[Disestablishmentarian]

Thank you for this extremely valuable summary of ISIS and the history of the Caliphate.

Since you are significantly more knowledgeable than I about these issues, I wonder if you would give an opinion about a couple of questions:

1. What do you make of the EU (especially France) wishing to incorporate their former colonies in the ME and northern Africa into the “greater” EU? Does this necessarily contradict the aspirations of the would-be Caliphate?

2. Do you see a nexus of Islam/Sharia/Caliphate with the globalist/Communist push for a single-party superstate with fully integrated (in domestic as well as international issues) secret police, control of media and abolishing Rule-of-Law?

I hate to push for more info ... but your opening summary was so good I had to ask.

[Jack Black]

Here is my opinion on the questions you asked:

1. What do you make of the EU (especially France) wishing to incorporate their former colonies in the ME and northern Africa into the “greater” EU? Does this necessarily contradict the aspirations of the would-be Caliphate?

Islam is at odds with the idea of the Nation State, because the Nation State implies that there is something "in addition" to Islam and Sharia (Islamic Law) that is needed. To the fundamentalist this is an offensive idea, the person espousing it is putting himself above Allah, who gave all the rules needed in the Koran.

Islam requires that Muslims work to make the whole world a part of the Dar Al Islam, that is the Uma, or Caliphate. So, there is no room for ideas like "France" "E.U." or "Egypt" in the mind of the Islamic Fundamentalist. There is an entire book on this topic (written long before 9/11, which shows that the problem has been understood by scholars for a long time) titled "Islam in a World of Nation States". The authors conclusion is it *might* be possible to make it work.

Some Muslims may like the idea of France incorporating their former colonies in North Africa, because it moves them one step closer to a unified Ummah.

The key difference in the devout Muslim's view of this is that it would merely be a tactical step, and the end point would require the entire combined entity (France/Algeria/Tangiers) to become Islamic (and if there is a Caliphate established join it, and have their leaders swear obedience to the true Caliph, following the examples of the many Arabian war lords of the 7th century who swore allegiance to Mohammed.

(Note: I have spelled Ummah differently here than in my previous post (Uma), which was written on a cell phone, and was difficult to check all the current correct spellings on.)

2. Do you see a nexus of Islam/Sharia/Caliphate with the globalist/Communist push for a single-party superstate with fully integrated (in domestic as well as international issues) secret police, control of media and abolishing Rule-of-Law?

Yes. I believe the UN General Assembly, which was created with a lot of push from the Communists who thought they could dominate it, is a possible tool of Islam at this point. Look at the many anti-Israel proclamations that come out of it. Recall the many surreal things that have happened there like making Iraq under Saddam one of nations on the Human Rights sub-committee.

The clever fundamentalists, like the Muslim Brotherhood, certainly see all these organizations are tools to advance the march of Islam.

Some of the things they work to achieve using these orgs include:

• Requirement for every country to take refugees (ie: Muslims)

• Making "denigration of religion" (ie Muslim Apostasy) a universal crime, via things like the Universal Declaration of Human rights and the creation and enforcement of a new "right" not to have one's religion denigrated.

• Acceptance of Sharia courts for Moslem communities in all nations, regardless of how those laws conflict with existing laws

• Acceptance of Muslim marriage practices, including polygamy, as a human right in all nations

• Creations of Koranic finance mechanisms to parallel Western ones. (Islam doesn't permit loans with interest)

And in all of these things Muslims are permitted, by their religion, to lie about their true aims when negotiating with non-Muslims. This is the idea contained in the Muslim concept of "Taqiya", or permitted deception to further Islam. Every believing Muslim has the ethical permission of their religion to act like only spies or undercover police are routinely permitted to act in the West. (That is lying is a given part of dealing with people.)

That's not to say they all are lying all the time, but any devout Muslim certainly understands that it is permitted in areas of importance, such as moving the world towards Sharia.