Posted on 10/04/2001 12:48:43 PM PDT by Turan
But since the rest of us are no longer living in the 14th century, we no longer accept slavery, selective taxes, murder and the sword as bargaining tools.
No blowing up school buses and pizza parlors either.
World Islamic Front Statement
23 February 1998
Shaykh Usamah Bin-Muhammad Bin-Ladin
Ayman al-Zawahiri, amir of the Jihad Group in Egypt
Abu-Yasir Rifa'i Ahmad Taha, Egyptian Islamic Group
Shaykh Mir Hamzah, secretary of the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Pakistan
Fazlul Rahman, amir of the Jihad Movement in Bangladesh
Praise be to God, who revealed the Book, controls the clouds, defeats factionalism, and says in His Book: "But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the pagans wherever ye find them, seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war)"(Surya 9-5); and peace be upon our Prophet, Muhammad Bin-'Abdallah, who said: I have been sent with the sword between my hands to ensure that no one but God is worshipped, God who put my livelihood under the shadow of my spear and who inflicts humiliation and scorn on those who disobey my orders.
The Arabian Peninsula has never -- since God made it flat, created its desert, and encircled it with seas -- been stormed by any forces like the crusader armies spreading in it like locusts, eating its riches and wiping out its plantations. All this is happening at a time in which nations are attacking Muslims like people fighting over a plate of food. In the light of the grave situation and the lack of support, we and you are obliged to discuss current events, and we should all agree on how to settle the matter.
No one argues today about three facts that are known to everyone; we will list them, in order to remind everyone:
First, for over seven years the United States has been occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places, the Arabian Peninsula, plundering its riches, dictating to its rulers, humiliating its people, terrorizing its neighbors, and turning its bases in the Peninsula into a spearhead through which to fight the neighboring Muslim peoples.
If some people have in the past argued about the fact of the occupation, all the people of the Peninsula have now acknowledged it. The best proof of this is the Americans' continuing aggression against the Iraqi people using the Peninsula as a staging post, even though all its rulers are against their territories being used to that end, but they are helpless.
Second, despite the great devastation inflicted on the Iraqi people by the crusader-Zionist alliance, and despite the huge number of those killed, which has exceeded 1 million... despite all this, the Americans are once against trying to repeat the horrific massacres, as though they are not content with the protracted blockade imposed after the ferocious war or the fragmentation and devastation.
So here they come to annihilate what is left of this people and to humiliate their Muslim neighbors.
Third, if the Americans' aims behind these wars are religious and economic, the aim is also to serve the Jews' petty state and divert attention from its occupation of Jerusalem and murder of Muslims there. The best proof of this is their eagerness to destroy Iraq, the strongest neighboring Arab state, and their endeavor to fragment all the states of the region such as Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Sudan into paper statelets and through their disunion and weakness to guarantee Israel's survival and the continuation of the brutal crusade occupation of the Peninsula.
All these crimes and sins committed by the Americans are a clear declaration of war on God, his messenger, and Muslims. And ulema have throughout Islamic history unanimously agreed that the jihad is an individual duty if the enemy destroys the Muslim countries. This was revealed by Imam Bin-Qadamah in "Al- Mughni," Imam al-Kisa'i in "Al-Bada'i," al-Qurtubi in his interpretation, and the shaykh of al-Islam in his books, where he said: "As for the fighting to repulse [an enemy], it is aimed at defending sanctity and religion, and it is a duty as agreed [by the ulema]. Nothing is more sacred than belief except repulsing an enemy who is attacking religion and life."
On that basis, and in compliance with God's order, we issue the following fatwa to all Muslims:
This is in addition to the words of Almighty God: "And why should ye not fight in the cause of God and of those who, being weak, are ill-treated (and oppressed)? -- women and children, whose cry is: 'Our Lord, rescue us from this town, whose people are oppressors; and raise for us from thee one who will help!'"
We -- with God's help -- call on every Muslim who believes in God and wishes to be rewarded to comply with God's order to kill the Americans and plunder their money wherever and whenever they find it. We also call on Muslim ulema, leaders, youths, and soldiers to launch the raid on Satan's U.S. troops and the devil's supporters allying with them, and to displace those who are behind them so that they may learn a lesson.
Almighty God said: "O ye who believe, give your response to God and His Apostle, when He calleth you to that which will give you life. And know that God cometh between a man and his heart, and that it is He to whom ye shall all be gathered."
Almighty God also says: "O ye who believe, what is the matter with you, that when ye are asked to go forth in the cause of God, ye cling so heavily to the earth! Do ye prefer the life of this world to the hereafter? But little is the comfort of this life, as compared with the hereafter. Unless ye go forth, He will punish you with a grievous penalty, and put others in your place; but Him ye would not harm in the least. For God hath power over all things."
Almighty God also says: "So lose no heart, nor fall into despair. For ye must gain mastery if ye are true in faith."
>>Note that Osama uses the Kuran's Surya 9-5 as his first justification for mass murder in the name of Allah.
Since none of the planned military actions are being taken in the name of Jesus, it would be irrelevant and beside the damned point.
What did you think of the Ottoman Empire? By the way, I'm glad Turkey has "secularized" its state. Now why hasn't the same thing occurred in most other Islamic States?
Why do the vast majority of terrorists practice Islam?
Yeah, lets continue with the analogies. Those poor Germans shouldn't have been punished for those evil Nazis. Those Germans would have loved to live with a democratic...and those poor Japanese....and the Vichy regime was just an aberration...and PolPot didn't really have much help in his genocide, just a lot of disenfranchized Cambodians. Have we got more excuses for hegemony, harboring terrorism, nazism, etc.?
Islamics and their sympathizers like to play that game don't they? Everything to divert attention away from the pervasive and insidious Islamicism and the Jihad.
I find this phrase fascinating. Please define "causing corruption in the earth". Would American troops in Saudi, would the existance of Israel, constitute "causing corruption"? Bin Laden would seem to be saying that spreading American Values in general should be considered "spreading corruption". If so, then this is a loophole wide enough to fly a 767 through.
Islam as described in the Qur'an is a modern, enlightened, progressive religion. A Muslim is above all a person of peace; he is tolerant with a democratic spirit, cultured, enlightened, honest, knowledgable about art and science and civilized.
Every time I read this stuff, I think of the story related to me from a calssmate that served in Saudi during the Gulf War. When prayer time came, there were religious police with white batons that went around making sure that everyone was in the proper position and praying. They even tried to make my classmate and his associates (American christians) bow down - even to the point of hitting them with the batons! So much for "an individual cannot be induced to the practice of religion". Not to mention that is has been documented repeatedly that suicide bombers are commonly told they get a shortcut to heaven if they blow themselves up and, for the palestinians at least, the government takes care of the remaining family.
And anywhere that Islamic law is used as the basis for national law (Iran, Afghanistan, etc) women are required to completely cover themselves, and not leave their houses without proper escort or permission, have to right to vote or have any public position at all. Just to mention one common repressive activity. I even understand the originally good concept behind those activities of trying to really protect and value women, but it's hardly considered modern and enlightened in the world today.
Actions speak louder than words.
They're applying the principles of Islam consistently. The peace-loving Muslims aren't.
Jesus was a man of peace, even allowing Himself to be tortured to death, nailed to a cross. His first disciples went to similar deaths. Not until the government adopted Christianity under Constantine ca. 315 AD do you find anyone doing violence even in the name of Christianity. And the founding texts in the New Testament clearly prohibit violence and even hate.
Mohommed on the other hand was a bloody general...and from the very first his followers spread Islam by the sword. The Koran, as demonstrated clearly by others above, advocates violence to those who don't follow it (its "peace" really is only SUBMISSION, with a Borg-like,"RESISTANCE IS FUTILE... " thrown in)...In its founders examples and its texts clearly shows to be a serious & committed Moslem, is, toward non-Moslems, to be a violent one.
I guess you don't have a Pope or someone who can say either way which is true and which isn't true Islam.
To be sure NOT ALL muslims are terrorists. And I think islam in Turkey is probably more tolerant than in a lot of other places - as it is here in America. But looking around the world, it doesn't seem that the general consensus from practicing muslims, is that this is a religion of tolerance or peaceful co-existence.
Actions speak louder than words.
Have there been horrors committed by Christians? Of course. There have been many times when "believers" have not adhered to the law of Christ. But my point is that every word in the Gospels is a word of peace. The only person who suffers for the Christian faith is the Christian; he does not make others suffer. When he does, he is in error.
I am not sure that the same thing can be said for Islam. There is much, both in the Quran and the Hadith, that is not peaceful at all. I think many sincere, God-enlightened people have sorted out the peaceful words (which were absorbed from later Judaism or from what people in that part of the world knew about Christianity, which unfortunately was under seige from the Arian heresy at the time that the Prophet had his visions), and are sincerely peace-seeking people.
I have friends who are Sufis, and I understand what you are saying, because the desire for God is very clear in you and in them. That said, I think you should look to the Lord Jesus Christ. I am a Byzantine Rite Catholic Christian, and I think you will find the fullness of faith in Christianty. And you will find peace.
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