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Islamic Terrorism: What the Vatican Really Thinks

Oct 6, 2004 9:56 am By Robert Spencer

Another magnificent and informative piece on the real dimensions of Vatican dhimmitude from Sandro Magister in Chiesa, with thanks to Anthony:

ROMA — There is a word that both the pope and his newspaper, “L’Osservatore Romano,” carefully avoid saying or writing. It is the word “Islamic” as applied to the terrorism of such origin.

John Paul II did not even use it on the third anniversary of September 11, 2001, speaking to a group of bishops from the United States.

Much less does “L’Osservatore Romano” use it. A day does not go by that the newspaper does not make note of “attacks,” “assaults,” “kidnappings,” “violence,” and “assassinations” carried out by Muslims. But not even once does the paper apply that description to the authors of the terrorist acts.

Another deafening silence from “L’Osservatore Romano” is that concerning the quality of Islamic terrorism: the absence of limits with which it works, in particular when it deliberately massacres children.

The car bombs detonated in Baghdad on September 30 in the midst of dozens of Iraqi children attending a celebration for the inauguration of a new water conduit, killing 37 of them, were chronicled by the official newspaper of the Holy See under the caption: “another day of ordinary violence.”

There is a Realpolitik motivation behind this understatement from Vatican authorities and their newspaper: silence on the Islamic origin of the terrorist offensive is the price paid to protect Christians from more serious threats, and in particular the Christians who live in Muslim countries.

But at the same time, the Vatican is aware that the current “fourth world war” (the words of Cardinal Renato Martino, imprudent as usual) against the West, Christianity, Judaism, and Muslim “apostates” is not the result of generic terrorism but of Islamist terrorism.

Proof of this awareness comes from the editorial in the latest edition of the magazine of the Rome Jesuits, ” La Civiltà Cattolica.”

“La Civiltà Cattolica” is a very special magazine. It is by statute at the service of the pope and the Holy See. Every one of its articles is examined by the Vatican secretariat of state before being taken to press.

An editorial in “La Civiltà Cattolica” thus carries significant authority. It reflects the point of view of the highest Vatican authorities, and finally that of the pope.

But at the same time, “La Civiltà Cattolica” is also an expression of the Jesuits who write for it. Thus it can say more than the individual authorities of the Holy See would themselves say.

So, in its latest edition, “La Civiltà Cattolica” dedicated its lead editorial, which is unsigned, to “terrorism of Islamic origin,” thus named from the beginning of the article.

Here follows the entire first part of the editorial, which surveys the last three years and analyzes the aims and methods of Islamic terrorism: in particular, its “loss of even the most minimal sense of humanity.”

The second part of the editorial, which is not reproduced here, examines a recent document opposing terrorism which was signed by 26 Muslim figures who live in Italy: it is an admirable document but, according to the magazine, is not representative and has no influence with the bulk of the Islamic groups, which are linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, that control the mosques.

Three Years of Struggle against Terrorism

From “La Civiltà Cattolica” no. 3703, October 2, 2004

There is a tragic conceptual connection beginning from New York on September 11, 2001, and reaching Beslan, in North Ossetia, on September 1, 2004. It is the connection of terrorism of Islamic origin, which in three years has sown death in many places all over the planet: 2,823 dead in New York and Washington (September 11, 2001), 202 dead in Bali (Indonesia, October 12, 2002), 21 dead in Jerba (Tunisia, April 11, 2002), 31 dead in Pakistan (March-June 2002), 45 dead in Morocco (May 16, 2003), 52 dead in Riyadh (Saudi Arabia, May 12 and November 8, 2003), 63 dead in Turkey (November 15-20), 175 dead in the Dubrovka theater and 39 in the Moscow metro (February 6, 2004), 191 dead in Madrid (Spain, March 11, 2004). The series ends, for now, with the 400 dead — 156 of them children — at the school in Beslan (September 1-3, 2004). This list does not include the countless attacks that spill blood nearly each day in Palestine and Iraq, whose victims are no longer even counted.

This shows that three years of fighting against terrorism have brought scarce results. Not only have the leaders of al-Qaeda not been captured, but they are to use al-Jazeera — the television network in Qatar, which is offering a precious service to Islamic terrorism — to make threatening declarations; and if a few terrorists, generally from the lower or middle ranks, have been killed or captured, even more have probably taken their place. And this is in spite of two wars (Afghanistan and Iraq) conducted by the United States and its allies, and one (Chechnya) conducted by Russia; and even though the United States has spent — it is said — 144 billion dollars to combat terrorism.

Thus today the world finds itself under attack by a terrorism that in a few years has changed greatly — unfortunately, for the worse — in terms even of the recent past.

* * *
In reality, Islamic terrorism has not changed the goals that it has pursued from its origin to the work of Osama bin Laden: to fight the Jews and the “crusaders” (the Christians, seen as inveterate enemies of Islam); to fight against the Western world — and the United States in the first instance — that seeks to dominate the Islamic peoples and rob them of their riches and which, moreover, because of its atheism and corruption, constitutes a grave threat to the Islamic faith; to vindicate the offenses and damages that Western colonialism has inflicted upon the dignity of the Islamic peoples and upon their culture and economic development; to strip of power the governments of majority Islamic countries that are allied with the West and have permitted the American military to trample upon the holy ground of Muslim countries and have served as logistic and military bases to fight against other Muslim countries and deprive them of their oil, the great resource that Allah has given to the “believers,” denying it to the “infidels.”

Read it all.

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