The author has done a great job at explaining why rational people should be concerned about Islam.

Well done sir.

'Dirty Wars' was published this year. Written by Jeremy Scahill, it explains in great detail the systematic violence and wanton depravity that emerged when the world became a battlefield, and oversight was abandoned.
At some point after WWII we determined that the energy locked up under Islamic sands was ours by right. When resistance came, the Dogs of War were unleashed. Occasionally, and only occasionally given the constant provocation, those dogs turn on their handlers.
We express surprise and outrage, but what did we think was going to happen? We went looking for the devil and the devil found us. Welcome to blowback.
The tragedy is that it did not have to become like this. But how to fix it, given the spilled blood and deep, deep distrust on both sides now?

Great post exposing the violence of Western imperialism.

I might find some of the views of this author more compelling, if Islam were at peace with itself.
Rather than a hotch potch of tribes continually at war with itself.
Or continually reinventing a man made belief system, that essentially disempowers the individual, but particularly women!
If someone cuts their own throat, the author seems argue, then so should we.
The crimes against Muslims, in the west, do not go investigated, as implied in this piece of patent propaganda!
Only one western nation has a recent history of propping up dictators?
Therefore, the author seems to argue, so do all western nations.
The recent killing of a London based soldier in a very public place, is designed to instil terror!
Which as a common tactic, by radicalised Muslims, is proving entirely counter productive, and progressively removing any sympathy or natural human empathy, for/with our Muslim brothers. Maybe that is the real divide and rule goal and the author seems to be assisting just that?
At the end of the day, there is only good or evil.
And there is simply no way to justify evil.
Indeed, Jihad is a purely intense internal struggle against our very own personal demons!
Even so, we remain entirely free to chose either good or evil!
In conclusion let me add, the sooner we completely divorce ourselves from any dependence on Middle East sourced oil, and what it funds, the better!
Rhrosty.

Uthman Badar states that he is the media representative of Hizb ut-Tahrir in Australia.

This Party aims to unify Muslim nations into one Islamic State or Caliphate ruled by Sharia law and the objective is considered an obligatory religious duty.

Once Hizb ut-Tahrir has succeeded in creating a unified, transnational Islamic state it should press on to expand the state into non-Muslim areas,according to the objectives of the Hizb ut-Tahrir founder Taqiuddin al-Nabhani .

It is banned by some governments and is a powerful Islamic group in more than forty countries,especially in the UK.

Hizb ut-Tahrir achieved notoriety recently during the ANZAC Day celebrations,when the Daily Telegraph quoted:

"A RADICAL Muslim group will likely stir the anger of Diggers and their families after urging Islamic Australians not to participate in Anzac Day celebrations.

Hizb ut-Tahrir published an opinion piece on its website on the eve of Anzac Day, titled "Anzac Day is not for muslims."

It suggests those who fought at Gallipoli were part of a military "failure".

"Further, the 'Anzac spirit' is more mythology than history. It ignores indiscretions by the ANZAC soldiers such burning the belongings of locals in Egypt, brawling, getting drunk and rioting, and contracting venereal diseases due to time spent in local brothels."

Premier Barry O’Farrell has condemned the publication, saying it was "contemptible."

NSW Opposition leader John Robertson said the comments were "disgraceful and offensive.

Badar is now the apologist for the gruesome bestial terrorist murder of the British soldier,which defies belief that he could have the audacity to attempt such propaganda in Australia.

His Party is very active in the UK and it is likely that it also has managed to achieved its share of radicalizing potential terrorists.

Radical Islam use the Western democratic institutions very successfully to achieve their own anti Western goals,as is the case here.

If an Australian were to make similar comments in some Arab countries,he would either face death or jail.

When are we going to wake up?

Obviously this bloke would be much happier living in a Muslim country.

Well mate we are not going to oblige you here. Why don't you try one that all ready is Muslim.

You know the ones, where the men wage war on women & children, & blow up shoppers just for fun.

How long is it since you lived in one? Perhaps you've forgotten.

could you imagine someone from a western nation getting the freedom to talk such rot if they lived in an Islamic nation?

You have to feel sorry for Uthman Badar, trying to pretend that the passages in his own Koran which quite plainly oblige Muslims to commit aggression against non believers, kill them, cut their throats, maim them, mutilate them, terrorise them, and force them into "dhimmitude" in order to spread Islam, is a difficult task. His only hope is that those who he is trying to deceive are not smart enough to read the passages themselves and see it all written there in black and white ink.

And when his co religionists do just what his God and Prophet command and kill, maim, mutilate and terrorise non believers in order to spread the Islam, he has got a real job. First, he has to praise the Jihadis who do Allah's work while placating the victims with touchy, feely placebos in the hope that they will not wake up to the dangers of Islamic immigration before it is too late.

Quoting old Testament passages where God orders the Jews to ethnically cleanse the inhabitants of Palestine/Israel hardly equates to God ordering the Christians to continue such behaviour.

But the elephant in the room which Uthmar ignores, is that while western nations have been very accommodating towards Muslims, the only thanks they have gotten in return is endemic welfare dependency combined with very high rates of violent crime. Then there is the creation of ethnic ghettoes where the locals have fled in terror of the intimidation and behaviour of the imported Muslims. Then there is the difficulty of getting teachers to teach in areas of high Muslim infestation due to the appalling behaviour of Muslim boys, especially towards female teachers.

Next comes the penchant for Muslim boys to wander the beaches insulting western girls lying on the beach in their bikinis and generally stirring up the locals. Add to that, riots, demands that their religion be above criticism, attacks on churches and synogogues, fatwas, demands for Muslim only areas, and terrorism, and we are beginning to realise that with The Religion of Constant Trouble, we have bought a pig in a poke.

"Muslim violence pales in comparison to western violence in all respects: numbers of people injured and killed, extent of economic and social impact, and brutality."

That rather depends on which period in history is examined, during the 20th century definitely. However, if we take the record of Islam from its invention in the 7th century until modern times and adjust for relative population levels Moslem violence has probably taken more lives.
Another case of Islamic amnesia perhaps.

"The western victim is humanised through positive portrayals and family photos; the Muslim victim is but a statistic." That of course is true and the West can't defend the indefensible--the invasion and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan in particular, are war crimes.

"... their secular liberal ideologies disguised as universal values ("human rights")

This is an often repeated claim by representatives of authoritarian ideologies, basically "our people are not interested in Western liberal democracy"--usually because the citizens of Islamic nations are prevented from learning anything about the doctrine of universal human rights by the theocrats in government. Presumably the woman about to stoned to death for "adultery" or the man to be executed for "blasphemy" regard their miserable and brutalised deaths as part of Islam's rich cultural heritage and have no interest in "human rights."

This is a challenge to all Moslem apologists--- allow Westerners to educate the people of Moslem nations in liberal democracy and then allow them to make a free and informed choice--what are you afraid of? Western governments allow Moslems to proselytise their peculiar superstition in liberal democratic nations.

I'm not surprised that the author despises secular liberalism, it indeed is the enemy of superstition and oppression.

Pretty well everyone above my post has answered and rebutted the author very well ...but there is more.

1. The web site Political Islam documents very well the fact that Mohammed was having no success at growing his myth driven ideology by relying upon persuasion...so he was forced to take up arms and become a terrorist guerrilla fighter. He slaughtered people and non compliant tribes by the thousands. He was, even by those days nothing more than a thug.

The Bulletins of Christian persecution and Jewish hatred and persecution make disturbing reading at anytime and it is ongoing.

http://www.politicalislam.com/blog/category/statistical-islam/

http://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm/frm/28244/sec_id/28244

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/12/enough_of_radical_islam.html

2. Their hatred of the Jews goes way back to the origins of this primitive mediaevalist ideology, because the Jews would not join up.

But notably the original versions of the Koran were written,or cobbled together, in Aramaic, a Jewish language. There was no Arabic written language, as currently understood.Thats why they had to memorise it.Mohammed and his mates were illiterate.

It was made up of many dialects in the same way there is no such thing as an common written aboriginal language today.

http://www.politicalislam.com/blog/category/bulletin-of-jew-hatred/

3. As for being the religion of peace. Here are 10 reasons why that is rubbish as well.

http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Pages/Top-10-Reasons.htm

There is no doubt that they are on a mission and one that will do us no favours

BTW ask your self why is it that 30m jews can earn by intelligence and had work some 80+ Nobel prizes but 2 billion arab speaking muslims can only earn 7, at last count.

The argument that Muslim victims are "invisible" is nonsense, doesn't the author have Google, go to Liveleak and all the gory details are there for everyone to see, Muslims beheading defenceless Westerners, Westerners mowing down Muslims with Apache gunships, Muslims killing Muslims...in 2013 it's up to the individual Muslim or Westerner whether they take the plunge and look into the abyss of human depravity.
What the author is doing is stereotyping "Westerners" all the while standing on his and his group's record of promoting unlimited Muslim victimhood and decrying the stereotyping of Islam as a violent cult, in that he's a typical religious hypocrite.

Bigmal,
You're not wrong, not exactly but when people hold up Judaism against Islam they always omit the staggering death toll and boundless works of misery and degradation initiated by the Jewish Bolsheviks in the name of Marx. The "Big Three" religions are the real axis of evil.

Gee, the forces of reaction and Islamophobia have crawled out from under their rocks to denigrate the article. Nowhere do any of these ignoramuses actually respond to the substance of the article but instead avoid the real issue - the violence of Western imperialism.

Jay of Melbourne,

What utter bulldust!!

we are talking about Islam here- not about your mad rabid antisemitic garbage!!

Get a life.

Hi Bigmal,

So, since the Koran as delivered to Muhammad is supposed to be an exact copy of the Perfect Book held by Allah in Paradise, unchangeable and uncriticisable, are you suggesting Allah preferred to speak in Aramaic, a Jewish language ?

As for Muslim vs Western violence. let's see: this past week, car-bombings in Iraq, Kabul, Pakistan; a brutal war in Syria; riots in Turkey and Tunisia. I don't recall any car-bombings in any Western country, or brutal civil war, or even riots, except maybe pretty tame affairs in Britain - and those in reaction to Muslim violence against an unarmed off-duty soldier.

When Westerners set off car-bombs against their own people, say in a market-place or pre-school centre - or somewhere even easier like an old people's home - I'll start to pay attention to the psychotic ravings of people like Mr Badar.

Until then, I'm forced to believe - by their actions - that Muslims are practicing tekkiah when they talk about a 'religion of peace'.

Joe

The last few in the list of 10 reasons why Islam is NOT a religion of peace.

7. Islam is the only religion that has to retain its membership by threatening to kill anyone who leaves. This is according to the example set by Muhammad.


8. Islam teaches that non-Muslims are less than fully human. Muhammad said that Muslims can be put to death for murder, but that a Muslim could never be put to death for killing a non-Muslim.


9. The Qur'an never once speaks of Allah's love for non-Muslims, but it speaks of Allah's cruelty toward and hatred of non-Muslims more than 500 times.


10. "Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!"
(The last words from the cockpit of Flight 93)

"Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!"

Also the terrifying chant used by the terrorists who butchered the British soldier as they tried to cut off his head in public view.

The same one whom Badar is drawing into his propaganda.

Truly a religion of peace!

Paul Weston on the Woolwich Killing, Islam and the State of Modern Britain

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=1ocqyqjaVSg#!

loudmouth

My understanding is that because Mohammed and his followers were illiterate, that is, unable to read or write, the story was dictated by Mohammed to scribes, and the only written language available was Aramaic.That doesnt mean the Mohammed spoke it.I understand that he spoke a tribal arabic dialect.

There are several sites that will explain this.

If interested look up also palimpsets found in a minaret in Sa'ana Yemen that were some of the oldest scribings ca 11th century If I remember correctly

Here is good old sincere Uthman playing the victim and justifying the Boston Bombings,plus every other atrocity, on the Evil West.

Its all our fault!!

But when the worldwide Caliphate is established everything will be OK.
Sharia law is the answer.

Actually he is very good at the ancient art of taqiyya-lying to and deceiving the infidel dogs for the benefit of Islam.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9dFwx_OG8g

What a clever little article, turning on its head the main complaint agains islam that its so-called moderates must take a stand against the radical rump and saying it is the West and its moderates who must do the rooting out of the fanatics, not islam.

The author sprays around some examples of a drunken soldier stabbing a boy and the mysterious murder of a venerable muslim scholar as showing how islam is a victim of the West like the West is supposed to be a victim of islam.

It is third rate sophistry contradicted endlessly by the daily examples of islamic atrocities:

http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/cleansing_christians_from_syria/

Islam is a primitive religion which has not evolved since its inception. It is like a living fossil of humanity's beastial past. The author's attempt to not only show equivalence by the West with islam's violence but that it is worse is grotesque; without the West Nazism, Facism and Communism would be rampant today.

With catholicism undergoing a justified trial for its vile deeds islam will remain as the last vestige of mankind's primitive past when religious based horrors were inflicted upon humanity.

The article makes 4 points which I summarise as follows:
1) Western nations commit violence on a larger scale than Muslim countries
2) The media of the West highlight atrocities against Westerners and play down the atrocities committed by Westerners
3) The Western public is uncritical of the Western media
4) The West has some serious problems within its own liberal-democratic framework

Many commentators here appear to insinuate that these points are presented as justification for Muslim violence. That is not the case: For one the author does not make such an assertion and secondly when one points out that X is wrong this does not mean that they imply that Y is right.

To criticise the article one must evaluate whether the points raised in the article are valid and whether the arguments are sound.

Unfortunately many of the comments here ignore this and focus instead on Muslim injustices. That would result in a big fat "Fail" for your school essay because the first rule is: your comments must address the topic: Western injustices.

Others conflate the role of the author and his beliefs with the points made in the article, committing the ad hominem fallacy. Again: Fail. Whether the author has an objective with his article or not is irrelevant with regards to the validity of the points he raises.

Others attempt to retort with 'you wouldn't be able to say this in a Muslim country'. This reasoning commits the straw-man fallacy, because nowhere does the author state in this article that he could. Fail.

Others simply assert that the author stereotypes Westerners. Where does he do so? I remember him stating "most Westerners are peaceful people". Straw-man: Fail.

Others again attempt to make their point by attaching vague reasoning to undefined concepts such as 'good' and 'evil' hoping to categorize people, beliefs and behaviours. Vagueness fallacy: Fail.

As a reader we may object on an emotional level with how we interpret an article, but if we want to learn from, and contribute to a conversation, we would do well to use disciplined reasoning.

Oh come on Mitch@T4R, there are only two thing to learn from this article.

1/ We must stop feeding the rubbish in the world, in the hope that it will stop biting the hand that feeds it.

2/ We should not allow a single one more in the country, & should deport any one who so much as J walks. Only fools not only allow a 5Th column to continue to function in their country, but actually feed it as well.

I would suggest to the author that even the west will only continue to turn the other cheek for so long. When our patience finally runs out, I suggest, you aint seen nothing yet.

Meanwhile we must stop loosing some of our best, trying to help these people. They are not worth the effort, & definitely the whole lot are not worth a single one of our men's lives.

I think it might be a very good time for them to start pulling their heads right in. Once the US is self sufficient in energy, attacking them will become much more dangerous

Mitch@T4R,

"your comments must address the topic: Western injustices."

Actually you've missed the point entirely (is that a category mistake?) the key phrase is-

"Muslim violence pales in comparison to western violence in all respects: " - any attempt to refute that statement requires an examination of Moslem violence, doesn't it? Of course there are a number of parameters we could use.

We could also agree with the author's proposition, but reject his supporting arguments.

I disagree with the points that you have raised concerning how to evaluate a written article, Mitch@T4R.

It is useless to address any point an author has made without at least trying to understand the underlying motivations which caused them to write that article. An article written about gun control should not be taken seriously if it is discovered that the author is a vegan.

People who write articles may not be honest and they can use topics to push other agendas (such as animal rights) which they know most people would find potty. They therefore use other topics as Trojan Horses for their true agenda. Such people can, and do, submit "facts" and arguments which they know are untrue on the basis that their moral position is so elevated, that telling a few fibs is quite alright in order to defend that elevated moral position.

Similarly, people with hidden agendas refuse to acknowledge the most self evident facts, and they constantly seek ways to frustrate debate and lead their opponents away from the truth by tossing very smelly red herrings all over the place. If you consider all authors to be beyond reproach, and that what they write can not have a hidden agenda, then I would have to award you a Fail in seriously assessing the veracity of any written topic.

The North Koreans in 1951 presented to the UN the written "confessions" of shot down US pilots with headings like "HOW MY CRUEL CAPITALIST MASTERS FORCED ME TO PERFORM INHUMAN GERM WARFARE ON PEACE LOVING SOCIALIST PEOPLE"

Would you bother to "evaluate the points raised" in those confessions? Or "evaluate whether its reasoning was sound"? Or would you make the connection that the "confessions" were invalid and instead use the self evident fact that the North Koreans were lying to discredit anything they said?

Whereas your logic is valid when it comes to articles written by reputable people. Simply regarding all authors as paragons of virtue, and taking what is read at face value, is a great way to get led up the garden path.

I would like to add to my above post.

A preliminary reading of Uthman Badar article reveals that he is a Muslim. His credibility has taken a couple of hits, right there. Central to his loss of credibility, is the religiously ordained concept of "Taqqiya", where it is not considered a sin to lie to non believers in order to further Islam. If Muslims have a credibility problem because of that, they should take it up with their imams.

Next Uthman claims that the 500 passages in the Koran in which Allah instructs his followers to make war upon, kill, maim, torture and cut the throats of unbelievers have been "taken out of context." My personal opinion is that he knows that this is not true. He is defending the indefensible and he has to get creative with the truth to do that.

Next he equates an unsolved murder of a Muslim man in Britain, and the stabbing of a child by a drunken British soldier (who was punished for his crime by the British Army) with the murder of a British soldier for religious reasons by a Muslim man in London shouting "Allah Akhbar." I am sorry, Mitch@T4R, but I have enough to know that this character is not arguing in good faith.

Confirmation comes when he blames westerners for the deaths of "half a million" children because of UN sanctions on Iraq. That doesn't wash. The one thing he does not address is that these sanctions were lawfully administered by the UN because of the intransigence of one Saddam Hussein who played sillybuggers with UN weapons inspectors

I could go on, especially pointing out his opposition to secular liberalism, but I think I have made my point.

This is a propaganda puff piece full of outrageous assertions which are not even worth taking seriously. It is far more effective to attack the entire ideology, point out its flaws and contradictions, and examine the intent and effect that ideology has, rather than get bogged down in detail refuting claims which one strongly suspects the author already knows is untrue.

LEGO

Totally agree with you...it is a puff piece.

Islamists need to concentrate on fixing up their own primitive political ideology of a religion, before hectoring others on completely trumped claims.

He may have some moral and ethical basis if there was some semblance of equivalence between what happens in liberal democracies, where he now lives, compared with Islamic states and sundry despotic tribal regimes that he and his followers came from...and are pouring in here in illegal boat loads at the rate of near 200 day. Notably, people are not going the other way.

Try taking a bible into Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere, see how you get on.

Or point it out to women, that in Saudi they are not even allowed to have a driver’s license ...and that’s on top off being told how to dress by a bundle of ignorant Wahhabi mullahs....Mullahs epitomised by this appalling level of ignorance.

http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2013/06/islamism-decade-of-spreading-polio

Go to Malaysia and see how the bumis get preferential treatment for key positions. Try and build a church in Malaysia etc, where they continue to contrive situations knock down Hindu,Chinese and Christian churches because they never had building permits when built 150 years ago etc ...but here in Australia we bend over to let them build their mosques.

Or listen to the ex PM of Malaysia Mahathir Moahammed giving the opening address to the opening of OIC in KL a few years ago, where he ran through the whole Islamist gamut of anti semiticism eg jews fight their wars by proxy, and are descended from apes and monkies, ie straight out of the Koran.

Whilst Islamic states are still bombing, killing, raping and pillaging themselves, try naming cases where free liberal democracies have declared war on another free liberal democracy. I would like to know of any.

bigmal

very accurate assessment of Malaysia. See how also they have treated their truely indigeneous people who are only funded in many cases for electricity and water if they convert to Islam.

From reading the comments here, the overall argument seems to be that:

a. Islam is a violent religion and Muslims are not nice people, therefore the West has had to

b. inflict violence on Muslim countries in order to stop Muslims from being violent and not-nice people, but unfortunately

c. this has not stopped Muslims from being violent and not-nice people, so

d. the West must keep on inflicting more violence on Islamic countries until they stop being violent and become nice people.

There. I’m glad we’ve sorted that out.

Killarney,

I'm not sure how on earth you come to that tortured conclusion. Here's another take on it:

A. Islam is a Utopian ideology and like all Utopias, there is room in the Islamic world only for believers in Islam - others will have to be (and have been over 1400 years) regrettably 'subtracted', as in all proto-fascist systems;

B. Islam is a religious ideology founded on violence (see above) and derives its authority from a garbled and reactionary selection from pre-existing desert, Judaic and Christian folk beliefs and half-digested biblical accounts - it is an ideology which is not to be criticised, and which is solidly based on male dominance and hierarchy.

C. It cleaves to an inegalitarian set of principles with a bogus veneer of equality between all Muslims (except for women) - there can never, in this ideology, be equality between believers and nonbelievers, such a notion would be abhorrent;

D. Muslims are no better or worse than any other people, save that they are at the mercy of a backward and destructive ideology. Their men are good-looking and their women are beautiful, but they have been locked into a repulsive set of ideas which will be extremely difficult for them to break out of, since it is supposed not only to have all the answers, but cannot be criticised.

E. Even so, one cannot NOT be a Muslim, one cannot become a non-believer - the punishment for this, as for so many other breaches of this vile code, is death. To a large extent, Muslims are trapped in a time-warp, while the rest of the world is rushing past them.

I feel dreadfully sorry for Muslims. I fear that they have many years, perhaps centuries, of violent and internecine warfare, not to mention struggles with non-Muslims, of which Syria is not just an example, but a horrific forerunner.

Joe

Uthman Badar does make some truthful observations. The Western Oligarchs are out of control since they see absolute power via nuclear weapons as being their right to rule the planet.

It is no accident that terrorists are found in Middle Eastern countries where oil or resources can be plundered. Afghanistan has $ trillions Lithium needed for our batteries as well as being an oil pipeline route from Turkmenistan.Afghanistan now provides 90% of the world's heroin. Only small time drug pushers get busted since they compete with really untouchable big ones.

People worry about the Jihadists but they are already enslaved by a greater evil,ie the Western system of debt money creation by a few private individuals.

Loudmouth

So … on the basis of arguments A, B, C, D and E, we in the West have a noble duty to keep bombing their countries, killing their people, overthrowing their governments, destabilising their societies, crippling their economies, destroying their essential infrastructure, annihilating their millennia-old cultural heritage and contaminating their natural environments.

In addition, these bad, bad people must relinquish all rights to self-defence against, or retaliation for, the treatment the West so dutifully inflicts on them.

Sounds fair.

So tell me Killarney what calumny of the past precipitated by westerners justifies this then.

http://www.meforum.org/3524/egypt-christian-children

The islamists have been doing this sort of thing since the 7-8th centuries.

Further they have been blowing up and destroying them selves on their own for centuries. Read what happened after Mohammed died.
The west had nothing to do with any of that either

Killarney, your posts are grotesque.

The West does not bomb islamic countries wily nily despite the loosely coordinated attacks by islamic forces on the West.

The West targets primary terrorist organisations like al qeada and the Taliban.

Previously nations like Iraq and Afghanistan were invaded because they were terrorist states.

Fundamentalism is the enemy of Western society and islam is the worst example of fundamentalism; conflict is inevitable yet the West has let the enemy invade us by stealth; aided and abetted by quislings, fools and traitors islam is rapidly encroaching Western nations. Bolt had an excellent post recently which sums up well the the roles the likes of you and so-called moderate muslims like Waheed Aly play in this invasion:

http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/no_waleed_a_war_against_totalitarians_is_never_fair/

No doubt you too, would like the conflict with islam to be 'fair'.

bigmal and cohenite

Thank you so much for expanding my education and de-ignorating me.

Gee whiz, there is no end to the horribleness of these people. And their horribleness has been going on for centuries and centuries. It's been going on for so long, nobody really knows how all that horribleness got started.

I'm so glad I'm a Westerner because there's no horrible stuff in our past like religious intolerance and slavery and civil wars and empires and beheadings and oppression of women. And our religion is so calming and peaceful - that's why its central icon is a half-naked man nailed to a cross, writhing in agony while being slowly tortured to death.

And, you're right, cohenite. Never let it be said that we bomb these horrible countries 'wily nily'. We do it with utmost concentration.

Killarney,

I think you are trying to manufacture an Enemy, what the great Italian writer Ignazio Silone (I think it was in 'Bread and a Stone') would have called ironically 'Our Historic Enemy'.

And it's a bit rich trying to give the impression that Islam is somehow a peaceful ideology. Apart from Indonesia (and maybe not even there, in parts), I don't think Islam has expanded in any way but through violence and aggression - from Arabia to Mesopotamia and egypt, from Egypt across north Africa into Spain, and from Mesopotamia into Central Asia, thence into India - always through wars of aggression. Marx's 'Notes on Indian History' is a chronicle of battle after battle initiated by Muslim forces.

Marc Bloch attributed the rise of feudalism in Europe in large part to the constant depredations of the 'Saracens', along with the Vikings and the various groups ravaging eastern Europe. And as a friend has pointed out to me, much of the Muslim culture in Spain that gets vaunted, even much of the architecture, was done by Jews and Christians, as well as slaves from Africa.

Keep reading on the subject, Killarney, it certainly can't do you any harm.

Joe

Killarney,

Forgive me, in my posting above (the one that goes from A to E), the points D and E were meant to be genuine, straight-out, accurate summaries, while the points A to C were meant to be characterisations of Islam, especially its ideological implications. I apologise for any confusion.

As an atheist with lingering Marxist tendencies, I don't carry any can for Christianity, but I would respectfully suggest that the Christian-oriented atrocities which you describe occurred some time ago - and it's not, surely, some sort of game where whatever Christian powers did a thousand years or hundreds of years ago, Muslims or Muslim countries can do now: what was evil then, as you rightly condemn, is even more evil now, even more beyond human and civilized behavior. Surely we know better now.

Case in point, of course, is the world's reaction to the fascist Serb attacks on people in Bosnia and Kosovo, much of them in the name of an extremely reactionary form of Christianity. I hope that no country, or people, or religion, will go down that dreadful path ever again.

Joe

Loudmouth, I can see where Killarney is coming from.

I believe that violent humans can be created (born?) into any country, culture, religion, and that growing up in a Muslim family does not mean they are more violent just because of that fact.

Both the Bible and the Koran have numerous examples of violent suggestions for their followers to consider.

I married an Irishman, and we went to Ireland in the early '90's, when the Catholics and the Protestants were shooting and bombing each other, as they had done for decades.

He had never even hit anyone in anger, but was still detained at airports we went to, for thorough questioning just because he was an Irish Catholic.....so he apparently must have been an IRA sympethiser.

He always said that most people in Ireland at that time believed that the violent thugs in the IRA, and their enemies, were all just violent criminals.
I am sure the bulk of Muslim people feel the same way.

There is a genetic link to violent behaviour, Suseonline, (95% -98% of people in jail are males) and genetics does provide the underlying personality that environmental factors, including good parenting, suitable role models, and the degree to which a culture accepts violence as a way of solving disputes, moulds the individual as they mature.

A person who may be born with violent tendencies may not become violent if his culture stresses that violence is inappropriate behaviour, and his parents, peers, and role models emphasise that point. But an average person born into a violent culture, with a medieval male code of honour where even the most casual insult must be met with immediate violence as a first resort, and where parents, peers, and role models emphasise that point, will almost certainly become a violent person.

Your claim that both the Koran and the Bible have "violent suggestions", which implies that both have parity in conditioning their parishioners to be violent, is incorrect. The Old Testament is common to the Jewish, Christian and Muslim religions, and their common God may have instructed the Jews to commit genocide on the inhabitants of Palestine/Israel, but that does not equate to the 500 passages in the Koran which specifically instruct Muslims to make war on, kill, behead, mutilate, and torture any non Muslim "near to them."

Muslims follow the teaching of Muhammad and Christians follow the teaching of Jesus Christ. The essential message Muhammad was the correctness of spreading Islam by the sword, and anyone who died fighting for Islam was the best sort of Muslim. The essential message of Jesus Christ was pacifism.

Most Muslims do not want to get involved in Jihad, but they can not sneer at the Muslims who do, because God has commanded that such people are the finest Muslims.

Most Christians do not believe in pacifism, but the underlying pacific message of their culture, is one in which most people consider violence should only be used in situations which clearly justify it. Unlike Islam, the concept of spreading Christianity today through violence is considered Unchristian.

The author calls on us non-Muslim citizens "to aggressively root out the Obamas, Camerons and Gillards leading them. Condemning aggressive wars and protesting once in a while is not enough."
What exactly does aggressively rooting out involve? Sir, is it something one can do without violence?

This might be of interest--from the conservative/right wing "counterjihad" site Gates of Vienna.

http://gatesofvienna.net/2013/06/london-violence-and-islam/

http://gatesofvienna.net/2013/06/we-changed-our-lives/

I'm sure that most commenters on this site would agree that the multi-culti Western collaborators and social engineers are undermining resistance to Islamization. The article by the Swedish blogger is particularly alarming--is Swedish society so compromised?

Well said Killarney. The Islamophobes continue their fulminations over a non-existent 'enemy' and defend the barbarity that is Western imperialism. 70 years their enemy was Jews. Now it is Muslims.

May I add this reference to the Saana palimpsets

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sana%27a_palimpsest

The significance of this is that it proves that the Koran has a history, and is not the perfect word of some deity but, like all other religions of the time, it has indeed evolved.

Sort of blows a big hole in some of the underpinnings.

Thank do for the internet and libraries and scholrly reseach inteh western tradition of Enlightenment

oops...sorry

I meant.

Thank God for the internet, libaries and scholarly research in western Enlightenment traditions

Killarney

" And their horribleness has been going on for centuries and centuries. It's been going on for so long, nobody really knows how all that horribleness got started. "

Nonsense, actually we know very well how the "horribleness" started, it started with Moslem attacks on Europe and the NE and continued for over 1000 years until the West was too technologically advanced to attack. It's simply a matter of relative power.

Moslem pirates also enslaved over one million Europeans.

So do you want to appeal to history or would you prefer to compare and contrast modern Islamic societies and liberal democracies?

I certainly don't support Western attacks on Moslem countries or Israel's colonial war, however let's not romanticise a very oppressive, expansionist and inhuman ideology.

Moslem nations should be left alone to continue their 1000 year torpor

It looks like some here do not understand the ad-hominem fallacy.

Nobody learns anything from claims like 'the author is prejudiced because he is Muslim, he is therefore not credible and therefore his arguments must be unsound'. This is the ad-hominem fallacy because it does not distinguish between the argument itself and the author and his (supposed) purposes for writing the article.

Why is bringing in the author's background a fallacy when analysing the argument he makes? Because if we allow this, then any argument would be without value: the argument remains unexamined: "he only says that because he is a Christian" says the Muslim,"she only says that because she is a Christian" retorts the Muslim." Can you detect any progress? What about the content of what they say?

A scientist says that humans have been to the moon. "of course she would say that. She is a scientist. She wants us to believe this so scientists get more tax-payer funding." Maybe it is true that this scientist has that objective, but does that mean that we haven't been on the moon?

Making unsubstantiated claims as a way to rebut an argument demonstrates inferiority in reasoning. As a result the author of the original article comes out on top, because he at least makes proper arguments. Whether these arguments are sound or not is for you to demonstrate. Such demonstration requires more than making claims.

If any comment is to have an impact it should convince people who are not already similarly prejudiced. For that you do need solid argumentation (and feel free to add emotional hooks to it, as long as you make sure the argument itself stands up to critical analysis).

Solid argumentation lists the propositions and conclusions of the argument and then shows that either at least one proposition is false or the logic used to arrive to the conclusion is unsound.

It looks like some people here are unable to comprehend that it is useless getting into an argument or debate unless you can figure out where your opponent is really coming from.

Thinking that your opponent has no self interest Mitch@T4R and is a completely impartial person who can be swayed by logic and fair debate is a naive position to take. Some people already know that you are right, but they will oppose you anyway because it is in their interests, or their demographic groups interest, to do so.

They will happily dispute the most self evident fact and make Himalayan premises on mole hill assumptions. They will toss red herrings everywhere, and argue that black is somehow white. They will make the most outrageous claims and then pretend that their claim is reasonable, demanding that you explain why it is not reasonable. They will ask you Dorothy Dixer questions, questions that are very hard to answer, and they will demand that you answer them.

The purpose, my dear Mitch@T4R, is not to debate, but to prevent debate. It is to shut you up. To confuse you and make you respond to their initiatives while they sit back and laugh at you.

If you want to go down that track, then you are an easy mark.

Now, look again at the post by Uthman Badar. Basically, he is regurgitating the very same arguments which anti Muslims routinely (and validly) toss at Muslims and simply saying "Two can play at that game."

His first assertion, that the Koran does not authorise violence towards non believers is not credible to any person who has read the Koran. He tries to equate two violent acts against Muslims with the killing of the British soldier. That doesn't wash. He attacks the western media as biased towards Muslims, but with the sexual assaults and beheadings of western reporters and the editor of the Danish newspaper Aftonbladet under police protection, what does he expect? Only space prevents me from a full analysis.

If you want to take this bloke seriously, go right ahead

"If you want to take this bloke seriously, go right ahead"

I take him very seriously.

He must be pleased at the ratio of "useful idiots" he has lured out.

Any debate about rights and accommodation of alternative values must be based on reciprocation; with islam there is none.

It is a gold-platted, take to the bank certainty that islam will not accommodate Western values if islam was in control; given that fact why do Western citizens feel compelled to extend tolerance to islam to the extent that the very system which enables islam to co-exist with Western values will be dismantled by islam if it gets the chance.

I have already given a list of measures aimed at ensuring islam conforms to the values of our society; inevitably it is a losing battle because as soon as islamic numbers reach a certain threshold confrontation and conflict will escalate; and with a craven leadership and political class in the West I can only see capitulation in the future.

Planet islam; your future.