U.K.: Jihadist who called for assassination of prime ministers and "huge attacks on centres and places of benefit to the crusaders" pleads guilty

Wellington -- another Jihad Watch reader has mentioned this book:

"Holy Terror: Inside the World of Islamic Terrorism" by
Amir Taheri

Taheri contends that the world will not resolve this dilemma until Islam embraces the concept of democracy.

The book is apparently hard to find. Have you read it?

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One reviewer @ amazon.com writes:

Those who believe that Islamic terrorism is somehow caused by the Palestine issue or even hatred of the United States will be surprised to learn that this is not the case. The author shows that Islamic terror started in the first days of Islam. First practiced within the Muslim community it later spread beyond the frontiers of Islam. The author, himself a Muslim, is at pains to show how Muslims have been the first and foremost victims of Islamic terrorism for centuries, and certainly long before the West discovered this new brand of violence. He calls for a united front between moderate Muslims and the democratic nations against Islamism."

Eastview, that was pretty much the post I wanted to make, you beat me too it.

I believe, however, it could have been improved. Here is how. This is for the Jihad warriors out there: Here's a reminder of what happens when you think "u iz hard,,,init"

http://www.globalsecurity.org/security/profiles/images/abu_musab_al-zarqawi_3.jpg

I would like to draw attention to the degree of bloat evident in the picture, indicating how much the precision guided munition shredded every fiber of his body. His 72 raisins are going to have a hard job putting him back together.

I have not read the book, Heidi2027 (though I respect Taheri's assessments of Iran), but I know enough about Islam to assert that it can never embrace true democracy without gutting itself like a fish. Speaking about Islam embracing democracy is as futile a prospect as saying that Marxism or Nazism should embrace democracy. No totalitarian system of thought (and Islam is the one major faith which is a totalitarian ideology) can accept the democratic experiment and that's because control freaks, be they Mohammed, Marx or Hitler, founded such systems and such systems represent the antithesis of Jeffersonian and Hamiltonian concepts of how a polity should be constructed (with due respect paid here to J&H's illustrious intellectual forebearers possessed of names such as Solon, Cleisthenes, Pericles and Locke).

Islam is as hopeless as are all other total belief systems. You can't reform them. You can only discard them. If Taheri thinks othewise, he is hoping against hope and is wrong. Give up the ghost I would tell him and let his fellow Persians rediscover a far wiser and more humane spiritual system that their own ancestors developed-----Zoroastrianism. After all, an Iran with Magi would be infinitely preferable to an Iran with mullahs.

Yes, the houris will definitely need to spend some time stitching the bastard back together. It could have been worse. Apparently it wasn't a direct hit, else they would have had a bigger job, like the one they face whenever a shaheed of the Religion of Pieces (a piece here, a piece there, another piece over there) arrives for servicing.

I agree with Wellington, Heidi. Until "moderate" Muslims are able to take off their sentimental blinders and recognize Islam's violence-prone incompatibility with the modern world, their efforts at reconciliation are futile. But, as is discussed on these pages at great length, stripping these elements from Islam would mean that it is no longer Islam.

Wellington, what's your take on the Baha'is, whose roots are in Islam? Are they, too, an irredeemable threat to modernism, or would they represent a sufficiently neutered version of Islam that the rest of the world might be able to live with? From what I read they still honor Mohammad as a prophet, albeit not the last one, so their tenets are somewhat sullied by this fact alone. Maybe Hugh could weigh in on this.

The Baha'is, Eastview, are an outgrowth of the Babists and they in turn are an outgrowth of Islam. I dunno'. Almost anything is better than Islam but if a belief system springs from it, I'm skeptical.

For instance, the Baha'is get all gooey about some kind of world government, which is a non-starter for yours truly. They're also too accommodating to all religions, i.e., all faiths have something good to say; well, I think Islam has virtually nothing good to convey and I ain't too big on Voodoo either. To their credit, the Baha'is don't want to resort to violence to enforce their beliefs (as opposed to that other religion we know of too well). As a skeptic myself, I long ago concluded that if you're going to go with religion, the two best are Christianity and Judaism. They have a rigorous intellectural architecture, an architectural blueprint which is not a threat to democratic societies, an emphasis on the dignity and worth of the individual and a Golden Rule second to none. These two religions also don't treat the world as some kind of illusion or repetitive experience (huge mistakes in my opinion), a la major Eastern religions.

Without wanting to offend so many who post here at JW and who fully understand the threat that Islam poses to the world at large, I nonetheless look upon all religions as fairy tales, bearing no significant relationship to ultimate reality. I also resent the use of fear, which even the most enlightened religions use in order to compel belief. Science and philosophy, except bastardized forms of them, don't do this. Religions do. If you don't accept this, that and the other thing, none of which are, of course, remotely provable, then you're going to come back as a cow or a carrot or rot in hell for eternity, blah, blah, blah. Don't like this. Don't accept this. Wouldn't do it this way were I God. If Wellington doubted I existed, I wouldn't condemn him to some awful fate, I'd just have a divine laugh at his expense. But all religions want more than just such a laugh. This means man is too serious or (what is worse) God is, assuming God exists. Well, I've gone on long enough here and think I'll end it before I make more than my usual share of enemies. Hey, aren't you glad you asked?

Until "moderate" Muslims are able to take off their sentimental blinders and recognize Islam's violence-prone incompatibility with the modern world,…

It, of course, is true.
Still, it is not its incompatibility with the modern world that we should point at. After all, Islam has been incompatible with the world long before the world became modern.
Islam’s diverse incompatibilities with the world at every stage of world’s history grow directly from its seeing the world as incompatible with Islam.

Thomas, you wrote:

"Islam has been incompatible with the world long before the world became modern."

Yes.

Ibn Ishaq, author of the Sira, or canonical life of Mohammed, includes in it the following statement: “‘Men, do you know what you are pledging yourselves to in swearing allegiance to this man [Muhammad]?’ ‘Yes. In swearing allegiance to him we are pledging to wage war against all mankind.’”

I also resent the use of fear, which even the most enlightened religions use in order to compel belief

"...to compel belief"?

Another thing: by what standards does one measure the degree of enlightenment of a religion?

Thomas_h : ...by what standards does one measure the degree of enlightenment of a religion?

Less corpses. Of course there are always some, even if it's 'merely' collateral psychological damage.

Wellington, have you by chance ever heard about or read a book titled "Cosmic Consciousness" by Richard Bucke? It was written by a Canadian physician ca 1900 after he underwent a spontaneous enlightenment experience similar to that of Buddha, Saul on the Road to Damascus, Walt Whitman, and many others of history's great or not so great that left him so shaken he was compelled to write about it. Bucke was a scientist at heart, who, convinced that his startling experience was of great significance, undertook to discover and document whether it was the common denominator that underlay each of the great religions of the world. The common denominator he found was that the founders of each of these religions, and numerous others who are not so well known, had, indeed, undergone exactly the same experience as he, and it is these experience that are the contents of their respective messages. Each chapter of the book describes the experience of one of these persons, whose life was completely turned upside down when the "heavens opened up" and over a period of minutes or hours found themselves in the thrall of what seemed to them to be knowledge pouring into them from a source outside themselves. The messages invariably involved love, and had very little to do with social matters except insofar as they involved love.

Was the triggering of these internal experiences due to neuron misfirings from ingesting moldy bread or mushrooms? Some would argue that, certainly most of my scientific colleagues would, but my take is that Bucke was onto something else. This book completely changed my perspective on many things, including clearing up the meaning of many obscure biblical passages, such as coming to an understanding of what Jesus was really referring to when he talked about the Kingdom of Heaven (it ain't a palace in the sky). Others might take something else away from this book, but it did a lot to help push me toward a unified understanding about religion, things that are relevant to the main subject matter here of Islam vs the West, but things which lie outside the purview of materialist science.

Addendum to my previous post: Having tossed out the above, I should go on record that my own view is that the enlightenment experience is some sort of spontaneous phase change that occurs in the organization of the human brain, with the formation of new synaptic connections that permit perceptions and associations that were previously not possible, with an effect similar to what would happen if a damaged optic nerve of a blind man were suddenly to be repaired so that he could see (admittedly, not an original analogy).

You are indeed correct, Thomas_h. Islam is, and has always been, incompatible with each and every civilization, ancient or modern, that it has ever come into contact with.

Reformation is not a happenin' thing.
Hesperado beat that in to me some time ago. Each time I wrote of the reformation of islam or of moderate islam he'd kick my ass for me.
I had to stop posting for a while and do some thinking. I arrived at the same conclusion. islam is doomed. Those that seek to change it from within are immediately threatened by their "more islamic" brethren. There's a story on JW now about an imam who backed womens rights and now fears for his life.
Typical. And it is this typical reaction to reformation that renders same impossible. Thus islam must cease to be as slavery, as I've said numerous times, cannot be suffered to exist by free men and women.

Death to islam.
Free the slaves.

DDA,

Ibn Ishaq, author of the Sira, or canonical life of Mohammed, includes in it the following statement: “‘Men, do you know what you are pledging yourselves to in swearing allegiance to this man [Muhammad]?’ ‘Yes. In swearing allegiance to him we are pledging to wage war against all mankind.’”

Thank you for quoting that record. Had I been aware of its existence I would have quoted it myself.

I just wanted to say something about the unique nature of incompatibility between islam and the rest of us.

Incompatibility of agents A and B is, besides being a symmetrical relation, is always related to some definite context C. Both A and B can be compatible in context C, but incompatible in context D.
For example, although it is obvious that men and women are compatible in the context of marriage or work, they are incompatible in the context of women-only, or man-only club - unless we modify (revolutionize as the progressives would say) the meaning of the concept of “only”.

Conversely, men are rather compatible with men in many contexts, but not, for example, in the context of marriage, unless, again we revolutionize the concept of marriage.
The, however imperfect, compatibility of say, Jews, Christians, Indians, Buddhists, Confucians in most social and political contexts rests, usually quite safely, on the shared deep, almost instinctive, belief in the ethical universality of the Golden Rule.
We believe we are born with the rule written in our heart. The religious among us believe that inscription is God’s gift to man. The non-believers may have different idea about its origin, but as long as they want to abide by it the disagreement doesn’t threaten our overall compatibility.

Islam rejects the primacy and ensuing from it universality of the Golden Rule. Islam insists that man is born a muslim, or that being muslim is what is written in the human heart. Being a non muslim is therefore not just a sin against god, but abomination of nature. What makes one fully human is one’s submition to Islam. It only follows that a muslim may and should follow the golden rule exclusively among fellow muslims. It may never be a universal command

But not only is a non-muslim not fully human, but the world, not being submitted to Islam is not fully world.

When I said that it is Islam that views the world as incompatible (with Islam) I wanted to point at the basic asymmetry in that incompatibility. While the non-muslims understand civilizational compatibility in the context of objectively existing world, Islam understands the world in the context of Islam. Our and Islam’s understanding of our incompatibility is itself incompatible. That indeed is the mother of all incompatibility.

Yoy jogged my memory about this book, Easwtview. I had forgotten about it but will look into it when I get the chance. I like to leave my mind open to most any possibility, though one does go with percentages after a while (gut feelings and hunches too). Perhaps the intense religious experience can be reduced to biochemical interactions but, as Malcolm Muggeridge observed, the universe is not only stranger than we know, it's probably even stranger than we can imagine. Will keep an open mind about this but I have to wonder why a God would make things so accessible to so few. Also, can't neglect the matter of frauds in all this. I can think of one in particular whose name began with "M". Still, I am turned off by the use of fear to further insure belief. As I wrote before, science and philosophy don't do this. I also can't eliminate the possibility of a deistic God who created things but is no longer involved in the unfolding of the universe. Many possibilities, eh? Thanks for the information.

"Reformation is not a happenin' thing.
Hesperado beat that in to me some time ago. Each time I wrote of the reformation of islam or of moderate islam he'd kick my ass for me."

Same with me, AI.

Islam is indeed dooomed, AI. Can't reform rot. It's only a matter of time, but before such time much tragedy will ensue as long as Islam exists. Have Islam, have death, represssion, stultification, wasted lives, stupidity, ignorance on a massive scale, horror. Such is Islam's real legacy----for now, after it's dead and for all time.

Wellington, Eastview, Alaskan, I too wholly accept that Islam is impossible to reform.

It is just that I, in the city of Rotterdam, am surrounded with family, colleagues, citizens and media that are so either PCMC or ignorant about the true nature of Islam. And I know personally a lot of civil and nice Muslims. We even have an affable Islamic mayor.

Now my problem is; can we present such a polarising view of Islam as really ANTI-DEMOCRATIC, at least in part? Oh, I intend to assert that allright, in my many conversations about Islam & Democracy, but should we not give the Muslims some kind of choice/ chance first?

Besides the stark choice between being Islamic and Theocratic or Democratic but then of necessity Apostate? I can see the outrage in my city/ country already; about racism/ discrimination, McCarthyism, even Hitlerism against those who dare to suggest this. Why, even the PVV doesn't dare to do it!

My management, not solution, of this polarisation-problem is that we somehow ourselves create a document about when a Muslim is an acceptable citizen of a Democratic country and when NOT. Carefully and cautiously worded, but still strong on essential Democratic constitution, laws, values.

Telling the world how fond we are of these and how difficult it is for us to live with people supporting a political system intent on taking those away from us. And with those Muslims who support or condone the oppression of religious minorities in Islamic countries while they themselves are given ALL rights in Democratic countries.

That way we can call the bluff of many Muslims, especially their taqqiya-leaders, or replace their ignorance with a bit of Democracy-knowledge, and we can justify any future discrimination on basis of a person being a Democratic citizen or a Theocratic enemy.

If we first give Muslims clear choices and at least the nominal chance to join Democracy consciously, at least ostensibly, it could be a step in the right direction.

No, nothing constructive will probably come from their side, BUT we then have one more argument-weapon or tool against these PCMC-defenders of Islam, and maybe we convince some ignorant fair-play-minded Westerners in this way.

Spoken by one amidst ignorant and prejudiced-against-Geert Wilders-people. Searching for good arguments and tools for the PVV.

"Wellington, Eastview, Alaskan, I too wholly accept that Islam is impossible to reform."

"but should we not give the Muslims some kind of choice/ chance first?"

Umm...which is it? "impossible to reform"? or "give them a choice/chance first"?

Caint have bote two of em' at the same time.

islam has had 1400 years to stop raping and killing in the name of the moon god.

No more chances. No more choice.

Death to islam.
Free the slaves.

"Umm...which is it? "impossible to reform"? or "give them a choice/chance first"?"

AI, I want to emphasize that giving the Muslims a choice/ chance first is first and foremost meant for the benefit of our fellow-democratic citizens and voters.

It is futile to seek out "moderate" Muslims and then try to cooperate with them. But maybe, to bring home the terrible truth about the incompatibility of Islam and Democracy we could ourselves formulate what we would expect from a person in terms of support and refraining of opposition too our most basic democratic values and laws, and our constitution. And we could also insist in such a document on the support of Western Muslims for the equal rights of religious minorities under Muslim rule until they are equivalent with their rights under Democratic rule.

Then when we can offer all Muslims with that document that choice, and chance, and they blow it, then we have one more tool, weapon and we may persuade some more of the undecided amongst our own. Who, right now, really consider any kind of discrimination on grounds of religion sacrilegious and would stagger when Muslims would only be given the stark choice of converting or being deported or at least discriminated against.

Although deception will be all over the place, it still could be a step in the right direction and it would show our goodwill.

Me? I have no goodwill towards islam, so the we does not include me. I doubt that it includes more than 10% of those long time posters here as well. I could very well be wrong, but I think a quick poll will prove me right.
My goodwill towards islam has been beaten to death by the endless terrorist attacks in the name of the moon god.

The olive branch has been extended to islam since it began killing some 1400 years ago. They've had their chances, hundreds of them during that time.
The time has come to end islam and free the muslims of their islamic chains.
There is no other choice IMHO.

Death to islam.
Free the slaves.