[Goetz_von_Berlichingen]

With respect to the use of the crescent and star, I have read the opinion that "Allah" is actually NOT the God of the Christians and Jews, but rather a moon diety or Arab god of war.

If you pivot the cresent and star motif perpendicularly, with the horns of the crescent facing up, the whole becomes the symbol of the ancient Carthaginian diety. It's name escapes me at the moment (Tanit?) but I believe it is considered to be the Phoenician version of Moloch or Ba'al.

[wardaddy]

Yirakh???...perhaps. I could be wrong. I'm not up to snuff on Carthaginian mythology which borrows heavily from the Phonecians and Caananites.

So Islam also has some symbolism left over from the old pagan days of yore. What a suprise right???

Regards;>)

[Non-Sequitur]

The Islamic calendar is a lunar calendar. Islamic months begin at sunset on the day of visual sighting of the lunar crescent, hence the importance of the crescent in the Muslim religion.

The Jewish calendar, on the other hand, is a combined solar/lunar calendar. Lunisolar calendars use months to approximate the tropical year. Since 12 months are about 11 days shorter than the tropical year, a leap month (also called intercalary month) is inserted about every third year to keep the calendar in tune with the seasons. So every three years the Jewish year has two months named Adar.