Why Won't We Discuss The Elephant?

Who Should Apologize? Not the Pope

Pope Benedict XVI got in more trouble than he could have imagined last week when, in the course of a lecture at a German university, he quoted from a debate in which one of the last of the Byzantine emperors disparaged the link between Islam and violence.

The speech, which sought to denounce religiously-inspired violence, provoked a response that was reminiscent of last fall's Danish cartoons controversy. Then, as now, the perception of an insult to Islam resulted in Muslim violence. A nun in Somalia was murdered and churches across the West Bank were torched. More horrors were promised and, in the face of intolerable international pressure, the Vatican did the unthinkable: make a public and tacit admission that the Pope was wrong about something.
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For over six decades the Vatican has refused to admit that a former Pope might have erred by his inaction during the Holocaust. The fact that it took them all of five days to cave in to the demands of Muslim censors speaks volumes about the fear of Islamist terror and the West's lack of self-confidence is speaking in defense of its basic values.
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The notion that Muslim violence and the rise of Islamist terror is not a fit topic for public debate is the real problem. The idea that jihad or an obligation to wage holy war had nothing to do with the historic spread of Islam is as absurd as the attempt to suppress debate about contemporary Islamist terror and hate for Jews and other non-Muslims is dangerous. The violent reaction of Muslim mobs to anything, whether ironic (as was the case with the Danish cartoons) or scholarly (as in the Pope's speech) that speaks to this issue only reinforces the cogency of a critique of Islamic culture and politics in our day.

It must be realized that the retreat of the Vatican is in line with the general rout of Western Europe when dealing with aggressive Islam in recent decades. The work of authors such as Bat Ye'or ("Eurabia") and Melanie Phillips (" Londonistan") have demonstrated other examples of this trend.

Even worse, editorials on the issue in newspapers such as The New York Times completely missed the point about the need to confront Muslim intolerance. By accepting the idea that the Pope had been insensitive, those who urged that he apologize implicitly accepted the idea that any aspect of Islamic practice, including jihad, is above criticism. But appeasing the "Arab street" in this manner will not work. It will instead just be taken as proof of the strength of their position and encourage even worse outrages in the future.

That a world religious leader such as the Pope cannot think aloud about the links between faith and bloodshed without fear is exactly what is wrong about exchanges between the West and the Islamic world.
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If this episode deters the Pope and others from further exploring these themes, it will be a major victory for the jihadist mentality and a defeat for genuine peaceful contact between the great faiths of the world.

The Pope may have felt he had to apologize, but despite the dangers, thinking persons who care about the future of the West and freedom ought to be asking the same questions that he has tentatively broached.

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-To look at the rise of anti-semitism throughout Europe today, especially the way it has become so main-stream, you would think that maybe the Nazis won the war after all!.

Who won the war? Surely you think I mean the recent Israeli-Lebanese war. Actually, I was referring to World War II. In Len Deighton's SS-GB, the Nazis have won the war in Britain. If that happened, we can imagine what the press would be forced to write about the Jews.

Three of the magazine covers below are from recent issues of British Journals. The fourth one is from a real Nazi publication.
New Statesman cover for article by Pilger and Sowell.
Independent cover for Robert Fisk article about Mearsheimer and Walt's "Israel Lobby" "study."
Cartoon in the Guardian inspired by the recent war in Lebanon
Older rendtition of the same idea, from Nazi Germany. It reads "Behind the Enemy Powers, The Jew."

Isn't that what British magazines might be featuring if the Nazis had won? Are we living in the alternate reality? Perhaps the Wehrmacht came pouring across the channel and overran old blighty and there are no more swallows over the white cliffs of Dover.

No, that is not what happened, but under the cover of "legitimate criticism of Israel," anti-Semitism is becoming fashionable in Britain again.
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Most convincing is detailed written evidence of the rise in anti-Semitism submitted by police, Catholic organizations and others. The National association of police officers reports that the violence of 2000 in Israel touched off a wave of anti-Semitic incidents, which continued to rise, and reached 375 in 2003 and 532 in 2004, according to Metropolitan Police.
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Coddling of Muslim extremists, like the ambiguous anti-"Zionist" campaigns of the New Statesman, The Guardian and the Independent, is encouraging anti-Semitism. Imams are allowed to incite to genocide and murder without being prosecuted. Anti-Semitic acts are overlooked if they can be attributed to Middle East issues.

Let's see how this works. X is angry at the Jewish sons of dogs because he believes Jewish sons of dogs should not be allowed to have their own country and because he was taught that the Jewish sons of dogs bake Matzoth from the blood of Christian children and are plotting to take over the world. All this of course is pure racist anti-Semitism. X gets legitimacy for his views not only from Imams and extremists, but from "respectable" journals like the Independent who document the imaginary "war crimes" of the "Zionists" in Jenin and Lebanon. As a result of his "anger," X is moved to beat up some Jews and burn a synagogue. The good bobby on the beat perceives that X is a Muslim, however, so he attributes X's acts to "legitimate anger over events in the Middle East".
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The British parliamentary study documents a situation that exists all over Europe. No doubt it will be dismissed in the usual quarters with the usual litany of "legitimate criticism of Israel is labeled anti-Semitism." This is how the Mearsheimer and Walt screed about the "Israel Lobby" was legitimized. But the cover of the Independent issue that reviewed the Mearsheimer and Walt study tells us what it is really about.
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-The study referred to in the above article is Anti-semitism is back.

Our parliamentary report finds that many British citizens who happen to be born Jewish face unacceptable harassment, intimidation and assault.

Anti-semitism is back. Today an all-party commission of enquiry has published a report on anti-semitism which sets out in stark terms the problem. The Commission had 14 MPs on it. None is Jewish. None is active in Middle East politics. The work was carried out in a traditional parliamentary manner - open witness sessions, scores of written submissions, visits outside London.

The conclusion is inescapable. Too many British citizens, who happened to be born Jewish, now face harassment, intimidation, and assault that is unacceptable in democratic Britain. Their synagogues are attacked. Their children jostled and insulted going to school. Their social events requiring levels of security protection that no other faith or community has to undertake.
[....]

-What are some signs that Europe is being consumed into Europistan? Well, here's one. The government of Spain will start paying a "submission tax" to the Muslims of their country.

The Spanish government, true to the principle of appeasement that it rode to power after the 3-11 bombings, is considering paying money to mosques. The stated purpose is to make the mosques less dependent upon foreign money – particularly, of course, terror financing from Saudi Wahhabis or others.

That money is pouring in. The March 11 terrorist bombers were active members of mosques that betrayed strong Wahhabi influence. According to Antonio Camacho, the Interior Ministry's secretary of state security, the new payment scheme is "about keeping them from having to look outside for financing because the state does not, in a way, support their activities."

So are we to believe that because the state hasn't supported Spanish mosques, they turned to the Wahhabis out of desperation? And so money will make the Wahhabis disappear? This is the sort of harebrained scheme that only true sons of Aethelred the Unready could dream up, or perhaps more precisely true sons of Marx and Engels, so besotted with socialism and materialism that they can't fathom the possibility that anyone could be motivated by anything other than the desire for material gain. The jihad? Pah. They just want money. Give them some and they'll quiet down.
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-What are the goals of the Islamists that are conquering territory, as we speak, in Somalia, Ethiopia, and other countries in north-east Africa?

Somali Journalist: The Islamists Have a Grand Agenda; They Want to Arabize Somalia and Turn it Into an Islamic Emirate in the Fashion of Taliban
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"They Compare Their Conquest of Mogadishu to That of Prophet Muhammed's Conquest of Mecca From the Quraishite Pagans"

"Peace is sweet but peace without dignity and freedom is no peace at all. The Islamists who took the power in Mogadishu told the people to have peace, go about their business, eat and drink, conjugate and have many children, go to the mosque and pray five times a day, send their children to Madrasses where they get brainwashed and chant Koran interpreted in a satanic way by Wahhabist/Salafist clerics and give praise to Allah that the warlords who kept them hostage for 15 years have gone.

"They compare their conquest of Mogadishu to that of Prophet Muhammed's conquest of Mecca from the Quraishite pagans. They believe that they are acting on God's behest and that the Almighty guides their guns. We tell them that they are not the army of Muhammed and that they are not in anyway nearer to Allah than a woman dancing to music in a beautiful wedding or tantalizing people's inner feelings with her melodious voice. We tell them that prophet Muhammed didn't ban music and dance and did not in anyway deny people to enjoy the pleasures of life. He is the one who told Aisha to send a singing girl for an Ansari wedding and who allowed Aisha to watch African dancers on an Eid day in Mecca. Muhammed is he who said that 'God did not send me to be harsh, or cause harm, but He sent me to teach and make things easy.'"

"The Warlords Used Brute Force to Coerce People and the Islamists Use Religion to Dehumanize People"
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-It turns out that the Egyptians are not going a very good job at stopping smuggling into Gaza.
-It's very ironic that Fatah lost power when they found religion.
-There is more and more evidence building, which shows that the ISM, International Solidarity Movement, is either assisting or taking part in terrorist activities.

As a front group for Palestinian terrorists, the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) sends young people from all over the world to the training fields of the West Bank and Gaza to learn from terrorists and to aid them logistically. Stop the ISM has now obtained photographs of ISM leaders and organizers holding AK-47 assault rifles. The images show some of the ISM women disguised as Jews living in the West Bank and in the company of an Al Aksa Martyrs Brigade terrorist.

One of our volunteers in the United Kingdom for Stop the ISM managed to infiltrate the ISM late last June in the Holy Land where the ISM operates in direct support of terrorists. Our volunteer (who prefers to remain anonymous to avoid retaliatory attacks) has had prior experience going undercover for the police in the UK. The photos and intelligence he brought back are proving invaluable to intelligence agencies watching the ISM and have been in official hands for over a month prior to this publication.

Unfortunately, neither U.S. Homeland Security nor the Israeli security agencies have to date regarded the ISM as a serious threat. Some of these ISM people in these photos managed to escape; nevertheless, arrests have been made, and more are forthcoming.
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Up to now, the ISM has been permitted to use our colleges and universities to find recruits to send to the Middle East to interfere with Israeli soldiers and border police. For example, every Friday, the ISM organizes riots in the West Bank. ISM members openly boast about having been arrested for vandalizing and destroying Israeli security fences and equipment. In March 2003, fugitive Islamic Jihad terrorist Shadi Sukiya was arrested in a house the ISM rented in Jenin. Two suicide bombers from the UK met with the ISM in Gaza before blowing up Mike’s Place, a bar in Tel Aviv, killing three people and wounding more than fifty in the process.
[....]

-So, what did former Islamic Republic of Iran President Khatami speak about at Harvard?

LIES THEY LOVED AT HARVARD
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Throughout, he presented himself as former president of "Iran," rather than of the Islamic Republic - although, legally speaking, there is no state known as Iran. He also insisted on describing himself as hich-kareh - someone with no official position at all - hiding the fact that he is a member of at least 11 organs of the Islamic Republic, including the all-important Assembly of Experts.

Khatami altered more than his identity: He edited Islam into a lovey-dovey cult that abhors the use of force, is uncomfortable with capital punishment, would never fight except in self-defense and actively welcomes other faiths.
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He used a vocabulary carefully designed to hoodwink the Americans without angering his fellow Khomeinists back home. The trick was reinforced by the fact that he often said one thing in Persian, while the interpreter said something else in English for the benefit of the Harvard audience.

For example, Khatami would speak of khoshunat, which means "roughness," but the interpreter would translate it into "violence" or even "terror." Thus, the Harvard audience would think that Khatami admits that there may be terrorism in the realm of Islam - while back in Tehran, he would appear talking only about "roughness" and "coercion."

In Persian, he would speak of "sodomy," but the Harvard audience would hear "gay sex." Referring to the leader of al Qaeda, he would say "that gentleman" (Aan Agha) in Persian, but the interpreter would say "Osama bin Laden."
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Khatami was also in total denial about the bloody history of his eight years as president. There was no mention of the 1,347 men and women executed during his two terms. And when it came to the murder of intellectuals and journalists by his henchmen, he pretended that other organs of the Islamic Republic had been responsible, without his knowledge. An Iranian student raised the murder of Iranian-Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi - and Khatami, with a broad smile, said he wasn't quite sure how the poor woman had died in one of his prisons.

He spoke a great deal about the need for dialogue, tolerance and understanding. But he made no mention of the fact that he had closed down 150 Iranian newspapers, imprisoned scores of journalists and unleashed his Hezbollah hounds to crush the student revolts against his regime.
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Khatami was practicing an art known as taqiyah, which could be translated into "dissimulation" or "obfuscation." This began as a theological tool to allow Shiites to hide their beliefs in hostile environments - but Khatami used it as a political tool to deceive Americans who obviously longed to be deceived.

Toward the end of the Harvard "Taqiyah fest," however, the tail of the cat began to show out of the Hojat al-Islam's bag. Someone mentioned Hezbollah - and Khatami began waxing lyrical about his love for what most Iranians regard as a terrorist outfit created and controlled by the Islamic Republic.

According to Khatami, Hezbollah has never been engaged in any act of terrorism and is nothing but a "national resistance movement" comparable to the French during the Nazi occupation. In other words, Israel is like Nazi Germany and Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah's branch manager in Lebanon, is Gen. Charles De Gaulle.

Was Hezbollah justified in triggering a war without informing the Lebanese people and government? Yes, said the Hojat al-Islam. Why? The war was justified because Hezbollah had to liberate occupied Lebanese territory. What territory? He mentioned the Shebaa farms - a piece of land the size of Central Park which, in fact, belongs to Syria.
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The Harvard people who gave Khatami a tribune from which to deceive the American people might want to know an old Persian saying: "When a mullah calls, an undertaker is sure to follow."

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