Never mind that the very term “Islamophobia” is used to silence all legitimate criticism of Islam. Such criticism is said to be based on an “irrational hatred” (a phobia) of Islam and of Muslims, but many of us believe that anyone who studies both the text of the Qur’an, and the observable behavior of Muslims toward non-Muslims both now, and during the past 1400 years, has good grounds for alarm about the Muslims in our midst.
Ilhan Omar’s proposal that a special envoy be appointed who would monitor and fight islamophobia, is discussed previously at Jihad Watch here, and here also: “Omar leads lawmakers in calling for US envoy to combat Islamophobia,” by Aris Folley, The Hill, July 20, 2021:
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and other Democratic lawmakers have signed onto a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken urging him to appoint a special envoy tasked with monitoring and combatting Islamophobia.
In the letter sent Tuesday [July 20], Omar and two dozen other lawmakers cited the spike in Islamophobia seen in recent years as well as the “persecution of Muslims manifesting itself around the world.”
What “spike in Islamophobia” is that? Hasn’t she noticed that during the past decade the Western world has flung open its gates to millions of Muslims who have been allowed to settle in the very midst of European states, deep behind what Muslims are taught to regard as enemy lines? Muslims have brought a “spike” in crime rates and in terrorism wherever they live. By taking advantage of every possible benefit that the generous welfare states of Western Europe offer – free or highly subsidized housing, free education, free medical care, family allowances, and more, Muslim migrants have cost the European taxpayers tens of billions of dollars – and counting.
All of this surely contributes to the “rational” antipathy that Europeans increasingly feel toward the Muslim migrants now in their lands, who largely refuse to integrate, supplement their welfare payments with crimes of property, and threaten the security on the streets of both women and of Jews. Meanwhile, both governments and the media confuse the public, in some cases by failing to identify Muslim terrorists as Muslims, or if they are so identified, the public is so often told by the police that the perpetrator was likely suffering from a “mental illness.” No one bothers to investigate what is in the Qur’an that explains perfectly such behavior by Muslims, including their duty to “strike terror in the hearts of the Unbelievers.” Mainstream journalists, and the police, are hellbent on ensuring that the public does not learn the contents of the Qur’an. Big Tech companies – including Google and Facebook – are willing collaborators in this effort, making it harder for islamocritical sites such as Jihad Watch to reach their potential audience. Public figures, from presidents on down, bend over backward to assure the public that Islam is a “tolerant and peaceful religion,” and tell us that “we mustn’t allow extremists to define Islam. We must not make the mistake of blaming Islam. For if we do, the terrorists will have won.”
Meanwhile, in the real world, since 9/11/2001 there have been nearly 40,000 separate terrorist attacks by Muslims.
When people start to mistrust or dislike Muslims, such feelings are based on what they observe of Muslim behavior and attitudes. It is based on real evidence, and does not reflect a pathological mental condition. Antisemitism is a very different phenomenon. It is a pathological condition; Jews are hated not for what they say or do, but for who they are. And nothing they say or do will change the mind of the convinced antisemite.
Antisemitism is a much bigger problem than anti-Muslim attitudes; outside Muslim countries themselves, where sectarian strife is common, anti-Muslim attitudes rarely result in violence. Jews in the U.S. are 2.5 times as likely to be attacked than Muslims. Outside the U.S., in Europe, anti-Jewish attacks are 5 ties more likely than anti-Muslim attacks.
The lawmakers also pointed to a recent annual report released by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), in which the office identified multiple countries with “patterns of mistreatment and human rights violations against either their entire Muslim populations or particular sects of Muslims.
Obviously the situation of Muslims in China, where one million Uighurs are in re-education camps, a carefully-bowdlerized Qur’an is the only version of the book that Muslims may possess, imams are humiliated by being made to dance in public and declare their allegiance to the Chinese Communist Party, the observance of Ramadan is made more difficult by forcing restaurants to remain open all day but then to close at night before the Iftar dinner, long “Islamic” beards must be cut, and Muslim first names are forbidden, is very bad. But other than China, and to a much lesser extent Myanmar, there is very little mistreatment of Muslims except in Muslim lands themselves. In Pakistan, Sunni terrorist groups such as Sipah-e-Sahaba specialize in killing Shiites, destroying their mosques and schools. Also in Pakistan, Ahmadi Muslims are by law not allowed to identify themselves as Muslims; they are despised as “Qadianis” who are guilty of “blasphemy” for believing that the 19th-century founder of the sect was indeed the Last of the Prophets. Ahmadis are a frequent object of both government repression and of private parties desirous of inflicting their own murderous punishments for blasphemy on the Ahmadis.
In Saudi Arabia, the Shi’a, almost all of whom live in the Eastern Province of al-Hasa where the oilfields are located, are mistreated by their Sunni political overlords; the Shi’a-populated province receives less aid from the central government to build much-needed infrastructure than any other region; it is also difficult for the Shi’a to obtain government employment. In Iran, it is the reverse. The Sunni Baloch in eastern Iran, on the border with Pakistan, are discriminated against by the Shi’a central government. Finally, in Afghanistan, the uber-Sunni Taliban was in the process of massacring the Shi’a Hazara in 2001 when the American troops arrived and rescued them; the Taliban have this year already renewed attacks on the Hazaras, not even waiting for all of the American troops to leave.
Ilhan Omar and her fellow lawmakers again:
“In addition to state-sponsored policies of Islamophobia, we have seen a disturbing rise in incidents of Islamophobic violence committed by individuals connected to larger transnational white supremacist networks, including but by no means limited to the mosque shooting in Christchurch, New Zealand in 2019 and the recent murder of a Muslim Canadian family in London, Ontario,” the lawmakers wrote.
Other than China, where are there “state-sponsored policies of Islamophobia”? Only Myanmar comes to mind, for its attempt to drive Muslim Rohingya, regarded as a security threat by the Burmese Buddhists, into Bangladesh. But certainly there are none anywhere in Western world, where governments and the media have dedicated themselves to minimizing domestic Muslim threats. As for Omar’s reference to “larger transnational white supremacist networks,” neither Brendon Tarrant, who carried out the mosque shooting in Christchurch, nor Nathaniel Veltman, who ran over a Muslim family in Ontario, had connections to such networks. They were lone wolves.
The lawmakers went on to strongly urge Blinken to establish the new role dedicated to combatting Islamophobia, calling it “a genuinely global problem that the United States should tackle globally.”
Ilhan Omar and her fellows want this proposal for the appointment of a special envoy on Islamophobia to achieve two goals. First, they want to impress upon the world that Muslims are every bit as much the victims of irrational hatred as the Jews whom Ilhan Omar thinks get far too much attention. Second, they want to use the charge of “Islamophobia” as a way to silence all legitimate islamocritics from continuing their work and, especially, to reduce their presence online.
Elder of Ziyon comnents on this here.
This would make worldwide bigotry worse, not better.
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom report that members of Congress reference various issues of religious intolerance, including antisemitism and intolerance towards Muslims. It also describes bigotry against Sikhs, Hindus, Yazidis, Christians and specific Christian sects like Copts and Jehovah’s Witnesses….
It would be interesting to know if Ilhan Omar would support the appointment of a special envoy on anti-Hinduism, who would have to focus on Muslim persecution of Hindus in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Would she want our government to establish a special envoy to report on the persecution of Sikhs in Pakistan? And what would Ilhan Omar say if President Biden were to appoint a special envoy on the persecution and murder of Christians worldwide, which — always excepting China and North Korea — is almost entirely the handiwork of Muslims in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Turkey, and Nigeria?
I suspect – don’t you? –that Ilhan Omar would resent any attempt to enlarge the number of such envoys; she wouldn’t want anything to distract from the attention paid to the work of the newly-appointed envoy on “Islamophobia.” Why, she might even volunteer to take on the task herself.
If Ilhan Omar has her way, this new envoy would focus only discrimination by “white supremacists” against Muslims. Muslim discrimination against other Muslims, which affects tens of millions of Sunnis, Shia, Ahmadis, and Sufis, would simply be ignored.
Hatred of Jews is not based on rationality. It is, rather, a pathological condition. It has nothing to do with what Jews do or do not do, whether they are capitalists or communists, deeply religious or atheists, Little-Enders or Big-Enders. For this hatred, it is sufficient that they are Jews.
Whatever an antisemite loathes most is the very quality he will attribute to the Jews. Reality does not matter. If he hates the rich, the Jews are “shylocks of high finance.” If he is against vaccines, Jews are “pushing vaccines to cause sterility among the Gentiles.” And so on, with so many possibilities to pin on “the Jews,” each more absurd than the last.
Omar cannot abide the focus on antisemitism. The Jews, the Jews, always the Jews, she can’t stand it: “What about the Muslims? What about Islamophobia?” She wants to push Muslims forward as equally the victims – no, even greater victims – of unreasoning hatred, than are Jews. None of the statistics on hate crimes compiled by the FBI bear her out; Jews are 2.5 times as likely to be the victims of hate crimes as Jews. Furthermore, she specifies in her statement about a special envoy on Islamophobia that “white supremacists” are to be blamed, just as they to be blamed for antisemitism. Neither is true. It’s not white supremacists, it’s not even non-Muslims, but other Muslims of rival sects, who pose the greatest danger to Muslims.
Antisemitism is “the oldest hatred” in time and the one with the farthest range in space. In its violence and virulence, it far outdoes any of the other ethnic or religious hatreds. It can be found all over the lands of what was once Western Christendom. It can be found, too, all over the Muslim lands. Those who feel antipathy for Muslims do so because of what Muslims believe and do. Those who feel that extreme antipathy for Jews known as antisemitism do so no matter what Jews believe and do.
Antisemitism is a hatred that, in its obsessiveness, is like no other, and to be properly combated requires a long period of mental immunization that has to begin in early adulthood. This hatred can never disappear, though the number of its adherents can be reduced to manageable proportions. But no one, least of all a crude antisemite such as Ilhan Omar, should be allowed to divert energy and attention away from that fight by claiming, both falsely, and with malice aforethought, that “Islamophobia” is just as bad. There are six million ghosts who beg to differ.
Check Burry says
Hugh
I agree with all you say.
She is a “%^^&*+:>
Rob Porter says
‘Why not heed Illhan Omar’? Largely because she is a largely incoherent dimwit from Somalia. That American lawmakers even listen to this woman is testament to the huge intellectual decline in America – as it is in Canada and all over the West. In Canada I marvel over how politicians and ‘authorities’ cover the links of Muslim terrorists to Islam. A Toronto police officer was recently deliberately mowed down and murdered by a Muslin. A fine officer by all accounts, the fact that a Muslim deliberately mowed him down has been deliberately concealed from the dimwitted and clueless public. The same applies to the Danforth (Toronto) murderer, Faisal Hussain who shot 13 and murdered two girls. But when four Muslims were mowed down and killed all hell broke loose with howls of “Islamophobia”, “racism”, “terrorism”, “hatred of Muslims”, always with Muslims presented as victims – despite Canadians in all capacities falling over themselves to appease Muslim demands for prayer rooms in schools and other things.
We should fear the actions of cowardly and stupid Western officials more than Muslims with their lies and endless demands. Principled officials would tell Muslims to ‘get lost’, but there are either few or no longer any principled officials in the West. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was right in 1978 when pointing out that the West is consumed by cowardice among its leaders and those fools referred to as ‘elites’.
Thank God for Robert Spencer, but even Donald Trump failed to heed his warnings
‘
mortimer says
The greatest persecution of Muslims actually comes from OTHER MUSLIMS of different sects. EVERY RELIGION and EVERY PHILOSOPHY and EVERY IDEOLOGY may be criticized in the modern world. Otherwise, PROGRESS is impossible. We will STAGNATE and Muslims will STAGNATE if Islam may not be criticized.
To claim that Islam may not be criticized is to agree that Islam is perfect. We do not agree that anything man-made is perfect. Islam is imperfect in many obvious ways, and moreover, it is the most obviously false and harmful religion of all time. It is a duty for every reasonable person to criticize what is imperfect and in need of reform or abandonment.
Beneath the Veil of Consciousness says
Again, please explain to me why this illegal alien is still in our country? How can her latest fake cuck-husband tolerate her hatred towards white Christians? Her aim is to muzzle the truth of Islam. The truth that it is full of lies, hatred, and distortions. It is the foundation upon which all supremacist ideologies hope to build their empires.
Keith O says
BVC, she reminds me of Gerry Adams who was the mouthpiece for Sin Fien in Northern Ireland.
All talk and saying the “right thing” to the “right people” whilst in the background helping to organise the IRA terror attacks.
He was called “the smiling face of terrorism” by the Brit squaddies. Notice the similarity?
Rob Porter says
Keith, have you ever heard this woman talk? ‘Thick as an Australian brick’ doesn’t fully characterize her, but idiotic American officials like Anthony Blinken, the Secretary of State, no less, actually hangs on her every word. Talk about “blind fools”. Like Boris Johnson and dimwits in Ireland, those in America are now clearly at least slightly insane.
mortimer says
It is not ‘white supremacists’ who oppose Islam. It is RATIONAL MODERNISM that is opposed to Islam.
Furthermore, it is 80% of the population of the earth that oppose Islam. People of all other philosophies, religions and ideologies know that Islam is their enemy. Islam is supremacist.
Muslims cannot silence 80% of humans without implementing Islamic totalitarian supremacism everywhere. Muslims may dream all they want, but they are not going to be the SUPREME RULERS of the world. They have failed to do so for 1400 years and they are going to fail catastrophically when the majority of Muslims soon leave this death cult … within about 2 decades.
The reasonable, modern, scholarly, meticulous assessment of Islam is showing Muslims how flawed their man-made death cult truly is. Islam is flawed ethically, logically, sociologically, scientifically, historiographically. Islam is so extensively flawed, in fact, it is only suitable for being completely abandoned. Islam has no helpful thoughts in it.
gravenimage says
Actually, Mortimer, the savagery of Islam was opposed much before the modern era. Infidels have fought to defend themselves from the violent encroachment of Islam for 1400 years now–sometimes successfully, sometimes not.
Rob Porter says
Mortimer, if 80% of Canadians are opposed to Islam this is entirely lost upon me. I get the impression that 80% don’t read, haven’t a clue what is going on in the world, heed the fool leader, Justin Trudeau – and don’t care to know more. The political correctness disease that for years has consumed Canada kills both interest in investigating a contentious subjects, thinking critically, and questioning what politicians, officials and the mostly thoroughly horrible media tells the unthinking public. As one good Canadian neighbour told me yesterday, “Most Canadians don’t read, know nothing, and don’t give a shit that they don’t”.
Infidel says
Memo to Ilhan:
There is already a new muslim axis of Turkey-Pakistan-Malaysia that’s dedicated to fighting islamophobia. If you like, you can take the next flight to Ankara and volunteer to join this effort. The goal of this is to wrest leadership of the ummah from Saudi Arabia. There is no reason that the US needs to do that, since we’re not a muslim country (no, 1% muslims don’t make us a muslim country, as Obama pretended)
mortimer says
Truly, Muslims themselves are the most ‘Islamophobic’ people today. Most Muslims do NOT follow up to 80% of Islamic teachings … all the little minutiae of Sharia that they MUST follow and practice for the achievement of Islamic paradise. Most Muslims are obeying a small amount of all those laws and regulations.
Especially, about 85% of Muslims fundamentally disagree with the ‘essential’ JIHAD DOCTRINE and they refuse entirely to practice jihad or allow others to practice it. Those counter-jihadic Muslims are the ones who have a ‘phobia’ of real Islam.
Any kafir who oppose jihad is not ‘phobic’ about it, but has a reasonable concern about how to stop JIHADIC TERRORISM.
The only way to stop JIHADIC TERRORISM is to DISCUSS IT with Muslims and convince them that the jihad doctrine cannot be of DIVINE origin, but that it is of 100% human fabrication. If Islam’s most important action (jihad) is man-made, then Islam is not worth while for anyone to follow. Islam is false and it is reasonable for Muslims to abandon it with confidence.
gravenimage says
Mortimer, the claim that since all Muslims are not currently waging violent Jihad against us that this ergo means that they actually reject this core concept of Islam does not hold–especially due to the tenets of Fard Ayn and Fard Kifaya. An obligation that is Fard Ayn is implicit on every able-bodied Muslim, but Fard Kifaya is on the Islamic community in general. Most Islamic scholars today agree that Jihad is Fard Kifaya–so long as individual Muslims support Jihad, they need not wage it personally so long as some from the Ummah are doing so.
Then, where is evidence that 85% of Muslims *prevent* other Muslims from waging violent Jihad? The fact is that many Muslims will not even report Jihad terror plots to Infidel authorities–this would hardly be the case if the vast majority of Muslims wanted to prevent Jihad terror attacks.
Mainstream Muslim groups like CAIR tell Muslims not to report Jihad terror plots.
“Hamas-linked terror org CAIR discourages Muslims from talking to FBI”
https://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/11/hamas-linked-terror-org-cair-discourages-muslims-from-talking-to-fbi
This would not be the case if most Muslims hated Jihad and wanted to stop it.
As for the idea that any Infidel can convince Muslims that Jihad is man-made and they will immediately leave Islam, I note that you have *never* said how many Muslims you yourself have “deprogrammed” in this manner. No names–just numbers. It must be quite a few by now–but you have never said. Not sure why if this is as you say so simple.
James Lincoln says
mortimer,
You are making an assumption that muslims will use factual evidence-based logic.
Perhaps a small percent will, the vast majority will not…
mortimer says
In regard to silencing criticism of Islam, this quote explains why we should insist on doing so …
– “…if any opinion is compelled to silence, that opinion may, for aught we can certainly know, be true. To deny this is to assume our own infallibility.”
-John Stuart Mill, On Liberty (1859).
By demanding that Islam not be criticized Muslim demand us to assume that Islam is ‘PERFECT’ and that Muslims possess ‘THE TRUTH’ and that their opinion alone is INFALLIBLE and that our opinions are erroneous. Perhaps our grim, pessimistic assessment of Islamic terrorism is grimly true.
john smith says
It’s beyond me that muslims themselves just cannot see how truly evil islam is.
They just don’t see it, they just don’t get it, The likes of Ilhan Omar are on the front line when it comes to defending this satanic death cult.
Aussie Infidel says
John, Omar’s affliction is all due to religious indoctrination. Anyone who believes in supernatural entities and actions has been indoctrinated with the tenets of some faith or other. Indoctrination usually takes place when the person is young and their personal resources and understanding of the world about them is too limited to refute the nonsense they are told. And that process continues on into adulthood, and is cemented by all the rituals associated with religious belief.
Eventually when mind and body co-ordination is complete, the person identifies with their new found faith, and is a full fledged adherent. And furthermore, their ability to think and behave differently is then virtually impossible. Very few religious people understand the power of indoctrination – which determines their own beliefs and behavior. Fortunately most religions are relatively benign, but some like Islam are downright evil, commanding the killing of unbelievers, apostates, and those who would criticise their irrational beliefs.
You are right that Omar doesn’t “see it” and doesn’t “get it”, But that’s because she is not capable of seeing through the fog of irrationality produced by the indoctrination process. Her cognitive dissonance or internal confusion would throw up so many mental and emotional barriers, that she is no longer able to think rationally about anything that would contradict her deeply inculcated belief set. You have probably heard of the expression, “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks”. (It is possible, but increasingly difficult – I practised hypnotherapy for about 20 years).
This is the same process that makes propaganda such an effective political weapon; it destroys a person’s ability to think clearly, which is why Muslims also practise Taqiyya.
john smith says
Aussie Infidel
Thank you for this most thorough and detailed explanation, what you have to say certainly does make a lot of sense.
James Lincoln says
Aussie Infidel,
An excellent explanation for the mindset of Ilhan Omar.
Unfortunately, it does not change the fact that she is a member of the US House of Representatives.
Due to her words and actions, she should, at the very least, be removed from all committees and marginalized to the greatest extent possible…
john smith says
Yes James I will go along with that, I should have also used the word excellent.
gravenimage says
Why We Should Not Heed Ilhan Omar’s Call for a Special Envoy to Fight ‘Islamophobia’
……………..
Yes–this would result in a terrible crushing of freedom of speech. Our ability to oppose the savagery of Islam would be crippled–perhaps fatally.
James Lincoln says
In this wonderful feature article, Hugh Fitzgerald states:
“When people start to mistrust or dislike Muslims, such feelings are based on what they observe of Muslim behavior and attitudes. It is based on real evidence, and does not reflect a pathological mental condition.”
100% correct.
Indeed, a true “pathological mental condition” would be to trust and “like” devout followers of islam…
Taha Hagar says
Also When people start to mistrust or dislike JEWS, such feelings are based on what they observe of JEWISH behavior and attitudes. It is based on real evidence, and does not reflect a pathological mental condition.
I hope you agree with this and not be a hypocrite about it.
marc says
@Taha Hagar said
“Also When people start to mistrust or dislike JEWS, such feelings are based on what they observe of JEWISH behavior and attitudes. It is based on real evidence, and does not reflect a pathological mental condition.”
In my experience this is total BS, I see fake stories of Jewish behaviour and religious practice daily that heavily influence those who do not know better to mistrust and dislike Jews, I have seen similar fake news about muslims but on a far far lesser scale.
gravenimage says
Note that Taha Hagar doesn’t cite a single “Jewish behavior” here. No surprise, really.
overman says
“Never mind that the very term “Islamophobia” is used to silence all legitimate criticism of Islam. Such criticism is said to be based on an “irrational hatred” (a phobia) of Islam and of Muslims, but many of us believe that anyone who studies both the text of the Qur’an, and the observable behavior of Muslims toward non-Muslims both now, and during the past 1400 years, has good grounds for alarm about the Muslims in our midst.”
ln a nutshell, probably the best explanation l’ve come across.
Actually, lSLAMOPHILIA is a far worse mental ailment. Described by some as a ‘Theological Virus’.
As written in his book [Douglass Murray] –
Islamophilia: A Very Metropolitan Malady:
“ISLAMOPHILIA shows how so many of the celebrities above, have, at some point chosen to abandon any hope or wish to criticize Islam and instead decided to profess some degree of love for it. Love, that Murray points out in the book, is often irrational and certainly misguided: Murray is not afraid to name and shame, and the book’s tour includes Sebastian Faulks and Martin Amis, Boris Johnson, South Park, Tony Blair, Ridley Scott, David Cameron, Liam Neeson, Justin Bieber, Random House Publishers, the BBC, Richard Dawkins, the Prince of Wales and even George Bush. Yes, George Bush.”
OLD GUY says
Ilhan Omar should be deported as a foreign agent. Islam is a world dominating ideology that has its sights set on destroying America. Omar represents Islam first and for most.