Sunday 29 March 2009

The MCB And Our Buddies Iqbal and Inayat

Sacranie smooth

Earlier this week, the government suspended ties with the Muslim Council of Britain after the MCB refused to condemn their deputy secretary general Daud Abdullah for signing a public declaration in support of Hamas.

The MCB has always been close to controversy.

Former secretary general Iqbal Sacranie has expressed admiration for both the jihadist group Hizb-ut Tahrir, which calls for a restoration of the caliphate and the implementation of Islamic law around the world, and Hamas co-founder Sheik Ahmad Yassin, referring to the latter as a "renowned Islamic scholar" and a "freedom fighter". He is also on record as saying, following the Salman Rushie affair of 1989, "Death, perhaps, is a bit too easy for him; his mind must be tormented for the rest of his life unless he asks for forgiveness to Almighty Allah."

Sacranie is also, along with MCB media secretary Inayat Bunglawala, a self-professed admirer of the noted Muslim thinker Sayyid Abul A'la Maududi (d.1979), who founded Jamaat-e-Islami, a group that is still working today in Pakistan and Bangladesh to make those countries into Islamic states, and explicitly rejects Western-style democracy. To read some of the "admirable" teachings of Maududi, see here.

Talking of Bunglawala, see the video below (at around the 3:30 mark) and witness him flat-out refusing to condemn hate-filled Saudi Wahhabi books, and even defending their right to be sold at British mosques.



The British government was right to sever links with this dubious "moderate" mainstream Muslim group. We may thank ourselves lucky that our country's Muslims aren't represented by such an odious organisation as the Council on American-Islamic Relations, but even so, it would be irresponsible to grant the MCB, which has failed to demonstrate adequately that it is committed to British values and opposition to jihadist ideology, any access to positions of power and influence in this country.

Thursday 26 March 2009

How Honest Are You Feeling?

Recently in Algeria, they celebrated a "national week of the Holy Koran". The week's schedule, promoted by the Algerian minister of religion, included conferences on the various aspects of the life of Muhammad, and a competition for the reading of Islam's sacred text.

I wonder, did they read these verses from the "sacred" text?

2:191-193 – “And slay them wherever ye find them, and drive them out of the places whence they drove you out, for persecution is worse than slaughter. And fight not with them at the Inviolable Place of Worship until they first attack you there, but if they attack you (there) then slay them. Such is the reward of disbelievers...And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is for Allah.”

4:95 – “Not equal are those believers who sit (at home) and receive no hurt, and those who strive and fight in the cause of Allah with their goods and their persons. Allah hath granted a grade higher to those who strive and fight with their goods and persons than to those who sit (at home). Unto all (in Faith) Hath Allah promised good: But those who strive and fight Hath He distinguished above those who sit (at home) by a special reward.”

8:39 – “And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is all for Allah.”

9:5 – “Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them (captive), and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush. But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then leave their way free. Lo! Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.”

9:29 – “Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book [Jews and Christians], until they pay the Jizya [non-Muslim poll tax] with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.”

9:111
– “Allah hath purchased of the believers their persons and their goods; for theirs (in return) is the garden (of Paradise): they fight in His cause, and slay and are slain: a promise binding on Him in truth...”

As for the celebration of "various aspects" of Muhammad's life, did they celebrate the massacre of up to 900 men of the Banu Qurayza, which he oversaw; or the attack on the innocent Jewish farmers of Khaybar; or the assassinations of Ka'b bin al-Ashraf and Asma bint Marwan; or any number of other atrocities and war crimes attributed to the "Prophet" by his own most esteemed biographers?

I suppose it depends on how honest they were feeling.

Tuesday 24 March 2009

The Armenian Genocide and Dreams of Sharia

It is my belief that one of the chief reasons for the complete indifference of many people to the possibility of the Islamisation of our societies is a major lack of understanding about what it means for a state to be Islamic - that is, to be governed by sharia law. "So what if some country starts governing according to sharia?" is the general attitude among many. "Isn't that their right? And how bad is it, really? Would life really change all that much?"

The best way to answer such a question is to look at the application of sharia in the past, and see whether it worked out well or not. That's what I'm going to do in this article - and I'm not even going to go that far back in history to do it.

The Armenian genocide consisted of two major massacres: first that of 1894-96, and second that of 1915. To this day the Turkish government denies that this ever happened, but even in saner places surprisingly little is known about the motivations behind this tragic historical reality.

Under the Muslim Ottoman Empire, the Christians of Armenia lived as a servile subject people called dhimmis. Subject to Ottoman control, they were allowed to practise their own religion, but only under a series of oppressive conditions that denied them basic freedoms and human rights (conditions which, incidentally, were not unique to the Ottoman Empire, but have been witnessed in all great Muslim dynasties throughout history). Some of these conditions were: forced payment of a special tax called the jizya, which only non-Muslims had to pay and which was often collected in a deliberately humiliating manner; denial of the right to bear arms and to give legal testimony in Muslim courts; and strictly enforced dress codes.

(It must be pointed out that all of these regulations are consistent with orthodox Islamic law regarding dhimmis, but this is something I plan to elaborate on further at another time.)

These discriminatory conditions were enforced consistently throughout the Ottoman period of rule. Even the Tanzimat “reforms” (1839-1856), which were initiated after intense European pressure on the Ottoman Empire to improve the treatment of its non-Muslim populations, failed to rectify or end this institutionalised discrimination.

The turning point came when the oppressed Armenian dhimmis began appealing to European powers for help. At this point, the Ottomans (once again consistent with sharia law) began to see such defiance as a betrayal of the Armenians' agreement of "protection", which made them licit for extermination by jihad. Speaking of the 1894-96 massacres, the Chief Dragoman (Turkish-speaking interpreter) of the British embassy reported:

“[The perpetrators] are guided in their general action by the prescriptions of the Sharia Law. That law prescribes that if the 'rayah' [dhimmi] Christian attempts, by having recourse to foreign powers, to overstep the limits of privileges allowed them by their Muslim masters, and free themselves from their bondage, their lives and property are to be forfeited, and are at the mercy of the Muslims. To the Turkish mind the Armenians had tried to overstep those limits by appealing to foreign powers, especially England. They therefore considered it their religious duty and a righteous thing to destroy and seize the lives and properties of the Armenians.”

The religious motivations for the massacres are well attested to. Eyewitness accounts from the era describe Muslims (not just government officials but ordinary Muslims, as well) attacking innocent Armenians on the streets and in their homes and churches, while chanting "Allahu Akbar" and "Believe in Muhammad and deny your religion". Around one and a half million Armenians are estimated to have been killed.

The Armenian genocide is also notable for having served as inspiration for Adolf Hitler prior to the Holocaust. During a 1939 speech in preparation for the invasion of Poland, he made an explicit reference to the genocide, saying, “Who after all is today speaking of the destruction of the Armenians?” Hitler justified their annihilation and stated that the world's consignment of this tragedy to the dustbin of forgotten history was only natural, because “[t]he world believes only in success.”

In the Armenian genocide, we have a striking case study of what can happen - and what has happened, throughout history - when sharia law is enforced by Muslim governments. This alone is reason enough to oppose the application of sharia anywhere in the world.

The final question is: how likely is it that this brutal totalitarian system will return in force one day? Some alarming facts suggest that if the Muslim popular will is anything to go by, it might happen sooner than we would like. Recent polling data suggests that around 80% of Muslims in Egypt and Pakistan desire a strict enforcement of sharia in Islamic countries. And even in this country (the UK), some 40% of Muslims have openly admitted that they would like to see our legal system replaced with sharia.

Such results should greatly alarm us, for they demonstrate that while only a minority of Muslims agree with the terrorist tactics of al-Qaeda, a significantly larger proportion - maybe even a majority in some areas - approve of al-Qaeda's ultimate goals: the implementation of sharia and the re-creation of a global Islamic state, or Caliphate.

We have seen what sharia can do. That's why it is so important to understand the threat that it - and the widespread Muslim support for it - poses to Western societal values.

Monday 23 March 2009

Why This Blog Exists

The purpose of this blog is to provide a politically incorrect analysis of the role of the religion of Islam in current affairs. In particular, I aim to raise awareness of how Islamic theology and law itself - not just the radical "misinterpretations" of a few "radicals" - are increasingly driving believing Muslims to commit acts of violence against non-Muslims (or fellow Muslims who are considered insufficiently faithful). This violence goes under the general label of jihad.

In the modern age,when the liberal mainstream media has succeeded in shutting down all open discussion of Islam's role in current world conflicts, and of the mainstream Islamic teachings that motivate such violence, an analysis that looks squarely at the truth is more vital than ever. If we wish to end the violence being committed in the name of Islam, and prevent the Islamisation of the West at the hands of a rapacious jihadist movement that will stop at nothing to implement Islamic sharia law globally, we must understand the ways in which Islam motivates acts of violence. Without such an understanding, the West can and will fall to Islamic totalitarianism. For those in doubt, the record of Islam in history demonstrates that even the mightiest empire can fall to Islamic jihad, in all its forms.

Another purpose of this blog is to chronicle the ways in which Islamic teachings lead to the large-scale oppression of religious minorities in Muslim countries. Inspired by Qur'anic injunctions that decree the eternal inferiority of unbelievers compared to Muslims; Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Zoroastrians and atheists face varying degrees of persecution in all Islamic countries - even here in the West, where Muslims make up the minority.

I will also examine the totalitarianism that is sharia, in all its unpleasant glory. Sharia is a fascist political system that denies freedom of conscience and speech, as well as freedom of religion. Although sharia is not fully in force anywhere in the world today (Saudi Arabia, Iran and Sudan practice nearly-complete forms of it), its effects can still be felt, and this blog will explore those effects.

Finally, I will draw attention to the inherent misogyny of Islam, which has brought, and is still bringing, suffering to millions of women throughout the Islamic world and among Muslim communities here in the West.

This blog will be semi-regular; I will try to update it at least a few times a week, with analysis of current news stories as well as original articles exploring various aspects of Islam. It should be noted in advance that the following are NOT positions that I hold:

- Hatred of all Muslims or belief that all Muslims are terrorists
- Deporting all Muslims from Western countries
- Nuking Muslim holy sites
- Pre-judging individual Musims based on the contents of their holy book or the actions of their co-religionists.

And so on. You should be able to figure out the rest. This is NOT a racist blog (Islam is not even a race), and I oppose bigotry of all kinds (which is why I oppose the jihad ideology that is central to orthodox Islam).

I hope visitors will learn something from my posts, and I look forward to seeing new faces of all kinds and creeds joining the resistance against the jihad ideology.

As-Salamu 'Alaykum
Ben