“If history is to inform, then this is great history.”
Chris Salcedo is a nationally recognized radio talk-show host heard on WBAP in Dallas, Texas, and KSEV in Houston, Texas. He is the author of the book “Liberty Rises” and the executive director of the Conservative Hispanic Society. Here he reviews my new book The History of Jihad From Muhammad to ISIS, which you can preorder here.
“A Priceless Opportunity to See Jihad in Practice,” by Chris Salcedo, LifeZette, July 1, 2018:
“Who will take care of my children?” asked an unlucky Arab, captured by the self-proclaimed prophet of Islam. “Hell,” Muhammad shot back, ordering his execution.
Robert Spencer displays a particular knack for weaving together multiple disparate threads into a cohesive narrative with his latest work, “The History of Jihad: From Muhammad to ISIS.” Spencer has compiled the first complete historical account of jihadi wars in a single volume.
Ranging from Arabia to Europe and India, Spencer recounts the innumerable battles, massacres, victories, and defeats of the jihadi wars that have been waged from Muhammad’s century to the present day, all in the words of the contemporaries who either waged those wars or suffered the consequences thereof.
Heroes and villains, like Saladin and Tamerlane, other lesser-known figures such as the Mughal emperor Jahangir, march across the ages and into history by Spencer’s unique hand. The volume of sources Spencer includes is staggering, and Spencer’s footnotes alone provide enough reading material for a lifetime.
Spencer’s handling of this subject isn’t tainted by bias. In the era of fake news, it’s a standard to be admired. How difficult to read of the gratuitous humiliation of the conquered, as in India where jihadi warriors were wont to tear down Hindu idols and build staircases of them, and not be moved!
Yet Spencer rarely pauses for judgment, passing instead to the next account as crime upon crime is piled up, from Muhammad’s Dark Age executions en masse of the Jews to medieval muezzins announcing the Islamic call to prayer standing atop mountains of skulls to the Armenian genocide and rise of terrorist groups in the 20th century.
Spencer’s “History” is rich in example, allowing great and small figures to speak in their own words. Tariq ibn Ziyad, the Muslim conqueror of Spain, promised his followers lavish wealth and “beautiful Greek maidens,” while the Barbary ambassador of Tripoli threatened the Founding Fathers Thomas Jefferson and John Adams that it was Muslims’ “right and duty” to “plunder and enslave.”
Spencer relies whenever possible on contemporary sources, giving a priceless insight into the mindset of people separated by dozens of cultures and hundreds of years and thousands of miles but united by one principle: jihad.
The heroes of this enormous account present an inspiration, from the Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI’s glorious last stand at the gates of Constantinople to the mountaineer Pelayo’s stubborn refusal to surrender as jihadis subjugated Spain.
Villains sadly are in far greater supply, including not only the bloodthirsty warriors of the jihad but the collaborators, traitors, and renegades who hoped to profit from the slaughter. It is easy to find parallels between the cowardly Bishop Oppa or the scheming, pragmatic British Empire and certain public figures and institutions in our present day.
Also striking is the magnitude of events that were once well-known, but are unknown or forgotten in the Western world. The unmitigated slaughter of the Muslim conquest of India may be familiar to Indian readers, but certainly must come as a surprise to Westerners….
Nowhere before has every jihad in history been combined into a single volume. Spencer’s work is an astounding achievement of staggering ambition, involving 1,400 years of jihadi war across half a dozen continents and providing a cohesive lens through which to view and understand it. Such a history has never before been attempted, but Spencer has succeeded in what many must have thought an impossible task.…
Kufar1 says
Thank you Mr. Salcedo (swt) for helping to promote Mr. Spencer (swt) excellent book. I will buy a copy or two, one for me and one for a friend when it comes out.
Terry Gain says
Subhanahu wa ta
SWT may refer to: Subhanahu wa ta’ala, Arabic for “May He be glorified and exalted”, Muslim honorific.
And thus sayeth all.
gravenimage says
Terry, I think Kufar1 was speaking tongue-in-cheek here.
Terry Gain says
GI
Well obviously.
gravenimage says
Sorry, Terry. 🙂
Walter Sieruk says
Not thinking so much, for now, about the violent and deadly jihad of Islam but the sly and insidious Stealth jihad of Islam as may be seen in an American hospital .
Having had a security guard position at the hospital that I live in, during the year, 2005 a rather odd thing happened. One day the guard both at the hospital parking building a group of Muslim men in one car stopped at my both and told me he is a doctor, I know, somewhat , and always recognize them. This Muslim who said he was a doctor hospital showed me no ID yet he entered the parking lot . I immediately regretted not asking to see his ID. This Muslim doctor and in Muslim friends must have sharp intellects because he and one of the friend most have noticed a look of regret and worry of my face because the Muslim doctor with one of his friends walked over to me and asked “Do you have a problem with us ?” To that question I replied “We are under yellow alert ” So then that Muslim doctor did showed me his ID and pointed his finger at me a gave me lecture for he said “You may ask to see my ID but you committed racial profiling and racial discrimination against us, this is illegal .” To this it needs to be made clear that that he did ask me a question and what did he want me to do, lie?. I have commit a politically incorrect “thought crime” only and didn’t commit discrimination because attempt stop them from entering that parking building and my worry was religion based and not race based . of course that’s also looked down on. It’s a good thing that I didn’t think of saying “Aren’t you glad to be living in America because in this nation because you have so many laws to hide behind?” Still his friend said to me “What about Timothy Mc Veigh and the Oklahoma bombing?” and “What is our name I’m going to report you.” The whole incident was intense but it did blow over. Maybe God was watching out for me?
Now I’m a bit old and retired, nevertheless in this year of 2018 I know a young man who still works at that hospital as security guard and me informed me that no who comes to visited a friend who is a patent is allowed to wear a “Never Forget ,September 11, 2001. any Tee shirt with anything on it about Islam that is not positive the Security officer are required to walk over to that person and say “Muslim are here also you must leave this hospital .” One day this very guard did take a chance and wear a “Never Forget September 11, 2001” button and one Muslim doctor told him “You must be objective while on duty as a guard” and then went the bosses and the Security office and complained he was offended by that button. So the bosses caved in and told him never on the job to war that button again or he’d be fired that to too “political” As for being “objective” as a , guard ? I say Bull! That’s saying that a guard can’t or should not be able to understand the different between right and wrong on duty. A guard that can’t or will not understand the different between right and wrong would be a useless person for Homeland Security. What more, this madness shows the Islamic power even in an American hospital. This is absurd, for this is America and not Pakistan or Egypt.
Lydia Church says
So it is a crime to be against the terrorism that occurred at 911, which is a fact?
Are they saying that it was a good thing then?
What’s next? Mandatory t-shirts in favor of 911 terrorism?
That is absurd!
I would march around there (or have a friend do it whom they don’t know) with that shirt on and banners outside, let them not like it then!
Wow. Thanks for sharing.
Ann says
Yes, again, thanks for sharing that. We’re so overwhelmed with the southern border invasion, the end of freedom in the UK and Europe – that our future Moslem problem is being overlooked.
In the UK, they’ve doubled their population every 10 years since the 1970s. (Paul Weston YouTube)
Pew link shows steep increase of Moslem population from 2007 to 2018.
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/01/03/new-estimates-show-u-s-muslim-population-continues-to-grow/
J D S says
Yes our Muslim invasion problem IS being overlooked not just by the man on the street though, but by those who have the great responsibility of keeping America safe, not that we all don’t have that responsibility, but our so called leaders are throwing this off and concentrating on things that take away from our security..seems mostly, the Democrats any way, that all they want yo do is try and find something on President Trump (WHO SEEM TO BE THE ONLY ONE WHO IS CONCERNED ABOUT AMERICA) All the time Islam is quietly, sometimes loudly, making entry into our society bringing with it their absurd sharia nonsense, Time to wake up and out America First….Remember not all Muslims are (PROVEN) terrorist but most terrorist are (PROVEN) Muslims So why are we not concentrating on securing our borders as well as securing our security INSIDE our borders.?????? Throw out this political correctness mess which is destroying our security..and the enemy knows this.
gravenimage says
Absurd indeed.
DHazard says
“The genocide suffered by the Hindus and Sikhs of India at the hands of Arab, Turkish, Mughal and Afghan occupying forces for a period of 800 years is as yet formally unrecognised by the World.
The only similar genocide in the recent past was that of the Jewish people at the hands of the Nazis.
The holocaust of the Hindus in India was of even greater proportions, the only difference was that it continued for 800 years, till the brutal regimes were effectively overpowered in a life and death struggle by the Sikhs in the Punjab and the Hindu Maratha armies in other parts of India in the late 1700’s.”*
*From “The Islamic Invasion of India: The Greatest Genocide in History”
https://blog.sami-aldeeb.com/2018/03/18/islamic-invasion-of-india-the-greatest-genocide-in-history/
Over 400 million people killed for not being Muslim. If you want to understand Islam go back to it’s roots. Like this.
gravenimage says
Robert Spencer’s The History of Jihad: “A Priceless Opportunity to See Jihad in Practice”
“If history is to inform, then this is great history.”
……………………….
Thank you, Mr. Salcedo.
Indiana Tom says
A Priceless Opportunity to See Jihad in Practice”
….or you could visit ISIS territory….
infidel says
Muslims do the grisliest crimes in Jehaad but NO ONE, including the victims, have any rights to talk about it or wear a badge in remembrance…
LKS says
DHazard males some good points. Let us not forget, we have our our own form of genocide, lt is called, abortion!