N

o political choice is ever a 0/100 or a 100/0 affair.  We balance, sift and finally settle, selecting the candidates we will reject and the ones we will vote for.

With Barack Obama, I quickly felt that his leftist voting record and his transparently disingenuous rhetoric was bad news for America and I hoped Hillary would win the Dem nomination – not so much because I thought that would make it easier for the GOP nominee to win, but because it meant that no matter who won, America would be in better hands than it would be if it was in Obama’s.

Still, he wasn’t 0/100 with me.  I thought that his unique heritage could play well on the foreign policy stage, even if I didn’t trust his own policies.  When gaps are huge – as they are between radical Islam and us – bridging has to come first, with policies following.  Obama could be a bridge, and even if there are downsides to bridging, there is an upside (again not a 100/0 or 0/100 thing).  The upside was that Obama might spark a “moderate revolution” in Islam, creating the opportunity for the religion’s worst elements to be censored – eliminated – from within, instead of by us.

Today in Cairo this was either going to happen or not happen.  And none of us know, now that the speech has been given, whether sparking the moderation of Islam will be Obama’s legacy or not.  But we do know, and have to admit, that he was uniquely qualified by his heritage and life story to give this speech. I have read no commentaries or news reports.  I don’t know how it was received in Cairo, Tehran, Dearborn or either the right or left side of the blogosphere.  I just read the transcript on Real Clear Politics, and this is what I think.

Structurally, the speech is very basic.  It defines seven issues and introduces each by finding and celebrating our common ground in that area before detailing our differences and the Obama vision for resolution.  In the seven issues, he covered everything I wanted him to cover, including in #5 the one with the most potential power: women’s rights. If the women of Islam begin to demand rights, it will be a great force toward moderation and economic development, and I hope that Islamic women and men will be inspired by those words. 

The speech strained credulity and history at times trying to find common ground, as was the case early on when he cited the Treaty of Tripoli as evidence of a long, normal history between America and Islam:

I know, too, that Islam has always been a part of America’s story. The first nation to recognize my country was Morocco. In signing the Treaty of Tripoli in 1796, our second President John Adams wrote, “The United States has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Muslims.”

“Recognize” is a unique way to put the relationship characterized by this treaty, which was all about war and piracy and slavery and extortion – hardly the basis for Islam always being a positive part of America’s story.  And it wasn’t John Adams that drafted the very controversial Article 11he quotes from, it was the diplomat Joel Barlow, who negotiated the treaty.

These oratorical stretches at the beginning of each of its seven sections are the points of the speech that are the must vulnerable, and surely will be the target of criticism.  I get it; he wants to show the connection, but the very fact that the connction is sometimes so hard to find reveals the difficulty of the challenge.

It is naive to think that one speech would transform the world; that’s the “magic bullet” theory that Obama seems to believe in but simply is not true.  Certain of his statements will stick in certain peoples’ craws and certain nations’ collective craws and will become their point of focus, building gaps, not bridges.   

On policy, a few things jumped out at me, most of all that he did not say unequivocally that Iran cannot be allowed to have nuclear weapons.  The closest he came to making a horrifying apology was in this section, when he appeared to apologize for our nuclear capabilities:

I understand those who protest that some countries have weapons that others do not. No single nation should pick and choose which nations hold nuclear weapons. That is why I strongly reaffirmed America’s commitment to seek a world in which no nations hold nuclear weapons.

Is he saying it was wrong for America to make the choice to become a nuclear nation?  It certainly seems so, and if that’s his belief, he’s got a lot of historical explaining to do, looking back, and he’s created a diplomatic quagmire, looking forward.

He satisfied me with his basic statements of support for Israel and surprised me in an extremely positive way with his frank condemnation of antisemitism and his statement – in Egypt, where antisemitism and Holocaust denial is a state-run business – that denying the Holocaust “is baseless, ignorant, and hateful.” I was less thrilled with his seeming acceptance of Hamas as a legitimate party going forward and his condemnation of Israeli settlements – but I loved that Holocaust talk!  How will it play in the Muslim world? We’ll see, but it certainly did no harm.

The other thing that troubled me is the promises he made to American Muslims, and the commitments he made on behalf of we non-Muslims.  He promised to make it easier for Muslims to fulfill the zakat – Islam’s charitable giving mandates – under U.S. tax law.  I wasn’t aware this was a problem, and I hope he’s not talking about making it easier for American Muslims to give to Hamas and other terrorist groups.

I’m also not sure which Americans, exactly, he was talking about here: 

Americans are ready to join with citizens and governments; community organizations, religious leaders, and businesses in Muslim communities around the world to help our people pursue a better life.

I know a few Americans who are doing that.  They’re called “missionaries,” and they have to live almost underground, fearful of religious persecution at any turn.  I fear Obama is calling for something akin to the radical Americans who went to Cuba in the 60s to harvest sugar cane – will there be troops of progressives trekking to Libya now, coming back with Islamic doctrination rather than leaving behind American ideals?

Then there was the ludicrous.  There always has to be the ludicrous in an Obama speech.

We will open centers of scientific excellence in Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia, and appoint new Science Envoys to collaborate on programs that develop new sources of energy, create green jobs, digitize records, clean water, and grow new crops.

Barry, Barry, Barry.  These people are living with intermittent electric power, water they can’t drink, and they use dangerously over-crowded public transportation or motorbikes or even donkeys and camels to get around.  Digitizing medical records when you’re going to clinics that wash and re-use wound dressings?  Green jobs when any job will do, thank you?  Leave the appeasing of the U.S. Greenies at home!

Still, I go back to the beginning and say this was a speech only Barack Obama could have given, and I have to say he did it well.  His audience wasn’t us, it was them, and he did not come off as either weak or arrogant, the two directions that would have sunk this initiative.  He positioned – perhaps too subtly for some – his country as a force for good, and held us up as an economic and human rights ideal.  He will be the source of many, many conversations in the Muslim world for some time to come, many of them focusing on this, the big question:

All of us share this world for but a brief moment in time. The question is whether we spend that time focused on what pushes us apart, or whether we commit ourselves to an effort – a sustained effort – to find common ground, to focus on the future we seek for our children, and to respect the dignity of all human beings.

My guess:  As is the case now, most of us will work toward common ground, a good future for our children and respect for others.  And a few radical Islamists will continue to focus on destroying all things not Islamic and creating a new caliphate.

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E

laina Cohen has labored long and hard for England’s leftist Labour party, slogging the precincts, pimping the candidates, collecting the cash.  So she felt it was her turn to head up an inner-city ward and submitted her application.

It came back stamped “Too white and too Jewish.”  Here’s the story:

Elaina Cohen claims that Labour councillor Mahmood Hussain said he would not support her application for an inner-city ward because ‘my Muslim members don’t want you because you are Jewish’.

Mrs Cohen, 50, has made an official complaint about the alleged remarks made by Mr Hussain, a Muslim and former lord mayor of Birmingham.

She said: ‘I am shocked and upset that a member of the Labour Party in this day and age could even think something like that, let alone say it.

‘People should not be allowed to make racist comments like that. If someone in the party feels I cannot represent them because of my colour or religion, that’s ridiculous.” (Daily Mail)

Cohen argued that she had worked hard for Birmingham’s Muslim community and had even been on official visits to Pakistan as part of her Labour labors – but, really, who’s she kidding with that “ridiculous” line.  Britain’s Labour party has encouraged massive immigration of Muslims in an effort to secure long-term dominance in local government and Parliament and has kowtowed to their every whim.  You want British public toilets to not face Mecca? Sure! You want police dogs to wear booties when searching your houses? Sure! You want us to ban our own flag because it offends you?  Why the heck not? You want welfare for your mulitple wives even though polygamy is illegal in England? Why didn’t you ask sooner!

You want Jews sent to extermination camps?

Hussssssain has denied making the comments. But then we know the Qur’an says it’s fine and dandy to lie to infidels in order to further the jihad, and, as it happens, Cohen had a witness:

Lorraine Briscoe, who runs a local community association, was sitting next to Mrs Cohen when the conversation took place on speakerphone last Tuesday.

‘I was disgusted that a councillor could make comments like that in 2009,’ she said.

‘He told her, “They will not vote for someone who is white and Jewish. My Muslim members don’t want you because you are Jewish”.

‘Elaina then asked him if he had talked to his Muslim members about it and he said, “I don’t want to talk about it with you” and hung up. 

Two days after the incident, Cohen’s application to run was summarily rejected.  She has filed an official complaint with, if you’ll excuse the term, Labour’s management.  Get ready for liberal antisemitism, round two.

Hat-tip: Mere Rhetoric

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E

ven though I’ve taken a leave of absence from the Watcher’s Council so I can have more time to work on my geopolitical thriller, I still make it over to Watch of Weasels for the Weekend Weasel post.  Bookmark it if you haven’t already, because the Watcher always does an outstanding job with it.

This week’s post, Weekend Weasel: Sharia Apologists, is a great read, setting up a conversation with Mrs. Weasels and a relative with the quaint name of Muttonhead as a tutorial on the differences between Sharia and Jewish law and the Christian and Catholic provisions that followed.

Having been through many of these conversations with Muttonhead I already knew where the argument was going before she got there. The myth that there is some sort of equivalence between Jewish law or even Catholic ecclesiastical doctrine is a common myth perpetuated by the left; a seed planted by pro-Sharia advocates as a part of the psychological war on all things not Islamic.

The term “useful idiot” was commonly used to refer to soviet sympathizers during the cold war (even though it originated much earlier). Today’s Sharia apologists are an extension of that sentiment although more dangerous in my estimation because the spread of Sharia is a worldwide phenomenon as is liberalism through ignorance.

The post has some terrific quotes on the subject, and when you see the differences laid out, it gives you a chill.  The conflict between Sharia and Judeo-Christian based law is stark, cold and frightening, and the Sharia apologists are a subtext in what reads like a cosmological thriller of good vs. evil on a grand scale. Particularly salient are the quotes by David Yerushalmi, General Counsel to Frank Gaffney’s Center for Security Policy, who concludes:

Because Jihad necessarily advocates violence and the destruction of our representative, constitution-based government, the advocacy of Jihad by a Shariah authority presents a real and present danger. This is sedition when advocated from within our borders; an act of war when directed at us from foreign soil.

Extremist? Not necessarily – and definitely the safer, more rational position for Americans to take.

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M

ore news from the “Religion of Peace” front:

HERAT, Afghanistan (Reuters) – Taliban militants publicly executed a man and girl on Monday for eloping when she was already engaged to marry someone else, an official said, in a sign of the grip the Islamists have over parts of Afghanistan.

Hashim Noorzai, head of Khash Rud district in southwestern Nimruz province, said the two were executed by gun shots in front of a crowd of villagers.

hat-tip: Infidels Are Cool

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P

eople who believe in karma and reincarnation better be very careful to live good lives … or they could be reborn in Pakistan. Here’s the latest from that lovely home of 176 million Muslims:

CHAKWAL: At least 24 persons died and 35 were injured at the Imambargah suicide bombing here.

One killer blew himself up with explosives during annual Majlis Aza being held at the Imambargah located in the centre of the town at Mohala Sarpak of City police station area. The blast ripped apart the bodies of the faithful at the Imambargah, leaving a horrific scene of scattered body parts and blood all around the incident site.

Eyewitnesses said that following a Majlis, the faithful had crowded the main gate of the Imambargah, while those entering into the Imambargah were being frisked, when a youth 16/17 year old during checking blew himself up, which resulted in on the spot death of 20 persons, while the other four succumbed to their injuries in hospital. Four children were also included among the dead, they said. (Int’l News, Pakistan)

Imagine, if you can, weekly killings of dozens of people as Baptists and Methodists take turns exploding their youth in each other’s churches. Of, for that matter, French existentialists and modernists taking turns with the exploding vests.

But that just doesn’t happen. This was just another Shi’a-Sunni tit-for-tat.  This was Islam, the only religion that fosters uncontrolled hatred both within and without. Yet they call themselves the religion of peace, and they make themselves the one religion that cannot be criticized.  This is the one religion that needs criticism and lots of it, and its efforts to squelch the human expression of concern about what’s going on in Islam will only nurture and feed its evil side.

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A

h, the Religion of Peace is at it again, this time flogging a teenage girl, who screams and cries as a circle of men watch intently. Does anyone else feel that this appears to be more like a sick sexual perversion, and not a religious event.

The girl was accused of “illicit relations” with a man, which the WSJ tells us was nothing more than appearing in public chaperoned by her father-in-law.  Of course, you will find no video of the father-in-law being flogged; it doesn’t exist because he wasn’t – the sin is just not his problem.  And as more evidence of the low regard Islam has for women, near the end of the clip, the girl stands up and a man can be heard shouting in the background.  According to BBC, he was angry that a mere female should be allowed to stand in the presence of men.

The clip was shot in Afghanistan, where we’re fighting the “good” war.

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T

he sheer, uncomprehendable horror of Islamic female apartheit through female genital mutilation (FGM), and the unforgivable fact that Western Civilization is allowing it due to uncontrolled liberalism, is downplayed in this Times (UK) article, which starts:

The [National Health Service] is to advertise free operations to reverse female circumcisions, with experts warning that each year more than 500 British girls have their genitals mutilated.

Despite having been outlawed in 1985, female circumcision is still practised in British African communities, in some cases on girls as young as 5. Police have been unable to bring a single prosecution even though they suspect that community elders are being flown from the Horn of Africa to carry out the procedures.

African?  As in primitive religions forgotten to the rest of the world? No, Aftrican as in Islamic, following the laws of the Prophet, shielded by the crushing multi-culturalism of England.  Indeed, the words “Muslim” or “Islam” do not appear at all in the article, which says the mutilations are carried out for “various reasons, such as religious and cultural traditions.”

This is reporting?  This is giving the people the facts they need to be intelligent citizens? Disgusting.

Let’s get real about Islamic mutilation of girls.  The lucky ones may just have their clitorus hacked out, condemning most of them to a life without sexual love, reducing them to little more than sex slaves.  The less fortunate lose their outer and inner labia in addition to their clitorus, and are left disfigured and humiliated in their roles as sex slaves.  The term for this particularly brutal form of FGM is tahur—which means “cleansing” or “purification.”

 According to Frontline, more than 130 million women are living today with the results of this barbarism, and more than two million girls – 5,000 every day – are assaulted by it each year. The practice, which is frequently carried out with a piece of broken glass, frequently results in death, or in lives full of chronic pain and infection.  “Approximately 75 percent of women cannot achieve orgasm without clitoral stimulation,” the article continues, “thus, the possibility of sexual satisfaction has been obliterated for millions of women in the Muslim world.”

Frontline’s article is much more forthright than the incoherant, PC gibberish published in the Times, making it clear that it is not Christian, Jewish, Hindu or Buddhist girls who are being mutilated:

The Muslim communities who practise FGM will not easily abandon their barbarity. The Egyptian government, for example, banned FGM in 1996, but an Egyptian court overturned the ban in July 1997. The problem is that the clitoris mutilators point to traditional teachings that sanction FGM. Islamic tradition, for instance, records the Prophet Muhammad emphasizing that circumcising girls is “a preservation of honor for women.” A legal manual of the Shafi’i school of Islamic jurisprudence, ‘Umdat al-Salik, which is endorsed by Al-Azhar University of Cairo — the oldest and most prestigious university in the Islamic world — states that circumcision is obligatory for both boys and girls.

To borrow the take-away line from Frontlines, the British government seems to think that protecting little girls’ genitals is less important nowadays than protecting itself from the charge of being Islamophobic.  How pathetic, and how appalling that the once-proud British people are allowing this horror to continue on their shores – you’d think this might cause the people to break through the phony barrier of “Islamophobia” and put an end to Islam’s uncivilized, barbaric practices, like FGM and jihad.

hat-tip: What Bubba Knows

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G

irls may just want to have fun, but Yemeni imams just want to have fun with girls.

In an uncharacteristic flash of enlightened social policy, the parliament of Yemen recently passed a law that set the minimum age for marriage at 17, a decision that was met with yet another fatwah from irate imams:

Sana’a (AsiaNews) – Some Yemeni religious figures have launched a “fatwa” against the law recently approved by Parliament that sets the minimum age for marriage at 17. The statement, signed by the rector of Al-Eman University, Sheikh Abdul-Majid al-Zindani, and by representatives of the party Islamic Islah, is aimed at eliminating the minimum age limit.

The question of the minimum age for marriage in Yemen was brought to the attention of world public opinion last April, following the case of Nojud Mohammed Ali, an 8-year-old girl who requested and obtained a divorce after being forced to marry a 30-year-old man.

Sheesh? What was her problem? Hasn’t she ever heard of Aisha, whom the Prophet himself married when she was but six, then … er … consummated when she was nine? Jihad Watch reminds us that the Qur’an (33:21) says that constituted a “beautiful pattern of conduct.”

Hence, the 17 signers of the fatwa claim that the law has no Islamic foundation and violates Sharia, which is the law of the land in Yemen.

“The marriage age,” says the assistant secretary general of the Islah party, Mohammad Assadi, “is an Islamic rule, and political parties cannot intervene in such affairs.”

Remember that when Muslims start clamoring for Sharia in your neck of the woods.

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L

iz Robbins, writing on the NY Times’ “The Lede/Notes on the News” blog, is by all indications a woman. As such, I’m sure she finds the cause of fighting domestic violence worthy of promoting tp the NYT’s readers. Heck, she can even focus on the particular problems the Muslim community has with men degrading their wives:

Even as Mr. [Mozzammil] Hassan, 44, [who beheaded his wife Aasiya] sits in jail under a suicide watch that has been considered only a precaution, said his attorney, James Harrington, the gruesome murder has provoked some soul-searching within the Muslim-American community about the role of women and domestic abuse within Islam.

Soul-search they must, as they’re believers in a religion created, expanded and propagated by men who treated women as not much different than livestock. (No wonder females are becoming popular as suicide bombers – they hurt the enemy with no discernable loss to the terrorists’ side!)

But Robbins must soul-search herself as well because she is giving Islam a pass on the larger issue of the despicable act of “honor” killing. Without even bothering to find a compliant Muslim to quote directly, she writes:

The Muslim-American community in Buffalo and around the United States has reacted with outrage over suggestions that this was a religiously motivated killing, an “honor killing” brought on by the shame of Mr. Hassan’s wife seeking a divorce. The Hassans were originally from Pakistan. Although some Muslim fanatical extremists have justified “honor killings” because of shame brought on a family, Islam is a peaceful religion, and does not condone such violence, Muslim-American leaders have repeated in the last week as the case drew more attention.

Not to put too fine an edge on it, but screw the Muslim-American community in Buffalo and around the United States. Who do they think they are, killing two daughters in Texas, one daughter in Georgia and now disgracing our shores by beheading a wife in New York just because they refused to become compliant cows? The Texas girls, shown here, dressed wrong so their dad shot them both.  The Georgia daughter wanted to divorce an abusive husband, so her dad killed her.  And Muzzammil Hassan, rather than face his own shortcomings (this would have been his third divorce), hacked off the head of the woman who, were he a Christian, he was bound by oath to God to protect.

We are America, not Pakistan or Yemen or some other sorry excuse for civilization. If our wives or daughters stray from the straight and narrow, we don’t kill them in the name of our righteous God . (Yes, all too often wives die at husbands’ hands in America – but in the name of anger and ego, not God, and we certainly don’t say their murder honors our God; we call it what it is – a vile and disgusting sin.)

We also don’t think much of newspapers that are so swift to attack the Catholic church for child-abusing priests, but are so completely unable to confront the evil in Islam.  Fortunately, the 50+ commentors on Robbins’ post aren’t buying her coddling of Islam; overwhelmingly they are tired of this religion and those who make excuses for it.  For example:

“Many Muslim-American organizations insist that honor killing is ‘Un-Islamic.’” Yet, many scholars of Islam equally assert that the Qu’ran as well as custom permits grave punishment for “disobedient” women.” The argument that Islam is a ‘religion of peace’ has grown so tiresome in the face of so much evidence to the contrary. – MPCT

True enough.  To true for the NYT.

Hat-tip: Soccer Dad

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O

ne week too late, the New York Times has finally published a story on the brutal beheading of Aasiya Hassan by her husband, owner of a TV network dedicated to proving that Islam is indeed moderate, a faith that’s ready for prime time in a civilized world.

The coverage starts off well, but rapidly deteriorates. Here’s the lead:

A man who founded a Muslim-American television station to help fight Muslim stereotypes is to appear on Wednesday in a suburban Buffalo court on charges that he decapitated his wife last week.

Kudos to the NYT; they put the newsworthy significance – beheadings and Muslim stereotypes – right in the lead, casting the story as it should be cast.  But then the story breaks down into a senseless defense of positive Muslim stereotypes:

The gruesome death of Ms. Hassan prompted outrage from Muslim leaders after suggestions that it had been some kind of “honor killing” based on religious or cultural beliefs.

Dr. Sawsan Tabbaa, a Muslim community leader who teaches orthodontia at the State University at Buffalo, said, “This is not an honor killing, no way.”

Dr. Tabbaa added, “It has nothing to do with his faith.”

They are not outraged that she was beheaded. They are not outraged that Islam tolerates such behavior – it is, after all, the only religion in the world whose followers routinely behead people in the name of its god. They are merely outraged that someone would consider Aasiya Hassan’s death an honor killing.

But let’s look at it, shall we?  Aasiya was divorcing Muzzammil, and that’s just not allowed in enlightened Islam.  Men can divorce women easy as pie, but women divorce men? No way.  So she – she, a mere woman – was bringing shame to Muzzammil.

Now, he could have shot her, or strangled her, or crushed her skull with a tire iron or done any of a number of other well established American ways to kill in a fit of passion.  But instead, he did something almost unique to Islam – he beheaded her.  This is no easy feat.  It’s time-consuming, difficult, and very, very personal.

You behead someone not to kill them, but to send a message.  And the message Mazzammil Hassan was sending was simple:  I will not be dishonored!

The NYT, after waiting a week to cover the story, has made itself complicit in covering up the true nature of the crime.

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