The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam

The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam
By Robert Spencer

While I was in an airport traveling from here to there, a destination forgotten, I encountered and Egyptian man who overheard my disgruntled comment on the less than truthful press being blasted over the TV monitor to those waiting for their plane. As we boarded he approached me and said, “my friend I see you are disturbed by the views of your press.” He went on saying “ I am Egyptian and converted from Muslim to Christian, you Americans do not know the whole story of Islam therefore cannot understand the truth.” He recommended this book to me. The following is my review and reaction. I will begin by saying that if you are one to be easily upset by opposing views, this review and the book are not for you. It may be politically incorrect.

I believe the author’s intent was to cause a paradigm shift in the Western readers mind. He strikes an alarm bell as to why one should wake up from a sleepy passive acceptance of a force aimed at ones freedom. Our Western Civilization thrives in a Democracy where elected government and constitutional law prevail. Why do democratic governments not feel threatened by the possibility of actually being subjugated to Sharia Law of Islam? A democracy has the mechanism to institutionalize a separate church and state to a degree the people find acceptable. They secure this with a military that can fend off an invasion of ideals that would oppress their people.

However the political culture Islam proscribes is quite different. In Islam, Sharia Law provides a continuance of Islamic rule and dominance over your free will. The “laws of thought” that serve as the core of this dominance are found written in many places in the Qur’an (Koran). The Hadith (more Islamic documents) interpretations put into law that which is written in the Qu’ran. Why do Muslims insist on Sharia Law? Sharia Law secures a physical disciplinary consequence to those who go against what is written in the Qur’an, thereby providing a legal mechanism of population control that cannot be contested without a fight to the finish.

So you could then respond with the aged old cliché that religion is the root cause of all wars. The paradigm shift nestled in this book is that it is not the religious practices that the West should be concerned but rather the Sharia Law (which really by default is a religious practice) that comes with it. The author sets course on a brief history lesson to put the word Crusades in perspective suitable to allow a paradigm shift to occur. The Crusades: where they religions wars or were they really a fight for individual rights? So lets follow the author’s thinking as he sets the basis for the propagation of Islam and then wraps it in a brief historical review.

Islam’s call to war is quoted over 100 different places in the Qur’an in this book. It is then trumpeted by the modern interpretations taught in four leading schools on Islam where readings from the Hadith and Islam Law books, derivatives of the Koran galvanize a religion founded in war. The Hadith translates the ancient language of the Koran into a context that can be understood today. The book points out that Osama bin Laden’s readings after September 11, were from the Law Books on Islam calling for three options for non-Muslims.
i. Accept Islam (convert)
ii. Pay the jizya, the poll tax on non-Muslims, which is the cornerstone of an entire system of “Dhimmitude” is to humiliate non-Muslims.
iii. War with Muslims

The historical timeline of Islam finds Mohammad warring first with his kin in Arabia and then his successors carried it forward across Northern Africa, Spain and Eastern Europe from 639 through 1100. The Christians began their Crusade Wars, first called for by Pope Urban in the 11th Century and these lasted about 250 years. Yes it is again cliché to indict the Catholic Church for a call to action actions carried out by noble men of realms of the Western World. Not to say that the Church was without it’s own faults, the call for defense of Christianity was championed by noble men, among them from England, Richard the Lionhearted and from France, Godfrey of Bouillon. Not all battles were directly attributed to the Church nor do historians agree upon their descriptions. The Crusade Wars did not result in the colonization of lands or the building of any Empire under the flag of the Catholic Church or any Kingdom’s flag. But rather Muslims were allowed to live freely in the land won back by Christians. This is of course not the case in Muslim territory where Christians were subjected to cruel treatment called Dhimmitude; which for better understanding amongst us modern Westerners could be correlated to Hitler’s treatment of the Jews. The Crusades came to an end when Western Europe became preoccupied with their own battles. The Muslim Turks took advantage of the situation and snatched much of Eastern Europe; we knew that land as the Ottoman Empire until 1918,

The book demonstrates that the Crusades were not a Christian conquest of Islam, but rather they were a series of battles to gain back Europe’s civil rights. And yes it was a brutal fight for freedom. So were our American Revolution and the Civil War. To apologize for this would be like apologizing to Hitler, Genghis Kahn, Sadam Hussein, Milosovich or any other brutal person who led the abuse and oppression of a society. The book indirectly poses this question: if I were put in a position to apologize, would I rather make an apology to this list of men than find myself apologizing to my children and family around me for not standing up to or waking up to the realities of disparate ideologies that could by design deny you the freedoms of choice.

So: to apply the lessons of the past to the modern world, why should the Western World be on guard against Islam? Sharia Law as it is levied by the authority of Mohammed and administered by the practitioners of the Islamic faith.
a. Islam is a religion of war. The Qur’an is a book of war, if a warrior wrote the Qur’an it is likely that his words promote dominance by force. The books sites many verse from the Qur’an as evidence to the affirmative.
b. Mohammad is a Prophet of War, Islam was spread by the sword right from the very beginning.
c. Islam promotes one to lie, steal, and kill. The Qur’an preaches a peaceful society amongst Muslims, but promotes jihad using and tactic of deceit to not just vanquish “non-believers but to mutilate them.” I write this reaction to make a point also made in the book where the Koran is clear that according to their Allah when a Muslim engages in war they don’t just kill their foe, but to mutilate them and parade them around in order to humiliate them. We saw this in Mogadishu and we are now seeing it in Iraq. This is what we in the West should have been prepared for. (example: the female aid worker who’s naked torso (minus limbs and head) was thrown into the street in Iraq)
d. Islam oppresses women
e. Islam is anti-Science
f. Islamic Unity, today’s jihads are orchestrated to return the world to Islamic rule much like the 700+ years they experienced from 600 to 1400

In the face of these realities Islamophobia has become a real word with ominous consequence. As I read the pages of this book and reflected back to the news clips where the visual was always the shot of bin Laden shooting an automatic weapon and the audio was a brief sound byte of a declaration of war on America. It seems the news glossed over the importance of those words and have since buried them. I say this because this book makes it two things clear: first, Islam’s doctrine is to wage war against non-Muslims and that means this doctrine could come from any country that stands fanatically behind the Koran. Second, unlike most Westerners (who are not well-studied on Islam), Muslims are well studied on the West as they view us through their Koran-based paradigm.

The most critical path we are on regarding Islamophobia; the author sites cases now in Western Courts putting freedom of speech is at risk. There are cases abroad where people who have spoken against Islam were tried and convicted for “hate crimes”. This is contrary to Muslim activity where they are allowed to “spin” terrorist activity to find justification. It is also contrary to Muslim activity were they can publicly assemble and shout words in affirmation to the likes of Osama bin Laden as was the case in Dearborn Michigan. Yes, our reaction to the human bombs against innocent people or the hanging of soldiers could always begin with shock of the morbid brutality of their actions. But then the educated mind would react to this not with a call to decease; but rational call to vanquish such hostile behavior. And to be clear I am not promoting killing, I am promoting the abolition of the behavior. When I contrast Abu Garab to the burning and hanging of Americans from a bridge, I peel back to the next layer of the onion to the people’s reaction. Our Christian dominated West reacted with apology and corrective action. The Muslims paraded in the streets. We should expect more of the same from them. And to the next layer this book goes against everything that is politically correct and brings out a comparative analysis of the teachings of each faith to explain why.

The author provides a solution that is spread across our government, the press, and we the people. The government must draw a harder line with other governments who promote Sharia Law, and the oppression of human rights. The author writes “If any moderate Islam project were to succeed, it will do so only by identifying elements in Islam that give rise to violence…” I would start with countries that allow madrassas and terrorist training camps. The press must start telling the whole truth as opposed to reporting only facts that support their views. We the people need to bone up on exactly what this “war on terror” is all about. The author writes, “This is not a war on terror. Terror is a tactic not an opponent. To wage a war on terror is like waging a war on bombs. Refusal to identify the enemy is extremely dangerous: It leaves those who refuse vulnerable to being blind sided.” The enemy is the teaching of Islam. Yes, “fundamentalist” are said to have hijacked a faith. But Islam is a faith where its origin and continued practice is in war. Rather than wage a war on weapons of mass destruction would “we the people” have allowed our current president, actually say it is good enough to wage a war on those countries that hold and promote the ideals of fundamental Islam. Presidents Wilson and Roosevelt could not take the country to war on ideals, so what makes Bush any different. The answer is magically “NO; because that would be intermixing church and state and using our military to do so. Only Lincoln was allowed to wage a war on disparate ideals. But could we rather wage a war on those that promote the ideals of Islam and the subsequent Sharia Law…”we the people” would have to first become as educated about our enemy as they are of us. We would have to learn how to separate Islam from Sharia Law and War.

This war we are currently engaged in that began when? …in 2003, 2001, 1991, 1967, 1943, 1400, it is a war that Mohammad began on the deserts between Mecca and Medina against his own people who at the time were non-Muslims. That conquest left much of Europe in the hands of Muslims, exposed to the brutal consequence of Sharia law. I have been to “Chop-Chop Square” as Westerners call it In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and yes they still have public stoning and the like. What is driven home in this book is that Islamic way of life well rooted in the bedrock of the Koran and is beyond belief and faith. It is a real call to war against anyone, Muslim or non-Muslim not practicing the words of the Koran

The author’s basic tenant is that the Qur’an and its complimentary Hadith are at the root of much of the dysfunctional social outcomes of Islam. One who is not familiar with these characteristics may find the book to be a militant call to arms. Given that the author dedicates only 270 pages to his two themes, combined with his casual vernacular, makes it a target for criticism. And as such you could say he has fueled the flames of a 1400-year conflict. However, first there is 1400 years of history leaving a trail that while Islamic society may give ground to individual freedom for periods of time, there comes a point that they violently snap back. Second, the doctrine of Islam is destructive to its own well-being. Third, it is Islamic doctrine that Muslims must dominate the world through any means.

Could it have been possible for President Bush or any American President to say in 2001 that this war is not a war on terror but a war on Islamic fundamentalist? Albeit the case, for political correctness he had to spin his call to war on the “Terrorists” “of any ilk” and then on Iraq (one of such ilk) with an eminent threat called weapons of mass destruction. He could have gone in a different direction when he said “you are either with us or your are against us”. That is where he (and we the people) went wrong. However, would history then put Bush along side Pope Urban as starting a religious war that has been in fact on-going, when all he was doing was proactively defending freedom. The author does leave you with a call to action. First, he is prodding you to wake up to reality. Second, whatever we do to defend ourselves, know what we are defending; our free(d) will.

Related web sites:
http://jihadwatch.org/
http://answering-islam.org.uk/
http://answering-islam.org.uk/Authors/Arlandson/top_ten_shar
ia.htm

Islamic Imperialism

Islamic Imperialism
By Efram Karsh

I picked this book up in a lending library of the Unity Church in the people’s republic of Boulder. How a book from such a controversial author found its way there is beyond me. This book makes it very clear that our struggle is not about religious conflicts, but about the imperialist desires of the caliphate rulers of Muslim faith beginning with Muhammad. The author introduces his thesis with the following quotes:
· “ I was ordered to fight all men until they say “There is no god but Allah””
o Prophet Muhammad’s farewell address, March 632
· “ I shall cross the sea to their island to pursue them until there remains no one on the face of the earth who does not acknowledge Allah”
o Saladin, January 1189
· “We will export our revolution through out the world...until the calls there is no God but Allah and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah” are echoed all over the world.”
o Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini, 1979
· “I was ordered to fight the people until they say there is no God but Allah, and his prophet Muhammad,
o Osama bin Laden, November 2001

Karsh then describes the backdrop history to color in the events those statements spawned. Within the fine brush strokes of this history you discover that Islam has been warring more amongst themselves than they have with infidels. They often found alliances with infidels convenient in their quests to rule their own Muslim world. Case in point; both Iran and Iraq went to the United States to supply their war with each other. This was very common during the crusades. The history is full of egregious Islamic deception rooted in a selfish quest for power.

I have read many books on the diplomacy surrounding war and in particular Islamic rationale for war with the West. They are consistent with Muhammad in his farewell address on the surface. However underneath there is a selfish quest for power on the part of a Caliph gone mad. What this book does is clearly demonstrates that the calls to Allah are mere rhetorical diversions to their real ambitions. Karsh labels it imperialism. A topic of world history in most cases and unfortunately continues as news in our newspapers today.

Karsh concludes with a call for Islam’s recognition of the concepts of nation states as a recognition of an everlasting fate-accompli, within their own world as well as their outside world. While Karsh makes this call he misses the errors made by the World Powers of the time in 1919 who did not draw up the boarders of the many small Islamic states that actually existed in the form of a millet system within the umma. Each region would be ruled by a caliph, imam or some voice of Allah, in competition akin to a survival of the fittest Muslim drama. This persisted up through and under the theme of Ottoman suzerainty and for the first in time in 1919 since the 800’s, Islam was not considered a power of any sort. He briefly suggest that on a larger scale beyond the Middle East Muslims favor democratic process found in republic states, as an example that his call has proven itself successful elsewhere. Interestingly, in those regions there is not the same degree of an overwelming thirst for power from Islamic origin

To sum up Karsh’s message he characterizes the plight that Nasser took Egypt through in 20th century. It represents the character of every Muslim Imperialist described not only in this book, but many others I have read. It goes as follows:

“that an idolized person had appeared who wanted his will to have, throughout the Arab countries, a degree of holiness, greatness and power which not even God’s prophets possessed… He ha made us feel every possible means that in Egypt and even the whole Arab world there could be only found one intelligence, one single power that could be relied on; the only thing ahead would be ruin. Thus was Fascism, Hitlerism, and Nasserism; all of them stand on a single base, which is elimination of minds and wills other than the minds of the leader.”

I am going to leave it there. I cannot improve on that. I equally do not have a solution. As current events unfold, there is an imperialism syndrome in the world today. There is a lot of jockeying and positioning for what I see as an eminent WWIII, or otherwise put the Crimean war, “take four”. Islam poses more of an immediate threat to both Russia, and China. Yet, they are happy to let the worlds leading power take it on the chin on their behalf and then rub salt in the wound. If it were not the United States it would simply be a different country taking the brunt of conflict, as history has shown.

In the past the quest for power seems to have had no protagonist other than a thurst for power. There is a sense of scarcity, which is only now blamed on oil, which drives a need for dominion that perpetuates imperial thinking as our Western world has equally demonstrated. As folks look to blame our current administration for not winning the peace, I struggle to find where any one else has ever done that. Wilson had it right in ideals, but he and the rest of the world failed to figure how to execute upon them.

To take a spin off of the authors assertion “A prominent Muslim Brother, Qutb, held lofty ideals about the original years of pure Islam (622-61). He described the degeneration in Islam’s direction. But he like too many of his predecessors, beginning with Mohammad, translated his interpretation of man’s jahiliya into a jihad. To be fair Qutb viewed jahiliya, man ruling man in ignorance or absence of God consciousness, to exist both within Islam and beyond.” History's big picture shows he is right. We continue to recognize the problem, but our response is wrong. If we are on a path for peace (big IF) we seem to keep getting in our own way.



Foot notes from my reading

Islamic Imperialism

Fatimin clan gave Islam its first real imperial presence

P 70 It seems little known how strong the Islamic foot hold was in Rome (Italy) in the years just prior to the crusades

p69 With Islamic power and position between far east and Europe in conjunction with Jews excluded from farming they evolved as the worlds businessmen. The crusades recognized this and began their Diaspora. This rote was taken over by Italian cities of Venice and Amalfi

p. 75-76 The Crusades must be viewed as a two-sided war with two divided factions. With Christians their was a schism between Rome and Constantinople. With Islam there was a schism between Shiites and Sunni.

p.79 Both sides of the Crusade wars were utterly convinced of the superiority of their religion. But their actions were guided by far more earthly combination of territorial and material ambitions.

p.96 Tsarina Catherine’s aspirations to wipe out the Ottoman Empire were thwarted by the rise and threat of Napoleon

p. 107 The Ottoman were courted by both sides at the beginning of WWI. They chose Germany as a way to expand Islam into Russia. A decision made in both fear of Russia and conquest of Asia, which became the U. S.S.R.

p. 119-123 It is interesting to read that Iran learned to despise Russia and England as early 1700. At that time the Orient was at a crossroad. Russia wanted the Black Sea. England needed Iran as a buffer. The battle for the Middle East made rivals of England and Russia. As Napoleon had aspirations on India, France allied with Russia.

What is intriguing here is Britain’s Imperial aspirations in the region. Other than defense of India, only an Empire on an uncherished land was in the offering. Russia on the other hand did have material cause in the 1800's

The Arab Caesar, Egyptian President Nasser, abducted power by converting from castigating Arabs to revering a pan Arab UAR. While oil may have had a part in his motives, and expelling the Imperial British who sponsored Israel, the author makes it quite clear that Nasser had one self serving interest for power.

In this same chapter the author makes it real clear that their is no Muslim unity. He has painted a landscape of a millennium of internal Islamic power plays holding out that Nasser is just one more.

p. 178 While Hakims quote on the previous page represents a history of power mongering, all worth quoting, Hakim states: What made Nasser's blunders more galling, was his total hostility to the idea of accountability.

p. 183 To further illustrate a Muslim empire agenda, cloaked in Muslim anti-Semitic posturing, Saddam extorted Kuwait for its oil until it could not comply. Then he simply invaded.

p 184 Today empire builders of Muslim decent wrap themselves around anti Israel sentiment to gain a pan Arab favor. This backfired for Iraq which took the Palestinian allies down with them. Arabs saw Palestine as a trader. But It was Israel who threw the PLO, a bankrupt organization, a lifeline

215-216 A Muslim brother Qutb held lofty ideals about the original years of pure Islam (622-61). He described the degeneration in Islam’s direction. But he like too many of his predecessors, beginning with Mohammad, translated his interpretation of man (jahiliya) into a jihad.

To be fair Qutb viewed jahiliya, man ruling man in ignorance or absence of God consciousness, to exist both within Islam and beyond. History's big picture shows he is right.