Behead All Those Who Insult Islam - This is the enemy. Jihadi’s Guide to Etiquette Rule 11: Never leave home without your matches, effigy-hanging sticks and death threat placards. You never know when they’ll come in handy. In Pakistan, dutiful followers of the jihadi guide have found a new pretext this week for an anti-Western bonfire party: the knighting of author Salman Rushdie in Britain. Muslim groups are burning Queen Elizabeth and Rushdie in effigy. The Union Jack is in flames. The Religion of Perpetual Outrage strikes again. It’s not just some obscure spokesman for a “tiny minority” objecting to Rushdie’s knighthood and leading the renewed calls for Rushdie’s death and Britain’s submission. Pakistan’s religious-affairs minister, Mohammed ljaz ul-Haq, bellowed: “If someone blows himself up he will consider himself justified. How can we fight terrorism when those who commit blasphemy are rewarded by the West?” He says he was misunderstood, but the message is as loud and clear as t...

By Raymond Ibrahim Islamic apologist extraordinaire Karen Armstrong is at it again. In an article entitled “ Balancing the Prophet ” published by the Financial Times, the self-proclaimed “freelance monotheist” engages in what can only be considered second-rate sophistry. The false statements begin in her opening paragraph: Ever since the Crusades, people in the west have seen the prophet Muhammad as a sinister figure.… The scholar monks of Europe stigmatised Muhammad as a cruel warlord who established the false religion of Islam by the sword. They also, with ill-concealed envy, berated him as a lecher and sexual pervert at a time when the popes were attempting to impose celibacy on the reluctant clergy. This is just an obvious error of fact. Armstrong and others try as a routine to tie European sentiments toward Islam to the Crusades, but in fact, “people in the west” had something of a “dim” view of Mohammed half a millenium before the Crusades. As early as the 8th century — just a fe...

By Raymond Ibrahim For three consecutive days, April 10-12, Tariq Ramadan, the controversial Muslim activist who was denied a U.S. visa for questionable activities (such as making “charitable” donations to the terrorist organization Hamas, which regularly commissions suicide-attacks), was invited by Georgetown University to give a one-way talk live via satellite — a move which many, including several Georgetown faculty, protested. The Washington Post reports that Ramadan’s overarching theme was that “Islam and democracy are not incompatible in their tenets of equality and freedom for all and that tensions between them have arisen because of historic problems — such as European colonialism, political manipulation by Middle Eastern autocrats and the influence of minority Islamic groups he described as ‘literalists.’” As to the question of Islam and violence, the Georgetown Voice reports he asserted that, “[Terrorism] is not only non-Islamic, it’s anti-Islamic.” And when discussing the pr...

In reference to Mazeni Alwi's article Mazeni is dishonest in that he says that "Christians of Jerusalem decided to give in to the Muslim army", they were attacked and it was the culminating point. With the help of the local Jews who welcomed the Muslims as liberators, the Muslims had subjugated the remainder of Palestine but had not been able to capture Jerusalem. Beginning in July 637, the Muslims began a siege of Jerusalem which lasted for five (hardly bloodless) months before Jerusalem fell in February 638. Arabs did not sack the city, and the Arab soldiers were apparently kept in tight control by their leaders. No destruction was permitted. This was indeed a triumph of civilized control, if imperialism, colonization, and bloody conquest can ever be said to be "civilized." It was at this conquest that many significant hallmarks of Muslim colonialism began. The conquered Christian and Jewish people were made to pay a tribute to the colonialist Muslims.The Musl...

All humans generally live according to some set of priorities. A person may make a priority of health, of pleasure, of study, of almost anything, really. But it is practically a law of nature that a person must make a priority of something. Even those who lead unstructured existences unconsciously live according to some set of unarticulated priorities, if only according to something so basic as the primal need for food, drink, and shelter. For many people, religious practice — striving to obey God’s commandments — is a high priority, the highest, even. Yet this priority can come into conflict with the character of the society in which one lives. This is undoubtedly the case for devout Muslims who voluntarily relocate to Western nations. This invariably will compromise what many of them profess to be their ultimate priority: living in accordance to the divine laws of Allah (i.e., sharia — most of which is derived from the words and deeds of seventh-century Mohammad). Some of these Musli...

Stand up for Denmark! Why are we not defending our ally ? Put the case that we knew of a highly paranoid religious cult organization with a secretive leader. Now put the case that this cult, if criticized in the press, would take immediate revenge by kidnapping a child. Put the case that, if the secretive leader were also to be lampooned, two further children would be killed at random. Would the press be guilty of "self-censorship" if it declined to publish anything that would inflame the said cult? Well, yes it would be guilty, but very few people would insist on the full exertion of the First Amendment right. However, the consequences for the cult and its leader would be severe as well. All civilized people would regard it as hateful and dangerous, and steps would be taken to circumscribe its influence, and to ensure that no precedent was set. In full....Stand up for Denmark! - Why are we not defending our ally? By Christopher Hitchens

This is happening in Pakiland.A Christian was accused of blasphemy by a Muslim neighbour who had a bone to pick with him. This sparked off a sequence of events which have been well covered in the press by news items and in several columns. The point is that violence occurred because of the fact that our theocratic thugs insist that these laws remain in place and have prevailed upon the General to toe their line. Early in November, churches in the Sangla Hill area were desecrated and destroyed, Christian students were beaten up, and one Pir Mohammad Afzal Qadiri, Markazi Ameer Alam-i-Tanzeem Ahl-e-Sunnat (unworthy of this impressive sounding name and title) not only condoned the attack by his fellow Muslims upon the Christian churches and properties, but urged those of his faith to unite and eliminate Christians for the honour and integrity of Islam. In full......

The UN Human Wrongs Council The UN’s Human Rights Council has long been a sick joke, an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms. To see a most graphic demonstration of its interpretation of human rights, just look at this to see what happened when Hillel Neuer, Executive Director of UN Watch, told it a few home truths. This is what he said: Mr. President, Six decades ago, in the aftermath of the Nazi horrors, Eleanor Roosevelt, Réné Cassin and other eminent figures gathered here, on the banks of Lake Geneva, to reaffirm the principle of human dignity. They created the Commission on Human Rights. Today, we ask: What has become of their noble dream? In this session we see the answer. Faced with compelling reports from around the world of torture, persecution, and violence against women, what has the Council pronounced, and what has it decided? Nothing. Its response has been silence. Its response has been indifference. Its response has been criminal. One might say, in Harry Truman’s words, tha...

Achilles' Heel - August 28, 2006 - The New York Sun Our Thought For The Day comes from Steve Centanni , the Fox News reporter freed over the weekend by his captors in Gaza : "We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint. Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it." Before their release, Mr Centanni and his cameraman, Olaf Wiig , had appeared on camera in Islamic robes, sitting cross-legged, and had read from scripts announcing that they had become observant Muslims and asking Bush and Blair to do likewise. "Islam is not just meant for some people. It is the true religion for all people at all times," said Mr Centanni. "I changed my name to Khaled. I have embraced Islam and say the word Allah." More........

The leader of the world's most ancient institution, one with an unbroken continuity that spans over two millennia, and a memory to match, took a stand with his report of the dialogue between Byzantine Emperor Manuel II and an "educated Persian". That dialogue occurred in year 1391. There is a context, which only ignoramuses could suspect the pope of not having taken into full account: in those years, the Ottoman Turks crushed and overran the Serbian kingdom, the Muslim warlord Tamerlane broke the back of the Persian empire and occupied it, the empire of Bulgaria was destroyed by the Ottomans and incorporated into their empire. The Muslim jihad was threatening the whole of Christendom, and was devastating Muslim lands as well, such as the anciently civilized Persia. To broaden the perspective, add that in short order, the Islamicized Mongols were to besiege Moscow, crush a Hungarian-German army in Central Europe, occupy Bosnia, besiege, sack, and slaughter New Delhi, and t...

At the dawn of a new century, a newly elected United States president was forced to confront a grave threat to the nation — an escalating series of unprovoked attacks on Americans by Muslim terrorists. Worse still, these Islamic partisans operated under the protection and sponsorship of rogue Arab states ruled by ruthless and cunning dictators. Sluggish in recognizing the full nature of the threat, America entered the war well after the enemy’s call to arms. Poorly planned and feebly executed, the American effort proceeded badly and at great expense — resulting in a hastily negotiated peace and an equally hasty declaration of victory. Barbary Pirates being boarded. As timely and familiar as these events may seem, they occurred more than two centuries ago. The president was Thomas Jefferson, and the terrorists were the Barbary pirates. Unfortunately, many of the easy lessons to be plucked from this experience have yet to be fully learned. The Barbary states, modern-day Morocco, Algeria,...

By Raymond Ibrahim Previous to Pope Benedict XVI’s November 30 visit to the Hagia Sophia complex in Constantinople, Muslims and Turks variously expressed apprehension and rage. Turkey’s independent paper Vatan put it thus: “The risk is that Benedict will send Turkey’s Muslims and much of the Islamic world into paroxysms of fury if there is any perception that the Pope is trying to re-appropriate a Christian center that fell to Muslims.” A sign of the cross, apparently, would be interpreted as a signal for a crusade. Built in Constantinople in the sixth century, the Hagia Sophia — Greek for “Holy Wisdom” — was Christendom’s greatest and most celebrated church. After parrying centuries of jihadi thrusts from Arabs, Constantinople was finally sacked by Turks in the jihad of 1453. Its crosses desecrated and icons defaced, this millennium-old church — as well as thousands of other churches in the then Byzantine Empire — was immediately converted into a mosque, the tall minarets of Islam sur...

The only winners from the resignation of U.S. ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton are the foes of the United States. Ambassador Bolton did a courageous job communicating and protecting American values in the belly of a beast where those values are at risk each and every day. His commitment to real and effective reform was unshakable. His honesty, integrity, and hard work produced substantial results on a multiplicity of levels in only 18 months on the job. He spearheaded the adoption of a first legally binding Security Council resolution sanctioning North Korea for its nuclear-weapons program; passage of a first ever Security Council resolution addressing the Iranian nuclear program; consensus-building among democratic states that resulted in 50 donor countries, responsible for 88 percent of the U.N. regular budget, taking a common position on management reform. Furthermore, he: had the foresight to refuse to lend credibility to the U.N. Human Rights Council, which as he predi...

The shop owned by Aziz al Soos on the edge of Bethlehem is a modest, single-storey place lost among terraces of restaurants, ironmongers and general stores, but it has one special characteristic. It sells pork. Fifty-year-old Mr al Soos is the third generation of his family to farm and butcher pigs. His grandfather started the business, selling pork to British troops stationed in Palestine during the 1930s, and its current status as the only pork butchery in the territories makes it a valuable place to gauge the plight of the Holy Land's dwindling Christian minority. The issue will be in the headlines later this week, when Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Cardinal Cormac Murphy O'Connor, head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, lead a joint delegation to Bethlehem to express solidarity with their beleaguered brethren. No member of the local Muslim majority would dare enter Mr al Soos's shop, allowing him to be candid in his assessment as h...

By Janet LeBy FrontPageMagazine.com December 7, 2006 A Muslim woman in Dearborn, Mich., lodged a complaint Tuesday against Fitness USA for an alleged civil rights violation involving a fellow gym patron. According to Jodi Berry, executive director of Fitness USA, Wardeh Sultan was praying in front of another member’s locker when the member wanted access to her belongings inside the locker. The inconvenienced patron tried to interrupt Ms. Sultan, but she remained prostrate in front of the locker and an altercation ensued. A manager was called into the locker room to intervene. Ms. Sultan later complained that the Fitness USA management was unconcerned about the humiliation she suffered when her prayers were interrupted. She stated that the gym personnel were insensitive, rejected her complaints and did not satisfactorily intervene on her behalf. Ms. Sultan further reported that the manager told her, “You have to respect her (the other patron), but she does not have to respect your god....

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION : THERE is a certain analogy between civilization and an infectious disease. Both pass from one community to another by contact, and whenever either breaks out, one of our first thoughts is, Where did the infection come from? In both alike there is the unanswered question, Where did it first originate? Do all outbreaks trace back to one primary source, or have there been several independent starting points? In reading the autobiography of that distinguished Orientalist Sir Denison Ross, there is a letter received from some inquirer which contains the sentence remarking what a good thing it would be if we could find out "how, and in what form, the Greek and Latin writers found their way to the ken of the Arab or Persian or Turkish student" (Sir Denison Ross, Both Ends of the Candle, n. d., p. 286). The author of the book makes no comment on this letter, but it may be noted that the way in which Greek literature passed to the Arabs and Persians, thence ...