Apologise For What?

There are many things that David Cameron should apologise for, but stating the obvious about Pakistan's support for the Taliban is not one of them.

In fact, Cameron dramatically understates the case against the jihadist state. The evidence of Pakistan's double game is so overwhelming that it is impossible to discuss it in full in a single blog post, but here are a few recent examples:

- A study by Matt Waldman, a Harvard researcher whose research is published by the London School of Economics, suggests that President Asif Ali Zardari made a secret visit to Taliban prisoners in a Pakistani prison to arrange their release earlier this year. "Reportedly, he told them they were arrested because he was under a lot of pressure from the Americans and that, 'you are our people, we are friends, and after your release we will of course support you to do your operations.'"

- Furthermore, "up to seven of the 15-man war council (shura) of the Taliban are said to be Pakistani intelligence agents."

- Prior to his death at the hands of the Americans last year, Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud was able to evade capture for a long time because he had friends in Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency, according to a Newsweek report.

- A special report in the New York Times in 2008 highlighted the support for the Taliban among Pakistani intelligence. Particularly revealing of the double game - that is, telling the Americans one thing and then doing the opposite - is this extract from an interview with a Taliban leader who was being completely ignored, apparently deliberately, by Pakistani law enforcement that claimed to oppose him:

So here was Namdar — Taliban chieftain, enforcer of Islamic law, usurper of the Pakistani government and trainer and facilitator of suicide bombers in Afghanistan — sitting at home, not three miles from Peshawar, untouched by the Pakistani military operation that was supposedly unfolding around us.

What’s going on? I asked the warlord. Why aren’t they coming for you?

“I cannot lie to you,” Namdar said, smiling at last. “The army comes in, and they fire at empty buildings. It is a drama — it is just to entertain.”

Entertain whom? I asked.

“America,” he said.

Dave The Turkey

And I thought allying with Nick Clegg was bad enough...

David Cameron today accused critics of Turkey’s membership of the EU of playing on fears of Islam - as he pledged to ‘pave the road from Ankara to Brussels’.

In a speech in the Turkish capital the Prime Minister promised to ‘fight’ to help the Islamic state achieve its 50-year goal of EU membership. He said that, by embracing the "moderate" Muslim nation, the EU can improve relations with the rest of the Islamic world. And he hit out at those who "wilfully misunderstand Islam" in order to oppose Turkey’s membership.

Dumb Dave says that such critics "see no difference between real Islam and the distorted version of the extremists." What he ignores, however, is that neither does his new mate, Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has said: "These descriptions are very ugly, it is offensive and an insult to our religion. There is no moderate or immoderate Islam. Islam is Islam and that’s it.”

‘They think the values of Islam can never be compatible with the values of other religions, societies or cultures," Dave adds. What he ignores is that neither does Erdogan, who has called the assimilation of Muslims into European societies a "crime against humanity".

The Prime Muppet - ahem...Minister - adduces in support of his backing of Turkish integration the country's "moderating influence in the Middle East". What he ignores is that Erdogan's ruling AKP party was directly involved in the sending of the warmongering hate flotilla that attempted to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza in May.

Cameron ignores many other things as well, including:

- Erdogan's antisemitism, and the general preponderance of Jew-hatred throughout the mainstream Turkish media, which I discussed here.

- Erdogan's denial of the Armenian genocide, and his threats to expel 100,000 Armenians from Turkey if the massacre is officially recognised

- Erdogan's statement in 1998, before he became Prime Minister, that "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers", which earned him a spell in prison for inciting religious hatred.

- The fact that Mein Kampf is a bestseller in Turkey

- The ongoing presecution of Christians in Turkey, sanctioned or at least ignored by Erdogan's government.

It seems that Call Me Dave is guilty of a bit of his own "willful misunderstanding" of the situation in Turkey, as he presses to have this monstrous Muslim nation and its odious leaders admitted further into the folds of Europe, where it would incubate like a cancer.

And, lest we forget, Cameron claims to be a Conservative (albeit a liberal one).

"No" To The Ground Zero Mosque

Protesters against the Ground Zero Mosque

In this article at the NY Post, "Behind the Mosque: Extremism at Ground Zero", explaining why we must say no to the Ground Zero mosque project, Andrew Bostom examines the jihadist connections of the man behind the controversy, Faisal Abdul Rauf. He also makes an important historical analogy which encapsulates the absurdity of even contemplating the building's construction on this sacred ground:

Wahhabism -- whether in the form promoted by Saudi money around the globe, or in the more openly nihilist brand embraced by terrorists -- is a totalitarian ideology comparable to Nazism or, closer still, the "state Shintoism" of imperial Japan. We would never have allowed a Shinto shrine at the site of the Pearl Harbor carnage -- especially one to serve as a recruiting station for Tokyo's militarists while World War II was still on.

Getting Off The (Dhimmitude) Bus

Two Muslim women have claimed they were refused a bus ride because one had her face covered by a veil.

The students, both 22 and from Slough, Berkshire, boarded a Metroline bus from Russell Square to Paddington, London. But they said when they presented their tickets on Tuesday, the driver told them they were a "threat" to passengers and ordered them off the bus.

Now obviously, two people sitting on public transport hiding their faces and unable to be identified, and also wearing the same garb previously used by many to disguise themselves while committing acts of terrorism, can quite reasonably be considered a threat to the public until further investigation is conducted. The media, and the Muslim Council of Britain, will try to tell you that thinking this constitutes "bigotry". Do not buy it.

One of the women, "Yasmin", says: "I realised it wasn't due to me getting on the bus, this may be a racist attack." In actual fact, it is unlikely that the bus driver could even see what race she was through the black sack, but in any case, the Islamic veil is not racial garb, and so can be opposed by anybody of any race.

The other woman, "Atoofa", said that she "hoped the driver would be educated about why women wear the traditional Islamic dress". This is somewhat amusing given that many Muslims tell us that the full veil is actually not an Islamic requirement at all, and that anyone who says otherwise is an Islamophobe. Therefore, if we're being consistent here (which is admittedly not something Muslims excel at), Atoofa's calls to educate the bus driver about "why women wear the traditional Islamic dress" - which must necessarily involve discussing the theological justification for the veil - are a manifestation of Islamophobia, and thus a source of "deep concern" to the Muslim Council of Britain.

And speaking of the MCB, they say: "Such incidents are sadly becoming more common. They have been fuelled against the climate of increasing anti-Muslim rhetoric and hostility, in particular on the part of sensationalised stories by the media, demonising Muslims in the eyes of the wider public."

As I wrote here a while ago, Muslims have been conditioned by their own holy book to believe that everyone hates them. The MCB's fantasies here, despite the tolerance the British people have actually shown towards Islam in the face of the relentless hostility it shows to us all the time, are indicative of this trend. The idea that Muslims themselves have any responsibility to regain the trust of non-Muslims doesn't enter their heads, and nor will it ever.

Anyway, I must congratulate the bus driver on his courage in this case, and I hope others follow his example. And by the way, who ever heard of Muslims doing anything dangerous on public transport?

The "Oh Really?" Factor

O'Reilly: He looks as dopey as he is

At Front Page today, Jamie Glazov brilliantly skewers the increasing liberalisation and dhimmitude of "conservative" American news pundit Bill O'Reilly.

A recent edition of his "O'Reilly Factor" show on Fox News, discussing the French burqa ban (video at the link above), has Billy Bumpkin making a disparaging reference to “the Western eye” to imply that forced veiling is only oppressive through our Western lens - as though there is no universal standard of human rights. Priding himself on being for “tolerance” and, therefore, for being in favor of allowing Muslim women to veil, he affirms that “most” Muslim women want to veil themselves.

Glazov observes:

First and foremost, stating that “most” people favor something in an environment where verbalized dissent or oppositional action is viciously punished is meaningless. In other words, to say that “most” Cubans support Castro or that “most” North Koreans support Kim Jong Il, when anti-regime thoughts and acts will, in these circumstances, get a Cuban or North Korean imprisoned, tortured or killed, is disingenuous and erroneous to the extreme."

He quotes the courageous Syrian-born Islamic apostate Wafa Sultan:

In 2005, I traveled to Syria with my American friend. We visited a small Syrian island (Erwad). My friend noticed that the majority of women in that place were head covered. I asked our tour guide to explain the reasoning behind it. I asked: “Are ALL women on this island covered? Without any hesitation he responded: “Yes, they are ALL covered except for a few whores.”

Glazov highlights the significance of this statement, and the attitudes it represents:

In other words, even in situations where you think it might be a Muslim woman’s decision to wear the veil, the bottom line is that it’s not her “choice.” When you make a decision, it does not necessarily mean your society has allowed you to freely choose what you chose.

Be sure to read the whole magnificent rebuttal to O'Reilly's pathetic nonsense.

There are other reasons, however - aside from the fact that the veil is a symbol of misogynistic oppression that does not belong in any civilised society - why the French burqa ban was the right thing to do, and why its example should be followed in Britain and everywhere else in the Western world. To name just a few:

- A ban would eliminate problems of identification, which are regularly exploited by terrorists and criminals, who use the burqa to disguise themselves and bypass security measures that are so often lifted for veiled Muslim women - and men.

- A ban would alleviate communication problems.

- A ban would prevent women from physically harming themselves and their children through lack of exposure to sunlight.

- A ban would go one step (although admittedly nowhere near the whole hog) towards preventing Muslims from deliberately isolating themselves from the Western societies they live in, and thus creating tension, division and mistrust. As former Apprentice contestant Saira Khan, a Muslim herself, has pointed out:

The veil restricts women. It stops them achieving their full potential in all areas of their life, and it stops them communicating. It sends out a clear message: 'I do not want to be part of your society.'

It is, as the saying goes, a "no-brainer". Except that Bill O'Reilly has no brain, and even he hasn't managed to grasp the significance of these facts yet - if he ever will.

"I Consider Myself A Muslim Soldier"

"Jihad is an obligation and duty in Islam on every Muslim." ~ Faisal Shahzad

Take a look at this video posted at the BBC, of failed New York bomber Faisal Shahzad's martyrdom video. Note the extensive Islamic religious character of this terrorist's appeal.

The BBC naturally focuses on Shahzad's claims that his attempt to detonate a bomb in Times Square this past May was motivated by a desire to "avenge" the killing of Muslim leaders in Iraq and Afghanistan. But even Auntie - suffering with cataracts in her old age that inhibit her from seeing Islam as the danger that it is - doesn't leave out what comes next:

"Islam will spread on the whole world and democracy will be defeated... and the world of Allah will be supreme."

There you go. These attacks aren't JUST revenge for the killing of Muslims in the Middle East. That means we CAN'T stop the violence by making concessions to prevent Muslims from hating us, as we have tried to no avail in Afghanistan. Nope; even if we hadn't killed Baitullah Mehsud and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, our friend Faisal would still want to wage jihad against us (jihad? What's that? The Beeb never mentions it, but Faisal does), until democracy is destroyed and "Allah will be supreme".

And by the way, where on earth did he get that idea?

“Tell those who disbelieve that if they cease (from persecution of believers) that which is past will be forgiven them; but if they return (thereto) then the example of the men of old hath already gone (before them, for a warning). And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is all for Allah.” (Qur'an 8:39)

Curiously, the video cuts away just as Shahzad is about to quote another verse from the Qur'an - sura 3, verse 110: "Ye [Muslims] are the best of peoples, evolved for mankind, enjoining what is right, forbidding what is wrong, and believing in Allah. If only the People of the Book [Jews and Christians] had faith, it were best for them: among them are some who have faith, but most of them are perverted transgressors."

Finally, Shahzad describes himself as a "Muslim soldier"........but of course, we must not say that ourselves, because that would be "Islamophobia".

"Moderate" Muslim spoksemen, as well as our non-Muslim leaders and analysts, will no doubt come out soon enough and say that Faisal Shahzad has twisted and misunderstood the peaceful teachings of their faith - but they will never explain how he managed to get Islam so desperately and unbelievably wrong, and that in itself will be most instructive.

Why You CAN (And Should) Choose Your Friends

"War is deceit", the warlord named Muhammad once said, and who would have thought back then, in the seventh century, that those words would still find such fond resonance in the twenty-first century?

There are many lessons to be learned from today's news that three British soldiers have been killed and four injured by a "renegade" Afghan soldier - who was supposed to be on our side - in Afghanistan. That these lessons need to be learned at all is disturbing given that, as the curiously brief "analysis" on the BBC website notes:

This is not the first time this kind of incident has happened.

Last November a member of the Afghan National Police opened fire on British soldiers he was serving alongside. He killed five and seriously injured half a dozen others.

And it's not just us dopey Brits who have sacrificed the lives of our soldiers in this way. In December, Jordanian suicide bomber Humam Khalil al-Balawi killed seven Americans at a CIA base in Afghanistan. The CIA had believed that Balawi was a double agent who was working for them in order to help them infiltrate al-Qaeda. However, it turned out that Balawi was actually infiltrating them instead, and people died as a result. And then, of course, there is Nidal Malik Hassan, a Muslim psychiatrist in the US army who went on a gun-toting jihad rampage at Fort Hood late last year.

These horrible incidents happened, and will continue to happen, because so many Western leaders assume that they know which Muslims are "moderates" and which are "extremists". And yet, as these and other incidents have highlighted, there is actually virtually no reliable way to tell the difference between a genuine moderate Muslim who will never take up arms against you, and a Muslim who may well do such a thing, but just tells you - very convincingly - that he won't.

The Qur'an instructs Muslims not to befriend unbelievers, "except by way of precaution, that ye may Guard yourselves from them.” (3:28) The renowned Muslim scholar Ibn Kathir, who represents a broad strain of mainstream Islamic tradition, explains that this clause refers to “those believers who in some areas or times fear for their safety from the disbelievers. In this case, such believers are allowed to show friendship to the disbelievers outwardly, but never inwardly.” He goes on to quote a companion of the Prophet Muhammad, who says: “We smile in the face of some people although our hearts curse them.” A more modern scholar, Sayyid Abul A'la Maududi, interprets the verse as follows: “This means that it is lawful for a believer, helpless in the grip of the enemies of Islam and in imminent danger of severe wrong and persecution, to keep his faith concealed and to behave in such a manner as to create the impression that he is on the same side as his enemies.”

Almost a decade of being in Afghanistan has shown us the folly and the futility of trying to get Muslims to like us. After all, their own holy book militates against it, and the ignorance of the British military and its leadership over how many of its Muslim allies are, in the words of Ibn Kathir, smiling in our faces while in their hearts cursing us, is killing our soldiers needlessly and without justification.

Cameron, Obama and all their flunkies like to believe that the Afghans are willing, on the whole, to fight alongside us against the Taliban, despite evidence to the contrary.*

What they fail to see, to the detriment of our soldiers and to us all, is that all the Muslims of Afghanistan read the same Qur'an, and revere the same Prophet, as the Taliban. That is where the problem lies, and it is in combating this problem that the most decisive action must be taken.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

* For example, see this AP article which contains the following details:

Neither are the Taliban regarded as an alien force. For many in Kandahar, they are neighbors, friends and relatives.

Haji Raaz Mohammad, a 48-year-old farmer from Kandahar, said he has never understood why the U.S. is trying to drive out the militants.

“I don’t know why they are doing it,” he said. “The Taliban are not outsiders. They are our own people.”

And do not forget, of course, how despite all our efforts to make friends with Afghans by giving them everything they want, they still weren't grateful enough to abstain from violently rioting - in their thousands - over a mere unsubstantiated RUMOUR that infidels had desecrated a Qur'an.

Imagine...

It is 1938. As the threat posed by Hitler and the Nazis becomes increasingly apparent, a small but significant minority of German immigrants starts getting more and more publicity in Britain.

These immigrants publicly declare themselves to be "moderate Nazis" - that is, Nazis who follow the "true" version of Nazism, which, they claim, is peaceful and tolerant. The media accepts them with open, tolerant arms, and instantly buys in to the idea that these immigrants represent the Nazi mainstream, which has unfortunately been "hijacked" by "extremists" who twist the ideology's core values into something monstrous.

Some astute British citizens, however, are concerned about the fact that most of these moderate Nazis seem to be doing very little to actually oppose - physically and ideologically - the "radical" ones back in Germany. What's more, they indignantly deny that Mein Kampf contains any violent or antisemitic content, and call anyone who says that it does a "Naziphobe". Following suit, the British media label those who criticise Nazism as a belief system "far-right" and "hateful". They demand that Britons show their tolerance by accepting a piecemeal integration of Nazi values into British society. A significant number of Britain's "moderate Nazis" agree, while those who claim that they do not never act to stop them.

Time goes on. The Holocaust happens, and millions of Jews die. Moderate Nazi groups issue condemnations, but they also condemn Allied responses to Hitler's expansionism, as well as continuing to deny that Nazism had anything to do with the atrocities. The British media and government blame the economic conditions of the 1930s and 40s for the violence, and some posit that the Holocaust was a "reaction" to the Treaty of Versailles. Furthermore, they run articles highlighting the fears of moderate Nazis that intolerant Brits might instigate a "backlash" against innocent Germans. Despite the fact that this backlash never materialises, Naziphobia continues to be held up as a greater crime and more serious threat than Nazism itself.

British Nazis continue to work towards the increasing Nazification of the country, and are never called upon by the authorities to take open, transparent and responsible action to eliminate the widespread acceptance and teaching of "radical Nazi ideology" from their communities - because to do so would be bigoted and would imply hatred for all Germans.

Fact or fiction?

On Another Planet

In the video above (around 1:25 mins in), Charles Bolden, the administrator of NASA - that's the National Aeronautics and Space Administration - reveals that the "foremost" task with which he has been entrusted by President Borat Obama is to "find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with predominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering.”

Only in the world (clearly not this one) of this dangerous Marxist President can the "foremost" goal of a space agency be to "reach out to the Muslim world". He did much the same thing during his appalling Cairo speech to the Muslim world around this time last year, during which he peddled the same falsehoods about the "historic [Muslim] contribution to science, math, and engineering.”

In the aftermath of that astronomical fail, the Scandinavian essayist Fjordman responded with a stunning fact-based essay (as opposed to fantasy-based, which is Obama's preferred method of policy-making), pointing out the glaring deficiencies - one may say black holes - in the President's presentation. Fjordman skewered Obama's planet-sized historical errors with ease - but Obama himself never got the memo.

The re-deployment of one of America's major symbols of scientific achievement as a means of inflating the egos of Muslims by lying to them about their past achievements certainly constitutes one giant leap for dhimmitude.

Charitable Giving And Selectivity

"This is just a random Chinese man benefiting from random Islamic charity."

In this fantastic analytical article, the guys over at the Religion of Peace explore the mainstream Muslim charity Islamic Relief, which claims on its website that it pays "no heed to color, race or creed." But dig a little deeper and we discover that, like all Muslim charities, it spends its time giving almost exclusively to Muslims, and thus does in fact discriminate by creed.

For example, as the article notes:

Most of the 27 countries/regions listed on Islamic Relief’s list are majority Muslim. But the six that are not in this category are even more telling of where the organization focuses its resources. Three of these countries have very substantial Muslim minorities - Ethiopia, India and Sri Lanka – and only the Muslim regions of these countries are mentioned in the details (Kashmir in India, the Ogaden region of Ethiopia, and the Kalmunai district in Sri Lanka – the country’s only majority Muslim municipality ).

Only three of the countries listed as recipients of Islamic Relief aid have a small enough Muslim population in which the identity of the aid recipients might otherwise be assumed to be non-Muslim by the casual observer. These are Kenya, China and Malawi.

However, in the case of Kenya, Islamic Relief touts its work among the Mandera ethnic group, which is Muslim. The two minor projects in Malawi are focused in the Chikwawa and Nsanje regions, where the Yao Muslims are concentrated. And in China, a nation that is only 1% Muslim, Islamic Relief does work in the remote Gansu region, one of the most heavily Muslim provinces in the country.

But what of the genuine relief efforts in totally non-Muslim areas?

Of the £8.7 million in individual grants received in 2007, the vast majority was from non-Islamic organizations in the West. Only 20% came from Islamic groups, almost all of which was specifically designated for projects assisting Muslims. Amazingly, Christian charities (including Christian Aid and the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development) actually accounted for just over 10% of the individual grants received by Islamic Relief – or nearly half of that donated by Muslim groups!....

As with all legitimate Muslim charities, the donations that Islamic Relief receives from non-Muslims exceeds by far the amount of aid spent on non-Muslims. The organization is simply passing along non-Muslim aid to non-Muslims (and probably benefitting from the window-dressing as well, since such a large amount of their funding comes from non-Muslim donors).

All of this underscores the fact that Islam is a supremacist ideology that discriminates - in so many ways - against all those outside of it. This discrimination even extends to charitable giving - an area in which the West has demonstrated its selfless superiority over past decades.

Justice For All

Three days ago, two suicide bombers carried out a deadly attack on a Sufi shrine in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore. At least 42 people died in the blasts at the popular Data Darbar shrine late on Thursday evening, officials say. At least 175 other people were hurt in the attack, believed to be the first to target a shrine in Lahore.

It goes without saying that I abhor those who carried out this crime against humanity, and mourn the loss of innocent life. These days, all criticism of Islam's violent streak by those such as myself brings cries from Leftists and Muslims of "Islamophobia" and "bigotry". And yet, so often, as in these cases, the victims of Islamic violence are Muslims themselves. If I was truly bigoted towards Muslims, I would not care about these recent attacks or others like them; in fact, I might even have rejoiced at the sight of Muslims killing each other.

But in reality, I believe in the equality of all people, including Muslims. I also uphold article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states:

"Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance."

I oppose Islam as a belief system because so many of its central tenets, as accepted in orthodoxy for fourteen hundred years, emphatically deny this and other basic human rights, and deny the equality of all people in dignity and before the law. To oppose a belief system which denies these things is not "hateful", and it doesn't mean that one "hates" every individual that identifies themselves as a follower of that belief system. It is simply to stand up for justice and human rights.

It is telling that in this modern day and age, Leftists and liberals, who claim to have a superior moral code, generally ignore blatant violations of human rights committed by non-white, non-Western cultures, while fixatedly blaming the West (and Israel) for abuses real and imagined, despite the record of Western civilisation when it comes to defining the values of freedom and equality that we now take for granted.

In doing so, many "moderate" Muslims and their Leftist allies contribute to the success of those who deny basic human rights to whole classes of people, and that will always be to their perpetual shame.

You Want Talks? Let's Talk About Islam...

The Taliban in Afghanistan has said it will not enter negotiations with Nato until foreign (read "infidel") forces withdraw from the country. A statement, given to the BBC, reads in part:

"We are certain that we are winning. Why should we talk if we have the upper hand, and the foreign troops are considering withdrawal, and there are differences in the ranks of our enemies?"

Why indeed - especially when their convictions stem directly from Islamic texts and teachings?

The Qur'an says, in language echoed by the Taliban statement: "“Be not weary and faint-hearted, crying for peace, when ye should be uppermost..." (47:35)

The famous Muslim scholar and Qur'anic commentator Ibn Kathir interprets this passage as follows:

"So do not lose heart, meaning, do not be weak concerning the enemies. And beg for peace, meaning, compromise, peace, and ending the fighting between you and the disbelievers while you are in a position of power, both in great numbers and preparations. Thus, Allah says, 'So do not lose heart and beg for peace while you are superior,' meaning, in the condition of your superiority over your enemy."

Indeed, any Western leader who knew anything about Islamic law would instantly reject the idea of holding "peace talks" with Islamic jihadists, for the simple reason that any agreements they make will be determined by Islamic law, and consequently useless.

In Islamic law, truces are viewed not as documents of lasting peace, but as expedient ways to cease hostilities while weak Muslim forces regroup, and can be ditched as soon as the Muslims feel like it. For example, the classic Islamic legal manual Umdat al-Salik, which has been endorsed by Islam's highest spiritual authority, Al Azhar University in Cairo, as conforming to Sunni orthodoxy, states regarding truces:

“There must be some interest served in making a truce other than mere preservation of the status quo...Interests that justify making a truce are such things as Muslim weakness because of lack of members or materiel, or the hope of an enemy becoming Muslim...If the Muslims are weak, a truce may be made for ten years if necessary, for the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) made a truce with Quraysh for that long, as is related by Abu Dawud. It is not permissible to stipulate longer than that, save by means of new truces, each of which does not exceed ten years. [emphasis added]”

Another legal manual, the Hedaya, reiterates this, and adds: “If the Imam make peace with the aliens [literally, harbis, i.e. unbelievers] for a single term (namely, ten years [emphasis added]) and afterwards perceive that it is most advantageous to the Muslim interest to break it, he may in that case lawfully renew the war, after giving them due notice...”

Ibn Kathir reiterates this as well, in his commentary on the Qur'anic verse mentioned above:

If, on the other hand, the disbelievers are considered more powerful and numerous than the Muslims, then the Imam (general commander) may decide to hold a treaty if he judges that it entails a benefit for the Muslims. This is like what Allah's Messenger did when the disbelievers obstructed him from entering Makkah and offered him treaty in which all fighting would stop between them for ten years.

Muhammad himself elucidated this in no uncertain terms: “If you ever take an oath to do something and later on you find that something else is better, then you should expiate your oath and do what is better.” (Bukhari v.9, b.89, no.260) The entire basis for the above legal rulings, as Ibn Kathir alludes to above, also rests on an incident in Muhammad's life, in which he broke a ten-year treaty, the Treaty of Hudaybiyya, he had concluded with his enemies, the Quraysh.

The consequences of this principle have played out throughout history. Notoriously, Yasser Arafat compared the 1993 Oslo Accords, which some analysts believed to be a first step towards a lasting peace between the Palestinians and Israel, with the Treaty of Hudaybiyya. Speaking in a mosque in Johannesburg when he didn't know he was being recorded, he said: “I see this agreement as being no more than the agreement signed between our Prophet Muhammad and the Quraysh in Mecca.” This implies that a peace deal had only been accepted on the part of the Palestinians as a temporary cessation of hostilities which Arafat could break at any time.

More recently, Hamas concluded a ten-year truce with Israel, which it undoubtedly saw as a good chance to regroup and emerge in a stronger position. Only a few months later, it was revealed that Hamas had been building a number of tunnels for the purpose of kidnapping Israeli soldiers, even while the truce was in effect. When Israel attacked one of those tunnels, Hamas responded with rocket-fire and accused Israel of breaking the truce.

The bottom line is that our leaders' suicidal ignorance of Islamic doctrine is killing our soldiers and wasting our money. That is unforgivable, and responsibility for it falls on all sides of the political spectrum.