About the Muslim belief in the Mahdi at the end of history, don't forget the role of Jesus in the eschatology of Islam:

"We [Muslims] believe that he was raised to heaven and is there, and will descend at the appointed time, end all wars, and bring peace to the world.

"Please do not confuse Imam Mahdi with Hadhrat Isa (Jesus)... They are two different persons, and both will come during the last days. According to Hadeeth, Imam Mahdi will appear first, and Hadhrat Isa [Jesus] will appear during Imam Mahdi's lifetime. Furthermore, only Hadhrat Isa [Jesus] will be able to kill Dajjal (the "anti-Christ")."

[Apparently, the role of Jesus in Sunni eschatology is subject to variation and disagreement among Sunnis -- some say he alone will slay the Dajjal, others say he will help the Mahdi slay the Dajjal]

http://www.islamcan.com/dayofjudgement/index.shtml

Posted by: remote_control at September 30, 2006 11:51 AM

Does something happen to people when they open up a Koran? Does some sort of gas come out that disables a person and softens their mind for brainwashing? I don't understand why people who are doing relatively well in places like these (and pre-Khomeini Iran) read the things that are in the Koran, buy them, then want to tear down their society and drag the rest of us down with them. This must be why there are so many mindless Islamaniacs out there.

Posted by: ISLAMSFORLOSERS at September 30, 2006 12:53 PM

Muslims are blaming poverty because they are parroting Liberals. Liberals love to use the poverty excuse whenever people commit crime. I guess they never heard of white collar crime.

When there was rioting over the Rodney King issue, a liberal friend of mine said "See, that's what happens when poor people aren't given the their fair share of wealth and opportunity."

I retorted: "How dare you claim that all criminals are poor people! Rich people commit crime too you know!"

She just looked at me blankly.

Posted by: atheling at September 30, 2006 4:31 PM

Fanaticism is not alien to Morocco throughout its history. This is something we know well in Spain, since we are neighbours.
That we see now the growing influence not only of the active jihadists but of the political movements that support them in Morocco is testimony to the danger Islam poses to the people who start studying it (the educational level of the population has somehow increased in most Islamic countries) as well as the fact that the "moderate" regime in Morocco has been unable to provide its population with something useful other than religion and submission to Allah and the Commander of the Believers,the King.
The Weekly Standard did publish an article on the matter recently and I am sure it won´t be the last one.
In Spain we still have Zapatero pampering to Morocco´s every need, with the support of all the political, academic, artistic and, even, business lefties. But it won´t be long before Morocco is seen worldwide as what it really is.

Posted by: Spanish diplomat at September 30, 2006 7:19 PM

Welcome Spanish Diplomat! It's good to know some people in Spain are truly aware of the dangers of Islam, unlike your Prime Minister who is an appeasing, pacifist idiot.

Remote_control, your comment was very informative. It's interesting to note that all three major religions are awaiting their Messiah and all believe he is coming soon, except each religion is expecting a different Messiah. I was told by a Shiite doctor they're awaiting the Al Mahdi who they believe is coming soon. It was explained that the Al Mahdi is a relative or descendant of Mohammed and will return with Jesus to destroy Israel with Jesus standing behind him. This is how it was explained to me as I tried to gather knowledge of their beliefs.

Posted by: Bonniea at September 30, 2006 11:24 PM

Spanish diplomat

Zapatero is a moron and naive. But Aznar is also not prepared to deal with the Moroccan dangers. His Perjil islet showdown was pathetic.

And he (and you) keep looking for a nexus between ETA and the Islamic Madrid train bombings in order to save his sheer incompetence at having tried to delay pointing the finger at the muslims.

Both Aznar and Zapatero have petty personal agendas. The bold and lucid Spanish political leader needed this hour is still nowhere in the horizon.

Posted by: rocky at October 1, 2006 12:47 AM

Americaningermany:

Morocco did apply for European Union membership in the late eighties. Brussels did not accept the application, of course, but offered Morocco a special agreement to regulate and enhance its relations with Europe. This had the general support of the, then, EU12 member States.

Currently, Morocco´s relation with the European Union is regulated by the bilateral Partnership Agreement, signed under the framework of the "Barcelona Process" for the relation between the EU and the Mediterranean countries.

Morocco did not want to be included in any Mediterranean programme or schedule: they felt they are entitled to a particular, singular relation with Europe. You see, they don´t want to be mixed with "the others", they are very special people...

Morocco´s friends in Europe are, basically, the French and many leading businessmen, politicians and academic people in Spain. This last thing is simply ununderstandable. Morocco is a country whose national interests and ours are incompatible most of the time. However, our lefties here believe you can build up a "cushion of interests" with them so as to reduce future tensions. This teory has proven to be wrong many times. However, they still try to follow it, and here you have Zapatero and his followers.

During the Perejil crisis with Morocco, Zapatero did not side with the Government, but he chose to visit the King of Morocco to appease tensions. This was impossible to forgive, given the fact there was a very high tension situation and military options were contemplated.

Posted by: Spanish diplomat at October 1, 2006 11:52 AM

And this leads me to

Rocky,

I do not agree with you about what you say regarding Aznar, the Perejil islet and the ETA connection to the Madrid train bombings.

First of all, Aznar stepped down after 8 years in power (and unlike Blair), he did not run for election in March 2004. You may like him of not. I disliked him most of the time, but in the end I understood he has been perhaps our best Prime Minister or ruler in 200 years (we have not had much luck with our politicians!). I won´t elaborate here, but Aznar´s performance in power make any possible comparison look simply ridiculous in most aspects.

On the other hand, Perejil islet might seem ridiculous to you, and, actually to all the people who care nothing for national insterests or dignity. If the incident had taken place with, say, "normal countries" like our neighbours Portugal or France, then negotiations should have been the most suitable and cost-efficient way to solve the dispute. But I hope you won´t deny the legitimacy of Spanish claims to sovereignty over Perejil island. You may argue whether Moroccan´s ones are better or worse than ours, but you cannot deny Spain does have a claim to the inhabited island for centuries.

The problem arouse with Morocco. Morocco is ruled by a clique of powerful men called colectively "the Makhzen", whose leader is the King. This also happen to be a Muslim country, whith a history of expansionism and threat to all of its neighbours. They feel they are entitled to rule the Western Sahara, Mauritania, north Mali, south-western Algeria and our towns and territories in North Africa: Ceuta, Melilla and the tiny islets around, plus the Canary Islands. You can see this is not a joke, it is a real threat to all of us, their neighbours. Of course, they are not in a position to annex all of this now. They took the Western Sahara in a moment of Spanish weakness. And they are waiting any possible signal of weakness in any of the other neighbours to claim the relevant territory from them.

When they occupied military the Perejil island, they did so in order to up the ante in our bilateral conflict those days, but also to test Spanish resolve to protect our citizens and our national territory in Africa. Negotiations were not going to make Moroccans to withdraw from the island. And the only signal you would send them would be that you are weak, that you don´t have the nerve to challenge and fight them: that you are an obedient dhimmi to the Commander of the Believers, Mohammad VI.

Finally, a word of caution. In March 11, 2004 the overwhelming majority of people in Spain had the feeling it was ETA and not Al-Qaida, the author of the train bombings. This is so because, unfortunately, we do have plenty of experience with ETA, and they were to attack another train station the previous Christmas day. It was only later that the evidence was gathered to accuse Islamic terrorism.

However, you should notice, Rocky, that:

1. The evidence they have gathered to accuse the Muslims arrested is very weak.

2. It has been found a very strange lack of transparency from our current Government in really investigating all possible clues and pieces of evidence.

3. Connections between Islamic terrorists and ETA terrorists had been found.

4. The attacks were carried out to make sure the Popular Party lose the elections. Very easy to identify people and groups have benefited enormously with Zapatero´s accession to power and with his appeasement agenda at home and abroad. Their current behaviour while in power looks terribly suspicious in many respects.

5. Zapatero began dealing with ETA when he had no chance to win the elections and while he signed an agreement with Aznar to corner the terrorist. He lied then because he said in public the opposite thing of what he was doing in private. He now has dealings with ETA which amount to an unconditional surrender of the rule of law in Spain and the national dignity to the benefit of the totalitarian separatists in the Basque Country. The Government tries to sell "peace" to the public, and it is not in their interest the truth be made public.

All in all, the important thing is that, unlike S-11, London, Bali or others, in Madrid the bombings seem to have a much more elaborated criminal conspiracy behind them. And the investigation isn´t over yet.

Posted by: Spanish diplomat at October 1, 2006 12:01 PM

Spanish Diplomat,

Thank you for the clarifications. It is good to propfit from your insight.
But isn't the fact of allowing oneself to be invaded by hordes of North Africans defeating any triumphalist claim to a small piece of territory?
The Muslims don't work in the open. They work silently within a society that allows them a safe haven. Post-Christian Spain did very little to avoid being a safe haven for Muslim activists during the 1980s and 1990s. The enemy is not Morocco, for the enemy Spain is facing stretches all the way to Southern Philippines.

One sad Lebanese Christian leader put it like this: "We fight for strictly the Lebanese nation, because we love it, but they (the Hizbullah) fight for a gigantic religious entity stretching all the way from the Maghrib to Pilippines. They fight with extreme motivation, for their ideals are very big and their morale is very high."
I don't think that Spain realizes the magnitude of the threat, especially since alQaida leaders talk of it as if it is already included in the Islamic territories.
When you rigttly say that:
"In March 11, 2004 the overwhelming majority of people in Spain had the feeling it was ETA and not Al-Qaida, the author of the train bombings.." it only goes on to show the sheer narcissism and folly of the Spanish people, thinking that a home-grown movement could do such a big thing.
Spain nurtured this jihadis mainly because the competent authorities were looking the other way towards ETA.
Spain in its blindness allows itself to think that the ETA threat and the jihadi threat are of the same dimension. Therefore you isnist in making comparisons that are not only jejune in my view, but even dangerous, because they conceal the very nature of the treat,
I am not claiming that ETA is not a threat, but (since it is a home-grown movement)it is a threat that has the potential of being totally defused by giving the basques an independent nation.
But the Muslim militants will never be content with anything short of dominating Europe and tyrannizing every Spanish citizen, now degraded to the status of a dhimmi, until you all become Muslims.
While the Basques will be content with staying at home once they got what they want, the Muslims will not. No matter how many concessions you may make to them, they will not rest until they have come to your doostep to Madrid and taken away your freedom. Their aim is to thoroughly humiliate you until you have submitted to Islam.

Posted by: rocky at October 1, 2006 10:17 PM