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Exposing the role that Islamic jihad theology and ideology play in the modern global conflicts

Failure of Democracy in Muslim Countries Eludes So-Called Experts

Nov 27, 2016 9:10 am By Andrew Harrod

francis-fukuyama

Given American policymakers’ ignorance of Islam, “I am just worried about people like me running around with big theories trying to set foreign policy,” stated famed intellectual historian Francis Fukuyama in Washington, D.C. His confession occurred at “Democracy in the Arab World: The Obama Legacy and Beyond,” a recent conference that did little to alleviate the knowledge deficit among hackneyed Islamism apologists.

Fukuyama’s luncheon address at the downtown JW Marriot luxury hotel focused on the cultural factors that aided the development of modern societies. While China benefited from the appearance 2,300 years ago of the “first modern, relatively impersonal state,” Fukuyama said, the “Arab world [is] where I think the fundamental problem is” for human progress today. Although he worried that the U.S. had not made an effort to understand Muslim societies comparable to its Cold War study of Russia, Fukuyama’s own knowledge of Islam was spotty. He described an often repressive and all-encompassing sharia law as a mere “balance to political power.”

Referencing the late scholar Ernest Gellner, Fukuyama maintained that “contemporary Islamism is basically just a different version of European nationalism in the nineteenth century.” Just as Europeans transitioning from intimate rural communities to urban anonymity during industrialization sought a new identity, Islamists invoke a “universal umma that extends all the way from Morocco to Jakarta.”  Similarly, this Islamism appeals to alienated second-generation European Muslim immigrants. Left unexamined was whether the cosmic worldview of a faith like Islam has considerably more ideological content, and can incite far more zeal, than nationalist allegiances, particularly in an increasingly globalized world.

At least Fukuyama didn’t minimize jihadist terrorism, unlike the preceding panelist, anti-Israel commentator Peter Beinart. He decried the “rise of ISIS and a massive increase fueled by cable news [coverage] of the threat of terror that emerged in 2014” and reflected upon President Barack Obama’s shared view that the “threat of terrorism had been exaggerated.” Obama rejected former President George W. Bush’s “war on terrorism” as the “new Cold War, the new World War II; there was fascism and communism, and now there was jihadism.”

In contrast to totalitarianism’s past appeal to, and rule over, millions, few “believed that you could build a new prosperous world based on the ideas of Osama bin Laden,” Beinart declared. His sanguine analysis ignored that faith-based jihadists have eternal timeframes capable of minimizing material setbacks. Contrary to the Third Reich’s twelve-year nightmare and the Cold War’s long twilight victory, Pope Francis’s warning of a “third [world] war … fought piecemeal” with jihadist movements and regimes worldwide has no end in sight.

Conference literature omitted the unsavory connection between this new kind of Third World War and Azmi Bishara, an Israeli-Arab writer and accused Hezb’allah operative who gave his conference keynote address online from Qatar. With terrorism charges hindering an American entry visa, this general director of the Qatari Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies (ACRPS) hosted the conference via ACRPS’s Washington, D.C. affiliate. The former Knesset member fled Israel in 2007 to escape charges of helping Hezb’allah plot terrorist attacks against Israeli targets.

Reiterating his anti-Zionist take on Palestinian “territory occupied in 1948,” Bishara’s address text condemned Israel’s “colonial apartheid” and claimed conspiratorially that “Israel’s security was the fetish for whose sake [the] rights of people were sacrificed” during the “Arab Spring.” Contradicting Fukuyama’s speculations, Bishara insisted that “it is not the Islamization of society that makes people afraid of change” and that the “obstacle for democracy in the Arab world is not the political culture.” His assessment that “post-Islamic Brotherhood” parties with an “Islamic identity,” such as the “Christian Democratic parties of Europe,” are emerging in Tunisia and Turkey was wildly optimistic.

Likewise, Princeton University political science professor and boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) supporter Ms. Amaney Jamal labored to blame Israel for democracy’s poor prospects in the Arab world.  In yet another example of what Islam scholar Martin Kramer critiques as the false “linkage” between Israel and sundry Middle East problems, one of her slides listed the “Arab-Israeli Conflict as an Obstacle to Reform.” Another slide alleged that the “percent who say it is an impediment” from Arab countries ranges from 84 percent (Lebanon) to 33 percent (Algeria). Because dictatorships seek international investment by suppressing anti-Israel sentiment, Jamal maintained that the Arab-Israeli conflict is “always going to keep investors out of the region.”

ACRPS associate researcher Abdulwahab Al-Qassab strained credulity elsewhere by stating that in 2003, “Iraq, actually, before the invasion, was a secular state” and that in “Arab society in Iraq, we had many strong unifying factors.” Such claims reflect al-Qassab’s outlandish assertion at a 2014 conference that Iraqi “society was known throughout history to be a well-integrated one, notwithstanding its diversity.” Critical observers should maintain a healthy skepticism toward a former major-general under the brutal Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein promoting “diversity.”

More realistic were the comments of Qassab’s fellow ACRPS associate researcher, Marwan Kabalan, and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Arab studies scholar Michele Dunne. Kabalan rightfully noted that “moderate” Syrian rebels are “lacking the ideological motivations that exist among the jihadis,” who “are actually bound by a very strong ideological bond.”

Dunne emphasized that Westernization had made Tunisia, the Arab world’s current hope for democracy, a “bit different from other Arab countries.” The “population was in general more educated … women were more liberated and empowered … the middle class was a bit larger … [and] the military was less involved in politics,” while Tunisia “was more connected to Europe.” “All of these things turned out to be very, very important,” she concluded.

Such realism reflects Fukuyama’s insight that not all cultural beliefs equally favor the development of peaceful and prosperous societies with liberty under law. Critical inquiry into Islamic doctrine and its troubled relationship with democracy will be necessary for overcoming the knowledge deficit in the free world’s latest struggle against tyranny. Whether ACRPS, based in Muslim Brotherhood-supporting Qatar, can alleviate this deficit is highly questionable.

Andrew E. Harrod is a freelance researcher and writer who holds a Ph.D. from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a J.D. from George Washington University Law School.  He is a fellow with the Lawfare Project.  Follow him on Twitter at @AEHarrod.  This essay was sponsored by Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum. It was cross-posted from The American Thinker.

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Filed Under: academia, Useful idiots, willful ignorance Tagged With: Abdulwahab Al-Qassab, Amaney Jamal, Azmi Bishara, Francis Fukuyama, Peter Beinart


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Comments

  1. Angemon says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 9:31 am

    Referencing the late scholar Ernest Gellner, Fukuyama maintained that “contemporary Islamism is basically just a different version of European nationalism in the nineteenth century.”

    That, alone, should have been more than enough to have him laughed off the room and into delivering his “Official Pundit” badge…

    • Alarmed Pig Farmer says

      Nov 27, 2016 at 10:49 am

      That’s the key problem: nobody is dismissed as an idiot or a liar anymore. Prez Barack declares his economic program a success even though income is way down and debt is way up. Similarly, Hillary had the nerve to campaign on her foreign policy experience even though she was wrong on everything and over four seasons compiled a batting average of 0.00, way below the Mendoza Line. No derision, no dismissal, they just keep on keeping on like yesterday is irrelevant. This practice is especially dangerous when it comes to Moslems.

      • CrossWare says

        Nov 27, 2016 at 2:10 pm

        You are right, propaganda become everything. But that is cultural marxism for you. Everything is relative so nobody can talk about failure anymore.

  2. Peter says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 10:34 am

    One doesn’t need “theories,” one needs facts. For example, Muhammad was a self-declared terrorist: “I have been made victorious with terror,” per Sahih Bukhari Volume 4 Book 52 (authentic) Hadith 220. You don’t need to be an expert to see that people are murdered every day on planet Earth (as opposed to the Islam is a “religion of peace, justice, tolerance and fairness” fantasy la-la-land) in the name of Allah.

  3. Alarmed Pig Farmer says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 10:35 am

    … he worried that the U.S. had not made an effort to understand Muslim societies.

    Try looking up some damned facts, or would that be too much effort? But the professor intellectual crowd prefers to deal in symbols, they’re neater and can be moved around the game board as dictated by real world events. The only real work product intellectuals give us on Islam is approach avoidance and confusion. Fukuyama may have been right about the end of history; that would be when the Moslems take over the world and the Sunni and Shia cut a permanent peace deal.

    • PRCS says

      Nov 27, 2016 at 11:41 am

      “Critical inquiry into Islamic doctrine and its troubled relationship with democracy will be necessary for overcoming the knowledge deficit in the free world’s latest struggle against tyranny.”

      So, when does it begin?

  4. Schrödinger says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 11:35 am

    Hot on the heels of what events prove was prematurely perceived to be the end of communism and the Cold War, we recall Francis Fukuyama released his popular 1993 book, boldly titled The End of History and the Last Man. It celebrated what he proclaimed the inevitable triumph of liberal democracy and capitalism over all other economic systems and forms of government.

    Even reading this book at that time — well before 9/11 — it struck me as more than a trifle impetuous to be making any such claim. It had indeed overlooked one or two things, events soon proving it’s thesis far more fundamentally flawed than he and most people then realised. Not only those associated with the Muslim Brotherhood but muslims in general had other ideas of the trajectory of history. It’s doubtful Fukuyama was familiar, in those overly confident times, with edifying literature such as The Reliance of the Traveller, the works of Sayid Qutb, Malik’s The Quranic Concept of War or delightful reading such as Abu Bakr Naji’s The Management of Savagery — a primer for al Qaeda and Islamic State operatives. To be fair, very few of us were. They weren’t all translated into English; neither had their imperatives been as translated into action as since. However it appears Fukuyama’s still to get around to perusing them, even being aware of them.

    To his credit, and even though he hasn’t released a “revised” edition of his book — given that would be somewhat contradictory for anything so self assuredly titled — he’s wised up a bit about islam since and is prepared to speak more honestly than many. His admittedly still rather muddled views on the subject have been expressed in a spirit of greater frankness than the blatant Taquiya and slanted, post modernist mumbo jumbo of the majority of the other illustrious speakers at this important conference.

  5. John A. Marre says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 11:44 am

    Try this: “Failure of pig farming in Muslim countries eludes experts.”
    Shouldn’t be hard to figure out. A Muslim country is ruled by a certain ideology. That ideology considers pigs as unclean.
    Same for democracy. A Muslim country is ruled by a certain ideology. That ideology considers democracy as wrong, and instead imposes a violent, oppressive, coercive totalitarian rule.

  6. Holly McMolly says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 11:46 am

    Religion, whether Islam, Judaism or Christianity, is a regressive and dangerous force. All religions must be opposed by people of good conscience who understand that solutions to life’s problems must be found by use of one’s brain, and not by appealing to made up nonsense.

    • Davegreybeard says

      Nov 27, 2016 at 1:35 pm

      @Holly McMolly says “
      “All religions must be opposed by people of good conscience who understand that solutions to life’s problems must be found by use of one’s brain, and not by appealing to made up nonsense.”

      It would be refreshing, Holly, if you actually used that brain that you claim to have.

      There is only one religion that poses a direct and palpable threat to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” and that one religion is Islam. Anyone with eyes to see and a working brain knows this.

      Furthermore, a natural and necessary ally of all people who would be free, yes including you Atheist Holly, are Christians. This is because any Muslim, converted to Christianity, ceases to be a threat.

      So pull your head out of your ass, Holly, and try to see the grand strategy and the big picture here.

      We should all be encouraging our Christian brothers and sisters to get off their butts and go out and proselytize amongst our Jihadist enemy – the freedom of mankind depends on it.

      Deus Vult

      • Tradiguy says

        Nov 27, 2016 at 2:00 pm

        The muslim is almost impossible to proselytise. Many have come to Christ but far more remain entrenched in the filth and hatred taken with their mothers milk. Indeed davegreybeard I agree that Holly is somewhat brain dead if she really thinks that all religions are a bad thing and we have to use our brains to reject it. Obviously an atheist and that’s a pity. I assure you she will know the truth one day. However, that aside, I agree that this Muslim threat is the largest threat the civilised world has ever faced and that was set up by the duplicitous, cowardly, back biting scumbag politicians who have betrayed their own people for their own gain. It won’t work, and they will pay a huge price – unfortunately we all will!

    • Vlad says

      Nov 27, 2016 at 4:09 pm

      “Religion, whether Islam, Judaism or Christianity, is a regressive and dangerous force. All religions must be opposed by people of good conscience who understand that solutions to life’s problems must be found by use of one’s brain, and not by appealing to made up nonsense.”

      Of course you are 100% correct, Holly. Religion is an invention of “man” and of course every Tom, Dick and Harry will denounce you for telling the Truth. Human stupidity knows no borders, none.

      But in defense of religions other then Shitslam, none of them are as idiotic as this death cult. Even the UnHoly Catholic Church had progressed since the middle ages and it’s witch-burnings and other atrocities in the name of an all loving god, that demanded obedience at the pain of death as had the Lutheran and other Denominations.
      Unfortunately, under Pope Dhimmy the First, the UnHoly Catholic Church is starting to revert back into the Middle Ages.

    • abad says

      Nov 27, 2016 at 4:49 pm

      Holly:

      Christians want to convert you.

      Muslims want to kill you.

    • sinantara says

      Nov 27, 2016 at 8:40 pm

      All civilizations have been based and are still based upon religion–the way people have been and are trying to make sense of existence. One of the products of religions has been morality. Hitler explicitly said that morality, particularly Christian morality, was an impediment to progress, that of the ubermensch. And look where it led too.

      Now one can call belief in God false, but all what one can do is keep building on what religion has constituted, calling God by other names, like dialectical materialism, in the end it will lead to immorality because there is no moral core. Dawkins has tried to explain morality biologically as evolved from the need for collaboration to balance the need for individual survival, and the survival of the fittest as beneficial to the species as a whole. But then why neglect the biological need for people to have a religion and the evolution of religion from Moloch to Jesus? That people have a biological need for religion can be from archeology, the Gobekli temple was constructed by hunter gatherers 10.000 BC…

      What atheists reject is mostly the God of their childhood, the flawed God of a flawed humanity… But these flaws are defined even by atheists based upon religion derived morality. If there were no God, Hitler would be right, because there is a kind of logic in his ideology, humanity suffers because of it is weak. So let’s eliminate the unter menschen, the retarded, the Jews, the Gypsies, the gays… We do that with our dogs, selective breeding, so why call line breeding incest if it is meant to improve the species, just get rid of the failures. That is why Cleopatra was not a retard but on the contrary very smart. That she had to kill siblings was good policy, if they were not failures they wouldn’t have failed, didn’t they. It is just that in the 21st century killing off siblings is considered to be bad manners, and Hitler too was to late in history. In earlier times conquest and genocide was the right of the strong and victorious (who were not just white heterosexual males).

      So God can be considered as a moral compass, a divine morality that doesn’t exist on earth. That said, yes, religious morality has been used and abused to justify crimes against humanity–homo sapien happens to be an aggressive, territorial and tribal species that distinguishes between us and them because it is hardwired to compete over breeding rights and hunting grounds. But we have also replaced the natural environment with a cultural one and are in the process of evolving a mundane and humanist civilization. In which we should evolve a God for all, a God who is not a white man with a beard in heaven or a narrow minded entity in love with a chosen human elevated to demigod who sends revelation to solve domestic problems.. or….or….. (fill in the blanks according to your own bias which I will respect).

      A God compatible with our present knowledge of the cosmos, Stephen Hawking equations and Seth Loyd’s cosmic computer. Still, people can not do with too abstract abstractions, we are hardwired to be artists and poets who have to translate reality in humanoid shapes. And we have to acknowledge that we are all midgets standing on the shoulders of past generations of midgets, some bigger some smaller but to call ourselves giants and our predecessors just midgets is dangerous hubris.

      Humanity has been created (or evolved) religious and it is better to be a little bit conservative than to be so progressive we become cultists shooting off in all directions, following every prophet the likes of Jim Jones and Applewhite. Navigation is looking backwards and forwards. We have to keep working on a morality that is really humane, and we have already come to agree on certain points, like the sanctity of human life, human rights, gender equality etc etc. These principles have to be projected back onto religious doctrine to interpret and then re interpret earlier ideals and endeavors. Which are mostly religiously motivated. This is how Islam and Christianity should converge, and the norm is already set, people have freedom of religion and freedom of not having a religion, but not the freedom to oppress. So I am optimistic, the west still gives me hope, as long as the west is not going too far with its relativism.

      Western civilization has been shaped by Judeo Christian values, period, and these values should not be thrown overboard because they are said to come from God we don’t believe in.

      Other religions? All have been instrumental in evolving morality, even Islam, but historical forces have stopped progress in Islam, the mistakes of the Muta’zilla to rely on state power, the sack of Baghdad by the Mongols, the takeover of the world of Islam by the Turks from the Arabs, the failure of Arab nationalism and the fallacy of Sayyid Qutb’s Islam is the solution, etc etc. It doesn’t mean Islam is a dead end, it can be reformed because it has to be reformed, and the alternative is WW3 and the nuclear annihilation of one party (after that Fukuyama’s end of history will be a fact).

      So to make short of the long, not religion is the source of all ills, humanity is, and religion is the way humanity has traveled to come where we are now. And the road is still long yet God is with us (what we should change is how we imagine God to be, we have indeed to get rid of the primitive anthropomorphism), for those who dare to venture into the unknown and dare to become pioneers).

      • sinantara says

        Nov 27, 2016 at 9:05 pm

        to add a little bit to the above, I have two scenarios in mind for WW3. One, a civil war starts in Europe when migrants keep pouring in and resistance becomes violent and organized and the conflict spiral out of control. What will happen, the world of Islam will unite and send mujahidin to Europe to defend the Muslims. And it may happen that Pakistan hands over the bomb to them). Two, ISIS is beaten and Turkey makes it move. And, the Kurds will fight back and Iraq and Syria defend their Kurds. Russia will intervene and Turkey will attack Russia calling upon Muslim solidarity world wide. And then what will NATO do?

  7. Tradiguy says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 1:42 pm

    A Satanic death cult hasn’t got the grace to form a democracy- the only thing they can do really well is hate and hate comes from only one source. It doesn’t matter who they hate as long as it’s someone! Christian folk are an easy target for these cowards but let’s think about this a minute. These savages tell the world that they have the truth. OK, which one is the truth? Sunni or Shite! You see, they can’t even sort it out amongst themselves killing each other whenever possible- they have to hate someone even if it’s a fellow Muslim to the point where they want to kill him or her! Having killed the other chap then you have the revenge thing going on where revenge must be enacted and the whole cycle goes round and round – peace never getting a chance. Could you ever see a democracy working with that sort of outlook? A democracy depends on each citizen playing their part and accepting the majority view. That brings calm and tranquillity of order but when you follow a death cult direct from hell it causes mental breakdown and agony. They will never know happiness with the shit they are attached to.

  8. Mike says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 2:52 pm

    Essentially, the more Westernised or “Christianianised” an Arab country is, the better the chance it has with democracy, i.e., Tunisia and Lebanon.

    The best that can be achieved without Westernisation is something akin to the UAE or Kuwait. Morocco is an example of a bit of both.

    Democracy and Islam just don’t work well together.

    Malaysia sort-of works, not well, but not a total disaster, either. Note that almost half the population is Chinese or Indian.

    Indonesia is a bit of an interesting case. So is Iran (despite the Islamic Republic). In both cases, I think that the underlying pre-Islamic culture is still quite strong, which is why the usual patterns do not hold in these cases.

    • Tjhawk says

      Nov 27, 2016 at 10:48 pm

      The Malaysians have a disguised jizya system called bumipatra. Bumipatra translates to “sons of the soil”. Ethnic Malays are designated Bumipatra. It just so happens that essentially all urban ethnic Malays are muslims. Malaysian economic and social policy is set for the advantage of Bumipatras and discriminates against the Indians and Chinese etc.

      Any economic holding in Malaysia must have a minimum of 30% Bumipatra ownership. The industrious Indians and Chinese drive the economy and the muslims suck 30% off the top. Nice work if you can get it.

  9. Cretius says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 5:11 pm

    We must expose Islam at every turn quoting their own religious teachings and by quoting Islamic law. Highlight the bigotry of their imams on line and the barbarous practices of their political system, especially in Europe and North America. Report their excesses as they occur WITHOUT COMMENT. This should shut down the Islamic charges of Islamophobia and Racism.

    Islamophobia is a trumped-up Islamic political term designed to further an agenda, as indicated by Abdur-Rahman Muhammad, a former member of the International Institute for Islamic Thought, who was there at the inception of the term. The term is a prime example of the Islamic teaching of using deceit or lies to protect or further the goals of Islam. The term is contrary to, or a political twisting of the definition of a phobia. Concise Oxford Dictionary.
    This loathsome term is nothing more than a thought-terminating cliché conceived in the bowels of Mohammedan think tanks for the purpose of beating down critics. It is sad and a real danger that western leaders and the mainstream media have bought into this canard.

    The Western principles of human rights, democracy and freedom are now severely threatened because of tolerance of the intolerable: the infiltration of a barbaric culture that beats, stones, rapes, honour kills and subjugation of women; that still conducts beheadings and the amputation of hands; and that murders apostates, among other barbaric practices. Victims are piling up under the still too pervasive political correctness and fear of being branded “racist” and “Islamophobic.” Western leaders and the leftist mainstream media have enabled extremist Islam. A grass roots movement is required to reverse this trend.

    Wrong on all counts.
    A phobia is an abnormal or morbid fear or aversion.[Concise Oxford Dictionary] There is nothing abnormal about recognising Islam and all the barbarism it brings. Therefore, there is no such thing as Islamophobia.

    Secondly, being against a system like Islam is not racism. Racism is the belief that one race is inherently better than another simply on the theory that human abilities etc. are determined by race.[COD] By definition, Islam is not a race.

    Lastly, Islam is a supremacist totalitarian political system that includes a religion defined by holy war, bigotry[COD], intolerance, sexism and barbaric cultural practises. Muslims are their own worst enemies. They even kill each other! No one has to lie about Islam. Simply bear witness to the intolerance, bigotry and hatred spread by imams online. Muslims demand respect and rights that they deny to everyone else. This makes them unfit immigrants/refugees to modern western democracies.

    Allowing such a poisonous political system/religion in is tantamount to committing national suicide.
    Worldwide intelligence services estimate that radical Islamists form 15% to 25% of Islam. Those 300 million+ Mohammedans constitute a real threat to the survival of western democracies, cultures and religions. Add to that the fact that holy war to advance Islam is a core teaching of Islam. In addition, approximately 80% of Mohammedans support the concept of holy war against non-believers.

    The ignorance of western leaders and mainstream media about the true nature of Islam is our greatest threat. The leaders of the western democracies and their leftist mainstream media have demonstrated an appalling ignorance of the bigoted teachings of Islam and it’s aggressive and bloody 1,400 year history of attacking and eradicating non-believers. Islam conquers through warfare. Islam makes no accommodation and it is against their belief system to assimilate.

    Islam encourages deception and lies to further their worldwide aim of eradicating democracies, non-believers and other cultures. There can be no accommodation of Islam or Islamic law.

    • Yousef says

      Dec 5, 2016 at 12:27 pm

      Top post buddy.. On point. saved it and want to repost it somewhere. Thanks

  10. Eric Jones says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 10:31 pm

    Fukiyama was and is wrong on so many points. He is the one who announced the ‘end of history’ after the Berlin Wall came down. Well Frances, history is still being made.

    Fukiyama equates modern islam with 19th century European nationlism. I don’t recall European nationalism calling for a one world government under one religion. Sharia is more than a balance to political power, it is political power. Under Sharia the umaha is the nation state

    I am sure that there are cultural factors that faclitate the rise of a modern state. For example China abolished slavery 2,000 years before the birth of Christ. While countries under Sharis still practiced slavery today.

    Sadam Hussein is dead; not a nice guy to be sure but he is not the boogie man many want him to be. Sadam had a secular government until the USA imposed a sharia constitition on iraq after our invaison. Under Sadam iraq had the largest university system in th ME where many Iraqui womwen persued education. The second in command under Sadam was a Christian. Yes Sadam used a heavy hand to supress Sunni and Shia in fighting. Sadam is prefereable to ISIS.

    Eric

  11. davej says

    Nov 27, 2016 at 11:38 pm

    Muslims are firmly opposed to democracy (Democracy Go To Hell signs), just as they are opposed to Free Speech, because either one leads to the exposure and eventual elimination of the worst totalitarian ideology in the world. Islam simply cannot withstand the light of objective analysis and they kind of know it.

    So their only recourse is to double down on enragement and repression. Since the only thing they respect is force that is where this is going to end up.

  12. Rob says

    Nov 28, 2016 at 1:52 am

    Prof Bernard Lewis explained it very cleverly.
    He said: ‘everyone knows the saying “no taxation without representation”.
    but the opposite is also true i.e “no representation without taxation”‘
    If oil states get the oil revenues direct from oil companies they don’t need to tax the population. If they did need to tax then they would have to listen and a democracy would be formed.

  13. Dennis says

    Nov 28, 2016 at 4:46 am

    When nationalism and religion combine an extremely corrupt and powerful justification is created: god is with us. We saw this in middle age Catholicism and Reformed churches. We see that now with Muslims.

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