Jewish World Review Ira Rifkin September 11, 2006
He polished the prose of Muslim leaders so their views would be marketable. He invited them home to break bread. He even attacked his co-religionists in print for not being more realistic. No more.
In January 1985, the Los Angeles newspaper I worked for assigned me to the religion beat. My first story was a feature on what was then a new phenomenon in Southern California, a fully licensed Muslim parochial school.
About 35 youngsters attended South Pasadena’s New Horizon Preschool and Kindergarten. It was the first of its kind in Los Angeles County and it operated under the auspices of the Islamic Center of Southern California, then as now one of this nation’s preeminent Muslim institutions. New Horizon’s purpose, I was told, was “to teach the values of Islam to the new generation.”
New Horizon, which now has grown considerably over the past two decades and now has several branches, was my introduction to Islam and to Muslims. Since then I’ve spent considerable professional time exploring the American Muslim community. I’ve also sought out participation in Jewish-Muslim interfaith activities; I’ve broken bread with Muslims at their homes and at mine, and at the White House at official presidential Ramadan break-the-fast events.
I fully embraced, even relished, these opportunities. Information and dialogue, I believed, could lower if not eliminate the barriers of suspicion that kept Muslims and Jews from understanding each others’ hopes and fears. We live in the United States, not the Middle East, I told myself. Here, reason might prevail.
Sadly, I no longer have much faith in that coming to pass. Five years after the Twin Towers crashed and the Pentagon burned I find myself profoundly soured on the idea that the two communities can ever work together to defuse the disharmony between them. Certainly not for the foreseeable future. Perhaps never.
. . . more
Dean?
Propaganda sharing between the right-wing Likud party of Israel and End-of-Times Christian Millenialists has resulted in a proliferation of articles like this one promoting the cataclysmic war of civilizations that the rest of humanity fears and dreads. This article puports to show the anguish of an Israeli who wanted to get along with Muslims, but after September 11th must sadly conclude that the entire Islamic faith is comprised of hopeless savages with whom no rational conversation can take place.
It must be a very difficult time to be a Zionist these days. Much of the modern world’s ethical and moral prinicples originate in Judaism. The State of Israel was founded with the mission to be a “Light Unto the Nations” (Isaiah 42:6) which implies a moral obligation to follow the highest ethical standard. No one could be more aware of the evil nature of religious and ethnic persecution than the survivors of the Holocaust.
Yet from the beginning Israelis faced the dillema that the land of Israel could not exist unless that land was taken from others. For most of it’s early history Israel bravely and brilliantly defended itself against attacks by it’s larger Arab neighbors. Yet each of these victories carried the seeds of future conflict because they resulted in Israeli occupation of predominantly Arab territories – a situation that led to a steady increase in violence between the occupiers and the occupied. The hope that the occupied lands could detach themselves from Israel faded as right-wing Israeli settlers laid claim to the newly occpid land. Israel needed Leibensraum. As hope faded, despair and anger rose, followed by more violence.
Today’s Zionist is overwhelmed by cognitive dissonance. On the one hand the Zionist is acutely aware of Judaism’s long moral and ethical tradition and Israel’s mission as “Light Unto the Nations. On the other hand he sees the terrible and immoral things Israel must do to the decendants of the original occupants and Israel’s Arab neighbors in order to survive.
He must square his outrage over centuries of ghettoization and oppression of Jews in Europe with Israel’s modern day ghettoization and oppression of the Palestinians. In old black and white photos he sees the barbed wire of Auswitz and Dachua and with his actual eyes he sees the barbed wire of the West Bank Security Wall, a terrifying modern day concrete and barbed wire enclosure inside which scores of rebelling Palestinians are shot dead every week. In the history books the Zionist sees the rubble and corpses of the flattened Warsaw ghetto, destroyed by the Nazis. In the newspaper he sees the rubble and corpses of South Beirut, flattened by the Israeli Air Force. During World War II the hated Nazis shot 100 civilians dead for each German killed by a resistance fighter, In September 2006 toxic waves filled of spilled petroleum and dead fish lap the east Mediteranean coastline as result of Israel’s deliberate act of collective punishment of the Lebanese people – this time by environmental disaster .
The enormous pressure of such massive cognitive dissonance, such sharp contrast between national ideal and national reality, must inevitably lead to rationalization. If Palestinians lash out and fight back, if they turn into hate-filled monsters, and if their fellow Arab’s sympathize with them we are supposed to believe that it is not because of anything Israel did, but because the Palestinians and Arabs are hate-filled, irrational religious fanatics. How convenient.
What a fatuous piece of moral relativism! Dean, please.
Scores of rebelling Palestinians shot dead every week? Really?
And the parallel tracks in your historical narrative of the Nazi extermination of the Jews and the Israeli — certainly you mean to say extermination although you cower from saying it — of the Palestinians, welded together by the conceptually meaningless term “cognitive dissonance” makes it all seem so so -what? –historically reasonable?
What you are trying to say is that the Israelis are just like the Nazis but they are too confused to realize it! What presumptious nonsense.
Liberalism has a reflexive antipathy towards assigning moral responsibility. It’s curious Dean that you seem to recognize that the evil perpretated by suicide bombings and other terrorist tactics is an evil at least as great as the Nazi evil — but you blame the victims of the terror instead of the perpetrators.
Liberalism does not see that its smug pieties are too small minded and too morally impoverished to comprehend real evil in any intellectually credible way.
Liberals used to stand for something. Now they are indistinguishable from the appeasement crowd of the 1930s. Remember them? German re-militarization was England’s fault.
Dean, Ira Rifkin is a religion writer, editor and adjunct professor of journalism at American University in Washington, D.C.
By his career as a journalist in both Los Angeles and Washington, D.C, it would seem Mr. Rifkin would not be predisposed to be hater of modernity and a fear-mongering fundamentalist. Or is it that the wonderful American culture and the global economy has not yet changed his heart to moderate his fundamentism as a Jew.
Wake up Dean, people with brains and hearts who have actual experience with Muslims are concerned that they can’t ever be assimilated as long as they are Muslims. That is a reasonable concern based upon empirical data and real world experience. You expect, in fact demand, that Chrisitains and Jews give up their beliefs and lament when we don’t do it easily, yet you persist in the irrationality that Muslims will easily let go of theirs. What you are asking for is the secularist view of utopia. After all, it really doesn’t matter what one beliefs about God as that will all wither away as the insanity it really is.
American culture and the global economy are not magic cure-alls, in fact they are frequently do more harm than good, something you never cease to bray about when it suits your purpose. What good is left in American culture is based firmly on the Judeo-Christian understanding of man in society, a foundation that Muslims don’t share. In fact, many Muslims detest that foundation as blashphemous at its heart.
There is no question that much in modern culture is blasphemous, but not the core that comes from Judeo-Christian civilization. Belief is not just window dressing that you can put on and take off, it is the center of every thought and action. You are hoping that Muslim’s will automatically and easily change belief when most evidence is to the contrary.
Dean, where is your belief?
Guide to several competing belief systems that cannot really be held by the same person if they know what they are thinking:
Judaism: Hear O Israel, the Lord your God is One!
Christianity: For God so loved the world, He gave is only begotten son that whoever believes in him might not perish, but have eternal life
Islam: There is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is his prophet.
Humanism: Man is the measure of all things, this has two main sub-groups Rationalism and a human centered pietism.
Secularism: Man rules all things.
Pseudo-paganism: If man would just go away, nature would restore herself to her pristine, primordial purity and everything would be fine.
Note 1, Dean removes any doubt about his double standard and apologizes for pure evil
Dean fully revealed his historical conclusions, his factual filter and his moral double standard in this sweeping comment. Some highlights
“Descendants of the original occupants”
Here Dean distorts and condenses history, essentially adopting the Muslim view of the world. Arabs are considered the “original” inhabitants of the area. In order to arrive at this conclusion, one must ignore the various other ethnic groups living in the Holy Land after WWII. There were many non-Arabs and many non-Muslims living in what was the renmants of the Ottoman Empire, later the British Empire. Dean has to erase those other groups from history and ignore the fact that Jews had a continuos history in the Holy Land despite the Diaspora. Apparently, Jews are capable of losing claim to the City of David which they built, and the remnants on Temple Mount. Muslims by contrast may claim land forever, regardless of the role of history. In both WWI, and WWII, Muslim leaders of the Middle East sided with the losing side. There is ample documentation of active material support from Muslim leaders of the Nazi war machine. Dean erases this from history and from any moral reckoning.
Dean ignores the repeated explanation of Palestinian terror groups that they refuse to recognized Israel because the land is NOW part of the Muslim ummah territory and such territory may never be voluntarily relinquished.
This is truly an ugly exercise in distorted history.
Double standard: Resist not evil for Israel and free pass for Arab atrocities
Note, how the ugliest atrocities committed by Muslim Arabs are morally deflected to Israel. This is the truly outrageous perversion of moral reasoning I have ever seen reduced to print outside of a Palestinian screed. Muslim Arabs may commit, and have committed, the most outrageous, direct attacks on non-combatants and they are excused by Dean as having been driven to it. Arab Muslims are not morally responsible for their actions, no matter how obscene and obscene they are. Israel, however, is held to the Christian standard of “resist not evil.”
Of course, Israel has the rule of law and an operating court system which has upheld the rights of Arab Israelis inside Israel and which has established a system of limits on military and police actions. No such structure exists in Arab lands which are ruled by despots. Gaza is descending into chaos, as its jihadi thugs are totally incapable of anything but murder and mayhem.
Not long ago, Dean asked me how I would apply the Christian teaching of ‘resist not evil” to the Middle East. What was truly interesting was not my answer, but, Dean’s approach. He would not approve any action by Israel in self-defense. Any tactic used by Israell was “immoral.” The use of ground troops to attack terror nests was immoral. The use of checkpoints was immoral. The use of targeted assassinations of terror murderers was illegal. In short, anything Israel could do to protect its population was immoral. This is the moral perversion of Christian teaching which is truly ugly and pernicious. This moral perversion is applied only to Israel. It is only when Israel defends its population that self-defense becomes immoral.
By contrast, just a few months ago, Chirac of France openly declared that France had nuclear weapons which it would use against any country harboring terrorists who attacked France. No, international outrage against that statement. What France was doing was declaring to the world that it would use any and all means to defend its people and territory. Something Israel cannot do.
Israel has participated in endless talks with various Palestinians representatives. Israel made peace with Egypt by returning territory used by Egypt to launch an attack on Israel. Israel turned land over to Arafat who continued to use the land, arms, and money supplied to launch attacks on the civilian population of Israel. Not a peep from Dean. Only Israel is a moral actor. Arabs are simply driven to evil and may be excused.
Again, a breathtaking self-revelation Dean. Breathtaking. Thanks for wiping out any doubts as to your worldview
Missourian wrote,
Couple of minor corrections. Many of the Palestianian Christians are, in fact, descendents of Jews who converted to Christianity and remained, continuously, in the Holy Land. Some are not, as the Muslims tended to jostle people around as a method of control, relocating Assyrians, Slavs, Greeks, etc. around their empire to keep them off-balance. I am sure that some of the ‘Arabs’ are in fact more, or less, descendants of the Jews as well. Many, probably most, are not. Quite a number of the Jews who have resettled in the Holy Land are most likely actually descendents of the Khazars whose empire was in the Crimea and who converted to Judaism in late antiquity. These people have no blood connection to Abraham, nor did their ancestors ever occupy Jerusalem.
Confusing, isn’t it? That is why I stay out of the whole ‘blood’ and ‘continuous’ connection situation. The population of the Holy Land prior to 1948 was quite ethnically mixed, and it is not really clear who got there when. It is my opinion that the Holy Land should actually be Christian, the religion of Jesus and the successor and fulfillment of Judaism.
But, I don’t get to make those choices. Prior generations of Christians would never have thought to create a Jewish state in the Holy Land. After all, that is absolutely NOT what the Crusades sought to accomplish. However, the decisions of Western leaders have created this state, and I certainly prefer it to a Muslim one by a long stretch.
But, it isn’t my ideal.
Missourian also wrote,
Israel had the chance to get rid of the occupied territories. It should have jumped at the chance, but instead held on. No one has really ever governed Muslims in peace. In fact, most nations (Spain, Byzantium) were smart enough not to try. Israel does not extend rights to Palestinians in the occupied areas. I don’t see how it could, but the fact is that Israel is trying to effectively control a captive population of Muslims in the West Bank and Gaza.
This is simply silly. It won’t work, and it hasn’t worked. Even if Israel gave all of them citizenship and full rights as Arab Israelis enjoy, it still wouldn’t work. Israel has to either ethnically cleanse the area or give it up. Option 3 is to keep this mess simmering until, hopefully, most of them leave.
Option 3 seems to be the ongoing plan.
NOte 6, Glen, not much disagreement
Glen I don’t have any real disagreement with you. I remain appalled at Dean’s open embrace of Arab atrocities and his obscene willingness to accept the idea that Arabs are driven to kill children with sniper rifles.
When I referenced the various ethnic groups that were present post WWII, I did so many to show that the facts were more complex than that conveyed by Dean’s comment that the Arabs were the “original” inhabitants of the Holy Land. I agree with you that once you start tracing back population patterns it can get very complicated. What isn’t unclear is that Hamas and Islamic Jihad operate on the basis of the idea that the Holy Land is Islamic and must not be relinquished voluntarily. They would also like Spain back and they have a plan to get Spain also. So far, their plans may well be working better than ours.
As to the Palestinian territories, wasn’t the Palestinian Authority supposed to act as a government after Oslo? I think I remember something about billions in international aid being diverted to Arafat’s terror budies. I believe Arafat’s widow lives in utter luxury in Paris with her daughter.
We need not go back centuries. Many Palestinians whose families fled, or were pushed out, of Israel proper still keep the housekeys to their former homes as symbols of their dispossesion. In the West Bank, there have been many families displaced to make way for settlements. Unlike an eminent domain confiscation, they are not reimbursed for their properties, but merely told to get out. In Jerusalem, the Israeli authorities have manipulated zoning laws and other residential codes to force Palestinians to surrender their properties and move out.
Greeks from the Northern part of Cyprus are in a similar situation. Technically they still own property in their former towns and villages which are now under Turkish control. They are not allowed by Turkish authorities to return to their homes, which are now inhabited by Turkish “settlers” from the mainland. Resolution to the Cyprus dispute has been hindered by the unwillingness of the Greek Cypriot exiles to accept the forced and unreimbursed confiscation of their homes and properties, a situation which would become final under the defacto partition of the island that Turkey is insisting on in any peace settlement.
It’s unlikely that there can be any peace agreement that allows either the Palestinian refugees from Israel proper, or the Greeks from Northern Cyprus to ever “go home.” However, in the case of Israel and Palestine we should stop compounding the problem by adding to the numbers of dispossed and displaced. President Bush has meekly suggested that no new settlements be built in the West Bank, but has balked at responding when the Israelis boldly defy him.
Missiourian wrote,
Most 3rd World nations are ruled by kleptocrats. The Israelis sort of let the Palestinians have a government, but not really. The problem is that Israel can’t decide what to do. Push out the Palestinians? 2-state solution?
Israel waffles on this, but that in itself is a strategy. Eventually, I wouldn’t be suprised to see most of the Palestinians immigrate as the ‘wall’ tightens in around them.
We’ll probably take more than our fair share.
Lucky us.
Dean, Note 5, Islamo fascism, willing to risk American lives in the hope that some Muslims will leave Islam.
Dean claims that American’s reaction to Muslims is nothing more important than nativist reactions to Irish Catholics, Japanese or other groups who successfully integrated. He doesn’t seem to notice that none of those groups included people who were willing to die to kill random Americans or who were willing to devote their lives to the actual destruction of America. It only took 19 to bring down the Twin Towers.
From Dean’s note 5, Islamo fascism:
Dean asserts that American Muslims are kind and cuddly becauase America is such a meritocratic, melting-pot. He claims that there have been no native born American Muslims implicated in a terrorist plot. On contraire, mon ami:
American born Muslims do not necessarily love our country: Example I
Not long after September 11, 2001, Washington Post reporter Marc Fisher visited the Muslim Community School in Potomac, Maryland. There “six young people, all born in this country, all American citizens, told me that no, they did not believe that Osama Bin Laden was necssarily the bad guy the president says he is, and no, they did not think that United States should be attacking Afghanistan, and no. they might not be able to serve their country if it mean taking up arms against fellow Muslims.” An eighth grader said, “If i had to choose sides, I’s stay with being Muslim. Being an American means nothing to me. I’m not even proud of telling my cousins in Pakistan that I’m an American.”
Marc Fisher, Washington Post, October 16th, 2001.
Example II:Abu Yousuf, ,an American born Muslim, called the United States conflict with Iraq a “Christian crusade to rid the world of Islam.” He also predicted that American soldiers in Iraq would starve, rape and murder our brothers and sisters. Mr. Yousuf is a leader in the Muslim Student Association which has chapters on hundreds of American campuses. Aaron Klein, “Soda, pizza and the destruction of America.” Wold Net Daily.com March 18, 2003.
Example III: Muhammad Faheed, a twenty-three-year old Muslim born in Pakistan who lived in America from the age of three, asserts that a Muslims allegiance must be to the Muslim ummah and not to the United States. He finished his speech with “the only relationship Muslims should have to the United States is to topple it.” Aaron Klein, “Soda, pizza and the destruction of America.” Wold Net Daily.com March 18, 2003.
Dean also claims that successful Muslims come to love and appreciate America.
Not Maher Hawash. This Palestinian Muslim worked for Intel and went by the nickname “Mike.” He was just an average, ordinary guy, an average American who had fully integrated himlsef into the mainstream community where he lived. In many respects he attained the American dream. He owned his own home and was respected a microchip-make Intel, one of the U.S.’s pre-eminent, high-tech giants. He was exceptionally popular and known in the community for his volunteer acitivites. From Scott Paltrow, “Immigrants Path: From Tech Success to Terror Charges.” Wall STreet Journal, April 29, 2003.
I am not willing to take the risk that even a few Muslim immigrants will resort to terror. I am not willing to look an American victim in the face and tell him or her that he or she lost a loved one because we were evangelizing Muslims by letting them into our country.
Just this year we have had people harmed on a North Carolina campus by a Muslim who admitted openly that he wanted to kill American because he thought America foreign policy was wrong. We had John Mohammed who was an unrepentent jihadist who wanted to sow terror among Washingtonians. Lastly, we had the Muslim in Seattle who killed five Jews because he was upset with what was happening in the middle east. The deaths of these people are the responsibility of those who have opened our country to the totally unnecessary immigration of Muslims.
Missorian: Can you cite a scientific and statistically valid survey on the attitudes of Muslim-Americans to support your claims that they represent a treasonous fifth column? Certainly you don’t expect us believe that to that the comments of a couple of hot-heads alone represent the views of several million people. A sample size of two has never been considered large enough to draw valid conclusions in any research study I have heard of. You may as well say that the comments of Jerry Falwell and Pat Roberson are representative of all Christians.
My own unscientific impression, based on anectodal reports I have read and heard (NPR is doing a series on American Muslims this week) suggests that the views of American Muslims are broad and diverse. You have some Muslim clerics who identify with the intolerant, fundamentalist Wahhabi sect based in Saudi Arabia. They do have religious views that are anomolous and incompatible with American values.
But it is important to understand that Wahabbismi s an extreme puritanical variant of Islam and considered by many Muslims to be a violent, fanatical perversion of the pluralistic Islam practiced by the majoruty in Islam. There are many Muslims not just in the United States, but worldwide, who reject Wahabbiism and seek to focus on the more gentler and nobler apects of their faith.
In his book, The Two Faces of Islam: The House of Saud from Tradition to Terror, author Stephen Schwartz writes,:
A reviewer of this book writes:
.
I’m an Orthodox Christian and not an advocate for Islam. But it is important that we understand the true nature and dynamics of the Islamic faith so that we do not mistakenly persecute people who are no threat, or initiate an unnecessary confrontation with people with whom we can resolve our ddifference in peace.
“Can you cite a scientific and statistically valid survey on the attitudes of Muslim-Americans to support your claims that they represent a treasonous fifth column?”
It’s not about “attitudes”. How do you define attitude? It is something much deeper. It’s about Ideas and Religion. Upstream you assert that we believe Muslim’s are “savages”. I think they are, but not in the sense you are thinking. They are “savage” in that their religion, their Big Idea, is of the Devil himself. A savage can be quite cultured and “rational” and “practical”. Just look at the materialists who rule our society by and large. Savage, in that they kill their own children by the millions every year. Yet, you find them in almost every college classroom educating. These posts have gone round and round for months here. The basic disagreement with the secular/religious left is that their Big Idea (i.e. the historical necessity of liberalizing and secular “progress” will trump Islam among Muslim people) is simply wrong. The effort to divide Islam (Whahabbism vs. “tolerant” strains) is an impulse of the left that it just can’t resist. It flows from their worldview that certain people will “get it” before others (that is get progressivism).
What struck me about Dean’s last post is the idea that this historical necessity of his philosophy is what happened in the West during the sixteenth centaury (which is of course the standard left view of history). I wonder if he believes a similar progressivism is happening in Orthodoxy, or if it already happened, or if perhaps he believes it will??
Dean, Note 11, The gravity of what is at stake dictates the burden of proof
Your recommended policy risks American lives. Mine does not. I do not have the burden of proof. It only takes one Muslim to kill dozens of Americans. Muslims are the only ethnic group in the history of the United States that ever harbored a significant number of people bent on destroying America.No other ethnic group has ever harbored such criminals.
Our first departure on the Muslim immigration issue, is the same issue that divides us with respect to the general immigration issue, a country’s right to protect and defend itself by policing its borders
First, Dean, you have revealed in your posts concerning immigration in general that you place almost no value on a) the rule of law and b) national sovreignty’s most basic feature: national borders and c) the right of a country, community or person to defend themselves against dangers of various kinds.
Just as you deny the Israelis the moral right to self-defense, a right openly and very brashly recently claimed by France, you deny Americans the moral right to protect and defend their country by screening people coming into it. You try to morally shame people who would protect their country by policing and controlling its borders.
Muslims have no moral or legal right to enter the United States. Like every other country on the planet the United States has the right to choose those whom they allow to enter.
A mistake regarding a single Muslim can result in the deaths of many.
We have already made immigration mistakes regarding Muslims. One of the leaders of the 1991 World Trade Center bombing was allowed in in an amnesty program. So, Dean, the very policy which you are now advocating resulted in the death of 6 people in the World Trade Center in 1991.
This is why I do not have the burden of proof on American Muslims.
Like the social worker, nanny-state, manipulator that all Leftists are, you want to take America and make America itself a tool in your world-wide social work project of reforming Muslims, making them less Muslim. However, you are doing this at the cost of America lives and that it was it is wrong and immoral in the extreme.
Dean, the policy you advocate got us 9/11
We failed to acknowledge the danger of admitting Muslims to America. We allowed a lax and careless immigration policy to admit Muslims bent on killing us. We blocked communication between domestic law enforcement and national security agencies. Eventually, all of these very bad policies came to fruition in the deaths of thousands. We ignored the significance of the first World Trade Center bombing.
Now, you actually argue for a continuation and expansion of that policy.
I don’t want one more dead American. Stop Muslim immigration now. My country is not a pinata for the world
John Mueller, Professor of Political Science at Ohio State University, and author of Overblown: How Politicians and the Terrorism Industry Inflate National Security Threats, and Why We Believe Them has another theory:
Note 16, Dean, how do you spell “delusional”
Dean, you have reached the point at which I can only say “get some treatment.” The Brits just broke up a plan to blow up airplanes flying from the U.K. to America. There have been serious convictions in upstate New York and Lodi. Jews were murdered by a Muslim in Seattle about two weeks ago. There are terror prosecutions going on all the time and from time to time, the feds get some serious convictions. The Maher Hawash case that I cited in a few comments back is only about 2 1/2 years old.
The article you cite is delusional. There are reasonable and rational critiques of the U.S. policy both internationally and nationally. However, you are off the reservation. Really off the reservation now.
Remember, if my policy of exclusing Muslims is put in force. Some Muslim don’t get to live in America. Muslims have no moral or legal right to demand the chance to live in America. If you policy is put in place, Americans die. You are gambling with American lives.
Deans plan for peace
Dismantle Israel and give the territory to Hamas and Hizbollah
Open our borders to another 20 million illiterate in Spanish and non-English
speakering manual laborers thereby depressing wages for unskilled workers
already here
Open our borders to the ethnic group which internationally has anywhere
from 15 to 30% of its members who think Osama Bin Laden should
have finished the job and who oppose women’s rights, religious freedom
and the separation of church and state and who have killed thousands
of Americans
Dismiss what Abu Bakr Bashir, leader of millions of today’s Muslims says
about Islam and Sharia
Dismiss the significance of the death of Theo Van Gogh and Pym Fortyn
Dismiss the warnings of Ayaan Hirsi Ali about the brutal totalitarian nature
of Islam
Reject the lesson of Kemal Ataturk who could not with the force of
an obedient army and dictatorial powers drag Turkey in to the modern
world
Reject as irrelevant the experience of Dutch politicians who now must
contend with Muslim politicians in Holland who openly support the
adoption of sharia law and who will not reject stoning and amputations
and polygamy that constitute major parts of sharia law
Allow one of the world’s worst thugs and torturers to speak at the
National Cathedral, assuming that the leader of the greatest
terror state on the planet, a man who has sent people to death
by torture should be given a platform while his government
wages war on America and the West
Heaven help us all
How easily we are mislead: Lies We Loved at Harvard
This is the torturer Dean wants dialogue with. Note Amir Taheri was born and raised in Iran and has worked as a journalist all over the Middle East, Europe and now America. Mr. Taheri is a native speaker of Persian and he can explain how the translator “smoothed over” the rough edges of the grand torturer for Islam.
From Amir Taheri
40-odd years ago, Iranian filmmaker Shin Nazerian produced a movie about a tough guy from a rough Tehran neighborhood who ends up in New York. A comedy of the clash of cultures, it was an instant hit.
One of the first things our tough guy did on arriving in the Big Apple was to “edit” his name to Mr. Small, to reassure the natives. This week, another visitor from Tehran came to New York as part of a U.S. tour that included a session at Harvard University – and took a cue from Mr. Small.
The visitor was the former president of the Islamic Republic – Hojat al-Islam wa al-Moslemeen Sayyed Muhammad Khatami. He too, decided to “edit” his name to cut a less outlandish image with his American interlocutors. Gone was the title Hojat al-Islam wa al-Moslemeen (“Proof of Islam and of Muslims”) and the sobriquet of Sayyed (“master”) used by those who claim to be descendants of the Prophet Muhammad.
Throughout, he presented himself as former president of “Iran,” rather than of the Islamic Republic – although, legally speaking, there is no state known as Iran. He also insisted on describing himself as hich-kareh – someone with no official position at all – hiding the fact that he is a member of at least 11 organs of the Islamic Republic, including the all-important Assembly of Experts.
Khatami altered more than his identity: He edited Islam into a lovey-dovey cult that abhors the use of force, is uncomfortable with capital punishment, would never fight except in self-defense and actively welcomes other faiths.
He never mentioned his ideological guru, the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini – knowing that this would revive memories of the hostages seized by the late mullah. Nor the current “supreme guide,” Ali Khamenei – who is, according to the constitution in force in the Islamic Republic, the world’s only truly legitimate ruler.
He used a vocabulary carefully designed to hoodwink the Americans without angering his fellow Khomeinists back home. The trick was reinforced by the fact that he often said one thing in Persian, while the interpreter said something else in English for the benefit of the Harvard audience.
For example, Khatami would speak of khoshunat, which means “roughness,” but the interpreter would translate it into “violence” or even “terror.” Thus, the Harvard audience would think that Khatami admits that there may be terrorism in the realm of Islam – while back in Tehran, he would appear talking only about “roughness” and “coercion.”
In Persian, he would speak of “sodomy,” but the Harvard audience would hear “gay sex.” Referring to the leader of al Qaeda, he would say “that gentleman” (Aan Agha) in Persian, but the interpreter would say “Osama bin Laden.”
Asked what he thought of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s various outrageous statements, the Hojat al-Islam never mentioned his successor by name. In Persian, he took pains to endorse Ahamdinejad’s basic position – but in English he gave the impression that he did not fully agree with his successor.
Khatami was also in total denial about the bloody history of his eight years as president. There was no mention of the 1,347 men and women executed during his two terms. And when it came to the murder of intellectuals and journalists by his henchmen, he pretended that other organs of the Islamic Republic had been responsible, without his knowledge. An Iranian student raised the murder of Iranian-Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi – and Khatami, with a broad smile, said he wasn’t quite sure how the poor woman had died in one of his prisons.
He spoke a great deal about the need for dialogue, tolerance and understanding. But he made no mention of the fact that he had closed down 150 Iranian newspapers, imprisoned scores of journalists and unleashed his Hezbollah hounds to crush the student revolts against his regime. His “dialogue of civilizations” had not been extended to thousands of Iranian workers bullied, beaten, murdered or forced out of their jobs simply because they had gone on strike.
Khatami also forgot to mention that there was no dialogue among Iranians inside Iran itself while he was in power. Nor did he tell his Harvard audience that he had refused to meet with Iranian-Americans or grant interviews to their media, especially in California.
The Harvard audience applauded the Hojat al-Islam, forgetting that during his reign Iran had had the largest number of prisoners of conscience in the world, and that Khatami had been a member of the “Committee for Islamic Cultural Revolution” that shut all Iranian universities in the early ’80s and purged tens of thousands of teachers and students because they opposed Khomeinism.
Khatami was practicing an art known as taqiyah, which could be translated into “dissimulation” or “obfuscation.” This began as a theological tool to allow Shiites to hide their beliefs in hostile environments – but Khatami used it as a political tool to deceive Americans who obviously longed to be deceived.
Toward the end of the Harvard “Taqiyah fest,” however, the tail of the cat began to show out of the Hojat al-Islam’s bag. Someone mentioned Hezbollah – and Khatami began waxing lyrical about his love for what most Iranians regard as a terrorist outfit created and controlled by the Islamic Republic.
According to Khatami, Hezbollah has never been engaged in any act of terrorism and is nothing but a “national resistance movement” comparable to the French during the Nazi occupation. In other words, Israel is like Nazi Germany and Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah’s branch manager in Lebanon, is Gen. Charles De Gaulle.
Was Hezbollah justified in triggering a war without informing the Lebanese people and government? Yes, said the Hojat al-Islam. Why? The war was justified because Hezbollah had to liberate occupied Lebanese territory. What territory? He mentioned the Shebaa farms – a piece of land the size of Central Park which, in fact, belongs to Syria.
The “dialogue of civilizations,” the discourse of deception, had reached its limit.
The Harvard people who gave Khatami a tribune from which to deceive the American people might want to know an old Persian saying: “When a mullah calls, an undertaker is sure to follow.”
I
Note 15, Dean and Prof. Mueller: The Utter Failure of the American Professorate
It is clear from Dean’s reference that he gives weight to Prof. Mueller’s status as a …….drumroll……Professor of Political Science. But, to those who see clearly and, if we manage to win this civilizational war and our culture survives, Mueller will be seen in the same light as the 1930’s Oxford Dons and Chamberlain.
Virtually the entire American professorate failed America. Yup, they failed America. They turned a blind eye to the resurgance of Islamic jihad for decades. They refused to accept the idea that religion is a motivator, they fell fack on the tired old non-answers offered by Marxism and they provided no warning for America of what was to come. Esposito should resign. He arrogated to himself the mantle of “foremost authority on Islam” in America, and yet he had no warnings for us of what was to come.
So, in truth, the professorate should hang its head, many should just outright resign and no longer may the phrase “Professor of Something at Somewhere University” be given any special weight, to the contrary, it is mark of shame.
Indian Authorities Seize Papers Carrying Popes’ Remarks Fearing Muslim Violence
Source: http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/
More information that Dean doesn’t want us to take into account. We are not to observe the behavior of Muslims in Europe, Russia, Africa, Asia or India.
Well for those of you who care to look at this behavior, here is more proof of Islam’s inherent violent nature; here in the real world, today in the daily newspaper.
Indian authorities seized newspapers containing reports of Pope Benedict’s gentle remarks about Islam and violence. Why, pray tell? Because Indian authorities knew that these remarks about Mohammed would cause Muslims to become violent. Muslims effectively censor free speech in India using the threat of violence which all of know is real.
Pope Benedict actually used Mohammed’s name, fancy that, that infidel with the pointy hat had the nerve to utter the name of the most favored of Allah. He also stated in the same address that Muslims had a duty to restrain the violent people within their group. One Muslim leader stated “Whate has been said against our Prophet is unbearable…..” No one must dare to even discuss Mohammed it is “unbearable.” There you have it. The religion of tolerance described by Khatami at Harvard. Let’s dialogue!!!!
Missourian writes: “Mueller will be seen in the same light as the 1930’s Oxford Dons and Chamberlain.”
Yeah, whatever, but the guy asks a legitimate question — why no attacks? The U.S. is the easiest place in the world to attack — all the weapons, chemicals, etc., are readily available. Hell, if they couldn’t figure out how to do a decent attack, all they would have to do is join Operation Rescue for a while and pump the convicted felons there for information.
But most of these guys here are like the Three Stooges version of jihadis. Maher Hawash — the dude takes the jihadi vow, travels half way around the globe, and can’t figure out how to get into Afghanistan.
Missourian: “I am not willing to take the risk that even a few Muslim immigrants will resort to terror. I am not willing to look an American victim in the face and tell him or her that he or she lost a loved one because we were evangelizing Muslims by letting them into our country.”
Well, from 1982 to around 2004, there were around 150 violent attacks against abortion clinics, including bombings actual and attempted, shootings, murders, etc. Add in death threats, garden variety assault & battery, bomb threats, etc., and the number is in the thousands. By your line of reasoning, we shouldn’t let any Christian anti-abortion immigrants into the country.
Note 21. Abortion clinic violence cannot be justified either outside or inside the clinic. I’m not sure what the “violent” in “150 violent attacks” outside the clinics consisted of, but I am sure that the 47 million attacks inside the clinics (through 2005) ended in death.
47 million!
Note 21, Jim, I can document the orthodoxy of jihad, you cannot find a single, reputable Christian leader who support abortion killings.
No one with a known or reasonably suspected propensity for violence should be let into the country, whatever his background. Would it be impolite for me to remind you that Muslims are the only religious group teaching that violence against Americans, including you, is a religious duty? What do you have against protecting America?
We have been down this tiresome road before. Jihad is the official teaching of Islam and always have been. I did make up the phrase ” domain of war.” It is an Islamic term and it refers to where you live.
You know as well as I do that no responsible Christian leader advocates abortion clinic killings. The Roman Catholic Church doesn’t teach that abortion killings are moral, neither does the Orthodox Church, neither do major Protestant denominations. You know that full well.
Yet, over and over, you pull out the “theological equivalence” garbage. There is a difference between official teaching of violence which is found in the Koran, the hadith and the sunnah and a person who calls himself Christian who violates the official (and published I might add) teachings of the major Christian groups.
You know this, but you keep repeating the same, tired taunts.
Jim, your loathing of certain Christian groups just might get you killed by a Muslim
It is clear that there are certain Christian groups that you loathe. Good for you, its a free country, loathe whom you will.
However, do you think that you could stop bashing them just long enough to assist in protecting our country?
I have yet to see you argue for one policy, one measure, one approach that would help to defeat the jihadis and defend America. Defending America seems to be an insignificant issue with you, you just got to beat them “fundies” over the head, over and over and over. After all Jerry Falwell annoys you, so you don’t have time to help out with the Muslims planning to attack America. As much as Jerry annoys you, he ain’t gonna kill ya. Mohammed Atta gladly would have.
Missourian writes: “Jim, I can document the orthodoxy of jihad, you cannot find a single, reputable Christian leader who support abortion killings.”
You can post a thousand nasty quote from Muslims. But the fact is that Muslim terrorism in the last five years has been practically nonexistent, even though the U.S. is the easiest country to attack from within. I don’t care if the Christian leaders are reputable or not. If you get blown up, shot, or assaulted, it doesn’t matter if the perpetrator is Muslim or Christian. You worry about what people say. I worry about what they do.
Missourian: “It is clear that there are certain Christian groups that you loathe. Good for you, its a free country, loathe whom you will.”
Yeah, I loathe the Christian version of the ayatollahs. You should too. They don’t like you any more than they like me.
Missourian: “I have yet to see you argue for one policy, one measure, one approach that would help to defeat the jihadis and defend America.”
You mean like not going to war against a Middle Eastern country that posed little threat to us? You mean like not exhausting our armed forces in Iraq? You mean not spending billions of dollars every month in Iraq that could be used to defend the U.S.? Didn’t I mention that? If not, let me mention it now.
Missourian: “Defending America seems to be an insignificant issue with you, you just got to beat them “fundies” over the head, over and over and over.”
Well hell, I pay many thousands of dollars in taxes every year. Doesn’t that count for anything? If your incompetent pals in the White House would spend the money effectively, we’d be in much better shape. Your problem with me is that I don’t sufficiently foam at the mouth over the Muslims. Again, I worry more about actions than words.
So why haven’t we had hundreds of attacks by Muslims living in the U.S. the last few years? What is your theory?
Note 24. Missourian writes:
Yup, loathe whom you will. But Jim and Dean should spare us the Rosie O’Donnell school of domestic policy: there is no difference between Islamofascism and fundamentalist Christianity. Notice how abortion clinic bombers are (rightfully) castigated, but the violence inside the clinic is ignored? Notice too how both bombings of the World Trade Center, the DC sniper, the LAX El-Al killing, the Seattle synogogue killing, the Detroit Muslim marches, the thwarted bombings of American planes flying in from London, are ignored as well? And this doesn’t even count the Americans targeted overseas.
If it weren’t for these examples, and if I heard moderate Muslims speaking out, I’d have a bit more confidence in their hypothesis. Yet they offer no reason why the Muslim experience in America would be any different than, say, England, Germany, France, and Holland apart from the fact that terrorism in the US (so far anyway) is less than in Europe.
The truth is that Islamofascists don’t really care about the kind of American exceptionalism that Jim, Dean, and Rosie want us to believe really exists. Prudence dictates caution. But, despite the stated aims of the Islamofascists to terrorize America into submission to Sharia Law, Jim, Dean, and Rosie want us to lower our vigilance for no other reason than no full-scale attack since 9-11 has occured. Anyone for wishful thinking?
Note 26: Liberals are not ignoring the threat coming from the more militant brands of Islam. A large number of have signed an American version of the Euston Manifesto.
“The key moral and political challenge in foreign affairs in our time stems from radical Islamism and the jihadist terrorism it has unleashed. We favor a liberalism that is as passionate about the struggle against Islamic extremism as it has been about its political, social, economic and cultural agenda at home.”
This is a statement coming from “signers or supporters in the United States of the Euston Manifesto and its reassertion of liberal values. [Their] views range from those of centrists and independents to liberals of varying hues on to the democratic left. “
Note 27. James, good find. Finally some rationality seems to be returning to the left wing, in England at least.
Fr. Hans writes: “But Jim and Dean should spare us the Rosie O’Donnell school of domestic policy: there is no difference between Islamofascism and fundamentalist Christianity.”
I have never said that they were the same. Obviously they are not. With all respect, my comments were very narrow in scope, dealing with the issue of why we have not seen more Islamic terrorism in the years post-9/11.
Fr. Hans: “Notice how abortion clinic bombers are (rightfully) castigated, but the violence inside the clinic is ignored?”
Again, my point was not to denounce everything that might be denounced. My point was that if we’re talking about terrorist acts, right-wing Christians are no slouches. And this includes only attacks against abortion clinics. I did not include all the many other instances of assault, murder, and sex abuse done by Christians. In other words, if a disturbed Muslim shoots someone, that attack is chalked up to Islam; if a disturbed Christian shoots someone, that attack is chalked up to a disturbed personality or bad personal theology.
Fr. Hans: “Notice too how both bombings of the World Trade Center, the DC sniper, the LAX El-Al killing, the Seattle synogogue killing, the Detroit Muslim marches, the thwarted bombings of American planes flying in from London, are ignored as well? And this doesn’t even count the Americans targeted overseas.”
Again, the topic was domestic terrorism, not what people in other countries are doing. By the way, I believe that the Seattle synagogue killing was done by a Middle Eastern fellow who was a baptized, but obviously disturbed Christian.
Fr. Hans: “Jim, Dean, and Rosie want us to lower our vigilance for no other reason than no full-scale attack since 9-11 has occured. Anyone for wishful thinking?”
It is not a matter of lowering vigilance, but of where you put your limited resources.
Again, I have to ask the question: if domestic Muslims are such a tremendous threat, why have we seen so little violence from them — around 5 or 6 million of them — post-9/11? Not trying to start an argument here, but the question seems reasonable to me.
Please don’t put words in my mouth. Nobody said anything about lowering our vigilance. We did mention, however, that it would be a good idea to lower the level of religious bigotry and fearmongering hysteria.
It’s election season. Its time to scare people. I understand that. Either you hate Muslims or your with the terrorists. Either you support President Bush’s attempt to rip up both the Constitution and the Geneva Conventionss or your with the terrorists. Either you support one-party rule in America or your with the terrorists.
Do you think we can’t see through the transparently partisan motivations for the anti-Islamic rhetoric? We’ve been through all this before, the lying, the fearmongering, the questioning of other’s patriotism. Iraq has a nuclear program and could launch warheads in 15 minutes. Iraq shopping for uranium in Niger. Aluminum tubes, Mobile weapons labs. “The smoking gun could be a mushroom cloud”. Iraqi agents met with Mohammed Atta in Prague to plan September 11th. Deliberate lies, every one.
Each time Jim Holman and I protested that the claims used to justify the Iraq war were based on false information, we were attacked as traitors, as appeasers, as unpatriotic and less than Christian. You would think that now that the claims used to justify the war in Iraq have been proven false, some by admissions from the President himself, those people who attacked us would apologize and admit their error. But no.
It’s ironic isn’t it – that the people who supported this costly, wasteful, unnecessary war in Iraq , a war which has drained away and squandered resources needed to protect America’s security, exhausted our military, and diverted so much of our attention that the Taliban has reconstituted itself in Afghanistan, thees people now have the temerity to question the concern of others for America’s security.
Note 25, Jim, references to legitimate scholarship are not “nasty quotes”
Here we diverge. I have provided references to legitimate scholarship or documentable quotes from Muslims who lead millions of other Muslims, and whose opinions and statements are therefore important.. You have decided to dismiss them as “nasty quotes.” In order to maintain your present state of mind you have to ignore the following:
a) 1400 years a nearly continuous armed conflict by the Ummah against non-Muslims
b) current theologians and Muslims leaders who continue to confirm the centrality of violent jihad. The person who is the closest Muslim have to the Pope openly calls for the annihilation of Jews worldwide. You yawn.
c) Muslim violence in nearly every continent of the world
d) violent attacks by individual Muslims in the United States, all of whom claim that they are acting on behalf of Islam and who were never considered unbalanced UNTIL the violent act itself
e) substantial federal convictions of people giving material aid to terror organizations, including a recent conviction of the public affairs officer of CAIR.
f) the fact that there was more than 10 years between the two World Trade Center attacks
You are obsessed with people you consider fundamentalist Christians. This hatred is so intense that you cannot focus on the greatest enemy your country has.
I didn’t make up 9/11, Jim. You even referred to Al Queda as the “enemy du jour.” As if 9/11 was some trivial event that we all should have moved on from by now.
Again, whether you recognize it or not, you are obsessed with your hatred of some stripe of Christian you call fundamentalist and it is distorting your thinking to the extent that you can’t even give Islam an objective examination.
Note 30. Nice try Dean but to label your critics as engaging in “religious bigotry and fearmongering hysteria” is over the top.
Look, you have offered a lot of opinion in the last few weeks, some of it specious. You’ve hobbled together a shameful display of moral equivalency comparing Israel to Nazi Germany (note 2) proving you don’t really understand Nazism; implicity argued for the collapse of any distinction between radical and moderate Muslims; characterized your critics as “bigots”, “fear-mongerers,” deliberate liars — the list goes on.
But the outrage falls flat. No one has said the things you accuse them of saying.
Read my post (note 26) again. I argue that the comparison between fundamentalist Christianity and radical Islam is specious.
Then I argue that the historical record shows Muslim radicalism has indeed struck America. (After 9-11, why does this need to be said at all?)
Then I conclude that the conflation of the first and second points has a clear polemical function: lower the vigilance towards Muslim aggression; a view I call wishful thinking.
Seems pretty straightforward to me.
One of the complaints toward the left is that they emotionalize rebuttals by attacking the motives of their critics rather than the ideas put forth. Your response above (note 30) is exhibit A. But the scoldings don’t work anymore. The terminology is worn out, the method tiresome.
Besides, the Muslim threat is real, and the threat of death and harm is a great clarifier. People are tending to think more clearly (some anyway) and aren’t as easily bamboozled by the high volume, emotionalized, polemics of the left as they used to be.
Interesting. This same debate appears to be breaking out elsewhere in the media.
In the LA Times Sam Harris writes:
Head-in-the-Sand Liberals
Western civilization really is at risk from Muslim extremists.
To which Kevin Drrum replies:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_09/009516.php
Note 33, Dean, death in defense of Islam is the highest possible good
I supplied you with passages from the Bukhari Hadith quotes from Mohammed in which he states that “death in the defense of the faith” is the highest possible good.
You accused me of being a warmonger and giving in to fear for bringing the actual text of Muslim “scripture” to the discussion.
Note 33, Dean, Bukhari Hadith quotes on dying for Islam
Source: http://www.usc/edi
Mohammed makes clear that fighting for Allah is high priority
Volume 1, Book 2, Number 25:
Narrated Abu Huraira:
Mohammed promises followers with rewards for fighting for Allah
Volume 1, Book 2, Number 35:
Narrated Abu Huraira:
Mohammed makes clear that Jihad involves “putting oneself in danger”
Volume 2, Book 15, Number 86:
Narrated Ibn Abbas:
Mohammed makes clear that jihad means the battle with non-Muslims that he just returned from:
Narrated Abdullah:
Mohammed distinguishes between holy fighting and ordinary cussedness
Volume 9, Book 93, Number 550: Narrated Abu Musa:
Quote makes clear that jihad refers to the recently completed Battle of the TrenchVolume 5, Book 58, Number 140:
Narrated Anas bin Malik:
Mohammed talks about the holy battle just completed
Narrated Ibn ‘Abbas:
Mohammed tells women they don’t have to actually fight holy battlesVolume 3, Book 29, Number 84:
Narrated Aisha (mother of the faithful believers):
There are about 30 more quotes, just use the search utility for “jihad.”
Test of American Muslim “moderates”
Will American Muslim moderates come to the defense of this journalist who warned his country against Islamic extremism and argued for peace with other religions? If not, it is all smoke and mirrors.
Source: http://www.asiantribune.com/index.php?q=node/2040
Moderate Muslim Journalist to be Tried for Sedition
Wed, 2006-09-20 00:33
Dhaka, 19 September, (Asiantribune.com): : At approximately 1:30 PM Bangladesh time, a judge ruled that the government would begin its sedition trial of journalist Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury, possibly within fifteen days.
Choudhury is the Muslim journalist who was arrested by the Bangladesh government in 2003. He was imprisoned under often deplorable conditions and tortured after angering the government and radicals by warning his country about the rise of Islamist terrorism there, urging Bangladesh to recognize Israel, and advocating interfaith understanding and religious equality.
In April 2005, after seventeen months in prison, Choudhury was freed after an unrelenting battled waged by Dr. Richard Benkin, an American Jew, and with the help of Representative Mark Kirk (R-IL).
Since his release, Choudhury has continued to pursue a course that advocates moderate Islam and opposes radical Islam. Together, Choudhury and Benkin have worked to form inter-religious ties with other advocates worldwide. Choudhury has also resumed publication of his paper, Weekly Blitz (Dhaka), which also champions the same causes. This summer, radicals set off explosives outside the office of Blitz, and they left a bomb in the paper’s press room that did not detonate.
Over the past several weeks, Choudhury was optimistic that the government would drop the charges, which Bangladesh officials have admitted on many occasions to be false. The presiding judge, a member of the radical Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) party, ruled that his trial for sedition—a capital offense—is to proceed immediately. The JMB is a member of the current ruling coalition and signs point to significant Islamist gains in the upcoming elections in January 2007.
NPR notes that half of Dearborn Muslim-Americans turn out to support Hizbollah
Source:http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5627457
Check out the signs equating Israel with Nazism. Take note of the threat to kill Jews just as their warlord founder did in his day.
This is happening every day in America. Dean states that we don’t have to worry because of the assimilationist power of American culture. But these people are clearly rejecting American culture if the streets are filled with fully covered women.
I don’t want “American culture” redefined to include veiled and covered women.
They should go back to their native Muslim countries. Dearnborn people born here should be paid to return with their parents and grandparents. Muslim immigration should be halted immediately. Saudi money should be blocked at the border and Saudis should not be allowed to use their funds to support schools, mosques or other institutions in America. American lives are at stake and we can’t even muster the will to block the enemy from entering our country.
Islam is the enemy of free speech everyway it takes hold.
It’s always wrong to paint with a broad brush.
Here are some of the people that Missourian wants to deport: http://www.patrioticapaam.org/Voices%20of%20Apaam.htm
Note 38. Dean, could you define “broad brush”? It’s not clear what is wrong and why it is always wrong without this definition.
Hard Cases make bad law:
Dean, this is classic Lefty emotionalism. The Cultural Left always argues against the rule of law and the application of general principles to all people who are similarly situated. Find one emotional case and then reject the application of a uniform law. Until the cultural left gets into power, that is.
Let’s apply your reasoning to obeying traffic lights. I argue that people who run traffic lights should be fined and points should be assessed against their license. Then Dean dredges up a picture of a mother of triplets who was rushing to work in order to earn the money to feed her family. The mother is a double amputee. Dean will flash this picture in our mind and plead: “Will you enforce this cruel law against this person.?” Then we are supposed to be morally ashamed of even thinking of enforcing this law. I call this “moral intimidation.” It is phony, it is indefensible and it improperly assigns the moral high ground to the cultural left. This argumentataive technique be applied to any law, any policy, any set of regulations. The Cultural Left works against the rule of law which our Founders fought to establish and protect. They will impose their own harsh laws when and where they have the power, such as on college campuses where speech is muzzled, policed and penalized.
The facts remain that Muslims are busy killing Americans right now, right here in America. They are here because we refused to do what every other country in the world does, that is, evaluate applicants for entry based on the effect that the applicant will have on America.
*We lost Bobby Kennedy because Sirhan Sirhan did not want a supporter of Israel to be in line for the Presidency.
*We lost 6 people in Seattle Jewish Foundation Office because we let a Muslim in the country.
*We lost some of our finest young officers just before the Iraq war because we allowed a Muslim to enlist in the Army.
* We had many people injured in North Carolina when a Muslim ran a car through a crowd on a University campus.
*We lost people at the El Al Airline counter because we let in a Muslim.
American lives are more important. We are at war. During WWII we did not open our doors to Germans or Japanese, we were at war with them.
Any Muslim who embraces free speech is an apostate. Sharia law is clear, the Murdering Madman Despot Mohammed made clear that the penalty for mocking him or his cult is death. There is no free speech in Islam. If General Abasid supports equal rights for women and free speech he is a Muslim apostate.
You have no way to distinguish between assimilated Muslims and non-assimilated Muslims. Case in Point. Mike Hawash who used his position at Microsoft as cover. He lived the American dream with a wife, kids, a house in the suburbs and a Little League membership. At night he supported jihadist websites and assisted in attempts to hack the Defense Department.
Dean is always willing to risk American lives and Israeli lives while he finds extenuating circumstances for Palestinians thugs and their cultural and religious associates.
With apologies to Jeff Foxworthy
If you believe wife-beating should be illegal…… you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you believe women’s testimony should have equal weight that of men’s
…… you are not Muslim you are in apostate
If you support the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution… you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you support the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution….. you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you oppose the legalization of polygamy….. you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you don’t believe that interaction between men and women should
be closely regulated in all spheres of life…. you are not a Muslim you
are an apostate
If you don’t believe that women should “cover” ……. you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you believe that male and female children should receive equal inheritances
from their parents….. you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you believe that artists should be able to portray the human figure ….
you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you believe that Muslims should live under Western legal codes…. you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you believe that a woman should be considered as a leader of a country…
you are not a Muslim you are an apostate.
If you believe that Islam should have the same status as an other religions
under the laws of a country….. you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
If you believe that Muslims should be given the freedom to leave Islam without
penalty…… you are not a Muslim you are an apostate
General Abasid is an apostate because he cannot both be a Muslim and enforce and ascribe to the U.S. Armies non-discrimination against women rules
Painting with a broad brush is wrong because very rarely do entire communities of people sharing only an ethnic or religious bond conform to a single negative stereotype.
Missourian wants us to believe that the behavior of a small number of Palestinian-American hot-heads, inflammed into making rash statements by the very real and ongoing oppression against their homeland, should be intepreted as an indication of seditious intent against our country by the much larger, wider and more diverse community to which the hot-heads belong.
Furthermore she calls for an immediate end to the immigration by members of the Islamic faith and the commencement of mass deportation of all Muslims. Because some Muslims engage in behaviors we rightly regard as offensive, she wrongly assumes that all Muslims engage in those behaviors.
It’s totally ridiculous, malevolent and counter-productive. For many decades there was a very successful fund-raising operation in the United States channeling donations from Irish-Americans into the coffers of the Irish Republican Army. Does this mean that the entire Irish-American community supported the IRA or their terrorist aims and needed to be deported? Of course not. Missourian claims that some Muslim hubands beat their wives, so she assumes they all beat their wives. It’s been rumoured that some Irish people like to have a drink now and then. Does this mean all people of Irish ancestry are drunks?
The idea of imposing collective punishment on entire ethnic or religuious groups, even during wartime was discredited by the Japanese-American internment experience during WWII. Some of the most highly decorated units during WWII came from the Japanese-American community. Internment in the end turned out to be no more than excuse for nativist bigots to loot and steal the property and farmstead’s of loyal Japanese-Americans.
Missourian’s proposal can only delight Osama Bin Ladin because it sends out a hateful message against Muslims that validates what OBL has been saying all along. Americans don’t welcome and embrace Muslims, Americans hate Mulsims and are the enemy of Islam. America has declared war on the entire Muslim faith. Really, if you are Osama Bin Ladin you can’t buy propaganda like the kind Missourian would have us give him for free.
Dean doesn’t believe in the force of religion, odd from a person claiming status not just as a Christian but an Orthodox Christian
Dean apparently doesn’t believe in the force of a religious/political body of thought called “Islam.” He is engaging in what can only be called as this point in history as a truly childish approach to a monumentally important civilizational clash.
Let us examine his latest missive:
Of course not. Missourian claims that some Muslim hubands beat their wives, so she assumes they all beat their wives.
No, Dean, I do not claim that “some Muslims beat their wives.” What I properly claim and what I can document to be true is that orthodox Islam teaches that Muslim mean have the right to beat their wives if the Muslim men deem their wives to be disobedient. This is a fact. It can be amply documented. Individual Muslim men may or may not beat their wives under different circumstances, but, there is no serious debate as to what Islam teaches.
To be a Muslim MEANS to believe that the Koran is the word of an almighty deity called Allah.
If you believe that the Koran is the word of an almighty diety called Allah THEN
you are Muslim and you are bound by the Koran.
If you are bound by the Koran then you believe that men have the right to beat their wives as it is clearly set out in the Koran.
Individual Muslim men may do many different things at different times. Muslims in America may obey American law because they don’t want to be arrested. However, IF THEY ARE MUSLIM and not an apostate,they believe that men should have the right to beat their wives, if the wives are disobedient. If they are Muslims and if they are not apostates, will use their political rights in America to work for the revision of existing American law to bring it in line with sharia law. Representatives of CAIR have made clear on many occaisions that they are working for the supremacy of sharia law in America and the revision of any laws in conflict with that, they just claim to be using peaceful means to do so.
American has no moral duty to admit anyone to its shores. Repeat, we have no moral duty to admit anyone to our country. We have every moral right to screen the people that might harm our country. If we cannot effectively screen Muslims (and realistically we cannot as we have failed over and over and over again) we should deny entry to new Muslims.
At a very fundamental level, 9/11 happened because we are unable and not prepared to effectively screen out Muslims who are here to kill us. No other ethnic, religious or cultural group is sending people here to kill us. Protecting Americans from being murdered in more important than granting Muslims the invaluable privilege of stepping on our beautiful shores. American lives are more important. Repeat Americans lives are more important than allowing Muslims to escape the miserable, backward societies that they have created for themselves. Forcing Muslims to live in their own countries will encourage them to improve them rather than to flee them. This is an overall good result.
Allowing Muslims to leave Muslim countries absolves them from the task of fixing their miserable countries
Muslim countries are miserably poor and backward. Egypt is at the very last of the list of countries in terms of economic health, the last of almost 180. Only sub-Saharan Africa falls below the Muslim world. The major output of the Muslim world is natural resources located and extracted by Westerners. The Muslim world does not produce products that others want to buy.
The French produce wine. The Italians produce cheese. The South Americans produce wool and agricultural produce. The Southeast Asians produce rice. The Japanese produce electronics. The Muslim world produce nothing anybody wants.
The West can and will move on beyond petroleum and when that happens a curtain of utter darkness will descend on the Islamic world. Stop enabling Islamic escapism. Stop Muslim immigration
Japanese Internment was not unjustified
Michell Malkin very bravely tackled the question of Japanese internment in her book on the topic. She was able to document that there existed an active Fifth Column at work in America.
America was at war. We had a right to defend ourselves. We had no good way to monitor Japanese-Americans and we knew that there were active spies among them.
Japanese-Americans were interned, they were not abused or killed or tortured.
They were released at the end of the world. The internment undoubtedly saved thousands of America military and civilian lives.
Dean can defend anything except his country.
I have been profiled by border control
When I was just past college age, I visited Germany. At the Germany border, I was stopped by German border control and my belongings were very seriously searched. Why? German border control knew that drug gangs had taken to recruiting naive and fatuous American college girls to transport drugs. I looked like an American college girl. I was “profiled.” My rights were not violated. I did not complain. I accept the necessity of law enforcement.
Muslims have no right to take offense if people fear them. Millions of Muslims march on a weekly basis fomenting nothing but hatred. They march in Dearborn supporting Hisbollah. The NPR reported that HALF of the Dearborn Arab “community” turned out for a pro-Hizbollah rally. We have 15,000 Hizbollah supporters embedded in our heartland because of policies supported by Dean.
Polities Dean support lead to 9/11 and the spread of leprosy to North America
No legal immigrant is admitted with a case of Hanson’s disease, aka leprosy. Leprosy is an African disease it is not “native” to North America. It is not “native” to the Western hemisphere. That was until, lax immigration allowed an influx of illegals with Hanson’s disease. American now has 90,000 active cases of Hanson disease and the health authorities hope that they have identified all of them before the disease is spread further.
9/11 happened because we cannot distinguish between Muslims who want to kill us and Muslims who don’t. I don’t care because no true Muslim can support the Koran and the Constitution. The Koran and the Constitution are in conflict. Given that a true Muslim, as opposed to an apostate, cannot truthfull pledge allegiance to the current U.S. Constitution, we have every moral, legal and ethical right to exclude Muslims.
The fact that we are even debating this reveals the depth of the obscene self-hatred that Dean carries for his civilization and his country.
I appreciate your efforts Missourian. However, Dean is an idealist of the classic sort – and Islam does not fit into his progressive world view. Instead of questioning his world view, he crams (or rather twists) religious and historical truths into his idea of history and man.
We have asked him (many times) “What is man?” but he never answers. We know his answer; man is the essentially good (or at least neutral) fact of nature progressively crawling out of the slime. He can’t help it if a few “bad apples” are left behind…;)
Dean is blessed however – he has Christians and other realists around him that make wiser decisions. Hopefully, this country will soon begin to take up the Islamic question (before it’s too late).
Note 48, I don’t think “idealism” should be used to describe Dean’s philosophy. he is a totalitarian and a syncretist
Christopher, O.K. I know I am a bore, but, I would like to add two thought.
I reject the idea that the cultural Left, of which Dean is a member, is “idealistic” it is, in fact, totalitarian. I won’t give them that pleasant of “idealist” because their policies are not idealistic. The world they want is not ideal. The societies they have dominated have not been better than other societies, they have been worse.
Some time ago, Dean started a comment with the premise that equality of outcome in economic affairs was the ideal and his definition of justice. Equality of outcome is not justice; it is the precise opposite. Equality of outcome in injustice and it amounts to a conspiracy of bureaucrats and free-riders against the productive people in society. In Dean’s world eventually everyone becomes a free rider, there are no true productive people left in society and the economic machine grinds to a halt. This is what happened in Russia, it took a long time because the economy was propped up with wealth from extractive industries which produced foreign exchange.
Dean is also a syncretist and his attachment to the exclusive status of Christ is tenuous. He comes very close to the position that “there are many roads to God.” He is unwilling to undertake the intellectual advancement and defense of Christianity. He ignores and denies the monumental differences between religions.
The acceptance of his ideas would be a catastrophe for Western civilization, the bearer and inventor of the future. Really the Third World is simply resisting the future. They don’t want it. They want the endless repetition of the stagn ant centuries that have come before. They want a Dark Age, an endless Dark Age and Dean is their collaborator.
As George Orwell said “pacifists are objective supporters of fascism.”
It is a bit surreal to have to remind people on a blog that purports to represent the teachings of Jesus Christ, that bigotry and hatred against other human beings is wrong. It is wrong even if those human beings are members of a faith whose beliefs we do not completely agree with. Since it is a pleasure to be persecuted for Christ, I accept your hurtful insults and gross distortions of my comments as part of process of witnessing for my Savior
I announce proudly that Jesus Christ came to preach a message of love and not hate. Christians are directed by the founder of their faith to work for peace, healiing and reconciliation in the world. We are specificically directed to “love our enemies” and “turn the other cheek”. We are asked to change our hearts and our minds and trust Our Savior that the power of love, compassion are understanding are stronger than hate, anger or fear. Few actions could be more contrary to the teachings of Jesus Christ than a campaign of hate intended to demonize a large portion of humanity, taunting, insulting, creating ill will, inflamming tensions and recklessly inviting further conflict. There is a respectful way to discuss the merits and differences of various religions, but the 24/7, in-your-face, Islamofascism campaign is not designed to be respectful but confrontational.
satan is always at work formenting hate and violence among the members of humanity. Our negative emotions are like gasoline for the fires of anger and destruction he seeks to light. Only by embracing love can we render the evil one powerless. Pope John Paul II understood that which is why he forgave the Muslim who tried to take his life and instead steadfastly continued to reach out to the Islamic world with respect and brotherhood.
Contrary to one person’s misrepresentation of my comments, I have never sought to minimize the differences between the various faiths. What I have called for is prudent restraint and respectful dialogue. With tensions between the West and the Islamic world are particularly inflammed we should not carelessly toss off dangerous comments like lit cigarrette butts flicked into dry brush. It is no affirmation of Christianity to assume a posture of preening moral superiority over people of other faiths; that is what the Pharisees did. Christians affirm their faith through acts of love, compassion and humility, not boasting and insults.