goodthief

The situation is complex and there are no simple solutions, only measures to take to improve the situation.

In my opinion the better people to consult are ex-Muslims such as like Ibn Warraq (a Pakistani British who studied Arab and Islamic Studies) a leading advocate encouraging Muslims to think through their Islamic faith. (http://www.islam-watch.org/IbnWarraq/). He wrote very good articles like “Islam, Middle East and Facism” http://www.islam-watch.org/IbnWarraq/Fascism.htm

He also wrote books like “Defending the West: A critique of Edward Said Orientalism” saying essentially that the West should not be too apologetic for her colonial past. http://www.islam-watch.org/IbnWarraq/Defending-West-Critique-of-Edward-Said-Orientalism.htm

Another ex-Muslim is Patrick Sookhdeo (an Anglican minister) who is considered an international authority on radical Islam. He wrote an article “The Myth of Moderate Islam” http://jimball.com.au/features/Myth-of-moderate-Islam.htm and a few other books.

His website includes an account of a Christian lady in the UK who was sacked for wearing a little cross round her neck whereas Muslims are allowed to wear head scarf. http://www.isic-centre.org/archive/109-cross-defined-as-non-essential-to-christian-faith.html

I think we have to face the fact that Muslims are compelled by Islam to be constantly on a jihad against non-Muslims.

A secular website which give accounts for many of the wars between Muslims and non Muslims writes,

“While all forms of religious fanaticism are negative, only Islam raises slaughter of all Kafirs (non-Muslims) to a holy creed, it teaches Muslims to gloat over the killing of non-Muslims and celebrate their death. Hence Islam is the most demented and dangerous form of religious fanaticism… So Islam will have to be the first to be removed from the path of human progress and the reply to Islam to be effective would have to be more blood-thirsty and paranoid than Islam itself.” http://www.historyofjihad.org/quran.html

The website predicts a war with Iran in June http://www.waronjihad.org/

Phillip,

I suggest you read the Islamist, by Ed Hussein. He documents his journey from the peaceful and moderate sufism of his parents generation through increasingly more radical groups, to the pan Islamism of Hisb-ut-Tahir.

Radical, literalist Islam is a relatively new phenomenon to most of the modern Muslim world. It is far more common in the young than in the previous generations, particularly in the west. I certainly am not overly optimistic about the chances of moderate Islam because of radicalisms prevalence among the youth. However I believe it is a fight worth winning. We need to engage with radical Islam everywhere, not just on the battlefield. That is too narrow a focus and will ultimately fail. We need to fight politically, economically, socially as well as militarily. In short we need a holistic approach.

By definition multiculturalism should be helpful in this fight. However multiculturalism in the west doesn’t imply greater knowledge of each others cultures, sadly it is the reverse. Multiculturalism has bred an ignorance of other cultures. The PC cultural relativists have in fact prevented the average person from a critical look at any other cultures. Only our own faults are investigated and promoted. A balanced look at other cultures is totally un-PC.

This has led to the warm-fuzzy style of PC multiculturalism, where the average person feels good about other cultures, but doesn’t actually know anything about them. This has been a very destructive process to the fabric of our society.

It is time to return to a policy of assimilation. This is the only model which can accommodate disparate and seemingly incompatible cultures. The era of deriding our own values whilst championing those of the ‘others’, must end. We need to acknowledge the value of our cultural inheritance and pass this on to those who come to live with us. It is time to end the black armband approach to our history. It is fundamentally dishonest and it only foments anger and mistrust.

Socratese.,

I wonder how you would explain the problems that Europe is having with homegrown Islamic fundamentalists. Are they also being too mean to Muslims? You seem to be adhering to the old, and discredited, theory, that poverty and lack of opportunity are the causes of Islamic fundamentalism. But this is rubbish. Middle class boys from across the Europe and the Middle East have been going to Iraq/Afghanistan in search of martyrdom. Fundamentalism is as much a reaction to the spiritual emptiness of the soft lefts social revolution as it is to poverty and oppression. Indeed the prevalence of fundamentalism among the west’s young Muslims clearly illustrates that poverty and oppression has an almost negligible role in radicalizing young people.

Success and wealth hasn’t stopped the Saudis using their petrodollars to spread their backwards version of Islam, indeed it has actively helped their missionary work.

Who are these people of good faith that are telling you that there is no extremism in the mosques? http://www.australian-news.com.au/enemy_within.htm

You say you are committed to being tolerant. I believe in tolerance as well, but to be tolerant of the intolerant is eventually counterproductive. There are things we cannot tolerate and we should be clear about this. As Costello said, those who want Sharia and the return of the caliphate should not come to Australia. They have no place being here.

We need to support moderate Muslims but at the same time we should be effectively targeting radicals and fundamentalists, especially ensuring that those Muslims who do migrate aren’t adding to the problem

Philip
I support your position 100% when you say: " We need to support moderate Muslims but at the same time we should be effectively targetting radicals and fundamentals.." That has always been my position and what I have benn arguing all this time.

There is NO doubt that middle class Islamists are creating homegrown ragicals all over Europe and in USA. The radicalisation is very complex as a process.Not even the families of these disaffected can understand the phenomenon.There are very sophisticated and highly complex cultural andpsychological processes at work.There are extremely clever and sophisticated mind-altering psychologists in mosques in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia that are proving so successful.It is proving difficult to counter theirt influence.Those who travel to these countries need to be under active surveillance and targeted in any way we can.

Sharia. Whenever it has been mooted that sharia should be tried in a non-Muslim country the loudest outcry against it has come from libearl and moderate and educated muslims in that part of the world,especially from amongst the women who naturally are vehementally opposed to the idea. I have any number of cut outs andexcerpts of protests from them. They DO NOT ANY PART OF SHARIA. What the pro-sharia mob have to learn andaccept is that our laws are created in PARLIAMENT and always will..in a secular democracy. We the people will decide our laws andif they dfont like it then they can bloody-well piss off.No compromise and no accomodation.

Socratease

Philip
All that has been written about the virulent strain of Jihad are correctly stated but they have to be put in the context in which they have been written.More on this later when I have researched it fully.A Muslim friend of mine is undertaking the research.

Fundamentalist conservative right wing bigoted Zionists point to the Old Testament,the Pentateuch,in fact, to justify their hatred of all Muslims,Palistinian in particular and what the OT says how they should be exterminated. Yahweh's commands to Aaron and Joshua for example about how they should clean out the "promised land" before occupying it.They say that Jehovah has not changed his mind since then.They act as though they would if they could "cleanse" the place in obedience to his wishes! And yet not every Israelli accepts the OT as such.They too say we should understand the contextt in which all that was said and written. Both Abrahamaic religions have the same religious and doctrinal base that came from over 4000years ago! They share a common context.

Robert

Paul.L

Assimilation between Muslims and non-Muslims has not happened (peacefully) and is not ever going to happen (this is built into the Islamic theology) in any part of the world.

This is the experience of South-East Asian countries like Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore where there was mass non-Muslim migration (to these countries) in the early 1900s.

Migrants that have settled in non-Muslim Thailand and Philippines have adopted the customs of the countries, but not so in the other SE Asian countries.

There is some semblance of tolerance between the Muslims and non-Muslims in the Islamic countries Indonesia and Malaysia, but this breaks down occasionally when the economy gets bad and the non-Muslims are blamed. For example, Mahathir the ex-PM of Malaysia blamed the British for the plight of the Muslims in Malaysia to this day even though the British left Malaya 50 years ago.

The Muslims wanted a separate state from India, the British gave them Bangladesh ( then East Pakistan). Today, Islam has made Bangladesh a failed state and the Indians are silently building a 3,300 km fence to keep out the Bangladeshis entering India.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003762578_bangfence26.html

The Rajasthan government in India has taken steps to expel illegal Muslim Bangladeshis workers (estimated 20 million ) in the country when the Muslims planted bombs and killed at least 80 people. Why did the Muslims plant bombs in Hindu temples?

http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Rajasthan-to-expel-illegal-Bangladeshi-workers/311038/
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article3925840.ece