WarSclerotic

Nothing to Do with Islam, Part 2, Front Page Magazine, Bruce Thornton, August 25, 2014

To read Part I, click here.

We in the West correctly find such views “extreme,” or “savage” and “barbaric,” but they are not “fringe” anomalies conjured out of textual misreadings by an extremist cult. They derive from the history and sacred texts of Islam, the clear meaning of which is illustrated on page after page of Muslim history. And they are being acted upon today across the Muslim world, as evidenced by the nearly 24,000 violent attacks perpetrated by Muslim terrorists since 9/11. Contrary to Obama, ISIL does speak for a religion. It’s called Islam.

Groups like ISIL or al Qaeda do not embrace “extreme religious views,” or “twist the overall message of religious texts,” as the New York Post has it. They act on a venerable tradition within Islam, one based on writings some Muslims have construed differently because of inconsistencies among various texts. But that doesn’t change the fact that the jihadists have within the faith long-established precedents for their actions, a tradition with millions of Muslim adherents worldwide, including the leaders of Turkey and Qatar who finance the vicious terrorist group Hamas, and the Mullahcracy in Iran, the world’s foremost supporter of Islamic terrorism.

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In his comments on the jihad being waged by the Islamic State in northern Iraq (ISIL), President Obama recycled yet again the shopworn false knowledge about Islam that continues to compromise our response to Muslim violence: “So ISIL speaks for no religion. Their victims are overwhelmingly Muslim, and no faith teaches people to massacre innocents. No just God would stand for what they did yesterday, and for what they do every single day.”

Over at the New York Post, a columnist rightly took the president to task by saying, “You can’t divorce the Islamic State from religion.” Unfortunately, the column is full of numerous misstatements that perpetuate the illusion that there is some peaceful, tolerant version of Islam that has been distorted and twisted by “extremists” or “fundamentalists.”

According to the writer, adherents of any faith can misread sacred texts literally in order to justify violence: “The problem isn’t just literalist interpretations of the Koran: The New Testament, the Jewish Torah and many other religious books contain explicit calls for disproportionate punishments and killing of nonbelievers.” Forget the false assumption that we are supposed to read all sacred texts allegorically rather than literally. I’d like to see the verses from the New Testament that explicitly instruct Christians to kill non-believers rather than try to convert them. On the contrary, Jesus preached, “Do not resist one who is evil. But if any one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Matthew 5.38), and “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5.43).

Concerning other interactions with non-believers, Jesus instructed his disciples, “And if any one will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet as you leave that house or town” (Matthew 10.14).  Because there are no explicit commands to kill non-believers in the New Testament, over the ages Christians who have justified violence with scripture have had to engage in tortuous interpretations and misreadings that over time have not been able to gain traction among all the faithful. That’s why despite widespread persecution across the world today, there is no major Christian terrorist movement.

Compare, in contrast, the Koran’s explicit calls to violence against non-believers, such as Koran 4.76: “Those who believe fight in the cause of Allah, and those who reject faith fight in the cause of evil: So fight ye against the friends of Satan.” This is consistent with the famous command in 9:29: “Fight those who believe not in Allah.” If someone wants to argue that “fight” is intended metaphorically in these verses, and has been “twisted” by a “literal” reading to serve some fringe interpretation, consider 4.74: “Let those fight in the cause of Allah Who sell the life of this world for the hereafter. To him who fights in the cause of Allah––whether he is slain or gets victory––Soon shall we give him a reward.” Obviously in this verse and numerous others “fight” means physical battle in which people are “slain.” Contrary to Christian scripture, in traditional Islamic doctrine non-believers who are invited to convert and refuse the call are not left alone, but killed or, if they are Jews or Christians, sometimes allowed to live in humiliating submission under a treaty that Muslims can break at any time for any reason.

As for the Torah, the list of verses allegedly commanding death for non-believers that crop up on anti-Biblical and atheist websites has nothing to do with gentiles. A favorite is Deuteronomy 17, which commands death for those who, “transgressing his covenant,” have “gone and served other gods and worshipped them.” But this is clearly a reference not to gentiles, but to Hebrews who have betrayed the covenant between God and the Jewish people by violating the first Commandment. So too with numerous other verses produced to prove that the Hebrew God ordered the Hebrews to kill gentiles. On the contrary, all these verses describe capital punishment for crimes committed by Jews, such as apostasy, witchcraft, adultery, fornication, and the like. Nowhere is there a verse commanding, like Koran 9.29, wholesale warfare against all gentiles who refuse to become Jews.

As for the orders given to Hebrew kings in the Old Testament to destroy another town or tribe, these are specific to that particular time, place, and people, and reflect the brutal warfare universal at that time. They are history, not theology. We may find such draconian punishments or collective violence distasteful, but they certainly do not comprise the sort of theology of violence against all non-believers that is found throughout the Koran and Islamic doctrine.

Obama is half-right that killing innocents, more specifically women and children, is forbidden in Islam. But there are conflicting traditions of interpretation about this prohibition going back centuries. The most famous Muslim philosopher, the 12^th century Ibn Rushd, known in the west as Averroës, discusses this controversy in his treatise Bidayat al-Mudjtahid. In contrast to the prohibition against killing women and children, Averroës writes, some interpreters quote Mohammed’s famous statement, “I have been commanded to fight the people until they say, ‘There is no God but Allah,’” which is consistent with Koran 9.5: “Then when the sacred months have slipped away, slay the polytheists wherever you find them.” As Averroës summarizes the controversy, “the source of their controversy is to be found in their divergent views concerning the motive why the enemy may be slain. Those who think that this is because they are unbelieving do not make exception for any polytheist,” including women and children. But even those who take the contrary view that only those able to fight may be killed make an exception for women who fight or who aid the enemy in some way, such as speaking against Islam or spying on Muslim warriors.

In short, many Muslims over the centuries have disagreed with Obama’s bald assertion that “no faith teaches people to massacre innocents.” Modern jihadists like ISIL, al Qaeda, Hamas, Fatah, and the numerous other groups thus have a foundation for their actions in a long tradition of Islamic theology. They see the outsized power and influence of the West, and the people who support it economically or politically, as a mortal threat to Islam. Thus destroying them is acceptable as a defense of the faith, for they are not “innocent” of aggression against Islam.

Many other practices of the jihadists likewise have justifications found in Islamic tradition and history, even if there are disagreements among Muslims about their validity. The jihadists’ penchant for beheading has its precedent in Koran 8.12: “I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Therefore strike off their heads and strike off every fingertip of them.” We have acted as though the filmed beheading of reporter James Foley is some unprecedented act of savagery by a Manson-like cult. But as Ian Tuttle reminds us, early in his career Mohammed beheaded the some 700 Jews of the Banu Qurayzah. In the 11^th century Yusuf ibn Tashfin beheaded 24,000 Spaniards and, in a primitive version of YouTube, sent the heads to cities in North Africa and Spain. In the 19^th century the Mahdist jihadists in Sudan beheaded their enemies, including the British war hero Charles “Chinese” Gordon. And Saudi Arabia today continues to publicly behead malefactors, 23 so far this August. There are few better ways to “cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve” or, as Obama said of Foley’s beheading, “shock the conscience of the entire world.”

Similarly, the indiscriminate bombing of people including women and children, whether through rockets or highjacked airliners, is argued as licit based on the fact that Mohammed used mangonels, a type of catapult, at the siege of al-Taif, even though such bombardment endangered women and children. Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri has written an essay justifying al Qaeda’s terrorist attacks of 9/11 based on this tradition. So too with the prohibition against suicide, used by some apologists to argue that so-called “suicide-bombers” are contrary to Islamic doctrine. But in the Koran and hadith it is clear that killing oneself as an act of martyrdom while fighting for the faith is acceptable. For example, according to one hadith, Muhammad said, “I would love to be martyred in Allah’s Cause and then get resurrected and then get martyred, and then get resurrected again and then get martyred and then get resurrected again and then get martyred.” That’s why for 14 centuries jihadists have said they love death the way infidels love life.

Groups like ISIL or al Qaeda do not embrace “extreme religious views,” or “twist the overall message of religious texts,” as the New York Post has it. They act on a venerable tradition within Islam, one based on writings some Muslims have construed differently because of inconsistencies among various texts. But that doesn’t change the fact that the jihadists have within the faith long-established precedents for their actions, a tradition with millions of Muslim adherents worldwide, including the leaders of Turkey and Qatar who finance the vicious terrorist group Hamas, and the Mullahcracy in Iran, the world’s foremost supporter of Islamic terrorism.

We in the West correctly find such views “extreme,” or “savage” and “barbaric,” but they are not “fringe” anomalies conjured out of textual misreadings by an extremist cult. They derive from the history and sacred texts of Islam, the clear meaning of which is illustrated on page after page of Muslim history. And they are being acted upon today across the Muslim world, as evidenced by the nearly 24,000 violent attacks perpetrated by Muslim terrorists since 9/11. Contrary to Obama, ISIL does speak for a religion. It’s called Islam.

Massive rocket barrage targets south; sirens sound near Tel Aviv

Palestinians, Cairo said waiting on Jerusalem response to month-long truce offer; over 80 rockets shot at Israel Monday;

Family of slain 4-year-old says they won’t return to Gaza-area kibbutz

By Itamar Sharon, Marissa Newman and Ilan Ben Zion August 25, 2014, 12:34 am  Updated: August 25, 2014, 1:29 pm

via Massive rocket barrage targets south; sirens sound near Tel Aviv | The Times of Israel.

This is What a Politically Correct Mental Breakdown Over ISIS Looks Like, Front Page Magazine, Daniel Greenfield, August 25, 2014

I remember how Churchill won WW2 by pretending that Hitler wasn’t running Germany, but was still painting ugly postcards.  And who can forget his stirring words. “We will deny that they are on the beaches. We will deny that they are in the cities. We will deny that there is a Nazi Germany.”

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I had to keep reading this to the end to be sure it wasn’t a parody. But this is what happens when someone in denial digs a deeper hole to deny in and then a deeper one under that.

It probably won’t surprise you too much to learn that the woman who wrote this came out of Berkeley. It may surprise you though that this appeared in The Telegraph.

We are not engaged in a religious war. This is not a confrontation between Islam and the West. To start from that premise is to place Isil (which should not be called by its presumptive title “Islamic State”) on precisely the ground it wishes to occupy.

If we acknowledge reality then the terrorists (who have nothing to do with Islam) will have won.

I remember how Churchill won WW2 by pretending that Hitler wasn’t running Germany, but was still painting ugly postcards.  And who can forget his stirring words. “We will deny that they are on the beaches. We will deny that they are in the cities. We will deny that there is a Nazi Germany.”

As the voices of what the media calls “moderate Muslims” – who should actually just be described as “Muslims” – say repeatedly, the activities of these terrorist criminals hacking their way through northern Iraq have nothing to do with the Islamic faith.

Problem solved. No need to address reality. We’ll just pretend that ISIS isn’t what it is and that will make us feel better. What about all the hundreds of British Muslim settlers flocking to ISIS? Let’s pretend that they don’t exist.

So now that we’re insisting that it’s not a religious war because ISIS says it is… what is it then?

So it is more important than ever to say that this is not a struggle between “our values” and those of medieval fundamentalism, or Islamist extremism. The contest is not modern liberal democracy versus the Dark Ages. This is to impose meaning on what is, in truth, meaningless.

Ah it’s meaningless.

Just thousands and thousands of armed fighters who for no reason are conquering parts of the Middle East and then ruling it. There’s no meaning to it whatsoever.

Sure we could listen to their explanation as to what they’re doing… but that would be imposing meaning on the meaningless actions of a well organized army creating a meaningless new system that it insists on calling a Caliphate for some meaningless reason.

What a bunch of crazy nuts.

Indeed, it may be worse than counterproductive to deal with Isil as if it were a rational force with established roots and a comprehensible set of demands capable of political solution. Just as this is not about religion, it is also not about politics,

Great. So now it’s not about religion or politics. ISIS is like Seinfeld. It’s about nothing. It’s completely incomprehensible if we choose to pretend that it is.

Question for Janet Daley, does ISIS even exist? Maybe we should start pretending that we imagined all the beheadings.

There is not even anything particularly Middle Eastern in the Isil mode of operation.

Aside from the location, the tactics, the symbolism and the religion… not a thing.

In fact, the gratuitous violence and promiscuous mayhem of its onslaught resembles nothing so much as 19th-century European anarchism

Whew. I knew it was Europe’s fault somehow. ISIS isn’t Muslim. It’s a bunch of European 19th century anarchists. That explains everything.

The next obvious question: how do you fight a dream that is without identifiable substance or consistent objectives?

I guess you could stop pretending that it’s a unidentifiable dream without an objective.  That would make it easier to deal with. The same advice goes for the rest of the media.

Or we can just pretend that it’s all a dream.

Minister Insists Israel Will Not Abandon Gaza Belt

Finance Minister Yair Lapid vows to help strengthen the South – both politically and financially.

By Tova Dvorin

First Publish: 8/25/2014, 7:04 PM

via Minister Insists Israel Will Not Abandon Gaza Belt – Defense/Security – News – Arutz Sheva.

The State of Israel will not sanction the organized evacuation of the Gaza Belt region, Finance Minister Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid) insisted Monday night, despite the rocket fire pelting the communities near Gaza on a minute-by-minute basis.

“Just because someone says to himself, ‘I do not want my children in the line of fire, I will get into the car and drive to where it’s safe,’ does not mean we will evacuate these communities,” Lapid said, in an interview with Walla!.

“It’s his right and we’ll help him find alternative arrangements, but Israel will not forsake entire communities, we will not see here an organized abandonment of settlements and we will not give this victory for Hamas,” he continued.

“Because then, where will it end? Will we evacuate Ashkelon? And then Ashdod? The State of Israel does not run off and evacuate communities due to terrorist organizations firing on their residents,” declared Lapid.

Lapid’s comments surface mere hours after the parents of four year-old Daniel Tragerman, hy”d, who was killed by a Hamas mortar shell Friday, announced that they would be permanently leaving their home in Kibbutz Nahal Oz after the incident.

The announcement highlights a mass exodus among Gaza Belt residents, with some 80% of families leaving their homes on a semi-permanent or permanent basis since Operation Protective Edge broke out on July 8, according to some reports.

Truce or no truce?

Lapid evaded questions on a possible ceasefire, hours after reports surfaced that Israel was weighing a deal.

“We are waiting to hear from the international community [on the ceasefire], so we do not know,” Lapid said. He indicated that Israel would take the ceasefire deal if it offered a chance for negotiations, but not under any other conditions.

“We will not negotiate under fire,” he stressed, asldo denying reports that Israel may have already accepted a ceasefire.

“I suggest not to rely on Palestinian media, but to wait for the official Israeli version of events, which will come at the right time,” he said.

Sources told the news outlet Monday morning that Israel accepted an indefinite ceasefire with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and that it was already in effect.

According to that report, in the first stage of the ceasefire Egypt will open the Rafah Crossing with Gaza, in exchange for a cessation of rocket fire. If the ceasefire holds, the second stage will see Israel extend the Gaza fishing zone – currently restricted to 0-3 miles from the coast for security reasons – first to six, and later 12 miles.

Israel will also open the Kerem Shalom Crossing, which has been shelled by terrorists on numerous occasions during Operation Protective Edge, and allow goods for trading to pass through, including food and, at a later stage, building materials.

‘Determination and patience the key to the campaign’

Lapid also addressed his visit to the Tragerman family home earlier Monday, after which he remarked that “Hamas would pay” for the death of four-year old Daniel and for laying waste to the South.

“I see communities where residents are determined to stay,” he said. “But the loss is painful. This death is painful. They understand, however, that this is a just war.”

“This campaign should be fought, and it should be run with determination and patience – there is no other way to mount a campaign [like this]. So they understand.”

Lapid added that he spoke with the mayors in the South about the potential for government aid due to the prolonged war.

The aid would apparently be in addition to the 13.5 million shekel aid plan that was already approved several weeks ago for the long-term reconstruction of the Gaza Belt, as well as Tourism Minister Uzi Landau’s request that the region be made VAT-free (an 18% discount on sales tax) for one year.

Will Hamas Be Held Accountable for War Crimes? Gatestone Institute, Khaled Abu Toameh, August 25, 2014

(Hamas and the Islamic State have more than extrajudicial killings in common. They share the same Islamic ideology and act in accordance with it. Regardless of that, and the actions of Hamas, et al, against Israel, it is highly unlikely that the United Nations or the “International Community” will hold it accountable for anything. That would be politically incorrect.– DM)

What Khaled Mashaal forgot to mention was that Hamas and the Islamic State do have at least one thing in common: they both carry out extrajudicial executions as a means of terrorizing and intimidating those who stand in their way or who dare to challenge their terrorism.

According to Hamas’s logic, all members of the Palestinian Authority government are “traitors” who should be dragged to public squares to be shot by firing squads. According to the same logic, Mahmoud Abbas himself should be executed for maintaining security coordination with and talking to Israelis.

As for the two executed women, the sources said that their only fault was that they had been observed asking too many questions about Palestinians who were killed in airstrikes.

Hamas’s extrajudicial executions of Palestinians suspected of “collaboration” with Israel are a sign that the Islamist movement is beginning to panic in the wake of Israel’s successful targeting of its leaders.

But the public executions by firing squad of more than 26 suspected “collaborators” in the Gaza Strip could also turn many Palestinians against Hamas.

Masked Hamas members (dressed in black) prepare to execute local Palestinians who they claim spied for Israel, Aug. 22, 2014, in Gaza. (Image source: Reuters video screenshot)

Hamas has banned the publication of the names of the executed Palestinians “out of concern for the social fabric” of Palestinian society.

In other words, Hamas is afraid that revealing the identities of the executed “collaborators” would spark outrage in the Gaza Strip and possible calls for revenge, especially from the families of the victims.

Hamas says that the suspected “collaborators” were brought before firing squads after being tried before special “revolutionary tribunals” consisting of security experts and officers.

It says that in time of war, there is no room for holding proper legal procedures and that security circumstances require secret trials followed by swift executions.

Yet some Palestinians in the Gaza Strip argue that in the absence of proper legal procedures, it is impossible to tell whether the convicted Palestinians were guilty or innocent.

Sources in the Gaza Strip revealed that some of the executed men belonged to Abbas’s Fatah faction and had no connection with Israel.

The Gaza-based Palestinian Centre for Human Rights was the only group that dared to criticize Hamas for embarking on a spree of public executions in front of passersby, including many children.

A statement released by the human rights group said it was following events “with deep concern news about extrajudicial executions in the Gaza Strip.”

Noting that among those executed by Hamas were two Palestinian women, the group called on the Palestinian Authority and Hamas to intervene to “stop these extrajudicial executions, regardless of the reason and motives behind them.”

Raji Surani, director of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, complained that the public extrajudicial executions “cause harm to all Palestinians” and called for “honoring the rule of law and human rights.”

However, “honoring the rule of law and human rights” has been a practice alien to Hamas ever since it seized control over the Gaza Strip through a violent and bloody coup against the Palestinian Authority in the summer of 2007.

Back then, Hamas killed dozens (some say hundreds) of Palestinians, including many from the rival Fatah faction headed by Mahmoud Abbas. Fatah members who were not killed during the fighting were later tossed from tall buildings or lynched in public squares.

One prominent Fatah activist, Samih al-Madhoun, was dragged to the street and brutally lynched by Hamas militiamen and supporters.

Over the past few days, Hamas officials have gone out of their way to tell the world that their movement is not like the Islamic State terror organization, which has become notorious for beheading almost everyone it finds standing the way of its creating an Islamic Caliphate.

“We are not a religious, violent group,” Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal said in an interview with Yahoo News from his luxurious hotel in Qatar. He said that Hamas, unlike the Islamic State terrorist group, operates only in Israel, the Gaza Strip and West Bank.

What Mashaal forgot to mention in the interview was that Hamas and the Islamic State do have at least one thing in common: they both carry out extrajudicial executions as a means of terrorizing and intimidating those who stand in their way or dare to challenge their terrorism.

Even the Palestinian Authority [PA] now seems to be drawing an analogy between Hamas and the Islamic State and other radical Islamist terrorist groups.

Tayeb Abdel Rahim, a senior aide to Mahmoud Abbas, strongly condemned Hamas’s extrajudicial executions, adding that that they are “reminiscent of the summary executions carried out by Wahhabi militant groups in other parts of the Middle East.”

Abdel Rahim added, “The executions were done in cold blood and according to Hamas law, which is: Who is not with Hamas is against it.”

Under Palestinian Authority law, all death sentences must be approved by the president of the PA. But in 2005, PA President Mahmoud Abbas issued a moratorium on death sentences — a prohibition that did not stop Hamas from pursuing executions under the pretext that the PA president was no longer a legitimate leader since his term had expired in 2009.

It is notable that the latest executions in the Gaza Strip were carried out after the formation of the Hamas-backedPalestinian “national consensus” government a few months ago. These extrajudicial executions show that despite the unity agreement between the two parties, Hamas continues to act as the sole authority in the Gaza Strip, where it has its own security forces, militias and “revolutionary courts.”

It is also ironic that Hamas has chosen to execute suspected “collaborators” at a time when it is seen as part of the “national consensus” government that continues to conduct security coordination with Israel. According to Hamas’s logic, all members of the Palestinian government are “traitors” who should also be dragged to public squares and the yards of mosques to be shot by firing squads.

According to the same logic, Abbas himself should also be executed for maintaining security coordination and talking to Israelis.

Hamas does not even need to interrogate or hold a trial for Abbas because he recently announced, during a meeting with Israelis in his office in Ramallah, that “security coordination with Israel is sacred.”

Sources in the Gaza Strip said that the executed men were affiliated with Fatah and had been suspected of maintaining contact with senior Fatah officials in Ramallah and some Arab countries. As for the two executed women, the sources said that their only fault was that they had been observed by neighbors asking too many questions about Palestinians who were killed in Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip over the past few weeks.

Hamas’s hysteria has seen it turn not only on its political rivals in Fatah and innocent Palestinians, but also against its own followers. According to sources in the Gaza Strip, Hamas arrested more than 250 of its own members after Israel last week killed its three top military commanders, Raed al-Attar, Mohamed Abu Shamaleh and Mohamed Barhoum.

The public executions in the Gaza Strip are a sign that Hamas is losing the war with Israel, particularly in the intelligence field. The three slain Hamas commanders are said to have been hiding inside a tunnel 30-meters [100 feet] deep, beneath a house in the southern town of Rafah. But this did not prevent the Israel Defense Forces from locating them and killing them. For Hamas, this is a serious security and intelligence blunder.

That is why Hamas is nervous and anxious to show that it is capable of responding to the targeted killing of its commanders. And there is nothing easier than dragging men and women into public squares and executing them in public after declaring them Israeli “agents.”

The extrajudicial executions will be added to the long list of crimes committed by Hamas against Palestinians. But the question remains whether the international community will ever hold Hamas accountable for its war crimes. Judging from the apathy of the international community and the United Nations to Hamas’s extrajudicial killings and other crimes, probably not.

Jihadi Cleric Justifies IS Beheadings: “Islam Is A Religion Of Beheading,” MEMRI, August 25, 2014

(This Islamic cleric seems to understand Islam. He rejects the notion that Islam is the “religion of peace,” often touted by his fellow Islamic clerics to shield non IS Islamist jihad groups from comparison. Islam is as Islam does. — DM)

After clarifying that he is opposed to killing Muslims, bin Mahmoud continues: “As for beheading infidel Jews, Christians and ‘Alawites, as well as apostate Shi’ites, who commit crimes against the Muslims, they must be terrorized, filled with fear and beheaded without any respect. Cutting off heads is part of the tradition of the [Prophet’s] Companions. In the Koran Allah ordered to smite the infidels’ necks and encouraged the Muslims to do this. He said [in Koran 47:4], ‘When you meet those who disbelieve on the battlefield, smite at their necks until you have killed and wounded many of them…

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In a recent article, jihadi cleric Hussein bin Mahmoud, a prominent writer on jihadi forums, expressed support for the beheading of American journalist James Foley by a member of the Islamic State (IS). Bin Mahmoud wrote that beheading was an effective way to terrorize the enemies of Islam, and stressed that, under Islamic law, Foley was a harbi, i.e. a non-Muslim whose life was not protected by an agreement of protection. He argued further that Islam allows and encourages such acts, since it is a religion of war and fighting.

The following are excerpts from the article, as posted August 21, 2014 on the Shumoukh Al-Islam forum.

“All Scholars… Agree On The Permissibility Of Killing A Harbi Infidel”

“I don’t know what to say. My mind is perplexed by words I have read and heard from people whom I do not know how to describe!! Millions of Muslims have been killed, tortured and driven from their homes; tens of thousands of Muslim women have had their honor violated and have been sexually abused by the Americans – yet people are weeping over a Christian American harbi infidel who entered the Islamic State, knowing full well what the Islamic State is, and without a pact [of protection]. Were the soldiers of the Islamic State supposed to pat this American harbi on the back and smile at him? All scholars, without exception, agree on the permissibility of killing a harbi infidel, and agree that his blood and property are fair game. Most of them [also] agree on the permissibility of killing him if he is taken prisoner. So where does this condemnation of the IS come from?… Let it be known to all people that when a harbi enters the land of Islam without a legal pact [of protection], his property, life and progeny are fair game.

“Many Muslims are influenced by the West’s false views and its repulsive ideas, which are exported to the Islamic nation in order to weaken it and change the perception of its youth so that [the youth] become cowardly and subdued and abandon the means of power and terror, and thus create a generation that does not know fighting or the cutting of necks. Recently we saw some who are considered scholars mixing things up and deceiving the nation, changing the concepts of Islamic law to fit the plans of the enemies. We don’t know if they did this out of ignorance about some of the tenets of Islamic law, or were [simply] lying…”

“Beheading A Harbi Infidel Is A Blessed Act For Which A Muslim Is Rewarded”

“Chopping off the heads of infidels is an act whose permissibility the [Muslim] ummah agrees on. Beheading a harbi infidel is a blessed act for which a Muslim is rewarded. The [only] matter scholars disagree about is the question of transferring the head from one place to another, traveling with it and carrying it around…”

Bin Mahmoud: Jews, Christians, Shi’ites And ‘Alawites Who Committed Crimes Against The Muslims Must Be Beheaded

After clarifying that he is opposed to killing Muslims, bin Mahmoud continues: “As for beheading infidel Jews, Christians and ‘Alawites, as well as apostate Shi’ites, who commit crimes against the Muslims, they must be terrorized, filled with fear and beheaded without any respect. Cutting off heads is part of the tradition of the [Prophet’s] Companions. In the Koran Allah ordered to smite the infidels’ necks and encouraged the Muslims to do this. He said [in Koran 47:4], ‘When you meet those who disbelieve on the battlefield, smite at their necks until you have killed and wounded many of them…

“How many hadiths [relayed by] the Prophet’s Companions have we read in which they demanded that he strike the necks of certain men, and the Prophet did not condemn the striking of necks… Striking necks was a well-known matter that did not elicit any condemnation in the eras of the Prophet, the rightly-guided caliphs and their successors,  right until the time of the Christian occupation of the Muslims’ lands in the [20th] century. Those crusaders fought the Islamic legal concepts, distorted the religion, and convinced the Muslims that their religion is a religion of peace, doves, love and harmony, and that there is no blood in it, no killing and no fighting. The Muslims remained in this state until Allah revived the tradition of beheading by means of the mujahid and slaughterer Abu Mus’ab Al-Zarqawi, may Allah have mercy upon him and accept him as a martyr.”

“Islam Is A Religion Of Bloodshed”

Bin Mahmoud goes on to quote a long list of texts which, according to him, prove that Islam condones beheading as a means of terrorizing the enemy, and then emphasizes once more that Islam is not a peaceful religion, since its essence is jihad and martyrdom. He concludes that “Islam is a religion of beheading”:

“The truth is that what distorts the image of Islam is not the beheading and terrorizing of infidels, but rather those who want [Islam to follow the path of] Mandela or Ghandi, with no killing, fighting, brutality, bloodshed or the striking of heads or necks. That is not the religion of [the Prophet] Muhammad son of ‘Abdallah who was sent [to fight] with the sword [until]   Judgment Day. The only Koranic surah that is named after him, Surah Muhammad, is [also] called ‘The Surah of Fighting’…

“Islam is a religion of power, fighting, jihad, beheading and bloodshed, not a religion of turning the left cheek to whoever slapped you on the right cheek. On the contrary, it is a religion of breaking the hand that is stretched out to humiliate the Muslim. [Any Muslim] who fights for his property, blood or honor is a martyr.

“In Islam, tourism [means] jihad for the sake of Allah… There is no true life for its believers except through jihad, [and] the goal of its fighters is to die for the sake of their religion…”