Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/31/2011

Thanks to NATO, freedom and democracy are now enjoyed by the Libyan people. Evidence of their new condition may be seen in the black flag of Al Qaeda, which flies over the courthouse in Benghazi. Reports coming out of the city say that it is being governed by Sharia law.

In other news, Hagia Sophia, the former cathedral of Constantinople and later an Ottoman mosque, is being returned to use as a mosque after serving as a museum for almost a century.

Meanwhile, British prime minister David Cameron says that British ships off the Horn of Africa will now be allowed to carry armed guards to protect them against pirates.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to A. Millar, C. Cantoni, CSP, Egghead, Erick Stakelbeck, Fjordman, Gaia, heroyalwhyness, Insubria, JP, KGS, Kitman, Nilk, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

Slavery and Jihad

The latest essay by Anestos Canelides examines the Islamic institution of chattel slavery, which accompanied the Great Jihad wherever it reached.


Slavery and Jihad
by Anestos Canelides

Sura 48.20: …Allah promises you much booty (spoils of war) that you will capture from the defeated infidel.

                   — Legacy of Jihad, by Dr. Andrew Bostom, pg. 127

Slavery has been a curse upon human existence since the dawn of mankind. During modern times there has been a thin illusion that slavery has vanished from the world. The sad reality is that slavery does exist in our modern era, and while slavery is not unique to Islam, there has never been an abolition of slavery in the Islamic world as there has been in the Western nations.

In recent decades slaves were taken in southern Sudan by Muslims from the north. These captives were either Christians or animists taken during the civil unrest between southern Sudan and the Muslims in northern Sudan.

Is there a connection between jihad and slavery in the Muslim world? Most importantly, is slavery an major factor in Jihad?

The main focus of this essay will not be the dhimmi status of the conquered, but jihad and chattel slavery in the Muslim world.

There is a permanent link between jihad and slavery. It is a uniquely Islamic institution, and provides a good explanation for the persistence of slavery in Islam’s dominions and societies. This may applied to specialized forms of slavery such as the employment of eunuchs, slave soldiering, child slavery, and harem slavery. Jihad slavery has been a powerful tool for both expanding Islamization and the maintenance of Muslim societies.^[1] It was a form of punishment for the infidels who were conquered, whether they were Christians, Jews, or idolaters.

Historian Spero Vyronis provides a description on how jihad slavery, as practiced by the Seljuk Turks and early Ottomans, was so important for the Islamization of conquered lands in the eleventh through fourteenth centuries.

A further contributing factor to the decline of the numbers of Christian inhabitants was slavery… Since the beginning of the Arab razzias in the lands of Rum (Roman), human booty had come to constitute a very important portion of the spoils. There is ample testimony in the contemporary accounts that this situation did not change when the Turks took over the direction of Jihad in Anatolia. They enslaved men, women and children from all major urban centers and from the countryside where the populations were defenseless. In the earlier years before the Turkish settlements permanently affected Anatolia, the captives were sent off to Persia and elsewhere but after the establishment of the Anatolian Turkish principalities, a portion of the enslaved were retained in Anatolia for the service of the conquerors.^[2]

The reality is that entire regions were depopulated, due largely to enslavement, and in Anatolia (present-day Turkey) once fertile farmland reverted back to forest. The majority of the looting, pillaging and enslavement of Christians began after the first Seljuk invasion of the former Byzantine lands. The disastrous loss by the Romans at the Battle of Manzikert in 1071 accelerated the Islamization of Roman lands. The Muslim Turkic tribes found the land similar to their homeland on the Eurasian steppes, so these nomads began migrating en masse into Roman territory.

They were not peaceful immigrants, and yes, it was a jihad against the Christian infidel. Many Christians were killed or enslaved in the process. The Byzantines (Romans) were not the only ones to have faced slavery by the Muslim invaders. The Islamic demand for a global caliph, stemming from the belief that Islam will dominate the world one day, has had an all too sad impact on the world. The Qur’an clearly says (Sura 4.75): “Those who believe fight in the cause of Allah and those who reject the faith fight in the cause of evil: So fight ye against the friends of Satan: feeble indeed is the cunning of Satan.”^[3]

Another example, according to Dr. Andrew Bostom, author of The Legacy of Jihad, may be found under the Shah Abbas I (1588-1626 AD), when the Safavid Shiite theocracy of Iran expanded its earlier form of slave razzias into the Christian Georgian and Armenians regions. Many people were enslaved in these regions and forcibly converted to Shia Islam. The males were made to serve in the military, and the females were forced into harems.^[4]

What is Wrong With Western Elites?

Below is Fjordman’s latest essay. For a complete archive of his writings, see the multi-index listing in the Fjordman Files.


Libya’s autocratic ruler Muammar Qaddafi was brutally tortured and killed on 20 October 2011 after France, Britain, the USA and NATO had actively given military support to rebel troops that were known to include groups with ties to terrorist organizations like al-Qaeda.

As writer Diana West said, “Qaddafi was not killed in retaliation for his attacks on American servicemen in Berlin in 1986, or the downing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie in 1989. He was not killed for his central role in the USSR’s terror networks going back to the 1960s and 1970s. He was killed after coming over to our side of George Bush’s ‘war on terror’ in the final phase of a civil war in Libya in which his regime fought al Qaeda affiliates. Horrific as it sounds, Qaddafi was killed because we and our NATO allies joined the other side.”

In February 2011, a day before he quit as Egypt’s president after popular uprisings, Hosni Mubarak had harsh words for his former allies in the United States and their misguided quest for democracy in the Middle East. “They may be talking about democracy but they don’t know what they’re talking about and the result will be extremism and radical Islam.”

Mubarak during his three decades in power kept stability in Egypt, peace with its neighbors including Israel and promoted decent economic progress in his country without being cruel. Despite this, the USA quickly turned its back on him when protests began. The Muslim Brotherhood has since gained in strength, and attacks on Coptic Christians have escalated.

Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966) from the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood was with his writings among the inspirations for the Jihadists terrorists from al-Qaeda who killed three thousand Americans on September 11th 2001. A decade later, President Obama and his Administration are actively aiding the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and elsewhere to gain more influence.

Many ordinary citizens, when witnessing our so-called leaders supporting our enemies, wonder whether Western political elites have lost their grip on reality. What are they trying to achieve with such stupid and suicidal policies? Why do they want to export democracy to Islamic countries, even if this brings radical organizations with hostile agendas to power, at the same time as the democratic system is being de facto abolished in Europe by the European Union?

My personal view is that the cultural, economic and especially immigration policies currently promoted by the ruling elites throughout virtually the entire Western world are harmful to the long-term interests of the European peoples who created this civilization. One fundamental question that has been hotly debated on the Internet by dissident writers is whether this trend is entirely accidental, and exclusively reflects the purely impersonal forces of technological globalization, or whether there is also a purpose and a plan behind some of these changes.

I believe that there is also an intentional plan of breaking down Western nation-states behind this trend. This is demonstrated by the statements of some key actors, by the all-pervasive (in the Western world at least) indoctrination with non-European “diversity” as well as by the systematic demonization and ridicule of all traditional practices, cultural symbols and national flags. The arguments, or rather lies, presented in favor of continued mass immigration and Multiculturalism are remarkably similar in all Western countries, too similar to be entirely coincidental.


The question is: Why? And what do those promoting such policies hope to achieve?

It is important to realize that this does not necessarily rule out other possible explanations, which may supplement rather than contradict the previous claim. It is undoubtedly true that modern Western technology has created a far more integrated world than existed in the past.

One could also successfully argue that there are deep underlying structures and ideas in Western culture and mentality at work here, too, for instance the concept of “universal egalitarianism” that could be found already in Greco-Roman Antiquity, and especially in Christianity. This was secularized after the Enlightenment in the form of human rights. Present-day Globalists, regardless of whether they come in a Socialist or a capitalist shape, can exploit these ideals.

Finally, there is no doubt that many people vote for open-border Globalists of their own free will. For example, I have been severely critical of the British government of Tony Blair, but we should remember that Blair with his Labour Party won no less than three elections in a row. Some of this can be attributed to media censorship and decades of indoctrination plus the mass importation of a new electorate in the form of immigrants who tend to vote for Socialist parties which give them access to more welfare payments. Some of it, maybe, but not all of it.

No matter how we twist this, the fact remains that tens of millions of Westerners have more or less freely voted for parties that insult and dispossess them and rob them of their heritage. We have become decadent, indifferent consumers who live only for the here and now, cut off from our historical roots and with little regard for the future of our nation. Far too often, we care little for what will happen 50-100 years from now as long as we can still personally enjoy a steady supply of material comforts and new electronic toys plus football and sex on TV.

My good friend Ohmyrus, an Asian essayist, has convincingly argued that one of the factors behind the booming budget deficits we can now observe in many Western countries plus Japan may be the short-term focus inherent to the democratic system, where people prefer short-term gain now at the price of long-term pain later and vote themselves into possession of other people’s money. Not enough of them think longer than a couple of election cycles — maybe ten years — ahead. History-conscious peoples who come from non-democratic cultures, for instance the Chinese, seem to find it easier to plan in terms of generations and centuries.

On top of this, the good components that a democracy may contain have ironically also been undermined by hollowing out this system from above through international organizations, which in many cases promote harmful policies even when the majority does not want this.

Brides of Satan

This email just came in from one of my contacts in England:

I saw a large group of Muslim women yesterday while I was travelling down a main thoroughfare in West London — a head-turning moment as roughly fifteen black-clad (head to toe, a couple of niqabs) women spilled out of an Arabic restaurant about midday.

• A clump of about seven or eight at the entrance
  
• Four pairs already walking away down the pavement — on their way to a mosque? It would have been interesting to jump off the bus and follow them, but I was on my way somewhere.

What made the event chilling was its martial aspect — the paired formation — I imagine similar events might have occurred in Victorian Britain when the Temperance League or similar went out to preach.

This bunch looked like the women who accompany Muslims Against Crusades demos. They appeared confident, etc., and most definitely ‘owned’ the pavement.

Incredible.

Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/30/2011

Dymphna and I were away for most of the day today visiting family, so both posting and the news feed are light.

A 17-year-old Coptic Christian high school student in Egypt was beaten to death by his classmates, in a classroom, for displaying a cross on a chain around his neck. The crime occurred on October 16th, but initial accounts by the media and the authorities failed to mention the role that religious enmity played in the attack. However, later reports by witnesses indicated that the fury of the boy’s murderers was aroused when he pulled the cross out from under his shirt where his Muslim classmates could see it.

In other news, Danish farmers will reportedly lose billions of kroner when the EU shifts some of its agricultural subsidies to other parts of Europe.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Egghead, Fjordman, Gaia, Insubria, Kitman, Mary Abdelmassih, Steen, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

The Unexamined Premises of Multiculturalism

The continued dominance of the doctrines of Political Correctness and Multiculturalism depends on a set of unexamined premises. If the axioms underlying PC/MC were ever carefully examined by a large proportion of the populace, the entire political superstructure of the West would collapse.

The practitioners of the Multicultural Arts are at least subliminally aware that the basic assumptions of their dogma cannot stand up to close scrutiny. This is why the proponents of PC/MC tend to respond to reasonable criticism with accusations of “racism”, vicious ad-hominem attacks, and physical violence. They fear that the edifice in which they have invested so much emotional and physical energy may in fact be spun from pure gossamer. Fear generates anger, and their fury demands the destruction of those who would expose their delusions.

The other day former British prime minister Tony Blair invoked one of the major unexamined premises of Multiculturalism while defending his party’s immigration policy during his time in office: “Britain cannot succeed unless it opens its borders to more people from different backgrounds.”

Where is the evidence for this assertion?

How has it been tested?

In what ways was Britain unsuccessful while it was still, well, British? In what ways is it more successful now?

None of these questions is asked by any significant public figure, because the axioms of Multiculturalism must not be questioned. They wouldn’t axioms if they were open to debate. Immigration is good for the country, and that’s that. It’s true because Tony Blairs says so.

Here’s the story from The Daily Mail:

Blair Defends Opening the Door to Mass Migration and Says it Had a Very Positive Impact on Britain

Former PM said it was ‘right’ that the country was made up of different cultures and faiths mixing together

Tony Blair has defended Labour’s controversial mass immigration policy by claiming that Britain cannot succeed unless it opens its borders to more people from different backgrounds.

The former prime minister said it was ‘right’ that the country was made up of different cultures and faiths mixing together.

Let’s continue our questioning of these unexamined premises. In what sense is it “right” to mix cultures? By whose standards?

Mr Blair added that migrants had made Britain ‘stronger’ and said those calling for greater curbs on foreigners entering the country were wrong.

Really? In what way is Britain stronger now than it was before it admitted all those immigrants?

Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/29/2011

As a consequence of the shooting at the American embassy in Sarajevo yesterday, seventeen Serbian Muslims were rounded up by police in the Sandzak region of Serbia today. All were said to be associated with the shooter, Mevlid Jasarevic, and were part of a radical Wahhabist group.

In other news, French president Nicolas Sarkozy says it was a mistake to ever have allowed Greece to join the euro.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Caroline Glick, Egghead, Fjordman, Insubria, JP, Kitman, Mary Abdelmassih, Nilk, PJ, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

Islamophobia, Islamic Slander, and the OSCE

As reported previously, Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff represented BPE yesterday at the “Confronting Intolerance and Discrimination against Muslims in Public Discourse” conference in Vienna. Elisabeth presented a brief paper during the meeting, which was posted here last night.

She submitted a longer version of the same paper to the conference organizers. It contained more detailed arguments, an appendix citing Islamic law, and footnotes for sources. It has been accepted, and was registered by the OSCE. An HTML version of the paper is below.



Buergerbewegung Pax Europa

In cooperation with and endorsed by

International Civil Liberties Alliance,
Mission Europa, Wiener Akademikerbund

Today’s meeting is ostensibly concerned with confronting intolerance and discrimination against Muslims in public discourse. Actually, however, it focuses on “Islamophobia”, a term invented by the Muslim Brotherhood in the early 1990’s. According to the David Horowitz Freedom Center, “it has become ‘a matter of extreme priority’ for the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.” It appears that the UK-based Runnymede Trust in 1996 coined the “accepted” definition, which includes any and all of the following components:

1.	Islam seen as a single monolithic bloc, static and unresponsive to new realities.
2.	Islam seen as separate and other:
	(a)	not having any aims or values in common with other cultures,
	(b)	not affected by them, and
	(c)	not influencing them.
3.	Islam seen as inferior to the West — barbaric, irrational, primitive, sexist.
4.	Islam seen as violent, aggressive, threatening, supportive of terrorism, engaged in ‘a clash of civilizations’.
5.	Islam seen as a political ideology, used for political or military advantage.
6.	Criticisms made by Islam of ‘the West’ rejected out of hand.
7.	Hostility towards Islam used to justify discriminatory practices towards Muslims and exclusion of Muslims from mainstream society.
8.	Anti-Muslim hostility accepted as natural and ‘normal’.

Runneymede has been in a close relationship with the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation for some time. Pax Europa and its affiliations note with grave concern that this definition — or any definition — of Islamophobia cannot and does not address the underlying problems with Islam and its teachings.

For example, Pax Europa believes that Islam denies equal rights to men and women. According to the above definition, simply raising this point has been considered Islamophobia. Pax Europa believes that for many, there is a political ideology component to Islam. Since its ideology informs the doctrine of political organizations like the Muslim Brotherhood, it is indeed a political ideology. Pax Europa is accused of Islamophobia for speaking to this reality, even when it can demonstrate a factual basis for the statements it makes in this regard.

Pax Europa is of the opinion that criticism of a religion, including Islam, must remain legitimate. This is echoed by the OSCE: “Criticisms of religious practices (just religious practices, not religions themselves?; BPE) are legitimate speech.” We believe, however, that while Muslims are not a monolithic group, for those Muslims who accept Islam as an ideology, there are elements of Islamic law that are monolithic, in that all Muslims worldwide, whether they live in Europe, Asia, Africa, or America, consider the Koran and the Hadith (authentic sayings of Mohammed) as the basis of their legal system. Certainly groups like the Muslim Brotherhood profess this! How are groups like Pax Europa to discuss such issues if not allowed to speak to the language and doctrines that define them?

We further note that the distinction between “acceptable” and “unacceptable” speech is one of grave concern. We would like to recall the OSCE commitments (Copenhagen 1990) which state with respect to freedom of expression:

The participating States reaffirm that

9.1)

- everyone will have the right to freedom of expression including the right to communication. This right will include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. The exercise of this right may be subject only to such restrictions as are prescribed by law and are consistent with international standards.

The participating States express their commitment to

10.1)

- respect the right of everyone, individually or in association with others, to seek, receive and impart freely views and information on human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the rights to disseminate and publish such views and information;

When we review the OSCE Commitments, their direct nexus is to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

Article 19 UDHR. Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

Pax Europa is of the opinion that the OIC (Organization of Islamic Cooperation) require public expression to conform to Shariah law. This includes perceived “anti-Muslim discourse” as well as cases of “discrimination”, whether intentional or unintentional. This is not speculation. In December 2005, at the Third Extraordinary Session of the Islamic Summit Conference, the OIC implemented a ten-year plan “to meet the challenges facing the Muslim Ummah”. Article 6 of the OIC Charter states:

The Islamic Summit is composed of Kings and Heads of State and Government of Member States and is the supreme authority of the Organisation. It convenes once every three years to deliberate, take policy decisions and provide guidance on all issues pertaining to the realization of the objectives and consider other issues of concern to the Member States and the Ummah.^[1]

Section 1 of the ten-year program covers “Intellectual and Political Issues”, and under category VII, “Combating Islamophobia“, we read this:^[2]

2.		Emphasize the responsibility of the international community, including all governments, to ensure respect for all religions and combat their defamation. [emphasis added]
3.		Affirm the need to counter Islamophobia, through the establishment of an observatory at the OIC General Secretariat to monitor all forms of Islamophobia, issue an annual report thereon, and ensure cooperation with the relevant Governmental and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in order to counter Islamophobia. [emphasis added]

If the OIC’s Ten Year Plan really does come from a “Summit,” and it does, it means that the plan reflects the policy objectives and state actions of non-EU state actors against citizens of EU Member States. Further, as Article 6 of the OIC Charter makes clear, the “Combating Islamophobia” initiative has been undertaken as an objective of OIC Member States and the Ummah. Neither the European Union nor any of its Member States belong to that Ummah. Hence, not only are the OSCE Commitments and Article 19 of the UDHR being compromised, but it appears that it is happening on behalf on foreign state actors in concert through the OIC. This should not come as a surprise. From the Secretary General of the OIC himself, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, on behalf of all 57 OIC Member States:

The End of Freedom of Expression in Europe

We’ve written numerous times in this space about the European Union’s “framework decision on combating racism and xenophobia”, which was implemented last November and became binding on the member states of the EU. Austria has now passed a law to meet the requirements of the framework decision. The new law will remove what little remains of free speech in Austria, especially as it concerns immigration and Islamization.

On October 19 Andreas Unterberger wrote a strongly-worded dissent against the new law. Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff sends this introduction to Mr. Unterberger’s piece:

In November 2010, only a year ago, I said the following at a conference hosted by IFPS:

A milestone in this ominous totalitarian trend will be reached tomorrow, 28 November 2010, when the member states of the European Union are required to implement an innocuous-sounding legal provision known as the “Framework decision on combating racism and xenophobia”, or, more fully, the “Council Framework Decision 2008/913/JHA of 28 November 2008 on combating certain forms and expressions of racism and xenophobia by means of criminal law.” According to the final article of the Framework Decision, “Member States shall take the necessary measures to comply with the provisions of this Framework Decision by 28 November 2010.”

This nightmare has become reality ten days ago here in Austria, when parliament passed the new Anti-Terrorism law. The passage of this law was sped up by the Breivik massacre in Norway with the ÖVP (the [formerly] Conservative Party).

We have been silenced. God help us. There is no democracy without freedom of speech.

However, mark my words: As I said in my intervention at yesterday’s OSCE conference, I will continue to speak out. I will not be silenced.

Many thanks to JLH for the translation:

The End of Freedom of Expression: The EU is Responsible, but not Alone

by Andreas Unterberger

Everything bad comes from the EU: This rapidly growing feeling among European citizens is being further strengthened this week by the Austrian parliament. Over the objections of the opposition, it could decide on the most severe restrictions of basic rights and freedoms which have been imposed on Austrians in the last 60 years. It is true that there were talks up to the last minute about alleviating — or for now only partly enacting — the so-called Terrorism Prevention Law, combined with strengthening of the Incitement Paragraph — which in truth proves to be a Support-of-Islamists Paragraph. It could just stay substantially the same. Every representative you talk to regretfully says with a shrug of the shoulders: We have to do it because of the EU…

Is this excuse correct? Only partly. In truth, in Austria — as in many other countries — there is a great deal of complicity in this law.

It is about extreme toughening of so-called incitement. Anyone who “makes contemptible or attempts to make contemptible” members of a certain group will in future be sentenced to up to two years in prison.

Thus, crimes purely of opinion are punished with prison, as in a dictatorship, even if the things expressed are the absolute truth.

And so, completely indeterminate terms like “make contemptible” are entered into the criminal code as crimes.

This damages the principle of equal treatment, since one may continue to make many groups contemptible, because they are not listed. It is permitted to make contemptible, for instance, entrepreneurs, farmers, priests, the rich, aristocrats, students, families, capitalists, Rotarians, fraternities, teachers, or Freemasons, but not groups defined by race, skin color, language, religion (including the most obscure sects), philosophy, citizenship, ancestry, national or ethnic origin, gender, handicap, age, or sexual orientation (camouflage word for homosexual).

With this, political correctness, which until now has only been concerned with nonsense like “daughter-son” becomes diktat, armed with the sharpest weapons of the state.

Herewith the otherwise taboo concept of “race” enters our law books, which promises some entertaining lawsuits. Until now any scientist or journalist who even used this abominated word was instantly flattened.

The coalition — with the minister of justice the prime culprit — cites the authority of a framework decision of the EU minister of justice of November, 2008 “on legally combating certain forms and expressions of racism and xenophobia.”

Therefore: Unfortunately, nothing can be done — at most, leave the EU? Which, despite all the mistakes involving Greece etc., would still cause much damage. Aside from the fact that this framework decision together with the current Austrian law will in fact encourage the sympathy for leaving the Union, it is just a lie to say that Austria and the other member states are mere helpless victims of the EU. For many reasons:

A Post-Breivik Finland

The Finnish blogger Vasarahammer posted the following guest essay at Tundra Tabloids earlier today. His topic is the post-Breivik crackdown on “Islamophobic” dissidents in Finland, which was much the same as in other Scandinavian countries — and indeed the rest of Europe.

See the original article for the accompanying photos.


A Post-Breivik Finland
by Vasarahammer

Breivik’s terror attack occurred in July at the time most of the Finns enjoy their summer holiday. That did not prevent the media storm that followed. It was made worse by the fact that a Finnish MP was quoted in Breivik’s manifesto even though indirectly. Fjordman quoted Jussi Halla-aho in one of his essays, which was copy-pasted to the manifesto created by the mass murderer Breivik.

The most hostile reaction came from the Social Democrats. The party secretary Mikael Jungner (pictured left) demanded that Halla-aho should resign from his position as the chairman of the Administrative committee in the Finnish parliament.

The stated reason was the fact that the mass murderer Breivik mentioned Halla-aho’s name in his manifesto. It did not matter to Jungner or the Finnish MSM that it was not Breivik who quoted Halla-aho but Fjordman. Still, a “second-hand” quote was enough to launch a witch hunt.

The biggest Finnish daily, the Helsingin Sanomat, had previously “revealed” that Halla-aho has connections to the “anti-Islamic” Gates of Vienna blog.

Aftermath

The Helsingin Sanomat article written by Jukka Huusko painted a grim picture of Halla-aho’s ties to the sinister Counterjihad movement. Huusko relied heavily on information provided by Jussi Jalonen, a war historian from the University of Tampere and a long-time critic of Halla-aho.

The article included a picture of Gates of Vienna blog and it said that Halla-aho was listed as a correspondent. This implied that Halla-aho was an active participant of the anti-Islamic subculture and that he drew the ideas from there. The target was to belittle Halla-aho and to present a view that Halla-aho is not an original thinker of his own right but just passively imitating ideas coming from abroad.

The biggest shock for me was, of course, that yours truly was also mentioned by Helsingin Sanomat as a correspondent of the infamous Gates of Vienna blog. My real name was not mentioned but HS published the identity of the man behind the Tundra Tabloids without his consent. The Finnish MSM would never publish the name of a suspected criminal belonging to a minority reserved for special protection, but KGS’s real name was there in the article under the heading “Mass murder in Norway”.

I could not have imagined when I started my blog Vasarahammer five years ago that the name of the blog would one day be mentioned in these circumstances in the pages of Helsingin Sanomat. However, I also realized that it was not me who was the target of witch hunt, but Halla-aho.

I also knew how Halla-aho became a correspondent in the infamous Gates of Vienna, since I translated Halla-aho’s first article at Gates of Vienna, a blog that has always been willing to publish articles concerning Finnish affairs for an international audience.

The fact that Gates of Vienna lists yours truly and Halla-aho as a correspondent is not evidence of some sinister conspiracy but a compliment that proves the common decency of the GoV administrators. They give credit where the credit is due and do not steal other people’s ideas and present them as their own.

Analysis of the Counter jihad movement

Towards a “Responsible” Freedom of Speech in Europe

As we reported last night, Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff represented Bürgerbewegung Pax Europa yesterday at an OSCE meeting in Vienna. The Austrian news paper Der Standard reported on the event yesterday evening in the following article.

Many thanks to JLH for the translation.

Congress in Vienna

European Muslims Demand Guidelines Against Islamophobia

“Freedom of speech in Europe entails responsibility”

Vienna — The initiative of European Muslims for Social Solidarity is demanding guidelines against Islamophobia in public discourse. Freedom of speech in Europe implies responsibility, which is often forgotten by political leaders and journalists, said General Secretary Bashy Quraishy on Friday in Vienna at a congress of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europa (OSCE).

Islamophobia has established itself in public discourse in Western society, lamented participants of the congress against discrimination and intolerance against Muslims. “From prejudices, we have advanced to an institutional racism in which any visible sign of Islamic faith is perceived as a threat,” said Ermine Bozkurt, Socialist representative in the European parliament.

Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/28/2011

A young Muslim from Serbia named Mevlid Jasarevic used an AK-47 to fire shots at the American embassy in Sarajevo today, wounding two security guards. The assailant hung around across the street afterwards, and a few minutes later was shot and wounded (some reports say killed) by a police sniper.

In other news, the unemployment rate in Spain has reached a record 21.5%.

And now for the weather. This is not in the news feed, but our regional forecast says that we will have sleet tomorrow morning. Can you believe it? Sleet! On October 29th, in Central Virginia!

I might as well move to Aalborg. At least the beer would be better there.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Egghead, Fjordman, Freedom Fighter, Insubria, JP, Kitman, Nilk, Srdja Trifkovic, Steen, Van Grungy, Vlad Tepes, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

Political Correctness in Germany

The following video by Dale Hurd at CBN concerns the harassment and vilification of people in Germany who fail to comply with the dictates of political correctness. It’s in English with German subtitles:


Hat tip: Winds of Jihad.

Must Catholics Make Room for Muslims?

A controversy erupted a few days ago at Catholic University in Washington D.C., where a lawyer filed a civil rights complaint about the university’s alleged failure to accommodate Muslim students adequately.

The video below features a heated argument on the issue from Sean Hannity’s TV program. It’s a shame Mr. Hannity and Jay Sekulow spent so much time shouting down Ibrahim Ramey, the Muslim spokesman on the show. I would have been interested to hear him answer the questions fully.

Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for uploading this video:

Fallacies That Deserve Correction

At OSCE meetings, participants may issue responses to issues that come up during the proceedings. At today’s meeting in Vienna on “Confronting Intolerance and Discrimination against Muslims in Public Discourse”, Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff presented the following intervention.


Intervention by Bürgerbewegung Pax Europa
Session I
October 28, 2011

On the problematic concept of ‘anti-Muslim discourse’:

I believe that everybody here, both the representatives of the participating states and of non-governmental organizations, shares a common goal of upholding liberty, peaceful coexistence and respect for diversity, in line with the OSCE purpose of upholding democracy and freedom.

This meeting has been called with these objectives in mind.

However, there are in the meeting agenda some fallacies that deserve correction, or the results might end up being counterproductive to the overall objectives of the OSCE. Let me point out the more obvious ones:

• Trying to steer public discourse is at odds with the core concept of freedom of expression.
  
• It is not made clear in the agenda if ‘anti-Muslim discourse’ includes criticizing Islam.
  
• Singling out Muslims for specific protection constitutes an act of discrimination itself.
  
• Anti-Christian anti-Jewish hate crimes are more common than anti-Muslim ones.
  
• National law protecting citizens’ rights apply equally well to Muslims as to others.

In brief, there is no good reason to single out Muslims as being in need of special protection, as Muslims have the same fundamental rights as any other citizen.

No such discussion, however frank and honest, should be considered directed against individual adherents of a faith, and hardly an issue of concern at government level.

Attempting to resolve conflicts in society by controlling the public discourse is usually a futile approach, as we saw in Eastern Europe decades ago, and at odds with the objectives of the OSCE.

With respect to the massacre by Anders Breivik, mentioned by member of the panel, Ms. Fekete:

Jihad or Treat!

This was Vlad’s idea. Once he suggested it, how could I resist?

The result of our collaboration was the Niqab-o’-Lantern:



Trick or Fatwa!

Steering Public Discourse

As mentioned earlier, Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff represented Buergerbewegung Pax Europa today at the “Confronting Intolerance and Discrimination against Muslims in Public Discourse” conference in Vienna. She issued the following statement at the meeting on behalf of BPE.



Buergerbewegung Pax Europa

In cooperation with and endorsed by

International Civil Liberties Alliance,
Mission Europa, Wiener Akademikerbund
Today’s meeting is ostensibly concerned with confronting intolerance and discrimination against Muslims in public discourse. Actually, however, it focuses on “Islamophobia”, a term invented by the Muslim Brotherhood in the early 1990’s. According to the David Horowitz Freedom Center, “it has become ‘a matter of extreme priority’ for the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.” It appears that the UK-based Runnymede Trust in 1996 coined the “accepted” definition, which includes any and all of the following components:

1.	Islam seen as a single monolithic bloc, static and unresponsive to new realities.
2.	Islam seen as separate and other:
	(a)	not having any aims or values in common with other cultures,
	(b)	not affected by them, and
	(c)	not influencing them.
3.	Islam seen as inferior to the West — barbaric, irrational, primitive, sexist.
4.	Islam seen as violent, aggressive, threatening, supportive of terrorism, engaged in ‘a clash of civilizations’.
5.	Islam seen as a political ideology, used for political or military advantage.
6.	Criticisms made by Islam of ‘the West’ rejected out of hand.
7.	Hostility towards Islam used to justify discriminatory practices towards Muslims and exclusion of Muslims from mainstream society.
8.	Anti-Muslim hostility accepted as natural and ‘normal’.

Pax Europa and its affiliations note with grave concern that this definition — or any definition — of Islamophobia cannot and does not address the underlying problems with Islam and its teachings.

For example, Pax Europa believes that Islam denies equal rights to men and women. According to the above definition, this is considered Islamophobia. Pax Europa believes that Islam is a political ideology. Since its ideology informs the doctrine of political organizations like the Muslim Brotherhood, it is indeed a political ideology. Pax Europa is accused of Islamophobia for saying so.

Pax Europa is of the opinion that criticism of a religion, including Islam, must remain legitimate. This is echoed by the OSCE: “Criticisms of religious practices (just religious practices, not religions themselves?; BPE) are legitimate speech.” We believe, however, that while Muslims are not a monolithic group, Islam is indeed monolithic, in that all Muslims worldwide, whether they practice their faith in Europe, Asia, Africa, or America, consider the Koran, the Hadith (authentic sayings of Mohammed) and the Sira (Mohammed’s biography) as the basis of their faith.

We furthermore note that the distinction between “acceptable” and “unacceptable” speech is one of grave concern. We would like to recall the OSCE commitments (Copenhagen 1990) which state with respect to freedom of expression:

The participating States reaffirm that

The Ultimate Halloween Costume

The latest from Pat Condell:


Hat tip: An EDL buck.

Srdja Trifkovic in Manhattan

Dr. Srdja Trifkovic will give a lecture next month in Manhattan. This just came in from the people at Chronicles:

Chronicles Magazine, in cooperation with the Lord Byron Foundation, presents

The Twilight of the Empire:
Global Consequences of America’s Decline

a lecture by Srdja Trifkovic

Sunday, 13 November 2011, at 2 p.m.
Serbian Orthodox Cathedral of St. Sava
15 West 25th St., New York (25th and Broadway)

America is no longer able to bear the financial burden of her military and political commitments around the world.

The only solution is to accept the limits of American power and to establish a rational correlation between its ends and means — in other words, to turn America into a “normal” power pursuing limited political, economic and military objectives in a world populated by other powers doing the same.

ESW: Liveblogging In Vienna

Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff represented Buergerbewegung Pax Europa at an OSCE meeting in Vienna today. Most of the action occurred while I was asleep, but the sun never sets on the International Counterjihad, and Nilk was able to live-blog the events from her perch in Oz.

I’ve reposted her text below. Visit Right Wing Death Bogan to see the photos.

Another live-blog of the meeting is available at Tundra Tabloids, also with photos.

Update: A longer version on the live-blog, including a video, is available at Europe News.


Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff is currently sitting in the plenary in Vienna, attending the confab about “Confronting Intolerance and Discrimination against Muslims in Public Discourse”.

She is also pretty much a lone voice in the wilderness that is public discourse in Austria when it comes to going against the current view, and seated with mainly men and mainly muslim ones at that when her views and travails are so widely known has to be challenging.

But… she is nothing if not brave, and more than capable of speaking up if she deems it fit.

I’ve offered to do a bit of a liveblog for her since she can’t be here doing it herself (one of the bonuses of global timezones, I guess).

Well, off to a flying start with the first speech being somewhat uninspiring (direct quote:”[7:16:29 PM] this is terrible”)

Update 1: the conference is to be based upon a forward-looking approach, with recommendations to require work of all stakeholders. Intolerance and discrimination can be overcome only with the co-operation of everyone, and of course, intolerance of islam goes hand in hand with racism.

It is fueled by stereotypes and prejudices, including the identification of terrorism with islam.

It is these sorts of biased views that led to “recent events” in a very tolerant country, and therefore intolerant speech should be avoided because words can do harm.

Finding a fair balance is hard.

Is freedom of expression absolute? When is it necessary to restrict it?

International standards do not provide answers.

The criminalisation of hate speech is a threat and can impede robust debate in a robust society.

OSCE stresses the protection and promotion of freedom of expression, stresses the role of education in shaping the attitude of young minds. Educators must combat these stereotypes.

[yup. get them while they’re young and malleable…nilk]

Update 2: Mr. Omer Orhun, advisor to the Secretary General of the OIC is the next speaker.

Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/27/2011

The EU summit reached a deal in which Greece’s lenders accepted a 50% writedown, the euro bailout fund was increased to €1.4 trillion, and Italy agreed to new austerity measures. According to the French finance minister, the last-minute deal “saved the euro”. Exultation over the good news cause stock markets to rise dramatically all over the world.

In other news, a French court has ruled that private nurseries, like public institutions, are required to comply with the no-burka law. Also in France, the planned mega-mosque in Marseille — which was to be a proud symbol of Islam’s power and status in the country — was refused a permit by the planning commission, due to zoning considerations.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Egghead, Erick Stakelbeck, Fjordman, Insubria, JP, Kitman, PJ, Steen, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

Iran and its Latin American Proxies

Below is a video of a joint subcommittee hearing (Oversight and Intelligence) in the House of Representatives concerning the recent attempted Iranian assassination of the Saudi ambassador in Washington, and the terrorist threat posed by Iran.

Historical correction: Chairman Michael McCaul (R-TX) was mistaken when he stated that the “assassination of a foreign diplomat” triggered the First World War. The precipitating incident was in fact the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the Austrian throne, on June 28th, 1914, by a Bosnian Serb named Gavrilo Princip. The Archduke was paying an official visit to Sarajevo in Bosnia (which had been annexed to the Austrian Empire in 1908) when he was killed. (Yes, I know I’m a nitpicker, but I like to get the historical details right.)

Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for uploading this video:

The Swedish Exception

The following article about the case of Khalid Saeed is based on a story told by Hans Erling Jensen. It was written by the editor of Sappho (the website of the Danish Free Press Society), and was translated into English by Hans Erling Jensen.


Is it an expression of Swedish hypocrisy when their authorities choose to send an apostate that left Islam back to Pakistan? The current case indicates that it is best to be a Muslim if you want to apply for asylum in Sweden.

In Sweden there is room for everyone. Or almost everyone! One of the few who did not merit entry is the Pakistani refugee Khalid Saeed, who has just been refused asylum.

But it is easy to be lured into thinking otherwise, that Khalid is qualified for a place in Sweden’s safe and sound embrace. According to his own statements, he and his family received very serious threats in their homeland.

It is an assertion which seems credible when Khalid also says that he is an apostate Muslim (he calls himself “humanist”). And he has not only distanced himself from his faith, he has done so publicly on his blog.

That should turn on all the warning lights!

In Pakistan he received a visit from several of Allah’s faithful. They maltreated him and threatened his life. Then he (and his family) went underground and escaped through a roundabout route to Sweden. Here he, his wife, and their three children stayed for the two years that the proceedings have been ongoing.

Now the asylum court has spoken and Khalid has to leave Sweden. (Khalid and his family have been underground since September 22nd).

But why do the Swedish authorities not find him worthy of staying?

It’s an absolutely relevant question.

And perhaps the Swedish artist Lars Vilks hits the nail on the head when he ironically writes on his blog:

Walking the Lonely Road of his Certainty

Oh Cassandra, what did you know?
You who bring bad news wherever you go.

                 — From “Helen And Cassandra” by Al Stewart

Since last July we’ve received a lot of email queries from reporters, TV people, writers, and other people who want to get in touch with Fjordman. The media professionals are obviously looking to interview him or write an article about him. The vast majority of non-professionals want to thank him and show their support, while the rest — fortunately a very small number — want to castigate him and revile him for his “racism” and “fascism”.

A self-identified “left-wing” writer from here in the USA wrote to us a few weeks ago with a request to contact Fjordman. Since then she and I have exchanged a series of emails on the situation in Europe. We discussed the blatant attempts to suppress free speech that have come to the fore since the Breivik massacre.

My correspondent is a liberal, but of the old school — she takes the idea of free speech seriously, and reveres the Bill of Rights. She asked me some thoughtful questions, which I did my best to answer. We both expressed our opinions, and the result was a rewarding series of emails.

The post below is condensed and adapted from several of my responses to her. I owe her a debt of gratitude for stirring up my thought processes and causing me to put these ideas into words.


The following quote is from a just-released book (only an e-book so far) entitled On Utøya: Anders Breivik, right terror, racism and Europe:

To refuse the far Right or fascists a platform for their propaganda thus requires a radically different agency, one that seeks to unite ordinary people in robbing the reactionaries of the space to organise. It is a policy that must be enacted by people themselves, as real democracy depends on ordinary people putting their minds and bodies on the line. At times that will expose the Left to claims from mainstream opinion makers that it is being ‘extreme’ or that the Left are just as bad as the fascists. At times the police, as they have done so many times in the past, will intervene to defend Right-wing thugs’ democratic ‘rights’, in stark contrast to their treatment of Left-wing protests.

This is what Fjordman, Jussi Halla-aho, Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff, and all the rest of the European Counterjihad movement have to contend with. A conservative’s “right” to free speech is understood to appear in scare quotes. It is something that is not really legitimate. Opponents of sharia are seen as using it to gain unfair advantage.

Leftists who believe that the ends justify the means think that silencing people like us through misuse of the law would be a worthy tactic. This isn’t a danger far in the future. This is the reality we face now, especially in Europe.

Fjordman is the “Dark Prophet of Norway”. He can see the grim future that lies ahead, and would like nothing better than to be heard, so that this future might be averted. Five or six years ago, changing course to avoid the coming train wreck might have been at least theoretically feasible. Today there is virtually no chance of escaping it.

So, like Cassandra, Fjordman says, “This is what lies ahead, Western Civilization! Woe unto you!”

The curse that was laid on Cassandra by the gods was that she would be able to see the future, but that her prophetic warnings would never be heeded by her countrymen. Fjordman has been cursed in a similar fashion.

Our critics focus on the term “Eurabia”, which they consider a “conspiracy theory”. But this is a side-issue. There are plenty of people on our side, people whose main goal is to reverse Islamization, who do not place the any particular emphasis on the concept of Eurabia. To focus on any “grand plan” is to miss the point. One may disregard Bat Ye’or entirely, yet look at the current picture in Europe and see exactly what is happening.

Facts is facts, as they say. Here are some:

Multicultural Extremists

Fjordman published an article today in the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet. Below is an English translation by Henrik Ræder Clausen, which was posted in a slightly different form earlier today at Tundra Tabloids.

Fjordman notes that “This essay is a reply to attacks from writer Marie Simonsen in the left-wing pro-Multicultural Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet.”


Multicultural Extremists
by Peder Jensen, a.k.a. Fjordman

Being critical of Islam or multiculturalism isn’t right-wing extremism, writes Peder Jensen. Also known as Fjordman.

Fjordman: “It is my opinion, supporters of non-European mass immigration are extremists, not the opponents of this,” writes Peder Jensen.

Dagbladet’s Marie Simonsen has repeatedly attacked me in this newspaper’s columns, most recently on 25 October. She writes that the author “ seems unable to participate in a public debate, where he would meet resistance .” Okay.

I hereby challenge her to show how many places in the world with large Muslim populations have shown the ability to live peacefully with their non-Muslim neighbors over a long period of time. I will respond with an article.

Being critical of Islam or multiculturalism isn’t right-wing extremism. Popular resistance against Islamization is now beginning to spread far into the traditional left. Thilo Sarrazin, for example, is a member of the SPD, the Social Democratic Party of Germany and thus a sister party of the Norwegian Labour Party, and even to those who were at Utøya.

But let’s not talk about such things; it will make it much harder for outlets, including Dagbladet, to demonize people they do not like, and it would be sad.

In my opinion, supporters of non-European mass immigration are the extremists, not the opponents of it. Is it not extreme to displace the native population in many parts of Europe, as is happening now?

Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/26/2011

Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi was under the gun at the EU summit over the issue of the Italian debt crisis. At the last minute he cut a deal with the Northern League, promising to resign and call early elections in return for the Lega’s approval of a deal to raise the retirement age to 67, which it had previously opposed. The EU believes that the euro may collapse if Mr. Berlusconi fails to deliver.

In other news, the family of the late Col. Muammar Qaddafi is petitioning the ICC in the Hague to have NATO charged with war crimes for the manner of the former dictator’s death. Also, reports indicate that Col. Ghedaffi’s son Saif has taken refuge in Niger.

Meanwhile, a video has surfaced of a Swiss couple who were kidnapped in Pakistan and have been held hostage there for four months.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, CSP, DS, Fjordman, heroyalwhyness, Insubria, JP, Kitman, LN, Nilk, Steen, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

Making Room for Al Qaeda in Libya

The Obama administration and its allies in Europe have encouraged and abetted the “Arab Spring” revolts in the Muslim world, enabling the Muslim Brotherhood to play a significant political role in North Africa after the overthrow of the old regimes. In Libya the West went so far as to apply military force to remove Col. Muammar Qaddafi from power and murder him, allowing Al Qaeda to join the new Libyan government.

As Ezra Levant and Daniel Pipes point out in the video below, this is a clear warning to other despots not to dismantle their nuclear programs. If Col. Gedhafi were to appear at a séance and speak from beyond the grave, he would surely say: “Whatever you do, boys, don’t give up your nukes!”

The second half of the video is devoted to a discussion of the re-Islamization of Turkey over the past decade, correctly identifying Turkey as the greatest threat to regional security.

Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for uploading this video:

Pigman vs. SuperJihad

Bosch Fawstin is an accomplished graphic artist whose work is already familiar to many of our readers. His iconic impression of Geert Wilders appears as a logo on the sidebars of numerous Counterjihad blogs.

Mr. Fawstin’s most ambitious work is a comic book entitled The Infidel (#1). It features Pigman, a grim superhero whose mission after 9-11 is to deliver payback to those who wage jihad on America.


The artist outlines the story with this brief description:

The Infidel is about twin brothers Killian Duke and Salaam Duka whose Muslim background comes to the forefront of their lives on 9/11. Killian responds to the atrocity by creating a counter-jihad superhero comic book called Pigman, as Salaam fully surrenders to Islam. Pigman’s battle against his archenemy SuperJihad is echoed by the escalating conflict between the twins.

Mr. Fawstin was born to an Albanian Muslim family in New York, but was raised in a secular American environment. This provided him with a non-Muslim worldview, allowing him to see the evil ideology behind Islam. As a result, he became an apostate.

Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/25/2011

The debt crisis and austerity regime have been hard on retail businesses in Greece. About 25% of the country’s businesses have closed, and that number is expected to increase next year. The worst-hit areas include the major shopping streets in downtown Athens, some of which have business vacancy rates of 30%-40%.

In other news, U.S. Marines stationed in Afghanistan are being trained not to spit, urinate, or sleep with their boots in the direction of Mecca. Meanwhile, two Danish foreign aid workers were kidnapped in Somalia.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Diana West, Gaia, Insubria, JP, Kitman, Nilk, Van Grungy, Winds of Jihad, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

The Society of Believers

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, I’m in the process of rereading Among the Believers: An Islamic Journey by V.S. Naipaul. The author’s journey began in Iran just a few months after the revolution, and then moved on to Pakistan in the late summer of 1979.

The three main contenders for the most dangerous exporters of Islamic zealotry are Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Pakistan. The Saudis provide funding and Wahhabism. The Turks provide a large population, and are a well-armed, technologically sophisticated regional power with an aggressively Islamic government. Pakistan, however, is the “Land of the Pure”, the first deliberately-constructed Islamic state in modern times. It is the home of some of the most virulent varieties of radical Islamic ideology and terrorist groups.

V.S. Naipaul saw the true nature of Pakistan clearly thirty-two years ago. The excerpt below is from the introduction to Section II, pp 88-91:

The idea of a separate Indian Muslim state, once it had been formulated, couldn’t have been resisted. The idea was put forward in 1930 by a revered poet, Sir Mohammed Iqbal (1876-1938), in a speech to the All-Indian Muslim League, the main Muslim political organization in undivided India.

Iqbal’s argument was like this. Islam is not only an ethical ideal; it is also “a certain kind of polity,” Religion for a Muslim is not a matter of private conscience or private practice, as Christianity can be for the man in Europe. There never was, Iqbal says, a specifically Christian polity; and in Europe after Luther the “universal ethics of Jesus” was “displaced by national systems of ethics and polity.” There cannot be a Luther in Islam because there is no Islamic church-order for a Muslim to revolt against. And there is also to be considered “the nature of the Holy Prophet’s religious experience, as disclosed in the Koran … It is individual experience creative of a social order.”


To accept Islam is to accept certain “legal concepts.” These concepts — revelatory, but not to be belittled for that reason — have “civic significance.” “The religious ideal of Islam, therefore, is organically related to the social order which it has created. The rejection of the one will eventually involve the rejection of the other. Therefore, the construction of a polity on national lines, if it means a displacement of the Islamic principle of solidarity, is simply unthinkable to a Muslim.”

Iqbal, in fact, is saying in a philosophical way that in an undivided India Islam will be in danger, will go the way of Christianity in Europe and cease to be itself. Muslims, to be true to Islam, need a Muslim polity, a Muslim state. The Muslims of India especially need such a state, Iqbal suggests; because “India is perhaps the only country in the world where Islam, as a people-building force, has worked at its best.” And Iqbal’s solution was simple: the Muslim majority areas of northwest India should be detached and consolidated into a single Muslim state.

Seventeen years later (and nine years after Iqbal’s death) it happened — and to the Muslim-majority northwest was added the Muslim majority eastern half of Bengal, a thousand miles away. But that Muslim state came with a communal holocaust on both sides of the new borders. Millions were killed and many millions more uprooted. And it was only afterwards that it became clear that that plan for the creation of Pakistan, apparently logical, meeting Muslim needs, had a simple, terrible flaw.

Speaking With Two Tongues

CBN’s Dale Hurd has visited Norway again, this time to talk to an Iraqi who made a film entitled Freedom, Equality, and the Muslim Brotherhood. We posted a subtitled video of the movie last February, which has unfortunately been taken down from YouTube in the interim.

Mr. Hurd touches the highlights of the film and discusses the way in which the Brotherhood has deceived Western leaders about its plan to take over Europe, and eventually the rest of the West, without resorting to violence:

Gates of Vienna News Feed 10/24/2011

Kidnapping continues to be a popular activity in the Muslim world. Al Qaeda has been blamed for the abduction of three Spanish aid workers in Algeria, and a Russian doctor was kidnapped by tribesmen in Yemen, who hope to use him to bargain for a prisoner exchange with the Yemeni government.

In other news, Swedish prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt has proposed that Norway’s oil wealth be used to help the Eurozone solve its debt crisis. The Norwegian government is concerned that any loans it makes to the EU might not be collateralized sufficiently, and would thus be risky.

Meanwhile, Mt. Etna in Sicily is in the midst of a spectacular eruption, throwing lava hundreds of feet into the air. The ash plume trailing from the volcano forced the closure of nearby Catania Airport.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Erick Stakelbeck, Fjordman, Insubria, JP, KGS, Kitman, Nilk, PJ, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

A Long Day’s Journey Out of Night, Part IV

Below is the final article of a four-part series on history, human development, and Islam by our English correspondent Seneca III. A slightly different version of this essay was previously published at Crusader Rabbit.

Previously: Part I, Part II, and Part III.

Seneca III informs us that an extension of this series is in the works, and further installments are to be expected in the future.


A Long Day’s Journey Out of Night
Part IV: Sexuality

by Seneca III

Sexuality comes in many guises, most of which will not surface in this essay in the interests of good taste (well, reasonably good taste!) and simple decency — in particular not those physically cruel, humiliating and positively inhumane practises to which some people subscribe. Such deviations distress me and it has already been difficult enough to write this essay in a form and manner just about suitable for public consumption without venturing into any of the darker corners of the human psyche.

Nevertheless I would recommended that anyone prone to prudishness or with a predilection to take offence at any but the most obscure references to the subject at hand should sign off now. Truly, I have no wish to distress you either.

That said…

“…It has long been held that chastity belts were in common usage amongst the gentry of the early Middle Ages. When the Knight or Lord went off to Outremer to besiege a town or two, and hack at a few necks in the process, the Lady remaining behind was locked into a certain type of activity-restricting iron girdle for reasons which, whilst rather obscure in this more enlightened age, may have had something to do with fidelity. Or whatever.

“Furthermore it is rumoured that skilled Lockpicks were in high demand during this milieu and made a quite a reasonable living in comparison with that of their fellow artisans, the Locksmiths. But why not? This, as you may be able to imagine, was not a risk-free profession on the basis that if found in ‘flagrante delicto’ by a somewhat tired and sandblasted Crusader his broadsword was likely to make the malfeasant’s eyes seriously water. Or so it is said. No first-hand reports have ever surfaced!”

…O.K., O.K., I know, the foregoing is complete and utter rubbish, both the legend itself and my vicarious meanderings on the subject, but I have stuck my neck out in order to make two points:

First, human sexuality is a subject that needs to be approached with at least a modicum of humour, otherwise it has a tendency to get serious, and when it does get serious it can turn quite nasty.

Secondly, most myths and legends, and even fairy tales and nursery rhymes, carry an underlying message. In their origins can often be found an idea, a story or even an example of wishful thinking that tells the reader or listener far more about the state of mind of the originator(s) and his or her situation than does the actual message. These mini-histories tend to be palimpsestic inasmuch as what is buried within can often be far more interesting and informative than that which is apparent on the surface.

In 1400 Konrad Kyeser von Eichstätt published ‘Bellifortis’, a book detailing the military technology of the time. Also in the book is a drawing captioned (in Latin) ‘These are hard iron britches of Florentine women which are closed at the front’, but he offers no supporting evidence or corroborating documents. This, for what it is worth, is the first known written account of chastity belts in the West, and succeeds the Crusades by a couple of centuries.

In 1889 one Alfred Pachinger, a German collector of antiquities, claimed to have found a chastity belt on the skeleton of a young woman who had been buried in Lintz, Austria, in the 16th century. The belt itself has since been ‘lost’ and researchers looking through the quite detailed Lintz town records have been unable to find any record of the woman’s burial. (The Teutonic mind-set does appear to surface quite frequently in this area of interest, doesn’t it? Now, why would that be I wonder?)

“Things Always Get Worse in the Middle East”

Here’s Ezra Levant talking about the new sharia dictatorship in Libya, and also the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Tunisia and Egypt. As he points out, the issue is not the accession of a new thug in Tripoli — that, after all, is business as usual in that part of the world — it’s the fact that the Western democracies used military force to install this particular thug, and are trumpeting the outcome as “freedom for Libya”.

Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for uploading this video:

Tunisia’s Future is Sharia

Libya has just become an Islamic republic; that is, a sharia-based state. According to the early returns from today’s elections, Tunisia is headed in the same direction.

The article below discusses the projected success of the Tunisan party Ennahda, which it describes as “Islamist”. More precisely, Ennahda is a local chapter of the Muslim Brotherhood in Tunisia. So the Muslim Brotherhood in alliance with Al Qaeda has just formed a government in Libya, the Brotherhood is in the process of winning an election in Tunisia, and the Brotherhood will shortly be taking the reins in Egypt.

Syria is probably next. Bashar al-Assad would be well-advised to pay close attention to those ghastly videos of the last moments of Col. Muammar Qaddafi.

Here’s the story about Tunisia’s election from The Times of Malta:

Islamists Take Lead in Tunisian Poll

Early results from polling stations in Tunisia put the Islamist Ennahda Party in the lead in many constituencies today.

Electoral officials are counting votes in landmark elections that saw more than 90% of registered voters cast ballots.

Official results are not expected until later today or tomorrow.

More on Robert Spencer’s Australian Tour

As I mentioned last week, Robert Spencer will be starting a tour of Australia at the end of November, sponsored by the Q Society.

A partial list of his whistle-stops has now been released: Melbourne, Perth, Sydney, Canberra, and Brisbane.

Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for uploading this video:

Tommy Robinson on BBC Radio

English Defence League leader Tommy Robinson was interviewed today on BBC West Midlands radio about the EDL’s upcoming demonstration in Birmingham. Halfway through the segment a caller from the UAF (Unite Against Fascism) was given a chance to air his views on the EDL in an exchange with the program’s host:


Below is an article from Suite101 with more information about Tommy’s BBC appearance:

UK: EDL Leader, Tommy Robinson Appears on BBC Radio West Midlands

Having just interviewed Waseem Zaffar, Labour Councillor for Lozells & East Handsworth ward, Birmingham, about his letter to the Home Secretary, Teresa May, requesting that the EDL demonstration, planned for Birmingham on Saturday 29th October be banned, Adrian Goldberg then spoke to Tommy Robinson, leader of the English Defence League to hear his side of the story.

Why Are the EDL Protesting in Birmingham Again?

Adrian Goldberg asked Tommy Robinson to explain what he plans to do in Victoria Square next week and why he is doing it? “We’re doing it...there’s a list of reasons, where do I start?” “There’s constant problems coming from the Birmingham area, I talk to Brummies on regular occasions about what’s happening within their communities.” Mr Robinson said with enthusiasm. “We’ve seen undercover mosque programmes, constantly, anytime it goes to Birmingham. You’ve seen the Madrasa schools, where it’s a ticking time bomb. What’s being taught in these Islamic Madrasa schools, across the country - it’s homophobic, it’s anti-Semitic, it’s anti-democratic and it’s anti-British and a whole generation are being turned against us. As we’ve seen they can’t even walk on the same side of the street as us.”

“So what is homophobic, anti-Semitic and anti-British?” Mr Goldberg enquired. “Their views on...you had a preacher at Birmingham University, come over to Birmingham University last year. He is on record as saying, that, when he is talking about adultery and homosexuality, that it is a public crime, it deserves a public punishment. Adultery is punishable by death, a slow and painful death by stoning - and he’s talking at Birmingham University!” Mr Robinson said.

Mr Goldberg responded: “That is a preacher (I’m not aware of this - but, I’m not disputing that it happened, I just don’t know) that’s a preacher that came to Birmingham, who is not of the Birmingham Muslim community.”

“You’ve just had six local Muslims arrested again.” Mr Robinson added. Mr Goldberg didn’t think that they should be commenting on people that had not yet been convicted, in keeping with the finest British tradition and that would ensure that they could carry on the conversation without being taken off the airwaves. Tommy agreed. Mr Goldberg asked whether Tommy believed that as a whole the Muslim community of Birmingham were homophobic, anti-Semitic and anti-British.

“No, I believe that if they are following the teachings of the Quran, then yeah, it’s homophobic, yes it’s anti-Semitic. Do not take Jews or Christians as your friends. It promotes death for homosexuals. It promotes a lot of hatred. There is so much hatred coming out of it. Kill the disbelievers wherever you find them. Strike fear into the heart of the disbeliever. All these things”

Mr Robinson went on: “But don’t get me wrong, I’ve grown up in Luton, in a multi-cultural town. Some of the best people I’ve met growing up are Muslim. Yeah? I know there’s great Muslims. No one needs to win that argument with me. What I’m saying is there is a serious problem with certain ideologies of Islam, that is happening across our country. Birmingham is being hit big with it. A lot of people are worried with what’s happening in their communities. The Islamists controlling their communities.”

Hizb ut-Tahrir