Indians To Islam?

The enemies of freedom walk boldly throughout freedom's camp these days unmolested.

While Venezuelan tyrant Hugo Chavez hits the streets of Harlem to stir up the locals with class war rhetoric and promises of free heating oil, and Mahmoud Ahmedinejad gets feted at the Hilton Hotel in New York, the hordes of Islam are reaching out to the Indians hoping to cause trouble:

Now will you believe me when I say the kissy-kissy relationship between Indians and radical Islam is more than an hallucination?

Long Plain First Nation has attracted international attention over the last few days.

A team from Al-Jazeera’s soon-to-be launched English television network has been filming a documentary about the experiences of aboriginals in Canadian residential schools. They have chosen Long Plain as a representative example of that experience and spent the last two days visiting with many elders and survivors of the residential school system at the First Nation.

My fave part:

“(Al-Jazeera) wants to shed some light on it, in respect to their own people,” noted the chief, who said not all community members were familiar with the TV network before it expressed interest in visiting the First Nation.

I wonder if they’d change their mind if they discovered Al-Jazeera is a mouthpiece for terrorists and antisemities who like to claim Jews are descended from pigs and apes?

Naw, probably not.

Islamic radicals have been recruiting among black, Hispanic and even white prisoners in the United States through chaplaincy front groups, playing off on their outrage against The Man for keeping them poor and in prison.

Whenever groups such as OCAP or the International Socialists march in Toronto, they usually have Palestinian activists along for the ride, even if the cause they're marching for isn't even tangentially related to the Middle East problem.

If any group in Canada has grievances to turn violent over, it is the Indians. Today the chiefs may just be letting Al-Jazeera cameramen on the reserve; tomorrow, will it be Al-Qaeda?

Hat tip: Dust My Broom

Bombs Not Boobs

An Indonesian Muslim cleric briefly imprisoned for his role in the 2002 Bali resort bombings demonstrates just why there can be no rational dialogue with Islam, even on the supposedly common ground of moral philosophy:

INDONESIAN TV shows that feature scantily dressed women are more dangerous than bombs, a militant Muslim cleric who served a jail term for links to the Bali bombings was quoted as saying today.

Abu Bakar Bashir said local television stations should offer more religious programs instead of showing half-naked women.

"If you ask which are more dangerous, half-naked women or the Bali bombs? The answer is of course women who bare their bodies," Bashir was quoted as saying by Antara news agency.

He said such shows could shake the faith of men and invite God's curse.

Bashir can't tell the difference between something good being used for evil, and an act that is intrinsically evil. And neither can a good many other Islamic clerics and thinkers.

But then, if good and evil are determined entirely by the capricious will of Allah and not in accordance with natural law discoverable and knowable by reason, there is simply no place to begin to debate.

More evidence that Islam is little different from post-modernism: for both, truth is what the powerful decide it is.

(An attitude shared with our liberal judiciary, but that is a topic for another day.)

Source: News.com.au

Day Of Rage

To demonstrate that Pope Benedict XVI's offhand quote of Byzantine Emperor Manuel Paleologus deliberately misconstrued Islam as a religion of violence and anger, Muslim leaders throughout the Middle East are calling for a special Yaum al Ghadab, or "Day of Rage" on Friday after mosque.

Well, what isn't a day of rage over there?

But don't get the wrong idea; apparently they won't be doing the usual rioting and rampaging:

We must not try to interpret Islamic terms and cultural signals by using our Western ideas," said Fawaz Gerges, a professor in the department of international affairs and Middle Eastern studies at Sarah Lawrence College, and an ABC News consultant. Gerges pointed out that in Islamic culture "ghadab" means anger or frustration. A day of rage does not mean a day of jihad (war), added Gerges.

Mimi Daher, a Muslim woman working in the ABC Jerusalem bureau, explained that the Grand Multi in Jerusalem reflected this cultural mindset today when he said, "Muslims have to express their anger. Was the pope expecting Muslims to clap their hands to him while hurting their faith and prophet? Of course not. We call on Muslims throughout the world to react in a disciplined manner, according to our Islamic faith."

"Disciplined manner" is a repeated theme among Islamic moderate leaders who encourage people to protest. As Gerges reminded me, when the cleric al-Qaradawi called for a day of rage, he stressed repeatedly that it should be civilized, urging Muslims to behave with civility and dignity. "We must show the world that we are still civilized even when we are aggrieved," he said.

You might equate civilized and dignified protest with orderly street marches, speeches, and letter writing campaigns, but that would be interpreting Islamic terms and cultural signals by using our Western ideas.

It takes a certain disciplined manner to properly burn a flag, bomb a church or torch a car, after all.

Source: ABC