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“Extremist” Islam is not extreme.

February 13, 2015

“Extremist” Islam is not extreme, Dan Miller’s Blog, Dan Miller, February 13, 2015

(The views expressed in this article are mine and do not necessarily reflect those of Warsclerotic or its other editors. — DM)

“Extremist” Muslims believe that the Koran and the Hadith must be taken literally and that Sharia law, rather than “man made” law, must control everyone. Secular Muslims seem to disagree or not to be very interested. “Extremist” Roman Catholics believe that birth control, abortion and pre-marital sex are sinful and oppose governmental support for them. Secular Roman Catholics seem to disagree or not to be very interested. 

“Extremist” Muslims are “literalist,” because they believe that the Koran is the word of Allah as faithfully transcribed by Mohamed, his messenger, and that there is no room for interpretation. The many conflicting verses in the Koran present a problem.

Rather than explain away inconsistencies in passages regulating the Muslim community, many jurists acknowledge the differences but accept that latter verses trump earlier verses. Most scholars divide the Qur’an into verses revealed by Muhammad in Mecca when his community of followers was weak and more inclined to compromise, and those revealed in Medina, where Muhammad’s strength grew. [Emphasis added, footnotes omitted.]

Classical scholars argued that anyone who studied the Qur’an without having mastered the doctrine of abrogation would be “deficient.” Those who do not accept abrogation fall outside the mainstream and, perhaps, even the religion itself.  [Emphasis added.]

Islamist literalism coupled with abrogation now has temporal, and often fatal, consequences for non-Muslims as well as for “apostate” Muslims because, as Mohammad grew stronger, his words became stronger and more violent toward apostates and other non-believers.

According to an article titled “What is Islam?” Revisited by Father James V. Schall, S.J., posted at Catholic World Report on January 8th,

Islam considers itself the only true religion. It has a “narrative” of itself that all branches of Islam hold, although they differ somewhat on how it is to be achieved. [Emphasis added.]

. . . .

In the Quran, there is no mention of the Trinity or Incarnation, except explicitly to deny them. It is blasphemy to believe in them, as well as to question anything connected with the Quran. Allah intends the whole world to observe the Sharia, the Muslim legal code, observing its letter. As soon as it can, this law is imposed in every Muslim land or smaller community, even in democratic states. No distinction between Islam and the state exists. Everyone is born a Muslim. If he is not a Muslim, it is because his parents or teachers corrupted him. It is impossible to convert from Islam to another religion, without grave, often lethal, consequences. [Emphasis added.]

It is not against the Quran to use violence to spread or enforce Islamic law. Those Islam conquers, even from its beginnings till now, it either kills, forces conversion, or imposes second class citizenship. The Islamic State, now so much to the forefront, seems to have the correct understanding of what the Quran intends and advocates.  [Emphasis added.]

. . . .

Dialogue is looked upon as a sign of weakness unless it can be used to further Muslim goals. In the case of the killings that Coren lists, if they are looked upon as legitimate means, there is no need either to talk about them or to cease their presumed effectiveness in spreading Islam. One cannot really appeal to the Quran to cease these killings, as there is ample reason within it to justify them as worthy means. Had it not been possible to justify these means in the Quran, the whole history of Islam would be different. Indeed, it probably never would have expanded at all. [Emphasis added.]

Similarly, “extremist” Christians can be characterized as “literalist” because they believe, for example, that Jesus was literally conceived immaculately and literally ascended bodily into Heaven. These views now have no deadly temporal consequences for Christians or anyone else.

As for the crusades and the inquisition, which Obama used to try to divert our attention from Islam,

Obama - crusades

Islam is the only religion the textual core of which actively and unequivocally defames other religions.

Blasphemy

Soon after Muslim gunmen killed 12 people at Charlie Hebdo offices, which published satirical caricatures of Muslim prophet Muhammad, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC)—the “collective voice of the Muslim world” and second largest inter-governmental organization after the United Nations—is again renewing calls for the United Nations to criminalize “blasphemy” against Islam, or what it more ecumenically calls, the “defamation of religions.”

To ban “defamation” of Islam —  in reality to ban accurate factual analyses of its core tenets — is to engage in jihad via lawfare with the help of non-Islamic nations, including Obama’s America, while violent Islamic jihad against all religions except “true” versions of Islam continues apace.

Yet the OIC seems to miss one grand irony: if international laws would ban cartoons, books, and films on the basis that they defame Islam, they would also, by logical extension, have to ban the entire religion of Islam itself—the only religion whose core texts actively and unequivocally defame other religions, including by name. [Emphasis added.]

For example,

Consider Christianity alone: Koran 5:73 declares that “Infidels are they who say God is one of three,” a reference to the Christian Trinity; Koran 5:72 says “Infidels are they who say God is the Christ, [Jesus] son of Mary”; and Koran 9:30 complains that “the Christians say the Christ is the son of God … may God’s curse be upon them!”

. . . .

[T]he Christian Cross, venerated among millions, is depicted—is defamed—in Islam: according to canonical hadiths, when he returns, Jesus (“Prophet Isa”) will destroy all crosses; and Muhammad, who never allowed the cross in his presence, once ordered someone wearing a cross to “throw away this piece of idol from yourself.” Unsurprisingly, the cross is banned and often destroyed whenever visible in many Muslim countries.

Reforming Islam

Egyptian President al-Sisi — who appears to be a fairly secular Muslim — told Muslim clerics in Cairo on New Years Day (on or about the date when Mohamed’s birthday is celebrated) that Islam needs to be reformed, substantially. He “accused Islamic thinking of being the scourge of humanity—in words that no Western leader would dare utter.” Following his address,

Sisi went to the St. Mark Coptic Cathedral during Christmas Eve Mass to offer Egypt’s Christian minority his congratulations and well wishing. Here again he made history as the first Egyptian president to enter a church during Christmas mass—a thing vehemently criticized by the nation’s Islamists, including the Salafi party (Islamic law bans well wishing to non-Muslims on their religious celebrations, which is why earlier presidents—Nasser, Sadat, Mubarak, and of course Morsi—never attended Christmas mass). [Emphasis added.]

(Under the Coptic calendar, Christmas falls on January 7th.)

Obama, who continues to oppose al-Sisi and recently met with supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood, ignored al-Sisi’s words and deeds. So did a spokesperson for His State Department which, in January

met with a delegation aligned with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood . . . . It is understood that the group, which included a leading Brotherhood-aligned judge and a Muslim Brotherhood parliamentarian, discussed their ongoing efforts against the current Egyptian government of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. [Emphasis added.]

El-Sisi came to power after he deposed the Muslim Brotherhood’s Islamist government in a popularly backed coup. After only one year of Muslim Brotherhood rule, 15 million people came out onto the streets demanding an end to their rule.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s stated goal is the recreation of an Islamic caliphate, although they follow a policy of the gradual implementation of sharia law. [Emphasis added.]

The Muslim Brotherhood, and “extremist” Islam in general, are Obama’s friends and advisers. They are also now the largest and most destructive enemies of western civilization; Obama assists them at every opportunity.

Meanwhile, a Muslim Brotherhood affiliate, Hamas, is busily training thousands of youth to attack Israel, the only free and democratic nation, as well as the only outpost of western civilization, in the Middle East.

On February 10th, a Jordanian columnist wrote, consistently with President al-Sisi’s remarks, that

“The escapism that mainstream Islam has nothing to do with those atrocities does not hold water anymore because Wahabism and Islam have become indistinguishable. To understand the crisis of Muslims today, one has to remember that Wahabism exists in several textbooks containing the alleged sayings of the Prophet Mohammad, or books of  ‘Hadith,’ revered by so many. What we must confront is the undeniable fact that it is from many stories found in these books that the unprecedented cruelty of groups such as the so-called Islamic State and Jabhat Al-Nusra emanates. [Emphasis added.]

. . . .

“There is obviously a propensity towards eliminating ‘the other’ imbedded deep within Wahabist ideology. It is not only foolish to deny this fact, it is also dangerous, for we would be covering the cancerous tumour with a bandage. What we cannot deny is that many of the Wahabist textbooks are the same operating manuals that Islamist butchers use to justify their savagery. For example, very few people know that while [the Jordanian pilot] Muath was being set on fire in that macabre video, the voiceover was a recitation of an Ibn Taymiyah fatwa deeming the incineration of unbelievers a legitimate act of jihad. Ibn Taymiyah is not some obscure scholar on the fringe of Sunni Islam. In the Sunni world, he is universally venerated with the title ‘Sheikh of Islam,’ elevating him to an almost infallible clerical status. [Emphasis added.]

“If we really want to defend Islam as a religion of mercy, if we really want to be believed when we proclaim the innocence of this religion, we need to do more than just repeat this meaningless mantra about us having nothing to do with [ISIS]. We have to muster the courage to identify the specific texts that actually defame Islam, denounce them and permanently cleanse Islamic tradition of them.” [Emphasis added.]

Until “extremist” Islam reforms itself, as al-Sisi (and a few other Muslims) contend that it  must, Islam in all of its manifestations will remain an existential threat to what’s left of western civilization. If Islam manages to reform itself Obama — who considers Islam to be just peachy now — will, once again, be shown to have been on the wrong side of history.

Nuclear Iran

Unfortunately, Obama’s place on the wrong side of history may become apparent long before Islam is reformed, when Iran gets (or is permitted to keep) and uses “the bomb.” Iran, and perhaps Obama, have availed themselves of the Islamic doctrine of taqiyya, which

allows Muslims to have a declared agenda, and a secret agenda (Jihad, slaughter, and mayhem) during time of weakness, this is called Taqiyya.” To put it in simpler words, it is the “art” of deception, or more correctly, of deceiving non-Muslim infidels. [Emphasis added.]

Barack Mitsvah

As noted in a Gatestone Institute article titled Iran speeding to nuclear weapons breakout, Prime Minister Netanyahu is a lone voice crying in the wilderness.

[H]e is one of the two world leaders in the West telling the truth, warning of what is to come (Geert Wilders of the Netherlands is the other). This burden of responsibility for his people (how many of us wish our leaders had even a bit of that?) has earned him only the venom of the Obama  Administration, who see him as trying to spoil their strategy of leading by procrastination. [Emphasis added.]

It is also becoming increasingly clear that the Obama Administration’s policy consists of running after Iran, in order to concede everything it wants, just to be able wave a piece of paper not worth the ink on it, claiming there is “a deal.” Iran, for its part, would probably prefer not to sign anything, and most likely will not. Meanwhile, both sides continue strenuously to claim the opposite. [Emphasis added.]

Iran seems likely to get and use, or to keep and use, nuclear weapons by virtue of the essentially bilateral Iran – US nuclear negotiations. Please see also The Iran scam continues, which I wrote in January of last year. The situation has worsened since then, with substantial concessions to, and few if any of significance by, Iran.

Obama and Netanyahu

The U.S. concessions have, in part, been in exchange for Iran’s “help” in defeating the Islamic State and hence becoming the major power in the Middle East.

Iran would be the hegemon of the Middle East. Some states would ‎accept Tehran’s authority, striking deals and kowtowing in order to survive. Europeans would ‎accommodate Iran, based on its control of the flow of Gulf oil. Israel and Saudi Arabia, nations ‎that Iran’s rulers have threatened to wipe from the map, would be left to fend for themselves.‎ [Emphasis added.]

. . . .

Doran cites evidence that in the first year of Obama’s first term, there were more ‎White House meetings on Iran than any other national security concern. Detente with Iran was ‎seen as “an urgent priority,” but the president “consistently wrapped his approach to that priority ‎in exceptional layers of secrecy” because he was convinced that neither Congress nor the ‎American public would support him.‎ [Emphasis added.]

A year ago, Doran further reports, Benjamin Rhodes, a member of the president’s inner ‎circle, told a group of Democratic activists (unaware that he was being recorded) that a deal with ‎Iran would prove to be “probably the biggest thing President Obama will do in his second term ‎on foreign policy.” He made clear that there would be no treaty requiring the Senate’s advice and ‎consent.‎ [Emphasis added.]

The president believes that “the less we know about his Iran plans, the better,” Doran ‎concludes. “Yet those plans, as Rhodes stressed, are not a minor or incidental component of his ‎foreign policy. To the contrary, they are central to his administration’s strategic thinking about ‎the role of the United States in the world, and especially in the Middle East.” ‎ [Emphasis added.]

Obama’s plans may well blow up in His face and, of greater importance, ours. Iran, particularly with the help of Russia and North Korea, will be able to do it. Here is a

short animated film being aired across Iran, [which] shows the nuclear destruction of Israel and opens with the word ‘Holocaust’ appearing on the screen, underneath which a Star of David is shown, Israel’s Channel 2 reported on Tuesday.

Don’t worry; be happy

Obama what me worry kid

Here’s the Revolting Truth from Andrew Klavan, which debunks everything bad ever said about Obama. Sort of.

Oh. And He’s not a narcissistic jerk either.

ALL of My policies are the best ever

ALL of My policies are the best ever

Categories: Andrew Klavan, Blasphemy, Christianity, Egypt, Foreign policy, Freedom, Hamas, Human rights, Humor, Iran, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, Islam, Islamic jihad, Islamic slaughter, Islamic State, Islamism, Israel, Lies, Middle East, Muslim Brotherhood, Netanyahu, Nukes, Obama, P5+1, Sharia law, Sisi, Terrorism, Terrorist training
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ISIS militants seize western Iraqi town, menace base housing U.S. personnel

February 13, 2015

ISIS militants seize western Iraqi town, menace base housing U.S. personnel

By Laura Smith-Spark, CNN

Updated 11:58 AM ET, Fri February 13, 2015

via ISIS militants seize western Iraqi town, menace base housing U.S. personnel – CNN.com.

(CNN)ISIS militants took full control of a western Iraqi town early Friday, security officials told CNN, bringing them within a few miles of an air base housing U.S. military personnel.

The extremist group took al-Baghdadi, west of Ramadi, and now they’re closing in on the strategic Ayn al-Assad Air Base, only about 15 kilometers (9 miles) away, the security officials said.

Iraqi forces there are calling for reinforcements. A U.S. defense official told CNN that no evacuations have been planned from the base.

That western front is just one of many where ISIS forces are on the move.

CNN’s Phil Black, in northern Iraq, said Friday that Kurdish Peshmerga fighters were starting to move from the north toward the city of Sinjar, held by ISIS since the summer.
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The militants’ seizure of the city provoked a major humanitarian crisis as its ethnic minority Yazidi population fled onto the rocky slopes of Mount Sinjar, where many became trapped without food and water.

The Kurdish fighters are on the offensive but face a long, difficult battle to win back the city from ISIS, whose fighters are firmly in control there.

ISIS attacked Peshmerga fighters in Sinjar on Thursday, as well as Kurdish forces positioned north of Iraq’s second-largest city, Mosul, and the town of Ba’shiqa, east of Mosul.

But it’s in Iraq’s west where ISIS militants have the momentum over the Iraqi army and Sunni tribesmen opposing them.

‘No direct threat’ to U.S. personnel

The ISIS fighters seized Al-Baghdadi, northwest of the capital of Baghdad, on Friday after attacking from three directions against Iraqi government forces, the security officials told CNN.

Ayn al-Assad, the largest military base in western Anbar province still under government control, is also where U.S. instructors train Iraqi pilots.

Already, the air base is taking sporadic indirect fire from militants using rocket launchers and mortars, the officials said.

Two security officials in the Anbar provincial office told CNN that security forces inside Ayn al-Assad killed eight suicide bombers Friday who were trying to breach the air base’s perimeter from the direction of Al-Baghdadi.

A statement issued by U.S. Central Command said the attack had been directed against an Iraqi army facility on the base and that the Iraqi forces had killed all eight militants.

“Coalition forces were several kilometers from the attack and at no stage were they under direct threat from this action,” it said.

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Top Lawmakers Launch Counterattack on Obama Anti-Israel Campaign

February 13, 2015

Top Lawmakers Launch Counterattack on Obama Anti-Israel Campaign

Republicans voice support for Netanyahu congressional speech

BY: Adam Kredo Follow @Kredo0
February 13, 2015 12:00 pm

via Top Lawmakers Launch Counterattack on Obama Anti-Israel Campaign | Washington Free Beacon.

Top Republican leaders took to public and private channels Thursday to expose a coordinated campaign by the Obama administration to attack Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over his acceptance of an invitation to speak before Congress, according to conversations with multiple lawmakers and leading pro-Israel insiders.

The statements, many of which were obtained by the Washington Free Beacon in conversations with leaders in Congress, come in the aftermath of a widely cited New York Times report in which Obama administration officials accused Netanyahu of breaking diplomatic protocol by agreeing to speak before receiving approval from the White House.

However, the paper of record was quickly forced to issue a correction reversing its previously published timeline that claimed Netanyahu went behind the White House’s back. As the correction notes, Netanyahu did not accept the invitation until after the White House was informed.

Several leading congressional offices that spoke to the Free Beacon in recent days indicated they support Netanyahu’s address, a sentiment that was echoed on Thursday afternoon by the Senate’s second most powerful member, Sen. John Cornyn (R., Texas).

Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas), a vocal administration opponent, told the Free Beacon that Obama “is more interested in undermining a close ally than in addressing the common threat we face, which is a nuclear-armed Islamic Republic of Iran.”

The controversy over Netanyahu’s appearance—which has prompted some Democrats to boycott the speech—was manufactured by the White House and its media allies, Cruz said.

“There is growing evidence that, as the New York Times correction demonstrates, this was never an issue of protocol—Prime Minister Netanyahu’s office followed protocol by accepting the invitation only after the White House was notified,” Cruz said. “The real issue is the president’s reluctance to hear a dissenting voice challenging his assumption that the Iranians are negotiating in good faith over their nuclear program.”

Cornyn took to the Senate floor Thursday afternoon to reveal that a majority of his colleagues have signed onto a letter welcoming Netanyahu and reiterating support for him in light of efforts by some lawmakers to boycott the speech.

“I hope the rest of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will join me in welcoming the prime minister to Washington so we can continue to work together as he details in graphic detail like no one else can do the threat of a nuclear Iran,” Cornyn said. “During this time of such great instability and danger in the Middle East, the United States cannot afford to waver in our commitment to one of our closest and most important allies.”

Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.), one of the leading backers of a bill to impose new sanctions on Iran, said that now is not the time for Congress to waver in its support of Israel.

“At a time when the civilized world faces Islamic extremist threats not just from the [Islamic State], but also from a nuclear Iran and its terror proxies, the United States should speak with one voice and stand with our allies,” Kirk said.

The statements of support among Republicans also come despite thinly sourced reports in left-wing anti-Netanyahu media outlets claiming Republican displeasure with the prime minister.

An official timeline of how the speech came to be contradicts the New York Times story and comments by Obama administration officials.

Discussions about inviting Netanyahu to speak about Iran began nearly a year ago and were initiated by House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio) and his Senate counterpart, Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.), according to Boehner’s office.

Boehner called Israeli Ambassador Ron Dermer in early January to extend the invitation and gauge Netanyahu’s interest. On Jan. 20, Boehner and McConnell formally extended the invitation to Netanyahu and informed the White House the following day.

Netanyahu only agreed to speak after Congress and the White House were informed about the invite.

Still, several Democratic allies of the White House have promised to boycott the speech.

Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D., Ore.) told CNN he is offended that Netanyahu wants to speak about the dangers of a nuclear Iran at the same time the White House is conducting diplomacy with it.

“It’s inappropriate to have a deliberate effort by the speaker and Prime Minister Netanyahu to sabotage the negotiating that we have with Iran,” Blumenauer said.

Lawmakers such as Cruz and Rep. Lee Zeldin (R., N.Y.), Congress’ sole Jewish Republican, said it is offensive and inappropriate for their colleagues to boycott a speech by the leader of America’s closest ally.

“It is an unnecessary reckless act of foolishness to skip out on this joint session of Congress,” Zeldin told the Free Beacon. “It’s a critical hour and there really should be no questions where they belong. It’s very telling as to who has their priorities misplaced when looking around that room and seeing who decides to skip out for all the wrong reasons.”

Cruz went on to call Democratic opposition to Netanyahu “profoundly irresponsible,” telling the Free Beacon that “no friend of Israel would work to undermine, much less actually boycott, the elected leader of Israel in this time of peril.”

Zeldin also blamed the White House for fueling the controversy, which has dominated the narrative in Washington, D.C., for weeks.

“The president is all politics all the time,” Zeldin said. “He’ll stick his chest out to a friend while going out of his way to reduce his negotiating ability with an enemy to a position of equality or weakness. It’s time for the White House to have a refresher course on who our friends are and who our enemies are.”

Rep. Tim Walberg (R., Mich.), a member of the Israel Allies Caucus, said it is completely appropriate for Netanyahu to brief Congress on the Iranian threat as negotiations with Tehran reach their deadline.

“Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has a real and consequential understanding of the dangers in allowing Iran to procure a nuclear missile,” Walberg said. “With both Israel and the United States’ safety and security at stake, the speaker did the right thing by inviting the prime minister to address Congress.”

Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) came out late Thursday with a direct appeal to his Democratic colleagues.

“You have your right to voice your concerns, but don’t do this to an ally; don’t do this to a nation that is as threatened today as it has ever been at any time in its existence,” Rubio said in a statement. “Don’t do this to a people that are in the crosshairs of multiple terrorist groups with the capability of attacking them.

Christians United for Israel (CUFI) launched on Thursday a campaign urging its members to demand that their member of Congress attend Netanyahu’s speech. More than 10,000 CUFI members acted on the alert in less than five hours, according to the group.

“The spectacle of Democrats boycotting Netanyahu’s speech is a new low for Washington. Our elected officials have a sacred duty to listen to all views on this critical issue—including those with which they may disagree—before making up their minds. Whether they like the fact that Netanyahu was invited or not, they should stop acting like peevish children and listen for a change,” CUFI executive director David Brog said.

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ISIS Fighters Advance on Town Near US Marine Base in Iraq

February 13, 2015

Iraqi Army Repels Attack on Base Hosting U.S. Marines

Friday, 13 Feb 2015 10:37 AM

By Melanie Batley and Newsmax Wires

via ISIS Fighters Advance on Town Near US Marine Base in Iraq.

Iraqi security forces on Friday repelled an attack by Islamic State insurgents against an air base in Anbar province where U.S. Marines are training Iraqi troops, Iraqi and U.S. military officials said.

Militants from the jihadist group had attacked the Ain al-Asad base and the nearby town of al-Baghdadi a day earlier, leading to sporadic clashes in the town overnight.

Al-Baghdadi has been besieged for months by Islamic State, which captured swathes of northern and western Iraq last year, prompting a campaign of U.S.-led airstrikes and the deployment of hundreds of U.S. military advisers to the country.

A U.S. defense official said the Iraqi forces had stopped the attack and re-secured the facility.

“Coalition forces were several kilometers from the attack and at no stage were they under direct threat from this action,” the official said.

About 320 U.S. Marines are training members of the Iraqi 7th Division at the base, which has been struck by mortar fire on at least one previous occasion since December.

Iraq’s Defense Ministry said on its website the Iraqi army killed eight assailants near the base, which is about 85 km (50 miles) northwest of Ramadi.

An Iraqi military official in Baghdad told Reuters the insurgents had taken advantage of a lull in the airstrikes, caused by poor weather, to launch the offensive.

He said Islamic State had been cleared from most of al-Baghdadi, with the remaining fighting centered around a police station.

That conflicted with reports from a tribal leader who said the jihadists were still in control of much of the town.

Ongoing clashes and poor communications in the area made it difficult to confirm such reports.

U.S. defense officials told CNN there are no plans to evacuate U.S. personnel from the air base, which is just a few miles from al-Baghdadi, but security officials said the militants are closing in on it and Iraqi forces are calling for reinforcements.

According to officials, the base has not been attacked but is taking sporadic indirect fire from militants in the form of rocket launchers and mortars.

Two security officials told CNN that security forces from the base killed eight suicide bombers on Friday who were trying to penetrate the air base.

At the same time, a U.S. defense official said that U.S. troops do not consider themselves trapped, are not contemplating a ground engagement with the Islamic State, and there have been no injuries to U.S. forces at the base, CNN said.

“It bears watching,” retired Col. Thomas Lynch, a National Defense University fellow, told Fox News, regarding the reports.

He stressed, however, that for the militants to be a real threat to the base they would need get through the perimeter.

“It’s not impossible,” Lynch said, but to do it they would have to amass a large number of fighters — which would make them “vulnerable” to airstrikes.

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Crusaders and appeasers – The Washington Post

February 13, 2015

Crusaders and appeasers – The Washington Post.


US President Barack Obama speaks before signing the Clay Hunt Suicide Prevention for American Veterans Act, H.R. 203, in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC, February 12, 2015. (Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images)

Charles Krauthammer

By Charles Krauthammer Opinion writer February 12 at 8:14 PM

His secretary of defense says, “The world is exploding all over.” His attorney general says that the threat of terror “keeps me up at night.” The world bears them out. On Tuesday, American hostage Kayla Mueller is confirmed dead. On Wednesday, the U.S. evacuates its embassy in Yemen, a country cited by President Obama last September as an American success in fighting terrorism.

Yet Obama’s reaction to, shall we say, turmoil abroad has been one of alarming lassitude and passivity.

Not to worry, says his national security adviser: This is not World War II. As if one should be reassured because the current chaos has yet to achieve the level of the most devastating conflict in human history. Indeed, insists the president, the real source of our metastasizing anxiety is . . . the news media.

Russia pushes deep into eastern Ukraine. The Islamic State burns to death a Jordanian pilot. Iran extends its hegemony over four Arab capitals — Beirut, Damascus, Baghdad and now Sanaa.

And America watches. Obama calls the policy “strategic patience.” That’s a synonym for “inaction,” made to sound profoundly “strategic.”

Take Russia. The only news out of Obama’s one-hour news conference with Angela Merkel this week was that he still can’t make up his mind whether to supply Ukraine with defensive weapons. The Russians have sent in T-80 tanks and Grad rocket launchers. We’ve sent in humanitarian aid that includes blankets, MREs and psychological counselors.

How complementary: The counselors do grief therapy for those on the receiving end of the T-80 tank fire. “I think the Ukrainian people can feel confident that we have stood by them,” said Obama at the news conference.

Indeed. And don’t forget the blankets. America was once the arsenal of democracy, notes Elliott Abrams. We are now its linen closet.

Why no antitank and other defensive weapons? Because we are afraid that arming the victim of aggression will anger the aggressor.

Such on-the-ground appeasement goes well with the linguistic appeasement whereby Obama dares not call radical Islam by name. And whereby both the White House and State Department spend much of a day insisting that the attack on the kosher grocery in Paris had nothing to do with Jews. It was just, as the president said, someone “randomly shoot[ing] a bunch of folks in a deli.” (By the end of the day, the administration backed off this idiocy. By tweet.)

This passivity — strategic, syntactical, ideological — is more than just a reaction to the perceived overreach of the Bush years. Or a fear of failure. Or bowing to the domestic left. It is, above all, rooted in Obama’s deep belief that we — America, Christians, the West — lack the moral authority to engage, to project, i.e., to lead.

Before we condemn the atrocities of others, intoned Obama at the National Prayer Breakfast, we shouldn’t “get on our high horse.” We should acknowledge having authored the Crusades, the Inquisition, slavery, etc. “in the name of Christ.”

In a rare rhetorical feat, Obama managed to combine the banal and the repulsive. After all, is it really a revelation that all religions have transgressed, that man is fallen? To the adolescent Columbia undergrad, that’s a profundity. To a roomful of faith leaders, that’s an insult to one’s intelligence.

And in deeply bad taste. A coalition POW is burned alive and the reaction of the alliance leader barely 48 hours later is essentially: “Hey, but what about Joan of Arc?”

The conclusion to this patronizing little riff — a gratuitous and bizarre attack on India as an example of religious intolerance — received less attention than it merited. India? Our largest and most strategically promising democratic ally — and the most successful multiethnic, multilingual, multiconfessional country on the planet? (Compare India to, oh, its colonial twin, Pakistan.)

There is, however, nothing really new in Obama’s selective condemnation of America and its democratic allies. It is just a reprise of the theme of his post-inauguration 2009 confessional world tour. From Strasbourg to Cairo and the U.N. General Assembly, he indicted his own country, as I chronicled at the time, “for arrogance, for dismissiveness and derisiveness (toward Europe), for maltreatment of natives, for torture, for Hiroshima, for Guantánamo, for unilateralism, and for insufficient respect for the Muslim world.”

The purpose and the effect of such an indictment is to undermine any moral claim to American world leadership. The line between the Washington prayer breakfast and the Ukrainian grief counselors is direct and causal. Once you’ve discounted your own moral authority, once you’ve undermined your own country’s moral self-confidence, you cannot lead.

If, during the very week Islamic supremacists achieve “peak barbarism” with the immolation of a helpless prisoner, you cannot take them on without apologizing for sins committed a thousand years ago, you have prepared the ground for strategic paralysis.

All that’s left is to call it strategic patience.

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Iran Speeding to Nuclear Weapons Breakout

February 13, 2015

Iran Speeding to Nuclear Weapons Breakout
by Bassam Tawil February 13, 2015 at 5:00 am Via The Gatestone Institute


(Yet another article sounding the alarm on Iran. It’s interesting to note the author states that Mr. Netanyahu and Geert Wilders are only two world leaders telling the truth about Iran. However, the author also comments that many of ‘us’ do not like them or the people they represent. How ironic. – LS)

Iran, with its proxies in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Bahrain and Yemen, has surrounded all the oil fields in the region and is currently busy encircling Jordan, Israel and Palestine.

Iran not only reaches now from Afghanistan to the Mediterranean, but Iranian Shi’ites have been spreading out through Africa and South America.

By the time U.S. President Barack Obama leaves office, Iran will not only have nuclear breakout capability, but also the intercontinental ballistic missiles to deliver its nuclear warheads to Europe and North America.

If Iran can finally drive the U.S. out of the Gulf by threatening U.S. assets, it will be free to pursue still further expansion.

If the deal signed with Iran is full of loopholes, it is Obama who will be blamed. Does Obama really want his legacy to be, “The President who was even a bigger fool than Neville Chamberlain”? He will not be seen as “Nixon in China.” He will be seen as the Eid al-Adha lamb.

Recently, foreign ministers from the European Union (EU) have been holding meetings with representatives of the Arab and Muslim world, including Turkey and Qatar, with the intention of forming a “joint task force to fight Islamist terrorism.”

Turkey and Qatar, for example, directly encourage Islamist terrorism, thus there is no way they can be part of a task force to act against it.

In some Islamic thinking, such nonsense, because of its certain lack of ever seeing the light, is merely a prologue to the ultimate war between Gog and Magog (“yagug wamagu”), and heralds the End of Days.

The Arab-Muslim world engages in perpetual internal strife. Iran, for instance, with its proxies in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Bahrain and Yemen, has surrounded all the oil fields in the region, and is currently busy encircling Jordan, Israel and the Palestinians. Iran not only reaches now from Afghanistan to the Mediterranean, but Iranian Shi’ites have been spreading out through Africa and South America. Another sign of the End of Days is the United States’ collaboration with Iran against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. It means the world will eventually pay for America’s looking the other way while the Iranians are building nuclear bombs in their cellars.

These cellars may currently be distant from the shores of the United States, but they are close to all the oil fields in the Middle East. By the time U.S. President Barack Obama leaves office, Iran will not only have nuclear breakout capability, but also intercontinental ballistic missiles to deliver its nuclear warheads. Its next target will be U.S. assets in the Gulf. If Iran can finally drive the U.S. “Great Satan” out of the Gulf by threatening U.S. assets, it will be free to pursue still further expansion.

These are or will be the victims of America’s determination to drag out the problem of an exploding Middle East. That way, U.S. President Barack Obama can hand the region over to the next president, while forever pretending that the vacuum created by pulling U.S. troops out of the Middle East — now being filled by Iran, the Islamic State and other terror groups — had nothing to do with him.

This situation leaves, ironically, the lone voice of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu crying in the wilderness. As much as many of us may not like him or the people he represents, he is one of the two world leaders in the West telling the truth, warning of what is to come (Geert Wilders of the Netherlands is the other). This burden of responsibility for his people (how many of us wish our leaders had even a bit of that?) has earned him only the venom of the Obama Administration, who see him as trying to spoil their strategy of leading by procrastination.

It is also becoming increasingly clear that the Obama Administration’s policy consists of running after Iran, in order to concede everything it wants, just to be able wave a piece of paper not worth the ink on it, claiming there is “a deal.” Iran, for its part, would probably prefer not to sign anything, and most likely will not. Meanwhile, both sides continue strenuously to claim the opposite.

Western leaders just seem not to be programmed to understand the capabilities of other leaders, and how they, too, negotiate, manipulate and hide behind lies. Obama’s Russian “Reset Button” did not work; his “Al Qaeda is on the run,” did not work; “We shall never let Russia take the Ukraine” did not work; and the unwinnable Israel-Palestinian “Peace Process” did not work.

Obama, in order to wave a piece of paper not worth the ink on it, seems eager to fall victim to bogus promises, worthless treaties and other leaders’ outright lies — only to look an even bigger fool than Britain’s former Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain. After meeting with Germany’s with Adolf Hitler in 1938, Chamberlain returned to Britain boasting of “peace in our time.” But Chamberlain did not have the luxury of seeing a Chamberlain duped before him. If the deal signed with Iran is full of loopholes, it is Obama who will be blamed. Does Obama really want his legacy to be, “The president who was an even bigger fool than Neville Chamberlain”? He will not be seen as “Nixon in China.” He will be seen as the Eid al-Adha lamb.

Bassam Tawil is a scholar based in the Middle East.

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Missiles and menaces in an Iran-Russia-North Korea alliance

February 13, 2015

Missiles and menaces in an Iran-Russia-North Korea alliance, The Hill, Michael Ledeen, February 13, 2015

Iranian scientists are often very good, and their missiles are excellent, but the satellite was not a product of Persian technology. According to well-informed Iranians, 70 percent of the package is Russian, 20 percent is “Asian,” (i.e., North Korean), and the rest comes from Europe. The Iranian input was gluing it together.

It’s no coincidence. Russia, Iran and North Korea are in active cahoots. They are pooling resources, including banking systems (the better to bust sanctions), intelligence and military technology, as part of an ongoing war against the West, of which the most melodramatic battlefields are in Syria/Iraq and Ukraine.

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At the beginning of February, Iran sent a spy satellite into orbit, the first time it had done so in three years. As you’d expect, they bragged about it, proclaiming it a triumph of national scientific know-how according to Agence France-Presse:

The satellite was locally made, said the official IRNA news agency, as was its launcher, according to [Iranian President Hassan] Rouhani, who noted that Iran’s aim is to have no reliance on foreign space technology.

“Our scientists have entered a new phase for conquering space. We will continue on this path,” Rouhani said in a short statement on state television.

Iranian scientists are often very good, and their missiles are excellent, but the satellite was not a product of Persian technology. According to well-informed Iranians, 70 percent of the package is Russian, 20 percent is “Asian,” (i.e., North Korean), and the rest comes from Europe. The Iranian input was gluing it together.

The composition of the satellite is significant, as it neatly provides us with the proper context in which to think about the world. It shows us that Tehran is part of a global alliance that stretches from Pyongyang, North Korea through Moscow, across the Middle East and into our own hemisphere, notably Havana, Cuba and Caracas, Venezuela.

I believe that the Iranians, Russians and North Koreans want us to recognize their alliance. Indeed, at the same time the Iranians were launching “their” satellite into orbit, the North Koreans were testing an anti-ship missile with Russian fingerprints all over it. In all likelihood, it’s a Russian cruise missile.

It’s no coincidence. Russia, Iran and North Korea are in active cahoots. They are pooling resources, including banking systems (the better to bust sanctions), intelligence and military technology, as part of an ongoing war against the West, of which the most melodramatic battlefields are in Syria/Iraq and Ukraine.

To judge by their language, the leaders of the three countries think the tide of world events is flowing in their favor. Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei delivered an ultimatum to the West, saying that Iran’s war against “evil” would only end with the removal of America. Russian President Vladimir Putin marches on in Ukraine, blaming the West for all the trouble, and the North Koreans are similarly bellicose.

They are singing from the same hymnal. And they aim to do us in.

Still, not all is well with our enemies. You wouldn’t expect a brutal regime to have trouble carrying out punishment against convicted criminals, but there are several documented cases in which that has occurred. Iran applies the Law of Talion — “an eye for an eye” — so that if someone is convicted for blinding another person, the punishment is to be blinded himself. Yet Iranian doctors frequently refuse to do it, insisting that it violates their oath to “do no harm,” and they have stuck to their principles, leaving the guilty parties in jail as the authorities search for a willing doctor.

This is, to be sure, an unusual form of civil disobedience, but I haven’t seen any reports of those doctors being punished for it. Which is not to suggest that human rights are improving in Iran, any more than they are in Russia or North Korea. Quite the contrary, in fact. Human Rights Watch, which is not notoriously tough on the Islamic Republic, recently published a grim analysis of the worsening treatment of the Iranian people.

Perhaps the doctors’ disobedience will carry over to broader segments of the society.

Categories: Foreign policy, Human rights, Iran, Iranian missiles, Iranian nukes, North Korea, Russia
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Should Islam Be Banned for Blasphemy?

February 13, 2015

Should Islam Be Banned for Blasphemy? Raymondibrahim.com via Middle East Forum, Raymond Ibrahim, February 13, 2015 (Originally published under the title, “Islam: Banned for Blasphemy?”)

Blasphemy

Islam is the only religion whose core texts actively and unequivocally defame other religions.

Modern day Muslim scholars and sheikhs agree that it is permissible to defame and mock Christianity.

It is this issue, Islam’s perceived “divine” right to defame and destroy, that the international community should be addressing—not silly cartoons and films.

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Soon after Muslim gunmen killed 12 people at Charlie Hebdo offices, which published satirical caricatures of Muslim prophet Muhammad, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC)—the “collective voice of the Muslim world” and second largest inter-governmental organization after the United Nations—is again renewing calls for the United Nations to criminalize “blasphemy” against Islam, or what it more ecumenically calls, the “defamation of religions.”

Yet the OIC seems to miss one grand irony: if international laws would ban cartoons, books, and films on the basis that they defame Islam, they would also, by logical extension, have to ban the entire religion of Islam itself—the only religion whose core texts actively and unequivocally defame other religions, including by name.

To understand this, consider what “defamation” means. Typical dictionary-definitions include “to blacken another’s reputation” and “false or unjustified injury of the good reputation of another, as by slander or libel.” In Muslim usage, defamation simply means anything that insults or offends Islamic sensibilities.

However, to gain traction among the international community, the OIC cynically maintains that such laws should protect all religions from defamation, not just Islam (even as Muslim governments ban churches, destroy crucifixes, and burn Bibles). Disingenuous or not, the OIC’s wording suggests that any expression that “slanders” the religious sentiments of others should be banned.

What, then, do we do with Islam’s core religious texts—beginning with the Koran itself— which slanders, denigrates and blackens the reputation of other religions? Consider Christianity alone: Koran 5:73 declares that “Infidels are they who say God is one of three,” a reference to the Christian Trinity; Koran 5:72 says “Infidels are they who say God is the Christ, [Jesus] son of Mary”; and Koran 9:30 complains that “the Christians say the Christ is the son of God … may God’s curse be upon them!”

Considering that the word “infidel” (kafir) is one of Islam’s most derogatory terms, what if a Christian book or Western cartoon appeared declaring that “Infidels are they who say Muhammad is the prophet of God—may God’s curse be upon them“? If Muslims would consider that a great defamation against Islam—and they would, with the attendant rioting, murders, etc.—then by the same standard it must be admitted that the Koran defames Christians and Christianity.

Indeed, it is precisely because of this that some Russian districts are banning key Islamic scriptures—including Sahih Bukhari, which is seen as second in authority after the Koran itself. According to Apastovsk district RT prosecutors, Sahih Bukhari has been targeted because it promotes “exclusivity of one of the world’s religions,” namely Islam, or, in the words of Ruslan Galliev, senior assistant to the prosecutor of Tatarstan, it promotes “a militant Islam” which “arouses ethnic, religious enmity.”

Similarly, consider how the Christian Cross, venerated among millions, is depicted—is defamed—in Islam: according to canonical hadiths, when he returns, Jesus (“Prophet Isa”) will destroy all crosses; and Muhammad, who never allowed the cross in his presence, once ordered someone wearing a cross to “throw away this piece of idol from yourself.” Unsurprisingly, the cross is banned and often destroyed whenever visible in many Muslim countries.

What if Christian books or Western movies declared that the sacred things of Islam—say the Black Stone in Mecca’s Ka’ba—are “idolatry” and that Muhammad himself will return and destroy them? If Muslims would consider that defamation against Islam—and they would, with all the attendant rioting, murders, etc.—then by the same standard it must be admitted that Islamic teaching defames the Christian Cross.

Here is a particularly odious form of defamation against Christian sentiment, especially to the millions of Catholic and Orthodox Christians. According to Islam’s most authoritative Koranic exegetes, including the revered Ibn Kathir, Muhammad is in paradise married to and copulating with the Virgin Mary.

What if a Christian book or Western movie portrayed, say, Muhammad’s “favorite” wife, Aisha—the “Mother of Believers”—as being married to and having sex with a false prophet in heaven? If Muslims would consider that a great defamation against Islam—and they would, with all the attendant rioting, murders, etc.—then by the same standard it must be admitted that Islam’s most authoritative Koranic exegetes defame the Virgin Mary.

Nor is such defamation of Christianity limited to Islam’s core scriptures; modern day Muslim scholars and sheikhs agree that it is permissible to defame and mock Christianity. “Islam Web,” which is owned by the government of Qatar, even issued a fatwa that legitimizes insulting Christianity. (The Qatari website also issued a fatwa in 2006 permitting burning people alive—only to take it down after the Islamic State used the fatwa’s same arguments to legitimize burning a Jordanian captive pilot.)

The grandest irony of all is that the “defamation” that Muslims complain about—and that prompts great violence and bloodshed around the world—revolves around things like cartoons and movies, which are made by individuals who represent only themselves; on the other hand, Islam itself, through its holiest and most authoritative texts, denigrates and condemns—in a word, defames—all other religions, not to mention calls for violence against them (e.g., Koran 9:29).

It is this issue, Islam’s perceived “divine” right to defame and destroy, that the international community should be addressing—not silly cartoons and films.

Categories: Blasphemy, Christianity, Islam
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Iraqi FM Deplores US Plan to Deploy Troops to Baghdad

February 13, 2015

Iraqi FM Deplores US Plan to Deploy Troops to Baghdad, Tasnim News Agency (Iran), February 12, 2015

(With Iran in control of both Iranian and Iraqi troops in Iraq, Obama’s recent request for congressional authorization to, maybe someday if he feels like it, deploy more U.S. special forces troops seems not to be welcome. — DM)

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During a press conference in the White House on Wednesday, US President Barack Obama said the Washington-led coalition purportedly fighting against the ISIL terrorist group in Iraq and Syria is on the offensive and that he might use US special forces to eliminate the Takfiris.

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TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Iraq’s foreign minister lashed out at US plans for the deployment of special forces to his country under the pretext of fighting the ISIL terror group, saying Baghdad has not asked the UN for any such troops.

“The message that Iraq has submitted to the (United Nations) Security Council never included a request for ground forces to enter Iraqi territory to conduct such operations,” Ibrahim al-Jafari told a press conference after meetings with Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop on Thursday.

The minister further said that Iraqi armed forces were making gains against the extremist militants on their own and were not in need of more troops, Press TV reported.

“We have established a set of guidelines” for the US-led coalition, including air support for Iraqi forces as well as providing training and intelligence, Jafari said, emphasizing that “no country has regular armies or ground troops present in Iraq except for providing training and counseling.”

Bishop, in turn, said Australia’s role in Iraq was solely restricted to aerial support, training, advice and intelligence, adding, “We have not sought to expand our role to include combat troops.”

During a press conference in the White House on Wednesday, US President Barack Obama said the Washington-led coalition purportedly fighting against the ISIL terrorist group in Iraq and Syria is on the offensive and that he might use US special forces to eliminate the Takfiris.

His remarks came hours after he asked Congress to authorize a three-year war against ISIL “and associated forces.”

Iraq has been facing the growing threat of terrorism, mainly posed by the ISIL terrorist group.

The ISIL militants made swift advances in much of northern and western Iraq over the summer, after capturing large swaths of northern Syria.

Since late September, the US and some of its allies have been conducting airstrikes against the ISIL inside Syria without any authorization from Damascus or a UN mandate.

Meanwhile, a combination of concentrated attacks by the Iraqi military and the popular forces, who rushed to take arms after top Iraqi cleric Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani issued a fatwa calling for fight against the militants, have blunted the edge of the ISIL offensive.

Categories: Combat troops, Foreign policy, Iran, Iraq, Iraqi military, Islamic State, Obama, Terrorists, U.S. Congress
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