Posted on 07/25/2006 6:19:02 PM PDT by Aussie Dasher
A WAR of words of almost biblical proportions has broken out between Australia's most senior Catholic and a Muslim leader.
Islamic Information and Services Network president Abu Hamza, of Coburg, wants the Bible banned because it incites violence.
He called Archbishop George Pell a "clown" for his comments this year that the Koran was full of "invocations to violence".
Mr Hamza told his followers the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, was full of murder and seemed to condone rape.
Dr Pell replied from the Vatican this week: "I am not sure how much Mr Hamza's comments improve the situation, but there are no teachings of Jesus, unlike Mohammed, which advocate violence against followers of other religions."
In the sermon, Mr Hamza told his assembly that the Bible's Old Testament said rape was punishable only by demands for financial compensation of "50 silver pieces" and marriage. He said Dr Pell should be ashamed of his ignorant attack on Islam.
Dr Pell has twice in recent times made comments on Islam and extremism, saying he found numerous examples of violence in the Koran.
"In my own reading of the Koran, I began to note down invocations to violence; there are so many of them, however, that I abandoned this exercise after 50 or 60 or 70 pages," he told a Catholic audience in the US in May.
Mr Hamza said: "He said something that has made the Muslims very angry. This ignorant man does not know Christianity, let alone Islam."
Mr Hamza, at times shouting during the taped sermon, said the Bible was filled with lechery and drunkenness and he would not want his enemies, let alone his children, to read certain parts of it.
One of the Islamic Information Service's stated objectives is to promote dialogue between religious faiths, and Mr Hamza challenged Dr Pell to debate whether Christianity or Islam more readily incited terrorism.
"president Abu Hamza, of Coburg, wants the Bible banned because it incites violence"
Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition!
He places his life in jeopardy by suggesting that the Koran incites violence...
Maybe Mr Hamza would care to explain why rape victims are executed in so many islamdertal dominated countries.
i'm pretty sure i remember Jesus saying somewhere, um, that we should cut, um, people's heads off if they don't agree with us. nuthin' about that heaven or hell judgment stuff.
bump
It was only a matter of time before the muskies brought this up. It will only get worse because so many are letting it.
Yeah, well, the truth hurts, doesn't it, Hammie?
Pell should take him up on it.
The Bible incites violence. Right. The only way the Bible incites violence is the reaction it brings forth from Muslims and others with evil inclinations.
Save civilization: Ban the Koran
Or was it " Murder helpless innocent women and children, take slaves, sneak attack without provocation, for I have no power or ability to get you into heaven"
No wait that was muuuuhamhead (Pigs be inseminating him)!
When the Israelites led by Joshua entered the land of the Canaanites they found murdered infants and children stuffed in clay pots who had been sacrificed. These were the people described in the Old Testament who were to be erased from the face of the earth, but weren't. Today those claiming descendency from these ancient people still sacrifice their children and continue to bring murder and mayhem to others. Nothing seems to change.
If the muslim wants the Bible banned it probably will be.
I know that this would be the case in the United States where the alcu rules.
Wasn't there an Abu Hamza as one of the 9/11 hijackers? I'd swear I've seen that name before as a terrorist.
Geez, reaching back into the Old Testament for his example, and then neglecting to mention how ancient Islam and modern Islam still advocate how rapists be dealt with... Namely, a slap on the wrist for the rapist, and then execute the girl.
Awaiting your return Lord to set these morons straight.
Not a chance here. Cardinal Pell is a close friend of Prime Minister Howard.
Hardliners target mosques
By Barney Zwartz
Religion editor
August 3, 2005
Hardline Muslim fundamentalists are targeting mosques, universities and high schools across Melbourne in a battle for the hearts and minds of local Muslim youth.
Mainstream Muslim leaders have identified three groups operating in Melbourne promoting radical forms of Islam and who they fear may turn rhetoric into violence.
One of the groups is building a mosque in Broadmeadows, another is a radical group of young Bosnians loosely attached to high-profile radical cleric Mohammed Omran, and the other comprises local members of the radical international political organisation Hizb ut-Tahrir.
One Muslim leader warned that some more extreme elements had left Sheikh Omran's group, claiming it was not radical enough. These were mostly Arabs, Algerians and Somalis.
Another political leader told The Age that radicals were causing problems and grief at mosques across Melbourne. "They are trying to take over executives, pamphleting, trying to recruit outside mosques," he said. "They are full of vitriol and poisonous rhetoric, and see the rest of Islam as corrupted."
Several local mosques have succumbed to the radicals in recent years, including Preston mosque, one of Melbourne's most prominent.
The Broadmeadows group, now building a mosque on Camp Road, was among those accused of manipulating an election to gain power at Preston in the 1990s.
Leaders of other suburban mosques say they continually have to fend off attempts by hardliners to take control.
Three weeks ago members of one of Sheikh Omran's groups, the Islamic Information and Support Centre of Australia, were asked to leave the Doncaster mosque after distributing leaflets to members as they came to pray, according to the mosque's secretary, Rahil Khan. "We are very, very strict on that, based on experience," he said.
The Bosnian mosque in Noble Park took out an intervention order against members of the same group in 2000 after disturbances prompted by radicals handing out leaflets, books and videos preaching hatred against the West.
Imam Ibrahim of the Noble Park mosque said: "They are hardliners. They tried every mosque, but it depends on the imam. If he is strong and stable and has followers, there is no problem."
The hardliners - estimated to make up about 5 per cent of Melbourne's Muslims - follow the Wahhabi teaching, the most restrictive version of Islam, which has made huge advances around the world in the past two decades, backed by billions of Saudi Arabian dollars.
At Preston, the radicals engineered an election and amended the constitution in the 1990s while the imam, Sheikh Fehmi el-Naji, was away on a pilgrimage to Mecca. Supporters of Sheikh Fehmi, Melbourne's most prominent imam, worked hard over the next decade to regain ground, and members say there is now an uneasy balance.
But Sheikh Omran claims his supporters still control Preston mosque. "Nothing has changed since that day," he told The Age.
Of the wider cultural war among Melbourne's Muslims, Sheikh Omran said: "I would say I'm winning. The Muslims are winning, and Islam in the end. Our message is winning hearts."
But Sheikh Omran - who has claimed that the Americans, not Osama bin Laden, might have been behind the September 11 attacks on America, and that the London bombings were not done by Muslims - said he did not support terrorism.
Sheikh Fehmi said of the Preston struggle: "There was antagonism, they tried everything, but we are standing on our feet." He said Sheikh Omran was bringing Muslims into disrepute in Australia. "Omran's opinions - I wouldn't call it teachings - he does not realise what he is doing, where he is living."
Concern that hardliners had succeeded in spreading their message to disaffected young men and converts was behind last week's plea from the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils to Muslim leaders and imams to do more to fight extremism.
One community leader said the radicals were targeting young people in high schools and universities and splitting families.
An imam said radical youths spoke to people coming to pray. "They tell them there's an attack on Muslims everywhere and a violent response is needed. If it's public, these guys are shouted down and kicked out. But if it's a conversation between two people who happen to be praying and one is an agitator, that's more sinister," he said.
Few leaders were willing to be named. One said: "A lot of people are scared of these people. The same sect is blowing places up around the world, and it wouldn't be too difficult here."
A Federal Government spokeswoman last night said that ASIO was monitoring groups, such as Hizb ut-Tahrir, which espoused extremist rhetoric and was known to have called for attacks overseas. However, the group was not known to have planned or conducted violent acts in Australia and had not been banned here.
She said ASIO monitored people and groups on the basis of terrorist links, not because of their membership of a particular community or religious group. "Wahhabism is a conservative form of Islam and is not in itself of concern to ASIO," she said.
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RADICAL AUSTRALIAN IMAMS REVEALED AS MAINSTREAM AFTER ALL
http://www.farisqc.observationdeck.org/?p=376
This form of infiltration has been going on for AT LEAST eight years.
I hope ASIO is up to the task...
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