The article "Egypt becomes a nightmare for Muslim Brotherhood" by Frank Lindsey is speculative. The Brotherhood may have lost some elections in student unions, just like our Australian student unions don't vote conservative, but the Brotherhood is firmly in control and is being supported by billions in aid from the US government so long as it does not abrogate its treaty with Israel. However, Frank’s article is conceding my point, that Egypt would be better off with a secular government than a Muslim one under Sharia law.
Luke and Frank, NCC state presidents, have not dealt with the core of my article:
l. Does the NCC consider Islam a benign religion like the Baptists or does it concede that it is a not only a religion but, in the words of Rev. Mark Durie, a totalitarian ideology? Durie's view is supported by the organisations who are in Coalition with the NCC on pro-life and pro-family issues: Family Voice Australia, Salt Shakers, Australian Christians, Culture Watch, Rise Up Australia etc. The NCC held no consultation with any of these groups or the deleted writers before embarking on its new undefined policy.
2. Does the Pat Byrne really think terrorism is a rarity? Re the Boston bombings the editorial of the Australia/Israel Review, May 2013 provides a perceptive analysis:
"....What is now counterproductive is to decline to draw the necessary conclusions that this was yet another part of a widespread campaign of terror motivated by the spread of transnational, violent radical Islamist ideology...."
The inspiration for this ideology comes from Islam’s scripture, the Quran: "Fighting is obligatory for you, though you dislike it." [Sura 2:126]. The word in Arabic for fighting means "to kill." And it says also "I shall cast terror into the hearts of the disbelievers. Cut off their heads, and cut off their limbs." [Sura 8:12] The Boston bombers may have killed only a few but they did succeed in severing the limbs of several.
This is what the NCC needs to consider instead of distancing itself from those who provide insightful critiques of Islam.
Greg Byrne

Luke McC (8 May) suggests that a simple phone call to the NCC office could have clarified their policy in regard to Islam. Well I wrote three letters to the President and Vice President Pat Byrne of the NCC and one to the National Secretary of the Australian Family Association early in 2012 trying to ascertain what was the cause of the antipathy towards me apparent in the attitude of Pat Byrne. I never received a reply.
In addition, as a partner of the World Congress of Families, I offered a free VIP registration to Pat Byrne to attend the World Congress of Families VI in Madrid in May 2012, and also invited him to chair an Endeavour Forum Inc. public meeting in Melbourne in August 2012 at which eminent US lawyers were speaking on pro-life issues. Pat declined both invitations as he is entitled to do, but he never took the opportunity on either occasion to discuss with me just what he objected to in any of my articles for News Weekly or AD 2000.
More recently the WA branch of the NCC is rejecting emails from NCC supporters who wish to provide information and discuss Islam. This is hardly conducive to dialogue. Secret decisions and behind-the-scene manoeuvreing may have been appropriate strategy for the NCC when it was battling communists in the trade unions in the 1950s but it it won't work in the internet era of the 21st century. I am not a communist and I don't claim any right to be published in NCC journals. But I and the other website-deleted writers do deserve the basic civility of an explanation before we are besmirched by claims that our articles published in NCC journals are damaging the reputation of the NCC.
Babette Francis

I have recently been reading a little of the 7th century history of the
stablishment of Islam as a religion, so I cannot claim to be well read on the subject.
However what I have read is so similar to what we see today of Islam
that I shudder to think what we are facing with the high level of Islamic immigration.

Mahomet was a terrorist war lord in 642 who claimed the angel Gabriel
visited him with a message from Allah.
One of the interesting things that happened was when his brother in law died he wanted to marry his widow.
This was apparently forbidden by custom at that time.
Very conveniently Gabriel turned up that night and said that Allah had OKed the marriage !
Oh, and Gabriel said he could also have more than one wife.
How convenient.

Therein probably lies the custom of cousin marriage which has blighted
the arabs ever since.
Sometimes argue that the Bible has parts that support the killing and
stoning to death, but from memory that is only in the old testament.
Christianity has ruled out those punishments as part of an unenlightened era.

The moslems are commanded to lie to kafirs, (you & me), if it will advance Islam.
That is why no treaties made with Islamists can be expected to last.

The Jews learnt that bitter lesson when their town was taken over as
a base for caravan raiding and renamed Medina. Those that would not
convert were slaughtered.

Mohamed also stated that if a country had even one moslem residing
in it, it had to be ruled by sharia law.
To bring that up to date, a convicted moslem in a Sydney court refused
to stand to be sentenced. His reason;
"I do not recognise the court as I am only answerable to Allah and Sharia Law."

There are many in the country now who do not have to obey our laws.
They consider them to be null and void.

That is the way it is and all the waffle in the world will not change that !

Hmm, a little more,
In contrast to the Bible the Koran is the direct word of Allah and
cannot be reinterpreted and is unchangeable.
Therein lies the problem that the rest of the world has with Islam.

The whole history puts into context, for me anyway, why the dispute
between the Jews and the Islamists is so intense.
The Jews lived in many areas of the middle east but were either killed,
converted or driven out of Arabia.
They settled all around the Mediterranean, but when Israel was founded
in 1956 the Jews were driven out of North Africa and other moslem
countries despite having lived there for 1000+ years and many went to Israel.
So if the Arabs want the refugees to return the Israeli refugees would also have to return, hmmm.

Greg you quote from the Talmud: "He who saves one life it is considered as if he saved an entire world".

Let me quote from the Qur'an

“Therefore We prescribed for the Children of Israel that whoso slays a soul not to retaliate for a soul slain, nor for corruption done in the land, shall be as if he had slain mankind altogether; and whoso gives life to a soul, shall be as if he ha given life to mankind altogether. Our Messengers have already come to them with the clear signs; then many of them thereafter commit excesses in the earth.” Qur’an 5:32 {http://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp?chapter=5&verse=32}

Yes i’d support more serious scholarly attention to Islam. I think you would find we have a lot in common, as the quote from the Qur’an suggests.

Can i also suggest that a more nuanced approach be taken, one that seeks the truth. For example, the following article by someone who has actually studied Islam: Carly Fiorina (former HP CEO): Technology, Busness and our way of life: What’s next. {http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/execteam/speeches/fiorina/minnesota01.html)}

cont...

Greg, your view of Islam as an extremist ideology is based on ignorance. To illustrate consider recent events in Timbukutu, where ISlamists were driven out by the French after 2 years of occupation.

My first point is that Timbukutu is the site of the first university. To quote from a BBC trailer:

"The University of Timbuktu was a medieval University in Mali, West Africa which comprised three schools; namely the Masajid of Djinguereber, the Masajid of Sidi Yahya, and the Masajid of Sankore. During its zenith, the university at Timbuktu had an average attendance of around 25,000 students within a city of around 100,000 people. There were four levels within the University curriculum, that included, the "Circle of Knowledge", the "Superior Degree", the "Secondary Degree", and the "Primary Degree". Teachings mostly consisted of Quranic principles; however, literature covering topics of science, mathematics, and medicine,among other disciplines. "
{http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.co.uk%2Fwales%2Farts%2Fsites%2Fprogrammes%2Fpages%2Ffrom_wales_to_timbuktu.shtml&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNGU-wc0rlriNnEtxw4dagHKrQqHeQ}

So how can this, or the history of the Moors (as recounted in Fiorini's speech in the previous post) be a product of an extremists ideology?

Secondly, the Islamists' occupation saw the library ransacked and the tombs of leading Islamic scholars desecrated {http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailykos.com%2Fstory%2F2012%2F07%2F03%2F1104872%2F-Black-Kos-Tuesday-s-Chile&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNG5Qey9p6528enGA_xwAnKer4rGbA} .

It is only through the efforts of the locals and the Ford foundation that they were able to smuggle out 90% of the manuscripts {http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D_4pJTaiev8k}.

The point i'd like to make with this example is that Islamists are hell bent on destroying Islamic culture or any culture!...clearly they need some education in their own faith and heritage!

Obviously, they can not claim to be acting in the name of Islam

So we do have much in common... including our enemies!
Salaams