“(or converted)”
There are two major divisions in Islam and a handful of smaller ones. The two biggies Shia and Sunni, are the equivalent of Catholics vs Protestants around the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. In other words, they aim to wipe each other out. So, converting to the “wrong” version could get you killed just as dead as being a Christian heretic. Nation states have no model in the Koran. They are an artifice of Western thought. But nations like Iran, Shia and, Saudi Arabia, Sunni, have formed around these religious demarcations and they are primed for a war that has been going on for around 1200 years. Only the United States, and to a lesser extent, Israel, have stopped the Middle East from erupting into a war that would flood the West with refugees the likes of which hasn’t been seen since the Bronze Age, which caused a general collapse of civilization. (Invasion of “the Boat People.”)
There is no possibility of reforming this religion as any attempt to do so will be stopped by the righteous believers using murder. Islam stagnated culturally at around the year 900, but technologically they now have cell phones, AK-47’s and nuclear weapons. Without Western technology these people would still be in the stone age. (Or, possibly the late Bronze Age.)
To be fair, the Sufis incorporate a mystical group that probably is religious in the normal sense.
But, for a significant portion of the devout, Islam is a conquering war plan, a psychological Borg. We don’t have to worry about the spiritual seekers. But it’s clear that the crazies are cultivated by Islam as a conquering army, and we certainly have to keep them at arm’s length.
I understand Obama’s seeding the US with Muslims, because I believe he is one. But what was GWB thinking?