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Hugh Fitzgerald: Simon & Schuster Gets With The Program

Mar 1, 2016 12:57 pm By Hugh Fitzgerald

Salaam-Reads

Last week it was announced that Simon and Schuster will publish a line of Muslim-themed books for children called Salaam Reads. The undertaking appears to have been prompted by one Zareem Jaffery, an executive editor at the publishing house, who says the “aim with the Salaam Reads imprint is in part to provide fun and compelling books for Muslim children” that will also be “entertaining and enriching for a larger non-Muslim audience.” She convinced Simon and Schuster that the time was right to get with this program, the program being to make Muslim children feel at home by reading about Muslim children just like themselves and to make familiar, and palatable, Muslim religious observances and beliefs to non-Muslim children, by showing how kids of four different “faith traditions” — “Musa, Moises, Mo, and Kevin” (can you spot the Catholic?) – become friends, pal around together, and find out about each other’s faiths, without anything to trouble their carefree, innocent friendship as each learns, in turn, about the religious practices and beliefs of each of the three other members of the group.

All this sweetness and light, however, will almost certainly be based on a lie, or rather on a series of lies. Of course, none of the books has yet been published, but we can confidently predict what in them will not be included, and what will. Just imagine, for a minute, how the two most important Muslim holidays, Eid Al-Adha and Eid Al-Fitr, are likely to be presented by Salaam Reads. At both of these feasts, an animal — a lamb, a goat, a cow, a camel — is sacrificed, its throat slit, and then it is left to bleed to death, often in full view of smiling and excited onlookers. You can find photographs of such scenes online, at Muslim websites. If the aim of Salaam Reads is to convey a truthful picture of Islam, then it ought to show how almost all Muslims practice it, and that includes the way those animals are killed, which is part of the violence that suffuses Islam. But do you think those responsible for Salaam Reads will provide any such pictures or photographs of these animals, dying or dead? When it comes to sharing knowledge of this aspect of the Muslim faith, Salaam Reads will not only avoid showing the practice, but in the text will provide only a vague brusque admission that “animals are sacrificed” at the two Eids, while carefully not hinting at how.

Ramadan will undoubtedly be given a lot of attention in the Salaam Reads series. After all, this month of fasting and prayer is comfortingly akin to the Christian observance of fasting and prayer at Lent. The treacly analogizing in a Salaam Reads book for middle-schoolers will likely go something like this: “Ramadan and Lent are both times for prayer. And just as Christians fast during 40 days of Lent, Muslims fast for a month of Ramadan. But there are differences. When Christians fast for Lent, they don’t give up all food – even the well-known giving-up of meat is not total, for it is abstained from mostly on Fridays and on Ash Wednesday. And individual Christians often choose to give up some particular food they especially like – such as chocolate or honey-glazed donuts or ice cream — or abstain from some activity that the one abstaining finds particularly pleasurable, such as shopping or watching television. When we Muslims fast, our fast is total, and goes from dawn to dusk.” (All this slyly implying the moral superiority of Muslim Ramadan to Christian Lent.)

You will likely find the following: “And at Ramadan we Muslims give to charity.” That is a most misleading phrase. What I am certain you will not find anywhere in the Salaam Reads books is the important information that for Muslims “zakat” (giving to the needy) means “giving to needy fellow Muslims,” and only to them. This is quite different from the Christian practice of giving to one’s fellow man, not just to one’s fellow Christians.

And readers will be treated to the heartwarming, cloudless and practically identical family lives of Musa, Moises, Mo and Kevin. These practitioners of the “three abrahamic faiths” will be shown to have so much in common. Perhaps not the quintessential It’s-A-Wonderful-Life home for all four families, but in all four families there will be one wife for one husband (thereby airbrushing out the actual arrangements of tens of millions of Muslim families all over the world), and in Mo’s Muslim family, his mother and sisters will not be off-puttingly niqabbed, but dutifully and demurely hijabbed. There will be no mention of plural wives, nor any discussion of the total authority of the Muslim father over his wife (wives) and children. No discussion of what can and has happened to Muslim girls who defied that authority and refused to wear the hijab – see the case of Aqsa Parvez, and of so many more like her.

And in Salaam Reads publications will be no mention of what Muslims are instructed to think about, and how to behave toward, non-Muslims, which are very different from what one would gather from the cheerful palling around of Muslim Mo with non-Muslims Musa, Moises, and Kevin. No Qur’an 60.4: “enmity and hatred have appeared between us [Muslims] and you [non-Muslims] forever until you believe in Allah.” Nothing about the many other verses instructing Believers such as Mo to be merciful with other Believers, but stern with the disbelievers, such as Musa, Moises, and Kevin. Nothing about the Islamic doctrine known as Al Wala’ Wal Bara’ (loyalty and disavowal), whereby a Muslim is required to love what Allah loves, and hate what Allah hates, and to be kind to Believers and harsh or angry with the Disbelievers.

The five pillars of Islam, incumbent on all Believers – shehada, zakat, salat, Ramadan, hajj – will be listed and discussed (as noted above, “zakat” will be translated as “charity,” instead of as “charity to fellow Muslims”), for they are relatively innocuous. The duty of Jihad, incumbent upon Muslims and so important that it has been described by some Sunni scholars as the “sixth pillar of Islam,” will either not be mentioned or, if mentioned, will be given the usual misleading maquillage, presented prettily as the individual Muslim’s “struggle to master himself, to be a better person” (part of the confusing folderol about the “greater jihad” and the “lesser jihad”), when Jihad’s main meaning, in Muslim minds, is the “struggle” to remove all obstacles to the spread, and then the dominance, of Islam, all over the world.

Salaam Reads will certainly be sure to include Quran 5:32, in its popular but incomplete and misleading form:

“The Holy Koran teaches that whoever kills an innocent, it is as if he has killed all mankind; and whoever saves a person, it is as if he has saved all mankind.”

But Salaam Reads will not include the modifying verse Qur’an 5:33:

“The only reward of those who make war upon Allah and His messenger and strive after corruption in the land will be that they will be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet on alternate sides cut off, or will be expelled out of the land.”

And I can just imagine the four boys – Musa, Moises, Mo, and Kevin – visiting each other’s churches, synagogues, mosques as part of Interfaith Outreach, and one of the non-Muslim boys proudly proclaiming that in this great land of ours, the First Amendment guarantees the free exercise of religion, and Mo then replying, “You know, some people seem to think that Muslims don’t respect freedom of religion, but nothing could be further from the truth. Why, more than a thousand years before the First Amendment guaranteed freedom of religion here in our home, we Muslims observed freedom of religion as guaranteed in the Holy Qur’an: ‘There is no compulsion in religion.'” (2.256) What that phrase actually meant in practice is that all non-Muslims have three choices under Muslim rule: death, or conversion to Islam or, if you were a Christian or Jew, and thus of the People of the Book (Ahl al-Kitab) you could be “tolerated” as long as you agreed to a life of indignity and humiliation as a “Dhimmi,” and agreed to pay a special tax, the “Jizyah.” If, in the Salaam Reads series, the word “Jizyah” appears at all, it will no doubt be defined as “an amount non-Muslims pay the Muslim state to protect them.” But protect them from whom? From the Muslims themselves. The exaction of the “Jizyah” is classic extortion.

Muhammad is the central figure in Islam. He is the Perfect Man (al-insan al-kamil) and the Model of Conduct (uswa hasana). But I’m fairly sure that in the Salaam Reads series, there’s a lot you won’t be told about Muhammad. You won’t learn of Muhammad’s consummation of his marriage to little Aisha when she was six, or about the assassination of the poetess Asma bint Marwan or the killing of the elderly Jewish poet Abu ‘Afak, who had mocked Muhammad in verse. You won’t find out about Muhammad’s raid on the Khaybar Oasis, where this “Perfect Man” seized loot from the inoffensive Jewish farmers, and in the afternoon took for himself as a sex slave a Jewish girl, Safiyya, whose husband, father, and brothers Muhammad had had killed that very morning. You won’t hear about the slaughter of 600-900 members of the Banu Qurayza in Medina after they had surrendered.

When the Salaam Reads books start to come out, see if you can find anywhere in their texts “kitman” and “taqiyya.” You won’t find those words printed on the pages. But not to worry: they’ll both be staring you in the face.

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Filed Under: Featured, Useful idiots Tagged With: Salaam Reads, Simon & Schuster


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Comments

  1. miriamrove says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 1:24 pm

    Sallam read: How to white wash and brain wash our children. M

    • mortimer says

      Mar 1, 2016 at 1:58 pm

      If Nazis could print books for children about Hitler, the Holocaust and World War II, it would be whitewashed in a similar manner with similar subliminal supremacist messages.

      What? No messages about how women half the value and intelligence of men? How about how daddy has the right to beat up mommy any time he wants? How about daddy is bringing how three new wives to replace mommy?

      Simon and Schuster should consider dropping this theocratic fascism. We can drop buying their books as well.

      Messages to Simon and Schuster: BOYCOTT.

      • mortimer says

        Mar 1, 2016 at 1:59 pm

        Corrections: What? No messages about how women have half the value and intelligence as men? How about how daddy has the right to beat up mommy any time he wants? How about daddy is bringing home three new wives to replace mommy?

        • copakeman says

          Mar 1, 2016 at 3:05 pm

          daddy also has the right to cut off his wife’s and daughter’s head whenever he feels they have become a burden, and kill as many unbelievers as he can..

          Why isn’t a girl or girls included in this playful “salaem reads” book ?

          Curious ?

        • Carolyne says

          Mar 2, 2016 at 10:57 am

          Here are a couple of math questions for the book.

          Three men testify in court and six women testify. How many men do the six women equal?
          Answer: 3

          Ahmed murdered eight Kaffir but two escaped. How many kaffir were there altogether:
          Answer: 10

          And

          Little Ahmed and his sister, Fatima, were invited to a birthday party by a schoolmate named Jimmy. Their mother told them they could not go. What was the reason?
          Answer: Superior Muslims must not make friends with the Kaffir, Jimmy, because he is descended from pigs and monkeys. Ahmed and Fatima’s father went to the party in their stead. wearing an exploding vest

          Ahmed’s father decided to take a second wife, nine year old Emine Fatima’s playmate. Fatima’s father accepted a dowry in exchange for his baby daughter. Kaffir laws forbid this. What did Ahmed’s father do?
          Answer: Married her anyway and raped her. She remains in hospital recovering form the damage caused by the rape. She will recover, but will not be able to bear children when she is an adult.

          There are endless possibilities for writing an instructional book about Islam.

          Hmmmm–I think I’ll write a book.

      • Shane says

        Mar 2, 2016 at 10:06 am

        Nothing about jihad being the duty of all Muslims and nothing about barbaric and misogynistic sharia law will be in the book. How about a chapter on honor killing and one on female genital mutilation?

  2. Adrian says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 1:26 pm

    Yes, “how enriching” for all non-Muslims to read along with Salaam, and reduce their hard-fought Western liberties…

    the Western elites are so in love with this suicidal urge…

  3. gravenimage says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 1:47 pm

    Hugh Fitzgerald: Simon & Schuster Gets With The Program
    ……………………

    This normalizing of Islam and brainwashing of our children has been going on for some time now–it is just becoming more blatant all the time.

    Here’s one disgusting example for very young children:

    “I Can Wear Hijab Anywhere!”

    http://www.amazon.com/I-Can-Wear-Hijab-Anywhere/dp/0860373193

    Will it also let these little girls know the risk they run of being “Honor Killed” if they *don’t* wear Hijab? Don’t count on it…

    • mortimer says

      Mar 1, 2016 at 2:06 pm

      “…normalizing of Islam and brainwashing of our children ”

      Next, they will ‘normalize’ PEDOPHILIA and brainwash our children to accept it.

      If pedophilia is wrong, then Islam is false.
      ,

    • billybob says

      Mar 2, 2016 at 8:16 am

      There will be a part about Kevin proudly celebrating First Communion, another about Moises at his Bar Mitzvah, and yet another about Musa going off to have her genitals mutilated… Oh, wait…

      • Atheist7 says

        Mar 2, 2016 at 8:24 am

        That is truly great. Genital mutilation should at least get their attention. But how about Neil going off to the Hayden Planetarium to study Cosmology?

  4. Ashley says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 2:12 pm

    It would be more fitting if the boys’ names were Jihadi John, Nidal Hasan, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, and Robert Spencer.

    THAT would be a children’s book worth reading…

    • KABOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM says

      Mar 1, 2016 at 11:10 pm

      Excellent.

    • Dacritic says

      Mar 2, 2016 at 10:19 am

      Haha. Genius from you, Ashley.

  5. JawsV says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 2:19 pm

    What a bunch of hooey.

  6. AlphaOmega says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 3:09 pm

    What language will this wonderful, peace seeking book be printed in ? OH NO, not the infidel English language. Will the peaceful Islamic people burn down a few more US embassies ?

  7. Atheist7 says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 3:11 pm

    So for teaching the real Islam and making happy children’s stories, we know that Muhammad was very bad, but let us not forget poor Timur. We don’t want to hurt his feelings now do we? So we should include at least one story about Timur: From Wikipedia (they couldn’t print it if it wasn’t true) we have: Timur invaded Baghdad in June 1401. After the capture of the city, 20,000 of its citizens were massacred. Timur ordered that every soldier should return with at least two severed human heads to show him. When they ran out of men to kill, many warriors killed prisoners captured earlier in the campaign, and when they ran out of prisoners to kill, many resorted to beheading their own wives.[49]. The real history of the Ottoman empire, with particular emphasis on how women and Kafirs are to be treated, should be required education for all school children.

  8. Jack Diamond says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 6:00 pm

    And after the slaughter of every man and adolescent boy of the Banu Qurayza, Muhammad sold the women and children into slavery (model of conduct) and took the most beautiful girl, Rayhana, all of 15 ((a little old for him) all for himself. Quite the story for young Muslim boys, her father and brothers and husband killed by Muhammad, then she is taken by Muhammad for his “gratification”, and since she refused to be his wife he just made her his sex slave. Other women were doled out as sex slaves for his men (“war booty” and remember the Qur’an has a chapter called “Spoils of War”) and then he divided up all the wealth and treasure of the Banu Qurayza as plunder for the Muslims. Because without a truce or “dhimmi” pact, the blood and treasure of disbelievers is allowable to Muslims. Muhammad said so. Model of conduct, perfect man, Seal of the Prophets. Islam for boys: booty and plunder, slavery and captives to rape. An excellent model of conduct for young Muslim Mo to aspire to.

    No none of this will likely be in Salaam Reads. Nor will “there are no animals viler than those who do not believe and remain disbelievers” (in 98:6 “the worst of creatures”); or “a Believer will not be killed for an infidel” (Abu Dawud bk39n4491); or Bukhari v.1bk2n25 “Allah’s Apostle said ‘I have been ordered (by Allah) to fight against the people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped (but Allah) and that Muhammad is Allah’s Apostle and offer the prayers and give the obligatory charity, so if they perform all that, THEN they save their lives and property from me” or “then their blood and their riches are inviolable from your hands (Muslims)” Sahih Muslim bk031n.5917. It won’t be in Salaam Reads, unfortunately it will be in the Qur’an and Sunnah.

    That kaffir blood and property are for the taking by Muslims except when protected by dhimmi pact or (temporary) peace treaty is not something Musa, Moises, and Kevin are supposed to know. That the relationship of the Muslim to the non-Muslim otherwise is one of hate and enmity and a state of war, is also something they are not to know. Until it is too late, that is.

  9. Angemon says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 6:18 pm

    When we Muslims fast, our fast is total, and goes from dawn to dusk.

    So basically you fast, take a break for dinner and breakfast, and fast again the next day. And you claim the Christian fast in not “total”. Hmmmmmm………

    You know what? I bet muslims couldn’t keep up with Christian fasting. And for any muslim stating otherwise, I dare him/her to do this for the whole of ramadan:

    http://news.nationalpost.com/toronto/man-will-drink-just-beer-no-solid-food-for-the-40-days-of-lent

    • TH says

      Mar 2, 2016 at 2:42 am

      Ramadam is a sham. Fasting from sunrise to sunset and then gorging themselves. They gain more weight in Ramadam than at any other time of year. As for Christian charity,in the early Christian centuries the pagans considered Christians foolish for they way they excercized Christian charity. There was no such thing in classical civilization. A general or politician would give out largesse on the occasion of his triumph or such, bread and cirucses for the masses, but nothing like Christian charity which is giving to any needy people with nothing in exchange. This was a revolution in the classical world.

      Today I read in a Spanish Catholic website that some cloistered nuns decided to give over part of their convent to the care of refugees. Hopefully, they are not foolish and will not be rapted by muslim “refugees”.

  10. abad says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 6:48 pm

    Salaam, hale shoma chetori?

    BTW Kevin must be an Irish Catholic.

  11. Pumbar says

    Mar 1, 2016 at 10:14 pm

    That’s all in the English editions of “salaam raids (sorry, reads)”. The arabic version will be very different.

  12. dumbledoresarmy says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 1:46 am

    Sneaky parents, by way of counter-attack, could point their older kids in the direction of Bosch Fawstin’s “Pigman” graphic novels.

    Or the hilarious cartoons – in the style of Ripley’s old “Believe It Or Not” series – that were done by an apostate, and linked at Ali Sina’s Faithfreedom site, entitled (I think) “Mohammed’s Believe It – Or Else!”.

  13. jim says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 1:52 am

    “Musa, Moises, Mo, and Kevin”

    Tells you immediately something about islam- it’s NOT intended for girls….

  14. dumbledoresarmy says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 1:57 am

    Thought for the day – and Mr Spencer and Mr Fitzgerald, and the collective jihadwatch regulars’ Brains Trust – should, I think, devote some thought to the subject:

    *What* sort of book, graphic novel, comic strip or animated cartoon would be suitable to tell children and teenagers the truth about Mohammed and Islam, sufficient to inoculate them against the varieties of Dawa and Islamic deception that they *will* encounter – *are* already encountering? What will put the girls – and that includes the preteen girls, the girls of nine, ten, eleven twelve – on their guard against ‘ Mohammedan male predators…including those who will present as super-charming potential dates?

    Bear in mind that kids have stronger stomachs than many give them credit for. One doesn’t need to be totally gruesome but the ugliness of Islam could, I think, be communicated truthfully if the writers and artists use their intelligence.

    We have writers and artists among our number.

    If the publishers won’t publish truthful materials it will be up to our counter-jihad movement to *self-publish*: to produce kid-suitable or teen-suitable high-quality materials that can be circulated as samizdat, to concerned grandparents, parents, godparents, aunts, uncles…. and yes, schoolteachers, librarians, sunday-school teachers, church youth workers.

    Shoutout to all and sundry: if you have chlldren, or are in contact with children or teens or young people in their twenties, *have* you done something to educate and warn them about the nature and dangers of Islam.. something that has *worked*? If so, what was it? How did you do it?

    • Atheist7 says

      Mar 2, 2016 at 8:10 am

      Your suggestions are spot on. I might add that it may be difficult to explain the “true” Islam without grossing out young kids. A good approach would be to make a comparison between the freedoms and restrictions that are placed on kids in Saudi Arabia and contrast that with freedoms and restrictions placed on kids in the United States. “How Islam conquered Turkey” (and many other countries) could be the title of a children’s book. I suppose that one could also have a cartoon book on Muhammad and other rulers on the Ottoman Empire and their fascination with making piles of severed human heads. I don’t know how the child psychology would play out here.
      The first time I read the Old Testament I just thought that The LORD was someone to be obeyed and feared. I thought that that was the way things should be. The killing of the “first born” did not sink in. The second time I read the same material I thought that the writings were the work of violent desert barbarians who demand submission. By then I had developed the idea that infanticide and the killing on innocent people for the crime of disobedience to God was an evil thing. So if kids read the true story of Muhammad by itself, they might actually think that that is the way things should be. It is therefore important to have a side-by-side comparison. For example: here in Islamic lands we have Sharia Law and serious restrictions of freedom versus here in America we have Secular Law with only moderate restrictions of freedom.

  15. OldVet says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 6:05 am

    What a Propaganda Ministry Simon and Schustsr are tuning into! Why, not just put in a bit about imans beating their pupils with a stick when teaching them to chant the Koran? I’m sure the kiddies would enjoy getting beaten as practice for when they are adults – wife beating and whippings by the religious police in Islamic countries.

  16. Dacritic says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 10:17 am

    You also won’t hear about Aisya (the bride whom Muhammad raped when she was nine) talking about a Jewish woman who laughed after having gone insane at seeing so many of her family members and friends having their heads lobbed off in one single afternoon. You also won’t hear that Aisya, the child, was herself with Muhammad watching these beheadings as they went on. What that does to a child, one can only guess. Then again, she was raped at nine.

    Hugh Fitzgerald is quickly becoming one of my favourite authors on Islam, and he has hit another home run with this one.

  17. Biff H says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 10:56 am

    What literature is currently available for a young and upcoming takfiri? Shouldn’t there be a book that Muslim children can comprehend that lays out the rationalizations a faithful Muhammadanian can turn too to justify butchering his co-raligionists? You can’t leave the kiddies drifting in the wind on subjects that impact the well-being of the Umma. A working title – When you slice and dice, be nice.

  18. Jay Boo says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 11:00 am

    Muslims wipe with —the Left

  19. Mae says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 11:47 am

    Of course, Simon and Schuster has every right to publish whatever books they choose and place them in whatever category they wish. However, may we assume that this book and all the subsequent indoctrination will be placed in the Fiction section of S&S’s catalogue?

    When there is ample evidence all around us that Islam is not a religion of peace but of political and physical conquest, leave it to the Dhimmis to make every effort to remove the truth from the marketplace.

  20. Nathan says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 12:27 pm

    Generally speaking, it’s a good idea to provide children an age-appropriate way to become aware of the existence of a religion that millions of people worldwide identify with. Children aren’t born monsters (of the ISIS-type), and most of them never go in that direction. Why should children learn to judge other children because of the religious tradition they are raised in? That would come pretty close to racism, wouldn’t it?

    Another issue is backward-facing philosophies and practices that make life more burdensome than it has to be. They can be identified in every society and to various degrees, and none should be exempt from criticism. That’s the essence of progressivism, the spirit that pulled our forefathers out of the similarly totalitarian religious conditions of the middle-ages, a time none of us want to return to.

    My warning is that releasing exaggerated criticism on all people who identify with Islam, and failing to explicitly exempt millions of upright, decent folks among them, speaks to a low-minded part of the reader. Reproachable as many of Islam’s doctrines and cultural practices may be, wholesale ideological condemnation (also questionable) easily leads to support, however passive it may be, for the mass murder currently being carried out in the Muslim-majority Middle East by consent or impotence of all world powers. That must not stand uncalled.

    • dumbledoresarmy says

      Mar 2, 2016 at 9:33 pm

      ‘exaggerated criticism’.

      Really?

      How can one ‘exaggerate’ criticism of a belief system that teaches its adherents to 1/ kill any adherent who leaves or tries to leave the cult (because Mohammed is firmly held to have said, “If anyone changes his DEEN [religion, that is, Islam – ed], KILL HIM” and 2 / kill anyone who criticises it (exhibit A: the dead body of Theo Van Gogh)??

      Those two features alone – which are not kooky way-out ‘fringe’ elements but are *core* elements of historic and classical Islamic practice and shape the conduct of individual mohammedans. Mohammedan families, and Mohammedan societies worldwide *today* – are ‘deal-breakers’, as far as I am concerned.

      (The wife-beatng verse, Quran 4.34, is also pretty decisive. And the extremely unhealthy validation and promotion of ‘marriage’ to little little girls which is established by the precedent of Mohammed’s wedding of little Aisha when she was six, and his bedding of her when she turned nine).

      Also: I am SICK AND TIRED of playing the deadly game called ‘Muslim Roulette”. Playing that game involves, for example, hiring Muslims to look after your kids… and then one day the nice Muslim nanny becomes really really devout and slices off your little kid’s *head*. It involves an Israeli supermarket hiring a nice local Arab Muslim to work in the supermarket … and he’s nice and he’s smiling and his background check (I bet there was one) didn’t show any danger signals, and he becomes a ‘trusty’ and is allowed to stay in the complex after hours… and he comes up to the Jewish security guard and politely asks to be let out of the building,… and as the guard is getting the keys, this same nice, smiling, trusted mohammedan … grabs an axe and hacks at the guard from behind, and keeps on hacking at him after he is down, and then takes out a mobile phone and *photographs* the bloodied dying body of the Jewish victim and then,… strolls coolly out of the opened door into the night.

      Because – and here’s something Mohammed is firmly believed to have said – “War is deceit”. And the dar al Islam is perpetually at war with the dar al Harb. At bottom, we ’cause’ jihad merely by being-Infidel.

      You need to read William Kilpatrick.

      “The Vast Majority Myth,” by William Kilpatrick, Crisis Magazine, December 15, 2015:

      http://www.crisismagazine.com/2015/the-vast-majority-myth

      Your advice would, presumably, be to *not* warn children about the many negative elements of classical Islam at all; and kids who are not fore-warned are going to end up converting to Islam like one Aussie boy did, and went off to Syria, and blew himself up; and girls who are not warned to be wary of smiling mohammedans may end up like the thousands of raped-and-pimped girls in the UK, treated like sh*t by Muslim sex gangs, or marry their charming mohammedan boyfriend and find themselves descending into a living death of uber-abuse. Or like that naive couple in Russia who are mourning their little girl who was *beheaded* by the nice Muslim nanny that they naively hired and whose increasing Islamic fervour they benignly sought to ‘understand’.

      Why *can’t* one express ‘wholesale ideological condemnation* of what is, manifestly, a death cult??

      I don’t see any real difference between Islam and, say, the Thuggee cult. Or Nazism. Or Maoism. Or the ideology that is ruining North Korea.

      Some things are just so completely condemnable that wholesale condemnation is *appropriate* and *healthy*.

      • Nathan says

        Mar 5, 2016 at 3:40 am

        Thank you for your thought-provoking response and also the article link.

        You speak as if you have a wealth of experience in dealing with Muslims, if you say you’re “sick and tired” of playing that game. Yet the examples you provide suggest that your outrage is largely vicarious. I can contrast that directly with my personal experience of being embraced and called “brother” by numerous Muslims from the Middle East, while I make no secret about being independent of any religious confession myself. My current circumstances and this particular moment in history make such meetings possible. Yet prejudices like the ones you express here would act as roadblocks and create an environment with cold borders and social segregation – prerequisites for the development of parallel cultures marked by mutual hate, and for the growth of systemic injustice.

        A Syrian recently described his town to me, saying that his neighbor to the left was Christian, his neighbor to the right Druze, while he himself is Muslim. The Christian neighbor got married to a woman of another faith, and friends and neighbors were invited to celebrate the interfaith wedding in front of the church, regardless of their respective religion. They all had a wonderful day and there were no tensions. I hope you wouldn’t label the country of Syria a “Mohammedan society”?

        Literal interpretation of canonical texts often carries the potential to lead adherents to excess/extremes. The antidote is proper education, a good portion of humanity and a bit of reason, which is what all of us need. And it doesn’t hurt to bring a certain amount of skepticism when reading old books. But what I will never do is write off entire populations because of one aspect of their cultural identity. That would not be adequate for dealing with the complexity of the world as we know it, and it would be a betrayal of the American values of justice I was raised to treasure.

        • Angemon says

          Mar 5, 2016 at 7:42 am

          Nathan posted:

          “A Syrian recently described his town to me, saying that his neighbor to the left was Christian, his neighbor to the right Druze, while he himself is Muslim. The Christian neighbor got married to a woman of another faith, and friends and neighbors were invited to celebrate the interfaith wedding in front of the church, regardless of their respective religion. They all had a wonderful day and there were no tensions. I hope you wouldn’t label the country of Syria a “Mohammedan society”?”

          Remember: the plural of “anecdote” is not “data:

          http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/syria-crisis-in-sacred-maaloula-where-they-speak-the-language-of-christ-war-leads-neighbours-into-8839610.html

          We knew our Muslim neighbours all our lives. Yes, we knew the Diab family were quite radical, but we thought they would never betray us. We ate with them. We are one people.

          (…)

          A few of the Diab family had left months ago and we guessed they were with the Nusra [al-Qaeda front]. But their wives and children were still here. We looked after them. Then, two days before the Nusra attacked, the families suddenly left the town. We didn’t know why. And then our neighbours led our enemies in among us.

          (…)

          We had excellent relations. It never occurred to us that Muslim neighbours would betray us. We all said “please let this town live in peace — we don’t have to kill each other.” But now there is bad blood. They brought in the Nusra to throw out the Christians and get rid of us forever.

          “Literal interpretation of canonical texts often carries the potential to lead adherents to excess/extremes.”

          Don’t do that. Don’t use muddled language. The quran, which the muslims claim to be the perfect word of allah, orders muslims to fight non-muslims until they convert or submit as dhimmies. The Bible does not command Jews and Christians to do the same. Plus, what are “excessive/extremist” Buddhists going to do? Immolate themselves?

          You don’t see Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Sikh, Hindu, etc., groups, on a worldwide scale, murdering people, rebelling against their governments and demanding to be ruled by their religious laws. Only muslims.

      • Keys says

        Mar 5, 2016 at 3:06 pm

        @Dumblesarmy and Angemon
        Thank you for replying to Nathan’s posts, which are well expressed and reasonable, but also deeply concerning, troubling, problematic, and perhaps ill-intentioned and agenda driven. Nathan may be sincere, but there is a trust issue that can not verified given the “lack of transparency” (ha, ha) and goals of CAIR, the Muslim Brotherhood, Jihad, etc. Wolves in sheeps clothing.

        Nathan says, for example, “My warning is that releasing exaggerated criticism on all people who identify with Islam….” I think he is saying that even if we do not criticize Muslims, we should not criticize Islam because to do so alienates millions of Muslims and puts the lives of non-muslims in danger. So, do not criticize Muslims, groups of Muslims, or Islam, because doing so will make one responsible for harming others. The mentality is that if you draw a picture of Mohammad and killing, rioting, and looting take place, you are responsible for all the mayhem. So just “shut up”. “Betrayal of American values”, indeed!

        And don’t you find this statement by Nathan ironic when comparing Islamic States to Western Democracies.
        “Yet prejudices like the ones you express here would act as roadblocks and create an environment with cold borders and social segregation – prerequisites for the development of parallel cultures marked by mutual hate, and for the growth of systemic injustice.”

        Nathan says, “Why should children learn to judge other children because of the religious tradition they are raised in?” This idea of tolerance is not what Islam teaches; this is not what is taught in the madras; not what Mohammad said; not the final teaching of Allah in the Koran, despite saying there is no compulsion in religion. Islam is submission, not toleration.

        All this, and more, is very troubling given what has happened in the US, Canada and Europe in the past few decades. We don’t want Islam jammed down our throats, consciously or unconsciously; and to use Nathan’s words: “That will not stand uncalled”.

        • Nathan says

          Mar 6, 2016 at 4:51 pm

          Only three weeks ago I was invited to a bar by two young men from Syria, where we each had a couple of beers. Incidentally, they are Muslim, and – taken strictly – Islam forbids drinking alcohol. What does this mean? (Martin Luther’s favorite question 😉 Are these men bad Muslims? Some would say yes. Are they untrustworthy – drinking alcohol to make me think they are not radical while they actually are, so at a point in the future they can find an opportunity to stab me in the back? I like to think of myself as being intellectually flexible, but that is a mental contortionist act so grotesque that only the writers of Homeland would be shameless enough to put it in the sales window. My take is that they’re normal guys, who understand their religion for what it is: part of their cultural heritage. To support this view, there’s a good example a little closer to home – from a “Western” perspective, that is: Italy. Four out of five Italians are Roman Catholic. Roman Catholicism – taken strictly – forbids using contraceptives. I would venture to say the observance rate for that prohibition is more like one out of five Italians, to be generous. Ask the average Italian why he’s Catholic, and he’ll tell you it’s because – he’s Italian! Of course there are also more pious and practicing types too, but that’s really their business, not ours.

          To Keys’ suggested interpretation on criticism, I stand by my original statement that no burdensome philosophies and practices should be exempt from criticism. And one step further, everything sacred, holy and true should be satired, parodied and lampooned. The Name of the Rose, work of the great Italian writer Umberto Eco †RIP comes to mind. On the other hand, when criticism starts to resemble a paranoid fear of every individual that identifies as Muslim, one’s sentiments become very difficult to distinguish from racism, that playground for the darkest of fantasies about a social group one may or may not have real experience with. I would like to think the vast majority of Americans are beyond that. Am I too much an idealist? Would you recommend I remove America as a people, in the shrine of my heart, from its place in the proud ranks of Western Democracies that treasure and practice freedom of religion and opportunity for all?

          Look, I hear Keys’ worries of having unwanted religious worldviews forced upon us. Before we barricade the front door and cock the shot gun, let’s look at the current situation. Millions of people have been driven from their homes by war. That has included violent and unwarranted home searches by government secret police; aerial bombings from government and foreign forces; beheadings and what-not by religious fanatics; and ruined careers, interrupted educations and hunger. That’s millions of people looking for a chance to start over and build a prosperous life. The refugees I’ve met here in Germany are highly motivated, polite and sincere. I’m happy to see them around town. I’m sorry America isn’t giving more of them the chance they deserve as our created equals. That would make good on the “good wishes” / promise we carried into the region in 2003, at least for the ones lucky enough to be welcomed in.

        • Angemon says

          Mar 7, 2016 at 6:36 pm

          Nathan posted:

          “Only three weeks ago I was invited to a bar by two young men from Syria, where we each had a couple of beers. Incidentally, they are Muslim, and – taken strictly – Islam forbids drinking alcohol.”

          Nope. Not “strictly”. There’s no such thing as “strict” islam. There is islam, a set of ideas, and some people adhere to it closely while others ignore cherry pick and/or ignore, willingly or not, parts of it.

          Also, the plural of “anecdote” is not “data”.

          “What does this mean? (Martin Luther’s favorite question 😉 Are these men bad Muslims? Some would say yes.”

          Who? Who are these people who would say they’re bad muslims?

          “Are they untrustworthy – drinking alcohol to make me think they are not radical while they actually are, so at a point in the future they can find an opportunity to stab me in the back?”

          Is there any reason to immediately rule out that idea?

          “I like to think of myself as being intellectually flexible, but that is a mental contortionist act so grotesque that only the writers of Homeland would be shameless enough to put it in the sales window.”

          So, basically, there is no reason to immediately rule out that idea, therefore, ridicule. Snarky sophistry to hide the lack of proper reasoning – how original…

          “My take is that they’re normal guys, who understand their religion for what it is: part of their cultural heritage.”

          Ah, so now you get to decide what islam is and what islam isn’t?

          “To support this view, there’s a good example a little closer to home – from a “Western” perspective, that is: Italy. Four out of five Italians are Roman Catholic. Roman Catholicism – taken strictly – ”

          Nope. Not “strictly”. There’s no such thing as “strict” Catholicism. There is Catholicism, a set of ideas, and some people adhere to it closely while others ignore cherry pick and/or ignore, willingly or not, parts of it.

          “forbids using contraceptives. I would venture to say the observance rate for that prohibition is more like one out of five Italians, to be generous. Ask the average Italian why he’s Catholic, and he’ll tell you it’s because – he’s Italian! Of course there are also more pious and practicing types too, but that’s really their business, not ours.”

          Using contraceptives, stabbing you in the back – same thing, really, right? All religions have their “extremists”. It doesn’t matter if Catholic “extremists” wear condoms and islamic “extremists” want to kill you – “extremists” are “extremists”, and all “extremism” is equally bad. For example, an extremely bad doctor and an extremely good doctor? Same thing – both are “extremists”, therefore none of them can be any good, right? Better go with the “passable”, “so-so” or “average” doctor that with an “extremely” good doctor – we don’t want to take risks, do we?

          “On the other hand, when criticism starts to resemble a paranoid fear of every individual that identifies as Muslim,”

          Ah, so in addition to deciding what islam is and isn’t, now you get to decide how much criticism of islam is allowed or not – and what constitutes a mental illness or not.

          “one’s sentiments become very difficult to distinguish from racism,”

          Because criticizing a set of ideas and thinking that, for example, one specific individual likes watermelon and fried chicken because of the color of his skin, is pretty much the same thing, right?

          “that playground for the darkest of fantasies about a social group one may or may not have real experience with.”

          Says the guy who gave us a couple of (allegedly real) examples and tried to extrapolate that they were representative of all muslims worldwide…

          “I would like to think the vast majority of Americans are beyond that. Am I too much an idealist? Would you recommend I remove America as a people, in the shrine of my heart, from its place in the proud ranks of Western Democracies that treasure and practice freedom of religion and opportunity for all?”

          Cue in the crybully.

          “Look, I hear Keys’ worries of having unwanted religious worldviews forced upon us. Before we barricade the front door and cock the shot gun, let’s look at the current situation.”

          Why do I have the feeling it’ll be a jaundiced view overlooking important facts?

          “Millions of people have been driven from their homes by war. That has included violent and unwarranted home searches by government secret police; aerial bombings from government and foreign forces; beheadings and what-not by religious fanatics; and ruined careers, interrupted educations and hunger. That’s millions of people looking for a chance to start over and build a prosperous life.”

          Cue in the usual “it’s just people escaping war, they will be thrilled to have a place to live peacefully” nonsense. People have their own ideas and feelings and worldviews and motivations, and lumping everyone like that is… what was it that you said? Oh, yeah, “very difficult to distinguish from racism”, on the grounds of “fantasies about a social group one may or may not have real experience with”.

          “The refugees I’ve met here in Germany are highly motivated, polite and sincere. I’m happy to see them around town.”

          Again, the nonsensical “I’ve met a couple good, nice < insert group here >, therefore all < insert group here > are good, nice people” fallacy – that one never gets old, apparently.

          But let’s go with that “I know a couple of < insert group here >, therefore I know all < insert group here >” “logic”. The women in Cologne during new Year’s eve met plenty of refugees they didn’t like – you know, the sort of people who are not thrilled to escape war and having a place to start over, but the sort of people who took that for granted because they, as muslims, deserved that, plus a wad of free money and girls to f***, whether those girls wanted it or not. Therefore, by your logic, we’re forced to assume that all “refugees” are like that.

          “I’m sorry America isn’t giving more of them the chance they deserve as our created equals.”

          Wait, that they *deserve*? What have they done to deserve anything out of America?

        • Nathan says

          Mar 9, 2016 at 1:07 pm

          I can only offer characterizations that are in keeping with my personal experience. Everyone who reads these comments can see that Angemon is twisting my words and putting words in my mouth. It should be clear that any traditional institutionalized religion may be adhered to by various degrees or not at all, which my examples also show. I confirm that my examples are all real and true accounts. It might be useful to add that I approach people from the Middle East with respect and speak to them in their own language (at least modern standard Arabic, since I don’t know any dialects yet, let alone Farsi or Kurdish). Typically my advances are met with affection and a keen interest in return. IMHO I have spoken with enough people to venture broader characterizations. As an aside, I remind that some of America’s great architectural icons were constructed at a time when leading intellectuals and historians were fascinated by the cultures of the Ancient Near East and our edifices were in fact partly inspired by the same.

          We would do well to regulate our fear and mistrust to more realistic levels. The attacks which took place in a handful of German cities on New Year’s Eve were real and they were wrong. Based on eyewitness reports, the perpetrators were from Morocco and Algeria, and many of them were already known to the police for previous misdeeds. I recall a German friend of mine telling me roughly 5 years ago that he hates Moroccans because of their thieving and belligerence. I personally have a closer acquaintance who is the perfect counterexample, but that nonetheless seems to be a somewhat trustworthy characterization for some western German cities.

          It would be obtuse to deny that our blue-eyed adventure in the Middle East starting in 2003 effectively set some high expectations in Iraq and the surrounding countries. And all those expectations have been thoroughly disappointed. In my view, the number of war refugees from the Middle East taken in by the USA (with adequate screening of course) can be used as a measure of the sincerity of American intentions in 2003, as well as of the overall humanitarian state of our country at present. The moment in which our fixation on the violent Islamist fanatics precludes the magical simplicity of face-to-face encounters between Americans and Arabs, is a sad moment for our country. I imagine it is precisely these encounters (between individuals of any race or creed) which the Hebrew folk song is referring to: “Hinneh ma tov uma naim / Shevet achim gam yachad” = “Look how good and wonderful it is / When brothers sit together” (my rough translation).

          I thank you all for the opportunity and hope that you have enjoyed our conversation at least as much as I have.

        • Angemon says

          Mar 9, 2016 at 2:38 pm

          Nathan posted:

          “I can only offer characterizations that are in keeping with my personal experience.”

          Like when you claim that the feelings and motivations of people you don’t know are akin to racism? Pull my other leg…

          “Everyone who reads these comments can see that Angemon is twisting my words and putting words in my mouth.”

          Which words have I twisted and which words have placed in your mouth? You know, since I quoted what you said and responded to it. C’mon, couldn’t you think of a more inconspicuous deflection that that?

          “It should be clear that any traditional institutionalized religion may be adhered to by various degrees or not at all, which my examples also show.”

          Your alleged examples meant to be taken as the norm are of individuals who barely adhere to their religion at all, as you acknowledge by saying that “some” would describe them as “bad muslims”.

          “We would do well to regulate our fear and mistrust to more realistic levels.”

          Said Bush when confronted with the perspective of a German terrorist group flying planes into buildings…

          “The attacks which took place in a handful of German cities on New Year’s Eve were real and they were wrong. Based on eyewitness reports, the perpetrators were from Morocco and Algeria, and many of them were already known to the police for previous misdeeds.”

          Were there many non-muslims among them? Because it seems you’re trying to steer the conversation away from religious beliefs and into ethnicity.

          “It would be obtuse to deny that our blue-eyed adventure in the Middle East starting in 2003 effectively set some high expectations in Iraq and the surrounding countries. And all those expectations have been thoroughly disappointed.”

          I’ll let you figure out the error in that…

          “In my view, the number of war refugees from the Middle East taken in by the USA (with adequate screening of course) can be used as a measure of the sincerity of American intentions in 2003, as well as of the overall humanitarian state of our country at present.”

          It’s not the sincere motivations of the US that’s the issue here. It’s the motivations of the people you’re taking in.

          “The moment in which our fixation on the violent Islamist fanatics precludes the magical simplicity of face-to-face encounters between Americans and Arabs, is a sad moment for our country.”

          Do you really believe that if a muslim, Arab or not (again, you’re trying to move from religion to ethnicity) is not foaming at the mouth and shouting “DEATH TO AMERICA” then he’s a peaceful, law-abiding “moderate” muslim? For example, Abdul Rahman al-Amoudi was the go-to moderate, pro-American muslim in the 90’s. Where is he now? Oh, yeah – doing 20-something years for funding terrorism. Journalists referred to him as “an expert in the art of deception”. What, there’s no need to worry about muslim terrorists posing as “refugees” because meeting Arabs face-to-face is “magical” or something?

          Sheesh, talk about a defective amygdala…

    • Western Canadian says

      Mar 6, 2016 at 9:14 pm

      Your knowledge base for islam, is so thin as to be measurable only in microns.

  21. Keys says

    Mar 2, 2016 at 12:48 pm

    Will there be a lavishly illustrated chapter, Bacha Bazi, about Salaam proudly serving as a “dancing boy”?

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