“This isn’t an Islamic problem. This is a jihadist problem,” said Mike Huckabee recently. Rudolph Giuliani spoke of “the way they”ve perverted their religion into a hatred of us.” In that, both men are reflecting the conventional wisdom — conventional wisdom which, if you dare to transgress, you become a pariah. Everyone, you see, knows that whatever it is we’re facing around the world today, it has nothing to do with Islam. If you don’t see that, you’re just a bigoted “Islamophobe.”
Fuad Hodzic, meanwhile, asks the court to pray, accuses his enemies of betraying Islam, and says, “I”m Allah’s slave.” This may indeed be, as Giuliani asserts, a perversion of Islam, but its adherents claim to be the exponents of true, pure, real Islam — as Hodzic clearly does here. Waving away the Islamic component of this appeal, as Huckabee, Giuliani, and pretty much everyone else does, only weakens our ability to counter this threat. For until some counter to this claim of Islamic purity is formulated — by peaceful Muslims who dare to stand up for human rights, and more importantly by non-Muslims who dare to point out and oppose the ways in which Sharia denies those human rights — this claim will continue to win recruits among Muslims. Merely asserting that it isn’t Islamic, in the teeth of so much evidence, does nothing to stop that.
“Serbia: Wahabi terror suspect displays religious fervour in court,” from AKI (thanks to all who sent this in):
Belgrade, 16 Jan. (AKI) — The trial of 15 members of radical Islamist Wahabi movement saw a rare display of religious fervour in a Belgrade court on Wednesday.
One of the accused, Fuad Hodzic, before entering a plea on charges of terrorism and illegal arms possession asked the court to bow and say a prayer before refuting charges against him. He said the indictment was a charade.
The group members are alleged to have operated a terrorist training camp in the Ninaja mountain in southwest Sandzak region and have been charged with planning terrorist attacks on the American embassy in Belgrade, a theatre and a hotel in Serbian capital.
They are also alleged to have planned an attack on a police station in Novi Pazar, Sandzak’s commercial and administrative centre.
According to the indictment, they also planned the murder of Sandzak mufti Muarem Zukorlic whom they accused of betraying Islam and of being an American spy.
“We were planning no terrorist attacks, nor the murder of the mufti Muamer Zukorlic,” Hodzic told the court.
“I swear to Allah, there are boys here who wouldn’t even know how to return home from here, let alone finding the American embassy,” he said.
He said the group moved to the mountain hideout because Zukorlic banned them from Novi Pazar mosque. He said Zukorlic was a “Jewish and American spy” who was hiding behind Islam.
According to the indictment, Hodzic told the police who arrested him in March last year: “You are my enemy and I don’t recognise this state and law, but only Allah the supreme.
“For you, I”m Bin Laden, your deadly enemy,” he told police. “I”m Allah’s slave, and you are the slave to money and your job.”…