arrest in connection with an alleged Christmas Day attempt to destroy the plane with a bomb. In January, the Obama administration released a review of the case that outlined a number of missteps but did not include any reference to the visa denial.

An official said the incident was left out because the move to overturn the initial decision did not seem out of the ordinary. That official and others said that, in reversing the initial decision and granting Abdulmutallab a visa, consular officials took into account that his father was a prominent Nigerian banker with strong ties to his community. There was no derogatory information or suggestion that he had ties to Islamist terrorism....

Abdulmutallab first applied for a U.S. visa in Lome, Togo, but was told that he needed to apply closer to his place of residence in Nigeria. He returned to Lagos and filed an application that stated incorrectly that he had never been denied a visa, leading a consular official to deny him one.

"It's kind of outrageous that the consular officer overturned this denial in the first place," Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) said in an interview. "The second thing is, if you go back to his first coming to this country, he could have been denied because he had lied on a previous application."...

Oddly enough, the Council said not a word about non-Muslims denied religious freedom in Saudi Arabia. "UN rights body passes Islamophobia resolution," from Middle East Online, March 25 (thanks to Twostellas):

GENEVA - The UN Human Rights Council on Thursday passed a resolution condemning Islamaphobic behaviour, including Switzerland's minaret building ban, despite some states' major reservations.

The resolution "strongly condemns... the ban on the construction of minarets of mosques and other recent discriminatory measures."

In a November referendum Swiss citizens voted to ban the construction of new minarets, a move that drew criticisms worldwide.

These measures "are manifestations of Islamophobia that stand in sharp contradiction to international human rights obligations concerning freedoms of religions," said the resolution.

Such acts would "fuel discrimination, extremism and misperception leading to polarization and fragmentation with dangerous unintended and unforeseen consequences," it said.

Some 20 countries voted in favour of the resolution entitled "combating defamation of religions", 17 voted against and eight abstained.

The resolution also "expresses deep concern ... that Islam is frequently and wrongly associated with human rights violations and terrorism."

It "regrets the laws or administrative measures specifically designed to control and monitor Muslim minorities, thereby stigmatising them and legitimising the discrimination they experience."

Putting forward the resolution on behalf of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, Pakistan's ambassador Zamir Akram said that the specific references to Islam, the only religion mentioned in the text, "reflect the existing regrettable situation in some parts of the world where Muslims are being targeted."

Babacar Ba, who represents the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, also told reporters that the resolution was a "way to reaffirm once again our condemnation of the decision to ban construction of minarets in Switzerland."

"This initiative that breaches religious freedom and rights of Muslims to build their places of worship as they wish to," he added....

Here's a solution: give them a nuke deal! "Pakistan: Violent attacks rise against Christians," by Syed Saleem Shahzad for AKI, March 25 (thanks to Twostellas):

Islamabad, 25 March (AKI) - There was an increase in violent attacks on religious minorities in Pakistan in 2009 and the government failed to take effective preventive action, according to the Human Rights Commission.The report singled out attacks against the Christian community in areas dominated by insurgents.

"As the militancy surged in the northwestern parts of the country, enforced migration and displacement of thousands of Christians from the Swat Valley, Peshawar, Mardan, Nowshera and FATA was reported following threats to them to convert to Islam or face death," the report said.

It also said many were forced to take refuge with their relatives in Punjab and Sindh provinces, and faced immense hardships as the government could not provide adequate protection.

"At the same time many Christian families victims of the blasphemy law were forced to live in hiding in attempts to save their lives. There was little change in their social ostracisation," the report maintained.

However the report said that worst sort of victimisation was done under the Blasphemy law.

Reports said in February last year clerics in Raiwind called on the government to register a case and punish those responsible for alleged desecration of Holy Koran in a private hospita in Lahore run by Fatima Memorial Hospital Lahore.

It was alleged that some Christian students had placed the Koran, the Islamic holy book, in shoe boxes. As the clerics protest mounted, the college administration closed down the institution for fear of unrest and violence....

Priorities. Sharia Alert from modern, moderate Indonesia: "Indonesia: Prominent cleric says sharia highest law," from AKI, March 26 (thanks to Twostellas):

Makassar, 26 March (AKI/Jakarta Post) - A prominent cleric from Indonesia's biggest Muslim organisation, the Nahdlatul Ulama, says that Islamic sharia law should take precedence over laws passed by the parliament.

"The power of positive law is not permanent because everything in the world is not permanent, therefore no law can permanently take effect," Saifuddin Amsir told the NU's congress in Makassar, South Sulawesi on Friday.

"Sharia is made based on consensus of Muslim communities," said Amsir, who is a member of the NU's law-making body.

Rejection of sharia is the main challenge facing Muslim clerics and scholars (ulema), he said.

"It's the challenge for ulema and clerics. They must be able to withstand criticism and rejection.

"That's the risk of being an Islamic teacher but they must not afraid since they follow the way of Allah," he said.

Tarek Fatah, call your office:

Earlier, participants of the NU congress concluded that sharia law does set a minimum age to marry.

The NU congress opposed Indonesia's child protection and marriage laws which sets the marriageable age at 16 for women and 19 for men.

Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono on Tuesday praised the organisation for its moderation and urged it to continue to reject extremism and violence....

I'm scheduled to speak at the Florida State University College of Law on March 30 at 12:30PM, but the Leftist and Islamic fascists are working overtime to try to silence me -- and the truth about Islamic jihad, Islamic supremacism, and Sharia. Many students are being intimidated and pressured into not attending.

That's why it's important for lovers of freedom to act.

Please contact the FSU law school and politely and calmly voice your support for my upcoming presentation there, and for the principles of free speech and free inquiry embodied in the flier for the event, which has become a focus of the faux and manipulative outrage of the enemies of free speech.

Here's the info:

Florida State University College of Law
425 West Jefferson Street
Tallahassee, FL 32306

The contact information for all the deans can be found here. Donald Weidner (dweidner@law.fsu.edu) is the principal dean, and the ones who met with student Eric Giunta, who organized the event, were Wayne Logan (wlogan@law.fsu.edu), Nancy Benavides (nbenavid@law.fsu.edu), and Janeia Daniels (jdaniels@law.fsu.edu). The faculty adviser for the Federalist Society is Fernando Tesón (fteson@law.fsu.edu), and that of the Muslim Law Students Association Rob Atkinson (ratkinso@law.fsu.edu).

You can email all of them. If you choose to call, the order should be Weidner (850.644.3071), Logan (850.644.4759), Benavides (850.644.7338), and Daniels (850.644.7338). You may call the two advisers if you so wish, as well (Tesón: 850.644.4287; Atkinson: 850.644.4503). But once again: be polite, courteous, respectful, and on-point. Encourage them not to cave in to intimidation, and to stand for the freedom of speech.

Warranting another 9/11?

Threatening blood and death over a cartoon -- and Western non-Muslims continue to kowtow to their irrational bullying, instead of standing up and saying, "Wait a minute. Killing people, or threatening people with death, because of a perceived insult to someone you revere is madness, and we're not going to stand for it. We're going to defend the freedom of speech as an indispensable protection against the authoritarianism and tyranny that crushes the human spirit.

"If you revere Muhammad, revere him. But don't demand that everyone else subordinate his free conscience to yours, and revere him as well. We are not insulting your prophet for the sake of insulting him, but to illustrate and defend the principle that in a truly free society, one in which human beings can flourish, we all have to put up with things that offend us. The only alternative is to establish the hegemony of one belief-system over all others, and while we realize that that is your goal, we will not endorse it. Indeed, in the name of human rights and human dignity, we will oppose it all the energy we have."

One day, maybe, we will have a politician who talks like that (yes, the Netherlands has one now). But I am not holding my breath.

"Malaysians protest over Muhammad cartoon," from Associated Press, March 26 (thanks to Alexandre):

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia -- More than 200 Malaysian Muslim protesters called on Sweden on Friday to take action against several newspapers that reprinted a caricature depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a dog.

The protesters burned a Swedish flag outside the Swedish embassy, chanting "Long live Islam" and "Down with Sweden" and carrying posters that read "Take some lessons from 9/11!!!" and "We fight for our prophet."

They also burned a picture of Swedish artist Lars Vilks, who made the drawing of Muhammad's head on a dog's body in 2007 that was reprinted in papers recently.

"We demand that the Swedish government take strong action against the newspapers and against the artist," said Sabki Yusof, one of the protest leaders from the opposition Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party. "It's unacceptable what they did to our prophet."

Swedish ambassador Helena Sangeland called for more dialogue with Muslims for better mutual understanding but said no action would be taken against the papers. She said she was "very disappointed" that the Swedish flag was burned.

"The Swedish government will not comment nor take any action against media. Freedom of expression is enshrined in our constitution. It is not negotiable," she told The Associated Press. "I don't think Malaysia-Sweden bilateral relations will be affected in any way."...

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki says that this nefarious Zionist plan is "unfortunately...approved by American officials," but actually, the content of his statement is not that much different from what Obama has been saying.

"Iran says Muslims must act over Jerusalem," from Reuters, March 26 (thanks to Maxwell):

Iran attacked Israel's construction plans in east Jerusalem on Friday, saying Muslims around the world needed to take action.

Announcements by Israel's right-wing government of new building projects in east Jerusalem - which the Jewish state seized in a 1967 war - have spoiled US plans to get Palestinians and Israelis back into peace negotiations.

"Expansion of Israeli settlements, destruction of Islamic and Christian sites and wide-scale construction of new synagogues ... show the Zionist plans to accelerate Judaization of east Jerusalem and unfortunately it is approved by American officials," Iran's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said in comments reported on Iranian state radio.

"This has raised the alarm for all people around the world and doubled the need for Muslim and other countries to act seriously," he said, adding that the 22-nation Arab League should take a strong stance at its meeting in Libya this weekend....

Here is what happened when one courageous student invited me to speak at the Florida State University College of Law. Eric Giunta is a Juris Doctor Candidate at Florida State University College of Law, where he serves as President of that school's premier conservative-libertarian debate society. He has written for LifeSiteNews and RenewAmerica.com. He maintains a blog, "Confessions of a Liberal Traditionalist," at lexetlibertas.wordpress.com. This article appears today in FrontPage -- and yes, as of this writing I am still planning on being there. But with the Leftist thugs and their Islamic supremacist allies on the case, you never know.

Florida State University College of Law is rather moderate as far as law schools go. Sure, nearly all the faculty are committed leftists, but they tend to be fair in their instruction, and are always willing to engage a conservative or libertarian constructively. The student body's a mixed bag ideologically. Most of the student organizations are oriented leftward, the campus Republicans exist in name only, and the most visible, and best-attended, student organization is our chapter of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies, for which I serve as President.

The Federalist Society is the nation's premier fellowship of law school conservatives and libertarians. We are a diverse coalition, united by our commitment to an originalist jurisprudence. Known in some circles as "right-wing extremism," originalism is a legal hermeneutic whose guiding principle is that laws retain their original public meaning until they are legally rescinded or amended. This contrasts with the predominant leftist hermeneutic, which considers the law to be a "living" instrument - not in the sense that it is open to amendment, but in the sense that laws promulgated at one moment can take on different meanings in another, by judicial fiat. The "living constitutionalist" believes judges are charged with reinterpreting the law in light of what is believed to be a legal metanarrative reflected in the broader legal tradition; the letter of the law is not so important as its spirit, a spirit which just so happens to accord with whatever leftist notions of personal morality and social justice happen to prevail at the time of adjudication.

The Federalist Society is a nonpartisan organization. We do not take stances on the controversial social and public policy issues, but we do foster debate and discussion of these issues from conservative and libertarian perspectives. Whatever the personal views of members and officers, the Society does not endorse the ideas presented by invited speakers.

(By extension, any and all ideas presented in this article are my own, and not that of the Federalist Society.)

On Tuesday, March 30, my FSU Law chapter will be honored to have Mr. Robert Spencer lecture on "Introduction to Islamic Jurisprudence: What You Need to Know." The flier for the event is simple enough: the aforementioned title, suspended above one of the controversial Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons. The cartoon I chose for the event is the one that features a fearsome Muhammad, his eyes shielded by the censor's black bar, flanked by two women in dressed in black niqabs, with a clear bar leaving room only for their eyes.

The approved fliers were put up around campus on the evening of March 24th. By the following morning, almost half of them were taken down, and at least one remaining one defaced with "This Is Racist!". The fliers were unlawfully removed by members of the newly founded chapter of the Muslim Law Students Association (MLSA) and various leftist fellowships on campus. They conveyed their offense to administration, and I was invited to meet with three of the deans that afternoon, along with the professor who acts as faculty advisor to both the MLSA and ACLU chapters. (As of this writing, the torn-down fliers have not been replaced by the administration or the MLSA.)

The faculty conveyed to me their concern that several students considered the cartoon to be offensive to Arabs. I quickly replied that a) Islam is not a race, b) most Muslims are not Arab, c) most Arabs in the United States are not Muslim, and d) Spencer himself is of Middle Eastern ancestry. (Interestingly, I may be as well. Both my parents are from Sicily, and my mother's maiden name, Scianna, appears to be Arabic in origin.)

To their credit, the administration is not asking me to cancel Mr. Spencer's lecture, is not compelling me to take down or edit the fliers, and have assured me that no counter-rally/protest will be permitted to disrupt the event as scheduled. They have asked me, with considerable rigor, to self-censor the aforementioned political cartoon, and have conveyed to me their impression that the image is gratuitously offensive, that my publication of it discredits the Federalist Society and the conservative movement, that the prestige of the law school is at stake, and that I will be (at least in part) morally responsible for any violent reaction and hurt feelings which occur as a result. I was also warned my professional reputation would suffer, both during and after law school.

The faculty advisor went further to accuse Mr. Spencer of radical extremism. When I pressed him to name a single extreme idea of Spencer's, the only thing he would point to is Mr. Spencer's endorsement of our flier. After the deans alerted me to the fact that the FSU police department would be preparing security for the event, and I remarked how shameful it was that such a measure was deemed necessary, I was assured that this was the same treatment that would be afforded a guest speaker who was a neo-Nazi. Further comparisons ensued: the cartoon was compared to the advertisement, some years ago, of a "Pimps and Hos Party" by some students at the law school- indeed, the MLSA faculty advisor did not know whether that party was as offensive as the cartoon! The cartoon was also compared to a pornographic display, or an anti-Semitic caricature.

Various colleagues have expressed similar sentiments to me, some more rationally than others, and I feel the various accusations deserve a response. It is being claimed that the Muhammad cartoon(s) bears no relationship whatsoever to Mr. Spencer's upcoming lecture, and has no relationship to anything relevant to we living in the United States.

I vehemently disagree.

Let me take this time to school my colleagues, and those others on the political left, or the cowardly right, who share a fundamental disrespect for religion, and so for religious distinctives. Ideas are not all equally valid, nor do they all equally withstand intellectual scrutiny, whether that criticism is conveyed artistically, literarily, or scholarly. And this is true of religious ideas as it is of any "secular" conceit. To answer one of the deans' comparisons, it does not stand to reason that because usurious money-lending is not intrinsic to Judaism, that therefore violence and subjugation of women/gays/non-Muslims is not intrinsic to traditional Islam. The best defense one can ever give to the charge of libel or slander is Truth, and any truth-claim that a reasonable person can defend is a legitimate object of political satire.

Secondly, I assured my esteemed elders that I agree with them, in principle, that one ought not to gratuitously offend the religious sensibilities of one's fellow man. But as with any precept of the moral law, the principle is more readily agreed to than the application. I do believe the aforementioned cartoon is legitimate satire, cleverly contrasting the treatment sharia law affords to images of Muhammad with what it mandates for women (among others). And it is a fact that Muhammad was a conquering warlord who wielded a scimitar. These inconvenient truths are no more sacrosanct than the priestly sex-abuse scandals and subsequent episcopal cover-ups, which have been, and still are, legitimate subjects for satire.

Not only does the image speak to the subject of sharia law, but it does so in a way that reflects current events and the current political climate. Just a couple of weeks ago, two American Muslim women were arrested for plotting to assassinate a Swedish cartoonist who drew similar caricatures of Muhammad. And the Organization of the Islamic Conference, the United Nations' largest voting block, has been at work for years trying to convince the non-Muslim world to incorporate sharia-inspired anti-blasphemy laws into their legal systems.

That is what should offend my esteemed colleagues at the Muslim Law Students Association: The fact that there are men fearing for their lives over the publication of a political cartoon, and not in some Talibanic theocracy, but in one of the most "liberal" environs on the planet! Where were my Muslim colleagues, and their useful idiots on the left, when just last week well over 500 Christians and their families were massacred by Islamists in Nigeria? Where were they when news broke that one Mr. Arshed Masih, a Pakistani Christian who would not convert to Islam, was burned alive and his wife raped while their two children were forced to watch? Why weren't they staging rallies on the FSU Law campus demanding accountability from the international community for these outrages against human rights? Why does it take the publication of a reasonably defensible political cartoon to arouse their moral indignation, when every month hundreds, if not thousands, are butchered (and millions more subjugated) in the name of the religious system which these cartoons supposedly misrepresent?

No, I do not believe in going out of my way to offend reasonable persons. But there is nothing in the flier advertising Mr. Spencer's event that should offend the sentiments of a reasonable person, even a reasonable Muslim moderate. I cannot possibly be expected, and nor should anyone else, to cater to the morally retarded sensibilities of an oversensitive minority.

I am proud to stand in solidarity with the Jyllands-Posten cartoonists, Salman Rushdie, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Lars Vilks, Geert Wilders, Brigitte Gabriel, Wafa Sultan, Nonie Darwish, the late Theo van Gogh, and all others who are resisting modern academia's imbecilic canons of self-censorship. I hope I can say the same for many of my colleagues, in Tallahassee and abroad. I wish I could say the same for my professors.

Obama continues his unconscionable persecution of Israel, which has always been a reliable ally of the United States, while bending over backwards to mollify duplicitous and unreliable Pakistan.

Yet another Which-Side-Is-Obama-On Update: "Binyamin Netanyahu humiliated after Barack Obama 'dumped him for dinner,'" by Giles Whittell and James Hider for the Times Online, March 25 (thanks to Pamela, who has some excellent comments on this that you should not miss):

For a head of state to visit the White House and not pose for photographers is rare. For a key ally to be left to his own devices while the President withdraws to have dinner in private was, until this week, unheard of.

Yet that is how Binyamin Netanyahu was treated by President Obama on Tuesday night, according to Israeli reports on a trip seen in Jerusalem tonight as a disastrous humiliation.

After failing to extract a written promise of concessions on Jewish settlements, Mr Obama walked out of his meeting with Mr Netanyahu but invited him to stay at the White House, consult with advisors and "let me know if there is anything new", a US congressman who spoke to the Prime Minister said today.

"It was awful," the congressman said. One Israeli newspaper called the meeting "a hazing in stages", poisoned by such mistrust that the Israeli delegation eventually left rather than risk being eavesdropped on a White House phone line. Another said that the Prime Minister had received "the treatment reserved for the President of Equatorial Guinea"....

I expect that the President of Equatorial Guinea would be treated better.

But meanwhile, the Obama Administration can't do enough to soothe Pakistani sensibilities ruffled by our horrible Islamophobic airport security procedures: "US ambassador in UK ensures no body scan for Pak foreign minister," from the PTI, March 25 (thanks to Block Ness):

WASHINGTON: The extent to which the Obama administration will go to humour Pakistan is highlighted by the fact that its envoy to UK drove four hours to Manchester to ensure that a zealous American airline security does not body scan foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi ahead of his arrival here.

When Qureshi's commercial flight to the US stopped in Manchester this week, American ambassador in London, Louis B Susman, drove four hours to be there for the hour long layover.

Susman's mission was to "avoid any unpleasantness - including the possibility that British-based US airline security might insist on body-scanning Qureshi - that might start the US-Pakistan strategic dialogue in Washington off on the wrong foot," the Washington Post reported.

As Pakistan and the US struggle to overcome what both characterise as a mutual "trust deficit," the Obama administration hopes that the upgraded strategic talks will consolidate the new partnership the President promised in exchange for Pakistan's cooperation in shutting down Taliban and al-Qaida havens in that country, the paper said....

UPDATE: "Barack Hussein Obama II's War Against Israel," by Pamela Geller at Big Journalism:

The Jewish people, both in Israel and the diaspora, seem to be suffering from the Stockholm Syndrome. There can be no logical reason why an American Jew could intellectually excuse Obama's twenty-year friendship and closeness with the anti-Semitic Farrakhan acolyte Jeremiah Wright. There is no way an American Jew could explain away or rationalize Obama's connections to Rashid Khalidi, Ali Abunimah, Bill Ayers, Bernardine Dohrn, and know about those connections without knowing what was coming. These Jews (and our history is plagued with them) love ideas, not people. They are so married to their dogma, their ideology, that they cannot, will not, see what is right in front of them. They worship at the church of human secularism. That is their religion. They have no G-d. They are merely wearing a Jewish coat, but do not speak for Jews.

Read it all.

What could go wrong? Well, for one thing, Sharia is a program for every aspect of life. So once one sets the precedent that it is good to accommodate Sharia, there is always more Sharia to accommodate -- including provisions institutionalizing discrimination against women and non-Muslims.

"Loan caters to Minneapolis Muslim business owners: The Alternative Finance Program respects Islamic law by offering fixed-rate loans," by Katherine Lymn for the Minnesota Daily, March 24 (thanks to Arafat):

An Islamic law enacted centuries ago was an obstacle for modern Minneapolis businesses until Minneapolis partnered with an African business resource group to allow Muslim business owners a way to both comply with their beliefs and invest in their businesses.

Since April 2007, the city of Minneapolis, in partnership with the African Development Center, has given out 38 loans in a way that is compliant to Islamic law by using a fixed rate in place of a variable interest rate.

Through the system, called the Alternative Finance Program, businesses pay a set rate of return, which corresponds with Islamic practices. The program is a slightly altered version of the common "Two-Percent" loans also offered by the city's Department of Community Planning and Economic Development.

"It really amounts to the same thing," Bob Lind, CPED director of business finance, said. "But it's ... just a different way of looking at it."

Recipients of the loan operate businesses that lie mainly in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood and along Lake Street, "typical strongholds for the Somali community," Lind said.

That is, the Somali community that has seen so many of its members return to Somalia to wage jihad in recent years.

Five of the loans went to businesses that are part of a Somali marketplace in the Cedar-Riverside area.

Said Karie, who works at Hijaz Clothing in the marketplace, explained that "everything that has [an] interest rate is actually a sin" for Muslims.

"It's been that way for years and years," Karie said.

The rule extends beyond just loans, as Muslims who follow the religion strictly will go as far as returning interest gained on savings to the bank or a charity, said Abdirahman Omar, general manager of Mustaqbal Computer Center.

"Personally, I wouldn't take it [interest] even if I needed it," Omar said....

The loan program is a response to the wave of Middle Eastern and East African immigrants in recent years, Lind said.

"We're just trying to work with those new immigrant populations to try to provide assistance and financing just like we would for anybody with the last name 'Smith' or 'Johnson,' " he said.

Partnering with the Minneapolis-based African Development Center, CPED has distributed almost $1.5 million to the businesses, with loans ranging from $10,000 to $150,000. Most fall between $10,000 and $20,000, Lind said.

He added that loan recipients have been good clients of the city; "[they] tend to borrow as short a term as possible [and] pay it back as quick as possible," Lind said.

Before the program, businesses were unable to get loans because of these religious beliefs, and they would turn to raising money internally, Lind said.

The program is a pathway for business owners to "achieve the American dream of creating wealth," Lind said.

He added that Minneapolis is the first city, to his knowledge, to adopt a Shariah-friendly loan program. He sees the city's version as becoming a model for others in the future.

I am sure it will be.

Comments by David G. Littman, NGO Representative to the United Nations, Geneva Association for World Education (AWE) and World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ)

My decision to return to the UN Human Rights Council on 24 March for a Parthian shot under the last item 10 was motivated by a wish to highlight key passages on human rights contained in the famous Cyrus the Great Cylinder of baked-clay in Akkadian with cuneiform script, dating from 539 BCE. It was excavated in 1879 by the Iraqi Christian archaeologist Hormuzd Rassam - a student of Sir Henry Layard - and since preserved in the British museum. I had tried to quote it earlier, but was cut off by the president and decided to make the 'point' a second time by quoting the Cyrus the Great 'Human Rights' Charter in comparison with the Khomeini the Great Islamic Republic of Iran Sharia Charter - and the item 10 situation in Afghanistan (then part of Cyrus's empire). Once again I was stopped barely 16 seconds after the two minute time limit, whereas two NGOs: the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission and the International Committee for the Respect and Application of the African Charter of Human Rights and of Peoples were each allowed a full 3 minutes, and three other NGOs spoke for 2.44, 2.37 and just over 2½ minutes, respectively. I was so shocked at being silenced by the president within 4 seconds while the African speaker before me had been allowed to continue his very rhetorical statement for a full three minutes without being cut off, that I raised my voice and asked: Sir, will you cut Cyrus the Great?" This decision was all the more astonishing as the Cyrus quotation was clearly appreciated by many at the plenum meeting, who were listening attentively, and Belgium Ambassador Alex van Meeuwen is usually very generous, allowing NGOs (including me) to go well beyond their two minute time limit while never stopping Member or Observer States delegates some of whom go on indefinitely against all the rules.

I did not intend to explain that Cyrus is praised several times in the Bible, even in messianic terms, for allowing the Jews in Babylonia to return to Jerusalem: "Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus..." (Isaiah (44:28-45:1); in Ezra (1 and 6: 3-5); 2 Chronicles (36:23-249), as these details are to be found in our written statement on Iran: A/HRC/13/NGO/137. [HERE] http://daccess-dds- ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G10/119/24/PDF/G1011924.pdf?OpenElement

* * * * *

The following joint statement was drafted and delivered by DGL for AWE and WUPJ.
Other statements made at the 13th session on other subjects will follow in due course.

ASSOCIATION FOR WORLD EDUCATION
WORLD UNION FOR PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM

United Nations Human Rights Council -13th session (1-26 March 2010)
Statement by David G. Littman - Wednesday (2:45 pm), 40th plenum 24 March 2010
President (Chair): Ambassador Alex Van Meeuwen (Belgium)
Item 10: Technical assistance and capacity-building:

[The words in brackets were not pronounced in the time available]

Sir, we have read carefully the comprehensive report of the High Commissioner on Afghanistan and noted the ghastly situation described under "women's rights" and of "freedom of expression" - to name but two aspects. The Deputy High Commissioner repeated it in her introductory statement this morning and her declaration on efforts to develop accountable governance & the rule of law in Afghanistan are worth meditating.

Sir, this has been a long and tiring session and our archaeological meditations suddenly took flight, going back to a UN Human Rights event 40 years ago, which we would like to recall in this context [as a sort of Parthian shot], always, sir, with your indulgence.

In 1971, the United Nations translated the famous 2,500 [539 BCE] year-old clay Cylinder Seal of Cyrus the Great into all the official languages of the UN - and some even called it the First Charter of Human Rights. Thirty year later, Noble Peace Prize Laureate Shirin Ebadi evoked Cyrus and I wish to quote her pertinent words [10/12/03]

I am an Iranian, a descendant of Cyrus the Great. This emperor
proclaimed at the pinnacle of power 2,500 years ago that "he
would not reign over people if they did not wish it." He promised
not to force any person to change his religion and faith and
guaranteed freedom for all. The Charter of Cyrus the Great should
be studied in the history of human rights.

Mr. President, I would like to read from that Charter to conclude. These are the words of Cyrus the Great, written 2550 years ago. [His huge empire included Afghanistan]:

I announce that I will respect the traditions, customs and religions of the
nations of my empire and never let any of my governors and subordinates
look down on or insult them while I am alive. From now on (...) I will
impose my monarchy on no nation. Each is free to accept it, and if any one
of them rejects it, I never resolve on war to reign. While I am king of Iran, Babylon, and the nations of four directions

[1st interruption by the president (after 2 minutes and 16 seconds):
"I thank you"- the speaker did not hear the gavel and continued]

I never let anyone oppress any other, and if it occurs, I will take his

[2nd interruption: "Your speaking time is over"- micro cut: 2 min. 20 sec.]

These lines could have been read within 45 secs. (total:3 mins.), the time allowed to the NGO who had just spoken before & another NGO

[or her right back and penalize the oppressor. And while I am monarch, I
will never let anyone take possession of movable and landed property of
the others by force or without compensation. While I am alive, I prevent
unpaid, forced labour. Today, I announce that everyone is free to choose
a religion. People are free to live in all regions and take up a job provided
that they never violate other's rights. No one should be penalized for his or
her relatives' faults. I prevent slavery and my governors and subordinates
are obliged to prohibit exchanging men and women as slaves within their
own ruling domains. Such a tradition should be eliminated the world over...

[The words of Cyrus the Great should be heard today by all here, especially those
From his former empire (Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and "in four directions") in
the hope that they will influence their leaders "to develop accountable governance
and the rule of law" under International Covenants they have signed and ratified.]

UPDATE from DAVID LITTMAN:

Mea culpa - with regrets. In preparing hastily my oral statement for the UN Human Rights Council, I first learned about the 1971 translation of the Cyrus the Great clay-cylinder into the six official UN languages and the copy in New York - and also saw the quote by Nobel Peace Laureate Shirin Ebadi on Cyrus in the Wikipedia article. Then, unwittingly, I used an erroneous translation of the famous Cyrus Cylinder that popped up on the internet -instead of checking it with the translation in Prof. James Pritchard's Ancient Near Eastern Texts (1955, pp. 315-16) in my own library. There is no doubt that Cyrus was a remarkable leader and conqueror, who created the largest empire in antiquity and left for posterity an envied reputation of magnanimity. He is greatly praised in the Bible for letting the enslaved Jews to return to Jerusalem in 538 BCE to rebuild the Temple, destroyed by the Babylonians. Three months ago two cuneiform tablet fragments were discovered in the British Museum collections , bearing inscriptions similar to those of the Cyrus cylinder. Perhaps they will yield more secrets on this subject. Yet, here are some positive words to be found in the clay-Cylinder: "My numerous troops walked around Babylon in peace, I did not allow anybody to terrorize (any place) of the [country of Sumur] and Akkad. I strove for peace in Babylon and in all his (other) sacred cities.... [I abolished] the yoke which was against their social standing. I brought relief to their dilapidated housing, putting (thus) an end to their (main) complaints."  

All I have to say about this is the same thing I had to say here: This will cause an international uproar, with mountains of blather about intolerance. Few, if any, in the mainstream media will note how severely the rights of non-Muslims are restricted in Saudi Arabia and in Sharia states in general, and few, if any, will even entertain the notion that France has a right to stand up for its cultural integrity and set some standards accordingly.

"Niqab for Muslim women banned in Canadian province," from IANS, March 25 (thanks to Block Ness):

TORONTO: After France, Muslim women have been banned from wearing niqab in Canada's French-speaking Quebec province.

A bill tabled Wednesday will not allow government services to women wearing the niqab.

The bill comes after protests triggered by an Egyptian immigrant's refusal to remove her niqab in her French languages classes in Montreal, forcing the school and the provincial government to throw her out.

The college says the Muslim woman was given the front seat in the class so that all male students sat behind her. She was even allowed to make presentations from the rear of the classroom with her back to the class which had three male and 17 female students.

However, students and the college authorities were shocked when one day the woman asked male students to move away from her and refused to sit with them around a U-table to converse and learn French pronunciation....

The government last week ordered that every niqab-clad woman must uncover her face to confirm her identity when applying for her medicare card. Wednesday's bill will be the first such step in North America to curtail any religious dress.

According to the bill, women seeking medical and auto insurance services will have to remove their veil, adding that face coverings will not be tolerated in people's dealings with government officials.

Speaking to the media, Quebec premier (equal to chief minister in India) Jean Charest said the step was needed for maintaining gender equality and secular character of public institutions.

"This (bill) is a symbol of affirmation and respect - first of all, for ourselves, and also for those to whom we open our arms. This is not about making our home less welcoming, but about stressing the values that unite us.

"An accommodation cannot be granted unless it respects the principle of equality between men and women, and the religious neutrality of the state,'' the premier said....

Sharia is not to be questioned. "Islamic court in Nigeria bans Twitter for debating on amputation," from ANI, March 25 (thanks to all who sent this in):

London, Mar 25 (ANI): An Islamic court in Nigeria has banned the use of Twitter and Facebook websites for conducting debates on the use of amputations as a form of punishment.

The court, in the northern city of Kaduna, backed a case brought by a pro-Sharia group arguing that a rights group was hosting debates on social networking sites, which would mock the Sharia system....

Sharia judges can order amputations of limbs for petty crimes in some states. The courts mostly deal with domestic issues such as marriage and divorce.

Sharia judges have sentenced some women to death by stoning for adultery, but the sentences have not been carried out.

The newspaper ThisDay quoted the judge's ruling as saying: "An order is hereby given restraining the respondents either by themselves or their agents from opening a chat forum on Facebook, Twitter, or any blog for the purpose of the debate on the amputation of Malam Buba Bello Jangebe."

In 2000, Jangebe made history as the first person in Nigeria to have an amputation carried out under Islamic law after being found guilty of stealing a cow....

Here is a terrific piece by Cliff May on Obama's new ambassador to the Organization of the Islamic Conference, Rashad Hussain. I share's May's concern that instead of standing up to this chief foe of freedom of speech in the world today, Hussain will kowtow. Why wouldn't he?

"Candor must counter Muslim half-truths," by Clifford D. May, March 25 (thanks to Twostellas):

Last month, President Barack Obama announced the appointment of Rashad Hussain as ambassador to the Organization of the Islamic Conference. By video, Obama told attendees at something called the U.S.-Islamic World Forum in Doha, Qatar, that Hussain, 31, was not just "an accomplished lawyer and trusted member of my White House staff," but also a "hafiz" - a Muslim who has memorized the entire Koran.

That reminded me: George Shultz, when he served as secretary of State under President Ronald Reagan, would bring new ambassadors into his office where he kept a globe. "Show me the country you'll be representing," he would say. The diplomat would give the globe a spin, abruptly halting its motion to indicate Botswana, Bhutan, Brunei or whatever country he'd be calling home for the next few years. Shultz would shake his head. "No," he would say. "You'll be representing the United States of America. Try to remember that."

The Organization of the Islamic Conference is a powerful global entity that most Americans have never heard of. It claims a "membership of 57 states spread over four continents," making it the largest intergovernmental organization after the United Nations - where, in recent years, it has arguably become the most powerful player.

The OIC's Web site is revealing. It includes a communique protesting Switzerland's ban of minarets, another on "Israeli Aggressions," a condemnation of the "reprint of the controversial drawing of the Prophet Muhammad by Swedish artist Lars Vilks . . . as reaction to an alleged plot to murder the cartoonist," and much on "Islamophobia."

There is not much on terrorism aside from a statement by Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the OIC's current secretary general, instructing that it "would be an unfortunate error in judgment in believing that Islam is linked to terror; that it is intolerant of other religious beliefs, that its values and practices are not democratic; that it favors oppression of freedom of expression and undermining human rights." [...]

One might argue Hussain should be making a forceful case for such democratic values as freedom and human rights - including for women and non-Muslims.

That Hussain has memorized the Koran is impressive. It remains to be seen whether he is equally familiar with the U.S. Constitution. He'll be representing the United States of America. He should try to remember that.

Read it all.

Will the Islamophobia never end? "Bangladesh: 50 Christians injured in Muslim attacks," from CatholicCulture.org, March 25 (thanks to Twostellas):

Armed with knives, bricks, and sticks, a group of Muslims attacked Christian villagers in Bangladesh on March 20, injuring 50.

"They [the Muslims] said they will kill some of our people," said Father Leo Desai of the Diocese of Dinajpur. "We're in a panic and are afraid to go out."

The attacks took place after a court ruled in favor of a parish in a land dispute. "Most tribal people are illiterate and have no land documents for their ancestral lands," explained diocesan official Father Anthony Sen. "Local Muslims occupy their lands and land disputes arise."

No one should be surprised that the Islam Channel said this. They were just being true to the teachings of Muhammad, who said: "If a husband calls his wife to his bed [i.e. to have sexual relation] and she refuses and causes him to sleep in anger, the angels will curse her till morning" (Bukhari 4.54.460). He also said: "By him in Whose Hand lies my life, a woman can not carry out the right of her Lord, till she carries out the right of her husband. And if he asks her to surrender herself [to him for sexual intercourse] she should not refuse him even if she is on a camel's saddle" (Ibn Majah 1854).

No, that is not surprising at all. It would be more surprising if they didn't teach this. What should be just as disquieting to British authorities is the "moderate Muslim" Quilliam Foundation's misleading and dubious indignation about this. Someone should ask the slick deceiver Ed Husain on what basis he rejects the ahadith above. But no one will. Those who could ask him can't get to him, and those who can get to him don't know or don't dare.

"UK's Muslim TV: Wives must not refuse sex with spouse," by Martin Bentham in the London Evening Standard, March 25 (thanks to Twostellas):

Britain's leading Muslim TV channel was accused of encouraging "marital rape" and promoting other intolerant views of women in a report on extremism published today.

The report by think tank Quillam says that the London-based Islam Channel broadcast comments saying that "the idea a woman cannot refuse her husband relations" was "not strange" and was instead part of "maintaining a strong marriage".

It says that the channel also broadcast advice that a wife should not leave her home without her husband's permission and that a woman who wears perfume in public is a prostitute.

The think tank, which is calling for an investigation by broadcasting watchdog Ofcom, also accuses the channel of advertising talks by al Qaeda-supporting preacher Anwar al-Awlaki, who is alleged to have inspired failed Detroit bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, and of giving a platform to other extremist Islamists.

The report, which was based on an analysis of broadcasts over three months, also states that Islam Channel's programmes have undermined trust between community groups by airing hostile comments about non-Muslims and those who follow alternative versions of Islam.

The channel's website says that it aims "to present the Islamic viewpoint and values" and provide "authoritative and impartial Islamic information". It aims to act as an "interface" between Muslims and non-Muslims and remove misconceptions about the religion....

The courageous Iranian freedom fighter Amil Imani writes about the Muslim scapegoating of Jews:

[...] Sadly, the Jewish people have been used as scapegoat for many centuries by a variety of non-Jews. Regrettably, Muslims for their part and have adopted scapegoating as an article of faith. The Muslims blame the Jews for all kinds of heinous things, dating back to the time of Muhammad himself. They say that the Jews of Medina betrayed the holy prophet by their treachery. They charged the poor exorbitant sums for their goods; did no productive work, yet made fortunes through money lending. To make matters worse, the Jews refused to embrace Muhammad's religion, they say. The story of Banu Qurayza's Massacre from Quranic verses, is very clear how Allah actually rejoices this in slaughter and enslavement of the tribe of Banu Qurayza's Jews.

Quran-33:25- "Allah turned back the unbelievers [Meccans and their allies] in a state of rage, having not won any good, and Allah spared the believers battle. Allah is, indeed, Strong and Mighty."

Quran-33:26- "And He brought those of the People of the Book [Jewish people of Banu Qurayza's] who supported them from their fortresses and cast terror into their hearts, some of them you slew (beheaded) and some you took prisoners (captive)"

Quran-33:27- "And He made you heirs of their lands, their houses, and their goods, and of a land which ye had not frequented (before). And Allah has power over all things." [Merciful Allah asked Prophet Muhammad to confiscate entire properties of surrendered Jews.]

Hence, following the example of Muhammad, many Muslim societies have been blaming the Jews for everything and find them deserving of victimization. The litany of atrocities committed against the Jews by the followers of Muhammad is long indeed.

Regrettably, ascribing blame to others and legitimizing their victimization has become a way of life with the rabid Islamists. As sick as scapegoating is, it confers advantages to its practitioners. For one, it rallies the faithful against an enemy portrayed as depraved and dangerous. That's how Hitler and his gang of thugs aroused the German nation against the Jews. They falsely, yet successfully, blamed the Jews for Germany's economic problems.

The Islamists, for their part, are still playing the Jewish blame card as best as they can. The State of Israel, by its very existence, has provided the inept and habitually devious Islamists a palpable target to blame and attack. Yet, Israel still not only exists, but thrives in their midst. None of the dastardly actions of the Islamists has been effective at realizing their dream of pushing the children of Israel into the sea....

Read it all.

Was that a warning or a threat? "Maliki aide warns of postvote violence if Sunni group wins," by Margaret Coker in the Wall Street Journal, March 25 (thanks to Twostellas):

BAGHDAD--A top aide to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki warned that violence would erupt across the majority Shiite country should the Sunni-heavy alliance led by Ayad Allawi win the parliamentary election held earlier this month.

Tensions are rising in response to preliminary vote totals from the March 7 election that indicate a neck-and-neck race between Mr. Maliki's political coalition and the bloc led by Mr. Allawi in an election seen as a barometer of stability in the fragile democracy.

Final results are due to be released Friday, and Shiites are nervous that they could lose their brief lock on power...

As if they have never threatened to do this before. "'Osama Bin Laden threatens retaliation over 9/11 trial,'" from the BBC, March 25 (thanks to all who sent this in):

A message said to be from Osama Bin Laden threatens to kill Americans if the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks is executed by the US.

Al-Jazeera news channel broadcast an audiotape reportedly from the al-Qaeda leader talking about Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other suspects. [...]

The taped message said: "The White House has declared its wish to execute (Mr Mohammed and the other suspects). The day the United States takes such a decision, it would be also taking the decision that any of you falling into our hands will be executed."...

"Mr Mohammed." Reminds me of Neville Chamberlain talking about "Herr Hitler."

The White House has been criticised for planning to put the five suspects on trial in New York. Critics say the trial near the Ground Zero will be expensive and disruptive.

White House officials have yet to decide if the trial will take place in a federal courtroom, or in a military commission.

Prosecutors are expected to seek the death penalty, while White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said in January that Mr Mohammed was going to "meet his maker" if found guilty.

The Pentagon says Mr Mohammed has admitted to being responsible "from A to Z" for the attacks in New York and Washington....

Proof that "Osama" is out of touch with reality:

In the tape broadcast on Thursday, the speaker said to be Bin Laden also accused US President Barack Obama of "following the footsteps of his predecessor".

"The politicians in the White House were practising injustice against us and still they are - especially by supporting Israel in its continuous occupation of Palestine," he said.

Yeah, Obama is supporting Israel with a reliability and fervor to rival Pakistan's attachment to its alliance with the United States.

"They used to think that America across the oceans is protected from the rage of the oppressed until our reaction was loudly heard at your home on the 9/11 with God's help."...

How odd that he would think that God would help him commit mass murder. Surely some of the Stateside adherents of the Religion of Peace™ are ready to refute that notion. Honest Ibe? Brave Ahmed? Anyone? Anyone?

This will cause an international uproar, with mountains of blather about intolerance. Few, if any, in the mainstream media will note how severely the rights of non-Muslims are restricted in Saudi Arabia and in Sharia states in general, and few, if any, will even entertain the notion that France has a right to stand up for its cultural integrity and set some standards accordingly.

"France to ban veil says Nicolas Sarkozy," from the Telegraph, March 25 (thanks to Kambiz):

Nicolas Sarkozy has said that France will ban the full Muslim veil.

The move would protect the dignity of women, the president added.

"The full veil is contrary to the dignity of women," he said. "The response is to ban it. The Government will table a draft law prohibiting it."...

And remember: this is the kind of law that the Organization of the Islamic Conference is agitating at the UN to get Western governments to adopt.

"Christian Woman Jailed under Pakistan's 'Blasphemy' Laws," from Compass Direct News, March 24:

GUJRANWALA, Pakistan, March 24 (CDN) -- Police in Alipur have arrested a Christian woman on a baseless accusation of "blaspheming" the prophet of Islam and tried to keep rights groups from discovering the detention, a Christian leader said. Alipur police in Punjab Province denied that they had detained Rubina Bibi when Khalid Gill, Lahore regional coordinator of the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance (APMA) and organizer of the Christian Liberation Front, inquired about her detention after a Muslim woman accused her of blasphemy, Gill told Compass.

"The Muslim woman's name was kept secret by the police and Muslim people, and we were not allowed to see the Christian woman," Gill said. "The Alipur police said they had not arrested her yet, contrary to the fact that they had arrested and tortured her at Alipur police station."

A reliable police source told Compass on condition of anonymity that a First Information Report (No. 194/2010) dated March 20 identified Rubina Bibi of Alipur, wife of Amjad Masih, as accused of making a derogatory remark about the Islamic prophet Muhammad. The charge comes under Section 295-C of Pakistan's blasphemy laws, which have gained international notoriety for their misuse by Muslims to settle personal grudges....

Read it all.

Here yet again is more evidence of what we have pointed out many times over the years: that there is no reliable way to distinguish between Islamic "extremists" and Islamic "moderates." These CIA officers, having been improperly trained in the nature of the enemy ideology and belief-system and filled with PC nonsense about the Religion of Peace™, assumed that al-Balawi was a reliable "moderate" -- until he murdered them.

"AP sources: Birthday cake awaited suicide bomber," by Eileen Sullivan and Matt Apuzzo for Associated Press, March 25 (thanks to Darcy):

WASHINGTON (AP) -- CIA officers in Afghanistan were so eager to meet the spy they believed would help them crack al-Qaida's leadership they planned a birthday celebration for his visit in December, current and former U.S. officials said.

A birthday cake was waiting.

But before they could even begin to question their golden source, he detonated a powerful bomb, killing himself and seven CIA employees in one of the deadliest attacks in the agency's history.

Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, a 36-year-old doctor who had been recruited by Jordanian intelligence officials, was really a double agent.

The account of the planned birthday gathering is the latest evidence that CIA officials at the Afghan base trusted the Jordanian and wanted to build rapport with him. It was confirmed by current and former officials briefed on the case, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter.

The bombing not only weakened U.S. intelligence operations, it touched off a sometimes contentious debate within the close-knit intelligence community about whether such emotions led the CIA to be too lax with its security....

That's not the problem. The problem is that they have completely misconceived the nature of the threat. Unless and until that changes, and it isn't going to anytime in the foreseeable future, there will be many more incidents like this one.

More Gitmo Follies, courtesy a dhimmi federal judge. "So, You Still Want to Close Gitmo? Judge's order to release 9/11 jihadist is a sign of things to come," by Andrew C. McCarthy in National Review, March 25:

Mohamedou Slahi is responsible for the murder of thousands of Americans. He was a core member of the 9/11 conspiracy -- the recruiter of Mohamed Atta and the other ringleaders. If he'd had his druthers, even more Americans would have been killed: He is almost certainly the al-Qaeda middle manager who activated the Canadian cell that attempted to bomb Los Angeles International Airport. On the scale of war criminals, he edges toward the Khalid Sheikh Mohammed range, as bad as it gets.

A federal judge has ordered that he be released.

Cassandra did not like being Cassandra. It is not enjoyable to foresee avoidable catastrophes again and again (and again and again and again) only to watch as no remedial measures are taken and disaster strikes. To repeat: The courts are institutionally incompetent when it comes to matters of national security, particularly the prosecution of war.

The Framers intended it that way. National-security decisions are the most important ones a political community makes, so our system of government was designed to have them made by the political branches -- by those who answer to the voters, to the people whose lives are at stake. When the political branches abdicate this first responsibility of government, sitting by as it is usurped by politically insulated judges, they deny us the freedom to decide for ourselves what our security requires. We are then the subjects of judges rather than masters of our own destiny.

The courts, moreover, are the worst institution to which we could surrender this authority. Not only are we powerless to vote them out if they get national-defense matters wrong, they are guaranteed to get them wrong. This is not because judges are bad people; it is because they have no responsibility for protecting the country. They are generally good people whose job is to ensure that the parties before the court are given due process. When a judge does that job conscientiously, due-process rights are inevitably inflated. That judges do not run completely out of control in maximizing due-process rights owes not to judicial temperance but to the powers of the political branches.

This genius of separation of powers is on display in the civilian justice system. We know that judges are hardwired to maximize the rights of accused criminals. So we don't give them free reign. It is Congress that writes the statutes that courts must apply and prescribes the rules of procedure. It is Congress that tells the judges what the punishment for a crime must be and whether an offender may be released -- it doesn't matter whether the judge thinks the criminal is unlikely to threaten society....

Be sure to read it all.

The problem is not that Muslims want to live according to the dictates of Sharia. The problem is that everyone else has to as well. Eurabia Alert: "KFC diner told 'you can't have bacon in your burger here - we're now halal,'" by Katherine Faulkner in the Daily Mail, March 24 (thanks to Kris):

A diner was left furious after a KFC restaurant refused to sell him a bacon burger - because it wasn't halal.

Alan Phillips was told the restaurant was no longer selling his favourite 'Big Daddy' burger, which contains a chicken burger with bacon, cheese and salad, because it had decided to sell only halal food.

The Burton-on-Trent branch is one of the 86 out of 750 British KFC restaurants which is now selling nothing other than halal meat.

The company has taken the burger off the menu because Islamic dietary law forbids Muslims to eat anything which has been prepared on the same premises as pork, which is itself strictly forbidden.

It said it was responding to 'increased demand' for a halal menu in the areas of Britain with growing Muslim populations.

Note that increased demand from Muslims results in discrimination against non-Muslims: the Muslims in the area apparently would not have been content with halal selections on the menu. All food not in compliance with Islamic food laws had to be eliminated -- in accord with the unilateral and supremacist nature of Sharia.

As I predicted, they would find some way to circumvent the full-body scanners. "Al-Qaida hiding bombs in breast implants, says MI5," from the Times of India, March 24 (thanks to all who sent this in):

LONDON: Al-Qaida is laying deadly "booby traps" by equipping its female suicide bombers with explosive breast implants that are impossible to be detected at airport security checkpoints, British intelligence agency MI5 has claimed.

"Women suicide bombers recruited by al-Qaida are known to have had the explosives inserted in their breasts under techniques similar to breast enhancing surgery," the British newspaper Sun quoted terrorist expert Joseph Farah, as saying.

The lethal explosives called PETN are inserted inside plastic shapes during the operation, before the breast is then sewn up, he added.

According to the MI5, al-Qaida doctors have been trained at some of Britain's leading teaching hospitals before returning to their own countries to perform the surgical procedures.

The intelligence agency has also discovered that extremists are inserting the explosives into the buttocks of some male suicide bombers.

Top surgeons have confirmed the feasibility of the explosive implants.

"Properly inserted, the implant would be virtually impossible to detect by the usual airport scanning machines," one surgeon said.

"You would need to subject a suspect to a sophisticated X-ray. Given that the explosive would be inserted in a sealed plastic sachet, and would be a small amount, would make it all the more impossible to spot it with the usual body scanner," he added.

A sachet containing as little as five ounces of PETN could blow "a considerable hole" in an airline's skin, causing it to crash, experts said.

CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror funding case -- so named by the Justice Department. CAIR operatives have repeatedly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. Several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror. CAIR's cofounder and longtime Board chairman (Omar Ahmad), as well as its chief spokesman (Honest Ibe Hooper), have made Islamic supremacist statements.

From "CAIR's Hate Crimes Nonsense" by Daniel Pipes and Sharon Chadha:

CAIR cites the July 9, 2004 case of apparent arson at a Muslim-owned grocery store in Everett, Washington. But investigators quickly determined that Mirza Akram, the store's operator, staged the arson to avoid meeting his scheduled payments and to collect on an insurance policy. Although Akram's antics were long ago exposed as a fraud, CAIR continues to list this case as an anti-Muslim hate crime.

CAIR also states that "a Muslim-owned market was burned down in Texas" on August 6, 2004. But already a month later, the owner was arrested for having set fire to his own business. Why does CAIR include this incident in its report?

CAIR lists the March 2005 lawsuit filed by the Salmi family for the firebombing of their family van as one example of a hate crime report it received in 2004. However, the crime named in the lawsuit occurred in March 2003, was already reported by CAIR in 2003, and should not have been tabulated again in the 2004 report.

CAIR reports that "a home-made bomb exploded outside of the Champions Mosque in the Houston suburb of Spring, Texas," staking its claim on eyewitness reports that on July 4, 2004, "two white males" were seen placing the bomb. We inquired about the incident and found that Spring's sheriff department could not locate any police files about an explosion. Further inquiries to the mosque and an e-mail to CAIR both went unanswered. There is scant evidence that any crime even occurred.

CAIR notes that "investigators in Massachusetts are still investigating a potential hate-motivated arson against the Al-Baqi Islamic Center in Springfield." However the case was long ago ruled a simple robbery, news that even CAIR's own website has posted. The Associated Press reported on January 21, 2005, that prosecutors determined the fire was set by teen-age boys "who broke into the Al-Baqi mosque to steal money and candy, then set the fire to cover their tracks." The boys, they clarified, "weren't motivated by hatred toward Muslims."

CAIR describes what happened to a Muslim family in Tucson, Arizona: "bullet shots pierced their home as they ate dinner in October 2004" and two months later their truck was smashed and vandalized. But the only evidence that either incident was motivated by hate of Muslims is the Dehdashti family itself, not the police. Detective Frank Rovi of Pima County Sheriff's Department, who handled the shooting investigation, said that according to the neighbors, the desert area by the Dehdashti house was often used for target practice. Neither incident was classified as a hate crime and both cases were closed by February 2005, long before the CAIR report went to press.

Of twenty "anti-Muslim hate crimes" in 2004 that CAIR describes, at least six are invalid – and further research could likely find problems with the other fourteen instances.

Should a group with a track record like this really be given a pass by AP and Minnesota education authorities?

"Muslim Group: Hate Incidents On Rise In MN Schools," from AP, March 24 (thanks to Wheeler):

ST. PAUL (AP) ― A Muslim civil rights group is calling on the Department of Education to investigate reports of racial and religious tensions in Minnesota public schools.

The Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations asked for the department's help Wednesday, following reports of anti-Muslim incidents around the state.

Muslim students have allegedly been called names and faced harassment by students and teachers. In one case, CAIR says, two students shoved pork bacon in the faces of Muslim high school girls. Muslims do not eat pork.

In another case, CAIR says, a bus driver went past Muslim students waiting at a bus stop. And CAIR says a teacher told students to spray air freshener when Muslim students entered a room....

The Saudis, of course, have never issued any complaints about Palestinian genocidal jihadist bloodlust. Quite the contrary. "Saudi Arabia: World must intervene with 'arrogant' Israel," from Haaretz, March 24 (thanks to Alexandre):

In a comparatively rare public complaint, Saudi Arabia lashed out Wednesday at Israeli government policy, asking major powers involved in Middle East peace-making for "clarifications about Israel's arrogant policy and its insistence on defying international will."...

Yet again, as with Israel, Obama troubles an ally and aids our enemies. As Pamela Geller asks trenchantly, "Is this jihadi worth more than our relationship with so strategic an ally as India?"

Apparently so. Find out why in our forthcoming book The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War On America (Simon & Schuster).

"A spy unsettles US-India ties," by M K Bhadrakumar in Asia Times, March 23 (thanks to Pamela, who has a great deal more background on this here):

News that the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had reached a plea bargain with David Coleman Headley, who played a key role in the planning of the terrorist strike in Mumbai in November 2008 in which 166 people were killed, has caused an uproar in India.

The deal enables the US government to hold back from formally producing any evidence against Headley in a court of law that might have included details of his links with US intelligence or oblige any cross-examination of Headley by the prosecution.

Nor can the families of the 166 victims be represented by a lawyer to question Headley during his trial commencing in Chicago. Headley's links with the US intelligence will now remain classified information and the Pakistani nationals involved in the Mumbai attacks will get away scot-free. Furthermore, the FBI will not allow Headley's extradition to India and will restrict access so that Indian agencies cannot interrogate him regarding his links with US and Pakistani intelligence.

In return for pleading guilty to the charges against him Headley will get lighter punishment than the death sentence that was probably most likely....

You'd think he'd be too ashamed, but apparently he has no shame. "Erdogan Accuses Armenians of 'Exterminating' Turks," from Asbarez, March 22 (thanks to Fjordman):

ANKARA (RFE/RL)-Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday claimed that Armenians in the Ottoman Empire never faced genocide and, on the contrary, themselves plotted to exterminate Turks.

Erdogan was reported to angrily deny the historical record of Genocide as he marked the 95th anniversary of a rare Turkish military victory during World War One.

"In 1915 and before that, it was the Armenian side that pursued a policy aimed at exterminating our people which led to hunger, misery and death," he said in a speech delivered in the city of Canakkale. "Forgetting all that is unfair and heartless. Our warriors always respected ancestral laws and did not kill innocent people even on the battlefield."

"I should underline that this country's soldier is bigger than history and that this country's history is as clean and clear as the sun. No country's parliament can tarnish it," Erdogan said, in a clear reference to U.S. and Swedish lawmakers' latest resolutions recognizing the annihilation of 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman Turks as genocide.

"There is no genocide in our civilization. Our civilization is the civilization of love, tolerance and brotherhood," he added, according to "Today's Zaman" daily.

Erdogan followed a similar line of reasoning last November when he stated that the universally condemned massacres of hundreds of thousands of civilians in Darfur, Sudan were not a genocide. "Muslims don't commit genocide," he said.

Yeah, surrrre.

The Turkish premier did use the word "genocide," however, when he condemned the deaths of several dozen Turkic-speaking and Muslim Uighurs during unrest in China's northwestern Xinjiang region last July. "The killings of Uighur Turks by the Chinese police during demonstrations constitute genocide," he said at the time. "I use this term intentionally."

Uh, yeah. You're in jail. That entails a certain denial of rights. "Muslim inmates sue ACI over meal plan," by Katie Mulvaney in the Providence Journal, March 23 (thanks to Block Ness):

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Sunni Muslim inmates serving time in maximum security at the Adult Correctional Institutions are suing prison administrators, accusing them of violating their rights by denying them the freedom to pray together and meals that comply with their faith.

The Muslim Brotherhood of the Islamic Faith allege in a suit filed in U.S. District Court that correctional officers routinely taunt them by calling them terrorists and the Taliban. The inmates say the guards threaten to retaliate against their complaints by placing them in isolation.

A Department of Corrections lawyer has denied the allegations and argues the case should be dismissed because the administrators were acting in good faith and not with deliberate disregard for the prisoners' needs or rights. The Muslim Brotherhood had failed to exhaust administrative remedies under the Department of Corrections inmate grievances, policies and practices....

The Muslim Brotherhood members who brought the lawsuit include Alvin Smith, convicted of stabbing two children to death in 1988; Shea Cook, serving time for murdering a stripper and tossing her body in a Connecticut river; and Simeon Briggs, who shot and killed two strangers as the left a city nightclub in 2003. They are representing themselves, led by Corey Day, who is doing time for burglarizing Ocean Tides, a school for troubled youth in Narragansett. They seek unspecified damages.

According to the complaint, the inmates say they are being denied their right to religious freedom because they are not being allowed to pray together openly in the yard or library. Their faith dictates they pray to Allah five times a day.

In addition, they argue they are given four slices of bread, three of cheese, and a vegetable in response to requests they be offered a diet that complies with their faith. The rest of the population eats meat loaf, hot dogs and fried chicken, they said.

"What the ACI is doing by serving us substandard food is forcing is to chose between the pangs of hunger ... or to compromise our faith and eat unlawful food ... ," Day wrote....

She said Muslim inmates are offered a meal plan during 30-day Ramadan that includes a breakfast bag of fresh fruit, hard boiled eggs, pastry, doughnuts, muffins, or cereal. Their evening meal is a pre-plated kosher meal. There is a feast at the end of Ramadan that includes chicken, collard greens, sweet potatoes, canned corn, soda, rice, and corn bread....

Torture!

Will the Islamophobia never end? "Islamic Extremists in Somalia Kill Church Leader, Torch Home," from Compass Direct News, March 24:

NAIROBI, Kenya, March 24 (CDN) -- Islamic militants in Somalia tracked down an underground church leader who had previously escaped a kidnapping attempt and killed him last week, Christian sources said.

Islamic extremist al Shabaab rebels shot Madobe Abdi to death on March 15 at 9:30 a.m. in Mahaday village, 50 kilometers (31 miles) north of Johwar. He had escaped an al Shabaab attempt to kidnap him on March 2.

Abdi's death adds to a growing number of Christians murdered by Islamic militants, but his was distinctive in that he was not a convert from Islam. An orphan, Abdi was raised as a Christian.

Sources said the militants prohibited his body from being buried, ordering that it be left to dogs as an example to other Christians. Al shabaab, which is fighting the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) of President Sheikh Sharif Sheik Ahmed, has embarked on a campaign to rid the country of all non-Muslims.

"The al Shabaab say, 'Leaving Abdi's body outside is a warning to all that a murtid [infidel] is a disgrace to Muslims,' hence creating fear to whoever would like to choose Christianity," said a source....

Demonstrating once again that terrorism works, and the threat of terrorism works -- and that's why we will see more of both. "Indonesian Police Ban Regional Gay Conference," from AP, March 24 (thanks to Block Ness):

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) -- Indonesian police ordered the cancellation Wednesday of a conference of Asian gay activists, saying it could prompt violent protests by conservative Muslim groups.

The conference, organized by the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association, or ILGA, was due to take place this weekend with participants from 16 countries.

The ban was issued by police in Surabaya, East Java's capital, where the three-day event was to be held, national police spokesman Brig. Gen. Sulistyo Ishak said.

The decision was made after considering public objections by Muslim groups and the Indonesian Ulema Council, an influential board of Muslim clerics, he said.

''There are indications that the event could trigger a social crisis and cause public unrest,'' Ishak said. ''This ban was issued for the sake of public order.''...

Of course.

Comments by David G. Littman NGO Representative to the United Nations in Geneva: Association for World Education (AWE) and the World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ)

The following joint statement was drafted and delivered by DGL for WUPJ on 22 March

* * * * *
WORLD UNION FOR PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM

United Nations Human Rights Council -13th session (1-26 March 2010)
Statement by David G. Littman - Tuesday (12:50) 22 March 2010
President (Chair): Ambassador Alex Van Meeuwen (Belgium)
Item 4: Human Rights situations in Palestine ... (Gaza-Goldstone Report: follow-up)

[The words in square brackets were not pronounced in the two minutes time limitation]

[Thank you, Mr. President. Five months ago at the 12th special session, the Council adopted a follow-up resolution on the Goldstone-Gaza Report sponsored by the OIC (Organization of the Islamic Conference), the NAM (Non-Aligned Movement) & the African & Arab Groups - with the usual automatic majority] which stresses: "that the right to life constitutes the most fundamental of all human rights." A/HRC/S-12/L - 14 October 2010]

Sir, we wish to stress again that the "right to life" is contradicted by a blatant omission in the 452 page Goldstone Report [A/HRC/12/48], which is the root cause of the Gaza tragedy. I am referring once again to the Hamas Charter which simply calls for Jews to be killed and Israel to be eliminated; a text which, like Mein Kampf, refers at length to a crude forgery [The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion]; a text that inspires a Jihadist-terrorist regime - with links to Hezbollah and Iran - to teach systematically a culture of hate and death to children and adults in schools, the media and on TV. We recommend last week's Report by MEMRI1 which provides scores of links to Hamas-controlled Al-Aqsa TV clips that show how Gaza children are taught to become 'Jihad martyrs', while killing Jews and anyone near them. These bloodthirsty TV 'shows' are there for all those with eyes to see and ears to hear.

[The titles are clear: "Dispatch those sons of apes and pigs to the hellfire on the wings of Qassem rockets" / "The Jihad against the Jews will continue until their annihilation / A Palestinian who kills one Jew will be rewarded as if he killed 30 million / Killing all Jews will not be satisfactory compensation for the 'Real Holocaust' in Gaza. On this visual irrefutable evidence, the U.S Treasury Department last week imposed sanctions on Al-Aqsa TV. Officials from the UK, France, Germany, Italy have been briefed on all this. (MEMRI, also PMW; and Intelligence & Terrorism Information Center: 'Response to the Goldstone Report: 'Hamas & the Terrorist Threat from the Gaza Strip. 2 ]

Sir, millions of Germans (not just Nazis) read Hitler's Mein Kampf - his Aryan 'struggle', mainly against Jews, that led to the monstrous 'final solution'- but very few persons worldwide felt concerned by such incitements to kill. Today, there is also little interest shown in this genocidal Hamas Charter, a Jihad / 'struggle' to kill Jews and wipe Israel off the map (with help from all and sundry), which we have been denouncing here since 1989 in vain. [1st time quoted by D GL for WUPJ at 45th session, Commission on Human Rights, 31st January 1989] Few have bothered to read how Jews, Judaism and Israel are targeted:

["Israel, Judaism and Jews challenge Islam and the Muslim people. 'Let the cowards never sleep.'" (Article 28), or that Article 7 quotes a 'saying' (hadith) still widely preached in talks and sermons worldwide that call on Muslims to fight & kill all Jews; 3 and that article 8, the Hamas 'slogan', is taken from the Muslim Brotherhood Charter, inspiring 'Jihadist Martyrdom Bombers' worldwide, and including U.S. convert 'Jihad Jane'; 4 and that the preface quotes its founder Hassan al-Banna's politicidal call: "Israel will exist and continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it." Cf. our written NGO statements. 5]

Mr. President, we would ask: how can Judge Goldstone, his colleagues, the UN Secretary-General, the High Commissioner for Human Rights, UN officials, UNESCO, UNICEF, the OIC and this Council, and the 'international community', willingly ignore such blatant calls for children to kill [a "direct and public incitement to commit genocide" that are punishable under articles 3 and 4 of the 1948 Genocide Convention] and shrill defamations of religion: Judaism - all in the name of Allah and Islam, while the Council prepares to adopt another resolution on "Combating Defamation of Religions" [first initiated in 1999 by the OIC]?

Sir, future historians will ask: why this weird silence; this eerie faculty for forgetfulness of past and planned horrors via direct and public incitement to both politicide and genocide? Next week Christians will celebrate Easter and Jews Passover - the Exodus from Egypt to the Promised Land of Israel [Cf. Koran, The Table, Surah V: 23-26], followed by the official Shoah / Holocaust Remembrance Day on 11 April. Now is the time, sir, for this Council to denounce all this and the Hamas Charter and not keep silent - while seeking true peace rather than one more 'resolution'.

.... A last word from Shakespeare's Othello: "Silence that dreadful bell." [II. iii. 175]

Thank you, Mr President.

Notes:

1. http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/4045.htm / MEMRI: Hamas. Special Announcements N° 107 (18 March 2010)

2. http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/site/content/t1.asp?Sid=13&Pid=334

3. "HAMAS aspires to implement Allah's promise, whatever time it may take. The Prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: 'The Hour [Day of Judgment] will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews and kill them; until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim O Abdallah [slave of Allah], there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. This will not apply to the Gharqad tree which is a Jewish tree.'"

4. "Allah is its target, the Prophet is its model, the Koran its Constitution; Jihad is its path, and death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes." (Article 8).This 'saying' - from the 1928 Charter of the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is a wing, according to its 1988 Charter, article 2 - is recorded from al-Bukhari and Muslim, both considered by serious Islamic scholars as highly reliable sources for the hadith or 'sayings' of the Prophet Muhammad.

5. See detailed written statement E/CN.4/2003/NGO/226: The 1988 Genocidal Charter of HAMAS: an evil legacy for 'Jihadist- Martyrdom' bombers. See also: A/HRC/S-1/NGO/4 (2006); A/HRC/S-9/NGO/3 (2009)

The late Edward Said is the individual single most responsible for the utter impossibility of discussing Islam and jihad honestly on most university campuses today.

In Middle East Quarterly, A. J. Caschetta reviews Daniel Varisco's Reading Orientalism: Said and the Unsaid:

Edward Said's reputation as a serious scholar has taken heavy blows in recent years, and those with a vested interest in Saidism have been busy attempting to repair the damage. Varisco's Reading Orientalism: Said and the Unsaid is one such attempt. If the Said apologists are finding it increasingly difficult to overlook the rhetoric of Said's Orientalism[1] in the wake of an ever-growing number of works that have exposed its faults--culminating with Ibn Warraq's A Defense of the West,[2] they show no signs of going gentle into the inevitable good night, and the book by Varisco, a professor of anthropology at Hofstra University, attempts mightily to buoy up Said's sinking reputation as the sage of post-colonialism.

The main problem Said's apologists face is Orientalism's being little more than a straw man argument; the biased, ethnically supremacist, cultural imperative that Said sketches is exaggerated at best and fabricated at worst. Unlike most Saidists, however, who ignore the misstatements, exaggerations, and fabrications, Varisco duly acknowledges them, making his approach unique. He claims to regret Said's methodology while supporting his task and his politics. The result is a very peculiar read, both for its remarkably self-conscious narrative and the certainty that it is addressing a sympathetic audience. Varisco seems convinced that he has written a very important book.

This review could end here were it not for an ambiguous claim made several times in the book. The back cover trumpets Varisco's "devastating critique of Said's methodology and conclusions" and asserts that it "employs 'critical satire' to parody the exaggerated and pedantic aspects of post-colonial discourse." On the strength of these remarks, I expected something quite different.

Beginning with a 6-page, pre-introductory preface titled "To the Reader," Varisco announces: "You have before you two books about one book." The one book of course is Orientalism and the two books are first, "a narrative that provides a critique of Said's Orientalism thesis," and second, the "endnotes and bibliography, where all the references are mercifully archived." As an admirer of endnotes, I was looking forward to the second book, but Varisco quickly threw cold water on my enthusiasm by warning that these notes contain "the asides and gratuitous rhetorical overkill that even the author finds too profligate for the narrative." Indeed.

So what kind of book is Reading Orientalism? What makes that seemingly simple question so difficult to answer is Varisco's ambiguous term "satirical criticism," a term he never defines. Naturally all satire is critical, but not all criticism is satirical. And the problem with satire is that it can go over the heads of its audience, through the shortcomings either of the audience or of the satirist.

In the post-Menippean context, Roman poetics conceived of satire as a combination of three requisite elements: the satirical text, the world, and the recognition that a satirical text comments on some aspect of the world. Without this recognition, a satirical text misses its mark, which usually renders it a complete failure; but sometimes it enjoys an inadvertent success as when the reading public accepts the text at face value, and it takes on a life of its own. (Think Gulliver's Travels read as children's literature rather than as the often bitter and scathing satire Jonathan Swift wrote on the society of his day.) Without the third element, satire does not work.

As someone immersed in the world of Saidism and its discontents, I find myself unable to locate the satirical connection between Reading Orientalism and the academic debate over Orientalism. Is Varisco parodying Said's unquestioning followers, those who would ignore inconvenient facts, make up others, and strong-arm history? Or is he parodying Said's tormentors, those who point out the errors of Orientalism and defend the West?

This failure to determine the butt of Reading Orientalism's satire led me to another, larger question: Is it still possible to parody academic discourse, particularly discourse in the humanities? Or have we closed that window of opportunity? When academics have become obsessed with queer theory and fecal studies, in which direction does parody lie?...

I myself think present-day academic discourse on Islam and the Middle East is so absurd as to be beyond parody, but in this I expect Hugh would differ -- although his parody of such discourse here a few years back read so much like the real thing that many people didn't realize it was a parody at all. Anyway, read it all.

In Human Events this morning I discuss al-Awlaqi's boast -- as contained in the title of the piece -- and CAIR's inversion of reality in going after a textbook company that dared to notice the undeniable fact that some Muslims in the U.S. are committing acts of terror.

"Jihad is becoming as American as apple pie and as British as afternoon tea." So said American-born Islamic cleric Anwar al-Awlaqi. And indeed, there has been a sharp uptick in jihad activity by Muslims in the U.S. and U.S-born Muslims since Barack Obama has become President, although some law-enforcement officials seem determined not to notice. And in this they are aided and abetted by American Muslim advocacy groups.

Just as al-Awlaqi issued his boast, the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) began a campaign against a textbook series because it noted that some Muslims in America are involved in terrorism. This once again raised questions about which side this unsavory Hamas-linked group -- which has just won the ringing endorsement of Los Angeles Sheriff Lee Baca -- is really on and questions about how aware and prepared law enforcement officials are about the jihad threat in America.

Al-Awlaqi, who was in contact with Nidal Hasan, the jihadist who murdered 13 Americans at Fort Hood in November 2009, and with Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the jihadist who tried to bring down an airplane as it landed in Detroit on Christmas Day, had plenty of reason to claim that "jihad is becoming as American as apple pie:" Evidence of U.S. Muslims' engaging in terrorism grows every day.

Recently a Chicago-based Muslim, David Headley, a.k.a. Daood Gilani, pled guilty to going on a reconnaissance mission to find targets for the devastating 2008 jihad attacks in Mumbai, in which over 150 people were murdered. Gilani also participated in a plot to bomb a newspaper in Denmark that published cartoons of the Muslim prophet Muhammad. Also last week, Sharif Mobley, a Muslim from New Jersey, was arrested in Yemen because of his ties to al Qaeda and his murder of a guard in an escape attempt.

Before that, two American Muslim women, both converts to Islam, were arrested for their involvement in a plot to murder the Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks for his cartoon of the Muslim prophet Muhammad as a dog. One was since released, although her mother and stepfather have voiced concerns about how she is teaching her six-year-old son to hate Christians and believe that Muslims must wage war against them.

And last month, a Muslim from Queens, N. Y., Najibullah Zazi, pled guilty to charges of leading a jihad plot to set off a bomb in the New York subway system. An Islamic cleric, Ahmad Afzali, pled guilty to tipping off Zazi that law enforcement officials had been asking about him, and then lying to them about having done so.

Meanwhile, the Pakistani government has charged five Muslims from Virginia with terrorism after they entered Pakistan and tried to join up with al Qaeda and the Taliban there in order to fight against American troops in Afghanistan. Initially the five tried to avoid being charged by explaining that they had come to Pakistan to engage in Islamic jihad, and that Islamic jihad was not illegal in Pakistan.

An undetermined number of Somali Muslims have gone from their new homes in Minneapolis back to Somalia in order to wage jihad in an al Qaeda-linked group. Bryant Neal "Ibrahim" Vinas, a convert to Islam from Long Island, has been charged with participating in an attack on an American military base in Afghanistan and, in 2009, giving information about the New York City subway system to al Qaeda operatives. Another American Muslim convert, Abdulhakim Muhammad (formerly Carlos Bledsoe), murdered Private William Long and gravely wounded Private Quinton Ezeagwula outside the Army-Navy Career Center in Little Rock, Ark., in June 2009. Muhammad explained that the shooting was "a jihadi attack."

And in August 2009, Daniel "Seifullah" Boyd, yet another convert to Islam, and six other Muslims in North Carolina were arrested and charged with "conspiring to provide material support to terrorists and conspiring to murder, kidnap, maim and injure persons abroad." On a surveillance audiotape Boyd proclaims: "I love jihad."

Yet last week, CAIR took umbrage at a book that dared to say that some U.S. Muslims have engaged in terrorism -- and Los Angeles Sheriff Lee Baca denounced as "un-American" those who have criticized him for his close work with the group. What's wrong with this picture?

Misunderstanders of Islam gather together and misunderstand the inner spiritual struggle. "Pakistani hardliners vow holy war to liberate Kashmir," by Sajjad Qayyum for AFP, March 23:

KOTLI, Pakistan -- Pakistani hardliners on Tuesday vowed to wage a holy war to liberate the disputed Himalayan state of Kashmir from Indian control.

About 5,000 people attended a rally in the town of Kotli in Pakistan-administered Kashmir about 80 kilometres (50 miles) east of Islamabad, shouting: "We are ready for jihad (holy war), we are ready for jihad!" [...]

"Diplomacy, talks and negotiations spanned over several decades have not worked," said Syed Salahuddin, chairman of the United Jihad Council, which consists of 16 Islamist groups, militant outfits and political parties.

"The only way to liberate Kashmir is jihad," said Salahuddin, who also leads Hizbul Mujahedin, a militant group fighting Indian rule in Kashmir.

He denied that the jihadi groups were behind attacks within Pakistan.

More than 3,100 people have been killed in suicide attacks and bomb blasts across the nation since July 2007, which are blamed on Islamist militants opposed to the government's alliance with the United States.

Tuesday's rally was also attended by leaders of Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), a charity widely viewed as a front for banned Islamist group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) which India and the United States blamed for the Mumbai attacks.

A resolution adopted after the meeting said: "Jihad will continue until India ends its occupation of Kashmir."

And beyond that, no doubt.

Emboldened by Western weakness. "US Navy warns al-Qaida threatens ships off Yemen," from AP, March 23 (thanks to John):

CAIRO - The U.S. Navy is warning of possible al-Qaida attacks against ships off the coast of Yemen, where an offshoot of the terrorist network has established a significant base of operations over the past year....

"Information suggests that al-Qaida remains interested in maritime attacks in the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden along the coast of Yemen," said an advisory from the U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence.

The warning said such attacks could be similar to the 2000 strike against the Navy destroyer USS Cole in Yemen's Aden harbor that killed 17 American sailors. The attackers used a small boat laden with explosives to blow a hole in the side of the ship.

"Other more sophisticated methods of attack could include missiles or projectiles," said the advisory, which was dated March 10....

Not giving up. "Al-Qaida leader in Iraq calls for continued jihad," from AP, March 23:

CAIRO -- The self-described leader of an al-Qaida front group has called for continued jihad against Iraq's American "occupiers" after the March 7 election that he claims was boycotted by most Sunni Arabs.

In a 24-minute audio tape posted Tuesday on militant Web sites, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi said the parliamentary election and its results meant nothing for the mujahideen, or holy fighters, and that the next government would be no different from the previous one....

Unfortunately, there's no word from this report or from Arab News, cited below, about which hadith is at issue, or which collection (Bukhari, Muslim, etc.). Or course, there are plenty to choose from, whether it be the ones about Aisha's age at marriage, the murder of K'ab bin Ashraf, or the one where Aisha says, "I have not seen any woman suffering as much as the believing women" and Muhammad does not comment on the afflicted woman's bruises. Just to name a few. "Saudi blasphemy case filed against writer - paper," by Neeraj Gangal for ArabianBusiness.com, March 19 (thanks to KK):

Jeddah's Summary Court is expected to look into complaints raised by a number of people against a Saudi writer for allegedly insulting Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), according to a report.

Saudi daily Arab News said that the Saudi writer had allegedly described a Hadith of the Prophet as barbaric, during a program on Al Hurra Channel, which is presented by Nadeen Al Badr.

The newspaper's sources said that the court had sent a copy of the lawsuit filed against the man to Justice Minister Muhammad Al Eissa in order to seek his opinion on the issue.

According to Arab News, the plaintiffs have presented audio and visual evidence to prove their argument.

Shouldn't Pakistan be working to show the U.S. that it is trustworthy, and not the other way around?

"US says it is open to nuke deal with Pakistan," by Chidanand Rajghatta for the Times of India, March 22:

WASHINGTON: Amid reports of massive 16-20 hour power outages across Pakistan causing public unrest, the Barack Obama administration has indicated it is open to Islamabad's plea for a civilian nuclear deal akin to the US-India agreement, notwithstanding continued disquiet about Pakistan's bonafides on the nuclear front.

The first indication of a possible policy shift by US, which had till now rejected Pakistan's entreaties for a nuclear deal, came in an interview the US ambassador to Islamabad, Anne Patterson, gave to a Pakistani-American journal in which she said the two sides were going to have "working level talks" on the subject during a strategic dialogue on March 24.

Patterson confirmed the claim of her Pakistani counterpart in Washington Hussain Haqqani, which were initially denied, that the two sides had had some initial discussions on the subject. Acknowledging that earlier US "non-proliferation concerns were quite severe", she said attitudes in Washington were changing.

"I think we are beginning to pass those and this is a scenario that we are going to explore," she told a LA-based Pakistani journal.

Another top US official, Af-Pak envoy Richard Holbrooke, was a little more circumspect. "We're going to listen carefully to whatever the Pakistanis say," he replied, when asked about Islamabad's demand for a civilian nuclear deal....

Intimations of a change in US policy came even as new reports emerged about the extent and scope of government-backed Pakistani nuclear proliferation in a book by former weapons inspector and non-proliferation activist David Albright. Successive US administrations, in an effort to absolve Islamabad and save it from embarrassment from past misdemeanors, have suggested that the country's nuclear mastermind A Q Khan acted on his own without permission from the Pakistani government or the military, but this assessment is strongly challenged by the non-proliferation community....

The idea that Pakistan deserves its own nuclear deal to overcome a trust deficit with the United States was first proposed by Georgetown University academic Christine Fair. "More so than conventional weapons or large sums of cash, a conditions-based civilian nuclear deal may be able to diminish Pakistani fears of US intentions while allowing Washington to leverage these gains for greater Pakistani cooperation on nuclear proliferation and terrorism," Fair argued in a newspaper article earlier this year....

The silence from Pakistani authorities is deafening. An update on this story. "Punjab: Christian burned alive dies, Christian community calls for justice," by Fareed Khan for Asia News, March 23:

Islamabad (AsiaNews) - Arshed Masih died last night in hospital from the serious injuries - burns covering 80% of his body - which the 38 year old Pakistani Christian suffered when he was set on fire because he refused to convert to Islam. The funeral of man, who died after three days of agony, should take place in the late afternoon, but the family has asked that "before an autopsy is performed." The Christian community of Pakistan condemns "with firmness" the latest episode of violence and denounces the "slowness" of the federal and provincial government to punish those responsible.

On March 19 a group of Islamic extremists burned alive Arshed Masih, a driver employed by a wealthy Muslim businessman in Rawalpindi. His wife worked as a maid in the same estate, situated in front of a police station. Recently disagreements had arisen between the employer, Sheikh Mohammad Sultan, and the couple because of their Christian faith. The couple had suffered threats and intimidation to force them to convert to Islam.

Arshed Masih died last night at 7.45 local time after three days of agony and suffering at the Holy Family Hospital in Rawalpindi, Punjab province. His wife Martha Arshed was raped by police en she sought to denounce the violence inflicted on her husband. The couple's three children - ages 7 to 12 years - were forced "to witness the torture inflicted on their parents.

Since 2005 Arshed Masih and his wife had worked and lived on the estate of the late Sheikh Mohammad Sultan. The pressure on them to renounce Christianity had lately become incessant. The owner had come so far as to threaten "dire consequences", to persuade them to embrace Islam. The couple were also accused of a recent theft by the owner who has promised to drop the complaint for their conversion.

Arshed Masih's funeral should be held in the late afternoon, although tension remains high in the area. Local witnesses tell AsiaNews that "the whole family is in shock and I s demanding an autopsy is carried out before burial." Several Christian associations and human rights activists - including Life for All, Christian Progressive Movement, Pakistan Christian Congress and Protect Foundation Pakistan - "protests are being stepped up outside the hospital."

Peter Jacob, executive secretary of the Justice and Peace Commission of the Catholic Church of Pakistan (NCJP), expresses to AsiaNews his "strongest condemnation" for the crime against the man and the rape of women perpetrated by police who should protect law and order . The Catholic organization has been active to ensure protection to the woman and children, of whom there are no immediate reports.

The Catholic activist notes with regret the silence of the Federal Minister for Minorities, the Catholic Shahbaz Bhatti, and denounces "the slow pace and the inaction of the federal and provincial government. "The executive - said Peter Jacob - has not yet taken concrete steps to prevent violence and abuse on minorities and punish the guilty."

The site BosNewsLife.com adds that yesterday the provincial government of Punjab blocked a protest march of Christians, under the pretext of "terrorist threat". The local community wanted to demonstrate against the "refusal" of the police to arrest the perpetrators of the crime.

Now wait a minute. Isn't there "no compulsion in religion" (Qur'an 2:256)? Sure. But as far as the Muslim murderers of Rasheed Masih and others like them are concerned, they are merely helping him along to make his free decision to convert to Islam. In general, a system that mandates the institutionalized discrimination of dhimmitude for those who remain non-Muslim within the Islamic state has a broad and expansive idea of what constitutes "no compulsion."

"Muslims Murder Pakistani Christian with Axe Blows," from Compass Direct, March 22:

MIAN CHANNU, Pakistan, March 22 (CDN) -- Six Muslims in Khanewal district, southern Punjab Province, killed a Christian with multiple axe blows for refusing to convert to Islam this month, according to family and police sources.

The six men had threatened to kill 36-year-old Rasheed Masih unless he converted to Islam when they grew resentful of his potato business succeeding beyond their own, according to Masih's younger brother Munir Asi and a local clergyman. The rival merchants allegedly killed him after luring him to their farmhouse on March 9, leaving him on a roadside near Kothi Nand Singh village in the wee hours of the next day.

The Rev. Iqbal Masih of the Mian Channu Parish of the Church of Pakistan said Rasheed Masih was a devoted Christian, and that both he and his brother Asi had refused the Muslims' pressure to convert to Islam.

"As the Christian family strengthened in business and earned more, the Muslim men began to harbor business resentment, as Muslims are not used to seeing Christians more respected and richer than them," the pastor said. "That business rivalry gradually changed into a faith rivalry." [...]

"Our continuous denial to recant our faith and convert gradually turned into enmity," Asi told Compass. The FIR further states, "Both the Muslim men [Rasool and Asif] were not only inviting them to Islam but hurling threats of dire consequences and death on them for the last six months in case they refused to convert."

Police said Rasool - a radical Muslim who along with Asif had threatened to kill the brothers if they did not convert, according to Asi - called Rasheed Masih to his farmhouse ostensibly to purchase potatoes on March 9, and that Rasheed went to it by motorbike at about 5:30 p.m. Waiting for Masih there, police said, were Rasool and Asif with an axe, Amjad and Kashif with iron rods and the two unknown Muslims with clubs.

They began striking him as soon as he arrived, police said. [...]

According to the FIR, when Asi and two Christian friends went to the farmhouse when Masih failed to return after a few hours, they were stunned to hear Masih shrieking as they witnessed him being beaten and struck with an axe. [...]

At press time the Muslim suspects were at large even though police have filed a case strong enough to apprehend and prosecute them, Asi said. He appealed for assistance from Christian rights groups and politicians, as his family is still receiving death threats in a bid to intimidate them into withdrawing the case, he said, and they feel powerless in comparison with the influence and wealth of the Muslim suspects.

Now wait a minute. The exemplary Moderate Muslim Tarek Fatah just grew monumentally indignant when Wafa Sultan dared to point out that (as is recorded in the earliest, most reliable Islamic sources) Muhammad was 54 when he consummated his marriage with the nine-year-old Aisha. Fatah assured us greasy Islamophobes that Aisha was actually fourteen or fifteen at the time she married Muhammad.

But then why do the Islamic leaders in Yemen not seem to understand this? In Islam, Muhammad is the supreme example of conduct (cf. Qur'an 33:21). Thus he is exemplary even in his marriage to a child: Muslims take this seriously and imitate Muhammad in this. Article 1041 of the Civil Code of the Islamic Republic of Iran states that girls can be engaged before the age of nine, and married at nine: "Marriage before puberty (nine full lunar years for girls) is prohibited. Marriage contracted before reaching puberty with the permission of the guardian is valid provided that the interests of the ward are duly observed."

The Ayatollah Khomeini himself married a ten-year-old girl when he was twenty-eight. Khomeini called marriage to a prepubescent girl "a divine blessing," and advised the faithful: "Do your best to ensure that your daughters do not see their first blood in your house."

Time magazine reported in 2001: "In Iran the legal age for marriage is nine for girls, fourteen for boys. The law has occasionally been exploited by pedophiles, who marry poor young girls from the provinces, use and then abandon them. In 2000 the Iranian Parliament voted to raise the minimum age for girls to fourteen, but this year, a legislative oversight body dominated by traditional clerics vetoed the move. An attempt by conservatives to abolish Yemen's legal minimum age of fifteen for girls failed, but local experts say it is rarely enforced anyway. (The onset of puberty is considered an appropriate time for a marriage to be consummated.)"

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) reports that over half of the girls in Afghanistan and Bangladesh are married before they reach the age of eighteen. In early 2002, researchers in refugee camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan found half the girls married by age thirteen. In an Afghan refugee camp, more than two out of three second-grade girls were either married or engaged, and virtually all the girls who were beyond second grade were already married. One ten-year-old was engaged to a man of sixty.

And now Islamic clerics in Yemen say that to oppose child marriage takes one out of Islam.

What would the exemplary Moderate Muslim Tarek Fatah say to them? What do you bet that if he responds to this at all, it will be not by saying anything to them at all, but by calling me names -- the way Moderate Muslim spokesmen in the West always respond to such challenges?

"Yemen: Ban on Child Brides Is Imperiled," from the Associated Press, March 22 (thanks to all who sent this in):

Some of Yemen's most influential Muslim leaders have declared supporters of a ban on child brides to be apostates. The religious decree, issued Sunday, imperils efforts to salvage legislation that would make marriage illegal for people younger than 17. A 2009 law that did that was repealed and sent back to Parliament's constitutional committee for review after some lawmakers called it un-Islamic....

What does one of these things have to do with the other? After the failed Christmas attack on Northwest Flight 253, it was revealed that, in the U.K., they "now issue 370,000 student visas a year - almost the entire population of Bristol or Manchester - yet hardly any of the applicants ever see hide nor hair of an Immigration Officer." Fast-forward three months to the story below, and its reports of increased availability, smuggling of, and expertise in hazardous materials, and a potentially catastrophic weakness in the defense against nuclear jihad becomes apparent.

"Nuclear terror risk to Britain from al-Qaeda," by Duncan Gardham for the Telegraph, March 22:

Britain faces an increased threat of a nuclear attack by al-Qaeda terrorists following a rise in the trafficking of radiological material, a government report has warned.

Bomb makers who have been active in Afghanistan may already have the ability to produce a "dirty bomb" using knowledge acquired over the internet.

It is feared that terrorists could transport an improvised nuclear device up the Thames and detonate it in the heart of London. Bristol, Liverpool Newcastle, Glasgow and Belfast are also thought to be vulnerable.

Lord West, the Security Minister, also raised the possibility of terrorists using small craft to enter ports and launch an attack similar to that in Mumbai in 2008, when more than 150 people were killed.

The Government is so concerned about the threat that it is setting up a command centre to track suspicious boats.

The terrorism threat level was raised from "substantial" to "severe" in January after the failed attempt to blow up an aircraft over Detroit on Christmas Day.

Three separate reviews of the country's ability to prevent a major terrorist attack were published simultaneously yesterday, before an international meeting on nuclear security in Washington next month.

Downing Street released an update to the National Security Strategy in which it stated that "the UK does face nuclear threats now" and added that there was "the possibility that nuclear weapons or nuclear material [could] fall into the hands of rogue states or terrorist groups".

The International Atomic Energy Authority recorded 1,562 incidents where nuclear material was lost or stolen between 1993 and 2008, mostly in the former Soviet Union, and 65 per cent of the losses were never recovered.

Another report, on the Government's "Contest" counter-terrorism strategy, said there was a danger that the increased expertise of insurgents in making bombs in Afghanistan had increased the threat from a radiological "dirty bomb".

It added that there was a "significant increase in the illicit trafficking of radiological materials, the availability of chemical, biological radiological and nuclear (CBRN) related technologies over the internet and the increased use of CBRN material for legitimate purposes", which could be acquired by terrorist organisations.

A third report, on Britain's strategy for countering chemical, biological radiological and nuclear terrorism, described al-Qaeda as the "first trans­national organisation to support the use of CBRN weapons against civilian targets and to try to acquire them".

The report said security around stockpiles of decommissioned material was "variable and sometimes inadequate, leaving materials vulnerable to theft by insiders and criminal and terrorist organisations".

Legitimate uses for such materials also "significantly increases the risk that they may be diverted and exploited by terrorist organisations".

It added that al-Qaeda had established facilities to conduct research into CBRN weapons when Afghanistan was under the control of the Taliban before 2002.

Since then the terrorist group had approached Pakistani nuclear scientists, developed a device to produce hydrogen cyanide, which can be used in chemical warfare, and used explosives in Iraq combined with chlorine gas cylinders.

The possibility of an attack launched from speedboats was highlighted by Lord West, speaking at the new National Maritime Information Centre in Northwood, Middlesex. He said hundreds of thousands of small boats arrived in Britain unchecked every year. "I think the public would be surprised to discover that we do not know about every single contact [with a vessel]," he said.

He said the agencies responsible for guarding the coastline did not know "with any clarity what is going on around our coasts"....

But it's the Israelis who must show that they want peace, according to the post-American President.

"Mideast; Israel, Firefight On Gaza Border," from ANSAmed, March 22 (thanks to Insubria):

(ANSAmed) - JERUSALEM, MARCH 22 - A firefight lasting several hours took place today on the border between Israel and the Gaza Strip following an apparent attempt by armed Palestinians to infiltrate into Israel near the Kissufim border crossing. According to initial reports from Israel TV station, three Palestinians were captured, according to other sources, three were killed. According to an Arab TV station, an Israeli soldier was killed, news that has not yet been confirmed officially in Israel. (ANSAmed).

Still no call from the post-American presidency to the Palestinians to cut out the genocidal and absolutist jihad rhetoric. "Mideast: Clinton, Israel Must Make Difficult Choices For Peace," from ANSAmed, March 22 (thanks to Insubria):

(ANSAmed) - WASHINGTON, MARCH 22 - US State Secretary Hillary Clinton believes that Israel must make "difficult but necessary choices" in the peace process, because the status quo in relations with the Palestinians is not sustainable. She will say this in a speech to the pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC today. "There is another path. A path that leads toward security and prosperity for all the people of the region. It will require all parties -- including Israel -- to make difficult but necessary choices," the statement reads following are excerpts of it released by the State Department. In her speech, Clinton also stresses that Washington guarantees Israel's security, specifying that the United States must "tell the truth when it is needed".(ANSAmed).

I look forward to that.

Modern, moderate Dubai, the hope of Dinesh D'Souza, steps up its Sharia adherence. "Farewell flambe: Dubai to hunt for booze in food," from Associated Press, March 22 (thanks to all who sent this in):

[...] Media reports today say Dubai authorities plan to step up enforcement of a 2003 law prohibiting restaurants from using booze in food preparation.

Alcoholic drinks are widely available in Dubai and the 2003 law has been mostly disregarded.

But the latest move appears aimed at easing worries from Muslim restaurant goers that no wine or liquor were used in preparing their meals. Fines for violators can run nearly $5,500.

Several Dubai chefs have argued that strict enforcement of the ban would compromise their dishes. They are in talks with the municipality for less severe regulations.

Good luck with that.

Apparently their claim centers around the fact that "Zubair Hassan and her children were the subject of numerous police reports and orders of protection, as well as investigations by Erie County's Child Protective Services," although "she declined to press charges and did not always cooperate with law enforcement." Could politically correct dhimmitude have played a role in their not wanting to bother the prominent moderate Muslim Muzzammil Hassan? Certainly.

"County, town face suit in beheading of woman," by Sandra Tan for the Buffalo News, March 21 (thanks to Mark):

Lawyers for the estate of Aasiya Zubair Hassan, the woman killed and beheaded in her cable television studio, have filed a notice of claim, indicating they intend to sue the Town of Orchard Park, Erie County and the Erie County Sheriff's Department for failing to prevent her death in February of last year.

Another wrongful death suit is under way against Hassan's husband and the Bridges TV network that the couple founded in 2004 to raise the profile of moderate American Muslims.

Lawyers for Zubair Hassan's estate indicated in the notice of claim that, because of "carelessness, negligence, recklessness and/- or omissions" by police and government agencies, Zubair Hassan suffered "grave bodily injury" and death.

Muzzammil S. "Mo" Hassan was charged with his wife's death after leading police to her body in the Bridges TV studio in Orchard Park on Feb. 12, 2009.

Zubair Hassan and her children were the subject of numerous police reports and orders of protection, as well as investigations by Erie County's Child Protective Services. The authorities were contacted many times over the course of Zubair Hassan's marriage, though she declined to press charges and did not always cooperate with law enforcement.

"The Town of Orchard Park, the Erie County sheriff and County of Erie owed Aasiya Z. Hassan, a vulnerable person, a nondelegable duty to respond and protect her," according to the notice of claim.

In the wrongful death suit filed against Hassan and Bridges Network, lawyers for the wife's estate are suing Hassan for damages on the grounds of assault, imprisonment, infliction of emotional distress and her death.

Bridges is being sued on the grounds of failing to provide a safe work place and appropriate security....

We are now ready to complete our joint viewing of The Michael Coren show. Please take the time, once again, to watch both segments above. My previous discussion of these segments is here and here.

It's back to Michael Coren, talking now to Steve Gilchrist right there in the studio. Gilchrist is a center-right politician, or was. He is, I gather, a business man and solid citizen reeking of respectability, positively putrid with probity. He is someone who, in the language of those who live in Eastern Canada (mind your Ps and Qs now, lest Hochelaga and surroundings slip out of the Federation), amidst what Voltaire dismissed as "quelques arpents de neige," might in far-off France have been called "l'Honnête Homme" -- not in the 17th century French sense but in the etiolated later sense of a Good Burgher. You often meet his type, even if you try to avoid them - or did I make this point before? - at alumni gatherings.

Gilchrist is, physically, a large and even beefy man. And his manner is that of someone who doesn't tolerate nonsense, cuts right to the chase, is unafraid to tell it just as he sees it, no matter what anyone thinks. That's right, that about sums up Steve Gilchrist, not one to mince words, so he tells us, not someone afraid to tell the truth. And what is it that no-nonsense unafraid-to-tell-the-truth-when-all-around-him are so afraid, tells us? Well, he tells us - take a look at 5.11-5.20 - that nowhere in the Qur'an is anyone told to kill Unbelievers, Infidels. Just like that. It's clear. It's obvious. Steve Gilchrist knows this. I, we, don't quite know how he knows this, for surely, if he read the Qur'an, he must have come across hundreds of Jihad verses. He must have read Sura 9, he must have read 9.29 and 9.5 at least. Did none of the following verses ever swim into his Canadian ken?

Qur'an 9:111: "The believers...shall fight in the way of Allah and shall slay and be slain..."

Qur'an 9:5: "When the sacred forbidden months for fighting are past, fight and kill the disbelievers wherever you find them, take them captive, torture them, and lie in wait and ambush them using every stratagem of war."

Qur'an 5:33: "The punishment for those who wage war against Allah and His Prophet and perpetrate mischief [reject Islam or oppose its goals] in the land, is to murder them, to hang them, to mutilate them, or banish them. Such is their disgrace. They will not escape the fire, suffering constantly."

Qur'an 47:4: "So when you meet in battle those who disbelieve, then smite the necks until when you have overcome them, then make (them) prisoners, and afterwards either set them free as a favor or let them ransom (themselves) until the war terminates. That (shall be so); and if Allah had pleased He would certainly have exacted what is due from them, but that He may try some of you by means of others; and (as for) those who are slain in the way of Allah, He will by no means allow their deeds to perish."

Qur'an 21:44: "Do they not see Us advancing, gradually reducing the land (in their control), curtailing its borders on all sides? It is they who will be overcome."

Qur'an 47.35: "And be not slack so as to cry for peace and you have the upper hand, and Allah is with you, and He will not bring your deeds to naught."

Qur'an 3:56: "As for those disbelieving infidels, I will punish them with a terrible agony in this world and the next. They have no one to help or save them."

Qur'an 4.89: "They desire that you should disbelieve as they have disbelieved, so that you might be (all) alike; therefore take not from among them friends until they fly (their homes) in Allah's way; but if they turn back, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them, and take not from among them a friend or a helper."

Qur'an 2:191: "...kill the disbelievers wherever we find them."

Qur'an 9.33: "He it is Who sent His Apostle with guidance and the religion of truth, that He might cause it to prevail over all religions."

Qur'an 2:193: "And fight with them until there is no persecution, and religion should be only for Allah."

Qur'an 8:71: "And if they intend to act unfaithfully towards you, so indeed they acted unfaithfully towards Allah before, but He gave you mastery over them."

Qur'an 8:12: "Your Lord inspired the angels with the message: 'I will terrorize the unbelievers. Therefore smite them on their necks and every joint and incapacitate them. Strike off their heads and cut off each of their fingers and toes.'"

Qur'an 8:58: "If you apprehend treachery from any group on the part of a people (with whom you have a treaty), retaliate by breaking off (relations) with them. The infidels should not think they can bypass (Islamic law or the punishment of Allah). Surely they cannot escape."

Qur'an 8:39: "So, fight them till all opposition ends and the only religion is Islam."

Qur'an 8:59: "The infidels should not think that they can get away from us. Prepare against them whatever arms and weaponry you can muster so that you may terrorize them. They are your enemy and Allah's enemy."

Qur'an 8:60: "Prepare against them (non-Muslims) whatever arms and cavalry you can muster that you may strike terror in the enemies of Allah (non-Muslims), and others besides them not known to you. Whatever you spend in Allah's Cause will be repaid in full, and no wrong will be done to you."

Qur'an 8:7: "Allah wished to confirm the truth by His words: 'Wipe the infidels (non-Muslims) out to the last.'"

Qur'an 4:101: "The unbelievers (non-Muslims) are your inveterate foe."

Qur'an 9.29: "Fight those who do not believe in Allah, nor in the latter day, nor do they prohibit what Allah and His Apostle have prohibited, nor follow the religion of truth, out of those who have been given the Book, until they pay the tax in acknowledgment of superiority and they are in a state of subjection."

Qur'an 9.30: "And the Jews say: Uzair (Ezra) is the son of Allah; and the Christians say: The Messiah is the son of Allah; these are the words of their mouths; they imitate the saying of those who disbelieved before; may Allah destroy them; how they are turned away!"

Sharia does not allow non-Muslims in the Islamic state to build new houses of worship or repair old ones. Sharia Alert from modern, moderate Indonesia: "Group mobs church, no injuries reported," from the Jakarta Post, March 21 (thanks to Twostellas):

INDONESIA: Hundreds of people mobbed the Huria Kristen Batak Protestan (HKBP) church under construction in Deli Serdang, North Sumatra, on Friday, calling for the project to be halted.

The crowd claimed the church did not have a permit to build in the area and spent an hour yelling abuse at the churchgoers and pastor. No injuries were reported.

North Sumatra Police spokesman Snr. Comr. Baharuddin Djafar, said the church had been secured and the local authority had mediated a meeting between the protesting residents and church officials.

The two sides, he said, were called to respect each [sic]. He said the incident flared up following the residents' long-held irritation with the church building, but he said the residents had not resorted to anarchism or physically damaging the church during their protest.

Well, let's be grateful for small favors!

J.A. Ferdinandus, head of North Sumatra Churches, said the incident had ended amicably.

"There will be a meeting on Tuesday to sign an agreement on peace and mutual respect between the residents and the church in Lau Dendang village," he said. - JP

Mutual respect -- a favorite Obama phrase. It seems to mean that the non-Muslim side will grant unlimited concessions, which the Muslim side will graciously accept.

The Saudis opened some human rights organizations with much fanfare not too long ago; now it turns out that they're devoted to protecting the "human right" -- i.e., the Sharia-mandated supremacy -- of Muslims over non-Muslims. For the subtext of this is that Muslim women can't take the humiliating work of maids, but non-Muslim women can.

"Rights groups reject fatwa allowing Saudi women to work as maids: Academics say domestic work is 'humiliating' for KSA nationals," from Arab News via Kipp Report, March 21 (thanks to Twostellas):

Saudi academics and lawyers have rejected a fatwa allowing Saudi women to work as maids, saying such work is 'humiliating' for them.

Labor Minister Ghazi Al-Gosaibi issued a decision two years ago allowing Saudi women to work as house managers and servants.

A fatwa, or religious edict, was subsequently issued by legal adviser Saleh bin Saad Al-Laheedan, who said it is permissible for Saudi women to work as maids if they cannot find other jobs, if they are over 50, and if they are accompanied by a mehram (a close male relative).

But speaking to Islamonline.net, Suhaila Zainul Abideen, a member of the National Society for Human Rights, expressed her surprise at Al-Laheedan's fatwa. She strongly opposed the idea of Saudi women working as maids....

Abideen asked whether any family would allow their womenfolk to work along with their mehrams, and urged the concerned authorities to take up the matter with King Abdullah, who she said would not accept the 'humiliation' of Saudi women. Al-Laheedan should have instead asked the authorities to make monthly payments to poor Saudi women, Abideen added.

Fahd Al-Johani, dean of student affairs at Taif University, also opposed Al-Laheedan's fatwa, saying working as maids would force women to violate certain Islamic principles. He said Al-Laheedan should have considered the present condition of maids before giving his fatwa....

Cementing the power of the group that is working to destroy Turkish secularism and establish Turkey as an Islamic state. "Erdogan Announces Legal Changes to Curb Powers of Courts, Army," by Steve Bryant and Ali Berat Meric for Bloomberg, March 22 (thanks to Twostellas):

March 22 (Bloomberg) -- Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced plans to rein in the power of the country's top judges and generals, who have opposed his Islamist-rooted government.

Proposed constitutional changes would give parliament in Ankara the power to prevent closure of political parties, and allow civilian courts to try army officers including leaders of the 1980 military coup, according to a draft posted on the governing Justice and Development Party's Web site today.

The party escaped closure by one vote on the 11-member Constitutional Court when it was charged with undermining secularism in 2008. The changes would expand the court to 19 members, including three selected by parliament from among candidates named by judges and lawyers. They would also stop prosecutors from using parliament speeches as evidence in any case to shut down a party....

This is because in the past the Court has shut down pro-Sharia parties, including one in which Erdogan himself was active.

Hamas used children as human shields and launched attacks from mosques and hospitals, but the dhimmi tool Ban Ki-Moon said nothing about that.

The Goldstone Report was a propaganda piece funded by the Organization of the Islamic Conference -- but the dhimmi tool Ban Ki-Moon says nothing about that, either.

The Iranian Supremo recently met with the top dog of Hamas and also called Israel a "dangerous cancer tumor." But about that the dhimmi tool Ban Ki-Moon was silent.

"Ban to Gazans: We stand with you," by Tovah Lazaroff for the Jerusalem Post, March 21:

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon on Sunday praised Israel for showing a "great love of humanity" in Haiti, even as he attacked its actions in Gaza, which he said caused "unacceptable suffering." [...]

On the eve of Ban's visit - his third since becoming secretary-general on January 1, 2007 - Israel took a small step toward meeting his demand with respect to the Gaza crossings, when it agreed to ease its restriction on building material to allow for the construction of 150 homes in Khan Yunis, a flour mill, a sewage treatment plant and classrooms.

During a morning visit to Khan Yunis, Ban told members of its civil society that the measure was a "positive, welcome step," but that "we need far, far more. This is like a drop in a bucket of water."

He noted that since his previous visit to Gaza 15 months ago, little reconstruction work had been done to repair the damage caused by Operation Cast Lead.

"It is quite distressing for me to see all the damage," Ban said.

He called on Israel to fully open its passages into Gaza, which have been closed to all but humanitarian aid since Hamas seized control of the Strip in 2007.

Ban attacked Israel's closure policy, which he said was "wrong" and "not sustainable." He added that "it causes unacceptable suffering of human beings and particularly to people and population in Gaza."

In addition, he said, it "prevents legitimate commerce and encourages smuggling. It undercuts moderates and empowers extremists."

People on both sides of the conflict should refrain from violence, said Ban, as he condemned both the Gazan rocket attacks and IDF actions, including its fatal shooting of two Palestinians in Iraq Burin near Nablus over the weekend.

"I urge all Gazans to choose the path of nonviolence, Palestinian unity and international legitimacy," Ban said....

Yeah, that's going to happen.

He lauded the "quiet courage" and "heroism" of the people who live in Gaza.

"My message to the people of Gaza is this: The United Nations will stand with you and continue to support you so that you can overcome all this human suffering."...

Shameful.

Sisters In Islam angered Sharia supremacists by opposing the caning of women for drinking alcohol, polygamy, and child marriage, and so a Muslim group is suing it to stop it from using the word "Islam" in its name. Apparently caning, polygamy and child marriage are so much a part of Islam in the view of the Malaysian Assembly of Mosque Youths that to oppose them places one outside the realm of Islam.

Isn't that ironic? In the West, if you point out that Islam allows for such things as caning, polygamy and child marriage, you are likely to be called "Islamophobic," hateful, bigoted and worse by self-appointed Islamic spokesmen -- witness Tarek Fatah's malicious savaging of Wafa Sultan for pointing out that Muhammad consummated his marriage with Aisha when he was 54 and she was 9. But in Malaysia, apparently, Tarek Fatah and others like him would be regarded as un-Islamic in the eyes of the Malaysian Assembly of Mosque Youths and other groups like it.

"Malaysia women's group sued over 'Islam' in name," by Sean Yoong for The Associated Press, March 22:

Muslim activists filed a lawsuit Monday against a Malaysian women's group, asking it to remove the word "Islam" from its name on the ground that it misleads people to believe it speaks for all Muslims.

The suit against Sisters in Islam, one of the most well-known nongovernment groups in this Muslim-majority country, comes after it angered conservative Muslims by criticizing Islamic Shariah laws that allow the caning of women for offenses such as drinking alcohol.

Note to AP: "conservatives" don't generally favor caning women for drinking alcohol.

Numerous Muslim groups have in recent months accused Sisters in Islam of misinterpreting religious principles, highlighting a divide between Muslims who demand strict enforcement of Islamic morality laws and others who fear religious intolerance is threatening the moderate practice of their religion.

The lawsuit was filed by Malaysian Assembly of Mosque Youths, whose leader, Mohammad Nawar Ariffin, said Sisters in Islam never obtained formal approval for the name with the government's registrar of societies.

"The use of the word 'Islam' in names must be restricted and protected," Mohammad Nawar told The Associated Press. "The so-called Sisters in Islam uses the word to attract attention, but it issues statements that contradict what other Muslims believe. It causes confusion among Muslims who might think that the group represents Islam."...

Hamidah Marican, executive director of Sisters in Islam, declined to comment on the case, saying the group's lawyers need to study the suit before they can issue any statement. However, she defended the group's work as being "driven by the tenets of the Quran and Islam."

Established in 1988, Sisters in Islam has long been the most outspoken advocate of reforms involving Muslim laws that allegedly fail to protect the rights of women, such as regarding polygamy and child marriages. Its official name is SIS Forum (Malaysia), but it uses Sisters in Islam on its Web site and publications....

Curiously, the new regulations also make officers' behavior more closely aligned with Sharia norms of gender interaction and interpersonal contact. "Police officers banned from asking for 'Christian' names," by Richard Edwards for the Telegraph, March 18:

Police officers have been banned from asking for a person's "Christian" name because it might offend people with other religious beliefs.

Officers taking down a suspect's particulars must now ask them for a "personal and family name" in case the word "Christian" offends Muslims, Sikhs or other faiths, according to the new official guidance.

Kent Police's prescriptive diversity rulebook also tells officers to refrain from using phrases such as "my dear" or "love", when addressing women for fear it may cause "embarrassment or offence". [...]

Last year it was revealed that officers in Warwickshire had been warned not to say "Evenin' all" - the phrase made famous by television show Dixon of Dock Green - because it could confuse people of "different cultural backgrounds" as to the time of day.

Other words now discouraged include, "businessman'', "housewives'' and "child'', all of which organisations argue have negative connotations.

"Child?!"

The new rulebook for Kent police, which has almost 7,000 officers, staff and community support officers, says it intends to "promote clearer communication" and "break down barriers" with diverse communities.

"Do not underestimate how your own cultural background may affect your perception and behaviour towards others," it warns.

One veteran Kent police officer of 15 years, who did not wish to be identified, said: "Most of us are fully aware of how to treat people from different cultural backgrounds, but being told we can't even ask what their 'Christian' name is just plain ridiculous.

"That is what we are brought up with - Christian name and surname - and to be honest if you had an officer ask for your personal name and family name it's just going to confuse people.

"It's just the latest in a long line of annoying PC-related nonsense that we keep getting shoved down our throats."

Marie Clair, spokesman for the Plain English Campaign, said: "I would like to know who these people with religious beliefs are that are allegedly so offended.

"I do not understand why someone in an office somewhere is coming up with these guidelines when there has been no outcry or complaints made public to suggest that the word "Christian" is offensive in this context.

"It is political correctness being pushed to its absolute limits. All common sense has been lost. Why can't we use familiar language which people understand?"

Somewhere, George Orwell is shaking his head.

If I had a nickel for all the times people in audiences where I've spoken, or emailers to this site, or learned analysts with whom I've debated, or any number of other people have told me confidently that Islam is not a monolith, that the umma is rent by deep divisions, and that the simple Sunni-Shi'ite divide about which every schoolchild knows would preclude any large-scale cooperative jihad action -- if I had a nickel for every one, I'd be able to buy that Jihad Watch learjet I had to return when Jamal Badawi reneged on his promise.

Islam is indeed not a monolith. The umma is indeed rent by deep divisions. Sunnis and Shi'ites do indeed hate each other. You'll note that the Taliban rep quoted here even says that the Iranians and the Taliban have different religions. But will Sunnis and Shi'ites cooperate in jihad activity? Sure, no problem. Iranian already funds Hamas. And now this.

"Iranians train Taliban to use roadside bombs," by Miles Amoore in The Sunday Times, March 21 (thanks to all who sent this in):

TALIBAN commanders have revealed that hundreds of insurgents have been trained in Iran to kill Nato forces in Afghanistan.

The commanders said they had learnt to mount complex ambushes and lay improvised explosive devices (IEDs), which have been responsible for most of the deaths of British troops in Helmand province. [...]

According to the commanders, Iranian officials paid them to attend three-month courses during the winter. [...]

Karl Eikenberry, the American ambassador to Afghanistan, recently described signs of co-operation between Iran and the Taliban as disturbing.

"Iran or elements within Iran have provided training assistance and some weapons to the Taliban," he said.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran has publicly backed his Afghan counterpart, Hamid Karzai. But American and British officials have accused Iran of playing a double game by giving covert backing to the Taliban.

Shi'ite Iran had long opposed the Sunni-dominated Taliban. The reason for the change was summarised by one Taliban commander who said of the Iranians: "Our religions and our histories are different but our target is the same. We both want to kill Americans."

The EDL (with Israeli flag at right)

UAF (fighting the police)

I don't know if it was really the socialist demagogue Huey Long who said that when fascism comes to America, it will be in the guise of anti-fascism, but whoever said it, the point holds true nowadays not only for America, but for the West in general. Yesterday's English Defense League demonstration was a case in point: the violence was provoked by the "United Against Fascism" group, a gang of thugs bent on attacking and silencing those who are resisting the spread of Sharia of Britain -- but those opposing Islamization and standing up for Israel and human rights against Sharia are the ones called fascists and even "Nazis" by one uninformed and Leftist senex in the viciously irresponsible (and unsupported) Daily Mail piece below. Apparently at least some at the Daily Mail buy the existence that desperate and fantastical invention of the libelblogger Charles Johnson, the pro-Israel neo-Nazi.

The EDL leadership has been consistent in rejecting the BNP and all racism and neo-fascism. There is no reliable indication that the EDL itself is in any way racist or neofascist, and a good deal of evidence to the contrary. The EDL is standing up to violent thugs from both the Left and the increasingly assertive Islamic communities in Britain, and they deserve the support of all free people.

Be sure to see Pamela's report -- she has a great deal more on this demonstration.

"Scores arrested as English Defence League and anti-fascists clash in violent street protests," from the Daily Mail, March 21 (thanks to Pamela):

More than 70 people were arrested during clashes between right-wing and anti-fascist protesters which brought a town centre to a standstill.

Police condemned the violence in Bolton, Lancashire, yesterday which erupted between supporters of controversial right-wing group The English Defence League (EDL) and Unite Against Fascism (UAF).

Thousands of people took part in a rally in Victoria Square, with at least two police officers and members of the public injured.

At least 74 arrests were made, more than 55 from the UAF and nine from the EDL, police said.

Officers said UAF protesters were responsible for most of the trouble - and the organisation's joint secretary, Weyman Bennett, was arrested and charged with conspiracy to organise violent disorder. [...]

Assistant Chief Constable Garry Shewan, from Greater Manchester Police, who led the policing operation, said his officers faced 'a lot of hostility' and 'unwarranted attacks', resulting in injuries.

And he reserved his fiercest criticism for the anti-Fascist group, who he said had turned up intent on causing trouble.

'Today in Bolton we have seen groups of people, predominantly associated with the UAF, engaging in violent confrontation,' he said. [...]

Second World War veteran Bertie Lois, 89, who lives in Farnworth, Bolton, protested with the UAF.

He said: 'I fought the Second World War against these Nazis. What did I fight for if we let them? The EDL are the enemy. I would say to them 'you are the guys we fought for, what are you doing?'

'I am also here because I am against the war in Afghanistan.' [...]

Police said there were 2,000 EDL protesters in the square, and around 1,500 from UAF.

The EDL describes itself as a peaceful, non-political group campaigning against 'militant Islam'.

But ugly scenes also marked one of their protests in Manchester last year, with 44 arrests and 10 injuries.

Oh, the opportunities for mischief: "الله became a fan of Emerson, Lake and Palmer." "الله became a fan of tube tops." "الله and the Flying Spaghetti Monster are now friends." "الله is attending Monster Truck Mayhem." But alas, Khomeini's pronouncement rings true again: there is no humor in Islam. There is, on the other hand, a whole lot of suppression of free speech, and here we go again.

An update on this story. "Facebook row as Middle East officials ban user 'who insulted Islam'," by Andrew Hough for the Telegraph, March 19:

A row has erupted in the Middle East after officials banned a Facebook user in Abu Dhabi for breaking the law after they "insulted" Islam by claiming to be Allah.

All internet providers in the United Arab Emirates have been ordered to block the unnamed user behind the site, after he alleged his claims were supported by verses of the Koran.

His actions sparked a wave a protest, with many calling on users to boycott the social networking site unless the site was removed.

After dozens of complaints about the Arabic-language site, titled "God and Prophets", the country's Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) announced this week it would ban the user from holding an internet account.

But that decision was met with more protest from what some viewed as censorship of the internet.

The user claimed they were an atheist and believed in no God but him/herself, reports in the Middle East claimed.

They said that Muslim prophets would be able to connect with users through the site, which contained Koranic verses and also appeared to mock Islam, as well as answering their questions.

The site soon had more than 600,000 followers, with many critical of the site.

Mohammad Al Ganem, the authority's General Manager, defended the authority's decision to ban the site, saying it "insulted" Islam.

"TRA received numerous calls and complaints from internet users expressing their anger against unidentified people who created a site on Facebook that is offending to God, prophets, messengers, the Holy Koran and even to all God's books," he told Gulf News.

"The creator of this site which he named 'God and Prophets' Site', attributes divinity to himself and spreads distorted writing pretending they are verses from the Koran.

"He also declared writing a new book falsifying himself as a god."

He added: "He spreads talk that is insulting to the prophets and to their holy stature.

"This is considered to be a felony according to the federal law."

He warned web users to be cautious about what they created or viewed.

"[The] internet is too vast to be controlled daily. There are unethical racists everywhere who do not recognise or honour religions or values," he said.

Hold it right there: Which race is Allah?

"They intentionally spread what destroys the country's symbols and values, and we should not spare any effort to combat them fiercely."

To which he might have added: "الله and 8 other people like this."

We are now ready to continue with our discussion of The Michael Coren show, Part 2. Please take the time, once again, to watch both segments.

Part 1 is here. Part 2 is above. And my discussion of Part 1 is here.

Returning from the station break, this segment begins with Tarek Fatah in apparent medias res explaining that the West's perception of Islam is flawed because it sees everything through the prism of Arab Islam, while the Islam practiced in the subcontinent, Tarek Fatah's neck of the woods, is so very very different.

There's Bangladesh, for example, with 150 million people, and yet in Bangladesh, he says, "whenever they get a chance they vote out the extremists." And neither Michael Coren, nor anyone in the audience, is likely to know what this means, to know who are "extremists" and who the good guys, relatively speaking. I presume that Tarek Fatah means the first head of an independent Bangladesh, back in 1971, Mujibur Rahman, and also Mujibur Rahman's daughter, the head of the "secular" Awami League, where "secular" means, as almost always in such cases, less fanatically a follower of the Shari'a rules, less fervently a Muslim, than those who oppose them. In his passing allusion to Bangladesh, Tarek Fatah makes no mention -- why not? -- of the many current examples of popular Muslim intolerance. He is content to limit himself to the misleading statement that when given a chance, Bangladeshis "throw out the despots." Is that quite enough? He fails to mention, for example, that Taslima Nasrin, the celebrated apostate, had to flee from Bangladesh to India in fear of her life, because of threats by Muslims eager to kill her, and a government unwilling to protect her. Is it the position of Tarek Fatah that if the Awami League were running things, Taslima Nasrin could live safely in Bangladesh?

And he does not mention, either, that astonishingly brave editor and journalist, Mr. Salah Choudhury, who dared to write words of sympathy and support for Israel, and for Hindus and Christians too. Choudhury has been under almost constant pressure - death threats, physical attacks, charges of treason, and finally, arrest and formal charges laid, all because he is a true and brave version of what we in the West would dearly wish all "moderate Muslims" to be. Shouldn't Tarek Fatah have done more than pretend that Islam somehow changes its spots, and so do Muslims, when we move from the Arab countries to Pakistan and Bangladesh?

Priorities, under Sharia: "The judges in Medina issued a statement expressing that Sibat deserved to be executed for having continually practiced black magic on his show, adding that this sentence would deter others from practicing sorcery."

"TV presenter gets death sentence for 'sorcery'," by Mohammed Jamjoom for CNN, March 20:

(CNN) -- Amnesty International is calling on Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah to stop the execution of a Lebanese man sentenced to death for "sorcery."

In a statement released Thursday, the international rights group condemned the verdict and demanded the immediate release of Ali Hussain Sibat, former host of a popular call-in show that aired on Sheherazade, a Beirut based satellite TV channel.

According to his lawyer, Sibat, who is 48 and has five children, would predict the future on his show and give out advice to his audience.

The attorney, May El Khansa, who is in Lebanon, tells CNN her client was arrested by Saudi Arabia's religious police (known as the Mutawa'een) and charged with sorcery while visiting the country in May 2008. Sibat was in Saudi Arabia to perform the Islamic religious pilgrimage known as Umra.

Sibat was then put on trial. In November 2009, a court in the Saudi city of Medina found Sibat guilty and sentenced him to death.

According to El Khansa, Sibat appealed the verdict. The case was taken up by the Court of Appeal in the Saudi city of Mecca on the grounds that the initial verdict was "premature."

El Khansa tells CNN that the Mecca appeals court then sent the case back to the original court for reconsideration, stipulating that all charges made against Sibat needed to be verified and that he should be given a chance to repent.

On March 10, judges in Medina upheld their initial verdict, meaning Sibat is once again sentenced to be executed.

"The Medina court refused the sentence of the appeals court," said El Khansa, adding her client will appeal the verdict once more. [...]

According to Arab News, an English language Saudi daily newspaper, after the most recent verdict was issued, the judges in Medina issued a statement expressing that Sibat deserved to be executed for having continually practiced black magic on his show, adding that this sentence would deter others from practicing sorcery.

Arab News reports that the case will now return to the appeals court in Mecca.

CNN has not been able to reach Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Justice for comment.

The Qur'an says there is "no compulsion in religion " (2:256) but Islamic law and the Qur'an itself are actually full of subtle and not-at-all-subtle means of coercion of non-believers (e.g., dhimmi status, the jizya tax, and of course, warfare). Add to that a situation where authorities, steeped in hatred of unbelievers (cf. Qur'an 98:6) are not accountable, and this is what happens.

"News Alert: Pakistan Christian "Burned", Wife "Raped", For Refusing Islam," from BosNewsLife, March 20 (thanks to DJM):

RAWALPINDI, PAKISTAN (BosNewsLife)-- A Christian man was fighting for his life in Pakistan's Punjab province Saturday, March 20, after Muslim leaders backed by police burned him alive for refusing to convert to Islam, while his wife was raped by police officers, Christian and hospital sources familiar with the case told BosNewsLife.

Arshed Masih was burned Friday, March 19, in front of a police station in the city of Rawalpindi near Pakistan's capital Islamabad, following apparent death threats from his Muslim employer Sheikh Mohammad Sultan, an influential businessman, and religious leaders, said the Rawalpindi Holy Family Hospital.

His wife, Martha Arshed, was allegedly raped by police officers. Their three children -- ranging in age from 7 to 12-- were reportedly forced to witness the attacks against their parents.

"Both [Masih] and wife were rushed to the Holy Family Hospital and are under treatment," the hospital said.

He was listed in serious condition with about 80 percent of his body burned.

Local police officials said they were "aware" of the attacks carried out by Muslim leaders and apparently at least some officers and added that an investigation was underway. No arrests were reported yet late Saturday, March 19.

Sheikh Mohammad Sultan could not immediately be reached for comment and it was not clear whether he had been in contact with police Saturday, March 20.

Before tensions emerged about their Christian faith, Masih worked as a driver and his wife as a maid for the Muslim businessman since 2005, Christians said.

The couple apparently lived with their children in the servant quarters of Sultan's estate in Rawalpindi, a key trade and tourist destination. In January, religious leaders and Sultan allegedly asked Arshed to convert to Islam with his whole family. After he refused, the group reportedly threatened him with "dire consequences"

Arshed offered to quit his job, but the businessman allegedly said he would "kill" him if he were to leave.

He apparently also told Christian mediators that he would never allow the Christian family to live somewhere else.

This week tensions raised after Sultan reported a theft of 500,000 Pakistani Rupees (5,952$), according to a document seen by BosNewsLife.

The Christian family members were not named as suspects in the so-called 'First Information Report' from police.

Sources familiar with the situation, who asked not to be identified for security reasons, told BosNewsLife that the businessman had offered the couple to drop the case if they convert to Islam or "else that both would not see their children again."

However, "Arshed refused to convert and stood firm in his faith. Arshed`s wife was raped by the police and he was burned alive," Friday, March 19, local Christians said, speaking on condition of anonimity.

The case comes at a time when church groups have complained about growing attacks against minority Christians by Muslim militants, often with the alleged support by local law enforcement officials and other authorities.

Emulating Muhammad's profound hostility toward music. "Student beaten to death for playing music," from Big News Network, March 20:

A student has died after being beaten to death by pro-Taliban radicals at a Pakistani university.

The beating, which occurred earlier in the week, culminated in the death of Anan Khan, who attended the University of Engineering & Technology in Peshawar.

He was severely beaten with several other students at the university by members of a student wing of the hard-line Jamiat-e Islami party.

Witnesses have said the IJT attacked Adnan for playing music.

Members of the IJT have a record of breaking up music appreciation functions and dance parties on the campus.

"Western jihad is here to stay." Well, certainly he is right as long as the current elite remains in power. "Jihad as American as apple pie, says US-born cleric," from AFP, March 20:

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Violent jihad, or Islamic holy war, is "becoming as American as apple pie," US-born fugitive cleric Anwar Al-Awlaqi said in an unauthenticated message released Friday.

"Western jihad is here to stay," warned Awlaqi as he commented on a blonde American who dubbed herself "JihadJane" and has pleaded not guilty to trying to recruit Islamist militants to murder a Swedish cartoonist.

"Jihad is becoming as American as apple pie and as British as afternoon tea," the US-Yemeni cleric said in an English-language message posted on militant forums and released by the US-based SITE monitoring agency....

"Eight years after 9/11 and the declaration of war against terrorism, jihad is still reaching the shores of Europe and America. Not from the outside, but from within. Jihad is not being imported but is being homegrown," read the message attributed to Awlaqi.

He also referred to Christmas Day bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab and to Colleen LaRose, the 46-year-old Pennsylvania resident who dubbed herself "JihadJane."

"The US has spent billions to protect its airlines but they couldn't prevent Umar Farouk, and the West has been profiling until 'Jihad Jane' shattered whatever trust was left in the value of profiling," the message read.

"A blond, blue-eyed, small framed, middle-aged female. It couldn't get any further from your typical 'terrorist' profile."...

That's why law enforcement officials should be targeting the ideology and the belief-system. But they aren't. And they won't.

Naivete. "Moderate Muslims speak, but they are rarely heard," from the Houston Chronicle, March 18:

Recently two events have occurred that describe opposing views of how some Muslims see the world. The reactions of Muslims in the United States to these two events will affect how their non-Muslim fellow citizens view this new and growing minority.

One of the events occurred March 7 when Adam Gadahn, an American-born "spokesman" for al-Qaida, called for terrorist attacks on American targets, including "mass transportation systems." Many non-Muslims will hear about this through the widespread media coverage it got and will wonder, "Where are the moderate Muslims among us? Why don't they speak out?"

But they have been speaking out. For example, the Muslim Public Affairs Council issued the following statement March 7: "MPAC rejects this latest call for criminal acts by al-Qaida, considering it a failed attempt to deliver its bankrupt ideology to Western Muslims, who have continued to reject terrorism in all its forms."

The Islamic Society of North America has also emphatically rejected Gadahn's statement: "American Muslims ... reject al-Qaida's attempts to lure our young men and women to their revolutionary fantasies. ... Adam Gadahn and his masters have deviated from justice by calling for the indiscriminate murder of vast numbers of people on American soil."

The other event occurred March 2, when Pakistani-born Sheikh Tahir ul-Qadri, a prominent theologian, launched a seminal fatwa in London condemning terrorism in all its forms. "Terrorism is terrorism, violence is violence and it has no place in Islamic teaching and no justification can be provided for it, or any kind of excuses of ifs and buts. The world needs an absolute, unconditional, unqualified and total condemnation of terrorism."

This is only one of many such statements that have been issued by Islamic scholars since 9/11, but it is significant because it is one of the few that was issued in English and publicized in the United Kingdom, where most British-born extremists have family or cultural links within the Muslim community.

Regrettably, our news media will probably devote significant coverage to Gadahn's statements, and too few non-Muslims will hear of the condemnations of his statements issued by American Muslim groups, or of ul-Qadri's fatwa. [...]

We are part of a group of Jews and Muslims who have come together to understand each other's narratives under the auspices of Interfaith Ministries and the Institute for Sustainable Peace....

What could go wrong? Plenty.

MPAC was formed out of the Islamic Center of Southern California, whose leaders are known members of the Muslim Brotherhood. MPAC's Senior Advisor, Maher Hathout, has close ties to the Brotherhood.

ISNA, for its part, has admitted ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas.

The Muslim Brotherhood "must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and 'sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and Allah's religion is made victorious over all other religions." -- Mohamed Akram, "An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America," May 22, 1991, Government Exhibit 003-0085, U.S. vs. HLF, et al. P. 7 (21).

And what more enjoyable way could they have found to sabotage our miserable house than to sucker the naive kuffar into buying that groups like MPAC and ISNA are really opposed to jihad?

Here we go again: more smooth lies, half-truths, detours and deceptions -- anything to keep us from looking squarely at the jihad doctrine as delineated by the Qur'an and Sunnah. It's interesting that Philip Jenkins gets a big feature on NPR for claiming that the Bible is more violent than the Qur'an -- when NPR offers the opposing view, featuring someone who says that the Qur'an is more violent than the Bible, we will know that the End Times have begun. "Is The Bible More Violent Than The Quran?," by Barbara Bradley Hagerty for NPR, March 18 (thanks to all who sent this in):

As the hijackers boarded the airplanes on Sept. 11, 2001, they had a lot on their minds. And if they were following instructions, one of those things was the Quran.

In preparation for the suicide attack, their handlers had told them to meditate on two chapters of the Quran in which God tells Muslims to "cast terror into the hearts of unbelievers."

"Slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, arrest them, besiege them, and lie in ambush everywhere for them," Allah instructs the Prophet Muhammad (Quran, 9:5). He continues: "Prophet! Make war on the unbelievers and the hypocrites! ... Hell shall be their home, an evil fate."

When Osama bin Laden declared war on the West in 1996, he cited the Quran's command to "strike off" the heads of unbelievers. More recently, U.S. Army Maj. Nidal Hasan lectured his colleagues about jihad, or "holy war," and the Quran's exhortation to fight unbelievers and bring them low. Hasan is accused of killing 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas, last year.

Given this violent legacy, religion historian Philip Jenkins decided to compare the brutality quotient of the Quran and the Bible.

Defense Vs. Total Annihilation

"Much to my surprise, the Islamic scriptures in the Quran were actually far less bloody and less violent than those in the Bible," Jenkins says.

Jenkins is a professor at Penn State University and author of two books dealing with the issue: the recently published Jesus Wars, and Dark Passages , which has not been published but is already drawing controversy.

Violence in the Quran, he and others say, is largely a defense against attack.

"By the standards of the time, which is the 7th century A.D., the laws of war that are laid down by the Quran are actually reasonably humane," he says. "Then we turn to the Bible, and we actually find something that is for many people a real surprise. There is a specific kind of warfare laid down in the Bible which we can only call genocide."

It is called herem, and it means total annihilation. Consider the Book of 1 Samuel, when God instructs King Saul to attack the Amalekites: "And utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them," God says through the prophet Samuel. "But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey."

When Saul failed to do that, God took away his kingdom.

"In other words," Jenkins says, "Saul has committed a dreadful sin by failing to complete genocide. And that passage echoes through Christian history. It is often used, for example, in American stories of the confrontation with Indians -- not just is it legitimate to kill Indians, but you are violating God's law if you do not."

Jenkins notes that the history of Christianity is strewn with herem. During the Crusades in the Middle Ages, the Catholic popes declared the Muslims Amalekites. In the great religious wars in the 16th, 17th and 19th centuries, Protestants and Catholics each believed the other side were the Amalekites and should be utterly destroyed.

'Holy Amnesia'

But Jenkins says, even though the Bible is violent, Christianity and Judaism today are not for the most part.

"What happens in all religions as they grow and mature and expand, they go through a process of forgetting of the original violence, and I call this a process of holy amnesia," Jenkins says.

They make the violence symbolic: Wiping out the enemy becomes wiping out one's own sins. Jenkins says that until recently, Islam had the same sort of holy amnesia, and many Muslims interpreted jihad, for example, as an internal struggle, not physical warfare....

So is it just that simple? Religious texts teach violence, and so believers commit acts of violence that they believe will please God, until they just forget that the texts that teach violence are actually in their Scriptures? And what exactly makes them do this forgetting? Setting aside the fact that the Old Testament passages Jenkins cites are specific commands for a particular times and place, not universal commands for all believers for all time to make war against unbelievers, as we see in the Qur'an, it is also true that Jenkins completely ignores the fact that it was Jewish and Christian principles involving the dignity of the human person as made in the image of God that led to the spiritualizing of violent passages in the first place. He also neglects to mention that when these passages were used in history to justify violence, this was contrary to their mainstream interpretations both before and after the periods in which the violence was committed.

In Islam, by contrast, there is such a sharp dichotomy between the believer and the unbeliever (cf. Qur'an 48:29, which tells the Muslim to behave mercifully to fellow believers, but harshly to unbelievers), that the spiritualizing of violent Qur'anic passages has never taken place. Jenkins claims that "until recently, Islam had the same sort of holy amnesia, and many Muslims interpreted jihad, for example, as an internal struggle, not physical warfare." In reality, the two understandings have never been considered mutually exclusive by Islamic scholars. Hasan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood and great proponent of violent jihad, mandated Sufi spiritual exercises for the early Brothers, so that they would not neglect the aspect of jihad as internal struggle. The Chechen jihad was long led by Sufis -- the great proponents of that internal jihad.

And it simply isn't true that until recently, the prevailing understanding among Muslims was that jihad is an internal struggle, but now that is changing. Imran Ahsan Khan Nyazee, Assistant Professor on the Faculty of Shari'ah and Law of the International Islamic University in Islamabad, his 1994 book The Methodology of Ijtihad offers a quite different explanation of why jihad may appear to be a relatively recent phenomenon. He asserts: "The primary goal of the Muslim community, in the eyes of its jurists, is to spread the word of Allah through jihad, and the option of poll-tax [jizya] is to be exercised only after subjugation" of non-Muslims. But if this is so, why hasn't the worldwide Islamic community been waging jihad on a large scale up until relatively recently? Nyazee says it is only because they have not been able to do so: "the Muslim community may be considered to be passing through a period of truce. In its present state of weakness, there is nothing much it can do about it."

Perhaps Philip Jenkins would be so kind as to explain to Imran Ahsan Khan Nyazee how he misunderstands Islam. Or perhaps Waleed El-Ansary, who is cited later on in the NPR piece, would take on the job:

That may be the popular notion of jihad, says Waleed El-Ansary, but it's the wrong one. El-Ansary, who teaches Islamic studies at the University of South Carolina, says the Quran explicitly condemns religious aggression and the killing of civilians. And it makes the distinction between jihad -- legal warfare with the proper rules of engagement -- and irjaf, or terrorism.

"All of those types of incidences -- [Sept. 11], Maj. Nidal Hasan and so forth -- those are all examples of irjaf, not jihad," he says. According to the Quran, he says, those who practice irjaf "are going to hell."

The problem with El-Ansary's slick explanation, of course, is that the Qur'an actually never "condemns religious aggression and the killing of civilians" -- if those civilians are non-Muslims. The NPR article offers no supporting citations. I invite all Muslim readers of this site (and non-Muslim Islamic apologists) to offer verses to support this assertion in the comments field below, and I will check in from time to time and examine each one that is offered in light of the mainstream and authoritative tafasir, or Muslim commentaries on the Qur'an.

So what's going on here? After all, we all have images of Muslim radicals flying planes into buildings, shooting up soldiers at Fort Hood, trying to detonate a bomb on an airplane on Christmas Day. How to reconcile a peaceful Quran with these violent acts?

El-Ansary says that in the past 30 years, there's been a perfect storm that has created a violent strain of Islam. The first is political: frustration at Western intervention in the Muslim world. The second is intellectual: the rise of Wahhabi Islam, a more fundamentalist interpretation of Islam subscribed to by Osama bin Laden. El-Ansary says fundamentalists have distorted Islam for political purposes.

"Basically what they do is they take verses out of context and then use that to justify these egregious actions," he says.

Contradiction: the word "fundamentalist," which is misapplied to Islam in the first place, usually means someone who takes the text literally. But here El-Ansary would have us understand that the "fundamentalists" in Islam are misusing the texts. So then how are they fundamentalists at all?

El-Ansary says we are seeing more religious violence from Muslims now because the Islamic world is far more religious than is the West.

Wait a minute. The Islamic world is more religious, and yet so few people seem to notice that the Islamic jihadists are taking all these Qur'anic verses out of context?

Still, Jenkins says Judeo-Christian cultures shouldn't be smug. The Bible has plenty of violence.

"The scriptures are still there, dormant, but not dead," he says, "and they can be resurrected at any time. Witness the white supremacists who cite the murderous Phineas when calling for racial purity, or an anti-abortion activist when shooting a doctor who performs abortions....

15,000 Islamic jihad attacks, about half a dozen murders of abortionists in the last thirty years, and they're equivalent. Right.

In this article, David Pugliese does his best to portray Ghulam Rasol as an illiterate, manipulated naif, operating (no doubt) according to a twisted, hijacked version of Islam -- a classic Misunderstander of the Religion of Peace™. In reality, however, what Ghulam Rasol did was entirely in accord with Islamic law. His going to Afghanistan to fight the Infidels was in line with the Islamic doctrine that jihad becomes obligatory upon all Muslims whenever a Muslim land is attacked. (Provocations by Muslims from that Muslim land don't factor into this equation -- if the non-Muslim enemy strikes back, that constitutes an invasion of Muslim land.) All the schools of Islamic jurisprudence agree that when a non-Muslim force enters a Muslim land, jihad becomes the individual obligation of every Muslim (fard 'ayn) rather than a collective obligation of the entire umma, from which one is released if others are taking it up (fard kifaya). Bulghah al-Salik li-Aqrab al-Masalik fi madhhab al-Imam Malik ("The Sufficiency of the Traveller on the Best Path in the School of Imam Malik,") says this:

Jihad in the Path of Allah, to raise the word of Allah, is fard kifayah [obligatory on the community] once a year, so that if some perform it, the obligation falls from the rest. It becomes fard `ayn [obligatory on every Muslim individually], like salah and fasting, if the legitimate Muslim Imam declares it so, or if there is an attack by the enemy on an area of people.

The Hanafi, Maliki, and Shafi'i schools of Sunni jurisprudence further declare that jihad, once it is fard 'ayn, is no different from prayer and fasting -- in other words, to engage in warfare with non-Muslims in that case is a religious devotion that cannot lawfully be evaded. Hashiyah Ibn `Abidin, an authoritative text of the Hanafi school, says that jihad is "fard 'ayn if the enemy has attacked part of the Islamic homeland. It thus becomes an obligation like salah [prayer] and fasting which cannot be abandoned."

"Would-be suicide bomber explains himself," by David Pugliese for Canwest News Service, March 20:

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Several months ago, Ghulam Rasol packed his bag and quietly slipped out of his village in northwest Pakistan.

He did not tell his parents, his brother or sister what he was doing or where he was going. They still don't know what happened to him.

Rasol decided to leave after being told by mullahs, who had come to his village outside Peshawar, that Afghanistan had been occupied by foreign troops. It was his duty as a good Muslim to kill those infidels, he was told.

The 20-year-old had never been out of Pakistan. He knows little about Afghanistan. Yet he decided it was his responsibility to his religion that he should wage jihad by becoming a suicide bomber.

Rasol acknowledges he has never met a foreigner. He can't tell the difference between a Canadian, U.S. or British soldier. Nor does it matter to him.

"I cannot distinguish between foreigners and we don't care from which country they are from," he explained through an interpreter. "Whoever is not Muslim are infidels for us." [...]

He decided to devote his life to jihad because the mullahs had told him it was his responsibility to do so. After that Rasol was taken to a nearby madrassa, or religious school, where he received his "education."

"They told us that in Afghanistan jihad is allowed, it is legal and they said: 'Go to Afghanistan and start jihad,' " he said. "They told us that we are Muslim and that in Afghanistan there are infidels, so it's our responsibility to go to Afghanistan and do jihad." [...]

He informed the mullahs at the madrassa he didn't want to kill fellow Muslims but he was willing to fight international troops. "I was ready to blow up myself among Westerns," he said. [...]

"It is not for a believer to kill a believer unless (it be) by mistake" -- Qur'an 4:92

"Ah, now I get it." As do so few in the West. "Terror TV: Latest Hamas kiddie hate show outrage," from the New York Daily News, March 20:

Get this straight: Whether Israel builds 0 or 1,300 or 13,000 homes in Jerusalem, it is a democracy ready to return to the negotiating table in good faith tomorrow.

But Hamas, the terror organization that controls Gaza, has no such interest. Witness the rocket fired from Gaza into Israel on Thursday, killing a man. Witness the incitements to hatred that Hamas refuses to relinquish.

This last is most vividly seen on children's television. There, the folks who brought you the jihadist bee and the martyr mouse are pushing full-steam ahead.

This month, Hamas' Al Aqsa TV aired a children's puppet show that told the tale of a sweet little boy, Alloush, who learns about a mosque that Jews seek to turn into a synagogue. The innocent child reports this news to his wise Uncle Hassan, who sets Alloush straight about what's in store for the mosque:

"The Jews come to defile it," he declares, announcing "a real catastrophe for the Arab and Islamic world."

Hassan issues a rallying cry:

"Alloush and dear children, each one of you must tell his father, his grandfather and the rest of his family that they should all arise as one. They must rise up against the criminal Zionists, who are planning to destroy Jerusalem and to turn the Islamic waqf [a building or land used for Muslim religious purposes] into something bad. We must rise against the Zionist criminals, the enemies of Allah, and liberate Jerusalem and all the holy places. Do you hear, Alloush?"

The little boy responds: "Ah, now I get it."

Of course he does. But does the Obama administration?...

Of course not.

"First-hand accounts from locals in the lawless areas of Pakistan close to the Afghan border, combined with those of Pakistani officers in the region, suggest that there is no shortage of Islamic foreigners willing to join the fray." Here is yet another indication that Islamic belief is what fuels jihad activity around the world, not nationalist sentiment. Otherwise, what would Arabs and Uzbeks be doing waging war in Afghanistan? "Arabs throw in their lot with 'global terrorists' in war against the infidel," by Anthony Loyd in The Times, March 20 (thanks to Kris):

They have been attacked from the air by American drones and on the ground by the Pakistan Army. Hundreds have been killed or injured on the battlefields of Afghanistan -- but the foreign fighters, or "global terrorists" of the North West Frontier Province, remain a formidable presence.

First-hand accounts from locals in the lawless areas of Pakistan close to the Afghan border, combined with those of Pakistani officers in the region, suggest that there is no shortage of Islamic foreigners willing to join the fray. Britain claims that these fighters are still the source of 75 per cent of terror plots against it.

Among this disparate group are al-Qaeda's Arab fighters, with a reputation for being well heeled and well mannered; Uzbeks from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), regarded as tough, rough and poor; and the Punjabis of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), viewed by their hosts as arrogant but militarily competent.

One Pakistani brigadier told The Times last week that his men had encountered more than 1,500 Uzbek militants during operations last autumn in South Waziristan. Another brigade commander said that 10 per cent of the 300 militants that his men had recently killed in Waziristan were foreign, including Arabs. [...]

However, not everyone is happy with their presence. "It's because of them that the army has come to our land and destroyed our homes," one local tribesman said. "Because of them our businesses are wrecked. Because of them we live as internal refugees.

"I've met ordinary people who say that they'd even welcome Israel or India if they helped us get rid of these Arabs and their friends."

Yikes! Even Israel or India?

And such a challenge would likely fall on deaf ears anyway, given the "Muslim view" that birth defects arising from such marriages are "a consequence of Allah's will, and they may therefore approach it with fatalism."

"Rise in marriages between cousins 'is putting children's health at risk,'" by Frances Gibb in The Times, March 20 (thanks to Kris):

The dangers of marriage between first cousins are to be highlighted by a leading professor, with a warning that their children are at risk of genetic defects.

Baroness Deech, a family law professor and crossbencher, will call next week for a "vigorous" public campaign to deter the practice, which is prevalent in Muslim and immigrant communities and on the rise. She will reignite a debate started five years ago when Ann Cryer, MP for Keighley, drew attention to the number of disabled babies being born in the town and called for cousin marriage to be stopped.

Fifty-five per cent of British Pakistanis are married to first cousins and in Bradford the figure is 75 per cent. British Pakistanis represent 3 per cent of all births in Britain but one third of children with recessive disorders. [...]

"The local estimate was that 75 per cent of Bradford disabled children had cousin parents and the rate of cousin marriage in the UK Pakistani community is increasing," Lady Deech will say. [...]

Yet there are cultural differences or ignorance about disabled children, she says. Women may be blamed in some minority cultures for being childless or having disabled children; while the "Muslim view . . . is that it is a consequence of Allah's will, and they may therefore approach it with fatalism". [...]

She says: "There is no reason, one could argue, why there should not be a campaign to highlight the risks and the preventative measures, every bit as vigorous as those centring on smoking, obesity and Aids." While there was reluctance to "target or upset Muslims over cousin-marriage issues" the practice was not mandated by religion, only permitted, so it is not at heart a religious issue, she argues....

Short-sighted dhimmi realpolitik is not solely the province of the West. John VI Cantacuzenes Alert: "Putin vexes US over Iran nuclear power," by Daniel Dombey and Isabel Gorst in the Financial Times, March 18:

Vladimir Putin, Russia's prime minister, promised on Thursday that Moscow would help Iran complete a civil nuclear power station by this summer, drawing criticism from Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state.

His remarks highlighted the continuing differences between the two powers over how to contain Iran's nuclear ambitions. Mrs Clinton was visiting Moscow on a trip partly designed to increase the pressure on Tehran by showing America's unity with Russia.

But Mr Putin told a meeting held in Volgodonsk, southern Russia, that work to complete the Bushehr plant on Iran's Gulf coast would soon be complete. "The first block of the Iranian atomic power station must be launched this summer," he said.

Asked about Mr Putin's remarks, Mrs Clinton said it "would be premature to go forward with any project at this time, because we want to send an unequivocal message to the Iranians".

However, she added: "We have consistently said that Iran is entitled to civil nuclear power. It is a nuclear weapons programme that it is not entitled to."...

And she seems to think that will be an easy distinction to draw and maintain.

A ridiculous article that, unfortunately, reflects all-too-common assumptions. "President Obama Seeks to Bridge Differences with Islam," by Jerome Socolovsky for VOA News, March 18 (thanks to Mackie):

U.S. President Barack Obama has again postponed his trip to Indonesia because of pressing issues in the U.S. The trip is part of his ongoing effort to reach out to Muslims worldwide. Last year, he gave a speech in Cairo that was considered a landmark in the effort to bridge differences between Islam and the West. Many Muslims believe he should do more [sic]

No one seems to think that Muslims have any responsibility to "bridge differences between Islam and the West." No, everyone, from Barack Obama to Jerome Socolovsky, and everyone in between, knows that the conflict is all the West's fault. Note how Jerome Socolovsky frames the conflict:

Frictions between Islam and the West often flare up - like when when a Danish newspaper published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed - or when Muslim girls in Europe went to school wearing veils, or new minarets in Switzerland were banned.

Note that he mentions nothing about, say, "frictions" "flaring up" when Muslims, acting in the name of Islam and jihad, murder thirteen Americans in cold blood at Fort Hood, or murder two American soldiers in Little Rock, Arkansas, or murder one and wound five in a Jewish Community Center in Seattle, or plow into a crowd of students, trying to murder as many as possible, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Etc.

No, none of that makes "frictions" "flare up." Instead, "frictions" only "flare up" when a Danish newspaper has the temerity to publish cartoons of the "Prophet Mohammed" -- as the mainstream media universally designates him these days, as if we're all Muslims now. Jerome Socolovsky gives no hint that he, or any reasonable person, may think that it's sheer madness or worse to go around murdering innocent people, or even demanding free speech restrictions, because of a few cartoons. As far as he is concerned, the cartoons -- not Islamic jihad mass murders -- make "frictions" "flare up."

And as if cartoons of Muhammad weren't bad enough, Europeans -- xenophobic and benighted as ever -- get angry when "Muslim girls in Europe went to school wearing veils." See how Jerome Socolovsky loads the dice? No mention of jihad terror attacks -- oh, no. Instead, "frictions" only "flare up" when poor little Muslim girls in Europe simply want to live according to the tenets of their own culture. How cruel and ethnocentric those Europeans are! They even banned "new minarets in Switzerland" -- no mention, of course, of how much more severely restricted is non-Islamic religious practice all over the Islamic world.

And then there comes this sage observation:

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have also complicated America's relationship with the Islamic world.

As longtime Jihad Watch readers know, I have never favored the foredoomed democracy projects-cum-social work exercises in Iraq or Afghanistan, but Jerome Socolovsky's assumption here seems to be that the adventures in both countries were some kind of unprovoked provocation. He makes no mention of 9/11, or of the Taliban's depredations, or of Saddam Hussein's reckless belligerence.

Last year, President Obama went to Cairo hoping to change that. He extended the traditional Muslim greeting, and said while he is a Christian, his father's family includes generations of Muslims. "I've come here to Cairo to seek a new beginning, between the United States and Muslims around the world," he said.

He declared that the U.S. is not at war with Islam, but is against violent extremists who exploit the tensions between Islam and the West.

Those tensions go all the way back to the Crusades - when Christian armies invaded the Holy Land.

True to form, Jerome Socolovsky makes no mention of the 450 years of jihad attacks that had conquered and Islamized over half of Christendom long before the first Crusade was even called, and to which the Crusades were a late and small-scale defensive reaction.

But there have also been times of harmony like in medieval Spain....

Even Maria Rosa Menocal, in her hagiographical book The Ornament of the World, admits that "times of harmony" went only so far in Muslim Spain, which institutionalized discrimination against Jewish and Christian dhimmis: "The dhimmi, as these covenanted peoples were called, were granted religious freedom, not forced to convert to Islam. They could continue to be Jews and Christians, and, as it turned out, they could share in much of Muslim social and economic life. In return for this freedom of religious conscience the Peoples of the Book (pagans had no such privilege) were required to pay a special tax -- no Muslims paid taxes and to observe a number of restrictive regulations: Christians and Jews were prohibited from attempting to proselytize Muslims, from building new places of worship, from displaying crosses or ringing bells. In sum, they were forbidden most public displays of their religious rituals." (Pp. 72-3)

So much for a paradise of tolerance and multiculturalism. Historian Kenneth Baxter Wolf observes that "much of this new legislation aimed at limiting those aspects of the Christian cult which seemed to compromise the dominant position of Islam." After enumerating a list of laws much like Menocal's, he adds: "Aside from such cultic restrictions most of the laws were simply designed to underscore the position of the dimmîs as second-class citizens."

But Jerome Socolovsky, ignorant of all this, goes on to say that Obama needs to hop to it, abandoning Israel and stopping defending ourselves against the global jihad:

Professor Ahmad El Tayeb of Al Azhar University in Cairo said the President's speech there was a landmark. "I was there, and I admired that speech very much. But we are still waiting to see practical results," he said.

He says the U.S. shouldn't side with Israel or fight wars in Muslim countries....

Yeah, that'll fix it.

Please take 12 minutes and 45 seconds and watch the two YouTube segments from a show hosted by Michael Coren. Part 1 is above. Part 2, which I will discuss in a future piece, is here.

Thank you.

Now we can continue.

Recently Michael Coren, host of a discussion program on Canadian television, had on three guests to discuss Islam: Tarek Fatah, the well-known (in Canada) Muslim Moderate, and two non-Muslim guests, Steve Gilchrist and Joan Crockatt. The program began with the usual career-promoting banter. Michael Coren observed that Tarek Fatah, author of "Chasing the Mirage," was about to come out with his second book, the subtitle of which, Tarek Fatah said, was "Unveiling the Myths That Fuel Muslim Antisemitism." Coren jocoseriously said that Fatah had the best publisher in the world, the very one that so intelligently published Michael Coren.

Pleasantries were swiftly over; it was time to be serious, about a serious subject. Coren mentioned that this discussion - all 12 minutes and 45 seconds of it - was prompted by a recent debate, held in a Toronto synagogue, between Wafa Sultan and Daniel Pipes, about the usefulness of relying on the notion of the "Moderate Muslim." Wafa Sultan argued that the concept itself was of cold comfort, even dangerous, while Pipes - a prominent proponent of a distinction he finds between "Islam" and "Islamism," argued, as he always has, that "moderate Muslims" are not part of the problem but part of the solution.

Coren then quotes Tarek Fatah as saying that when he had heard Wafa Sultan describe Muhammad as "a child-rapist," those "words stunned me, like a jolt of electricity." And what's more, Wafa Sultan insinuated "that my Islamic faith was filth" by stating that she was "clean of Islam." Apparently Tarek Fatah, who exhibits a certain shakiness with English here and there, does not think the word "clean" can mean "free of," and he can only think in levi-straussian le-cru-et-le-cuit polarities. And of course many in the audience, unless they are paying close attention and know something about Islam, are likely to think, why yes, how wantonly cruel of that awful Wafa Sultan, how mean to insult this man's faith, what with his soft-spoken earnest look and rumpled suit and rumpled tie, and pleasingly plump appearance (no lean-and-hungry Tariq Ramadan here).

The thing about this is, if someone came up to me and said, Hey, let's bomb a synagogue, I just wouldn't go for it. Ever. Under any circumstances. No matter how much I got "badgered."

War Is Deceit Update: "Synagogue Bomb Suspects: The Feds Put Us Up to It!," by Jonathan Dienst and Hasani Gittens for the NBC New York, March 19 (thanks to all sent this in):

Defense attorneys say an alleged plot to bomb New York synagogues was hatched and directed by a federal informant.

Lawyers for four men from Newburgh have filed a motion to dismiss the terror indictment against them.

They said the informant badgered the defendants until they got involved in the plot.

They said the informant chose the targets, supplied fake bombs for the synagogues and a fake missile to shoot down planes. The motion said he also offered to pay the defendants, who attorneys alleged weren't inclined toward any crime until the informant began recruiting them.

"The government well knew that their case had been a government-inspired creation from day one and that the defendants had not been independently seeking weapons or targets," the motion said....

Living large at Gitmo

"...raising concerns among security officials that the terrorism suspects could pass sensitive data to terrorists in the future, according to U.S. officials."

Uh, yeah.

Will the self-deception and dhimmi idiocy never end?

"Gitmo suspects allowed laptops while in custody," by Bill Gertz at the Washington Times, March 19 (thanks to all who sent this in):

The Pentagon allowed five captured al Qaeda members currently held at the Guantanamo Bay prison to use laptop computers in detention, raising concerns among security officials that the terrorism suspects could pass sensitive data to terrorists in the future, according to U.S. officials.

The computers, without Internet access, were provided to Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four other suspected 9/11 conspirators at the prison at the U.S. naval base in Cuba after approval by senior Pentagon officials in September 2008.

The battery-powered laptops were kept in the detainees' cell areas, and limitations on their use were imposed, defense officials said. The practice continued until January, when charges against the five were temporarily dropped after Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced the men would be tried in civilian court, not by military commission.

Mr. Holder then backed off plans to hold trials in federal court in New York City and said this week that a decision on where to conduct the trials is expected in the coming weeks.

In addition to Mohammed, the other al Qaeda members who were given computers were Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin Attash, Ramzi Binalshibh, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al-Hawsawi.

The computer access was granted by Guantanamo authorities before an Oct. 6, 2008, ruling by Marine Corps Col. Ralph H. Kohlmann, a military judge, that formally granted the five terrorism suspect the right to use computers, said Col. Les Melnyk, a Pentagon spokesman....

Why quietly? Best not to call too much attention to your dhimmitude. Then some folks who still have an attachment to the human rights that are trampled by Sharia might object. "U.N. Drops Muslim Brotherhood Figure From 'Terrorist Finance' List," by Mark "Must Be Loving This" Hosenball for Newsweek, March 17 (thanks to all who sent this in):

The U.N. Security Council has quietly dropped Youssef Nada, a prominent financial and diplomatic representative of the Muslim Brotherhood, from an international sanctions list directed at curbing the activities of alleged terrorist financiers. The delisting of Nada, by the Al-Qaida and Taliban Sanctions Committee, was announced by this official notice posted on the Security Council's Web site. In addition to Nada himself, the notice declares that two businesses associated with him, Waldenberg AG of Liechtenstein and Youssef M. Nada & Co. GMBH of Vienna, also have been removed from the U.N. sanctions list.

The Security Council's announcement does not explain why the council decided to drop financial sanctions against Nada and his companies--sanctions intended to curb their ability to conduct financial activities anywhere in the world. But Victor Comras, a former adviser on financial sanctions to the U.S. State Department and, later, an adviser to the committee that produced the sanctions lists, says he find the U.N. action troubling. "To my mind this is a great mistake. I'm kind of mystified by it," Comras told Declassified. When Nada was put on the U.N. sanctions list, it was done with great public fanfare, Comras said. But when the U.N. decided to take his name off, it was done with a minimum of public discussion.

In an e-mail, Comras added: "Even though Nada may no longer be involved in funding Al Qaeda, he has made it clear a number of times that he will continue as a major financial supporter of Hamas . . . As you know, Nada never really suffered from the [U.N. listing]. He continued to live well, travel, and, most likely, to access and manipulate his assets through his family and others." Nada has previously denied any involvement with Al Qaeda.

Comras also noted that given the fact that all listing and delisting decisions by the U.N. sanctions committee have to be unanimous, at some point, in his view, the Obama administration would have had to signal that it was willing to go along with Nada's delisting. Nada and his companies were placed on a terrorist-finance sanctions list maintained by the U.S. Treasury before they were added to U.N.'s list; according to the list currently available on the Treasury Department's Web site, Nada and his companies are still on it.

In a statement, a Treasury spokesperson said that the U.S. has supported "the removal of those individuals who are no longer appropriate for listing pursuant to that specific regime." But the spokesperson added that Nada remains on the Treasury's U.S.-only sanctions list....

Well done, Lee Baca! You've done a terrific job ignoring the fact that CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror funding case -- so named by the Justice Department. You've also ably bypassed the fact that CAIR operatives have repeatedly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. You show no awareness of the fact that several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror. I am sure you have no idea, or don't care, that CAIR's cofounder and longtime Board chairman (Omar Ahmad), as well as its chief spokesman (Honest Ibe Hooper), have made Islamic supremacist statements.

And for all that, you now reap the praise of your masters. Congratulations!

"Headley, 49, had denied the charges but changed his plea to avoid the death penalty or extradition to India, Pakistan or Denmark."

Jihad Watch reader Paul comments: "Heh. Didn't really believe all those promises of the celestial Playboy Club, did we now, Daood?"

"US citizen David Headley admits role in Mumbai attacks," from the BBC, March 18 (thanks to all who sent this in):

A US citizen has pleaded guilty to scouting targets for the 2008 attacks on the Indian city of Mumbai.

David Headley, at his trial in Chicago, also admitted plotting to attack a Danish newspaper that published a cartoon many Muslims deemed offensive.

Headley, 49, had denied the charges but changed his plea to avoid the death penalty or extradition to India, Pakistan or Denmark.

The attacks on Mumbai in November 2008 left more than 170 people dead....

Prosecutors said Headley, a Pakistani-American, had made several surveillance trips to India and Denmark.

According to court documents, he passed on information to his contacts with the Pakistan-based Islamic militant group, Lashkar-e-Taiba.

The group has been blamed for organising the Mumbai attacks....

He is alleged to have told prosecutors that he had been working with Lashkar-e-Taiba since 2002.

He was first charged with plotting to attack the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten after they angered Muslims by publishing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.

Headley changed his name from Daood Gilani in 2006 after he was told by members of Lashkar-e-Taiba that he would be travelling to India to carry out surveillance duties for the group, prosecutors said.

Turning an ally into an enemy and enemies into allies. Which side is he on? Read more about this in my forthcoming book with Pamela Geller, The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War On America.

"Obama blocks delivery of bunker-busters to Israel," from the World Tribune, March 18 (thanks to Pamela):

WASHINGTON -- The United States has diverted a shipment of bunker-busters designated for Israel.

Officials said the U.S. military was ordered to divert a shipment of smart bunker-buster bombs from Israel to a military base in Diego Garcia. They said the shipment of 387 smart munitions had been slated to join pre-positioned U.S. military equipment in Israel Air Force bases.

"This was a political decision," an official said....

No kidding, really?

In traditional Islamic theology there is the idea that the teaching on jihad was revealed in stages: first, tolerance; then, defensive warfare; then, offensive warfare to establish Sharia over the world. Many, many Islamic authorities, ancient and modern, teach this -- and it belies the soothing Religion of Peace™ lies and half-truths that Islamic apologists peddle so successfully in Western countries. Here is yet another Islamic authority teaching the same thing. "This is an article from online Arabic magazine Moheet, which has offices in Egypt and the UAE." "Moheet: 'The Purpose of Jihad Is to Establish the Word of Allah,'" from Translating Jihad, March 18:

[...] Why It Is Considered Our Sixth Pillar of Islam - Jihad Is Ordained to Establish the Word of Allah
Moheet - Iman al-Khashab, 13 Mar 2010

Jihad in the path of Allah is a mainstay of the religion and a great religious duty, as the Prophet (PBUH) said: "The most important thing is Islam, and it is supported by prayer, and its apex is jihad in the path of Allah." Allah has commanded us in many verses (of the Qur'an), and urged us, as has also our Prophet (PBUH), regarding the issue of jihad. The Prophet desired it himself, and urged (others) to it. He declared its virtues so often that some scholars consider it the sixth pillar of Islam, due to its importance, which is attested by how often it appears in the Qur'an and hadith.

Jihad is an ancient religious duty, for Moses (PBUH), who struggled (jahada) to lead the children of Israel (out of Egypt), said to his people: "O my people! Enter the holy land which Allah hath assigned unto you, and turn not back ignominiously, for then will ye be overthrown, to your own ruin" (Qur'an 5.21). That is what happened to them, and Allah punished them. But in the end, after the death of Moses (PBUH), they waged jihad and conquered the holy house (Jerusalem), entering it through jihad in the path of Allah.

* * *

[Dr. Jamal al-Marakobi] added: "After that, Allah mandated jihad, rather than widespread destruction, as a punishment for the infidels who refused to worship Allah Almighty and disdained he who had created them. For jihad was the tradition (sunnah) of the prophets, from the first centuries until the coming of our prophet Muhammad (PBUH). For Muhammad went out with this law, which is jihad in the path of Allah, to establish the word of Allah and do away with shirk (polytheism) and infidelity. Allah said: "Fight them on until there is no sedition (fitna), and the religion is wholly Allah's, but if they cease, let there be no hostility, except to those who practice oppression" (Qur'an 2.193). This is the wisdom behind waging jihad, in order that Allah alone be worshipped, as (the Prophet) (PBUH) said: "I have been sent with the sword to ensure Allah is worshipped."

Dr. al-Marakobi said: "Allah obligated the ummah (Islamic nation) to jihad in the path of Allah, but it was ordained in stages. For in the days in which the Prophet (PBUH) and the Muslims were in Mecca, they were forbidden from waging jihad, and were obliged instead to (peacefully) propagate Islam. The Prophet (PBUH) was in Mecca for thirteen years after receiving the mission to call the people to Allah Almighty, and was not commanded to fight, but was forbidden from it, despite what he and his companions suffered at the hands of the infidels.

They were forbidden from jihad during this period because they did not have sufficient strength, and their enemy was stronger than they were. If they had fought at that time, their enemy would have overpowered them. When the Prophet (PBUH) emigrated to Medina, and found the Ansar (i.e. supporters; name given to Muslims from Medina), Allah authorized jihad for them, but it was not a commandment, as Allah Almighty said: "To those against whom war is made, permission is given (to fight), because they are wronged--and verily, Allah is Most Powerful for their aid" (Qur'an 22.39). After that, they were commanded to fight those who fought against them, but still refrain from fighting those who did not fight against them, as the Almighty said: "Fight in the path of Allah those who fight you, but do not be the aggressors, for Allah loveth not aggressors" (Qur'an 2.190).

The Muslims were initially commanded to fight only those who fought against them. However, later they were commanded to fight not only those who fought against them but also those who did not, in order to establish the word of Allah. This was a requirement so long as the Muslims had sufficient power, were prepared, and had a state ruled by the Prophet of Allah (PBUH). The purpose of jihad is not simply to gain authority, or expand the kingdom, or get money, or kill people. The purpose of jihad is to establish the word of Allah. For if the infidels accept the call of Islam and return to their Creator, they will not be attacked. But if they rebel they must be fought so that their wickedness and infidelity may cease, and they may receive their punishment, although their punishment with Allah will be so much more severe and horrible in the fire of hell, for they are infidels and polytheists, who despise the worship of Almighty Allah....

Read it all.

Of course, Obama does accept the Palestinian narrative. In "The President's Middle East Playbook" at The Intermediate Zone, March 17, Avi Davis provides some important background on Obama's current bullying of Israel:

[...] Almost anyone who lives in Jerusalem knows that the area in dispute, Ramat Shlomo, is a Jewish neighborhood and has been so for thirty years. It is surrounded by other Jewish neighborhoods and no Israeli in their right mind would consider surrendering it in any final peace deal with the Palestinians. Giving up Ramat Shlomo would be the equivalent of giving up the world famous Hebrew University on Mount Scopus, the tony Jerusalem suburb of French Hill and even the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem's Old City. All three are just as integrated into the Jewish identity of Jerusalem as Ramat Shlomo. Only by accepting the Palestinian narrative - that all of Jerusalem belongs to the Palestinians, could anyone possibly envision the suburb as future Palestinian territory.

The punditocracy is awestruck by the apparent petulance of it all. What, they are all asking, did he hope to gain? Was the intention to dress down Netanyahu and bring him into line? Well, the Israeli prime minister is defiant and there is no sign whatsoever he will accede to the administration's demands that he cancel the permit. This stance has rallied much of the country behind him. Rather than weakening the Israeli leader, as Obama might have hoped, he has only added to his political capital.

The Palestinians watch in delight as they wait for the Americans to deliver Israeli concessions without having to do anything but chew on their falafel. They win either way. If the peace process continues to stall they can continue to wait, which is their modus operandi anyway. If Obama finally gets Netanyahu to say uncle, they will be dealing with a castrated Israeli leader viewed as unable to control his own foreign policy.

The Arab League, those irredentist potentates, are no doubt rolling around on their palace beds in glee. They had made clear to Obama that there could be no further progress in Middle East peace without resolving the grievous wound to Arab pride caused by the Arab-Israeli dispute. Ramat Shlomo has become their poster child for Israeli transgression and so now they are winning too, convincing an American president to do their bidding....

Read it all.

The local imam incited the Islamic supremacists to attack the Christians. So yet another imam is exposed as a Misunderstander of the Religion of Peace™. Why didn't his Qur'anic study tell him to respect the People of the Book, and not to wage jihad against or expect them to assume dhimmi status? Aren't Islamic apologists in the West forever telling us that the only people who believe that Muslims hold to jihad against Jews and Christians, and in dhimmitude, are greasy Islamophobes? How is it then that so many Muslims, including even imams, turn out to be greasy Islamophobes?

"Egyptian police arrest 13 Copts, victims of attack by Islamic extremists," from Asia News, March 18 (thanks to C. Cantoni):

Cairo (AsiaNews / Agencies) - Egyptian security forces have arrested 13 Coptic Christians - including four minors, subsequently released - victims of the attack on 12 March. They are being charged with illegal religious assembly, damage to public property, arson and assault. About a dozen Muslims, from a total of 2000 perpetrators, have been detained over the assault against 400 Coptic faithful at the Church of St. Michael in Mersa Matrouh in the north-west of Egypt.

The violence was sparked by extremists, incited by the local Imam, Mohamad Khamis Khamis, during Friday prayers. From the microphones of the mosque of Al-Ansar, located near the church of Saint Micheal, near the building that housed the Copts, the Islamist leader urged the faithful to "holy war" against the Christian place of worship, ordering its destruction, and calling for the expulsion of the "infidels."

The crowd was trapped inside the church and the Copts attacked them, raiding the homes before setting them on fire. The raid resulted in the wounding of 23 Christians, including two seriously, so who have been sent to Victoria Hospital in Alexandria, 200 km away. Sources of the local church denounced the complete devastation of 18 houses, four shops and 18 cars. "These people are completely ruined," says the activist Wagih Yacoub.

The attack on the Coptic Christian community lasted over 14 hours. The - delayed - intervention of the security forces prevented carnage. The police transported the parishioners from the church, located in the suburb of Rifiyah, to their homes, which they are patrolling to prevent new attacks by extremists.

Matta Zakaria, a local priest, reported to the agency AINA "the arrest of four children, aged between 13 and 17 years by the police." By "deception", the agents conducted the youths to the police station asking them to identify the Muslim assailants. Among young people there was also a young man who was not in church during the assault. The boys speak of "insults and beatings" by police, who ordered the release after the intervention of Copt several priests. The police have opened a file of investigation against those arrested - Christians and Muslims - on charges of illegal religious assembly, damage to public property, arson and assault. The pre-trial detention will last 15 days....

CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror funding case -- so named by the Justice Department. CAIR operatives have repeatedly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. Several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror. CAIR's cofounder and longtime Board chairman (Omar Ahmad), as well as its chief spokesman (Honest Ibe Hooper), have made Islamic supremacist statements.

The fact that this gang of Islamic supremacist thugs, liars, smear artists and stomach-stapled beekeepers opposes this textbook is a huge mark in its favor.

"Muslim group calls textbooks discriminatory," by Jon Hurdle for Reuters, March 17 (thanks to all who sent this in):

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Muslim activists launched a campaign on Wednesday against a series of educational books that they say promote anti-Islamic sentiment among U.S. school children.

"The World of Islam," a 10-book series, encourages young readers to believe Muslims are terrorists and seek to undermine U.S. society, said the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the nation's largest Muslim advocacy organization.

One book contains the passage: "For the first time, Muslims began immigrating to the U.S. in order to transform American society, sometimes through the use of terrorism."

So what's the problem? Is CAIR saying that Muslims have committed no acts of terror in the U.S.? Tell it to Nidal Hasan. Tell it to Abdulhakim Muhammad. Tell it to Naveed Haq. Tell it to Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar. Etc.

Moein Khawaja, civil rights director for CAIR in Pennsylvania, said the group has gotten dozens of complaints about the books from Muslim parents around the country.

He said he was not aware of any discrimination against Muslim children due to the books, which are intended for middle- and high-school students.

The books were published in late 2009 by Mason Crest Publishers of Broomall, Pennsylvania, which worked with the Philadelphia-based Foreign Policy Research Institute to ensure their accuracy. It was unclear if the books are in use in any schools.

Khawaja said at a news conference that the books are "rife with incorrect information and fear-mongering" and called the FPRI a "pro-war think tank that has vigorously advocated for the Iraq war in the past and continues to defend that position."

INSTITUTE DISAGREES

Founded in 1955, the institute says on its website it is a non-profit group devoted to research on international affairs. It counted among its board members Alexander Haig, U.S. secretary of state under President Ronald Reagan, who recently died.

FPRI vice president Alan Luxenberg denied the books were anti-Islamic.

"This assertion is without basis, and there is no better way to ascertain the truth than to read the books," the institute said in a press release.

Luxenberg said the terrorism quote had been taken out of context and that it followed five pages on the history of Muslim immigration to the United States that said only some U.S. Muslims became radicalized, starting in the 1980s.

Luxenberg is the author of one of the books, "Radical Islam," the cover of which features a machine gun and a Muslim head scarf, with what looks like bloodstains underneath the scarf and the title word "Radical."

In its defense, the institute noted a quote in "Radical Islam" that reads: "The Western world must ally itself with the Muslim world in the war on radical Islam."...

Yeah, that's worked so wonderfully so far.

One thing you can say in support of Jon Hurdle, Reuters reporter: he is the first mainstream media reporter I've ever seen to include some shadow of a hint, however inadequate, that all may not be on the up-and-up with CAIR:

Critics have accused CAIR of being a front for the Palestinian Hamas faction and of receiving funding from the Arab world.

She has been in custody since October, this says. Why are we only hearing about all this now?

An update on this story. "U.S. 'Jihad Jane' Pleads Not Guilty to Terrorism," from Reuters, March 18:

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - A Pennsylvania woman who called herself "Jihad Jane" pleaded not guilty on Thursday to charges of providing material support to terrorists and conspiring to kill in a foreign country.

Colleen LaRose appeared in federal court in Philadelphia accused of plotting with others over the Internet to kill a Swedish cartoonist who depicted the Prophet Mohammed in a way that was offensive to Muslims, and of wanting to become a martyr to Islam.

LaRose, 46, from Pennsburg, Pennsylvania, has been in custody since October. A grand jury indictment against her, unsealed on March 9, says that she recruited men online to wage "violent jihad" or holy war, in South Asia and Europe.

She told co-conspirators that her appearance as a blonde-haired white woman would allow her to "blend in with many people" and avoid being detected as an Islamic terrorist, the indictment says.

Yeah, sure. As if anybody were giving Arab or Pakistani men extra scrutiny.

CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror funding case -- so named by the Justice Department. CAIR operatives have repeatedly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. Several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror. CAIR's cofounder and longtime Board chairman (Omar Ahmad), as well as its chief spokesman (Honest Ibe Hooper), have made Islamic supremacist statements.

Nor is that all that can be said about CAIR. See more here.

But just try telling it to the blinkered dhimmi who is the sheriff of Los Angeles.

"Sheriff Baca argues with Republican congressman about Islamic group," by Robert J. Lopez in the Los Angeles Times, March 17 (thanks to all who sent this in):

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca argued with a Republican congressman from Indiana during a hearing Wednesday when the lawmaker questioned his relationship with an Islamic nonprofit group.

Baca was in Washington testifying before the House Committee on Homeland Security when he was questioned by Rep. Mark Souder about attending fundraisers for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, officials said....

The exchange between Baca and Souder was recorded by a reporter for KPCC-FM (89.3). To hear the recording, click here.

"There's a substantial difference between protected speech and government officials going to fundraisers for organizations that do speech that is radical. And Sheriff Baca, you've been 10 times to the fundraisers for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which even the FBI has separated themselves from," Souder said, according to the recording.

Baca shot back, citing his service in the Marines and support of Israel, according to the report. "The security of Israel has always been at the forefront of my thinking," he said. "And for you to associate me somehow through some circuitous attack on CAIR, is not only inappropriate, it is un-American."

Whitmore said department records show that Baca attended two CAIR fundraisers in recent years.

"Just because they are Muslim Americans does not mean they want to destroy Israel or the U.S.," Whitmore said.

Right. But what about all the evidence?

Her jihad against free speech got nowhere, but other Muslims continue to pursue it in other ways. "'JihadJane' said to have confessed" by Derrick Nunnally, John Shiffman, and Kathleen Brady Shea for the Philadelphia Inquirer, March 18 (thanks to all who sent this in):

The Montgomery County woman who calls herself "JihadJane" has confessed to the FBI about her alleged role in a plot to kill a Swedish cartoonist, according to two people close to the investigation.

Colleen LaRose confessed to FBI agents shortly after her October arrest at Philadelphia International Airport, where she had just arrived from London, said the two sources, who spoke on conditon of anonymity.

LaRose, 46, whose arrest was kept quiet until related arrests last week in Ireland, is scheduled to be arraigned this morning at the federal courthouse in Philadelphia....

"...while the whole wide world is fast asleeeeeep..."

Yikes! C-Span has put its archive online, including all eight of my appearances going back to 2002. You can watch any or all of them here.

The two highlights, if you ask me (and I know you didn't), are my two-against-one debate with non-Muslim Islamic apologist Dinesh D'Souza and "moderator" Suhail Khan at the Conservative Political Action Conference in 2007, and the Heritage Foundation speech about Muhammad in 2006.

But you may prefer my bravura renditions of "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning" or "Won't Get Fooled Again." Oh, those aren't online yet?

The dhimmitude and self-censorship on Facebook's part, however, may not be a given in this case. The creator of the site says he is redesigning it and that it will be back. We'll see. Free Speech Death Watch Update: "'Allah is'... angering Muslims?," by Rachelle Kliger for The Media Line News Agency, March 17:

Thousands of Muslim Facebook users have pushed to remove an Arabic-language Facebook page created by a user taking on the identity of Allah, or God.

The user claimed he/she was an atheist and believed in no God but him/herself, saying that Muslim prophets would be able to connect with users through the site and answer their questions, according to news reports.

The page, displaying warped Koranic verses and making fun of Islam, soon garnered a 600,000 strong following and drew thousands of responses to its status updates, many of them scolding the creator.

Campaigners who said it was an insult to Islam and to God demanded Facebook remove the page and some even urged users to boycott Facebook altogether.

While campaigners are viewing the removal of the page on Tuesday as an indication of their success, the creator of the controversial profile page said she (or he) removed it to create a new look.

Olivier Bassile, chief executive of Reporters Without Borders to the European Union and head of the organization's Belgian office, said censorship of the material was the wrong strategy by Facebook, if Facebook did indeed remove the page under pressure.

"It's related to freedom of expression," he told The Media Line new agency. "It was only logical that one day Facebook and other social media would face this pressure because the traditional media is already suffering from this pressure."...

Dr. Abeer Najjar, a media researcher at the American University of Sharjah, said she would not consider the response by Facebook of removing the page as indication that freedom of speech was under threat, as long as the request came from the public, but she warned that such calls are often used by governments to legitimize censorship.

"The problem is that when the public asks for it, it encourages the authorities and gives them legitimacy to censor other things," she told The Media Line. "The fundamental problem is that it empowers the governments and gives them a green light for more censorship."

Uh, yeah.

The United Arab Emirates' Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) went as far as to instruct all Internet service providers in the UAE to block the offensive page, following numerous calls and complaints from Internet users who were angry about the site.

Counter campaigns to the Allah page drew more than 100,000 people, including the "20 million campaign to close down the group of the heretic who claims he's God" that drew more than 52,000 and other campaigns that called on Muslim users to boycott the popular website....

"Abraham was neither a Jew nor a Christian, but he was a true Muslim Hanifa, and he was not of the polytheists" -- Qur'an 3:67

While ignorant non-Muslim Westerners burble about the "three great Abrahamic faiths," in the Islamic tradition the other two "great Abrahamic faiths" have no legitimacy whatsoever: the Biblical prophets were all actually Muslims, and Judaism and Christianity are illegitimate twistings of their original Islamic teachings. Judaism and Christianity are thus completely delegitimized.

This historical appropriation, which is far from the first of its kind, is of a piece with that delegitimization. Not only were Mary (and Jesus) Muslims, but they were "Palestinians." So now a nationality invented in the 1960s for the purposes of political manipulation is fitted out with some historical heroes. And this is all only fuel for the jihad against those who, in an act of projection astounding in its scope, are then portrayed as the ones actually doing the historical delegitimization and appropriation.

"Fatah proud of womem [sic] fighters, Martyrs, and Virgin Mary," by Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook for Palestinian Media Watch, March 17:

In its official statement in honor of International Women's Day, the Fatah movement listed a group of "Palestinian" women of whom it is proud: Martyrs, fighters, prisoners and the Virgin Mary.

Turning Virgin Mary and Jesus from Judeans (Jews) into "Palestinians" is a basic part of the Palestinian Authority's revision of history. The PA leadership has for years been attempting to create a Palestinian-Islamic history in the Land of Israel. This is not an alternative interpretation of modern history; rather, it is an invented history from long before Islam was founded (610 CE) and long before the Romans tried to sever Jewish ties to the Land of Israel/Judea by renaming it "Palestine" in the year 135 CE. Although historically meaningless, turning Jesus and the Virgin Mary into Palestinians is a repeating theme of PA historical revision.

The following is the Fatah Communications and Education Authority statement in honor of International Women's Day from the official Fatah website:

"If we are proud of the holiness of our land, then we are proud and pride ourselves that the first and most important holy woman among the nations and peoples is from the holy land: The Virgin Mary - the woman of love and peace - is of the nation of Palestine, whose roots are grounded in the depths of history. Our movement takes note of its pride in all the women Shahidas (Martyrs), prisoners, Palestinian fighters, who have become a model of sacrifice and a school that teaches the meaning of giving and of sacrifice."
http://www.palvoice.com/index.php?id=23043
[Fatah website, March 8, 2010]

In Human Events I discuss the arrests of Jihad Jane and Jihad Jamie, and the implications of those arrests that the mainstream media is, true to form, ignoring:

Last week two American Muslim women were arrested for their involvement in a plot to murder the Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks. One has since been released, but the cases of both women raise questions for Muslim groups in America and law enforcement officials - questions that are not being adequately answered.

Both "Jihad Jane" -- Colleen (or Fatima LaRose)-- who has been charged with recruiting suspects for "violent jihad" and conspiring to kill Vilks, and "Jihad Jamie," Jamie Paulin-Ramirez, who has since been released, are American women who became, out of despair, desperation, or the search for some great cause, converts to Islam.

Terror analysts have devoted a great deal of time to discussing how both were "radicalized" via the Internet. This calls for a new variation on an old truism. Just as guns don't kill people (people kill people), so also the Internet doesn't radicalize Muslims: Islamic jihadists radicalize Muslims.

And these bored suburbanites didn't have to go to the Internet to get "radicalized." As long ago as January 1999, the Naqshbandi Sufi leader Sheikh Muhammad Hisham Kabbani declared in a State Department Open Forum that Islamic supremacists controlled most mosques in America: "The most dangerous thing that is going on now in these mosques," he said, "that has been sent upon these mosques around the United States - like churches they were established by different organizations and that is ok - but the problem with our communities is the extremist ideology. Because they are very active they took over the mosques; and we can say that they took over more than 80% of the mosques that have been established in the US. And there are more than 3000 mosques in the US. So it means that the methodology or ideology of extremist has been spread to 80% of the Muslim population, but not all of them agree with it."

Terrorism expert Yehudit Barsky affirmed the same thing in 2005, saying that 80% of the mosques in this country "have been radicalized by Saudi money and influence." The Center for Religious Freedom found in 2005 a massive distribution of hateful jihadist and Islamic supremacist material in mosques in this country. And in June 2008 federal investigators found that the Islamic Saudi Academy in Virginia, despite promises to stop teaching such material, was still using books that advocated that apostates from Islam be executed and that it was permissible for Muslims to kill and seize the property of "polytheists."

This is the kind of teaching that Jihad Jane and Jihad Jamie imbibed. Jihad Jamie, despite her apparent non-involvement in the plot to murder Vilks, appears to be passing on this hatred to her six-year-old son, Christian (now Walid). Her mother, Christine Holcomb-Mott, recounted that the boy "said that Christians will burn in hellfire. That's what they are teaching this baby." Paulin-Ramirez's stepfather, George Mott, also a convert to Islam, said of young Walid: "He's in an Islamic school. They're teaching him hate."

According to Mott, the boy told him: "We are building pipes [pipe bombs], like the Fourth of July!" And he asked Paulin-Ramirez: "What are you going to do, strap a bomb on and blow up something?"

Her answer was direct: "If necessary, yes."

Direct, yes, and chilling, because nothing is being done about it. Law enforcement and government authorities assume, without any evidence to support their assumption, that the overwhelming majority of Muslims in the U.S. reject and abhor such perspectives. Yet despite their protestations of moderation, American Muslim advocacy groups such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) have done absolutely nothing to develop any response to the Islamic "radicalism" that converts to Islam encounter on the Internet - or in American mosques.

The one thing that can and should be done would be to call American Muslim groups to account, and demand that they institute in mosques and Islamic schools comprehensive, honest, verifiable programs teaching against the jihad doctrine and Islamic supremacism.

But officials will never do this. They would prefer to pretend that the jihad doctrine and Islamic supremacism do not exist. And so we will see many more desperate American housewives becoming Jihad Janes and Jihad Jamies.

We're not talking "interior spiritual struggle," either. "Purported al-Awlaki message calls for jihad against U.S.," by Paula Newton for CNN, March 17:

London, England (CNN) -- American-born Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki is calling for jihad against America, claiming "America is evil" in a new audio message obtained exclusively by CNN.

"With the American invasion of Iraq and continued U.S. aggression against Muslims, I could not reconcile between living in the U.S and being a Muslim, and I eventually came to the conclusion that jihad against America is binding upon myself just as it is binding on every other Muslim," he says in the recording that runs more than 12 minutes.

Al-Awlaki is believed to be hiding out in hills of southern Yemen with the protection of his very powerful family tribe.

CNN could not authenticate the recording as being by al-Awlaki, but sources have told CNN that they believe the voice on the recording is him and that the recording is genuine.

Al-Awlaki's voice in the recording is measured and clear as he takes on the cadence of a preacher. He singles out Muslim Americans for a provocative message:

"To the Muslims in America, I have this to say: How can your conscience allow you to live in peaceful co-existence with a nation that is responsible for the tyranny and crimes committed against your own brother and sisters? How can you have your loyalty to a government that is leading the war against Islam and Muslims?" [...]

But as Pamela Geller says: "They can cut a thousand, a million tongues, but you can't cut out the truth about Islamic jihad."

Attackers kill 12 in latest Nigeria fighting," by Jon Gambrell for Associated Press, March 17 (thanks to Pamela):

LAGOS, Nigeria - Attackers killed 12 people Wednesday morning in a small Christian village in central Nigeria, officials said, cutting out most of the victims' tongues in the latest violence in a region where religious fighting already has killed hundreds this year.

The attack almost mirrored the tactics used by those who carried out similar massacres in Christian villages last week when more than 200 people were slaughtered.

Under the cover of darkness and a driving rain, raiders with machetes entered the village of Byie early Wednesday, setting fire to homes and firing gunshots into the air to drive frightened villagers into the night, witness Linus Vwi said.

"It was raining. They took that advantage," Vwi said.

Vwi said he and about 20 neighbors rushed into the surrounding wilderness, cowering in bushes as they listened to screams.

He said the attackers spoke Fulani, a language used mostly by Muslim cattle herders in the region. Officials and witnesses blamed Fulani herders for the killings last week.

Fulani community leader Sale Bayari denied that Fulanis took part in those killings, though he said the community suffered a similar massacre recently.

Six people were wounded in the overnight raid and taken to a local hospital, said Mark Lipdo, leader of a regional Christian nonprofit group. He said attackers burned down 15 homes during the violence.

The dead included seven women, four children and one man, Lipdo said. Attackers removed the tongues of most of the victims, witnesses said.

It was unclear why attackers took the victims' tongues. In Nigeria, killers sometimes take body parts of their victims for black magic or "juju" rituals, later using them as charms.

Attacks this month come after more than 300 people -- mostly Muslim -- were killed in January violence in the nearby city of Jos and its surrounding villages....

Much as AP would like to portray this as an outbreak of ethnic or religious violence in which both sides are equally at fault, in reality the Muslims have been the aggressors all along. The last paragraph quoted above is simply a lagniappe about retaliatory violence, inserted so as to avoid appearances of "Islamophobia."

In Pakistan, jihadists are folk heroes. And so is Adolf Hitler, for largely the same reasons: genocidal Jew-hatred, militarism, etc. Yet the execrable libelblogger Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs had the mendacious temerity to smear anti-jihadists as neo-Nazis. "The Führer Cult: Germans Cringe at Hitler's Popularity in Pakistan," by Hasnain Kazim in Spiegel, March 17 (thanks to C. Cantoni):

Germans are popular in India and Pakistan, but not always for the right reasons. Many in South Asia have nothing but admiration for Adolf Hitler and still associate Germany with the Third Reich. Everyday encounters with the love of all things Nazi makes German visitors cringe.

Pakistan is the opposite of Germany. The mountains are in the north, the sea is in the south, the economic problems are in the west and the east is doing well. It's not hard for a German living in Pakistan to get used to these differences, but one contrast is hard to stomach: Most people like Hitler.

I was recently at the hairdresser, an elderly man who doesn't resort to electric clippers. All he has is creaky pair of scissors, a comb, an aerosol with water. He did a neat job but I wasn't entirely happy.

I said: "I look like Hitler."

He looked at me in the mirror, gave a satisfied smile and said: "Yes, yes, very nice." [...]

Sometimes it's better to keep quiet about one's German origins. It's embarrassing because people here think they're doing you a favor by expressing their admiration for the Nazi leader. I suspect most Indians and Pakistanis have no idea what this man did. They see him as the bold Führer who took on the British and Americans.

More likely, they love him because he murdered Jews, the worst enemies of the Muslims (cf. Qur'an 5:82).

In the Islamic world, not just in Pakistan but right across from Iran to northern Africa, anti-Semitic sentiment of course plays a role. Conversations with German visitors rapidly turn to the injustice being suffered by the Palestinians who were robbed of their land. [...]

A few days ago a white Mercedes built in the 1970s was driving ahead of me in the center of Islamabad carrying a family of seven. On the back was a sticker bearing a black swastika in a white circle. Underneath it read: "I like Nazi." [...]

English editions of Hitler's "Mein Kampf" can be found in bookshops even in the most remote parts of India. And Indian schoolbooks have been known to celebrate Hitler as a great leader.

Once my wife and I visited the cafe in the beautiful Hotel Imperial in New Delhi. It has a garden lined with palms, excellent tea and friendly waiters in uniforms that recall the colonial era. A young man served us. The name tag on his uniform attracted my interest so I asked him why he had this rather unusual name for an Indian man. "Oh, my parents named me after a great historic person," he explained.

The name, in black letters on a golden plate, read: Adolf.

Will the Islamophobia never end? "Iraq: Christian killed in northern city of Mosul," from AKI, March 17 (thanks to C. Cantoni):

Baghdad, 17 March (AKI) - Masked gunmen on Wednesday shot dead an Iraqi Christian in the northern city of Mosul, the Assyrian Christian website Ankawa.com reported. The city has been at the centre of a number of attacks targeting Christians in recent months.

Yaqub Adam, a 54-year-old father was hit by a hail of bullets fired from a pistol with a silencer. He was murdered near the shop where he worked as a glassmaker.

It was the first Christian killing since Iraq's national elections on 7 March and came less than a week after 122 Christian families returned to Mosul, the capital of Nineveh province.

Around 800 families had left their homes in Mosul in the past few months to seek safety in villages in the surrounding province, Mosul's bishop Monsignor Emil Shimoun Nona, told Adnkronos International (AKI).

Over 40 Christians have been killed in Mosul in the past three months in bomb and gun attacks in a resurgence of the violence which killed 40 Christians and caused more than 12,000 to flee in 2008....

The Turks are irked.
The Turks are irked.
Who would dare to irk the Turks?
One who smirks, "You're genocidal jerks!"

And so now, in a move reminiscent of those who say in effect, "Say that Islam is a religion of peace or we'll kill you," the Turks are saying, "Say we didn't commit genocide against the Armenians or we will start persecuting the Armenians." And remember, the Armenian genocide itself started with mass expulsion orders. Hrayr Karapetyan, an Armenian MP, certainly sees Erdogan's statement as heralding another genocide: "The statement once again proves that there is an Armenian genocide threat in present Turkey."

"Turkey threatens to expel 100,000 Armenians over 'genocide' row," by Damien McElroy for the Telegraph, March 17 (thanks to all who sent this in):

Turkey has threatened to expel 100,000 Armenians from the country in response to the US branding the First World War killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks as "genocide". [...]

Tensions with Armenia have recently escalated as a well-organised worldwide campaign has persuaded the American Congress and Swedish parliament to adopt resolutions condemning the incidents as "genocide".

An Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day Bill has also been put before the House of Commons and Mr Erdogan has warned Gordon Brown that relations would suffer if parliament passes it.

Turkish law already makes discussion of genocide an offence punishable by imprisonment.

"There are currently 170,000 Armenians living in our country. Only 70,000 of them are Turkish citizens, but we are tolerating the remaining 100,000," said Mr Erdogan.

"If necessary, I may have to tell these 100,000 to go back to their country because they are not my citizens. I don't have to keep them in my country." [...]

Mr Erdogan said its neighbour should distance itself from the overseas community leading the lobbying.

He said: "Armenia has an important decision to make. It should free itself from its attachment to the diaspora. Any country which cares for Armenia, namely the US, France and Russia, should primarily help Armenia to free itself from the influence of the diaspora."

But yesterday there was uproar in Armenai [sic] over the suggestion of deportations. Hrayr Karapetyan, an Armenian MP, condemned Mr Erdogan's remarks as blackmail.

"The statement once again proves that there is an Armenian genocide threat in present Turkey, thus world community should pressurise Ankara to recognise [the] genocide," he said....

Patrick Sookhdeo's book Global Jihad: The Future in the Face of Militant Islam came out in 2007, and no book before or since has rivaled it as a single-volume resource for Islamic teachings on jihad. That makes this book truly essential reading for anyone who is tired of the politically correct fog of misinformation that envelops us everywhere about the threat we are facing, and who wants to know the truth.

The scope and range of this book is unique. Sookhdeo, who has won justified renown in Britain for his stands in defense of human rights against Islamic supremacism, opens the book with an evaluation of some of the fashionable explanations for Islamic jihad terrorism: the legacy of colonialism, poverty, demographic pressures, local political conflicts, Israel and the Palestinians, a loss of identity among alienated and marginalized youth, honor and shame, the Western invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq and the war on terror and other issues relating to Western foreign policy, the corrupt secular West and its polluting impact, and many others. Then he reproduces a question that a Muslim journalist in the U.K. asked after the July 7, 2005 jihad bombings in London: "Why was it four Muslims who blew themselves up? Why have other marginalised communities not produced suicide bombers?"

Then Sookhdeo answers the question: "The answer to this question lies in the legitimacy that the Muslim source texts, classical Islamic theology, and paradigmatic early Muslim history give to violence against non-Muslims and to the ways in which modern Islamists, drawing on these sources, have formed ideologies which justify violence in a modern context."

Global Jihad then supplies key extracts from the Qur'an and Hadith, as well as from the teachings of early Islamic scholars and jurists from the various Sunni and Shi'ite madhahib -- and they teach, with a remarkable unanimity, the necessity for Muslims to wage war against unbelievers and subjugate them under the rule of Islamic law. Sookhdeo also explains key Islamic doctrines related to that of jihad, including the dar al-Islam/dar al-harb division and the idea that the whole world belongs to Muslims and is only rightly ruled by an Islamic state. He traces the historical development of the theology of jihad, delineates the types of jihad and their objectives, and relates the jihad doctrine to both Sunni and Shi'ite eschatology. This book even contains expositions of Islamic theology regarding matters attendant to jihad, such as the treatment of prisoners and the acceptability of beheading. There are also illuminating sections on the doctrine of taqiyya, the sufferings of dhimmi populations subjugated within the Islamic state, and the Islamic justification for suicide bombing.

But this is much more than simply a book of illuminating Islamic theological and legal texts, however useful these are. Sookhdeo surveys the contemporary Muslim debate on the nature of jihad, profiles modern-day reformers (and some who claimed the title with less than convincing justification for doing so), and explores various responses to modern-day jihad activity.

So this book is a uniquely useful resource for anyone who wants to understand what we are up against, right? Right. So it was no surprise when Sookhdeo began to be attacked by those who want to make sure that non-Muslim Westerners do not come to a clear understanding of the threat we face. The venomous antisemite and historical revisionist Ben White attacked the book in an odd review that noted correctly that Sookhdeo contended that "the primary motivation of terrorists and suicide bombers is theological" and then purported to refute that contention not by showing that Sookhdeo had misrepresented Islamic theology, but that jihadists cited political issues in their communiques -- thus demonstrating only that Ben White has no clue whatsoever about the inherently political character of Islamic theology.

This was enough, however, for the Islamic supremacist blogger Yusuf Smith (Indigo Jo), who showed up here a few years back in a most illuminating exchange (read the comments), to dub Sookhdeo "the Sookhdevil" -- resulting in Sookhdeo being threatened with death by some of Indigo Jo's coreligionists. Yusuf did not, of course, call them devils.

It was all par for the course -- and showed in a particularly vivid manner that Global Jihad, as meticulously researched and exhaustively documented as it is, is right on the mark.

"Good women are obedient....As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them." -- Qur'an 4:34

But...but...doesn't Qaher Sharif know that Islam protects women's rights? He must be some kind of Islamophobe!

"Algeria: Prison for Violent Husbands Is Against Koran, Mufti," from ANSAmed, March 15 (thanks to Block Ness):

(ANSAmed) - ALGIERS, MARCH 15 - The proposal to introduce prison terms for men who beat their wives goes against the Koran and the teachings of the prophet Mohamed, according to the head of Algeriàs Superior Islamic Council. Qaher Sharif fiercely criticised the bill presented to the head of state Abdelaziz Bouteflikàs by the head of the Consultative Council on Human Rights Farouk Qustantiti. "This man's aim is to violate a law of the Koran and of the Sunnah, and he meddles in subjects that are beyond his competence", Sharif said in an interview with the Arab-language edition of the daily newspaper El Khabar. "Hés done it before with the death penalty, and now with beatings," he added, asking "what difference can it make to him what goes on between a man and his wife?" The President of the Islamic Council said that he was stunned by Qustantinìs proposal, because "God has already pointed out precisely the way that a husband must behave towards his wife". He quoted verses 34 and 35 of the Surah on women, in which men are advised to "admonish women, confine them to their bed and beat them" should they commit "nushooz", a term signifying both infidelity and a refusal of sexual intercourse. Sharif pointed out that the text is so precise that it indicates the method of punishment to be used against the wife, and that this should be neither "too insistent, nor provoke disfigurement".

But the protests, the cries of racism and "Islamophobia," are sure to come -- and then Quebec authorities are likely to cave. "Muslims seeking female clerk can 'line up again,'" by Graeme Hamilton for the National Post, March 17 (thanks to all who sent this in):

MONTREAL -- In recent years, the few fully veiled Muslim women who had dealings with Quebec's health-insurance board could choose to be served by a woman to avoid exposing their faces to a man outside their family.

But in the latest example of the province's growing resistance to the accommodation of minority religious practices, the insurance board on Tuesday announced the end of the policy after the provincial human rights commission said it has no duty to acquiesce.

"From now on, for a woman who is veiled with a niqab or a burka and comes to our office asking to be photographed by a woman, the answer is no," said Marc Lortie, spokesman for the Régie de l'assurance maladie du Québec. "Line up again, or come back another day." [...]

"If you want to integrate into Quebec society, here are our values," Immigration Minister Yolande James told reporters last week. "We want to see your face." Ms. Ahmed has filed a complaint with the Quebec Human Rights Commission. [...]

"Generally speaking, staff at Ontario service centres are very aware of cultural requirements and diversity and we do our best to accommodate individual situations," said Alan Cairns, a spokesman for the Ministry of Government Services.

The furor over the still rarely seen niqab is a clear sign that Quebec's debate over the "reasonable accommodation" of religious and ethnic minorities has returned with full force....

Yep. And it's going to keep on returning.

They have tried to defend themselves by saying they only were waging jihad, and jihad is not illegal in Pakistan. "Pakistani court charges 5 Americans with terrorism," by Zarar Khan for Associated Press, March 17 (thanks to Visvas):

ISLAMABAD - A Pakistani court charged five young Americans on Wednesday with planning terrorist attacks in the South Asian country and conspiring to wage war against nations allied with Pakistan, their defense lawyer said.

The men -- all Muslims from the Washington, D.C., area -- pleaded not guilty to a total of five charges, the most severe of which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison, defense lawyer Hasan Dastagir told The Associated Press....

The men, aged 19 to 25, were charged by an anti-terrorism court inside a prison in Sargodha, the city in Punjab province where they were arrested in December. They were reported missing by their families in November after one left behind a farewell video showing scenes of war and casualties and saying Muslims must be defended.

Their lawyer has said they were heading to Afghanistan and had no plans to stage attacks inside Pakistan.

The court also charged the men with planning attacks on Afghan and U.S. territory, said Dastagir. The charges did not specify what was meant by U.S. territory but could be a reference to American bases or diplomatic outposts in Afghanistan.

The men also were charged with contributing cash to banned organizations to be used for terrorism and with directing each other to commit terrorist acts.

"This last charge carries life in prison while the rest of the charges have lesser punishments," Dastagir said....

"Malcolm Moss, national chair of the Prison Officers' Association, said: "We are seeing more and more Muslim gangs in our prisons. Often Muslims who go to prison are forced into gangs for their own protection. And that culture takes over a wing, takes over an area of the prison. We see it as a real danger, now and for the future of prisons." -- from an article here

Notice how Malcolm Moss, though he is not one of those denying the problem of the takeover of British prisons by Muslim prisoners, can't quite state head-on what the real worry is.

For example, these Muslims who take over in prisons constitute a "real danger" -- but not just, as Moss states, "now and for the future of prisons." They constitute a danger, much more importantly, for all of British and, indeed, for the Western societies within which, as holders of British passports, they can now freely move and operate . After all, eventually most prisoners are released. And those who were Muslim to begin with, but perhaps did not take Islam quite to heart, have had a chance in prison to take it quite to heart. And what is more disturbing is that those who entered prison as non-Muslims, but accepted Islam in order to avoid being treated brutally by Muslim fellow prisoners, may -- rather than simply slough it off as they would their prison garb, once they are again out in the world -- come out as True Believers. Often what begins as an act of protective coloration ends up transforming the person who started out thinking he was merely making a temporary compromise in order to stay alive -- and that means he, and others like him, will emerge as Muslims, but Muslims who even when they were non-Muslims were at war with society and its norms.

Comments by David G. Littman, NGO Representative to the United Nations in Geneva: Association for World Education (AWE) and the World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ) :

The following joint statement was drafted & delivered by DGL for WUPJ on 16 March:

* * * * *

WORLD UNION FOR PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM

United Nations Human Rights Council -13th session (1-26 March 2010)
Statement by David G. Littman - Tuesday (am) 16 March 2010 (22nd meeting)
President (Chair): Ambassador Alex Van Meeuwen (Belgium)
Item 4: Human Rights situations that require the Council's attention

Sir, there is a serious human rights principle that requires the Council's urgent attention now.

We would remind all delegates of that fateful period of appeasement in the 1930s when the League of Nations closed down soon after the new grandiose Palais des Nations had opened. While fear stalked the streets of Europe, on the stage of history, a mad leader (Führer) was allowed to run amok.

One man was not blinded by duplicity or fear and he spoke out for freedom at that moment of truth. In a 28 June 1939 speech [Carlton Club, London], Winston Churchill used a metaphoric image that is pertinent today when related to a controversial president who constantly reiterates - while seeking nuclear power - that another Member State should be "wiped off the map". And there is another OIC leader-for-life who has called for our host country to be split into pieces - and then went further with a ghoulish call for a Jihad against Switzerland - and all this in defiance of the UN Charter - article 2:4

All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state or in any manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.

Who knows how many demented Jihadist bombers might be tempted by these religious-sounding calls to seek 'martyrdom' - and an irresistible heavenly reward - by trying to blow up the UN corridors of power. Churchill's words on Hitler relate to this mania which requires the Council's urgent attention:

Is he going to blow up the world or not? The world is a very heavy thing to blow up! An extraordinary man at a pinnacle of power may create a great explosion, and yet the civilised world may remain unshaken. The enormous fragments and splinters may clatter down upon his own head and destroy him...but the world will go on.

As threats against Member States are also an attack on the human right to life, the Human Rights Council has a sacred duty to condemn such unacceptable calls to Jihad, which are in total violation of the Purposes of the UN Charter and of the International Bill of Human Rights. They should be severely reprimanded by this Council and by other UN bodies and persons.

Silence here & now would make of us all the accomplices of terrorism and tyranny.

Thank you Mr President.

As always, what's standing in the way here is Muhammad's own example -- a "beautiful pattern of conduct," per Qur'an 33:21. Muhammad married Aisha when she was six, and consummated the marriage when she was nine. For this cleric, condemning child marriage would thus run the risk of implying Muhammad did something wrong, or that his example is less relevant for Muslims in modern times. In a land where churches are firebombed over the use of the word "Allah," one can imagine there being some fallout over that.

In any event, keeping the status quo on child marriage laws lets the Sharia-inclined have it both ways: there is a symbolic law on the books for the sake of appearances, but a religious loophole to get around it in practice.

"Malaysian minister rejects child marriage reform," from Agence France-Presse, March 16:

KUALA LUMPUR -- Malaysia's religion minister on Tuesday defended Islamic laws that allow girls under 16 to marry, amid a controversy over two youngsters who were married off to middle-aged men.

The issue has flared in Malaysia after reports that two girls aged 10 and 11 were wed in the conservative northern state of Kelantan last month. They have now been removed from their husbands.

Rights groups have called for the reform of Islamic laws that allow marriage under the age of 16 if religious officials give their consent. Sharia law runs in parallel with civil law in multi-ethnic Malaysia.

"There is no need to amend the law," Jamil Khir Baharom, a cabinet minister in charge of religious affairs, told reporters.

"The law already exists... marrying someone aged 16 and below requires the consent of the court. The court does not simply grant the consent," he said.

"Maturity is a subjective question. It depends on the development of the person. Maturity is not based on age solely."

But 11 years old is 11 years old.

Pressure group Sisters in Islam has called for an end to child marriages, saying the practice was "unacceptable" but continued in Malaysia because of a "belief that Muslim girls can be married off once they reach puberty".

"The minimum age of marriage for Muslim girls must be raised to 18 to be in compliance with the Child Act which defines children as those below the age of 18," it said in a statement.

Other citizens in the multicultural country -- where the population is dominated by Muslim Malays -- are not permitted to marry before the age of 18.

Malaysian authorities are investigating the case of the two girls in Kelantan, both linked to a man who is accused of leading an Islamic cult.

He is accused of marrying the 11-year-old girl and giving away his 10-year-old daughter to a family friend.

Sharia court officials told the New Straits Times Tuesday the 11-year-old's marriage was not approved in court.

But if it had been, a grown man's marriage to an eleven-year-old could have been quite alright under the law.

The girl was found outside a mosque in the nation's capital over the weekend and is now being treated in hospital.

Women, family and community development minister Shahrizat Abdul Jalil has spoken out against the practice.

"A child of that age does not have the choice or capacity to give her full consent and, as such, child marriage is viewed within the context of force and coercion," she said in a statement to AFP.

Hamas calls for a new intifada and the Obama team continues to act as if Israel were the obstacle to peace.

What planet are these people on?

(Planet jihad, apparently.)

"Clinton: Israel must prove commitment to peace," by Matthew Lee for Associated Press, March 16 (thanks to Mark):

WASHINGTON - Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Tuesday said Israel must prove it is committed to the Mideast peace process with actions. But she brushed aside suggestions that relations with the main U.S. ally in the Mideast are in crisis over Israeli plans to build new Jewish housing in east Jerusalem.

Clinton said Israel must back up verbal pledges to talk peace with the Palestinians and improve an atmosphere poisoned by last week's housing announcement if stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks are to be relaunched. She stressed that the U.S. remains committed to Israel's security despite current tensions.

Resolving what has become the most serious spat between the two countries in decades has become a top priority for the Obama administration as it strives to restart the moribund peace process with indirect, shuttle diplomacy by special Mideast envoy George Mitchell. Yet Clinton made clear that Israeli steps were needed first.

"We are engaged in very active consultations with the Israelis over steps that we think would demonstrate the requisite commitment to the process," Clinton said....

Do the Palestinians have to abandon jihad? End the genocidal children's shows? Stop teaching Jew-hatred? Nope. None of the above. They don't have to do anything at all.

Trying to put an end to the courtroom jihad against free speech. "Denmark wants Brussels to stop UK Mohammed cartoon lawsuit," by Leigh Phillips for the EUObserver, March 16 (thanks to John):

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The Danish minister of justice has called on the European Commission to put a stop to a lawsuit by a Saudi lawyer who is using the UK's famously libel-happy courts to go after Danish newspapers for their publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.

"It's fundamentally reasonable that judgments in the EU can often be exercised across borders," the minister, Lars Barfoed, said according to the Berlingske Tidende newspaper.

"But it would be taking it to the extreme if a UK court could rule against the Danish media and then require compensation and court costs to be paid." [...]

And there is that small matter of free speech:

The British government for its part recognises there is a problem.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: "The government is concerned about any potential chilling effect that our libel laws are having on freedom of speech. In response to the concerns that have been expressed, the justice secretary has set up a working group to examine a range of issues around the substantive law on libel."

In addition, three weeks ago the country's Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee published the report of its inquiry into libel, which criticised the current situation.

"The government is considering this report and the recommendations that it makes very carefully," the spokesperson said.

Comments by David G. Littman, NGO Representative to the United Nations in Geneva: Association for World Education (AWE) and the World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ)

The following joint statement was delivered on behalf of the three NGOs named (AWE /IHEU /WUPJ) and the text was prepared by their representatives.

* * * * *

ASSOCIATION FOR WORLD EDUCATION

INTERNATIONAL HUMANIST AND ETHICAL UNION

WORLD UNION FOR PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM

United Nations Human Rights Council -13th session (1-26 March 2010)
Joint Statement by David G. Littman - Friday (15:45pm) 12 March 2010 (21st meeting)
President (Chair): Ambassador Alex Van Meeuwen (Belgium)
Item 3: Promotion and Protection of all human rights: Freedom of religion or belief
[The words in brackets and smaller type were not spoken in the 2 ¾ minutes allowed]

Minarets and Murder

We thank Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief Asma Jahangir for her
Report and outstanding work. We are dismayed however by the increasingly strident attacks on freedom of expression in this Council, made in the name of religious freedom by the OIC, and in particular the gross exaggeration of issues such as the recent Swiss vote to ban the construction of new minarets, while the Council is failing to address many real issues of religious freedom, such as the murder of Christians in Egypt and Pakistan, the very recent massacre of over 500 Christians in the Plateau State, Nigeria, and the ongoing ethnic cleansing of Christians of Iraq.

Our Christmas Day joint Appeal requested the OHCHR "to take the necessary measures" to save the ancient Christian and other non-Muslim ethnic-religious of Iraq, being systematically cleansed from their homeland.

Sir, minarets are not central to Islam, any more than spires are to Christianity. Banning the construction of new minarets does not impede in any way the ability of Muslims to practise freely their religion, so why the uproar about a democratic Swiss vote when the OIC allows so much human rights abuse in Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere to go unchallenged?

And why have we heard no condemnation from the OIC and the Council of the call by Libya for a 'Jihad'- a Holy War against Switzerland? This is a "threat" against a Member State, forbidden by the UN Charter (Art.2:4): ["All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the UN."]

And how to stop the ongoing persecution of Christians, Mandeans and other minorities in Iraq; of Bahais in Iran and now in Egypt; of Copts in Egypt; and of Ahmadis and Christians in Pakistan? How does the OIC propose stopping the constant attacks on churches and the murder or arrest of priests, pastors and worshipers in several of these countries? The OIC condemns Islamophobia on the slightest grounds, but makes no effort to do the same for Christianophobia, and rampant Judeophobia in the media in their own countries.

Surely, Mr President, these are the questions the Council should be asking under the heading of freedom of religion.

[Sir, after the Swiss vote the High Commissioner stated on 1 December 2009: "I hesitate to condemn a democratic vote", but added, in regard to Switzerland with its exemplary democratic system - "I urge people everywhere to take this issue of discrimination extremely seriously." A day before Ms. Jahangir stated:

"This vote reminds us that no societies are immune to religious intolerance" If this be "religious intolerance" then democracy is truly doomed.]

To conclude, Mr President, the Swiss people have given a coherent example of true democracy in reminding us all of article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the "right to freedom of opinion and expression," and article 21:3 on genuine elections. ["The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by a secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures."]

In the words of that great American President, Abraham Lincoln 150 years ago [1858]: "The ballot is stronger than the bullet."

* * * * *

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission seems to think so. "The price of separatist schools," a New York Post editorial, March 16:

Does a radical Muslim have a right to head a New York City public school? The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission seems to think so.

That panel ruled last week that city officials discriminated against Debbie Almontaser when they forced her out as principal of the taxpayer-funded madrassa she helped found.

Yet the Khalil Gibran International Academy, which is billed as an Arabic-themed public school, was a bad idea from the start -- and Almontaser was an even worse choice to lead it.

As The Post reported in 2007, Almontaser served as spokesman for an organization that shared office space with an Arab group that hawked T-shirts bearing the slogan "Intifada NYC" -- an apparent reference to the bloody Palestinian terror campaign against Israeli civilians.

Incredibly, Almontaser defended the shirts, claiming that "intifada" was really just an Arabic word for "shaking off."

Never mind, as The Post also reported, that the group's co-founders were members of an outfit that advocates the elimination of the Jewish state.

At best, in other words, Almontaser -- a self-styled "moderate" -- was willfully blind to the reality of Islamic terror and has no business teaching city schoolkids for that reason alone.

More likely, she played the folks at the Education Department for fools....

No doubt about that. Read it all.

In "Obama Libels Israel, MSM Continues to Lie, Snooze" at Big Journalism, March 16, Pamela Geller discusses the Obama Administration's double standard on Israel and the Palestinians -- and some noteworthy historical antecedents to current events:

U.S.-Israeli relations have hit a 35-year low over the contentious east Jerusalem building project. Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren said: "Israel's ties with the United States are in their worst crisis since 1975...a crisis of historic proportions." This is because, according to Barack Obama, Jewish homes in the Jewish homeland "hinder peace" with Muslims. According to the Associated Press:

Israel's already strained relationship with the U.S. hit a new low last week when it announced the construction plans during a visit by Vice President Joe Biden. The timing of the announcement deeply embarrassed the Obama administration and put plans for indirect peace talks with the Palestinians in jeopardy.

What about the timing of the Palestinian Authority's "honoring" of a mass-murdering female genocidal bomber, for whom the Palestinians are naming a square in Ramallah? The Jerusalem Post reported: "The ceremony was scheduled to take place on the 32nd anniversary of the attack, the worst terrorist incident in Israel's history, in which terrorists commandeered a bus and murdered 37 people, including 10 children." It too was scheduled to take place during Biden's visit, but was postponed for a week after Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu asked Obama's Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, to get the Palestinians to cancel it.

"The announcement of the settlements on the very day that the vice president was there was insulting," said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Obama adviser David Axelrod also said: "This was an affront, it was an insult, but most importantly, it undermined this very fragile effort to bring peace to that region. For this announcement to come at that time was very, very destructive."

Neither Clinton nor Axelrod mentioned anything about the honoring of the jihad terrorist being insulting. And it will still take place, just a week late. Yet Obama is pressuring Israel, not the Palestinians. Jews living in their holiest city is unacceptable, but senior Palestinian Authority officials joining the Fatah youth movement in a "popular inauguration" ceremony for a square named for a terrorist is just fine. The stalkers of the Jews are no hindrance to peace.

What is insulting is America's abandonment of our most loyal and trusted ally in a region that can only be described as a hot mess, full of backward, oppressive, and brutal hellholes -- save for Israel.

America is profoundly pro-Israel; yet Barack Obama is taking on our best friend and most strategic ally in the Middle East and creating an environment, a free zone, for rampant anti-Semitism.

It is no coincidence that as all this unfolded, Palestinian Arabs were rioting every day in Jerusalem and elsewhere, because of their false charge that Israel is trying to destroy Islamic holy sites. And instead of working to calm the situation, the "moderate" Palestinian Authority is trying to make things worse by fabricating yet another libel against the Jews: now they're saying that Israel tried to burn down Al-Aqsa Mosque in 1969.

This is eerily reminiscent of many of the blood libels spread by Muslim leaders against the Jews throughout history, specifically the ones that the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, spread in the Muslim world before he co-conspired with Hitler to exterminate the Jews during the Holocaust.

On April 4, 1920, there was carnage in Jerusalem. Muslims spent four days massacring Jews and burning down buildings in the Jewish quarter. The future Mufti was arrested and charged with incitement to violence. Historian Maurice Pearlman in his 1947 book The Mufti of Jerusalem explains that the riots were touched off by al-Husseini's "inflammatory articles in the newspaper, Suriyahal Janubiyah." Pearlman adds: "In the weeks preceding the attack faked pictures had been disseminated among the Arabs showing the Mosque Omar in ruins. The caption beneath declared that it had been destroyed by Jewish infidels who were now seeking to build on its site the Jewish Temple."...

Read it all. And read more about Obama's hardline anti-Israel stance in our forthcoming book The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War On America, coming this July from Threshold Editions/Simon & Schuster. Pre-order here.

The late Michael Radu's new book, published posthumously, alas, by Encounter Books, discusses, clearly and forthrightly, the Islamization of Europe.

And it contains a Foreword written by...me.

"Michael Radu, with characteristic incisiveness, cuts through the mindless multicultural relativism of modern liberalism to demolish the illusions of well-meaning but ignorant appeasers of Islamic radicalism. The crux of his argument: tolerance of intolerant Muslims in Europe threatens the civil liberties and individual rights that European culture has so brilliantly advanced over centuries of struggle." -- Nils H. Wessell, former Director, Foreign Policy Research Institute

"Michael Radu has written a most interesting and comprehensive book about the important issues of Muslim immigration and Islamism in contemporary Europe. No matter what readers viewpoints might be they will learn an enormous amount." -- Barry Rubin, author of The Tragedy of the Middle East and Global Survey of Islamism

Don't these Nigerian Islamophobes know that jihad is an interior spiritual struggle? "Internet Video: Muslims Must Rise Up in Nigeria," from AP, March 16 (thanks to all who sent this in):

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) -- A video posted on a militant Web site calls for Muslims in Nigeria to use ''the sword and the spear'' to rise up against Christians in Africa's most populous nation, according to a translation released Tuesday by a U.S. group that monitors militant sites.

The video on the Ansar al-Mujahideen forum, a Web site sympathetic to al-Qaida, comes in the wake of a series of religious massacres and riots in central Nigeria.

The video shows television news footage and graphic images of those killed as a narrator tells viewers ''the solution is jihad in the cause of Allah,'' according to a translation provided by the SITE Intelligence Group.

''Negotiations, dialogues and protests will not stop the advancement of the enemies and their massacres,'' the narrator says. ''Nothing will stop them but the sword and the spear.''

The narrator also says the ''crusader West'' is interested in Nigeria for its abundant oil reserves. He refers to President Umaru Yar'Adua, a Muslim from northern Nigeria, as a ''tyrant'' who allowed the killing of a sect leader whose group's attacks on police stations and rioting left more than 700 people dead in July....

Further weakening the great myth of a moderate Islam, the slick and self-proclaimed moderate Muslim Tarek Fatah has now exposed himself as an enemy of those who are truly interested in defending human rights against the global jihad and Islamic supremacism. He did so by savaging the courageous freedom fighter Wafa Sultan in a National Post article here.

Luckily, the Post was decent enough to publish this magnificent response: "Counterpoint: In defence of Wafa Sultan," by Joanne Hill in the National Post, March 12 (thanks to all who sent this in):

Tarek Fatah has used the National Post to present a one-sided, inaccurate and potentially dangerous editorial about statements made by Dr. Wafa Sultan during her March 3rd debate in Toronto with Dr. Daniel Pipes.

Mr. Fatah's article is not an unbiased report: it is an opinion piece full of loaded terms such as slur, attack, hateful, anguish, Islam haters and vitriol. He misquotes Dr. Sultan and presents as fact a conclusion that is not supported by any of her statements: a conclusion that I believe puts her life in danger.

I am a freelance reporter; I covered the debate between Dr. Pipes and Dr. Sultan for the Jewish Tribune. I have an audio recording of the entire event, including the Question and Answer period, so I can state with complete accuracy what was and was not said by Dr. Sultan.

Mr. Fatah assumes the authority of a mind-reader to reveal what he claims is Dr. Sultan's hidden intention. Given his first-hand experience of the eagerness of some Muslims (or "Islamists" if he would prefer) to issue death threats against anyone who is perceived as threatening Muslims, there are three reasons why I find it disturbing that he would attribute to Dr. Sultan this motivation: "Perhaps the answer she had in mind was too outrageous even by her own standards: Force Muslims to convert or die."

This is disturbing, first of all, because Dr. Sultan said nothing that would lead the listener to come to this conclusion. When asked during the Q&A, "How do you get Muslims to reform? Do you expect them to convert to another religion?" Dr. Sultan replied:

"Give them the freedom to choose: that's all I'm asking for. Give them the freedom to search, to ask, to be exposed to different sides, different values, different lifestyles. I can tell you from my very own experience, what has helped me to reform myself is being exposed to Western values and being free to express my conclusion. I always compare between my life under Islamic Sharia and my life as a free woman in America and I write about that on my website in Arabic. So when you expose people to different [sic], and you give them the freedom to choose, that's all we need in the Islamic world. I'm not asking [them] to convert to a different religion; I'm asking to grant them the freedom to choose, the freedom to be, to follow whatever path they want to follow. That's all."

Second, this is what Dr. Sultan said at the conclusion of the Q & A:

"I'm not speaking up against Islam to please anyone but my conscience. We suffer a lot under Islamic Sharia. It is not fair. Enough is enough. We need to live our lives as human beings. I want you to know I'm not here to incite anyone against Muslims. Muslims are my family: my Mom, my brother, my sister. You know, I cannot peel off my own skin. I feel sorry for them because they are victims of a very hateful ideology. Really, if you take a look at any Islamic country, what do you see? Nothing but miserable situations, especially women who are living in this society. So I am speaking up to save them, looking for a better future for them. And believe it or not, when it comes to my readers in the Arab world, I feel it is easier for me to address my thoughts than to penetrate the Western mind. People in the West live by the Western ethical code which doesn't allow them to judge people based on their religion - and there's nothing wrong with that-but they need to know that Islam is not merely a religion: it is also a political ideology and that's what I am fighting. That's what I am speaking up against. And I hope one day, the future for our generation in the Muslim world will be much better than the life I lived under Islamic Sharia in Syria."

And third, the terrible, secret motivation which Mr. Fatah attributes to Dr. Sultan is in fact a commandment made by Mohammed to his followers regarding non-Muslims:

"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." (Source: Sahih Muslim Book 19, Hadith #4294.)

There is more.

Contrary to what Mr. Fatah writes, Dr. Sultan did not say: "Muhammed was a child rapist."

Rather, she said: "As a married man, Mohammed raped Aisha when she was nine; he was 54."

If Mr. Fatah is hurt by this statement, perhaps he should consider the source: Islamic doctrine. I challenge Mr. Fatah to deny this....

Oh, you can bet he did. Read it all, and read the comments at the National Post piece also. And then consult the Islamic source here.

The formidable Ali Sina weighs in here.

Ready...Set...Lie
by D. C. Watson

What do Islamic organization representatives have to say? Depends on who's listening. Their statements are ones of convenience. On radio or television, where the American public might be tuned in, they struggle through their lack of personality, attempting to appear harmless, and just wanting to belong. In front of their fellow believers, they take a different tone.

Edina Lekovic, Muslim Public Affairs Council: "Nobody has fought--working harder to fight terrorism and extremism than the Muslim American community. We work with all levels of law enforcement, we work with our communities."

vs.

Edina Lekovic, MPAC: From the July 1999 edition of Al-Talib, the Muslim News magazine at UCLA, when Lekovic was one of the managing editors: "When we hear someone refer to the great mujahid Osama bin Laden as a 'terrorist', we should defend our brother and refer to him as a freedom fighter..."

Salam Al Marayati, Executive Director, MPAC: "Yes we all need to be more vigilant and support our law enforcement in protecting our country..."

vs.

Salam Al Marayati, MPAC, while speaking to fellow Muslims in Dallas, TX about Muslim informants being used by the FBI in a California terrorism investigation: "Counter-terrorism and counter-violence should be defined by us."..."So, number one, we reject any effort, notion, suggestion that Muslims should start spying on one another."

Mahdi Bray, Muslim American Society, on the Muhammad cartoons: "As a Muslim, I can understand the emotional intensity of the issue, however, responding through violence does not uphold the dignity of our faith."

vs.

Mahdi Bray, MAS: At a Washington, D.C. rally, he played the tambourine while one of the speakers sang "let's all go into jihad, and throw stones at the face of the Jews."

Ibrahim Hooper, Council on American Islamic Relations: "We love the First Amendment ... we uphold it every day."

vs.

Ibrahim Hooper, CAIR, on a decades-old book entitled "The Life and Religion of Mohammed", which was made available for purchase by National Review, and can still be purchased from various vendors: "The National Review must clarify its position on Islamophobic hate speech and offer a public apology for promoting a book that so viciously attacks the faith of one-fifth of the world's population."

Mazhar Rishi, CAIR: In a column that was authored by Rishi, he recites the First Amendment, pretty much word for word.

vs.

Mazhar Rishi, CAIR: During a panel to discuss the Muhammad cartoons, Rishi stated: "The right to free speech is not absolute; it does not give a right to defame Prophet Muhammad or any other religious figure."

None of what this CAIR representative said about free speech is written in the First Amendment, and neither is the name "Prophet Muhammad."

Apparently, Speech Patrolman Rishi agrees to disagree... with himself.

"My CAIR-Inspired Firing," by Michael Graham: "The First Amendment and I have been evicted from ABC Radio in Washington, DC. On July 25th, (2005) the Council on American-Islamic Relations demanded that I be "punished" for my on-air statements regarding Islam and its tragic connections to terrorism..."

CAIR attempted in 2007 to stop a speech by author and Jihad Watch director Robert Spencer from taking place.

These are just two of the many examples of their attempts to ice free speech in the land that made it famous.

Exception: These organizations do seem to find the First Amendment useful, if it can possibly benefit some of their more uncouth co-religionists, such as the ones recently arrested for disturbing a public event, shouting down a discussion at U.C. Irvine by the Israeli Ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren.

Ibrahim Hooper, CAIR: "It is well known, particularly in this holiday season, that Christians follow the teachings of Jesus. What is less well understood is that Muslims also love and revere Jesus as one of God's greatest messengers to mankind."

And to prove it, when a Muslim family in Minnesota visited a Long John Silver's restaurant and ordered a children's meal for their three-year-old son, which happened to come with a toy that included a small notepad with the phrase "Build with Jesus" written at the top, CAIR demanded that Yum! Brands, parent company of Long John Silver's:

• Investigate the incident.
• Offer the Muslim family a formal written apology.
• Review the toy distribution policy for all restaurants and ensure that such incidents would not be repeated.
• Participate in CAIR's sensitivity and diversity training.
* So, CAIR officials, which is it? Are you anti-Jesus, or just trying to pick a fight with Fish n' Chips and Chicken Planks?

This organization has also showcased its "love" and "reverence" for Jesus in the Rifqa Bary case:

Here is a statement from Nihad Awad, Council on American Islamic Relations, from his written testimony sent to Senator John Kyl, Chairman, Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security (dated 9/9/2003). Under the heading "The Truth About CAIR":

Myth: "In a recent congressional hearing, Mr. (Steve) Emerson proclaimed that, "... (CAIR) received some of its initial seed money from the Holy Land Foundation: for Relief and Development (HLFRD)..."

Fact: "This is an outright lie. Our organization did not receive any seed money from HLFRD."

Maybe Jihad Nihad never saw, or just forgot about this.

The Council on American Islamic Relations has provided a section on its website entitled "Dispelling Rumors about CAIR."

In this section, "Top Internet Disinformation #5" addresses Nihad Awad publicly declaring his support for Hamas in 1994.

CAIR's response (excerpt): "This statement was made in March 1994, before CAIR was formed. Hamas did not commit its first suicide bombing until October 1994. The United States subsequently identified Hamas as a specially designated terrorist in January 1995. Thus, Awad's remarks came seven months prior to Hamas' first suicide bombings..."

Wrong answer. According to documented timelines, Awad's remarks came just weeks, not months before Hamas carried out bombings in two Israeli cities... a car bombing that killed eight people in Afula on April 6, 1994, followed by a suicide bombing on April 13, 1994 in Hadera, which killed five.

Regardless of when Hamas perpetrated its first suicide bombing, this gang was murdering Israelis since the late 1980s, and was designated as a terrorist organization by Israel in 1989, five years before Awad's statement.

Moving ahead, these double-dealers should keep a few things in mind...

• If Nihad Awad feels that when he speaks with "the American", he speaks "with someone who doesn't know anything," he and his associates can clear their calendars, and we can all assemble in a public forum, address this "Jekyll and Hyde" routine of theirs, and see who knows what.

• They can stop telling us that not all Muslims are terrorists, or support the Islamic jihad ideology. The Council on American Islamic Relations reportedly losing 90% of its membership is a good indication of this.

• While they've managed to dupe some of the old media as well as certain politicians in this country, outside of moving to a nation governed by Islamic law, the smartest move they could make would be to stop betting against the American people.

The restoration of this one synagogue connected to Maimonides, once court physician to the Fatimids, was not prompted by some sudden deep realization of the need, culturally and politically, to recognize, at least by allowing this one synagogue to be rebuilt, that for thousands of years Egypt had had Jews living in the land, that the last of them had been finally expelled or driven out by unspeakable insecurity, their lives made intolerable, by Nasser. But let's be fair, for the attacks on Jews in 1941 whipped up by Hasan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood and the grandfather of Tariq Ramadan, were not just on Jews alone, but also on Copts. And to continue the fairness theme, when Egyptians attacked non-Muslims in 1952, killing dozens of them, including eleven British citizens, Jews were not singled out.

And to be fair, after the Colonels' coup that toppled fat Farouk and the ancien regime, and then Nasser rid himself of Colonel Naguib and the others and became the Supreme Leader, and decided to seize the property of the many different "non-Egyptian" Egyptians, some of whom were the descendants of families that had lived in Egypt and contributed, for centuries, to the economy, it wasn't only Jews who suffered, but Greeks, and Italians (few may recall that the poets Cavafy and Ungaretti were both born in Alexandria), and others too of those sometimes described in old books as "Levantines" of indeterminate origin. The Egyptian government seized the property of all of these hundreds of thousands of people, accumulated in some cases over the centuries. We can all see how the Egyptian economy started to flourish as soon as those awful "foreigners" were out of the way.

Over at the NewsReal blog they've been arguing for several days, while I was flying through the air in a tin can, giving a talk, flying elsewhere in another tin can, etc., over whether or not I am right about the non-existence of moderate Islam. And so now it is time for a Marshall McLuhan moment. If you don't know what I mean by that, watch the clip above.

Here's the latest: "David Swindle's Complaint is a Diversion," by John R. Guardiano at NewsReal, March 15. In it, Guardiano takes issue with Swindle, a fellow NewsReal Blog writer, for saying that he "'viciously' and 'harshly' attacked Robert Spencer" by apparently calling me "ignorant," "caricaturing," and "right-wing." And Guardiano says:

The bottom line is this: Robert Spencer is a big boy and an accomplished scholar. Surely, he can handle a little mild-mannered criticism. I certainly have nothing against him.

In fact, I respect Mr. Spencer and his work, even if I think (as I do) that he is ultimately and profoundly wrong or mistaken about Islam and the war against radical Islam.

And he adds: "My hope is that we can discuss substantive issues without all this Sturm und Drang over hurt and bruised feelings."

Absolutely, Mr. Guardiano. My feelings are not now and never have been hurt. I appreciate David Swindle's defense of my work, but I don't care what anyone calls me, and I've been called far worse than anything John Guardiano has said here. If such things bothered me, I would never have lasted so long doing this work publicly, especially given the viciousness, dishonesty, and taste for ad hominems of the Leftist/jihadist attack machine.

Anyway, to the point: does a moderate Islam -- by which I mean a version of Islam that does not teach that believers must make war against unbelievers and subjugate them under the rule of Islamic law -- exist at all?

Perhaps Mr. Guardiano would take issue with that definition of moderate Islam. He says here:

But the idea that Islam is inherently threatening and irredeemable also isn't true. This charge, in fact, is a dangerous and malicious lie. In reality, as Dinesh D'Souza observes in his excellent (albeit much misunderstood) book, The Enemy at Home: the Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11:

The Koran, like the Old Testament, has a number of passages recommending peace and others celebrating the massacre of the enemies of God.

D'Souza doesn't mention, of course, and probably doesn't know, that the Qur'an's violent passages are presented as open-ended commands for believers to wage war against unbelievers, while the Old Testament's violent passages are specific to particular individuals and situations, and are never presented as open-ended commands to all believers.

Nor does D'Souza ever manifest any awareness of the fact that the Qur'an is not simply a book containing passages with different emphases that are more or less up for grabs as to how believers interpret them. In reality, in stark contrast to the Jewish and Christian traditions that have worked to spiritualize in various ways the violent passages of the Bible, the literal understanding of the violent Qur'anic passages has always held sway in Islamic theology -- and they have been considered binding. They are also considered to take precedence over the Qur'an's more tolerant passages.

Don't take my word for it. Let's see what Muslim authorities say.

1. Muhammad's earliest biographer, a pious Muslim named Ibn Ishaq, explains the progression of Qur'anic revelation about warfare. First, he explains, Allah allowed Muslims to wage defensive warfare. But that was not Allah's last word on the circumstances in which Muslims should fight. Ibn Ishaq explains offensive jihad by invoking a Qur'anic verse: "Then God sent down to him: 'Fight them so that there be no more seduction,' i.e. until no believer is seduced from his religion. 'And the religion is God's', i.e. Until God alone is worshipped."

The Qur'an verse Ibn Ishaq quotes here (2:193) commands much more than defensive warfare: Muslims must fight until "the religion is God's" - that is, until Allah alone is worshipped. Ibn Ishaq gives no hint that that command died with the seventh century.

Question for John Guardiano: I take it you believe that Ibn Ishaq was wrong, and misunderstood the true, peaceful teachings of the Qur'an and Muhammad?

2. According to a 20th century Chief Justice of Saudi Arabia, Sheikh 'Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Humaid, "at first 'the fighting' was forbidden, then it was permitted and after that it was made obligatory." He also distinguishes two groups Muslims must fight: "(1) against them who start 'the fighting' against you (Muslims) . . . (2) and against all those who worship others along with Allah . . . as mentioned in Surat Al-Baqarah (II), Al-Imran (III) and At-Taubah (IX) . . . and other Surahs (Chapters of the Qur'an)."

Question for John Guardiano: I take it you believe that the Chief Justice of Saudi Arabia also was wrong in thinking that warfare against unbelievers was obligatory, and that he misunderstood the Qur'an?

3. The great medieval scholar Ibn Qayyim (1292-1350) outlines the stages of the Muhammad's prophetic career: "For thirteen years after the beginning of his Messengership, he called people to God through preaching, without fighting or Jizyah, and was commanded to restrain himself and to practice patience and forbearance. Then he was commanded to migrate, and later permission was given to fight. Then he was commanded to fight those who fought him, and to restrain himself from those who did not make war with him. Later he was commanded to fight the polytheists until God's religion was fully established."

The idea that one must fight the "polytheists" until "God's religion was fully established" was understood throughout Islamic history as referring to a responsibility Muslims had as an umma to wage war against unbelievers until Sharia was established over them. This was the impetus for the jihadist incursions into North Africa, Europe, Persia, India and elsewhere. Question for John Guardiano: I take it you think that all that was wrong, and was based on a mistaken understanding of the Qur'an and Islam?

4. Al-Suyuti says that the Verse of the Sword (9:5) abrogates no less than 124 more peaceful and tolerant verses of the Qur'an. Tafsir al-Jalalayn asserts that the Qur'an's ninth sura "was sent down when security was removed by the sword." Ibn Kathir declares that Qur'an 9:5 "abrogated every agreement of peace between the Prophet and any idolater, every treaty, and every term....No idolater had any more treaty or promise of safety ever since Surah Bara'ah [the ninth sura] was revealed." Ibn Juzayy agrees: the Verse of the Sword's purpose is "abrogating every peace treaty in the Qur'an."

None of them say that the Verse of the Sword applies only to the seventh century.

Question for John Guardiano: I take it that you believe that all these Islamic scholars misunderstood the Qur'an and formulated Islamic teaching incorrectly as a result?

5. A Shafi'i manual of Islamic law that in 1991 was certified by the highest authority in Sunni Islam, Cairo's Al-Azhar University, as conforming "to the practice and faith of the orthodox Sunni community." This manual, 'Umdat al-Salik (available in English as Reliance of the Traveller), spends a considerable amount of time explaining jihad as "war against non-Muslims." It spells out the nature of this warfare in quite specific terms: "the caliph makes war upon Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians . . . until they become Muslim or pay the non-Muslim poll tax." It adds a comment by a Jordanian jurist that corresponds to Muhammad's instructions to call the unbelievers to Islam before fighting them: the caliph wages this war only "provided that he has first invited [Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians] to enter Islam in faith and practice, and if they will not, then invited them to enter the social order of Islam by paying the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya) . . . while remaining in their ancestral religions." Also, it says if there is no caliph, Muslims must still wage jihad.

Question for John Guardiano: I take it you believe that the imams of Al-Azhar were wrong and misunderstood Islam when they certified this book as a reliable guide to the true teachings of Sunni Islam?

But perhaps Mr. Guardiano will dislike those questions, for he goes on to say this:

This is not to say that Islam is a religion of peace. Rather it is to say that Islam is far more rich and complicated than the simple caricature of Islam created by vehement right-wing critics like Robert Spencer at Jihad Watch, Andrew McCarthy at National Review Online, and yes, my colleague here at NewsReal Blog, John L. Work. [...]

A better approach would be to follow the counsel of Islamic scholar Daniel Pipes. Pipes urges Western leaders to encourage and promote moderate Islamic thinking and scholarship. This to help promote a moderate reformation of Islam.

But to follow this approach, you first have to believe that Islam has an inherent truth which is worth explicating and developing. I believe that it does; my right-wing critics believe otherwise; and therein lies the crux of our dispute.

Islam has an "inherent truth"? I can't see anyone but a believer in Islam affirming that, so Mr. Guardiano and I do indeed part company on that one. But in any case, he seems to be saying that Islam is not a religion of peace, but that he thinks it can change, and that I think it cannot change. Actually, I have never said that it cannot change, but any realistic appraisal of the prospects for Islamic reform has to take into account such impediments to change as the content of the Qur'an and Sunnah, its traditional interpretation by the schools of Islamic jurisprudence, the death penalty for those who engage in heresy or innovation, and the closure of the gate of ijtihad.

For example, Guardiano quotes Daniel Pipes invoking the Sudanese reformer Mahmud Muhammad Taha, but fails to add that Taha was executed for heresy. In fact, all of the quotations he uses from Pipes show Pipes arguing that moderate Islam can exist, not that it exists now. Guardiano also apparently doesn't know that Pipes has said: "Robert Spencer and I have discussed the perceived differences in our view of Islam. He and I concluded that, although we have different emphases - he deals more with scriptures, I more with history - we have no disagreements."

Anyway, I hope Mr. Guardiano can handle a little mild-mannered criticism, and look forward to his substantive response to these points.

Here's the latest in the Jihad Jane/Jihad Jamie case. "In Ireland, a Hearing on a Plot to Kill a Swedish Cartoonist," by Eamon Quinn and John F. Burns for the New York Times, March 15 (thanks to Bill):

WATERFORD, Ireland -- A late-night court hearing Monday in this quiet Irish town gave new glimpses into the case that American and Irish prosecutors are pursuing against a group of Muslims on both sides of the Atlantic suspected of plotting to kill a Swedish cartoonist who depicted the Prophet Muhammad atop the body of a dog.

Five of the seven people arrested in Ireland a week ago have been released, the last of them shortly before Monday's hearing. But two others, an Algerian man and a Libyan man, were formally charged with relatively minor offenses that lawyers involved in the case said could keep them in custody while more serious charges, including conspiracy to murder, are weighed by Irish prosecutors. The lawyers said charges against the five others were also possible.

The Algerian who appeared in the Waterford court, named as Ali Charaf Damache, 45, was said by police officials to be suspected of being the group's leader. Mr. Damache, a 10-year resident of Ireland, was charged with sending a threatening computer message to another Muslim in Waterford. The Libyan, named as Abdul Salam al Jahani, 32, was charged with using a false name to obtain asylum status in Ireland in 2001. Both were ordered held without bail while an investigation continued.

No reference was made in the 15-minute hearing to the wider circumstances of the case, which has centered in the United States on a 46-year-old Pennsylvania woman, Colleen R. LaRose, a Muslim convert who adopted the pseudonym of JihadJane on the Internet, and has been in custody in Philadelphia since the fall on charges of linking up with militants overseas in a plot to carry out a murder, apparently that of the Swedish cartoonist, Lars Vilks.

The arrests in Ireland drew a second American woman into the case: Jamie Paulin-Ramirez, 31, from Leadville, Colo.. A Muslim convert like Ms. LaRose, Ms. Paulin-Ramirez is the wife of Mr. Damache, the Algerian charged in the Monday's hearing, according to a Waterford lawyer involved in the case, and is several months pregnant. She was one of the seven arrested last Tuesday, but was released on the weekend. [...]

Ms. Paulin-Ramirez's mother, Christine Mott, 59, said in an interview last week in Colorado that her daughter announced her conversion to Islam last Easter and became increasingly estranged from her family....

Hmmm. Now, why is that?

Worth murdering for, they thought

The jihad against free speech, free expression, and free thought continues. "2 charged in 'plot to kill Swedish cartoonist,'" from CNN, March 16:

(CNN) -- Irish authorities said Tuesday they have charged two men who were reportedly part of an international plot to kill a controversial Swedish cartoonist.

The two men appeared in Waterford District Court on Monday night, the Courts Service of Ireland said. While the service refused to confirm whether their case is related to the alleged plot, Irish and British media outlets including The Irish Times reported the connection.

The first man, Ali Charaf Damache, was charged with making a menacing call to an individual.

The other man, Abdul Salem Monsour Khalil al Jahani, was charged with failure to produce a valid passport or other valid document to establish his identity, contrary to the Immigration Act 2004....

An American woman who called herself "Jihad Jane," Colleen LaRose, was indicted in the United States earlier this month for allegedly conspiring to support terrorists and kill a person in a foreign country, namely a resident of Sweden. The U.S. official identified the target to CNN as Lars Vilks, a cartoonist who outraged some with a drawing of the prophet Mohammed.

The indictment against LaRose says she worked with at least five co-conspirators. The U.S. official said the people arrested in Ireland were directly related to the same plot to which LaRose was allegedly connected....

How did they do that? By allegedly dancing and drinking alcohol inside the synagogue -- which sounds as if it could have been an ordinary and reasonable celebration under the circumstances. But Egyptian officials preferred to portray it as the dhimmis getting out of line. After all, how would it look to be rededicating a synagogue in Cairo while their Palestinian brothers are ratcheting up their jihad against Israel?

"Egypt scraps synagogue ceremony after 'provocative' acts," from AFP, March 14 (thanks to all who sent this in):

CAIRO (AFP) - Egypt cancelled the formal opening Sunday of a renovated 19th-century synagogue in Cairo to protest what antiquities chief Zahi Hawass said were "provocative" Jewish and Israeli action.

Hawass and Culture Minister Faruq Hosni were due to attend the event, a week after 150 people, including rabbis and the US and Israeli ambassadors, attended the rededication of the Maimonides synagogue.

Hawass, citing press reports, said in a statement that the cancellation comes after "provocative" acts during the March 7 ceremony in Cairo's ancient Jewish quarters by the Jewish community.

He referred to "dancing and drinking alcohol in the synagogue, as reported by several newspapers" and said these acts "were seen to provoke the feelings of millions of Muslims in Egypt and across the world."

The decision was also taken at "a time when Muslim holy sites in occupied Palestine face assaults from Israeli occupation forces and settlers," Hawass said.

He was referring to clashes at Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque compound and plans to include two contested West Bank holy shrines on a list of Israeli heritage sites. Hawass said this was also a "provocation."

The synagogue of Maimonides, known in Egypt by its Arabic name of Musa bin Maymun, is named after the 12th century Jewish scholar, philosopher and physician.

Egypt began restoration of its Jewish sites several years ago....

But...but...deep down, they really, really want peace! "Senior Fatah officials joined Fatah youth movement in 'popular inauguration' ceremony for terrorist square," by Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik for Palestinian Media Watch, March 14 (thanks to all who sent this in):

Although world pressure forced the Palestinian Authority to cancel the official ceremonies to name a square after the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi last week, several senior Fatah officials participated in a "popular inauguration" organized by Fatah's youth movement. According to the PA, the square is now named after Mughrabi and an official ceremony, including placing a monument, will take place at a later date. Thursday's "popular inauguration" was on the 32nd anniversary of "the Coastal Road Massacre" of 1978, in which 37 were murdered in a bus hijacking.

Among the senior Fatah officials participating in the popular inauguration were Tawfiq Tirawi, member of the Fatah Central Committee and former head of the PA Police in the West Bank, and Jamal Huweil, a Fatah member of Palestinian Parliament from Fatah.

Poster Text: "On the anniversary of the Coastal Road Operation we renew our commitment and our oath that we uphold the charge and that we will not stray from the path of the Shahids - Shahida (Martyr) Dalal Mughrabi Square, Shabiba students' movement / Palestine] [Al-Quds, March 12, 2010]

Palestinian Media Watch first reported in January that the square was to be named for Mughrabi, After the initial story, PMW published five follow-up bulletins, including one reporting that the day chosen by the PA for the naming ceremony was to be March 11, the anniversary of the terror attack. Israeli news reported that PM Netanyahu asked George Mitchell and then Vice President Biden to put pressure on the PA to cancel the event. On March 10, the PA cancelled the official ceremony.

Click here to see timeline of PMW reports and other news stories related to the cancellation of the official ceremony.

Trying to minimize the impact of world pressure on the PA, Adnan Al-Dumeiri, spokesman for the PA Security Apparatus, announced at the "popular inauguration" that the official inauguration was postponed "due to technical reasons and not because of Israel's request."...

Of course!

Not that we'd expect Hamas to call for a day of hacky sack tournaments and indie rock concerts. In any event, things are going downhill fast in Jerusalem, and the usual suspects are egging it on. "'Day of rage': Riots in Jerusalem," from YNet News, March 16:

The day dubbed "the day of rage" by Hamas and extremist Islamic groups opened with riots - both in the holy city and on the way to it. Hundreds of Arabs burned tires and hurled stones at Border Guard officers at several locations throughout the city Tuesday morning. At least three officers and 11 rioters were lightly injured, and eight were detained. Meanwhile, in the North, a bus full of Muslim passengers on their way to al-Aqsa Mosque was stopped and turned back. Police said the bus was inspected following tip-offs of possible plans to riot in Jerusalem.

Arab MKs and members of the Higher Arab Monitoring Committee also arrived at the al-Aqsa Mosque Tuesday morning. "The Netanyahu government is dangerous and irresponsible, and is leading the region to a third intifada," said MK Talab El-Sana (United Arab List - Ta'al).MK Ahmad Tibi told Ynet he was inside the mosque: "There is a renewed occupation of east Jerusalem and the al-Aqsa Mosque, gunshots can be heard in every direction."

Dozens of masked rioters hurled stones at Border Guard officers near the Shuafat refugee camp in Jerusalem, and set fire to tires. The force dispersed the rioters using stun grenades. Two policemen were lightly injured and seven Palestinians were arrested.

In another incident, at the northern entrance to the Isawiya neighborhood in Jerusalem, masked protesters also burned tires and hurled stones at Border Guard officers. The rioters were calmed and dispersed by the village's elders. Security forces also dispersed masked rioters hurling stones near the Temple Mount's Majlis Gate....

Telling lies to further the jihad -- as Muhammad said, "War is deceit."

"PA Libel: Israel tried to burn down Al-Aqsa Mosque in 1969," by Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook for Palestinian Media Watch, March 15 (thanks to all who sent this in):

As Palestinians continue almost daily rioting in Jerusalem and other cities, claiming Israel is damaging places holy to Islam, the Palestinian Authority has chosen to rekindle another libel whose goal seems to be to increase the unrest and rioting.

This renewed libel is based on a rewriting of history by the Palestinian Authority, accusing Israel of assisting in the arson attack in the Al-Aqsa Mosque in 1969.

The facts of the case were as follows: A non-Jewish Australian started a fire in the Al-Aqsa Mosque on Aug. 21, 1969. The fire was extinguished and the damage was repaired.

More than ten years ago the Palestinian Authority initiated the lie that Israel was involved in the arson or that it Jew who started the fire with the Israeli government's help. The libel was revived this week with this slide broadcast on PA TV:

Text on top: "Israeli aggression against the holy places"

Text in middle: "And on Aug. 21, 1969, the Jew Dennis Michael set fire to the Al-Aqsa Mosque, with the support of the Jewish government, which cut off the water supply from the neighborhoods close to the Al-Aqsa Mosque with a view to delaying the operations to extinguish [the fire]."

Text on bottom: "Aggression against the holy places - the occupation: a long history of defiling and desecrating that which is sacred."
[PA TV (Fatah), March 5, 2010]...

Meanwhile, Pamela Geller does some historical investigation and finds that this sort of incitement has happened before.

Of course it is. "The Jihadists Next Door," from Investors Business Daily, March 15:

Security: The arrests of three new homegrown terrorists, including two "Jihad Janes" and an al-Qaida suspect who infiltrated nuclear plants, confirm a rise in homegrown jihadist activity.

Sharif Mobley is one of the latest jihadists next door. Before he was rounded up in a sweep of suspected al-Qaida terrorists in Yemen, Mobley worked at five nuclear plants in New Jersey, Maryland and Pennsylvania. He shot two guards, killing one, before his capture.

Mobley grew up in New Jersey before converting to Islam. His militancy shocked an old high school friend, who ran into him after returning from an Army tour in Iraq. Mobley told him: "Get the hell away from me, you Muslim killer!"

Then there's Colleen LaRose, aka Jihad Jane, who was arrested in Philadelphia for allegedly plotting to kill a Swedish cartoonist who'd "offended" Muslims. Jamie Paulin-Ramirez of Denver was also arrested in connection with the assassination plot.

All three suspects are U.S. citizens from different parts of the country. One is black, one white and one formerly married to a Hispanic immigrant. Two, shockingly, are women. While each suspect has a different background, all three are Muslim converts radicalized over the Internet -- a dangerous trend.

American converts are al-Qaida's prime recruits right now, because they have a better chance of slipping through security checkpoints. [...]

While the essential ingredient in these cases is militant Islam, we have to wonder if the left isn't making otherwise normal Americans vulnerable to such treasonous seductions. After all, the hate-America lobby -- led by the American Civil Liberties Union and often cheered by the media -- has comforted even the most guilty in the war on terror, including the 9/11 mastermind and other Gitmo detainees.

Take Omar Hammami. A smart American college kid who grew up Baptist in the Alabama suburbs, he's now an al-Qaida field commander in Somalia wanted by the FBI.

What happened? He became consumed with events in Iraq and Afghanistan and began subscribing to conspiracy theories about 9/11. He learned to hate his country, which he calls a legitimate "target" for attack....

Read it all.

So whom do you want to believe? Do you want to believe those who claim, such as Charles Krauthammer, that there is "Islam" and then there is "Islamism" and there is vast and therefore comforting difference between the two - though that difference is never really adequately discussed in detail - and we must never forget it?

What do others, aside from Charles Krauthammer, have to say about Islam and "Islamism"?

Ibn Warraq has repeatedly said that he has no idea what "Islamism" may mean. For Ibn Warraq, the real distinction is between the ideology of Islam and some of those who call themselves Muslims, that is, adherents of the ideology: "There are moderate Muslims. Islam itself is not moderate."

This lapidary formula points to a truth: that the texts of Islam, if not only taken literally -- and they are taken literally, that is the whole point - but also taken to heart, create people who are, to appropriate a line of Shakespeare, toward Infidels (and not infrequently toward each other), "savage, bloody, rude, not to trust."

Wafa Sultan, who has thought long and hard about the matter, says repeatedly that "there is no difference between Islam and Islamism."

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, who has thought long and hard about Islam and Kemalism and everything in-between, angrily says that "there is no difference between Islam and Islamism."

Has Bing come down with the same "bug" that infected Google for so long -- the one that censored negative searches about Islam?

Try it yourself: go to Bing and type in "Jews are." One suggested completion of the phrase will show up:

Now type in "Christians are," and you'll get two suggestions:

But if you type in "Muslims are," you get no hint that they are evil, pumpkin-like, or stupid. You get nothing at all:

So once again possible negative suggestions are filtered out for the world's most thin-skinned and lethal religious believers -- the ones waging a global campaign against free speech about the aspects of their religion that incite and justify violence and supremacism. What a coincidence!

For more on Bing, see here.

(Thanks to Richard for the heads-up.)

Calling Obama on his double standard. "Barack Hussein Obama vs Israel," from Sultan Knish, March 14 (thanks to all who sent this in):

The manifold organs of the ObamaMedia are abuzz with outrage over what they are calling Israel's "insult" to the United States. But what was the nature of this awful and outrageous insult? Did Israeli officials pull off V.P. Biden's rug to show off his bald head underneath. Did they ask him why the suit of his pants is so shiny. Did they make him sit at the kiddie table?

More to the point did Israeli TV air calls for a Jihad against America, as Palestinian Arab TV did? Did Israel name a square after the murderer of an American photographer, as the Palestinian Authority did? Did an Israeli Anchorman do a skit in blackface during Obama's visit, as a Turkish anchorman did during Obama's visit to Turkey? Are Israeli religious institutions issuing Fatwahs against America, as Al Azhar University, which Obama visited and spoke at, has done? Are Israeli leaders funding terrorism against America, as the Saudi King, before whom Obama bowed, does?

No, none of those incidents were described as insults. Nothing that Muslim countries did to mock, humiliate and murder Americans were even noticed at all. None of them produced furious condemnations from the White House or two hours of Hillary Clinton screeching on the phone at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. So what did Israel do that was so awful, so horrible and terrible? It built houses. Yes, civilian houses. Not army bases or nuclear missiles or walls. Houses.

Israel approved a construction project to build housing for its own people, in its own capitol city, Jerusalem. Some of the housing will be built in the Shimon HaTzadik neighborhood, situated around the grave of Shimon the Righteous, a Jewish religious figure famed for rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. A neighborhood where Jews have lived for over a century. As well as Ramat Shlomo, a thriving neighborhood with thousands of Jewish families living in it.

The Obama Administration's objections to Jews living in Jerusalem are purely racial and religious. If Israel were approving a construction project to build housing for Arab Muslim citizens of Israel, Biden, Hillary and their media troupe wouldn't be screeching about it to the high heavens. It is only because Jews are to live there, that they have a problem with it. Their objections therefore are purely based on race and religion-- and completely racist....

Read it all.

"It's really shocking to us. Islam means peace. Can you make peace with terrorism?"

No, Islam means submission. Can you make peace with dissembling and half-truths? And are you trying to convince jihadists that their version of Islam is wrong, or is your ire reserved for non-Muslims who dare to notice that Muslims are plotting blood and death against the Infidels in the name of Islam?

"Rev. John B. Rochford, a Baptist minister and administrator of the South East Refugee Information Center, compared the situation to the plight of the Irish decades ago, when they were frequently suspected of terrorism."

Yes, and some Irishmen were terrorists. Thus non-terrorist Irish should have understood the suspicion and cooperated fully with law enforcement efforts -- particularly if they really opposed the terrorism, no?

"U.S. Woman Released in Terror Case," by Neil Shah, Vanessa O'Connell and Evan Perez in the Wall Street Journal, March 15:

Irish police released without charge an American woman who was among seven people arrested last week in Ireland in connection with an alleged plot to murder a Swedish cartoonist.

Jamie Paulin-Ramirez, a 31-year-old Colorado mother and recent convert to Islam who was among those detained, is no longer in the custody of the Irish police, said a person familiar with the matter. Both Irish and U.S. authorities declined to provide further details. [...]

Others worry about the impact of the arrests. Rev. John B. Rochford, a Baptist minister and administrator of the South East Refugee Information Center, compared the situation to the plight of the Irish decades ago, when they were frequently suspected of terrorism.

Some residents also said they were upset about the media's portrayal of the Islamic religion in recent coverage of the terror-related arrests.

Sheikh Ahmed, 45, a law student at the Waterford Institute of Technology, said some coverage in the tabloids--including images of Osama bin Laden--hurts the Muslim community by stirring up tensions.

"It's really shocking to us," he said. "Islam means peace. Can you make peace with terrorism?"

In "Glenn Beck, Think Before You Preach" in Human Events today, Pamela Geller calls out Glenn Beck for smearing Geert Wilders:

Something very disturbing happened last Monday on FOX. Glenn Beck, who has, for the most part, steered clear of jihad, sharia and Islamic supremacism, put his toe in the water, and for the first time since I started fighting the long war, I got nervous.

Beck called the Dutch politician Geert Wilders, who produced the film Fitna about Islamic Koran-based violence, a fascist, and far-right.

What is Beck doing?

Why would he stigmatize Wilders this way? Wilders is the embodiment of what our founding fathers extolled. Individual rights. Freedom of speech. Not sharia law.

In the House of Lords on March 5, Wilders said:

I believe that Islam is not compatible with our Western way of life. Islam is a threat to Western values. The equality of men and women, the equality of homosexuals and heterosexuals, the separation of church and state, freedom of speech, they are all under pressure because of islamization. Ladies and gentlemen: Islam and freedom, Islam and democracy are not compatible. They are opposite values.

Was Beck saying that standing up to defend the "equality of men and women, the equality of homosexuals and heterosexuals, the separation of church and state" and "freedom of speech" is fascist?

Good question. Read it all.

They did this, of course, in order to draw retaliatory fire they could then use to claim that Israel was targeting civilians. "'Hamas used kids as human shields,'" by Yaakov Katz for the Jerusalem Post, March 15 (thanks to Weasel Zippers):

Hamas gunmen used Palestinian children as human shields, and established command centers and Kassam launch pads in and near more than 100 mosques and hospitals during Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip last year, according to a new Israeli report being released on Monday that aims to counter criticism of the IDF.

The detailed 500-page report, obtained exclusively by The Jerusalem Post, was written by the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center (Malam), a small research group led by Col. (res.) Reuven Erlich, a former Military Intelligence officer who works closely with the army.

The IDF and the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) cooperated with the report's authors and declassified hundreds of photographs, videos, prisoner interrogations and Hamas-drawn sketches as part of an effort to counter the criticism leveled at Israel in the UN-sponsored Goldstone Report....

Read it all.

Via Atlas Shrugs.

In "Is the Gitmo Bar Pro-Islamist?" at The Corner, March 13, the always clear-thinking Andrew McCarthy takes on the artificial Islam vs. Islamism that Charles Krauthammer and so many others take for granted. I discussed Krauthammer's remarks here.

Islamism is a much broader and more mainstream (in Islam) ideology than suggested by the surprisingly ill-informed comments Charles Krauthammer made about a week ago (see Dr. K's commentary here; Mark Steyn's reaction, with which I agree, is here.) Jihadist terrorists are a subset of the Islamists, but many Islamists disagree with the terrorists' means — they are mostly on the same page as far as ends are concerned.

Personally, I don't think there is much difference, if any, between Islam and Islamism. In that assessment, I'm not much different from Turkey's Islamist prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who claims it is "very ugly" for Westerners to draw these distinctions between Muslims as "moderate" or "Islamist" -- "It is offensive and an insult to our religion," he says, because "there is no moderate or immoderate Islam. Islam is Islam, and that's it."

Islamists are Muslims who would like to see sharia (Islamic law) installed. That is the necessary precondition to Islamicizing a society. It is the purpose of jihad. The terrorists are willing to force sharia's installation by violent jihad; other Islamists have varying views about the usefulness of violence, but they also want sharia, and their jihadist methods include tactics other than violence. I reluctantly use the term "Islamist" rather than "Islam" because I believe there are hundreds of millions of Muslims (somewhere between a third to a half of the world's 1.4 billion Muslims) who do not want to live under sharia, and who want religion to be a private matter, separated from public life. It is baffling to me why these people are Muslims since, as I understand Islam, (a) sharia is a basic element, and (b) Islam rejects the separation of mosque and state. But I'm not a Muslim, so that is not for me to say. I think we have to encourage the non-sharia Muslims and give them space to try to reform their religion, so I believe it's worth labeling the sharia seekers "Islamists" in order to sort them out. But I admit being very conflicted about it because I also concede that the Islamists have the more coherent (and scary) construction of Islam. We wouldn't be encouraging reform if we really thought Islam was fine as is.

In any event, Islamist ideology is multi-faceted. You can be pro-Islamist, and even pro-Qaeda, without signing on to the savage Qaeda methods. And the relevant question with respect to progressive lawyers is not so much whether they are pro-Qaeda as it is whether, as between Islamists and the U.S. as it exists, they have more sympathy for the Islamists. That's a fair question, but a very uncomfortable one to ask. Indeed, as Jonah broaches it, he softens it to whether the insinuation that the lawyers are pro-Qaeda is "counter-productive." That's an interesting question but a very different one from whether the insinuation is true.

In a column a few days ago, I addressed the insinuation this way:

“Al-Qaeda Seven” reminds me of another legal shorthand expression: “mob lawyer.” It’s a common expression — everyone uses it. I’d wager that a number of the DOJ’s Gitmo lawyers have either used it or been in conversations where it rolled effortlessly, and without objection, off the tongues of other prosecutors. “Mob lawyers” are lawyers who regularly represent members and associates of the mafia. It’s such a commonplace that even the mob lawyers call themselves “mob lawyers.” It’s a handle; it doesn’t mean the people who use the term don’t see the moral difference between mobsters who commit heinous crimes and the lawyers who defend them. Same with the “al-Qaeda Seven.”

Much of the commentary on this point, including from some people who usually know better, has been specious. The normally sensible Paul Mirengoff, for example, huffs, “It is entirely inappropriate to suggest that these lawyers share the values of terrorists or to dub the seven DOJ lawyers ‘The al-Qaeda Seven.’” The values of the terrorists? Which values?

Jihadists believe it is proper to massacre innocent people in order to compel the installation of sharia as a pathway to Islamicizing society. No one for a moment believes, or has suggested, that al-Qaeda’s American lawyers share that view. But jihadist terrorists, and Islamist ideology in general, also hold that the United States is the root of all evil in the world, that it is the beating heart of capitalist exploitation of society’s have-nots, and that it needs fundamental, transformative change.

This, as I argue in a book to be published this spring, is why Islam and the Left collaborate so seamlessly. They don’t agree on all the ends and means. In fact, Islamists don’t agree among themselves about means. But before they can impose their utopias, Islamists and the Left have a common enemy they need to take down: the American constitutional tradition of a society based on individual liberty, in which government is our servant, not our master. It is perfectly obvious that many progressive lawyers are drawn to the jihadist cause because of common views about the need to condemn American policies and radically alter the United States.

That doesn’t make any lawyer unfit to serve. It does, however, show us the fault line in the defining debate of our lifetime, the debate about what type of society we shall have. And that political context makes everyone’s record fair game. If lawyers choose to volunteer their services to the enemy in wartime, they are on the wrong side of that fault line, and no one should feel reluctant to say so.

Read it all. And there is more here.

This trend, of course, is nothing new. "Muslim gangs imposing sharia law in British prisons," by Andrew Gilligan for the Telegraph, March 15:

Non-Muslim inmates at the high-security Long Lartin jail have been forced by the gangs to stop playing "Western" music and take down pictures of women from their cells, according to one former prison officer there. Prisoners at the jail, although allowed to cook their own food, are not allowed to prepare pork for fear of offending the Muslim inmates, the officer said.

The officer, speaking to Radio Five Live's Donal Macintyre show, told how younger prisoners were targeted for forced conversion to Islam by the gangs. "They went along because they were intimidated. They genuinely weren't of the Muslim faith," she said. "I knew one lad quite well, who was approached by the radical Muslims and he changed. He was being controlled and bossed around and he wasn't even allowed to look at me or speak to me.

"He just seemed very frightened all the time. He used to be forced to pray at certain times and he was even forced to grow a long beard even though he didn't want to."

One Catholic prisoner who refused to convert was seriously assaulted after being repeatedly threatened by the gang, the officer said. "He said every so often they would come to his cell and hold the Koran up through the small window in the cell door and start running their fingers along their throats," she said.

The officer's testimony is consistent with findings by the official prison watchdog, the chief inspector of prisons. In a report last year, the inspector, Anne Owers, quoted a number of prisoners at Long Lartin about the increasing dominance of Muslim gangs in the jail.

Long Lartin was, said one, "turning into an American-style jail, [where] if you are not in a gang, you're in trouble. People are converting to Islam for protection."

Another said: "There is a gang culture here, which is an issue. There are issues with Muslim gangs wanting to overpower others. A lot of people are becoming Muslim just because it is a bigger gang."

Ms Owers says there is a similar gang culture in at least three other high-security prisons, Whitemoor in Cambridgeshire, Belmarsh in south-east London and Full Sutton in North Yorkshire. Some of the gang leaders are terrorist prisoners but most are in for ordinary offences.

Two Muslim former prisoners claimed in the BBC programme that Muslims "run" some London jails and describe how they watched al-Qaeda videos in their cells, brought in by corrupt prison officers. They also detail further bullying and abuse of prisoners who refused to convert to Islam and said that in one London jail, prisoners who wanted to play music had their stereos smashed. They said that the official prison imams appointed by the Home Office were largely ineffective and not respected by Muslim prisoners.

Malcolm Moss, national chair of the Prison Officers' Association, said: "We are seeing more and more Muslim gangs in our prisons. Often Muslims who go to prison are forced into gangs for their own protection. And that culture takes over a wing, takes over an area of the prison. We see it as a real danger, now and for the future of prisons."

Mr Moss called for more Muslim prison officers to be recruited as part of an urgent effort to "face up" to the gangs.

Why can't the current prison staff "face up" to the gangs? Who is in control in the prison?

A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice said: "It is ridiculous to suggest that any gang 'controls' a prison. The Prison Service has a wealth of experience in dealing with gang activity and managing prisoners who form gangs. Expert staff identify, challenge and disrupt those prisoners attempting to bully, influence or intimidate others. We have long established strategies to address gang behaviour, and to counter bullying, combat illicit mobile phones and tackle drugs."

If you've got the strategies... use them.

The spokesman said there was "no evidence" that al-Qaeda videos had been watched and insisted that bacon was not banned.

The author asks: "Should the immigrants adopt the values of their adoptive land -- or, to the contrary, should society change to accommodate the newcomers who now form part of it?"

Liberal democracies depend on the premise that there are unalienable human rights that a government cannot violate and retain a legitimate right to rule. To want to defend that concept is far from the extreme, rabid, reactionary position that it is portrayed as here -- even (horrors!) at the risk of being impolite. You don't defend your values by... not defending them.

"Culture clash: European art provokes Muslims," by Michael Weissenstein for the Associated Press, March 14:

LONDON - With the West locked in conflicts across the Muslim world, why would anyone throw fuel on the fire?

Yeah, you'll want to read this one sitting down.

A small group of Europeans have been doing just that -- provoking death plots and at least one murder by turning out art that derides the Prophet Muhammad and the Quran in the name of Western values.

Behind the scenes is something bigger: a rising European unease with a rapidly growing Muslim minority, and the spreading sense that the continent has become a front in a clash of civilizations.

Recent events -- including surprising electoral success by an anti-Islamic Dutch party, moves to ban veils in France and minarets in Switzerland, and arrests in Ireland and the U.S. this week in an alleged plot to kill a Swedish cartoonist -- are signs of the rising tensions.

Swedish artist Lars Vilks says he was defending freedom of speech when he produced a crude black-and-white drawing of Muhammad with a dog's body in 2007. Authorities say that set him in the crosshairs of an assassination plot by extremists including Colleen LaRose, a 46-year-old Muslim convert from Pennsylvania who dubbed herself "Jihad Jane."

"I'm actually not interested in offending the prophet. The point is actually to show that you can," Vilks said in a recent interview with The Associated Press. "There is nothing so holy you can't offend it."

The Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten also said it was defending free speech in 2005 when it printed 12 cartoons of Muhammad, one in a bomb-shaped turban, setting off protests and the torching of Western embassies in several Muslim countries. And bottle-blond Dutch populist politician Geert Wilders said he was promoting European values by producing Fitna, a 15-minute film that lays images of the Sept. 11 attacks alongside verses from the Quran. The film was shown in Britain's House of Lords this month.

The cases are extreme, but millions of moderate Europeans also are re-examining the meaning of the liberal values widely cherished across the continent. How, many are asking, should a liberal society respectfully deal with immigrants who often espouse illiberal values? Should the immigrants adopt the values of their adoptive land -- or, to the contrary, should society change to accommodate the newcomers who now form part of it? [...]

Jan Hjarpe, a professor emeritus of Islamic studies at Lund University in southern Sweden, near Vilks' home, said the deliberate provocations were helpful to Islamic extremists, who have been hunting for targets that would win them popularity in the Muslim world.

Translation: Fighting back causes "extremism."

"It has had almost no effect on the Muslim community in Sweden, who regard it as not very interesting," he said. "These threats against him have to do with extremist groups that want something to react to."

Denmark's Prophet Muhammad cartoons emerged from a discussion in 2005 about whether Islam was being treated with special sensitivity among Danish artists for fear of reprisals from extremists. Jyllands-Posten said the project was a way to challenge self-censorhip [sic] and show that Muslims, too, must be ready to put up with mockery in a society based on democracy and free speech. [...]

In light of the abysmal record of the Dutch toward the Jewish population during the Nazi occupation, when some 70 percent were deported and killed, it was considered impolitic to show resentment against another ethnic group. But that didn't mean the resentment wasn't there. It was only in 2002 when the populist politician Pim Fortuyn began speaking openly against immigration and the threat to the Dutch identity that people felt free to voice their anger. Fortuyn's popularity soared, and the party he founded was hugely popular even after Fortuyn himself was assassinated (by an animal rights activist).

Successive governments clamped down on immigration and forced new arrivals to learn about the Dutch language and culture in an attempt to integrate them into mainstream society.

Oh, the humanity!

Wilders is derided by his enemies as a neo-fascist but has been able to turn his provocations into political success: his Freedom Party winning in the town of Almere and coming in second in The Hague this month the only two races it ran out of 394 cities and towns that elected local councils.

Sorry, AP.

Lending legitimacy to a system that does not deserve it, and would seek to subjugate them if it were strong enough. "Fears over non-Muslim's use of Islamic law to resolve disputes," by Afua Hirch for the Guardian, March 14:

Campaigners have voiced concerns over a growing number of non-Muslims using Islamic law to resolve legal disputes in Britain despite controversy over the role of sharia law.

A spokesman for the Muslim Arbitration Tribunal (MAT) said that there had been a 15% rise in the number of non-Muslims using sharia arbitrations in commercial cases this year. Last year, more than 20 non-Muslims chose to arbitrate cases at the network of tribunals, which operate in London, Birmingham, Bradford, Manchester, Nuneaton and Luton. "We are offering a cheap and effective service for Muslim and non-Muslims," said MAT spokesperson Fareed Chedie.

"95% of the people who come to us for arbitration do not feel they need legal representation." Chedie said that tribunals deal mainly with civil and commercial cases, including mosque disputes referred by the Charity Commission. But the tribunals have also continued to hear cases in the field of family law and divorce, Chedie said.

"We are increasingly dealing with reconciliation and mediation in marriage," said Chedie. "Many of these are cases where women have petitioned because they have a difficult marriage and want some guidance and direction. If they then want to terminate the marriage then we can help with that."

The increase in marriage and divorce cases comes as one law firm has begun offering advice on civil Scots law and sharia law, making it the first in Britain to offer both civil and Islamic law as part of one service.

Glasgow law firm Hamilton Burns says that it is responding to a greater demand from Muslim clients who want advice on sharia law alongside civil advice under Scots law. It has teamed up with Shaykh Amer Jamil, a Muslim scholar who specialises in Islamic family law.

"We hope that by incorporating sharia family jurisprudence against a background of domestic Scottish legislation, we can provide our clients with as much relevant information as possible," said Niall Mickel, a solicitor advocate and managing partner at Hamilton Burns.

But some groups have criticised the move by the Scottish firm, arguing that the recognition of sharia law decisions in Britain is regressive and harmful to women....