INFIDELS as the MAHDI i feel it is my duty to expose the fraud perputrated against you by evil men, in the olden days a holy warrior would only fight another warrior, these charletans killing unarmed non combatants are suffering from a delusion if they think they are going anywhere except hell. why kill you now when in sixty years europe will be ours simply by outbreeding you. why do you let godless men sign away your freedom to a unknown power without protest?, they have common purpose in your schools, your media and everywhere else telling you what to think, where are all the christian crusaders?.
HOLY WARRIORS, i have the mark and the space between the teeth as passed down from my lord muhammed peace and blessings be upon him whose sword and standard are encased in istanbul for important men to see. WHAT MADNESS IS THIS?, who decides other than ALLAH who is important and who is not?, is that the men who order you to kill innocent civilians in his name?, you vote for the fat and the corrupt who lied to start war in the holy lands and then kill the innocent who had no say in such matters?, my lord was a open book his house open to ALL men unbelievers included,"Invite to the way of your Lord with wisdom and beautiful preaching and reason with them in the best manners possible" Holy Quran (Sura Al-Nahl 16, Ayah 125)
you feel the need to reason with people who have invited and made you welcome and allowed you to worship ALLAH in there lands and would threaten, kill and rape them in his name using wartime versus to justify your crimes?, you think a real christian who dont want any reward in this life and lives poorly is a threat to you?, and they put woman in his holy places and gay people and make laws to make him try to accept this, then i say you wish to make slaves out of slaves to become slaves yourself.
Sunday 13 April 2008
Friday 6 July 2007
Few UK imams 'come from Britain'
Only eight per cent of imams preaching in British mosques were born in the UK, BBC-commissioned research suggests.
The research, for BBC News and the BBC Asian Network, also suggests that only 6% of imams in Britain speak English as a first language.
I would say less than that, before i put the link in i have highlighted some areas of interest,
The general secretary of the Muslim Council of Britain, Muhammad Abdul Bari, told the BBC imams were essential to an EFFECTIVE STRATEGY.The imams were "overwhelmingly" qualified in the traditional Islamic curriculum, which he said had CHANGED LITTLE SINCE MEDIEVAL TIMES.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6275574.stm
We will fight the fat and corrupt in far off places.... The mahdi
The research, for BBC News and the BBC Asian Network, also suggests that only 6% of imams in Britain speak English as a first language.
I would say less than that, before i put the link in i have highlighted some areas of interest,
The general secretary of the Muslim Council of Britain, Muhammad Abdul Bari, told the BBC imams were essential to an EFFECTIVE STRATEGY.The imams were "overwhelmingly" qualified in the traditional Islamic curriculum, which he said had CHANGED LITTLE SINCE MEDIEVAL TIMES.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6275574.stm
We will fight the fat and corrupt in far off places.... The mahdi
Thursday 15 March 2007
ISLAM ON TRIAL
Islam on Trial: The Prosecution’s Case against Islam
Amber Pawlik March 13, 2007
September 11, 2001 changed the world. Islamic terrorists hijacked American airplanes; flew them into several, major, symbolic buildings of hers; causing thousands to fall, crash or burn to their early death. The terrorists who did it did not do it for land or money: they did it fully, openly and proudly in the name of their religion, Islam, being promised 72 virgins. It thrust unto us Middle Eastern politics, Islam, and a new enemy. Islam itself has come into the forefront of public debate - or at least it should have.
The majority of us have at least a crude knowledge of Islam and what Islamic countries are like. We know they live in abject poverty. We know their progress is slim to none. We know many of them treat their donkeys better than women. We know they defy just about all Western ideals.
One would think that, especially after September 11, 2001, there would be criticism of Islam coming from every which way. Feminists, Christians, capitalists, secularists, human rights activists, hell even animal rights activists should have something to say about Islam. We are, after all, a country with free speech, aren’t we? Yet, even after September 11, there has been nothing but haunting silence.
In the current state of the world, Muslims are involved in almost every war or battle. It was Muslim terrorists who bombed a train in Madrid Spain; Muslim terrorists who held a school hostage in Russia, killing children; Muslim terrorists who flew planes into the World Trade Center. The past 1400 years of Islamic history has been riddled with terrorism, from the days of Muhammad to Al-Zarqawi.
But, for whatever reason, Islam is above any kind of critical look or debate. It is given an almost holy status. People don’t just avoid criticism of it; they are quick to defend it. Those who criticize Islam are often banished to the Never Never Land of political suicide. The defenses given for Islam are so hysterical; you would think you just insulted their mothers or something.
Islam is not the problem, we keep getting told. The terrorists, they assure us, had the “wrong interpretation” of the Koran and are not true Muslims.
We have watched Islamic terrorists behead innocent civilians. We have been told that this is completely and totally against Islam.
From the Koran:
"When thy Lord spake unto the angels, 'I will be with you: therefore stablish ye the faithful. I will cast a dread into the hearts of the infidels.' Strike off their heads then, and strike off from them every finger tip." - Sura 8:12 (Bold mine)
We have watched Islamic terrorists commit “jihad” against the West. Under no circumstances, we are lectured, does the Koran tell its followers to attack nonbelievers.
From the Koran:
"Make war upon such of those to whom the Scriptures have been given as believe not in God, or in the last day, and who forbid not that which God and His Apostle have forbidden, and who profess not the profession of the truth, until they pay tribute out of hand, and they be humbled." Sura 9:29
We know that the Islamic terrorists envision a world that is entirely Muslim. Surely this has nothing to do with the Islam religion.
From the Koran:
“Say to the infidels: If they desist from their unbelief, what is now past shall be forgiven them, but if they return to it, they have already before them the doom of the ancients! Fight then against them till strife be at an end, and the religion be all of it God's. If they desist, verily God beholdeth what they do:" - Sura 8:39-40
It is interesting the responses I usually get when I start quoting the Koran directly. When I start quoting the Koran, such as the verses I previously quoted, the responses I get are usually:
That I must not be quoting from the Koran but another book that quotes the Koran, which must be wrong.
That Muslims believe some parts of the Koran were written by Satan. (And it must be these bad quotes that I gave them.)
That what I quoted to them was only one or two verses and I must take into consideration the whole book. (Which I happily will).
That the translation I am reading is wrong, and the original Koran is much gentler and nicer.
It is really rather obvious: quoting what the Koran actually says is too much for their ears. Shut if off: let them see and hear no evil.
Today, our unwillingness to identify the enemy today is so bad, we can’t even watch movies where the enemy is, heaven forbid, Islamic terrorists. Not only will we not create new fiction, we won’t even report the facts. The bloody history of Islam is whitewashed in regular history books and courses. In fact, the more violent Islam gets, it seems, the more excuses and protection it gets. If you ever notice, Islam was not called a “Religion of Peace” before 9/11. Then they kill 3000 people and get called a “Religion of Peace.”
Perhaps it should be our new slogan: Ignorance is Strength; Freedom is Slavery; Islam is Peace.
September 11, 2001 changed world politics forever. The oppression, mass murder and terrorism that has marked the Middle East for 1400 years hurled itself unto Western society. Yet no one is willing to identify the enemy - scared, not for fear of political persecution or assassination but of becoming unpopular. When something so obvious and so horrible becomes so wrong to talk about: that is when you know it’s time to talk about it.
Ladies and Gentleman, this is the prosecution’s case against Islam. I am charging it with creating oppression, poverty, slavery, rape and terrorism.
The Case against Islam
When it comes to the connection between Islam and Islamic terrorism, it is our ability to reason - in this case the ability to read the Koran - that is so often under attack. Therefore, let us begin by reviewing our fundamentals: our philosophical fundamentals.
When reading a book, the two fundamentals involved are what it is for all of man’s interaction with reality: existence and consciousness. Existence is what exists and consciousness is awareness of what exists. A person’s views on existence and consciousness, which is their view on metaphysics and epistemology, is the foundation of their philosophical beliefs and will effect every other aspect of their worldly views. Is existence firm and absolute or an ever-moldable flux? Can human consciousness understand existence or are humans doomed to be in a blind stupor, never able to understand the reality around them?
Please note that reason is the process by which man absorbs sensory data and categorizes it in his mind as to understand it. Therefore reason is only possible if existence is absolute and man’s consciousness is potent enough to understand existence. It is the philosophy of objectivism that maintains that reality is what it is and man is capable of understanding it.
When reading a book, what exists is the text and the degree to which you are conscious of what it says is the degree to which you focus your mind on it. The purpose is to study the text so that you can develop an understanding of it, i.e. discover its identity. You do not re-invent what you are reading or come to your own arbitrary conclusion regarding what the text says: your goal is to come to a clear, precise understanding of what the text means. The ability to do this is called reading comprehension.
You do not typically have an “interpretation” of a text. “Interpretations” are only necessary when some aspect of reality is confusing, vague or hard to understand. For instance, an interpreter is needed to translate one language to another for people, as the foreign language is otherwise incomprehensible to those people. “Interpretations” therefore also imply that only a person with an advanced or specialized knowledge can interpret something - it is not open to a lay person. “Interpretations,” such as the “interpretation” of the law or the “interpretation” of someone’s behavior are also generally regarded as only someone’s opinion - only quasi-based on fact - apt to be right or wrong.
It is revealing that those who discuss Islam always refer to human understanding of the Koran as a mere “interpretation.” By identifying human understanding of the Koran as an “interpretation,” it automatically establishes the text as fluid, subjective and moldable - as an incomprehensible text that anyone can take any different way.
There may perhaps be parts of the Koran that are confusing and contradictory and indeed need an interpreter. But if so, one must point out what text is confusing or contradictory and what the different “interpretations” thereof might be, especially, given their claims, as it pertains to terrorism. This would open the debate up to human reason. But those who defend Islam do not do this: instead they typically make a broad, generic statement that people make the “wrong interpretation” of the Koran. Broad statements such as this are not indicative of a confusing or contradictory text but of an assault on objectivity itself.
Notice this author’s defense of not being able to understand a “true Islam.” This is an article entitled, “What is Real Islam?” by M.A.Hussain from a website called humiliateamerica.com:
“It is impossible to tell what Islam is objectively and what Islam is not. There are several problems of interpretation of religious scriptures which are insurmountable such that there cannot be “real Islam” or real Christianity”. The interpretation of religious scripture whether by a nonbeliever or of any believer is a subjective process. The religious scriptures belong to history and history is nothing but a point of view. The "objective history" or "objective historical process" is not accessible whatever methodology you adopt, you can never give an objective account of history.” (Bold mine; incorrect punctuation and grammar the author’s.)
Not even history, according the author, is objectively determinable. This is not just an attack on the ability to understand Islam but reality itself.
I propose that the arguments about the inability to interpret the Koran are not meant to emphasize the confusing nature of the Koran but to exempt it from the Law of Identity. They want you to regard what is written in front of you in plain language as not being what it is but that it can be anything at all. Up can mean down; black can be white; or any A can be any other non-A.
This same attack on objectivity does not just happen with the Koran; it has infiltrated all the major humanities, and even some of the hard sciences. For instance, indeed in history, the new breed of historians (known as revisionists) will tell you that there is no objective history; that it is (of course), “open to interpretation.” In political science, new supposed scholars tell us the Constitution is more of a suggestion than a commandment, and, of course, “open to interpretation.” (The Constitution was designed to be living but this means it can be amended not re-“interpreted.”)
Why do they do this? So they can do the interpreting.
History, the Constitution, and reality get in the way of their ideologies. When reality gets in your way, doubt reality.
If you notice, despite the fact that these scholars believe reality can never be objectively deciphered, they never become skeptics. One would think if reality is such a foggy haze that humans can never objectively decipher, we would be forever unsure and doubtful of the world around us. Instead, such new scholars charge right on, asserting absolute knowledge - “interpreting” history, law, reality for you.
Notice that with the Koran that they don’t become skeptics over what the “interpretation” of the Koran is. Even though interpretations are generally regarded as not right or wrong, and they insist the Koran is too “profound” to understand, they announce that the terrorists most definitely had the “wrong interpretation.” The Koran is mostly incomprehensible, but apparently they have the magical ability to understand its true meaning and dictate it to us.
This is a game that has been being played for decades. This attack on objectivity stems from the root, from the philosophical level, from our ideas of existence and consciousness. The ideas that have permeated academia for decades have been the notion that reality isn’t real; that reason is impotent in understanding reality. This philosophical foundation was formalized into an official philosophical system by Immanuel Kant.
Kant attacked reason (and, therefore, reality) from the inside: by re-defining it. Allow me to re-emphasize the definitions of some terms. Reason is the process by which man absorbs sensory data and uses it to understand the world around him. It doesn’t matter how big or small the knowledge is - from understanding what a “cat” or “dog” is, by using your own five senses and rational mind - to understanding any elaborate science. Logic is the method by which man processes that knowledge, making accurate, or rather non-contradictory, identifications of reality. (Forgive me for being redundant; it is only for explanation purposes). Mysticism is to develop a conclusion or understanding of the world through some non-sensory means, such as a person who believes in God based on faith.
Kant said that reason was “a priori,” that is to say “without experience.” How can man have any knowledge, understanding or enlightenment while void of reality? Kant made the most offensive attack on reason possible: smearing it by defining reason as mysticism, i.e. to develop knowledge with no sensory data, i.e. no evidence
This is why academic elites are unabashed in dismissing reality, history, and the obvious in front of your eyes in favor of their bizarre ideologies. Attacking reality doesn’t seem awkward or illogical to them; it seems sophisticated - the very definition of reason. Reality is an ever-changing and contradictory flux, apt to be whatever they say it is. Everything is considered moldable today, from history to human nature itself. Kant laid the groundwork for full-scale, institutionalized propaganda.
This is the same game being played with the Koran. It comes utterly natural to them to portray the Koran as being subjective, fluid, and totally incomprehensible; outside the realm of human mind. They wield manipulation as effectively as a knight with a sword.
There is one thing in the way of their schemes: your rational mind. While thwarting everyone’s eyes away from the obvious, their enemy is that one person who insists on facts and demands evidence. Therefore, they need to make you doubt your own mind, i.e. your ability to reason. In the case of the Koran, this means your ability to read a book correctly.
Therefore they need to infuse waves of doubt and confusion over anyone trying to read to understand the Koran. “You are no Islamic scholar!” they will shout at you. “The Koran is so profound!” they cry. “It has so many commentaries and notes!” Don’t even bother to read it, you will not understand it.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Koran is not hard to read or understand. These are merely the hysterics of intellectual snobs trying to create an inferiority complex in you.
Notice that there is a double standard. If someone says the Koran is peaceful, it is taken as plain, simple fact, regardless that said person has usually never even read the Koran. But the person who challenges Islam is held to the most excruciating of standards to prove themselves and their ability to judge the Koran. Unless you read the Koran in its original language, under a renowned scholar in Mecca, they will announce you have no idea what you are talking about. Indeed, it is usually people who have never read the Koran who are the most hysterical in these kinds of accusations.
When these methods of don’t work, they can always resort to ad hominems: calling you an “idiot,” “moron,” etc simply for having the “incorrect” view. However, they don’t even have to do this anymore. Today, it is not just limited to a select few who want to insult you: it is popularly accepted to call anyone who questions Islam a “bigot” or “ignorant.” People have been “educated” from birth that to challenge Islam is evil. Nothing could be more anti-enlightened, anti-reason and downright destructive.
Islam apologists, including Muslims themselves, have gotten very good at thwarting people from reading and understanding the Koran. They do so in the most effective way possible: by appealing to your respect for intelligence. Whenever you cite a verse in the Koran, without skipping a beat, they will cry that you, “Took the verse out of context.” This appeals to people’s sense of having a full, conceptual of understanding of any given thing. If you notice though, they never actually put the verse in context. This is not an appeal to conceptual understanding, as it seems to be, but is used to make you believe that somehow, someway, the verses around a particular verse will change said verse’s identity. They will also tell you whenever you quote a verse from a Koran that you have the “wrong translation.” On some level this appeals to people’s respect for those who take the time to learn another language. But it is utterly ridiculous to think that only those people can judge the Koran: there are many, many translations of the Koran, all of which say essentially the same things. These are nothing but silly, awkward, and for some unknown reason - often effective - method of controlling information as to control thought.
One would think if Muslims were so proud of their religion, they would be encouraging people to read their holy text to prove its righteousness not thwarting people away from it at every step. People who are just want nothing more than for others to take a good, hard look at them - not generalizing them with others or brushing them aside. An innocent person being charged with murder, for instance, will want and demand all the facts of the case to come out, to shine as much light on the case as possible, and to be allowed to take the stand to make his or her case. The unjust person seeks to manipulate and deceive others, always trying to stop people from taking too hard of a look. For an example, see the lying, deceptive ways of any criminal.
So let’s do just that: shine pouring light onto the Koran to see what it is. We are going to give Islam what it frankly does not deserve: the nicety of a trial.
In order to judge Islam, I did what most Islam apologists and most Muslims (many of whom are illiterate) did not do: I read the Koran.
I find it interesting that interest in the Koran skyrocketed after 9/11. But there are hardly any commentaries describing what is actually in the Koran.
Anyone who has ever sat down to read the Koran has my deepest sympathies. It is an extremely boring, mind-numbing and repetitive book
The Koran is considered the written word of Muhammad’s teachings, who was inspired by the angel Gabriel. According to the introduction to the Koran I read in paper back, Muhammad was born into a poor family but lived in a wealthy city. He grew up without a father and ended up marrying a rich widow (and then went on to have many different wives, including at least one six-year-old girl). The Koran was written down by others as he could not read nor write.
The Koran is broken up into “Suras,” which are like books in the Bible or chapters in a book. There are 114 Suras and over 6100 verses. The Suras range in size from as small as 4 verses to as many as 286. For the most part, the larger Suras are at the beginning and they get progressively smaller until the very short Suras at the end.
This is how the very beginning of the Koran starts out.
Sura 2:3-6, which falls on the first page of the Koran:
“And who believe in what hath been sent down to thee, and in what hath been sent down before thee, and full faith have they in the life to come.
These are guided by their Lord; and with these it shall be well.
As to the infidels, alike is it to them whether thou warn them or warm them not – they will not believe.
Their hearts and their ears hath God sealed up; and over their eyes is a covering. For them, a severe chastisement!”
The very beginning of the Koran starts out with stating that nonbelievers are wrong, wrong, wrong and believers are good, good, good. It doesn’t say what the believers should do - there are no principles, values or morals laid out - just that non-believers are wrong.
It didn’t take long for me to be utterly shocked at what I read in the Koran:
"O our Lord! punish us not if we forget, or fall into sin; O our Lord! and lay not on us a load like that which thou has laid on those who have been before us; O our Lord! and lay not on us that for which we have not strength: but blot out our sins and forgive us, and have pity on us. Thou art our protector: give us victory therefore over the infidel nations." Surah 2:286 (Bold mine)
This, quite frankly - is it! The Koran is nothing but one long vitriolic speech aimed at infidels: saying that they are dumb, blind, stupid, thankless, liars; that they will have boiling water poured on them; that they will be sent to hell where they will be choked with food and without any friends; that Allah hates them; and also loves those who fights against them
I wanted to be able to give you, my reader, some kind of percentage estimate of just how much the Koran deals with nothing but infidels. I could give you an eyeballed estimation of how much of it is nothing but hatred at infidels, but I would not expect you to take my word for it. Going through the Koran and summing up every single verse to get a percentage would be way too cumbersome. However, I thought of a way to get across to you, my reader, a warranted percentage: I could take a random sampling of verses from the Koran and make projections from there.
Now this is not some sort of literary review, not that the Koran is complex enough to warrant a literary review. I performed the study I did, at first, solely to get an accurate percentage to present.
I originally did a small study. I wanted at least 30 samples because statistically, so as long as there are 30 samples, the central limit theorem applies, i.e. the sampling is large enough to be statistically significant. I tried to think of a fair way to pick samples. Had I gone through and just pointed to verses, I likely would have gotten accused of cherry picking. So I took verse 10 from randomly chosen Suras. I did this to show I was not picking one verse over another. I ended up with 34 verses. You can read the verses I took along with commentary regarding what context the verse is in, why I assigned it to the category I did and the calculations of my confidence interval here.
I was really quite pleased with the results: I felt they provided a nice broad overview of the Koran and even captured one good verse! It also hit some of the bigger but smaller aspects of the Koran - the fact that it mentions Noah's Ark many times (where it gleefully describes how the infidels drowned); that it thinks infidels are utterly thankless; that Allah actually makes nonbelievers not believe, etc. These were the results
18/34 (52.9%) - over half - of these random verses is vitriol aimed at infidels.
6/34 (17.6%) Deal with Allah
5/34 (14.7%) Deal with believers
4/34 (11.8%) Deal with Day of Judgment or Day of Doom
1/34 (3.4%) ... is a good verse! (Do not steal from the poor / Give to the poor)
However, upon some contemplation I decided that my study could be done better. Perhaps there might have been some bias by only picking verse 10 from the verses. I took the verses from an online Koran (it was easier to cut and paste quotes from an online source), and it was an anti-Islamic site so perhaps there was some bias. (It turns out there was not; the same translation is used by some pro-Islamic sites). I also felt there was at least one major theme that was ignored in my sampling: how Islam treats women. The confidence interval I ended up with was that one could be 95% confident that the percentage of hatred of infidels in the Koran was between 36.1% and 69.7%. That really is not very tight.
So I did a bigger study. This time I took it from a pro-Islamic site. I wanted to have at least 200 samples. I tried to think of the most diplomatic way to take random verses. I could go in and take every 30th verse, giving me approximately 200 verses. But that would skip over several Suras as many of them only have 5 - 9 verses in them. So I decided to give the verses a representation similar to the way our founding fathers set up our Congress: every Sura (just like every state) would be given a certain minimum representation and then larger Suras (just like larger states) would also have some kind of larger representation. So I took one verse from each Sura, thereby representing each Sura. I took the verse right in the middle. That gave me 114 verses. I wanted about 86 more. So then I went through and took every 70th verse. This naturally gave the larger Suras more of a representation. I ended up with 201 verses.
And, after hours of work, the results are in: they are exactly the same. For the percentage I was most interested in, how much of the Koran is nothing but hatred at infidels, it was exactly at 53%. I was also quite happy that this sampling captured several verses about women. The confidence interval was also much better this time: with 95% confidence, we can say the proportion is somewhere between 45.8% and 59.6%. You can read the verses I took, my commentaries, and the calculation of the confidence interval here.
Here are the results of my larger study:
106/201 (52.7%) is hatred aimed at infidels, defined as
Threats towards infidels either in the after life or this life *Degrading infidels by calling them evil, stupid, blind, deaf, liars, thankless, etc.
Calls to fight against them.
Verses that say "except the believers" when wishing death on nonbelievers were counted as hatred since avoiding death is not a positive to believers
The threat or insult can be aimed at infidels in general or any specific infidel.
50/201 (24.9%) Deals with believers, defined as
Mentioning them
Saying they are righteous
Saying they will get good things
Any mentions of one of the prophets was snuck into this category too
23/201 (11.4%) deal with Allah,
Who he is
That he is almighty
Any of his creations
10/201 (5%) deal with the Day of Doom or the Day of Judgment
Either the Day of Doom when destruction is sent on the earth or
Day of Judgment when all are judged before Allah
Any message pertaining to how God records what men do was assigned this category
4/201 (2%) are anti-woman
That it’s OK to beat a woman
Women and slaves get married off but have no choice in the matter and is very self-serving to Muhammad or men in general.
4/201 (2%) deal with giving to the poor in some way
2/201 (1%) deal with some kind of Muslim custom or etiquette, for instance
How to divorce your wife
1/201 (0.5%) disapproves of a man who murdered someone, but only because it was for the wrong reason to kill someone.
1/201 (0.5%) actually says it is OK for people to have their religion while Muslims have theirs
Over 50% of the Koran deals with nothing but hatred aimed at infidels. You will notice Allah is mentioned a lot, as well as the goodness of believers and the Day of Doom/Judgment, the former being a day when the Koran gleefully exclaims that Allah will send destruction to the earth and destroy the infidels. Notice how much of the Koran that deals with not just infidels but with the theme of believers verses nonbelievers, setting up believers as holy, righteous, almost perfect human beings and nonbelievers not just as wrong but as wretched scum. If you add up the number of verses that deal with infidels, believers, Allah, and the Day of Judgment/Doom, that percentage is a full 94%. This is really the only thing in the Koran as the Koran itself readily admits: "... This book is no other than a warning and a clear Koran, To warn whoever liveth; and, that against the Infidels sentence may be justly given." Sura 36:69-70
You may notice that details outlining Muslim customs and etiquette do not take up much room in the Koran. In fact, Ramadan, from what I can tell, is only mentioned once in the Koran. You can see how seriously Muslims take Ramadan. Now imagine how seriously they take the rest of the 94% of the Koran.
There is no moral system outlined in the Koran - with the exception of allowing men to beat their wives, sleep with their slaves, and there is an occasional, “give to the poor.” There certainly is no unequivocal “Do not kill”; “Do not steal”; or “Do not lie,” let alone any other insight into how to behave properly as a human being. Most of the “moral” guidance given in the Koran is not a restraint on humans but permission to do what they want - mostly for men to do what they want.
The Koran is very self-serving to men and especially Muhammad when it comes to having access to women. It promises men young virgins in heaven with “supple breasts” and “large brown eyes,” but what about the women? Muhammad had up to fifteen wives at one time, but the rest of the believers were limited to four. Sura 66:1 shows not only the self-serving nature of the Koran for Muhammad but the entire purpose of the Koran itself:
"Why,1 O Prophet! doest thou hold that to be FORBIDDEN which God hath made lawful to thee, from a desire to please thy wives, since God is Lenient, Merciful? " Sura 66:1
Note 1 from Sura 66 further clarifies this verse:
1 The first verses of this Sura were revealed on occasion of Muhammad's reviving affection for Mary, a Copt slave sent him by the governor of Egypt from whom he had recently sworn to his wife Hafsa to separate entirely. Hafsa, who had been greatly incensed at their amour, of which Muhammad had himself informed her, communicated the matter in confidence to Ayesha, from whose altered manner, probably, the prophet found that his secret had been betrayed. To free Muhammad from his obligation to Hafsa was the object of this chapter.
Muhammad had told his wife that he would stop having sex with a slave. However, he came back to tell her that he is allowed because Allah does not forbid it. Hence, to hell with her wishes!
Indeed, the Koran gives men full right to have sex with female slaves and their allotted four wives:
"It is not permitted thee to take other wives hereafter, nor to change they present wives for other women, though their beauty charm thee, except slaves whom thy right hand shall possess. And God watcheth all things." Sura 33:52
Thus my charges of rape and slavery against Islam.
I propose the Koran is nothing but a rationalization: Muhammad’s rationalization to do whatever he wants in the name of “religion.”
A verse in the Koran that needs no further comment:
"And we said, 'Take in thine hand a rod and strike15 with it, nor break thine oath.' Verily, we found him patient!" - Sura 38:43
NOTE 15 IN SURA 38: "Thy wife; - on whom he had sworn that he would inflict an hundred blows, because she had absented herself from him when in need of her assistance, or for her words (Job ii.9). The oath was kept, we are told, by his giving her one blow with a rod of a hundred stalks. This passage is often quoted by the Muslims as authorising any similar manner of release from an oath inconsiderately taken."
The only arguable “good” verses in the Koran are commandments to give to the poor, which according to the study I did accounts for about 2% of the Koran. Some may argue that giving to the poor is a good thing. Perhaps. But, in the Koran, it is couched inside commandments of NOT getting wealthy.
"These are they who purchase this present life at the price of that which is to come: their torment shall not be lightened, neither shall they be helped." Sura 2:80
"Let not prosperity in the land on part of those who believe not, deceive thee. Tis but a brief enjoyment. Then shall Hell be their abode, and wretched the bed!" Sura 3:196
"... What! prefer ye the life of this world to the next? But the fruition of this mundane life, in respect of that which is to come, is but little." Sura 9:38
And if this isn’t malicious enough, the Koran’s wish for people who have wealth:
"Let not, therefore, their riches or their children amaze thee. God is only minded to punish them by these, in this life present, and that their souls may depart while they are unbelievers." Sura 9:55 (Bold mine)
The Koran is hostile to any kind of wealth, pleasure or success on this earth. Even having children is considered a test from God of where a Muslim’s loyalties lie. Man is meant to remain humble with only modest earnings, pouring most of his earnings to the cause of Islam. How can business, technology, art, music, or any other form of wealth or happiness develop out of this? Those who “purchase this present life” like this, according to Islam has done so at the price of the afterlife. Given Muslims, Muslims who follow the Koran anyway, are forbidden any pleasure while on this earth, death must feel like liberation to them
Thus my charge of creating poverty against Islam.
What has a tendency to shock most people about Islam and the Koran is its belief in predestination, which you may notice in the study I performed. Allow me to introduce you to one of the biggest theological contradictions of all time. The Koran is filled with threat after threat thrown at nonbelievers. And yet the Koran says that it is Allah who causes people to believe or not believe.
"He whom God guideth is the guided, and they whom he misleadeth shall be the lost." Sura 7:177
"No soul can believe but by the permission of God: and he shall lay his wrath on those who will not understand." - Sura 10:100
"And they who believe not say, 'Unless a sign be sent down to him from his Lord ...' SAY: God truly will mislead whom he will; and He will guide to Himself him who turneth to Him,” Sura 13:27
"Had God pleased, He could have made you one people: but He causeth whom He will to err, and whom He will He guideth: and ye shall assuredly be called to account for your doings." Sura 16:95
So, if God and God only can cause people to not believe, then why all the threats? What good will they do? Whose fault is it that they are nonbelievers and why should they be punished for something out of their control? (I argued that the Koran had an identity, i.e. a specific meaning; I never promised it would make sense.)
Imagine you are a Muslim and want more than anything to be a good Muslim and to get into heaven. How do you know that Allah will pick you to be one that he will guide? Every person, according to Islam, has no control over his fate but rather is at the mercy of Allah’s whim.
This belief in predestination is not just mysticism; it is much worse. Not only do men gain knowledge through faith only; it is only some men (and the Koran says only a few men) are privy to such knowledge. And now the most pressing question: if all the world is to be Muslim, as the Koran commands, but people cannot be converted, how can that happen? There is only one way.
Almost the entire Koran is dedicated to delegating to infidels an inferior status. They are called blind, stupid and ignorant. No proof is given of why they should believe; Muhammad performed no miracles for people. When some skeptics asked for proof, the response was:
"And when ye said, 'O Moses! we will not believe thee until we see God plainly;' the thunderbolt fell upon you while ye were looking on:" Sura 2:52
Infidels are accused of being thankless. The Koran says infidels promise that they will believe in God if God relieves them of their affliction, but when God does, they forget him. Infidels mock the prophets when they come to give their message to them. All of this sets up for what the Koran, at heart, is: one long battle cry against infidels.
I find it interesting that the Koran is not in chronological order. It was re-arranged, and interestingly enough, most of the downright violent Suras were put at the beginning.
"Is it not proved to those who inherit this land after its ancient occupants, that if we please we can smite them for their sins, and put a seal upon their hearts, that they hearken not?” Sura 7:98
“Say to the infidels: If they desist from their unbelief, what is now past shall be forgiven them, but if they return to it, they have already before them the doom of the ancients! Fight then against them till strife be at an end, and the religion be all of it God's …" - Sura 8:39-40
"And when the sacred months are passed, kill those who join other gods with God wherever ye shall find them; and seize them, besiege them, and lay wait for them with every kind of ambush: but if they shall convert, and observe prayer, and pay the obligatory alms, then let them go their way, for God is Gracious, Merciful." Sura 9:5
Yes, this is straight from the Holy Book of the religion that gets called a “Religion of Peace.”
Muslims are commanded to fight. Only the weak are excused.
"It shall be no crime on the part of the blind, the lame, or the sick, if they go not to the fight. But whoso shall obey God and His Apostle, He shall bring him into the gardens 'neath which the rivers flow: but whoso shall turn back, He will punish him with a sore punishment." Sura 48:17
After fighting, believers have a right to the infidel’s houses.
“And He made you heirs to their land and their dwellings and their property, and (to) a land which you have not yet trodden, and Allah has power over all things.” Sura 33:27
Thus my charge of oppression against Islam.
The Koran is clear on when fighting can stop. Some may say that the Koran says fighting can stop once “peace” is made, which is how the following is watered down in some translations:
"Yet if they turn to God and observe prayer, and pay the impost, then are they your brethren in religion. We make clear our signs to those who understand." "But if, after alliance made, they break their oaths and revile your religion, then do battle with the ring-leaders of infidelity - for no oaths are binding with them - that they may desist." Sura 9:11-12
Muslims are taught to wage war on nonbelievers. It is written in plain language. Muslims are to fight until nonbelievers convert or pay alms. All else are to be killed. Ladies and gentlemen, thus my charge of terrorism against Islam.
Let me remind you of the September 11, 2001 attacks. Along with the Pentagon (and another plane which never made its destination of the White House as some courageous heroes took it down before it could get there), the Islamic terrorists targeted the twin towers of the World Trade Center: symbols of American wealth and prosperity.
"And when we willed to destroy a city, to its affluent ones did we address our bidding: but when they acted criminally therein, just was its doom, and we destroyed it with an utter destruction" - Sura 17:17 (Bold mine)
"We will not burden a soul beyond its power: and with us is a book, which speaketh the truth; and they shall not be wronged: But as to this Book, their hearts are plunged in error, and their works are far other than those of Muslims, and they will work those works, Until when we lay hold on their affluent ones with punishment; lo! they cry for help:" Sura 23:64-66 (Bold mine)
I will remind you the reason why the terrorists were willing to kill themselves to kill Americans: they were promised 72 virgins in heaven.
"But, for the God-fearing is a blissful abode, Enclosed gardens and vineyards; And damsels with swelling breasts, their peers in age." Sura 78:31-33
"But the pious shall be in a secure place, Amid gardens and fountains, Clothed in silk and richest robes, facing one another: Thus shall it be: and we will wed them to the virgins with large dark eyes." Sura 44:51-54
The terrorists who attacked us on September 11, 2001 did not do so in the name of their country or for any demand, such as money or land: they did it openly and proudly in the name of Islam. They were not misguided; they were in every way Islamic.
The very last Suras in the Koran are very short and riddled with cries about the evilness of infidels. Even as I read them, I could feel the burning hatred of infidels that one is meant to feel after reading them. These ending Suras can be considered chants - short, quick, hysterical chants - against infidels.
Some will insist that my verses were totally lifted out of context. This argument does not have much merit. As you can tell from my study, the “context” of just about all verses in the Koran is a sea of hatred. It is in fact the Islam apologists who do not put things in context. Islam apologists comb the Koran for any and all “good” quotes and take it as proof that the Koran is peaceful. For instance, there is a quote in the Koran which says Muslims can have their religion and other people can have theirs. This may seem good until you realize that, in the Koran, it says other religions may exist with Muslims, but they are to live as second class citizens, paying taxes to Muslims.
The other argument usually given is that the Koran does call for violence but only in self-defense. In some translations of the Koran, the phrase “in case of war” or “in case the infidels attack you” is conveniently placed in all calls for violence. This really is nothing more than a blatantly misleading lie. Muslims who say this are taking advantage of taqiyya (or taqiyah), an allowance for Muslims to lie. While taqiyya can mean that if a Muslim feels his life is in danger he can lie; it can also mean a permission to lie in general. According to fact-index.com, taqiyya can essentially mean that, “[A] Muslim is allowed to say untruths to a non-Muslim if in their heart they still respect the truths that they externally deny.”
I have noticed Muslims downright lying through their teeth in public about true Islam. It is frustrating and flabbergasting. However, knowing about taqiyya brings it full circle that they are in fact lying. But I often wondered: why? If they really are interested in destroying America (and when you dig deeper most Muslim fundamentalists, especially ones willing to lie for Islam, are), why would they lie to opponents? Why do they care what their enemies think? But I believe I figured it out: it is like an enemy fighter who waves a white flag, insisting they are peaceful, causing you to drop your weapons, then opens fire.
However, even so, let’s assume it was true that the Koran calls for violence only in self-defense. Why does it put it in such blatantly collectivist terms? Why is it one group, Muslims, only allowed to defend themselves against another group, infidels?
The fact is, all hate movements have been marked by this same thing: victimology and collectivism. They convince themselves that they are a victimized, oppressed group of another group - that they are being attacked or held down by another group - then launch a war. It is never specific people who have been hurt by other specific people, but by a broad, generic group of "Jews" or "bourgeois" or "nonbelievers."
The Koran is not very unequivocal in stating that enemies as people who threaten your life. Infidels, according to the Koran, are by definition enemies.
“And when ye go forth to war in the land, it shall be no crime in you to cut short your prayers, if ye fear lest the infidels come upon you; Verily, the infidels are your undoubted enemies!” Sura 4:102 (Bold mine.)
“They (the polytheists) sell the signs of God for a mean price, and turn others aside from his way: evil is it that they do! They regard not in a believer either ties of blood or faith; these are the transgressors!” Sura 9:9-10 (Bold mine.)
I asked a Muslim once about Muhammad. Muhammad was obviously a warlord - apparently the very first Islamic terrorist to hijack the Islam religion. This man I talked to insisted that that Islam was a religion that advocated violence only in self-defense. I asked him if Muhammad fought in self-defense or in aggression. He answered, “both.” So I asked him why Muhammad fought in aggression, perhaps it was a pre-emptive strike against enemies about to strike. And, if it was a pre-emptive strike, I asked him if Muhammad had significant intelligence data to suggest that “enemy” nations were about to attack him. He told me that Allah “in his infinite wisdom” told Muhammad that these people were his enemies.
This is the problem with Islam and this is the problem with blind faith. There are no prescribed rules for who is an enemy and who is not. Whoever is perceived to be an enemy is an enemy.
Everything about Islam prepares its people to be fighters. It riles them with hatred. It prods them to fight. Even the “holidays” in Islam trains fighters. Take for instance Ramadan. Instead of feasting and celebrating, Muslims are to sacrifice during the daylight hours for a month. I propose that this is an effective way to train its followers for war. Besides the practical ability to go without food for extended amounts of times, it trains people to accept a tough life. The only place you will see this kind of behavior in America is for various types of military training.
This isn’t a matter of clamoring over a few verses or of deciding whether or not some verses contradict other verses in the Koran. This is about the fundamental theme of the Koran, which is: burning hatred of infidels and wishes of death and destruction for them. Any Muslim who picks up the Koran and takes it seriously will at the very least believe infidels are evil and deserving of death. Islam is a fighting ideology with an uncanny hatred for those who don’t believe as they do. But don’t take my word for it. Please, by all means, read the Koran for yourself.
Many people, naïve to Islam, will point to the fact that there are 1.3 billion Muslims in the world and not all of them become terrorists. True, they do not. The problem is not the regular people but the leaders. Most people, anywhere, just accept the major philosophy/religion of their time and usually do not follow or take it very seriously. Observe that it isn’t the poor or ignorant who typically become terrorists but the rich and educated, i.e. the ones who are capable of understanding the Koran and have the means to implement what it says. This is about what Islam is as an ideology and what the ramifications will be when adopted.
My detractors might give some other reasons for why terrorism is created. Typically, many assign the cause of terrorism to some pet cause that they have. Feminists blame the “patriarchy”. Socialists blame it on “poverty.” These are obviously grounded not in reality but ideology. They are not honest evaluations; they would rather continue grinding their axe against men, the wealthy, whoever it is they hate. Blaming it on “poverty” is particularly sneaky. It is simply not true; most terrorists are middle class if not filthy rich. When the religious fundamentalists are poor, they do not have the means to fight. It is when they became wealthy, recently mostly from oil money, that they can launch bigger, more effective attacks. Blaming it on poverty is sneaky: it suggests the solution is to pour more money - more money to go to jihad - into their hands. Indeed, what we need is the exact opposite: we need to starve them of all resources, especially financial ones.
Some try to argue that Islam has produced scientific achievements in the past. Most people tend to attribute the invention of Algebra to Muslims. But it was not Muslims or even Arabs that discovered Algebra: it was the Iranians. The Iranians have a rich history of enlightenment and are more influenced by their heritage, which is one that emphasizes education and scholarship, than religion. Another person some point to is a man named Razi, who made advancements in medicine, as evidence of Muslim accomplishment. But Razi was not an Arab or a Muslim but again an Iranian. In fact, he was so hostile to Islam that he wrote several books denouncing faith and upholding reason and had to live as a heretic. Razi was to the Muslim world what Galileo or Copernicus was to ours.
It should be obvious to Western people: faith, mysticism and religion are antagonistic to science, reason and progress. We can easily see how Christianity was responsible for The Dark Ages but refuse to see how Islam is responsible for the violence and primitive life in the Middle East. Islam cannot even uphold a decent society let alone a prosperous one. Progress is not some kind of gift from the heavens. If you look at all successful societies, you will see the influence of one man: Aristotle. Progress requires a commitment to reason. The only way for peace or stability to come to the Middle East is for Islam to leave and Enlightenment to reign.
One would think that “liberals” would be the first to condemn Islam. It is the polar opposite of all of their stated values and they have a tendency to think they are enlightened. But, eerily enough, they almost seem to side with Islam; although they go after Christianity with an unusual tenacity. This seems odd, since Islam is by far a more faith-based and hateful religion than Christianity. And, while I disagree with Christianity, it upholds at least a decent, stable moral framework for people to co-exist peacefully. Islam does not. The fact that liberals speak out against Christianity, allegedly in the name of reason, but not Islam shows that the left is not anti-faith but anti-values. If you notice, leftists didn’t embrace Islam until they realized its potential for terrorism. This speaks volumes.
Even if we take down every Islamic dictatorship in existence now that harbors and finances terrorists, so as long as this malignant ideology is around, it will inspire its followers to pick up and fight infidels. We attempted to fight communism militarily, fighting aggressive communist nations and arming ourselves up to our armpits, to fail. For over a half of a century we refused to call communism itself evil. Then, in the 1980s, Ronald Reagan was willing to step up to the plate and challenge communism ideologically. Communism came tumbling down with hardly a fire shot. Like with Islam, for decades we were told it was “bad people” running the communist countries that was the problem. It was not; like with Islam, the problem is the ideology. I am however more hopeful that people will call Islam evil, and sooner, as if people can see how communism, which comes in the package of equality and peace, is an evil ideology; they can certainly see how Islam is evil.
Never underestimate the power of a simple, consistent, moral argument against the ideology of our enemies. If we are going to fight terrorism, we need to fight the ideology that inspires terrorism. As far as those hysterical people who say that challenging Islam is akin to starting a mass genocide: fighting - and winning - in the realm of ideas is a far more humane and peaceful way to end threats to our lives and nation.
Most seem to believe that Islam needs to be “secularized” for peace and freedom to come to the Middle East. Frankly, this is just a politically correct way to say Islam is the problem. Whether you believe Islam has to be “secularized” or eradicated, the simple fact remains that Islam is the problem. Until we are willing to prosecute Islam as a violent religion: our war on terror will never end.
The jury is out. May all those with a rational mind judge accordingly.
Reference
J.M. Rodwell, The Koran (New York: Dulton, 1977).
Amber Pawlik March 13, 2007
September 11, 2001 changed the world. Islamic terrorists hijacked American airplanes; flew them into several, major, symbolic buildings of hers; causing thousands to fall, crash or burn to their early death. The terrorists who did it did not do it for land or money: they did it fully, openly and proudly in the name of their religion, Islam, being promised 72 virgins. It thrust unto us Middle Eastern politics, Islam, and a new enemy. Islam itself has come into the forefront of public debate - or at least it should have.
The majority of us have at least a crude knowledge of Islam and what Islamic countries are like. We know they live in abject poverty. We know their progress is slim to none. We know many of them treat their donkeys better than women. We know they defy just about all Western ideals.
One would think that, especially after September 11, 2001, there would be criticism of Islam coming from every which way. Feminists, Christians, capitalists, secularists, human rights activists, hell even animal rights activists should have something to say about Islam. We are, after all, a country with free speech, aren’t we? Yet, even after September 11, there has been nothing but haunting silence.
In the current state of the world, Muslims are involved in almost every war or battle. It was Muslim terrorists who bombed a train in Madrid Spain; Muslim terrorists who held a school hostage in Russia, killing children; Muslim terrorists who flew planes into the World Trade Center. The past 1400 years of Islamic history has been riddled with terrorism, from the days of Muhammad to Al-Zarqawi.
But, for whatever reason, Islam is above any kind of critical look or debate. It is given an almost holy status. People don’t just avoid criticism of it; they are quick to defend it. Those who criticize Islam are often banished to the Never Never Land of political suicide. The defenses given for Islam are so hysterical; you would think you just insulted their mothers or something.
Islam is not the problem, we keep getting told. The terrorists, they assure us, had the “wrong interpretation” of the Koran and are not true Muslims.
We have watched Islamic terrorists behead innocent civilians. We have been told that this is completely and totally against Islam.
From the Koran:
"When thy Lord spake unto the angels, 'I will be with you: therefore stablish ye the faithful. I will cast a dread into the hearts of the infidels.' Strike off their heads then, and strike off from them every finger tip." - Sura 8:12 (Bold mine)
We have watched Islamic terrorists commit “jihad” against the West. Under no circumstances, we are lectured, does the Koran tell its followers to attack nonbelievers.
From the Koran:
"Make war upon such of those to whom the Scriptures have been given as believe not in God, or in the last day, and who forbid not that which God and His Apostle have forbidden, and who profess not the profession of the truth, until they pay tribute out of hand, and they be humbled." Sura 9:29
We know that the Islamic terrorists envision a world that is entirely Muslim. Surely this has nothing to do with the Islam religion.
From the Koran:
“Say to the infidels: If they desist from their unbelief, what is now past shall be forgiven them, but if they return to it, they have already before them the doom of the ancients! Fight then against them till strife be at an end, and the religion be all of it God's. If they desist, verily God beholdeth what they do:" - Sura 8:39-40
It is interesting the responses I usually get when I start quoting the Koran directly. When I start quoting the Koran, such as the verses I previously quoted, the responses I get are usually:
That I must not be quoting from the Koran but another book that quotes the Koran, which must be wrong.
That Muslims believe some parts of the Koran were written by Satan. (And it must be these bad quotes that I gave them.)
That what I quoted to them was only one or two verses and I must take into consideration the whole book. (Which I happily will).
That the translation I am reading is wrong, and the original Koran is much gentler and nicer.
It is really rather obvious: quoting what the Koran actually says is too much for their ears. Shut if off: let them see and hear no evil.
Today, our unwillingness to identify the enemy today is so bad, we can’t even watch movies where the enemy is, heaven forbid, Islamic terrorists. Not only will we not create new fiction, we won’t even report the facts. The bloody history of Islam is whitewashed in regular history books and courses. In fact, the more violent Islam gets, it seems, the more excuses and protection it gets. If you ever notice, Islam was not called a “Religion of Peace” before 9/11. Then they kill 3000 people and get called a “Religion of Peace.”
Perhaps it should be our new slogan: Ignorance is Strength; Freedom is Slavery; Islam is Peace.
September 11, 2001 changed world politics forever. The oppression, mass murder and terrorism that has marked the Middle East for 1400 years hurled itself unto Western society. Yet no one is willing to identify the enemy - scared, not for fear of political persecution or assassination but of becoming unpopular. When something so obvious and so horrible becomes so wrong to talk about: that is when you know it’s time to talk about it.
Ladies and Gentleman, this is the prosecution’s case against Islam. I am charging it with creating oppression, poverty, slavery, rape and terrorism.
The Case against Islam
When it comes to the connection between Islam and Islamic terrorism, it is our ability to reason - in this case the ability to read the Koran - that is so often under attack. Therefore, let us begin by reviewing our fundamentals: our philosophical fundamentals.
When reading a book, the two fundamentals involved are what it is for all of man’s interaction with reality: existence and consciousness. Existence is what exists and consciousness is awareness of what exists. A person’s views on existence and consciousness, which is their view on metaphysics and epistemology, is the foundation of their philosophical beliefs and will effect every other aspect of their worldly views. Is existence firm and absolute or an ever-moldable flux? Can human consciousness understand existence or are humans doomed to be in a blind stupor, never able to understand the reality around them?
Please note that reason is the process by which man absorbs sensory data and categorizes it in his mind as to understand it. Therefore reason is only possible if existence is absolute and man’s consciousness is potent enough to understand existence. It is the philosophy of objectivism that maintains that reality is what it is and man is capable of understanding it.
When reading a book, what exists is the text and the degree to which you are conscious of what it says is the degree to which you focus your mind on it. The purpose is to study the text so that you can develop an understanding of it, i.e. discover its identity. You do not re-invent what you are reading or come to your own arbitrary conclusion regarding what the text says: your goal is to come to a clear, precise understanding of what the text means. The ability to do this is called reading comprehension.
You do not typically have an “interpretation” of a text. “Interpretations” are only necessary when some aspect of reality is confusing, vague or hard to understand. For instance, an interpreter is needed to translate one language to another for people, as the foreign language is otherwise incomprehensible to those people. “Interpretations” therefore also imply that only a person with an advanced or specialized knowledge can interpret something - it is not open to a lay person. “Interpretations,” such as the “interpretation” of the law or the “interpretation” of someone’s behavior are also generally regarded as only someone’s opinion - only quasi-based on fact - apt to be right or wrong.
It is revealing that those who discuss Islam always refer to human understanding of the Koran as a mere “interpretation.” By identifying human understanding of the Koran as an “interpretation,” it automatically establishes the text as fluid, subjective and moldable - as an incomprehensible text that anyone can take any different way.
There may perhaps be parts of the Koran that are confusing and contradictory and indeed need an interpreter. But if so, one must point out what text is confusing or contradictory and what the different “interpretations” thereof might be, especially, given their claims, as it pertains to terrorism. This would open the debate up to human reason. But those who defend Islam do not do this: instead they typically make a broad, generic statement that people make the “wrong interpretation” of the Koran. Broad statements such as this are not indicative of a confusing or contradictory text but of an assault on objectivity itself.
Notice this author’s defense of not being able to understand a “true Islam.” This is an article entitled, “What is Real Islam?” by M.A.Hussain from a website called humiliateamerica.com:
“It is impossible to tell what Islam is objectively and what Islam is not. There are several problems of interpretation of religious scriptures which are insurmountable such that there cannot be “real Islam” or real Christianity”. The interpretation of religious scripture whether by a nonbeliever or of any believer is a subjective process. The religious scriptures belong to history and history is nothing but a point of view. The "objective history" or "objective historical process" is not accessible whatever methodology you adopt, you can never give an objective account of history.” (Bold mine; incorrect punctuation and grammar the author’s.)
Not even history, according the author, is objectively determinable. This is not just an attack on the ability to understand Islam but reality itself.
I propose that the arguments about the inability to interpret the Koran are not meant to emphasize the confusing nature of the Koran but to exempt it from the Law of Identity. They want you to regard what is written in front of you in plain language as not being what it is but that it can be anything at all. Up can mean down; black can be white; or any A can be any other non-A.
This same attack on objectivity does not just happen with the Koran; it has infiltrated all the major humanities, and even some of the hard sciences. For instance, indeed in history, the new breed of historians (known as revisionists) will tell you that there is no objective history; that it is (of course), “open to interpretation.” In political science, new supposed scholars tell us the Constitution is more of a suggestion than a commandment, and, of course, “open to interpretation.” (The Constitution was designed to be living but this means it can be amended not re-“interpreted.”)
Why do they do this? So they can do the interpreting.
History, the Constitution, and reality get in the way of their ideologies. When reality gets in your way, doubt reality.
If you notice, despite the fact that these scholars believe reality can never be objectively deciphered, they never become skeptics. One would think if reality is such a foggy haze that humans can never objectively decipher, we would be forever unsure and doubtful of the world around us. Instead, such new scholars charge right on, asserting absolute knowledge - “interpreting” history, law, reality for you.
Notice that with the Koran that they don’t become skeptics over what the “interpretation” of the Koran is. Even though interpretations are generally regarded as not right or wrong, and they insist the Koran is too “profound” to understand, they announce that the terrorists most definitely had the “wrong interpretation.” The Koran is mostly incomprehensible, but apparently they have the magical ability to understand its true meaning and dictate it to us.
This is a game that has been being played for decades. This attack on objectivity stems from the root, from the philosophical level, from our ideas of existence and consciousness. The ideas that have permeated academia for decades have been the notion that reality isn’t real; that reason is impotent in understanding reality. This philosophical foundation was formalized into an official philosophical system by Immanuel Kant.
Kant attacked reason (and, therefore, reality) from the inside: by re-defining it. Allow me to re-emphasize the definitions of some terms. Reason is the process by which man absorbs sensory data and uses it to understand the world around him. It doesn’t matter how big or small the knowledge is - from understanding what a “cat” or “dog” is, by using your own five senses and rational mind - to understanding any elaborate science. Logic is the method by which man processes that knowledge, making accurate, or rather non-contradictory, identifications of reality. (Forgive me for being redundant; it is only for explanation purposes). Mysticism is to develop a conclusion or understanding of the world through some non-sensory means, such as a person who believes in God based on faith.
Kant said that reason was “a priori,” that is to say “without experience.” How can man have any knowledge, understanding or enlightenment while void of reality? Kant made the most offensive attack on reason possible: smearing it by defining reason as mysticism, i.e. to develop knowledge with no sensory data, i.e. no evidence
This is why academic elites are unabashed in dismissing reality, history, and the obvious in front of your eyes in favor of their bizarre ideologies. Attacking reality doesn’t seem awkward or illogical to them; it seems sophisticated - the very definition of reason. Reality is an ever-changing and contradictory flux, apt to be whatever they say it is. Everything is considered moldable today, from history to human nature itself. Kant laid the groundwork for full-scale, institutionalized propaganda.
This is the same game being played with the Koran. It comes utterly natural to them to portray the Koran as being subjective, fluid, and totally incomprehensible; outside the realm of human mind. They wield manipulation as effectively as a knight with a sword.
There is one thing in the way of their schemes: your rational mind. While thwarting everyone’s eyes away from the obvious, their enemy is that one person who insists on facts and demands evidence. Therefore, they need to make you doubt your own mind, i.e. your ability to reason. In the case of the Koran, this means your ability to read a book correctly.
Therefore they need to infuse waves of doubt and confusion over anyone trying to read to understand the Koran. “You are no Islamic scholar!” they will shout at you. “The Koran is so profound!” they cry. “It has so many commentaries and notes!” Don’t even bother to read it, you will not understand it.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Koran is not hard to read or understand. These are merely the hysterics of intellectual snobs trying to create an inferiority complex in you.
Notice that there is a double standard. If someone says the Koran is peaceful, it is taken as plain, simple fact, regardless that said person has usually never even read the Koran. But the person who challenges Islam is held to the most excruciating of standards to prove themselves and their ability to judge the Koran. Unless you read the Koran in its original language, under a renowned scholar in Mecca, they will announce you have no idea what you are talking about. Indeed, it is usually people who have never read the Koran who are the most hysterical in these kinds of accusations.
When these methods of don’t work, they can always resort to ad hominems: calling you an “idiot,” “moron,” etc simply for having the “incorrect” view. However, they don’t even have to do this anymore. Today, it is not just limited to a select few who want to insult you: it is popularly accepted to call anyone who questions Islam a “bigot” or “ignorant.” People have been “educated” from birth that to challenge Islam is evil. Nothing could be more anti-enlightened, anti-reason and downright destructive.
Islam apologists, including Muslims themselves, have gotten very good at thwarting people from reading and understanding the Koran. They do so in the most effective way possible: by appealing to your respect for intelligence. Whenever you cite a verse in the Koran, without skipping a beat, they will cry that you, “Took the verse out of context.” This appeals to people’s sense of having a full, conceptual of understanding of any given thing. If you notice though, they never actually put the verse in context. This is not an appeal to conceptual understanding, as it seems to be, but is used to make you believe that somehow, someway, the verses around a particular verse will change said verse’s identity. They will also tell you whenever you quote a verse from a Koran that you have the “wrong translation.” On some level this appeals to people’s respect for those who take the time to learn another language. But it is utterly ridiculous to think that only those people can judge the Koran: there are many, many translations of the Koran, all of which say essentially the same things. These are nothing but silly, awkward, and for some unknown reason - often effective - method of controlling information as to control thought.
One would think if Muslims were so proud of their religion, they would be encouraging people to read their holy text to prove its righteousness not thwarting people away from it at every step. People who are just want nothing more than for others to take a good, hard look at them - not generalizing them with others or brushing them aside. An innocent person being charged with murder, for instance, will want and demand all the facts of the case to come out, to shine as much light on the case as possible, and to be allowed to take the stand to make his or her case. The unjust person seeks to manipulate and deceive others, always trying to stop people from taking too hard of a look. For an example, see the lying, deceptive ways of any criminal.
So let’s do just that: shine pouring light onto the Koran to see what it is. We are going to give Islam what it frankly does not deserve: the nicety of a trial.
In order to judge Islam, I did what most Islam apologists and most Muslims (many of whom are illiterate) did not do: I read the Koran.
I find it interesting that interest in the Koran skyrocketed after 9/11. But there are hardly any commentaries describing what is actually in the Koran.
Anyone who has ever sat down to read the Koran has my deepest sympathies. It is an extremely boring, mind-numbing and repetitive book
The Koran is considered the written word of Muhammad’s teachings, who was inspired by the angel Gabriel. According to the introduction to the Koran I read in paper back, Muhammad was born into a poor family but lived in a wealthy city. He grew up without a father and ended up marrying a rich widow (and then went on to have many different wives, including at least one six-year-old girl). The Koran was written down by others as he could not read nor write.
The Koran is broken up into “Suras,” which are like books in the Bible or chapters in a book. There are 114 Suras and over 6100 verses. The Suras range in size from as small as 4 verses to as many as 286. For the most part, the larger Suras are at the beginning and they get progressively smaller until the very short Suras at the end.
This is how the very beginning of the Koran starts out.
Sura 2:3-6, which falls on the first page of the Koran:
“And who believe in what hath been sent down to thee, and in what hath been sent down before thee, and full faith have they in the life to come.
These are guided by their Lord; and with these it shall be well.
As to the infidels, alike is it to them whether thou warn them or warm them not – they will not believe.
Their hearts and their ears hath God sealed up; and over their eyes is a covering. For them, a severe chastisement!”
The very beginning of the Koran starts out with stating that nonbelievers are wrong, wrong, wrong and believers are good, good, good. It doesn’t say what the believers should do - there are no principles, values or morals laid out - just that non-believers are wrong.
It didn’t take long for me to be utterly shocked at what I read in the Koran:
"O our Lord! punish us not if we forget, or fall into sin; O our Lord! and lay not on us a load like that which thou has laid on those who have been before us; O our Lord! and lay not on us that for which we have not strength: but blot out our sins and forgive us, and have pity on us. Thou art our protector: give us victory therefore over the infidel nations." Surah 2:286 (Bold mine)
This, quite frankly - is it! The Koran is nothing but one long vitriolic speech aimed at infidels: saying that they are dumb, blind, stupid, thankless, liars; that they will have boiling water poured on them; that they will be sent to hell where they will be choked with food and without any friends; that Allah hates them; and also loves those who fights against them
I wanted to be able to give you, my reader, some kind of percentage estimate of just how much the Koran deals with nothing but infidels. I could give you an eyeballed estimation of how much of it is nothing but hatred at infidels, but I would not expect you to take my word for it. Going through the Koran and summing up every single verse to get a percentage would be way too cumbersome. However, I thought of a way to get across to you, my reader, a warranted percentage: I could take a random sampling of verses from the Koran and make projections from there.
Now this is not some sort of literary review, not that the Koran is complex enough to warrant a literary review. I performed the study I did, at first, solely to get an accurate percentage to present.
I originally did a small study. I wanted at least 30 samples because statistically, so as long as there are 30 samples, the central limit theorem applies, i.e. the sampling is large enough to be statistically significant. I tried to think of a fair way to pick samples. Had I gone through and just pointed to verses, I likely would have gotten accused of cherry picking. So I took verse 10 from randomly chosen Suras. I did this to show I was not picking one verse over another. I ended up with 34 verses. You can read the verses I took along with commentary regarding what context the verse is in, why I assigned it to the category I did and the calculations of my confidence interval here.
I was really quite pleased with the results: I felt they provided a nice broad overview of the Koran and even captured one good verse! It also hit some of the bigger but smaller aspects of the Koran - the fact that it mentions Noah's Ark many times (where it gleefully describes how the infidels drowned); that it thinks infidels are utterly thankless; that Allah actually makes nonbelievers not believe, etc. These were the results
18/34 (52.9%) - over half - of these random verses is vitriol aimed at infidels.
6/34 (17.6%) Deal with Allah
5/34 (14.7%) Deal with believers
4/34 (11.8%) Deal with Day of Judgment or Day of Doom
1/34 (3.4%) ... is a good verse! (Do not steal from the poor / Give to the poor)
However, upon some contemplation I decided that my study could be done better. Perhaps there might have been some bias by only picking verse 10 from the verses. I took the verses from an online Koran (it was easier to cut and paste quotes from an online source), and it was an anti-Islamic site so perhaps there was some bias. (It turns out there was not; the same translation is used by some pro-Islamic sites). I also felt there was at least one major theme that was ignored in my sampling: how Islam treats women. The confidence interval I ended up with was that one could be 95% confident that the percentage of hatred of infidels in the Koran was between 36.1% and 69.7%. That really is not very tight.
So I did a bigger study. This time I took it from a pro-Islamic site. I wanted to have at least 200 samples. I tried to think of the most diplomatic way to take random verses. I could go in and take every 30th verse, giving me approximately 200 verses. But that would skip over several Suras as many of them only have 5 - 9 verses in them. So I decided to give the verses a representation similar to the way our founding fathers set up our Congress: every Sura (just like every state) would be given a certain minimum representation and then larger Suras (just like larger states) would also have some kind of larger representation. So I took one verse from each Sura, thereby representing each Sura. I took the verse right in the middle. That gave me 114 verses. I wanted about 86 more. So then I went through and took every 70th verse. This naturally gave the larger Suras more of a representation. I ended up with 201 verses.
And, after hours of work, the results are in: they are exactly the same. For the percentage I was most interested in, how much of the Koran is nothing but hatred at infidels, it was exactly at 53%. I was also quite happy that this sampling captured several verses about women. The confidence interval was also much better this time: with 95% confidence, we can say the proportion is somewhere between 45.8% and 59.6%. You can read the verses I took, my commentaries, and the calculation of the confidence interval here.
Here are the results of my larger study:
106/201 (52.7%) is hatred aimed at infidels, defined as
Threats towards infidels either in the after life or this life *Degrading infidels by calling them evil, stupid, blind, deaf, liars, thankless, etc.
Calls to fight against them.
Verses that say "except the believers" when wishing death on nonbelievers were counted as hatred since avoiding death is not a positive to believers
The threat or insult can be aimed at infidels in general or any specific infidel.
50/201 (24.9%) Deals with believers, defined as
Mentioning them
Saying they are righteous
Saying they will get good things
Any mentions of one of the prophets was snuck into this category too
23/201 (11.4%) deal with Allah,
Who he is
That he is almighty
Any of his creations
10/201 (5%) deal with the Day of Doom or the Day of Judgment
Either the Day of Doom when destruction is sent on the earth or
Day of Judgment when all are judged before Allah
Any message pertaining to how God records what men do was assigned this category
4/201 (2%) are anti-woman
That it’s OK to beat a woman
Women and slaves get married off but have no choice in the matter and is very self-serving to Muhammad or men in general.
4/201 (2%) deal with giving to the poor in some way
2/201 (1%) deal with some kind of Muslim custom or etiquette, for instance
How to divorce your wife
1/201 (0.5%) disapproves of a man who murdered someone, but only because it was for the wrong reason to kill someone.
1/201 (0.5%) actually says it is OK for people to have their religion while Muslims have theirs
Over 50% of the Koran deals with nothing but hatred aimed at infidels. You will notice Allah is mentioned a lot, as well as the goodness of believers and the Day of Doom/Judgment, the former being a day when the Koran gleefully exclaims that Allah will send destruction to the earth and destroy the infidels. Notice how much of the Koran that deals with not just infidels but with the theme of believers verses nonbelievers, setting up believers as holy, righteous, almost perfect human beings and nonbelievers not just as wrong but as wretched scum. If you add up the number of verses that deal with infidels, believers, Allah, and the Day of Judgment/Doom, that percentage is a full 94%. This is really the only thing in the Koran as the Koran itself readily admits: "... This book is no other than a warning and a clear Koran, To warn whoever liveth; and, that against the Infidels sentence may be justly given." Sura 36:69-70
You may notice that details outlining Muslim customs and etiquette do not take up much room in the Koran. In fact, Ramadan, from what I can tell, is only mentioned once in the Koran. You can see how seriously Muslims take Ramadan. Now imagine how seriously they take the rest of the 94% of the Koran.
There is no moral system outlined in the Koran - with the exception of allowing men to beat their wives, sleep with their slaves, and there is an occasional, “give to the poor.” There certainly is no unequivocal “Do not kill”; “Do not steal”; or “Do not lie,” let alone any other insight into how to behave properly as a human being. Most of the “moral” guidance given in the Koran is not a restraint on humans but permission to do what they want - mostly for men to do what they want.
The Koran is very self-serving to men and especially Muhammad when it comes to having access to women. It promises men young virgins in heaven with “supple breasts” and “large brown eyes,” but what about the women? Muhammad had up to fifteen wives at one time, but the rest of the believers were limited to four. Sura 66:1 shows not only the self-serving nature of the Koran for Muhammad but the entire purpose of the Koran itself:
"Why,1 O Prophet! doest thou hold that to be FORBIDDEN which God hath made lawful to thee, from a desire to please thy wives, since God is Lenient, Merciful? " Sura 66:1
Note 1 from Sura 66 further clarifies this verse:
1 The first verses of this Sura were revealed on occasion of Muhammad's reviving affection for Mary, a Copt slave sent him by the governor of Egypt from whom he had recently sworn to his wife Hafsa to separate entirely. Hafsa, who had been greatly incensed at their amour, of which Muhammad had himself informed her, communicated the matter in confidence to Ayesha, from whose altered manner, probably, the prophet found that his secret had been betrayed. To free Muhammad from his obligation to Hafsa was the object of this chapter.
Muhammad had told his wife that he would stop having sex with a slave. However, he came back to tell her that he is allowed because Allah does not forbid it. Hence, to hell with her wishes!
Indeed, the Koran gives men full right to have sex with female slaves and their allotted four wives:
"It is not permitted thee to take other wives hereafter, nor to change they present wives for other women, though their beauty charm thee, except slaves whom thy right hand shall possess. And God watcheth all things." Sura 33:52
Thus my charges of rape and slavery against Islam.
I propose the Koran is nothing but a rationalization: Muhammad’s rationalization to do whatever he wants in the name of “religion.”
A verse in the Koran that needs no further comment:
"And we said, 'Take in thine hand a rod and strike15 with it, nor break thine oath.' Verily, we found him patient!" - Sura 38:43
NOTE 15 IN SURA 38: "Thy wife; - on whom he had sworn that he would inflict an hundred blows, because she had absented herself from him when in need of her assistance, or for her words (Job ii.9). The oath was kept, we are told, by his giving her one blow with a rod of a hundred stalks. This passage is often quoted by the Muslims as authorising any similar manner of release from an oath inconsiderately taken."
The only arguable “good” verses in the Koran are commandments to give to the poor, which according to the study I did accounts for about 2% of the Koran. Some may argue that giving to the poor is a good thing. Perhaps. But, in the Koran, it is couched inside commandments of NOT getting wealthy.
"These are they who purchase this present life at the price of that which is to come: their torment shall not be lightened, neither shall they be helped." Sura 2:80
"Let not prosperity in the land on part of those who believe not, deceive thee. Tis but a brief enjoyment. Then shall Hell be their abode, and wretched the bed!" Sura 3:196
"... What! prefer ye the life of this world to the next? But the fruition of this mundane life, in respect of that which is to come, is but little." Sura 9:38
And if this isn’t malicious enough, the Koran’s wish for people who have wealth:
"Let not, therefore, their riches or their children amaze thee. God is only minded to punish them by these, in this life present, and that their souls may depart while they are unbelievers." Sura 9:55 (Bold mine)
The Koran is hostile to any kind of wealth, pleasure or success on this earth. Even having children is considered a test from God of where a Muslim’s loyalties lie. Man is meant to remain humble with only modest earnings, pouring most of his earnings to the cause of Islam. How can business, technology, art, music, or any other form of wealth or happiness develop out of this? Those who “purchase this present life” like this, according to Islam has done so at the price of the afterlife. Given Muslims, Muslims who follow the Koran anyway, are forbidden any pleasure while on this earth, death must feel like liberation to them
Thus my charge of creating poverty against Islam.
What has a tendency to shock most people about Islam and the Koran is its belief in predestination, which you may notice in the study I performed. Allow me to introduce you to one of the biggest theological contradictions of all time. The Koran is filled with threat after threat thrown at nonbelievers. And yet the Koran says that it is Allah who causes people to believe or not believe.
"He whom God guideth is the guided, and they whom he misleadeth shall be the lost." Sura 7:177
"No soul can believe but by the permission of God: and he shall lay his wrath on those who will not understand." - Sura 10:100
"And they who believe not say, 'Unless a sign be sent down to him from his Lord ...' SAY: God truly will mislead whom he will; and He will guide to Himself him who turneth to Him,” Sura 13:27
"Had God pleased, He could have made you one people: but He causeth whom He will to err, and whom He will He guideth: and ye shall assuredly be called to account for your doings." Sura 16:95
So, if God and God only can cause people to not believe, then why all the threats? What good will they do? Whose fault is it that they are nonbelievers and why should they be punished for something out of their control? (I argued that the Koran had an identity, i.e. a specific meaning; I never promised it would make sense.)
Imagine you are a Muslim and want more than anything to be a good Muslim and to get into heaven. How do you know that Allah will pick you to be one that he will guide? Every person, according to Islam, has no control over his fate but rather is at the mercy of Allah’s whim.
This belief in predestination is not just mysticism; it is much worse. Not only do men gain knowledge through faith only; it is only some men (and the Koran says only a few men) are privy to such knowledge. And now the most pressing question: if all the world is to be Muslim, as the Koran commands, but people cannot be converted, how can that happen? There is only one way.
Almost the entire Koran is dedicated to delegating to infidels an inferior status. They are called blind, stupid and ignorant. No proof is given of why they should believe; Muhammad performed no miracles for people. When some skeptics asked for proof, the response was:
"And when ye said, 'O Moses! we will not believe thee until we see God plainly;' the thunderbolt fell upon you while ye were looking on:" Sura 2:52
Infidels are accused of being thankless. The Koran says infidels promise that they will believe in God if God relieves them of their affliction, but when God does, they forget him. Infidels mock the prophets when they come to give their message to them. All of this sets up for what the Koran, at heart, is: one long battle cry against infidels.
I find it interesting that the Koran is not in chronological order. It was re-arranged, and interestingly enough, most of the downright violent Suras were put at the beginning.
"Is it not proved to those who inherit this land after its ancient occupants, that if we please we can smite them for their sins, and put a seal upon their hearts, that they hearken not?” Sura 7:98
“Say to the infidels: If they desist from their unbelief, what is now past shall be forgiven them, but if they return to it, they have already before them the doom of the ancients! Fight then against them till strife be at an end, and the religion be all of it God's …" - Sura 8:39-40
"And when the sacred months are passed, kill those who join other gods with God wherever ye shall find them; and seize them, besiege them, and lay wait for them with every kind of ambush: but if they shall convert, and observe prayer, and pay the obligatory alms, then let them go their way, for God is Gracious, Merciful." Sura 9:5
Yes, this is straight from the Holy Book of the religion that gets called a “Religion of Peace.”
Muslims are commanded to fight. Only the weak are excused.
"It shall be no crime on the part of the blind, the lame, or the sick, if they go not to the fight. But whoso shall obey God and His Apostle, He shall bring him into the gardens 'neath which the rivers flow: but whoso shall turn back, He will punish him with a sore punishment." Sura 48:17
After fighting, believers have a right to the infidel’s houses.
“And He made you heirs to their land and their dwellings and their property, and (to) a land which you have not yet trodden, and Allah has power over all things.” Sura 33:27
Thus my charge of oppression against Islam.
The Koran is clear on when fighting can stop. Some may say that the Koran says fighting can stop once “peace” is made, which is how the following is watered down in some translations:
"Yet if they turn to God and observe prayer, and pay the impost, then are they your brethren in religion. We make clear our signs to those who understand." "But if, after alliance made, they break their oaths and revile your religion, then do battle with the ring-leaders of infidelity - for no oaths are binding with them - that they may desist." Sura 9:11-12
Muslims are taught to wage war on nonbelievers. It is written in plain language. Muslims are to fight until nonbelievers convert or pay alms. All else are to be killed. Ladies and gentlemen, thus my charge of terrorism against Islam.
Let me remind you of the September 11, 2001 attacks. Along with the Pentagon (and another plane which never made its destination of the White House as some courageous heroes took it down before it could get there), the Islamic terrorists targeted the twin towers of the World Trade Center: symbols of American wealth and prosperity.
"And when we willed to destroy a city, to its affluent ones did we address our bidding: but when they acted criminally therein, just was its doom, and we destroyed it with an utter destruction" - Sura 17:17 (Bold mine)
"We will not burden a soul beyond its power: and with us is a book, which speaketh the truth; and they shall not be wronged: But as to this Book, their hearts are plunged in error, and their works are far other than those of Muslims, and they will work those works, Until when we lay hold on their affluent ones with punishment; lo! they cry for help:" Sura 23:64-66 (Bold mine)
I will remind you the reason why the terrorists were willing to kill themselves to kill Americans: they were promised 72 virgins in heaven.
"But, for the God-fearing is a blissful abode, Enclosed gardens and vineyards; And damsels with swelling breasts, their peers in age." Sura 78:31-33
"But the pious shall be in a secure place, Amid gardens and fountains, Clothed in silk and richest robes, facing one another: Thus shall it be: and we will wed them to the virgins with large dark eyes." Sura 44:51-54
The terrorists who attacked us on September 11, 2001 did not do so in the name of their country or for any demand, such as money or land: they did it openly and proudly in the name of Islam. They were not misguided; they were in every way Islamic.
The very last Suras in the Koran are very short and riddled with cries about the evilness of infidels. Even as I read them, I could feel the burning hatred of infidels that one is meant to feel after reading them. These ending Suras can be considered chants - short, quick, hysterical chants - against infidels.
Some will insist that my verses were totally lifted out of context. This argument does not have much merit. As you can tell from my study, the “context” of just about all verses in the Koran is a sea of hatred. It is in fact the Islam apologists who do not put things in context. Islam apologists comb the Koran for any and all “good” quotes and take it as proof that the Koran is peaceful. For instance, there is a quote in the Koran which says Muslims can have their religion and other people can have theirs. This may seem good until you realize that, in the Koran, it says other religions may exist with Muslims, but they are to live as second class citizens, paying taxes to Muslims.
The other argument usually given is that the Koran does call for violence but only in self-defense. In some translations of the Koran, the phrase “in case of war” or “in case the infidels attack you” is conveniently placed in all calls for violence. This really is nothing more than a blatantly misleading lie. Muslims who say this are taking advantage of taqiyya (or taqiyah), an allowance for Muslims to lie. While taqiyya can mean that if a Muslim feels his life is in danger he can lie; it can also mean a permission to lie in general. According to fact-index.com, taqiyya can essentially mean that, “[A] Muslim is allowed to say untruths to a non-Muslim if in their heart they still respect the truths that they externally deny.”
I have noticed Muslims downright lying through their teeth in public about true Islam. It is frustrating and flabbergasting. However, knowing about taqiyya brings it full circle that they are in fact lying. But I often wondered: why? If they really are interested in destroying America (and when you dig deeper most Muslim fundamentalists, especially ones willing to lie for Islam, are), why would they lie to opponents? Why do they care what their enemies think? But I believe I figured it out: it is like an enemy fighter who waves a white flag, insisting they are peaceful, causing you to drop your weapons, then opens fire.
However, even so, let’s assume it was true that the Koran calls for violence only in self-defense. Why does it put it in such blatantly collectivist terms? Why is it one group, Muslims, only allowed to defend themselves against another group, infidels?
The fact is, all hate movements have been marked by this same thing: victimology and collectivism. They convince themselves that they are a victimized, oppressed group of another group - that they are being attacked or held down by another group - then launch a war. It is never specific people who have been hurt by other specific people, but by a broad, generic group of "Jews" or "bourgeois" or "nonbelievers."
The Koran is not very unequivocal in stating that enemies as people who threaten your life. Infidels, according to the Koran, are by definition enemies.
“And when ye go forth to war in the land, it shall be no crime in you to cut short your prayers, if ye fear lest the infidels come upon you; Verily, the infidels are your undoubted enemies!” Sura 4:102 (Bold mine.)
“They (the polytheists) sell the signs of God for a mean price, and turn others aside from his way: evil is it that they do! They regard not in a believer either ties of blood or faith; these are the transgressors!” Sura 9:9-10 (Bold mine.)
I asked a Muslim once about Muhammad. Muhammad was obviously a warlord - apparently the very first Islamic terrorist to hijack the Islam religion. This man I talked to insisted that that Islam was a religion that advocated violence only in self-defense. I asked him if Muhammad fought in self-defense or in aggression. He answered, “both.” So I asked him why Muhammad fought in aggression, perhaps it was a pre-emptive strike against enemies about to strike. And, if it was a pre-emptive strike, I asked him if Muhammad had significant intelligence data to suggest that “enemy” nations were about to attack him. He told me that Allah “in his infinite wisdom” told Muhammad that these people were his enemies.
This is the problem with Islam and this is the problem with blind faith. There are no prescribed rules for who is an enemy and who is not. Whoever is perceived to be an enemy is an enemy.
Everything about Islam prepares its people to be fighters. It riles them with hatred. It prods them to fight. Even the “holidays” in Islam trains fighters. Take for instance Ramadan. Instead of feasting and celebrating, Muslims are to sacrifice during the daylight hours for a month. I propose that this is an effective way to train its followers for war. Besides the practical ability to go without food for extended amounts of times, it trains people to accept a tough life. The only place you will see this kind of behavior in America is for various types of military training.
This isn’t a matter of clamoring over a few verses or of deciding whether or not some verses contradict other verses in the Koran. This is about the fundamental theme of the Koran, which is: burning hatred of infidels and wishes of death and destruction for them. Any Muslim who picks up the Koran and takes it seriously will at the very least believe infidels are evil and deserving of death. Islam is a fighting ideology with an uncanny hatred for those who don’t believe as they do. But don’t take my word for it. Please, by all means, read the Koran for yourself.
Many people, naïve to Islam, will point to the fact that there are 1.3 billion Muslims in the world and not all of them become terrorists. True, they do not. The problem is not the regular people but the leaders. Most people, anywhere, just accept the major philosophy/religion of their time and usually do not follow or take it very seriously. Observe that it isn’t the poor or ignorant who typically become terrorists but the rich and educated, i.e. the ones who are capable of understanding the Koran and have the means to implement what it says. This is about what Islam is as an ideology and what the ramifications will be when adopted.
My detractors might give some other reasons for why terrorism is created. Typically, many assign the cause of terrorism to some pet cause that they have. Feminists blame the “patriarchy”. Socialists blame it on “poverty.” These are obviously grounded not in reality but ideology. They are not honest evaluations; they would rather continue grinding their axe against men, the wealthy, whoever it is they hate. Blaming it on “poverty” is particularly sneaky. It is simply not true; most terrorists are middle class if not filthy rich. When the religious fundamentalists are poor, they do not have the means to fight. It is when they became wealthy, recently mostly from oil money, that they can launch bigger, more effective attacks. Blaming it on poverty is sneaky: it suggests the solution is to pour more money - more money to go to jihad - into their hands. Indeed, what we need is the exact opposite: we need to starve them of all resources, especially financial ones.
Some try to argue that Islam has produced scientific achievements in the past. Most people tend to attribute the invention of Algebra to Muslims. But it was not Muslims or even Arabs that discovered Algebra: it was the Iranians. The Iranians have a rich history of enlightenment and are more influenced by their heritage, which is one that emphasizes education and scholarship, than religion. Another person some point to is a man named Razi, who made advancements in medicine, as evidence of Muslim accomplishment. But Razi was not an Arab or a Muslim but again an Iranian. In fact, he was so hostile to Islam that he wrote several books denouncing faith and upholding reason and had to live as a heretic. Razi was to the Muslim world what Galileo or Copernicus was to ours.
It should be obvious to Western people: faith, mysticism and religion are antagonistic to science, reason and progress. We can easily see how Christianity was responsible for The Dark Ages but refuse to see how Islam is responsible for the violence and primitive life in the Middle East. Islam cannot even uphold a decent society let alone a prosperous one. Progress is not some kind of gift from the heavens. If you look at all successful societies, you will see the influence of one man: Aristotle. Progress requires a commitment to reason. The only way for peace or stability to come to the Middle East is for Islam to leave and Enlightenment to reign.
One would think that “liberals” would be the first to condemn Islam. It is the polar opposite of all of their stated values and they have a tendency to think they are enlightened. But, eerily enough, they almost seem to side with Islam; although they go after Christianity with an unusual tenacity. This seems odd, since Islam is by far a more faith-based and hateful religion than Christianity. And, while I disagree with Christianity, it upholds at least a decent, stable moral framework for people to co-exist peacefully. Islam does not. The fact that liberals speak out against Christianity, allegedly in the name of reason, but not Islam shows that the left is not anti-faith but anti-values. If you notice, leftists didn’t embrace Islam until they realized its potential for terrorism. This speaks volumes.
Even if we take down every Islamic dictatorship in existence now that harbors and finances terrorists, so as long as this malignant ideology is around, it will inspire its followers to pick up and fight infidels. We attempted to fight communism militarily, fighting aggressive communist nations and arming ourselves up to our armpits, to fail. For over a half of a century we refused to call communism itself evil. Then, in the 1980s, Ronald Reagan was willing to step up to the plate and challenge communism ideologically. Communism came tumbling down with hardly a fire shot. Like with Islam, for decades we were told it was “bad people” running the communist countries that was the problem. It was not; like with Islam, the problem is the ideology. I am however more hopeful that people will call Islam evil, and sooner, as if people can see how communism, which comes in the package of equality and peace, is an evil ideology; they can certainly see how Islam is evil.
Never underestimate the power of a simple, consistent, moral argument against the ideology of our enemies. If we are going to fight terrorism, we need to fight the ideology that inspires terrorism. As far as those hysterical people who say that challenging Islam is akin to starting a mass genocide: fighting - and winning - in the realm of ideas is a far more humane and peaceful way to end threats to our lives and nation.
Most seem to believe that Islam needs to be “secularized” for peace and freedom to come to the Middle East. Frankly, this is just a politically correct way to say Islam is the problem. Whether you believe Islam has to be “secularized” or eradicated, the simple fact remains that Islam is the problem. Until we are willing to prosecute Islam as a violent religion: our war on terror will never end.
The jury is out. May all those with a rational mind judge accordingly.
Reference
J.M. Rodwell, The Koran (New York: Dulton, 1977).
Saturday 13 January 2007
Thursday 30 November 2006
The Time Traveller.
The Time Traveller.
The Time Traveller appeared suddenly in my study on New Year’s Eve, 2004. He was a stolid, grizzled man in a grey tunic and looked to be in his late-sixties or older. He also appeared to be the veteran of wars or of some terrible accident since he had livid scars on his face and neck and hands, some even visible in his scalp beneath a fuzz of grey hair cropped short in a military cut. One eye was covered by a black eyepatch. Before I could finish dialing 911 he announced in a husky voice that he was a Time Traveler come back to talk to me about the future.
Being a sometimes science-fiction writer but not a fool, I said, “Prove it.”
“Do you remember Replay?” he said.
My finger hovered over the final “1” in my dialing. “The 1987 novel?” I said. “By Ken Grimwood?”
The stranger – Time Traveler, psychotic, home invader, whatever he was – nodded.
I hesitated. The novel by Grimwood had won the World Fantasy Award a year or two after my first-novel, Song of Kali, had. Grimwood’s book was about a guy who woke up one morning to find himself snapped back decades in his life, from the late 1980’s to himself as a college student in 1963, and thus getting the chance to relive – to replay – that life again, only this time acting upon what he’d already learned the hard way. In the book, the character, who was to experience – suffer – several Replays, learned that there were other people from his time who were also Replaying their lives in the past, their bodies younger but their memories intact. I’d greatly enjoyed the book, thought it deserved the award, and had been sad to hear that Grimwood had died . . . when? . . . in 2003.
So, I thought, I might have a grizzled nut case in my study this New Year’s Eve, but if he was a reader and a fan of Replay, he was probably just a sci-fi fan grizzled nut case, and therefore probably harmless. Possibly. Maybe.
I kept my finger poised over the final “1” in “911.”
“What does that book have to do with you illegally entering my home and study?” I asked.
The stranger smiled … almost sadly I thought. “You asked me to prove that I’m a Time Traveler,” he said softly. “Do you remember how Grimwood’s character in Replay went hunting for others in the 1960’s who had traveled back in time from the late 1980’s?”
I did remember now. I’d thought it clever at the time. The guy in Replay, once he suspected others were also replaying into the past, had taken out personal ads in major city newspapers around the country. The ads were concise. “Do you remember Three Mile Island, Challenger, Watergate, Reaganomics? If so, contact me at . . .”
Before I could say anything else on this New Year’s Eve of 2004, a few hours before 2005 began, the stranger said, “Terri Schiavo, Katrina, New Orleans under water, Ninth Ward, Ray Nagin, Superdome, Judge John Roberts, White Sox sweep the Astros in four to win the World Series, Pope Benedict XVI, Scooter Libby.”
“Wait, wait!” I said, scrambling for a pen and then scrambling even faster to write. “Ray who? Pope who? Scooter who?”
“You’ll recognize it all when you hear it all again,” said the stranger. “I’ll see you in a year and we’ll have our conversation.”
“Wait!” I repeated. “What was that middle apart . . . Ray Nugin? Judge who? John Roberts? Who is . . .” But when I looked up he was gone.
“White Sox win the Series?” I muttered into the silence. “Fat chance.”
I was waiting for him on New Year’s Eve 2005. I didn’t see him enter. I looked up from the book I was fitfully reading and he was standing in the shadows again. I didn’t dial 911 this time, nor demand any more proof. I waved him to the leather wingchair and said, “Would you like something to drink?”
“Scotch,” he said. “Single malt if you have it.”
I did.
Our conversation ran over two hours, but the following is the gist of it. I’m a novelist by trade. I remember conversations pretty well. (Not as perfectly as Truman Capote was said to be able to recall long conversations word for word, but pretty well.)
The Time Traveler wouldn’t tell me what year in the future he was from. Not even the decade or century. But the grey cord trousers and blue-grey wool tunic top he was wearing didn’t look very far-future science-fictiony or military, no Star Trekky boots or insignia, just wellworn clothes that looked like something a guy who worked with his hands a lot would wear. Construction maybe.
“I know you can’t tell me details about the future because of time travel paradoxes,” I began. I hadn’t spent a lifetime reading and then writing SF for nothing.
“Oh, bugger time travel paradoxes,” said the Time Traveler. “They don’t exist. I could tell you anything I want to and it won’t change anything. I just choose not to tell you some things.”
I frowned at this. “Time travel paradoxes don’t exist? But surely if I go back in time and kill my grandfather before he meets my grandmother . . .”
The Time Traveler laughed and sipped his Scotch. “Would you want to kill your grandfather?” he said. “Or anyone else?”
“Well . . .Hitler maybe,” I said weakly.
The Traveler smiled, but more ironically this time. “Good luck,” he said. “But don’t count on succeeding.”
I shook my head. “But surely anything you tell me now about the future will change the future,” I said.
“I gave you a raft of facts about your future a year ago as my bona fides,” said the Time Traveler. “Did it change anything? Did you save New Orleans from drowning?”
“I won $50 betting on the White Sox in October,” I admitted.
The Time Traveler only shook his head. “Quod erat demonstrandum,” he said softly. “I could tell you that the Mississippi River flows generally south. Would your knowing about it change its course or flow or flooding?”
I thought about this. Finally I said, “Why did you come back? Why do you want to talk to me? What do you want me to do?”
“I came back for my own purposes,” said the Time Traveler, looking around my booklined study. “I chose you to talk to because it was . . . convenient. And I don’t want you to do a goddamned thing. There’s nothing you can do. But relax . . . we’re not going to be talking about personal things. Such as, say, the year, day, and hour of your death. I don’t even know that sort of trivial information, although I could look it up quickly enough. You can release that white-knuckled grip you have on the edge of your desk.”
I tried to relax. “What do you want to talk about?” I said.
“The Century War,” said the Time Traveler.
I blinked and tried to remember some history. “You mean the Hundred Year War? Fifteenth Century? Fourteenth? Sometime around there. Between . . . France and England? Henry V? Kenneth Branagh? Or was it . . .”
“I mean the Century War with Islam,” interrupted the Time Traveler. “Your future. Everyone’s.” He was no longer smiling. Without asking, or offering to pour me any, he stood, refilled his Scotch glass, and sat again. He said, “It was important to me to come back to this time early on in the struggle. Even if only to remind myself of how unspeakably blind you all were.”
“You mean the War on Terrorism,” I said.
“I mean the Long War with Islam,” he said. “The Century War. And it’s not over yet where I come from. Not close to being over.”
“You can’t have a war with Islam,” I said. “You can’t go to war against a religion. Radical Islam, maybe. Jihadism. Some extremists. But not a . . . the . . . religion itself. The vast majority of Muslims in the world are peaceloving people who wish us no harm. I mean . . . I mean . . . the very word ‘Islam’ means ‘Peace.’”
“So you kept telling yourselves,” said the Time Traveler. His voice was very low but there was a strange and almost frightening edge to it. “But the ‘peace’ in ‘Islam’ means ‘Submission.’ You’ll find that out soon enough”
Great, I was thinking. Of all the time travelers in all the gin joints in all the world, I get this racist, xenophobic, right-wing @#%$.
“After Nine-eleven, we’re fighting terrorism,” I began, “not . . .”
He waved me into silence.
“You were a philosophy major or minor at that podunk little college you went to long ago,” said the Time Traveler. “Do you remember what Category Error is?”
It rang a bell. But I was too irritated at hearing my alma mater being called a “podunk little college” to be able to concentrate fully.
“I’ll tell you what it is,” said the Time Traveler. “In philosophy and formal logic, and it has its equivalents in science and business management, Category Error is the term for having stated or defined a problem so poorly that it becomes impossible to solve that problem, through dialectic or any other means.”
I waited. Finally I said firmly, “You can’t go to war with a religion. Or, I mean . . . sure, you could . . . the Crusades and all that . . . but it would be wrong.”
The Time Traveler sipped his Scotch and looked at me. He said, “Let me give you an analogy . . .”
God, I hated and distrusted analogies. I said nothing.
“Let’s imagine,” said the Time Traveler, “that on December eighth, Nineteen forty-one, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt spoke before a joint session of Congress and asked them to declare war on aviation.”
“That’s absurd,” I said.
“Is it?” asked the Time Traveler. “The American battleships, cruisers, harbor installations, Army barracks, and airfields at Pearl Harbor and elsewhere in Hawaii were all struck by Japanese aircraft. Imagine if the next day Roosevelt had declared war on aviation . . . threatening to wipe it out wherever we found it. Committing all the resources of the United States of America to defeating aviation, so help us God.”
“That’s just stupid,” I said. If I’d ever been afraid of this Time Traveler, I wasn’t now. He was obviously a mental defective.“The planes, the Japanese planes,” I said, “were just a method of attack . . . a means . . . it wasn’t aviation that attacked us at Pearl Harbor, but the Empire of Japan. We declared war on Japan and a few days later its ally, Germany, lived up to its treaty with the Japanese and declared war on us. If we’d declared war on aviation, on goddamned airplanes rather than the empire and ideology that launched them, we’d never have . . .”
I stopped. What had he called it? Category Error. Making the problem unsolvable through your inability – or fear – of defining it correctly.
The Time Traveler was smiling at me from the shadows. It was a small, thin, cold smile – holding no humour in it, I was sure — but still a smile of sorts. It seemed more sad than gloating as my sudden silence stretched on.
“What do you know about Syracuse?” he asked suddenly.
I blinked again. “Syracuse, New York?” I said at last.
He shook his head slowly. “Thucydides’ Syracuse,” he said softly. “Syracuse circa 415 B.C. The Syracuse Athens invaded.”
“It was . . . part of the Peloponnesian War,” I ventured.
He waited for more but I had no more to give. I loved history, but let’s admit it . . . that was ancient history. Still, I felt that I should have been able to tell him,or at least remember, why Syracuse was important in the Peloponnesian War or why they fought there or who fought exactly or who had won or . . . something. I hated feeling like a dull student around this scarred old man.
“The war between Athens and its allies and Sparta and its allies – a war for nothing less than hegemony over the entire known world at that time – began in 431 B.C.,” said the Time Traveler. “After seventeen years of almost constant fighting, with no clear or permanent advantage for either side, Athens – under the leadership of Alcibiades at the time – decided to widen the war by conquering Sicily, the ‘Great Greece’ they called it, an area full of colonies and the key to maritime commerce at the time the way the Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf is today.”
I hate being lectured to at the best of times, but something about the tone and timber of the Time Traveler’s voice – soft, deep, rasping, perhaps thickened a bit by the whiskey – made this sound more like a story being told around a campfire. Or perhaps a bit like one of Garrison Keillor’s Lake Wobegon stories on “Prairie Home Companion.” I settled deeper into my chair and listened.
“Syracuse wasn’t a direct enemy of the Athenians,” continued the Time Traveler, “but it was quarreling with a local Athenian colony and the democracy of Athens used that as an excuse to launch a major expedition against it. It was a big deal – Athens sent 136 triremes, the best fighting ships in the world then – and landed 5,000 soldiers right under the city’s walls.
“The Athenians had enjoyed so much military success in recent years, including their invasion of Melos, that Thucydides wrote – So thoroughly had the present prosperity persuaded the Athenians that nothing could withstand them, and that they could achieve what was possible and what was impracticable alike, with means ample or inadequate it mattered not. The reason for this was their general extraordinary success, which made them confuse their strengths with their hopes.”
“Oh, hell,” I said, “this is going to be a lecture about Iraq, isn’t it? Look . . . I voted for John Kerry last year and . . .”
“Listen to me,” the Time Traveler said softly. It was not a request. There was steel in that soft, rasping voice. “Nicias, the Athenian general who ended up leading the invasion, warned against it in 415 B.C. He said – ‘We must not disguise from ourselves that we go to found a city among strangers and enemies, and that he who undertakes such an enterprise should be prepared to become master of the country the first day he lands, or failing in this to find everything hostile to him’. Nicias, along with the Athenian poet and general Demosthenes, would see their armies destroyed at Syracuse and then they would both be captured and put to death by the Syracusans. Sparta won big in that two-year debacle for Athens. The war went on for seven more years, but Athens never recovered from that overreaching at Syracuse, and in the end . . . Sparta destroyed it. Conquered the Athenian empire and its allies, destroyed Athens’ democracy, ruined the entire balance of power and Greek hegemony over the known world at the time . . . ruined everything. All because of a miscalculation about Syracuse.”
I sighed. I was sick of Iraq. Everyone was sick of Iraq on New Years Eve, 2005, both Bush supporters and Bush haters. It was just an ugly mess. “They just had an election,” I said. “The Iraqi people. They dipped their fingers in purple ink and . . .”
“Yes yes,” interrupted the Time Traveler as if recalling something further back in time, and much less important, than Athens versus Syracuse. “The free elections. Purple fingers. Democracy in the Mid-East. The Palestinians are voting as well. You will see in the coming year what will become of all that.”
The Time Traveler drank some Scotch, closed his eyes for a second, and said, “Sun Tzu writes – The side that knows when to fight and when not to will take the victory. There are roadways not to be traveled, armies not to be attacked, walled cities not to be assaulted.”
“All right, goddammit,” I said irritably. “Your point’s made. So we shouldn’t have invaded Iraq in this . . . what did you call it? This Long War with Islam, this Century War. We’re all beginning to realize that here by the end of 2005.”
The Time Traveler shook his head. “You’ve understood nothing I’ve said. Nothing. Athens failed in Syracuse – and doomed their democracy – not because they fought in the wrong place and at the wrong time, but because they weren’t ruthless enough. They had grown soft since their slaughter of every combat-age man and boy on the island of Melos, the enslavement of every woman and girl there. The democratic Athenians, in regards to Syracuse, thought that once engaged they could win without absolute commitment to winning, claim victory without being as ruthless and merciless as their Spartan and Syracusan enemies. The Athenians, once defeat loomed, turned against their own generals and political leaders – and their official soothsayers. If General Nicias or Demosthenes had survived their captivity and returned home, the people who sent them off with parades and strewn flower petals in their path would have ripped them limb from limb. They blamed their own leaders like a sun-maddened dog ripping and chewing at its own belly.”
I thought about this. I had no idea what the hell he was saying or how it related to the future.
“You came back in time to lecture me about Thucydides?” I said. “Athens? Syracuse? Sun-Tzu? No offense, Mr. Time Traveler, but who gives a damn?”
The Time Traveler rose so quickly that I flinched back in my chair, but he only refilled his Scotch. This time he refilled my glass as well. “You probably should give a damn” he said softly. “ In 2006, you’ll be ripping and tearing at yourselves so fiercely that your nation – the only one on Earth actually fighting against resurgent caliphate Islam in this long struggle over the very future of civilization – will become so preoccupied with criticizing yourselves and trying to gain short-term political advantage, that you’ll all forget that there’s actually a war for your survival going on. Twenty-five years from now, every man or woman in America who wishes to vote will be required to read Thucydides on this matter. And others as well. And there are tests. If you don’t know some history, you don’t vote . . . much less run for office. America’s vacation from knowing history ends very soon now . . . for you, I mean. And for those few others left alive in the world who are allowed to vote.”
“You’re shitting me,” I said.
“I am shitting you not,” said the Time Traveler.
“Those few others left alive who are allowed to vote?” I said, the words just now striking me like hardthrown stones. “What the hell are you talking about? Has our government taken away all our civil liberties in this awful future of yours?”
He laughed then and this time it was a deep, hearty, truly amused laugh. “Oh, yes,” he said when the laughter abated a bit. He actually wiped away tears from his one good eye. “I had almost forgotten about your fears of your, our . . . civil liberties . . . being abridged by our own government back in these last stupidity-allowed years of 2005 and 2006 and 2007 . Where exactly do you see this repression coming from?”
“Well . . .” I said. I hate it when I start a sentence with ‘well,’ especially in an argument. “Well, the Patriot Act. Bush authorizing spying on Americans . . . international phonecalls and such. Uh . . . I think mosques in the States are under FBI surveillance. I mean, they want to look up what library books we’re reading, for God’s sake. Big Brother. 1984. You know.”
The Time Traveler laughed again, but with more edge this time. “Yes, I know,” he said. “We all know . . . up there in the future which some of you will survive to see as free people. Civil liberties. In 2006 you still fear yourselves and your own institutions first, out of old habit. A not unworthy – if fatally misguided and terminally masochistic – paranoia. I will tell you right now, and this is not a prediction but a history lesson, some of your grandchildren will live in dhimmitude.”
“Zimmi . . . what?” I said.
He spelled it out. What had sounded like a ‘z’ was the ‘dh.’ I’d never heard the word and I told him so.
“Then get off your @#%$ and Google it,” said the Time Traveler, his one working eye glinting with something like fury. “Dhimmitude. You can also look up the word dhimmi, because that’s what two of your three grandchildren will be called. Dhimmis. Dhimmitude is the system of separate and subordinate laws and rules they will live under. Look up the word sharia while you’re Googling dhimmi, because that is the only law they will answer to as dhimmis, the only justice they can hope for . . . they and tens and hundreds of millions more now who are worried in your time about invisible abridgements of their ‘civil liberties’ by their ‘oppressive’ American and European democratically elected governments.”
He audibly sneered this last part. I wondered now if the fury I sensed in him was a result of his madness, or if the reverse were true.
“Where will my grandchildren suffer this dhimmitude?” I asked. My mouth was suddenly so dry I could barely speak.
“Eurabia,” said the Time Traveler.
“There’s no such place,” I said.
He gave me his one-eyed stare. My stomach suddenly lurched and I wished I’d drunk no Scotch. “Words,” I said.
The Time Traveler raised one scar-slashed eyebrow.
“Last year you gave me words about 2005,” I said. “The kind of words Ken Grimwood’s replayers in time would have put in the newspaper to find each other. Give me more now. Or, better yet, just @#%$ tell me what you’re talking about. You said it wouldn’t matter. You said that my knowing won’t change anything, any more than I can change the direction the Mississippi is flowing . So tell me, God damn it!”
He began by giving me words. Even while I was scribbling them down, I was thinking of reading I’d been doing recently about the joy with which the Victorian Englishmen and 19th Century Europeans and Americans greeted the arrival of the 20th Century. The toasts, especially among the intellectual elite, on New Year’s Eve 1899 had been about the coming glories of technology liberating them, of the imminent Second Enlightenment in human understanding, of the certainty of a just one-world government, of the end of war for all time.
Instead, what words would a time traveler or poor Replay victim put in his London Times or Berliner Zeitung or New York Times on January 1, 1900, to find his fellow travelers displaced in time? Auschwitz, I was sure, and Hiroshima and Trinity Site and Holocaust and Hitler and Stalin and . . .
The clock in my study chimed midnight.
Jesus God. Did I want to hear such words about 2006 and the rest of the 21st Century from the Time Traveler?
“Ahmadenijad,” he said softly. “Natanz. Arak. Bushehr. Ishafan. Bonab. Ramsar.”
“Those words don’t mean a damned thing to me,” I said as I scribbled them down phonetically. “Where are they? What are they?”
“You’ll know soon enough,” said the Time Traveler.
“Are you talking about . . . what? . . . the next fifteen or twenty years?” I said.
“I’m talking about the next fifteen or twenty months from your now,” he said softly. “Do you want more words?”
I didn’t. But I couldn’t speak just then.
“General Seyed Reza Pardis,” intoned the Time Traveler. “Shehab-one, Shehab-two, Shehab-three. Tel Aviv. Baghdad International Airport, Al Salem U.S. airbase in Kuwait, Camp Dawhah U.S. Army base in Kuwait, al Seeb U.S. airbase in Oman, al Udeid U.S. Army and Air Force base in Qatar. Haifa. Beir-Shiva. Dimona.”
“Oh, @#%$,” I said. “Oh, Jesus.” I had no clue as to who or what Shehab One, Two, or Three might be, but the context and litany alone made me want to throw up.
“This is just the beginning,” said the Time Traveler.
“Wasn’t the beginning on September 11, 2001?” I managed through numb lips.
The one-eyed scarred man shook his head. “Historians in my time know that it began on June 5, 1968,” he said. “But it hasn’t really begun for you yet. For any of you.”
I thought – What on earth happened on the fifth of June, 1968? I’m old enough to remember. I was in college then. Working that summer and . . . Kennedy. Robert F. Kennedy’s assassination. “Now on to Chicago and the nomination!” Sirhan Sirhan. Was the Time Traveler trying to give me some kind of half-assed Oliver-Stone-JFK-movie garbled up conspiracy theory?
“What . . .” I began.
“Galveston,” interrupted the Time Traveler. “The Space Needle. Bank of America Plaza in Dallas. Renaissance Tower in Dallas. Bank One centre in Dallas. The Indianapolis 500 – one hour and twenty-three minutes into the race. The Bell South Building in Atlanta. The TransAmerica Pyramid in San Francisco . . .”
“Stop,” I said. “Just stop.”
“The Golden Gate Bridge,” persisted the Time Traveler. “The Guggenheim in Bilbao. The New Reichstag in Berlin. Albert Hall. Saint Paul’s Cathedral . . .”
“Shut the @#%$ up!” I shouted. “All these places can’t disappear in the rest of this century, your goddamned Century War or not! I don’t believe it.”
“I didn’t say in the rest of your century,” said the Time Traveler, his torn voice almost a whisper now. “I’m talking about your next fifteen years. And I’ve barely begun.”
“You’re nuts,” I said. “You’re not from the future. You escaped from some asylum.”
The Time Traveler nodded. “That’s more true than you know,” he said. “I come from a place and time where your grandchildren and hundreds of millions of other dhimmi are compelled to write ‘pbuh’ after the Prophet’s name. They wear gold crosses and gold Stars of David sewn onto their clothing. The Nazis didn’t invent the wearing of the Star of David . . . the marking and setting apart of the Jews in society. Muslims did that centuries ago in they lands they conquered, European and otherwise. They will refine it and update it, not toward the more merciful, in the lands they occupy through the decades ahead of you.”
“You’re crazy,” I cried, standing. My hands were balled into fists. “Islam is a religion . . . a religion of peace . . . not our enemy. We can’t be at war with a religion. That’s obscene.”
“Have you read the Qur’an and learned your Sunnah?” asked the Time Traveler. “It would behoove you to do so. Dhimmi means ‘protection.’ And your children and grandchildren will be protected . . . like cattle.”
“To hell with you,” I said.
“Your dhimmi poll tax will be called jizya,” said the Time Traveler. His voice suddenly sounded very weary.“Your land tax for being an infidel, even for fellow People of the Book – Christians and Jews – will be called kharaz. Both of these taxes will be in addition to your mandatory alms – the zakat. The punishment for failure to pay, or for paying late, a punishment meted out by your local qadi, religious judge, is death by stoning or beheading.”
I folded my arms and looked away from the Time Traveler.
“Under sharia – which will be the universal law of Eurabia,” persisted the Time Traveler, “the value of a dhimmi’s life, the value of your grandchildren, is one half the value of a Muslim’s life. Jews and Christians are worth one-third of a Muslim. Indian Parsees are worth one-fifteenth. In a court of the Eurabian Caliphate or the Global Khalifate, if a Muslim murders a dhimmi, any infidel, he must pay a blood money fine not to exceed one thousand euros. No Muslim will ever be jailed or sentenced to death for the murder of any dhimmi or any number of dhimmis. If the murders were done under the auspices of Universal Compulsive Jihad, which will be sanctioned by sharia as of 2019 Common Era, all blood money fines are waived.”
“Go away,” I said. “Go back to wherever you came from.”
“I come from here,” said the Time Traveler. “From not so far from here.”
“@#%$,” I said.
“Your enemies have gathered and struck and continue to strike and you, the innocents of 2006 and beyond, fight among yourselves, chew and rip at your own bellies, blame your brothers and yourselves and your institutions of the Enlightenment – law, tolerance, science, democracy – even while your enemies grow stronger.”
“How are we supposed to know who our enemies are?” I turned and growled at him. “The world is a complex place. Morality is a complex thing.”
“Your enemy is he who will give his life to kill you,” said the Time Traveler. “Your enemies are they that wish you and your children and your grandchildren dead and who are willing to sacrifice themselves, or support those fanatics who will sacrifice themselves, to see you and your institutions destroyed. You haven’t figured that out yet – the majority of you fat, sleeping, smug, infinitely stupid Americans and Europeans.”
He stood and set the Scotch glass back in its place on my sideboard. “How, we wonder in my time,” he said softly, “can you ignore the better part of a billion people who say aloud that they are willing to kill your children . . . or condone and celebrate the killing of them? And ignore them as they act on what they say? We do not understand you.”
I still had not turned to face him, but was looking over my shoulder at him.
“The world, as it turns out,” continued the Time Traveler, “is not nearly so complex a place as your liberal and gentle minds sought to make it.”
I did not respond.
“Thucydides taught us more than twenty-four hundred years ago – counting back from your time – that all men’s behavior is guided by phobos, kerdos, and doxa,” said the Time Traveler. “Fear, self-interest, and honour.”
I pretended I did not hear.
“Plato saw human behavior as a chariot pulled by precisely those three powerful and headstrong horses, first tugged this way, then pulled that way,” continued the Time Traveler. “Phobos, kerdos, doxa. Fear, self-interest, honour. Which of these guides the chariot of your nation and your allies in Europe and your surprisingly fragile civilization now, O Man of 2006?”
I stared at the bookcase instead of the man and willed him gone, wishing him away like a sleepy boy willing away the boogeyman under his bed.
“Which combination of those three traits — phobos, kerdos, doxa — will save or doom your world?” asked the Time Traveler. “Which might bring you back from this vacation from history – from history’s responsibilities and history’s burdens – that you have all so generously gifted yourselves with? You peaceloving Europeans. You civil-liberties loving Americans? You Athenian invertebrates with your love of your own exalted sensibilities and your willingness to enter into a global war for civilizational survival even while you are too timid, too fearful . . . too decent . . . to match the ruthlessness of your enemies.”
I closed my eyes but that did not stop his voice.
“At least understand that such decency goes away quickly when you are burying your children and your grandchildren,” rasped the Time Traveler. “Or watching them suffer in slavery. Ruthlessness deferred against totalitarian aggression only makes the later need for ruthlessness more terrible. Thousands of years of history and war should have taught you that. Did you fools learning nothing from living through the charnel house that was the 20th Century?”
I’d had enough. I opened my eyes, turned, reached into the top left drawer of my desk, and pulled out the .38 revolver that I had owned for twenty-three years and fired only twice, at firing ranges, shortly after it was given to me as a gift.
I aimed it at the Time Traveler. “Get out,” I said.
He showed no reaction. “Do you want more than words?” he asked softly. “I will give you more than words. I give you eight million Jews dead in Israel – incinerated – and many more dead Jews in Eurabia and around the world. I give you the continent of Europe cast back more than five hundred years into sad pools of warring civilizations.”
“Get out,” I repeated, aiming the revolver higher.
“I give you an Asian world in chaos, a Pacific rim ruled by China after the vacuum of America’s withdrawal – this nation’s full resources devoted to fighting, and possibly losing, the Century War – a South America and Mexico lost to corruption and appeasement, a resurgent Russian Empire that has reclaimed its old dominated republics and more, and a Canada split into three hateful nations.”
I cocked the pistol. The click sounded very loud in the small room.
“We were speaking about ruthlessness,” said the Time Traveler. “If you fail to understand it at first, you learn it quickly enough in a war like the one you are allowing to come. Would you like to hear the litany of Islamic shrines and cities that will blossom in nuclear retaliatory fire in the decades to come?”
“Get out,” I said for a final time. “I’m ruthless enough to shoot you, and by God I will if you don’t get out of here.”
The Time Traveler nodded. “As you wish. But you should hear two last words, two last names . . .religious judge Ubar ibn al-Khattab and rector-imam Ismail Nawahda of New Al-Azhar University in London, part of the 200,000-man Golden Mosque of the New Islamic Khalifate in Eurabia.”
“What are those names to me or me to them?” I asked. My finger was on the trigger of the cocked .38.
“These religious officials were on the Islamic Tribunal that sentenced two dhimmis to death by stoning and beheading,” said the Time Traveler. “The dhimmis were your two grandsons, Thomas and Daniel.”
“What was . . . will be . . . their crime?” I was able to ask after a long minute. My tongue felt like a strip of rough cotton.
“They dated two Muslim women – Thomas while he was in London on business, Daniel while visiting his aging mother, your daughter, in Canada – without first converting to Islam. That part of sharia, Islamic law, is called hudud, and we know quite a bit about it in my time. Your grandsons didn’t know the young women were Muslim since they both were dressed in modern garb - -thus violating their own society’s ironclad rule of Hijab — modesty. The girls, I hear, also died, but those were not sharia sentences. Not hudud. Their brothers and fathers murdered them. honour killings . . . I think you’ve already heard the phrase by 2006.”
If I were to shoot him, I had to do it now. My hand was shaking more fiercely every second.
“Of course, the odds against one sharia court in London sentencing both your grandsons to death for crimes committed as far apart as London and Quebec City is too much of a coincidence to believe in,” continued the Time Traveler. “As is the fact that they would both be introduced to Muslim girls, without knowing they were Muslim, and go on a single dinner date with them at the same time, in cities so far apart. And Thomas was married. I know he thought he was having a business dinner with a client.”
“What . . .” I began, my arm holding the pistol shaking as if palsied.
The Time Traveler laughed a final time. “All of your grandsons’ names were on lists. You wrote something . . . will soon write something . . . that will put your name, and all your descendents’ names, on their list. Including your only surviving grandson.”
I opened my mouth but did not speak.
“According to their own writings, which we all know well in my day,” continued the Time Traveler, “ ‘Hadith Malik 511:1588 The last statement that Muhammad made was: “O Lord, perish the Jews and Christians. They made churches of the graves of their prophets. There shall be no two faiths in Arabia.’ And there are not. All infidels – Christians, Jews, secularists — have been executed, converted, or driven out. Israel is cinders. Eurabia and the New Khalifate is growing, absorbing what was left of the old, weak cultures there that once dreamt of a European Union. The Century War is not near over. Two of your three grandsons are now dead. Your remaining grandson still fights, as does one of your surviving granddaughters. Two of your three living granddaughters now live under sharia within the aegis of New Khalifate. They are women of the veil.”
I lowered the pistol.
“ Enjoy these last days and months and years of your slumber, Grandfather,” said the scarred old man. “Your wake-up call is coming soon.”
The Time Traveler said three last words and was gone.
I put the pistol away – realizing too late that it had never been loaded – and sat down to write this. I could not. I waited these three months to try again.
Oh, Lord, I wish that some person on business from Porlock would wake me from this dream.
It was not the horrors of his revelations about my grandchildren that had shaken me the most deeply, shaken me to the core of my core, but rather the the Time Traveler’s last three words. Three words that any Replayer or time traveler visiting here from a century or more from now would react to first and most emotionally – three words I will not share here in this piece nor ever plan to share, at least until everyone on Earth knows them – three words that will keep me awake nights for months and years to come.
Three words......................................
The three words are the campaign slogan of the Democrats for ‘08:
NO MORE WAR.
Those words, chanted as a cheap promise by Americans sick of war, will seal our doom. We’ll elect men and women who refuse to stand against the rising tide of Islamic domination - all in the name of a false peace. Those three words will finalize our abandonment of purpose. It will prove that we Americans have failed to ‘appreciate the persistent, long-term threat posed to our liberties and survival’ by a Movement that envisions a world dominated and defined by an Islamic Caliphate. It will signify that we no longer have the will to stand against an enemy that will ‘fight any war, make any sacrifice, suffer any hardship, and pay any price’ to achieve religious totalitarianism.
NO MORE WAR.
Those three words mean we’ve given up. Therein lies our doom.........
Be afraid ... very afraid.
The Time Traveller appeared suddenly in my study on New Year’s Eve, 2004. He was a stolid, grizzled man in a grey tunic and looked to be in his late-sixties or older. He also appeared to be the veteran of wars or of some terrible accident since he had livid scars on his face and neck and hands, some even visible in his scalp beneath a fuzz of grey hair cropped short in a military cut. One eye was covered by a black eyepatch. Before I could finish dialing 911 he announced in a husky voice that he was a Time Traveler come back to talk to me about the future.
Being a sometimes science-fiction writer but not a fool, I said, “Prove it.”
“Do you remember Replay?” he said.
My finger hovered over the final “1” in my dialing. “The 1987 novel?” I said. “By Ken Grimwood?”
The stranger – Time Traveler, psychotic, home invader, whatever he was – nodded.
I hesitated. The novel by Grimwood had won the World Fantasy Award a year or two after my first-novel, Song of Kali, had. Grimwood’s book was about a guy who woke up one morning to find himself snapped back decades in his life, from the late 1980’s to himself as a college student in 1963, and thus getting the chance to relive – to replay – that life again, only this time acting upon what he’d already learned the hard way. In the book, the character, who was to experience – suffer – several Replays, learned that there were other people from his time who were also Replaying their lives in the past, their bodies younger but their memories intact. I’d greatly enjoyed the book, thought it deserved the award, and had been sad to hear that Grimwood had died . . . when? . . . in 2003.
So, I thought, I might have a grizzled nut case in my study this New Year’s Eve, but if he was a reader and a fan of Replay, he was probably just a sci-fi fan grizzled nut case, and therefore probably harmless. Possibly. Maybe.
I kept my finger poised over the final “1” in “911.”
“What does that book have to do with you illegally entering my home and study?” I asked.
The stranger smiled … almost sadly I thought. “You asked me to prove that I’m a Time Traveler,” he said softly. “Do you remember how Grimwood’s character in Replay went hunting for others in the 1960’s who had traveled back in time from the late 1980’s?”
I did remember now. I’d thought it clever at the time. The guy in Replay, once he suspected others were also replaying into the past, had taken out personal ads in major city newspapers around the country. The ads were concise. “Do you remember Three Mile Island, Challenger, Watergate, Reaganomics? If so, contact me at . . .”
Before I could say anything else on this New Year’s Eve of 2004, a few hours before 2005 began, the stranger said, “Terri Schiavo, Katrina, New Orleans under water, Ninth Ward, Ray Nagin, Superdome, Judge John Roberts, White Sox sweep the Astros in four to win the World Series, Pope Benedict XVI, Scooter Libby.”
“Wait, wait!” I said, scrambling for a pen and then scrambling even faster to write. “Ray who? Pope who? Scooter who?”
“You’ll recognize it all when you hear it all again,” said the stranger. “I’ll see you in a year and we’ll have our conversation.”
“Wait!” I repeated. “What was that middle apart . . . Ray Nugin? Judge who? John Roberts? Who is . . .” But when I looked up he was gone.
“White Sox win the Series?” I muttered into the silence. “Fat chance.”
I was waiting for him on New Year’s Eve 2005. I didn’t see him enter. I looked up from the book I was fitfully reading and he was standing in the shadows again. I didn’t dial 911 this time, nor demand any more proof. I waved him to the leather wingchair and said, “Would you like something to drink?”
“Scotch,” he said. “Single malt if you have it.”
I did.
Our conversation ran over two hours, but the following is the gist of it. I’m a novelist by trade. I remember conversations pretty well. (Not as perfectly as Truman Capote was said to be able to recall long conversations word for word, but pretty well.)
The Time Traveler wouldn’t tell me what year in the future he was from. Not even the decade or century. But the grey cord trousers and blue-grey wool tunic top he was wearing didn’t look very far-future science-fictiony or military, no Star Trekky boots or insignia, just wellworn clothes that looked like something a guy who worked with his hands a lot would wear. Construction maybe.
“I know you can’t tell me details about the future because of time travel paradoxes,” I began. I hadn’t spent a lifetime reading and then writing SF for nothing.
“Oh, bugger time travel paradoxes,” said the Time Traveler. “They don’t exist. I could tell you anything I want to and it won’t change anything. I just choose not to tell you some things.”
I frowned at this. “Time travel paradoxes don’t exist? But surely if I go back in time and kill my grandfather before he meets my grandmother . . .”
The Time Traveler laughed and sipped his Scotch. “Would you want to kill your grandfather?” he said. “Or anyone else?”
“Well . . .Hitler maybe,” I said weakly.
The Traveler smiled, but more ironically this time. “Good luck,” he said. “But don’t count on succeeding.”
I shook my head. “But surely anything you tell me now about the future will change the future,” I said.
“I gave you a raft of facts about your future a year ago as my bona fides,” said the Time Traveler. “Did it change anything? Did you save New Orleans from drowning?”
“I won $50 betting on the White Sox in October,” I admitted.
The Time Traveler only shook his head. “Quod erat demonstrandum,” he said softly. “I could tell you that the Mississippi River flows generally south. Would your knowing about it change its course or flow or flooding?”
I thought about this. Finally I said, “Why did you come back? Why do you want to talk to me? What do you want me to do?”
“I came back for my own purposes,” said the Time Traveler, looking around my booklined study. “I chose you to talk to because it was . . . convenient. And I don’t want you to do a goddamned thing. There’s nothing you can do. But relax . . . we’re not going to be talking about personal things. Such as, say, the year, day, and hour of your death. I don’t even know that sort of trivial information, although I could look it up quickly enough. You can release that white-knuckled grip you have on the edge of your desk.”
I tried to relax. “What do you want to talk about?” I said.
“The Century War,” said the Time Traveler.
I blinked and tried to remember some history. “You mean the Hundred Year War? Fifteenth Century? Fourteenth? Sometime around there. Between . . . France and England? Henry V? Kenneth Branagh? Or was it . . .”
“I mean the Century War with Islam,” interrupted the Time Traveler. “Your future. Everyone’s.” He was no longer smiling. Without asking, or offering to pour me any, he stood, refilled his Scotch glass, and sat again. He said, “It was important to me to come back to this time early on in the struggle. Even if only to remind myself of how unspeakably blind you all were.”
“You mean the War on Terrorism,” I said.
“I mean the Long War with Islam,” he said. “The Century War. And it’s not over yet where I come from. Not close to being over.”
“You can’t have a war with Islam,” I said. “You can’t go to war against a religion. Radical Islam, maybe. Jihadism. Some extremists. But not a . . . the . . . religion itself. The vast majority of Muslims in the world are peaceloving people who wish us no harm. I mean . . . I mean . . . the very word ‘Islam’ means ‘Peace.’”
“So you kept telling yourselves,” said the Time Traveler. His voice was very low but there was a strange and almost frightening edge to it. “But the ‘peace’ in ‘Islam’ means ‘Submission.’ You’ll find that out soon enough”
Great, I was thinking. Of all the time travelers in all the gin joints in all the world, I get this racist, xenophobic, right-wing @#%$.
“After Nine-eleven, we’re fighting terrorism,” I began, “not . . .”
He waved me into silence.
“You were a philosophy major or minor at that podunk little college you went to long ago,” said the Time Traveler. “Do you remember what Category Error is?”
It rang a bell. But I was too irritated at hearing my alma mater being called a “podunk little college” to be able to concentrate fully.
“I’ll tell you what it is,” said the Time Traveler. “In philosophy and formal logic, and it has its equivalents in science and business management, Category Error is the term for having stated or defined a problem so poorly that it becomes impossible to solve that problem, through dialectic or any other means.”
I waited. Finally I said firmly, “You can’t go to war with a religion. Or, I mean . . . sure, you could . . . the Crusades and all that . . . but it would be wrong.”
The Time Traveler sipped his Scotch and looked at me. He said, “Let me give you an analogy . . .”
God, I hated and distrusted analogies. I said nothing.
“Let’s imagine,” said the Time Traveler, “that on December eighth, Nineteen forty-one, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt spoke before a joint session of Congress and asked them to declare war on aviation.”
“That’s absurd,” I said.
“Is it?” asked the Time Traveler. “The American battleships, cruisers, harbor installations, Army barracks, and airfields at Pearl Harbor and elsewhere in Hawaii were all struck by Japanese aircraft. Imagine if the next day Roosevelt had declared war on aviation . . . threatening to wipe it out wherever we found it. Committing all the resources of the United States of America to defeating aviation, so help us God.”
“That’s just stupid,” I said. If I’d ever been afraid of this Time Traveler, I wasn’t now. He was obviously a mental defective.“The planes, the Japanese planes,” I said, “were just a method of attack . . . a means . . . it wasn’t aviation that attacked us at Pearl Harbor, but the Empire of Japan. We declared war on Japan and a few days later its ally, Germany, lived up to its treaty with the Japanese and declared war on us. If we’d declared war on aviation, on goddamned airplanes rather than the empire and ideology that launched them, we’d never have . . .”
I stopped. What had he called it? Category Error. Making the problem unsolvable through your inability – or fear – of defining it correctly.
The Time Traveler was smiling at me from the shadows. It was a small, thin, cold smile – holding no humour in it, I was sure — but still a smile of sorts. It seemed more sad than gloating as my sudden silence stretched on.
“What do you know about Syracuse?” he asked suddenly.
I blinked again. “Syracuse, New York?” I said at last.
He shook his head slowly. “Thucydides’ Syracuse,” he said softly. “Syracuse circa 415 B.C. The Syracuse Athens invaded.”
“It was . . . part of the Peloponnesian War,” I ventured.
He waited for more but I had no more to give. I loved history, but let’s admit it . . . that was ancient history. Still, I felt that I should have been able to tell him,or at least remember, why Syracuse was important in the Peloponnesian War or why they fought there or who fought exactly or who had won or . . . something. I hated feeling like a dull student around this scarred old man.
“The war between Athens and its allies and Sparta and its allies – a war for nothing less than hegemony over the entire known world at that time – began in 431 B.C.,” said the Time Traveler. “After seventeen years of almost constant fighting, with no clear or permanent advantage for either side, Athens – under the leadership of Alcibiades at the time – decided to widen the war by conquering Sicily, the ‘Great Greece’ they called it, an area full of colonies and the key to maritime commerce at the time the way the Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf is today.”
I hate being lectured to at the best of times, but something about the tone and timber of the Time Traveler’s voice – soft, deep, rasping, perhaps thickened a bit by the whiskey – made this sound more like a story being told around a campfire. Or perhaps a bit like one of Garrison Keillor’s Lake Wobegon stories on “Prairie Home Companion.” I settled deeper into my chair and listened.
“Syracuse wasn’t a direct enemy of the Athenians,” continued the Time Traveler, “but it was quarreling with a local Athenian colony and the democracy of Athens used that as an excuse to launch a major expedition against it. It was a big deal – Athens sent 136 triremes, the best fighting ships in the world then – and landed 5,000 soldiers right under the city’s walls.
“The Athenians had enjoyed so much military success in recent years, including their invasion of Melos, that Thucydides wrote – So thoroughly had the present prosperity persuaded the Athenians that nothing could withstand them, and that they could achieve what was possible and what was impracticable alike, with means ample or inadequate it mattered not. The reason for this was their general extraordinary success, which made them confuse their strengths with their hopes.”
“Oh, hell,” I said, “this is going to be a lecture about Iraq, isn’t it? Look . . . I voted for John Kerry last year and . . .”
“Listen to me,” the Time Traveler said softly. It was not a request. There was steel in that soft, rasping voice. “Nicias, the Athenian general who ended up leading the invasion, warned against it in 415 B.C. He said – ‘We must not disguise from ourselves that we go to found a city among strangers and enemies, and that he who undertakes such an enterprise should be prepared to become master of the country the first day he lands, or failing in this to find everything hostile to him’. Nicias, along with the Athenian poet and general Demosthenes, would see their armies destroyed at Syracuse and then they would both be captured and put to death by the Syracusans. Sparta won big in that two-year debacle for Athens. The war went on for seven more years, but Athens never recovered from that overreaching at Syracuse, and in the end . . . Sparta destroyed it. Conquered the Athenian empire and its allies, destroyed Athens’ democracy, ruined the entire balance of power and Greek hegemony over the known world at the time . . . ruined everything. All because of a miscalculation about Syracuse.”
I sighed. I was sick of Iraq. Everyone was sick of Iraq on New Years Eve, 2005, both Bush supporters and Bush haters. It was just an ugly mess. “They just had an election,” I said. “The Iraqi people. They dipped their fingers in purple ink and . . .”
“Yes yes,” interrupted the Time Traveler as if recalling something further back in time, and much less important, than Athens versus Syracuse. “The free elections. Purple fingers. Democracy in the Mid-East. The Palestinians are voting as well. You will see in the coming year what will become of all that.”
The Time Traveler drank some Scotch, closed his eyes for a second, and said, “Sun Tzu writes – The side that knows when to fight and when not to will take the victory. There are roadways not to be traveled, armies not to be attacked, walled cities not to be assaulted.”
“All right, goddammit,” I said irritably. “Your point’s made. So we shouldn’t have invaded Iraq in this . . . what did you call it? This Long War with Islam, this Century War. We’re all beginning to realize that here by the end of 2005.”
The Time Traveler shook his head. “You’ve understood nothing I’ve said. Nothing. Athens failed in Syracuse – and doomed their democracy – not because they fought in the wrong place and at the wrong time, but because they weren’t ruthless enough. They had grown soft since their slaughter of every combat-age man and boy on the island of Melos, the enslavement of every woman and girl there. The democratic Athenians, in regards to Syracuse, thought that once engaged they could win without absolute commitment to winning, claim victory without being as ruthless and merciless as their Spartan and Syracusan enemies. The Athenians, once defeat loomed, turned against their own generals and political leaders – and their official soothsayers. If General Nicias or Demosthenes had survived their captivity and returned home, the people who sent them off with parades and strewn flower petals in their path would have ripped them limb from limb. They blamed their own leaders like a sun-maddened dog ripping and chewing at its own belly.”
I thought about this. I had no idea what the hell he was saying or how it related to the future.
“You came back in time to lecture me about Thucydides?” I said. “Athens? Syracuse? Sun-Tzu? No offense, Mr. Time Traveler, but who gives a damn?”
The Time Traveler rose so quickly that I flinched back in my chair, but he only refilled his Scotch. This time he refilled my glass as well. “You probably should give a damn” he said softly. “ In 2006, you’ll be ripping and tearing at yourselves so fiercely that your nation – the only one on Earth actually fighting against resurgent caliphate Islam in this long struggle over the very future of civilization – will become so preoccupied with criticizing yourselves and trying to gain short-term political advantage, that you’ll all forget that there’s actually a war for your survival going on. Twenty-five years from now, every man or woman in America who wishes to vote will be required to read Thucydides on this matter. And others as well. And there are tests. If you don’t know some history, you don’t vote . . . much less run for office. America’s vacation from knowing history ends very soon now . . . for you, I mean. And for those few others left alive in the world who are allowed to vote.”
“You’re shitting me,” I said.
“I am shitting you not,” said the Time Traveler.
“Those few others left alive who are allowed to vote?” I said, the words just now striking me like hardthrown stones. “What the hell are you talking about? Has our government taken away all our civil liberties in this awful future of yours?”
He laughed then and this time it was a deep, hearty, truly amused laugh. “Oh, yes,” he said when the laughter abated a bit. He actually wiped away tears from his one good eye. “I had almost forgotten about your fears of your, our . . . civil liberties . . . being abridged by our own government back in these last stupidity-allowed years of 2005 and 2006 and 2007 . Where exactly do you see this repression coming from?”
“Well . . .” I said. I hate it when I start a sentence with ‘well,’ especially in an argument. “Well, the Patriot Act. Bush authorizing spying on Americans . . . international phonecalls and such. Uh . . . I think mosques in the States are under FBI surveillance. I mean, they want to look up what library books we’re reading, for God’s sake. Big Brother. 1984. You know.”
The Time Traveler laughed again, but with more edge this time. “Yes, I know,” he said. “We all know . . . up there in the future which some of you will survive to see as free people. Civil liberties. In 2006 you still fear yourselves and your own institutions first, out of old habit. A not unworthy – if fatally misguided and terminally masochistic – paranoia. I will tell you right now, and this is not a prediction but a history lesson, some of your grandchildren will live in dhimmitude.”
“Zimmi . . . what?” I said.
He spelled it out. What had sounded like a ‘z’ was the ‘dh.’ I’d never heard the word and I told him so.
“Then get off your @#%$ and Google it,” said the Time Traveler, his one working eye glinting with something like fury. “Dhimmitude. You can also look up the word dhimmi, because that’s what two of your three grandchildren will be called. Dhimmis. Dhimmitude is the system of separate and subordinate laws and rules they will live under. Look up the word sharia while you’re Googling dhimmi, because that is the only law they will answer to as dhimmis, the only justice they can hope for . . . they and tens and hundreds of millions more now who are worried in your time about invisible abridgements of their ‘civil liberties’ by their ‘oppressive’ American and European democratically elected governments.”
He audibly sneered this last part. I wondered now if the fury I sensed in him was a result of his madness, or if the reverse were true.
“Where will my grandchildren suffer this dhimmitude?” I asked. My mouth was suddenly so dry I could barely speak.
“Eurabia,” said the Time Traveler.
“There’s no such place,” I said.
He gave me his one-eyed stare. My stomach suddenly lurched and I wished I’d drunk no Scotch. “Words,” I said.
The Time Traveler raised one scar-slashed eyebrow.
“Last year you gave me words about 2005,” I said. “The kind of words Ken Grimwood’s replayers in time would have put in the newspaper to find each other. Give me more now. Or, better yet, just @#%$ tell me what you’re talking about. You said it wouldn’t matter. You said that my knowing won’t change anything, any more than I can change the direction the Mississippi is flowing . So tell me, God damn it!”
He began by giving me words. Even while I was scribbling them down, I was thinking of reading I’d been doing recently about the joy with which the Victorian Englishmen and 19th Century Europeans and Americans greeted the arrival of the 20th Century. The toasts, especially among the intellectual elite, on New Year’s Eve 1899 had been about the coming glories of technology liberating them, of the imminent Second Enlightenment in human understanding, of the certainty of a just one-world government, of the end of war for all time.
Instead, what words would a time traveler or poor Replay victim put in his London Times or Berliner Zeitung or New York Times on January 1, 1900, to find his fellow travelers displaced in time? Auschwitz, I was sure, and Hiroshima and Trinity Site and Holocaust and Hitler and Stalin and . . .
The clock in my study chimed midnight.
Jesus God. Did I want to hear such words about 2006 and the rest of the 21st Century from the Time Traveler?
“Ahmadenijad,” he said softly. “Natanz. Arak. Bushehr. Ishafan. Bonab. Ramsar.”
“Those words don’t mean a damned thing to me,” I said as I scribbled them down phonetically. “Where are they? What are they?”
“You’ll know soon enough,” said the Time Traveler.
“Are you talking about . . . what? . . . the next fifteen or twenty years?” I said.
“I’m talking about the next fifteen or twenty months from your now,” he said softly. “Do you want more words?”
I didn’t. But I couldn’t speak just then.
“General Seyed Reza Pardis,” intoned the Time Traveler. “Shehab-one, Shehab-two, Shehab-three. Tel Aviv. Baghdad International Airport, Al Salem U.S. airbase in Kuwait, Camp Dawhah U.S. Army base in Kuwait, al Seeb U.S. airbase in Oman, al Udeid U.S. Army and Air Force base in Qatar. Haifa. Beir-Shiva. Dimona.”
“Oh, @#%$,” I said. “Oh, Jesus.” I had no clue as to who or what Shehab One, Two, or Three might be, but the context and litany alone made me want to throw up.
“This is just the beginning,” said the Time Traveler.
“Wasn’t the beginning on September 11, 2001?” I managed through numb lips.
The one-eyed scarred man shook his head. “Historians in my time know that it began on June 5, 1968,” he said. “But it hasn’t really begun for you yet. For any of you.”
I thought – What on earth happened on the fifth of June, 1968? I’m old enough to remember. I was in college then. Working that summer and . . . Kennedy. Robert F. Kennedy’s assassination. “Now on to Chicago and the nomination!” Sirhan Sirhan. Was the Time Traveler trying to give me some kind of half-assed Oliver-Stone-JFK-movie garbled up conspiracy theory?
“What . . .” I began.
“Galveston,” interrupted the Time Traveler. “The Space Needle. Bank of America Plaza in Dallas. Renaissance Tower in Dallas. Bank One centre in Dallas. The Indianapolis 500 – one hour and twenty-three minutes into the race. The Bell South Building in Atlanta. The TransAmerica Pyramid in San Francisco . . .”
“Stop,” I said. “Just stop.”
“The Golden Gate Bridge,” persisted the Time Traveler. “The Guggenheim in Bilbao. The New Reichstag in Berlin. Albert Hall. Saint Paul’s Cathedral . . .”
“Shut the @#%$ up!” I shouted. “All these places can’t disappear in the rest of this century, your goddamned Century War or not! I don’t believe it.”
“I didn’t say in the rest of your century,” said the Time Traveler, his torn voice almost a whisper now. “I’m talking about your next fifteen years. And I’ve barely begun.”
“You’re nuts,” I said. “You’re not from the future. You escaped from some asylum.”
The Time Traveler nodded. “That’s more true than you know,” he said. “I come from a place and time where your grandchildren and hundreds of millions of other dhimmi are compelled to write ‘pbuh’ after the Prophet’s name. They wear gold crosses and gold Stars of David sewn onto their clothing. The Nazis didn’t invent the wearing of the Star of David . . . the marking and setting apart of the Jews in society. Muslims did that centuries ago in they lands they conquered, European and otherwise. They will refine it and update it, not toward the more merciful, in the lands they occupy through the decades ahead of you.”
“You’re crazy,” I cried, standing. My hands were balled into fists. “Islam is a religion . . . a religion of peace . . . not our enemy. We can’t be at war with a religion. That’s obscene.”
“Have you read the Qur’an and learned your Sunnah?” asked the Time Traveler. “It would behoove you to do so. Dhimmi means ‘protection.’ And your children and grandchildren will be protected . . . like cattle.”
“To hell with you,” I said.
“Your dhimmi poll tax will be called jizya,” said the Time Traveler. His voice suddenly sounded very weary.“Your land tax for being an infidel, even for fellow People of the Book – Christians and Jews – will be called kharaz. Both of these taxes will be in addition to your mandatory alms – the zakat. The punishment for failure to pay, or for paying late, a punishment meted out by your local qadi, religious judge, is death by stoning or beheading.”
I folded my arms and looked away from the Time Traveler.
“Under sharia – which will be the universal law of Eurabia,” persisted the Time Traveler, “the value of a dhimmi’s life, the value of your grandchildren, is one half the value of a Muslim’s life. Jews and Christians are worth one-third of a Muslim. Indian Parsees are worth one-fifteenth. In a court of the Eurabian Caliphate or the Global Khalifate, if a Muslim murders a dhimmi, any infidel, he must pay a blood money fine not to exceed one thousand euros. No Muslim will ever be jailed or sentenced to death for the murder of any dhimmi or any number of dhimmis. If the murders were done under the auspices of Universal Compulsive Jihad, which will be sanctioned by sharia as of 2019 Common Era, all blood money fines are waived.”
“Go away,” I said. “Go back to wherever you came from.”
“I come from here,” said the Time Traveler. “From not so far from here.”
“@#%$,” I said.
“Your enemies have gathered and struck and continue to strike and you, the innocents of 2006 and beyond, fight among yourselves, chew and rip at your own bellies, blame your brothers and yourselves and your institutions of the Enlightenment – law, tolerance, science, democracy – even while your enemies grow stronger.”
“How are we supposed to know who our enemies are?” I turned and growled at him. “The world is a complex place. Morality is a complex thing.”
“Your enemy is he who will give his life to kill you,” said the Time Traveler. “Your enemies are they that wish you and your children and your grandchildren dead and who are willing to sacrifice themselves, or support those fanatics who will sacrifice themselves, to see you and your institutions destroyed. You haven’t figured that out yet – the majority of you fat, sleeping, smug, infinitely stupid Americans and Europeans.”
He stood and set the Scotch glass back in its place on my sideboard. “How, we wonder in my time,” he said softly, “can you ignore the better part of a billion people who say aloud that they are willing to kill your children . . . or condone and celebrate the killing of them? And ignore them as they act on what they say? We do not understand you.”
I still had not turned to face him, but was looking over my shoulder at him.
“The world, as it turns out,” continued the Time Traveler, “is not nearly so complex a place as your liberal and gentle minds sought to make it.”
I did not respond.
“Thucydides taught us more than twenty-four hundred years ago – counting back from your time – that all men’s behavior is guided by phobos, kerdos, and doxa,” said the Time Traveler. “Fear, self-interest, and honour.”
I pretended I did not hear.
“Plato saw human behavior as a chariot pulled by precisely those three powerful and headstrong horses, first tugged this way, then pulled that way,” continued the Time Traveler. “Phobos, kerdos, doxa. Fear, self-interest, honour. Which of these guides the chariot of your nation and your allies in Europe and your surprisingly fragile civilization now, O Man of 2006?”
I stared at the bookcase instead of the man and willed him gone, wishing him away like a sleepy boy willing away the boogeyman under his bed.
“Which combination of those three traits — phobos, kerdos, doxa — will save or doom your world?” asked the Time Traveler. “Which might bring you back from this vacation from history – from history’s responsibilities and history’s burdens – that you have all so generously gifted yourselves with? You peaceloving Europeans. You civil-liberties loving Americans? You Athenian invertebrates with your love of your own exalted sensibilities and your willingness to enter into a global war for civilizational survival even while you are too timid, too fearful . . . too decent . . . to match the ruthlessness of your enemies.”
I closed my eyes but that did not stop his voice.
“At least understand that such decency goes away quickly when you are burying your children and your grandchildren,” rasped the Time Traveler. “Or watching them suffer in slavery. Ruthlessness deferred against totalitarian aggression only makes the later need for ruthlessness more terrible. Thousands of years of history and war should have taught you that. Did you fools learning nothing from living through the charnel house that was the 20th Century?”
I’d had enough. I opened my eyes, turned, reached into the top left drawer of my desk, and pulled out the .38 revolver that I had owned for twenty-three years and fired only twice, at firing ranges, shortly after it was given to me as a gift.
I aimed it at the Time Traveler. “Get out,” I said.
He showed no reaction. “Do you want more than words?” he asked softly. “I will give you more than words. I give you eight million Jews dead in Israel – incinerated – and many more dead Jews in Eurabia and around the world. I give you the continent of Europe cast back more than five hundred years into sad pools of warring civilizations.”
“Get out,” I repeated, aiming the revolver higher.
“I give you an Asian world in chaos, a Pacific rim ruled by China after the vacuum of America’s withdrawal – this nation’s full resources devoted to fighting, and possibly losing, the Century War – a South America and Mexico lost to corruption and appeasement, a resurgent Russian Empire that has reclaimed its old dominated republics and more, and a Canada split into three hateful nations.”
I cocked the pistol. The click sounded very loud in the small room.
“We were speaking about ruthlessness,” said the Time Traveler. “If you fail to understand it at first, you learn it quickly enough in a war like the one you are allowing to come. Would you like to hear the litany of Islamic shrines and cities that will blossom in nuclear retaliatory fire in the decades to come?”
“Get out,” I said for a final time. “I’m ruthless enough to shoot you, and by God I will if you don’t get out of here.”
The Time Traveler nodded. “As you wish. But you should hear two last words, two last names . . .religious judge Ubar ibn al-Khattab and rector-imam Ismail Nawahda of New Al-Azhar University in London, part of the 200,000-man Golden Mosque of the New Islamic Khalifate in Eurabia.”
“What are those names to me or me to them?” I asked. My finger was on the trigger of the cocked .38.
“These religious officials were on the Islamic Tribunal that sentenced two dhimmis to death by stoning and beheading,” said the Time Traveler. “The dhimmis were your two grandsons, Thomas and Daniel.”
“What was . . . will be . . . their crime?” I was able to ask after a long minute. My tongue felt like a strip of rough cotton.
“They dated two Muslim women – Thomas while he was in London on business, Daniel while visiting his aging mother, your daughter, in Canada – without first converting to Islam. That part of sharia, Islamic law, is called hudud, and we know quite a bit about it in my time. Your grandsons didn’t know the young women were Muslim since they both were dressed in modern garb - -thus violating their own society’s ironclad rule of Hijab — modesty. The girls, I hear, also died, but those were not sharia sentences. Not hudud. Their brothers and fathers murdered them. honour killings . . . I think you’ve already heard the phrase by 2006.”
If I were to shoot him, I had to do it now. My hand was shaking more fiercely every second.
“Of course, the odds against one sharia court in London sentencing both your grandsons to death for crimes committed as far apart as London and Quebec City is too much of a coincidence to believe in,” continued the Time Traveler. “As is the fact that they would both be introduced to Muslim girls, without knowing they were Muslim, and go on a single dinner date with them at the same time, in cities so far apart. And Thomas was married. I know he thought he was having a business dinner with a client.”
“What . . .” I began, my arm holding the pistol shaking as if palsied.
The Time Traveler laughed a final time. “All of your grandsons’ names were on lists. You wrote something . . . will soon write something . . . that will put your name, and all your descendents’ names, on their list. Including your only surviving grandson.”
I opened my mouth but did not speak.
“According to their own writings, which we all know well in my day,” continued the Time Traveler, “ ‘Hadith Malik 511:1588 The last statement that Muhammad made was: “O Lord, perish the Jews and Christians. They made churches of the graves of their prophets. There shall be no two faiths in Arabia.’ And there are not. All infidels – Christians, Jews, secularists — have been executed, converted, or driven out. Israel is cinders. Eurabia and the New Khalifate is growing, absorbing what was left of the old, weak cultures there that once dreamt of a European Union. The Century War is not near over. Two of your three grandsons are now dead. Your remaining grandson still fights, as does one of your surviving granddaughters. Two of your three living granddaughters now live under sharia within the aegis of New Khalifate. They are women of the veil.”
I lowered the pistol.
“ Enjoy these last days and months and years of your slumber, Grandfather,” said the scarred old man. “Your wake-up call is coming soon.”
The Time Traveler said three last words and was gone.
I put the pistol away – realizing too late that it had never been loaded – and sat down to write this. I could not. I waited these three months to try again.
Oh, Lord, I wish that some person on business from Porlock would wake me from this dream.
It was not the horrors of his revelations about my grandchildren that had shaken me the most deeply, shaken me to the core of my core, but rather the the Time Traveler’s last three words. Three words that any Replayer or time traveler visiting here from a century or more from now would react to first and most emotionally – three words I will not share here in this piece nor ever plan to share, at least until everyone on Earth knows them – three words that will keep me awake nights for months and years to come.
Three words......................................
The three words are the campaign slogan of the Democrats for ‘08:
NO MORE WAR.
Those words, chanted as a cheap promise by Americans sick of war, will seal our doom. We’ll elect men and women who refuse to stand against the rising tide of Islamic domination - all in the name of a false peace. Those three words will finalize our abandonment of purpose. It will prove that we Americans have failed to ‘appreciate the persistent, long-term threat posed to our liberties and survival’ by a Movement that envisions a world dominated and defined by an Islamic Caliphate. It will signify that we no longer have the will to stand against an enemy that will ‘fight any war, make any sacrifice, suffer any hardship, and pay any price’ to achieve religious totalitarianism.
NO MORE WAR.
Those three words mean we’ve given up. Therein lies our doom.........
Be afraid ... very afraid.
Tuesday 21 November 2006
The Blair and Brown cash givaway
UK to give $910m for madrassas, poverty
* Total funding will cover the period between UK financial year 2008-09 and 2010-11
Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: Britain will provide financial assistance of $910 million to Pakistan to reduce poverty, reform madrassas and improve the delivery of health and sanitation services and clean water.
The commitment was made under an agreement called the ‘Long Term Development Partnership Arrangement’ signed after one-on-one and delegation level meetings between Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and his British counterpart Tony Blair at Prime Minister’s House.
Under the agreement, the UK Department For International Development (DFID) will provide Pakistan $201 million in the UK financial year 2007-08. The total funding of $910 million will cover the period between UK financial year 2008-09 and financial year 2010-11. Much of the cash will go towards promoting President Gen Musharraf’s policy of “enlightened moderation” in madrassas that have been blamed for radicalising Muslim youths, including visiting Britons. The assistance under the agreement includes financial aid, technical cooperation for capacity development, support through international organisations or civil society organisations and other forms of development assistance.
The agreement aims at helping Pakistan meet the Millennium Development Goals for reducing poverty and strengthening financial management and accountability to reduce the risk of misuse of funds. Aziz later told a press conference the grant from the UK government would help Pakistan achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Blair told a press conference in Lahore that some $38 million would be released immediately to help tackle poverty in Pakistan.
This an additional cost, on top of the £5,000,000,000 ($9,485,702,716) spent on the Iraq war so far, and the £1,000,000,000 ($1,897,302,733) which has been spent on the military situation in Afghanistan.
The funding news came shortly after Blair had said on Al Jazeera television that the invasion of Iraq (which took place on March 19, 2003) had been a "disaster".
David Davies, Tory MP for Monmouth, said of Blair's decision to waste taxpayers money on Pakistani madrassas: "He does not seem to have grasped the fact that these people are not motivated by money. They are motivated by extremist religious ideology."
The Mahdi says......ALLAH has blinded the senses of the infidel leaders, his own people pay the jizya tax and are humiliated on a daily basis.
* Total funding will cover the period between UK financial year 2008-09 and 2010-11
Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: Britain will provide financial assistance of $910 million to Pakistan to reduce poverty, reform madrassas and improve the delivery of health and sanitation services and clean water.
The commitment was made under an agreement called the ‘Long Term Development Partnership Arrangement’ signed after one-on-one and delegation level meetings between Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and his British counterpart Tony Blair at Prime Minister’s House.
Under the agreement, the UK Department For International Development (DFID) will provide Pakistan $201 million in the UK financial year 2007-08. The total funding of $910 million will cover the period between UK financial year 2008-09 and financial year 2010-11. Much of the cash will go towards promoting President Gen Musharraf’s policy of “enlightened moderation” in madrassas that have been blamed for radicalising Muslim youths, including visiting Britons. The assistance under the agreement includes financial aid, technical cooperation for capacity development, support through international organisations or civil society organisations and other forms of development assistance.
The agreement aims at helping Pakistan meet the Millennium Development Goals for reducing poverty and strengthening financial management and accountability to reduce the risk of misuse of funds. Aziz later told a press conference the grant from the UK government would help Pakistan achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Blair told a press conference in Lahore that some $38 million would be released immediately to help tackle poverty in Pakistan.
This an additional cost, on top of the £5,000,000,000 ($9,485,702,716) spent on the Iraq war so far, and the £1,000,000,000 ($1,897,302,733) which has been spent on the military situation in Afghanistan.
The funding news came shortly after Blair had said on Al Jazeera television that the invasion of Iraq (which took place on March 19, 2003) had been a "disaster".
David Davies, Tory MP for Monmouth, said of Blair's decision to waste taxpayers money on Pakistani madrassas: "He does not seem to have grasped the fact that these people are not motivated by money. They are motivated by extremist religious ideology."
The Mahdi says......ALLAH has blinded the senses of the infidel leaders, his own people pay the jizya tax and are humiliated on a daily basis.
Thursday 16 November 2006
Discover islam
This Blog sets out to expose that islam is a political religious ideology that controls all aspects of its followers lives, most people believe that everybody else thinks as they do in regard to values,morals,people in the west have had generations of turn the other cheek and be forgiving to others etc etc, muslims regardless of what they say have had years of islam is superior and must wipe out all other belief structures until only islam remains.what people fail to realise is that its never been separate from islamic law and is as much political as religious and as they believe its Gods word its final, so you can not criticise it or even use logical debate, they will always lie to all unbelievers in fact it is encouraged to do so, islam has two sides one is all peaceful this is the side presented to the west when its weak to fool liberal minded idiots and stupid politicians using abrogated verses from the koran which i agree were peacful until other verses were written to take there place, i am afraid to tell you good people that the clerics preaching KILL THE INFIDELS are the ones following the correct path and teachings of the koran, the so called moderates would rather wait sixty years and just outbreed the indiginous populations of the host countries, bin laden and his father had over one hundred children or soldiers of Allah, The clerics just want to get the job done quicker, there is an islamic timeline in which certain things are supposed to happen call them signs if you will, the moderates just dont believe the time is right until the appropriate sign appears, if you doubt what im saying please try and do some research and prove me wrong, i know what the sign is do you?.
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