A frequent letter-to-the-editor writer (who frequently defends Islam) attempts to allay fears re the report that Canada's Muslim population will triple by 2030:
...Islam is a religion of peace and instructs its followers to display tolerance to the views and customs of the society in which they reside. Followers of Islamic principles in its true form display modesty, kindness to others and the poor, and adhere to a moral code similar to that practised by Christians. Islam has been used as a tool by some individuals to obtain power over the masses. The end result has been the transformation of Islam into an incoherent body of teachings as displayed in certain countries. Strict observances, punishment and extremist behaviour is not grounded in Islam...
Leaving aside the obvious taqiyyah (Islam "tolerant"? Tell it to the dhimmis. Islam used as a tool by "some individuals" to obtain power? Oh, you must be speaking of Islam's founder, the original holy warrior. Strict punishment not grounded in Islam? Hello, sharia-decreed amputations!) the above reminds me of the lame arguments proffered by fans of Communism--that, done correctly, it will result in a wondrous Utopia, the problem being that no one has yet figured out how to do it "properly".
If it's that hard to figure out, it doesn't--it can't--work.
You will read nada in this piece in the Toronto Star by a Columbia U. history prof (a useful idiot double-header) about the sharia imperitive and how it drives the faithful to want to enshrine Allah's law as the state's modus operandi. Instead, the prof blames the U.S.--for Iran's theocracy, for Egypt's crumbling autocracy--and urges everyone to accept the inevitablity of the Muslim Brotherhood's dominance:
Washington’s reluctance to embrace a post-Mubarak Egypt reflects gratitude for his past support of American policies in the Middle East. But even more it reflects a fear that the Muslim Brotherhood will somehow emerge as the dominant force in a new Egypt. Yet it was precisely America’s decision to cushion the Shah’s fall and defy popular demands that he be held responsible for his autocratic rule that led to the Iranian hostage crisis.
There is no way of knowing how Iranian-American relations would have developed if America’s diplomats had not been held prisoner for 444 days. But that highly dramatized rebuke of American policy was clearly the tipping point in America’s demonization of the Islamic Republic, and vice versa. And it paved the way for America’s support, first tacit and later overt, for Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Iran.
There is no way of knowing how Iranian-Amerian relations would have developed? Yes there is. With the sharia-fiends in charge, America would still be Satan personified. And if the Ikhwan prevails in Egypt and the other falling Arab dominoes--same thing, only worse.
Remember, people, there is a religious conspiracy to rule the globe, only it isn't secret and it isn't Jewish. It's the Ikhwan.
Deja vu, no? From AFP:
TUNIS — Arsonists set fire to a synagogue in the southern Gabes region of Tunisia, a leader of the local Jewish community said Tuesday.
"Someone set fire to the synagogue on Monday night and the Torah scrolls were burned," Trabelsi Perez told AFP, criticising the lack of action by the security services to stop the attack.
"What astonished me was that there were police not far from the synagogue," added Perez, who is also head of the Ghriba synagogue on the island of Djerba, the oldest synagogue in Africa...
The Muslim Brotherhood "non-violent" and biddable? Don't you believe it for a mo' (or a Mo') writes Andrew McCarthy:
It is simply delirious to suggest that we can work with the Muslim Brotherhood, that the Brotherhood has renounced violence, or that a Brotherhood-led government will ultimately be better for the United States or, for that matter, for Egyptians.
We have two principal interests in the region: peace and anti-terrorism. Say what you will about Mubarak, who has committed abominable abuses and stunted the growth of civil society — albeit in the face of a non-stop terrorist threat that is more immediate and existential than anything we face in the U.S. Mubarak has also kept the peace with Israel, and he has been a real ally against terrorists (as opposed to “allies” who profess allegiance with us but do more to abet than defeat jihadism).
By contrast, the Muslim Brotherhood, which is staunchly opposed to the West and which supports aggression against U.S. forces operating (and promoting democracy) in Muslim countries, is pledged to the destruction of Israel. Hamas is a Brotherhood franchise. The Brotherhood would neither keep the peace nor support our efforts against terrorism. Its doctrine is a pro-terrorist doctrine. If you fall for its claims to be against “terrorism,” you are falling for a word game — they do not consider attacks against Israel or against Western forces in Muslim countries to be terrorism. They consider that to be resistance...
"Can't we all get along?" pleads the leader of the free world (sounding like a pathetic guy who's taken a pummeling, and who can't figure out what to do now).
As if Egyptians are paying any attention to the voice of this clueless pipsqueak.
How glad the scads and scads of
Ahmeds and Muhammads would be
If they were "free."
But you're so "charismatic,"
The choice of the fanatic.
You appeared and people cheered.
You're the straw man of the raving Muslim Bro's.
How they won you, it was easy, I suppose.
It's not that you're magnetic
But Hosni got 'em too splenetic
And anon he will be gone.
They've got a crush on you,
Mo ElBee,
All the day and night-time
Hear them seethe.
Mubarak he was so tight-fisted
But he's been thrashed and been resisted.
Could you lead, could you hold?
Or like a timid Prufrock will you fold?
The world is pushin' such mush.
But will the Ikhwan crush
Their baby--that's you?
How does one condemn the persecution of Christians in Egypt without actually using the word "Christians" (because to do so breaches P.C., and would be rude to Muslims)?
Easy-peasy for the "non-violent" masters of P.R., the Muslim Bro's.
The civil unrest in Egypt has had at least one semi-positive effect. It has united left (as exemplified by Hillary Clinton) and right (as exemplified by Elliott Abrams) in hyper-optimism. Alas, it's a folie a deux, as both sides have persuaded themselves that the land where the Muslim Brotherhood got its start and remains a going (and growing) concern is capable of becoming, in Mrs. Clinton's words, a "real democracy."
Update: Caroline Glick calls the Ob-optimists "clueless":
What has most confounded Israeli officials and commentators alike has not been the strength of the anti-regime protests, but the American response to them. Outside the far Left, commentators from all major newspapers, radio and television stations have variously characterized the US response to events in Egypt as irrational, irresponsible, catastrophic, stupid, blind, treacherous, and terrifying.
They have pointed out that the Obama administration's behavior - as well as that of many of its prominent conservative critics - is liable to have disastrous consequences for the US's other authoritarian Arab allies, for Israel and for the US itself.
The question most Israelis are asking is why are the Americans behaving so destructively? Why are President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton charting a course that will necessarily lead to the transformation of Egypt into the first Salafist Islamic theocracy? And why are conservative commentators and Republican politicians urging them to be even more outspoken in their support for the rioters in the streets?
Does the US not understand what will happen in the region as a result of its actions? Does the US really fail to understand what will happen to its strategic interests in the Middle East if the Muslim Brotherhood either forms the next regime or is the power behind the throne of the next regime in Cairo?
Distressingly, the answer is that indeed, the US has no idea what it is doing..
Update: Pessimist-realist Barry Rubin writes:
(T)he White House is now calling for a smooth transition in Egypt. In other words, after one week of not-so-gigantic demonstrations, President Barack Obama is openly calling for the downfall of a 60-year-old regime that has been allied with the United States for about 40 years in the most important country in the Arab world.
It’s one thing for the president to urge moderation, no violence, and efforts at compromise. It’s another to push the Egyptian government out of power and possibly usher in a new era of catastrophe for the Middle East and the world.
Couldn’t the U.S. government wait a bit and see what happens? Couldn’t it express public support for the regime and privately urge reforms and a change of personnel? Doesn’t it have any sense of the danger of anarchy or anti-American forces coming to power in Egypt?
Remember, it doesn’t have to be an Islamist regime. It can be an Islamist-radical nationalist government with a moderate front man. The outcome could make Iran’s revolution look like a picnic...
Mark Steyn, a chap who's had his innings with the bullies who keep the thoughts of Canadians "pure," is on the whole cheered by the Lars Hedegaard acquittal. "This is an encouraging verdict," says Steyn,
because it shows how easily the statist enablers for Islamic imperialism crumble to dust when you shine a light on them. That's why it's important to internationalize these cases - to emphasize that Ezra Levant is Elisabeth Sabaditsch Wolf is Geert Wilders is Lars Hedegaard. As Ayaan Hirsi Ali says, we have to spread the risk, so that the Islamic supremacist thugs understand that they will have to kill us all. So it is a victory, if not for free speech then at least for the western resistance.
Hear, hear. Of course, soon enough that resistance will have to contend with spiralling Muslim demographics--By 2030 Canada's Muslim population to triple, according to the headline in today's National Post. That's likely to advance the cause of halal-approved soups and sharia financing, but unlikely to do much good for the resistance or for our fundamental freedoms, least of all free speech (a big no-no for those with a sharia-infused worldview, wary as they are of "blasphemy" and the impudent loudmouths who practise it).
