Posted on 12/14/2008 11:26:28 AM PST by MtnClimber
Mordechai Nisan, writing a decade ago, observed that already by the mid-1990s the world's then over 50 Islamic nations had amassed considerable economic and military power -- both of which have further increased during the subsequent 10-years:
The Muslim umma [global community] was by the mid-1990s numbering approximately one billion believers, possessing over 50 Muslim states, and in control of a little less than a third of United Nations membership; moreover, possessing more than 50 per cent of known crude oil resources and a combined military arsenal of conventional and non-conventional weaponry second only to the combined Western bloc of states. The international balance-of-power could not in the aftermath of the end of the Cold War ignore the Muslim civilization and its awesome pretensions to playing a dominant role in global affairs.
Nisan's cogent observations continue to have obvious implications for the so-called "war within Islam" narrative promoted by policymaking, academic, and media elites across the political spectrum, and reaffirmed, vociferously, in the aftermath of the recent jihadist carnage in Mumbai, India.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
I am amazed that so called moderate Muslims don’t rise up against the Jihadists. The Jihadists are determined to destroy their own countries too.
i don’t think there are any “moderate muslims”.
one is either for allah or not.
not means infidel.
I think that Muhammed was right when he worried that his Hadith was written about dreams influenced by the devil.
Yep! A friend of mine once commented that the best way to judge a religion was by the fruits it bears. What do you call a religion that seems to worship death and destruction?
That would be because you have never taken even the most cursory of the Hadith and the Koran.
The Democratic Party
The Democratic Party
Stop FR. The FR Post of the Day was just written.
Perhpas, for the same reasons moderate Social Conservatives can't corral our strident fringe?
Without an acknowledged leader such as a Pope, this is what WE get.
How a Real ‘War Within Islam’ Would Look
I would say it would look like a lot less islamofacists in the world.....
Moderate muslims = donate money to islamofascists
Also very quite bunch
I have actually been to four majority Muslim countries: Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, UAE and Indonesia. In Bahrain I watched the hourly Muslim prayers from the Saudi TV stations which had english subtitles. They were the most hate-filled rants I have ever heard. Indonesia seemed to tolerate Christians and Hindus and I did not see any hate-filled prayers there, not that it could not happen.
That certainly has a "put up or shut up" appeal to it, but in fact it is very unlikely to take place. There are several reasons for this, none of them particularly complimentary.
First is the same issue of sovereignty that modern terrorism depends upon. Will the radicals in Pakistan go along with an army of foreigners, especially Muslims, intending to engage an army of Islamists with whom the people are in open sympathy? Will they allow their own government to approve it?
Second is the the Islamic world in its entirety cannot field an army of the size necessary to do the job under the unified command necessary to direct it. The last time it happened was when the Turks took over and that was a very long time ago.
Third is that there is no popular sentiment within Islamic countries to support such an operation. These have been systematically propagandized to the point where the terrorists are seen as Robin Hood heroes and their victims as evil defenders of Zionism. I shall repeat that - despite the sort of bleatings quoted by the author there is no popular sentiment within Islamic countries, even those attacked, to undertake this operation. Without that support it will not happen.
Fourth is that far from 1.2 billion (or whatever the number of the day is) Islamic warriors, the Islamic world is, broadly speaking, effete, disorganized, and entirely dependent on an extraction economy for its continued prosperity. Moreover, that prosperity is itself predicated on the economic welfare of a West currently in recession. If there is an upside to this it is that modern terror is also dependent on that source of funding and will eventually diminish as the flow of funds does.
I am not optimistic on the issue. Clearly we have forced Islamist terror to ground in Pakistan and just as clearly there is no will within the West to finish it off. The leader most closely associated with our success to date has been relentlessly marginalized and his opponents empowered, opponents glib in promoting the fallacious notion that Afghanistan is the "right" war and both entirely incapable and notably unwilling to do anything substantive - and risky - about it.
btt
What do you call a religion that seems to worship death and destruction?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Fifty years ago they called it Mohammedanism. Now we call it Islam. There apparently have been many down through the ages. The history of mankind is to a large degree the history of bloody human sacrifice, in the twentieth century it went by names like Nazism, Fascism, Communism, Socialism etc. The only common thread seems to be that some people must be killed for the salvation of other people, yet it is quite common for people to believe it CANNOT happen to them!
Some great writer whose name escapes me once said on a bad day,”The human brain is the only known instance of an animal evolving an organ it does not know how to use”.
Suppose you didn't know much about being a Christian, and so you went to Fred Phelps' Baptist Church (Westboro)... you might get the impression that Christianity preaches that everyone is going to Hell no matter who they are, or what they do, pickets funerals to celebrate the damnation of their fellow man, and asserts that anyone leaving the congregation of that specific church is an apostate who is also damned. Phelps defends his interpretation using (carefully selected) quotes from the Bible.
Similarly there have been Christian sects who really do think that the religion should be spread by the sword (there still are, in fact), and also defend that interpretation by picking out numerous quotes from the Bible.
In Islam, it's exactly the same. Most mosques in Westernised countries are perfectly normal, reasonable places which aren't promoting anything that even remotely resembles the doctrine that the Taleban preached.
The main difference between Islam and Christianity, is not in the doctrines. It is that there is a formal structure within the Christian religion(s) which differentiates between mainstream interpretations that are endorsed by the mainstream, and fringe interpretations which are not.
Islam doesn't have that formal structure. So no matter how much of a nut a Moslem might be, anything he says that's consistent with the texts - even if the interpretation is completely at odds with everyone elses', he is presenting a valid interpretation of the religion. It really is as simple as that.
That is why, in the Islamic world, all an invading force has to do to legitimize its power base, is claim to be complying with Islamic law. There's no authority or heirarchy within the religion as a whole, that can say "BULLSHIT!" and mobilise the mainstream to boot that regime out.
Bin Laden's a good example of that. He wants Saudi Arabia for himself. So he's told some Islamic scholars that he wants to bring back the Caliphate (conveniently with himself at its head).
A long time ago it became clear that he'd have to provoke a "war on Islam" by the West, in order for him to present himself as the "defender of Islam" to people who don't give a rat's ass about the Caliphate.
For Islam to need defending, clearly it needed to be "under attack". So, it needed a boogeyman, and America was to be that boogeyman.
I don't think enough people realise this... Bin Laden needed America to be islamophobic. He needed America to attack a Moslem country. It was the only way to ensure he could draw moderates over to his way of thinking.
That’s what I was thinkin. Wham Bam, thank you Mam.
/mark
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