In the news - muslims......

[Soldier4Christ]

Alarm raised about Saudi school in Virginia

McLEAN, Va. - A private Islamic school supported by the Saudi government should be shut down until the U.S. government can ensure the school is not fostering radical Islam, a federal panel recommends.

In a report released Thursday, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom broadly criticized what it calls a lack of religious freedom in Saudi society and promotion of religious extremism at Saudi schools.

Particular criticism is leveled at the Islamic Saudi Academy, a private school serving nearly 1,000 students in grades K-12 at two campuses in northern Virginia's Fairfax County.

The commission's report says the academy hews closely to the curriculum used at Saudi schools, which they criticize for promoting hatred of and intolerance against Jews, Christians and Shiite Muslims.

"Significant concerns remain about whether what is being taught at the ISA promotes religious intolerance and may adversely affect the interests of the United States," the report states.

The commission, a creation of Congress, has no power to implement policy on its own. Instead, it makes recommendations to other agencies.

The commission does not offer specific criticism of the academy's teachings beyond its concerns that it too closely mimics a typical Saudi education.

The report recommends that the State Department prevail on the Saudi government to shut the school down until the school's textbooks can be reviewed and procedures are put in place to ensure the school's independence form the Saudi Embassy.

Messages left Wednesday with the State Department and the Saudi Embassy were not immediately returned.

Several advocacy groups in recent years have cited examples of inflammatory statements in religious textbooks in Saudi Arabia, including claims that a ninth-grade textbook reads that the hour of judgment will not come "until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them."

Saudi officials said they have worked in recent years to reform the textbooks and the curriculum, but critics say progress has been insufficient.

The school's director-general, Abdalla I. Al-Shabnan, said Wednesday that he had not seen the report. But he said the academy has adjusted its curriculum in recent years and removed some of the inflammatory language that had been included in the Saudi text. The school's curriculum may now serve as a model for the Saudi government to use in continuing its reform of Saudi schools, he said.

"There is nothing in our curriculum against any religion," Al-Shabnan said.

He also said he is willing to show the school's curriculum and textbooks to anybody who wants to see them, and he expressed disappointment that the commission did not request materials directly from the school.

"We have an open policy," he said.

He also pointed out that many of the school's teachers are Christian and Jewish.

The commission based its findings in part on a the work of a delegation that traveled to Saudi Arabia this year. The commission asked embassy officials to review the textbooks used in Saudi schools generally and at the Islamic Saudi Academy specifically but did not receive a response.

Commission spokeswoman Judith Ingram said the commission did not request to speak to academy officials because that went beyond the commission's mandate.

The report also criticizes the school's administrative structure, saying it is little more than an offshoot of the Saudi Embassy, with the Saudi ambassador to the United States serving as chairman of the school's board of directors. The structure "raises serious concerns about whether it is in violation of a U.S. law restricting the activities of foreign embassies."

After the Sept. 11 attacks, critics questioned the nature of the religious education at the Saudi academy. The school again found itself in the spotlight in 2005, when a former class valedictorian, Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, was charged with joining al-Qaida while attending college in Saudi Arabia and plotting to assassinate President Bush.

Abu Ali was convicted in federal court and sentenced to 30 years in prison. He is appealing his conviction.

[Soldier4Christ]

Former NYC Madrassa Intifada Principal Seeks Reinstatement

New York CAIR yesterday participated in a news conference at City Hall in support of the former Madrassa Principal reinstatement. Debbie Almontaser resigned after a controversy erupted over a T-Shirt with the words Intifada NYC on it. New York City School officials have said today that the former principal will not be rehired.

CAIR supported Debbie Almontaser, has threatened to file a law suit against the City of New York and possibly Mayor Bloomberg for allegedly violating her rights by forcing her to resign her position as Principal of the Madrassa.

Almontaser voluntarily resigned her position as the Principal of Khalil Gibran International Academy when the City of New York threatened to close the school down if she did not leave. Almontaser currently works in an administrative position for the public school system.

Controversy continues to surround the Madrassa as radical Imam Talib Abdur Rashid, sits on the Advisory Board of the school. The Imam has served at the Mosque of the Islamic Brotherhood since 1989 the radical Islamic group has been linked to supporting terrorism and devotion to Ahmadinejad Holocaust denials.

[Soldier4Christ]

A White Christmas in Mecca?

By Phyllis Chesler

Towards the end of Ramadan, (October 11th, 2007), a group of 138 Muslim clerics released a Letter which called for peace between Muslims and Christians. Jews, (my people), Hindus, Buddhists, other non-Christian denominations, secularists, and atheists were not included in this theologically-based appeal.

Already, I’m worrying. Why are they only talking to Christians? Although Jews represent less than 1% (.003%) of the world’s population, (there are perhaps 14 million of us), why not talk to Jews—since Jewish scripture is cited in the Letter; and because we are also viewed as so very powerful?

But, what’s wrong with approaching Buddhists and Hindus who number 360 million and 900 million, respectively? What about Chinese traditionalists who number 225 million, or primal-indigenous worshippers who number 190 million? Secularists and atheists number 850 million; that’s a lot of people. (Yoruba, Juche, and Sikhs number 20 million, 19 million, and 18 million, respectively.)

The reason for excluding these other groups is quite obvious—and chilling. Historically, Muslims have been taught to sue for (a temporary or a false) “peace” only when they are in the weaker, not stronger position, as a way of buying time to better prepare for a military-religious triumph.

Demographically, the only group that outmatches the Muslims is Christians. Therefore, although all the other denominations add up to one billion, thirty three million, their combined number is still smaller than the number of Muslims in the world, who number 1.2 billion. Christians number 2 billion. (I am also counting secularism and atheism as religious denominations – they often have fundamentalists among them too.)

As someone who has gone on record calling for Judao-Christian alliances with dissident, moderate, secular, and “peace” oriented Muslims and ex-Muslims, I do not think that this Letter or its signatories are serious about finding “common” ground.

I fear that the Letter’s purpose was to dis-inform and disarm uninformed Westerners who have been led to believe that their own concepts of “peace” are the same as Muslim concepts.

Indeed, The Letter has already been received very positively in the western mainstream media: the New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, International Herald Tribune, the Times of London, the London Guardian, Ecumenical News International, and the BBC did not challenge the Letter’s motives or signatories or place the Letter in historical or theological context.

However, both the Times of London and the Washington Post quote Anglican bishop Michael Nazir-Ali who noted that “the two faiths’ understanding of the oneness of God is not the same. One partner cannot dictate the terms on which dialogue must be conducted.”

Last year, I debated a number of people on Al-Hurrah about the Islamic Veil. Yvonne Ridley, a British convert to Islam, was one of the debaters. She characterized the plight of Muslims in the West as being oppressed and attacked; she said that her people’s blood was flowing in the streets of London and on the West Bank. She threatened a lawsuit in The Hague on behalf of Muslim religious freedom in the West. Knowing that people were watching this debate all over the Arab Middle East and Muslim world I politely and diplomatically appealed to those living in Saudi Arabia and on the West Bank.

I did not call for an international lawsuit on behalf of the rights of all those non-Muslim religions that are savagely persecuted in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Pakistan, and in Gaza and on the West Bank. But I pointed out that religious intolerance did not exist in the West but in the Muslim world. Rather than bring such a lawsuit, I called upon Saudi Arabia to start practicing some version of Western Judao-Christian religious tolerance.

Ridley went ballistic.

One more personal example: When I was interviewed in the London Guardian and in the Chicago Tribune (in 2006), both interviewers were very respectful and even friendly. However, when the interviews appeared, the questions suddenly contained negative critiques that were never presented to me. In one instance, a Muslim religious feminist rebutted what I was about to—but had not yet said. In another instance, the interviewer told me that “the new material had been imposed” from on high.

I doubt that Jewish, Christian, non-Christian, and secular and atheist views are this carefully preserved and protected in the Arab Muslim world.

In my view, the West is not at war with Islam: Count up the number of Muslim immigrants and mosques in the West. But Islam is certainly at war with the West. Count how few churches, temples, shrines and synagogues exist in the Arab and Muslim world and how endangered infidels are in the Islamic world.

[Soldier4Christ]

Rural town may block Muslim site
MARYLAND | Local leader draws up legal hurdle that could derail plan for mosque on farm

WALKERSVILLE, Md. -- A Muslim group's plan to build a mosque and convention site on a 224-acre farm has met with resistance from many residents of this rural, overwhelmingly Christian town who fear its tranquility and security may be jeopardized.

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA insists it will be a friendly neighbor, but its proposal -- including an annual national gathering of thousands of Ahmadis -- could be blocked by a measure under consideration by the town commissioners.

''Muslims are a whole different culture from us,'' said the mayor, Ralph Whitmore, taking a break at his livestock feed store. ''The situation with the Muslims is a touchy worldwide situation, so people are antsy over that.''

Two days after Ahmadiyya leaders fielded questions at a public forum in August, town Commissioner Chad Weddle introduced a zoning amendment that would prohibit places of worship, schools and private clubs on land zoned for agriculture -- including the farm the Ahmadis have contracted to buy.

If the five commissioners approve the measure in a vote expected as early as next week, the Ahmadis could be blocked from building a mosque on the site. Even if the amendment fails, the group still would need a special exception to proceed -- their request for one is pending before the town's planning commission.

To some, Weddle's amendment smacks of discrimination.

''The situation indicates this is an action that is being directed toward one specific faith community and, as such, that makes it highly suspect,'' said Roman P. Storzer, a Washington attorney who has been retained by the land's prospective seller, David Moxley.

Muqtedar Khan, a political science professor at the University of Delaware, said the blunt opposition voiced by some Walkersville citizens is reminiscent of the persecution Ahmadis have endured in Pakistan. There, they are forbidden to practice their religion because they believe there was a prophet after Muhammad -- Hadrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, who died in 1908.

''It is quite ironic,'' Khan said, that the Ahmadis -- allowed to worship freely in the United States -- ''are suffering a backlash because of their association with Islam.''

But Syed Ahmad, a federal economist who is managing the Walkersville project for the group, said the persecution in Pakistan is far worse.

''Here, people are civilized and they get up and they talk and they oppose you,'' Ahmad said, ''but they're not going to kill you.''

Ahmad, who emigrated from Pakistan in 1980, says members of his community won't go where they're not wanted. The group's leaders have gone door-to-door to persuade Walkersville residents that Ahmadis are not terrorists.

Ahmad acknowledged that the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the U.S. campaign against terrorism have made residents wary.

''They hear 'Muslims,' and they don't know anything beyond that,'' he said. ''To me, it's natural until they get a chance to ask questions what our beliefs are -- and then they realize these are good people.''

Some residents aren't convinced. When the Ahmadis visited Kambra Minor, a clerk at the Walkersville Market, ''I told them, you have to understand -- there's a certain connotation to a Muslim group, especially in a blue-collar area like this,'' Minor said.

Resident David Sample testified during a hearing last month that he is an intelligence officer whose office at the Pentagon, about 40 miles away, was destroyed in the Sept. 11 attacks.

''I just stress to the board and the community that we pay attention to what's going on, what the motive is, who the people are,'' he said.

[Shammu]

Immigrant youths turn to violence in Amsterdam
Georg Schreuder Hes

19-10-2007

It has been an unusually violent week for Amsterdam's western Slotervaart district. Cars were torched and youths clashed with police on several consecutive nights after a 22-year-old ethnic Moroccan was shot dead at a police station. He was killed by a policewoman he had just stabbed a number of times. The riots that followed reminded Amsterdam's Chief Commissioner Bernard Welten of a major nightmare for Western European cities: violence on a Parisian scale.
 
Every major town in the Netherlands has its share of so-called problem youths, the type of violent adolescents who gang up to terrorise the neighbourhood. Many of them are the children of migrant workers of Moroccan descent who arrived in the Netherlands in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The Dutch called them guest workers, the operative idea being that they would return to their country of origin when they were no longer needed. So nobody bothered to teach them Dutch, or much of anything else for that matter. The guest workers had their wives come over, but they, just like their husbands were not expected, or encouraged, to integrate into Dutch society.
 
The next generation
However, very few went back. What they did do, much to the government's surprise, was have children. These children were raised in a strange and often openly hostile environment, by parents who did  not speak the language and tried to instil moral values completely at odds with those of the country they lived in. So, kids being kids, they began taking advantage of the language gap by playing off their parents against their teachers and pretending not to understand what any Dutch person in a position of authority was saying.
 
The situation was substantially exacerbated by successive governments that chose to ignore what people in the streets knew was an increasingly serious problem. For years, political correctness dictated that problems with migrant children could not be openly discussed. Anybody trying to do so would be accused of blatant racism and Islamophobia. So by the time the social climate began to change, in the late 1990s, the situation had spun well and truly out of control.
 
Violent incidents
Slotervaart, a district in the west of Amsterdam, is not very different from any other poor district in the Netherlands' major cities. What sets it apart from similar districts is a recent series of violent incidents. On 11 October, a 16 year-old Moroccan boy died of a stab wound he sustained in a fight with a 14-year-old classmate after the two got into an argument over a pen. Only three days later, a disturbed Moroccan man walked into the local police station and, without any provocation, stabbed and seriously injured a police woman and one of her colleagues. The man was shot dead by one of the officers.
 
In the following days, local Moroccan youths torched four cars in the district and smashed the windows of the police station. Since then, police have been intensively patrolling the district, which led to the arrests of eight youths who were detained when officers found jerry cans full of petrol in their vehicle. In the past few days, senior police officers have been making comparisons with the riots that raged in Paris in which more than 9,000 cars were torched two years ago.
 
Fundamental differences
However, both Interior Minister Guusje ter Horst and experts on the Moroccan youth gangs issue say that the two situations are fundamentally different. There is reportedly far more poverty, unemployment and racism in the Paris suburbs. Criminologist Frank van Gemert from the Free University said in today's de Volkskrant that another major difference with the French situation lies in the fact that the Dutch government is spending millions of euros on aid to the Slotervaart district. And police are in regular contact with religious leaders and other representatives of the local community. Mr Van Gemert says these youths may feel frustrated, but they can't say that they are being abandoned by the government.
 
His argument that they are simply using the recent incidents as an excuse to raise hell is born out by police reports showing that they are dealing with a limited group of around 35 youths, all of them repeat offenders. In NRC.Next, district council chair Ahmed Marcouch says that the vandalism in his district has nothing to do with emotions over the recent deaths:

Immigrant youths turn to violence in Amsterdam

[Shammu]

Many of them are the children of migrant workers of Moroccan descent who arrived in the Netherlands in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Moroccans are 99% Muslim, so it would be 99% safe to say that these rioters are Muslim.

[Soldier4Christ]

Mistrial declared in Muslim charity case

A judge declared a mistrial Monday for most former leaders of a Muslim charity accused of funding terrorism, after chaos broke out in the court when three jurors disputed the verdict that had been announced.

The trial of five former Muslim charity leaders was thrown into turmoil when jurors acquitted three of them of funding terrorism - but some members of the panel disputed the verdict announced against the two others.

U.S. District Judge A. Joe Fish sent the panel back to resolve the differences, and because of the confusion, did not officially accept any of the jury's findings.

The verdicts were announced after a two-month trial and 19 days of deliberation. When they were read in court, three jurors said they were incorrect.

The jury forewoman said she was surprised by the three jurors' actions.

"When we voted, there was no issue in the vote," she said. "No one spoke up any different. I really don't understand where it is coming from."

The judge had announced that Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development fundraiser Mufid Abdulqader was acquitted on all counts, and two co-defendants - former chairman Mohammed El-Mezain Mohammed El-Mezain and the group's New Jersey representative, Abdulrahman Odeh - were acquitted on most counts.

The verdicts questioned by the jurors were on charges against the foundation, as well as former chief executive Shukri Abu Baker and former chairman Ghassan Elashi.

In all, five former Holy Land leaders and the group were accused of providing aid to the Middle Eastern terrorist group Hamas. The U.S. government designated Hamas a terrorist group in 1995 and again in 1997, making financial transactions with the group illegal.

[Shammu]

Israel to come under Sharia law, says Israeli Arab cleric

A leading Israeli Arab Muslim cleric said at the weekend that the Jewish state will very soon cease to exist and the whole of the country will come under Sharia (strict Islamic) law as another piece in the puzzle to reconstituting the Islamic Caliphate.

In an interview with a local Arabic-language newspaper, Sheikh Kamal Khatib, deputy head of northern Israel's Islamic Movement, insisted that the world is "on the threshold of a new era. The future belongs to Islam and the Muslims."

Khatib said that in preparation for the coming Islamic takeover, Muslims who hold Israeli citizenship like himself should begin to actively rebel against the state by refusing to cooperate with and forming alternatives to the Israeli authorities.

Also at the weekend, Khatib's boss, Sheikh Raed Salah denounced current peace negotiations leading to a two-state solution to the Israeli-Arab conflict as an "evil Israeli scheme." Salah, who is also an Israeli citizen, has long maintained that that Muslim world must not recognize Israel's right to exist.

Israel to come under Sharia law, says Israeli Arab cleric

[nChrist]

Israel to come under Sharia law, says Israeli Arab cleric

A leading Israeli Arab Muslim cleric said at the weekend that the Jewish state will very soon cease to exist and the whole of the country will come under Sharia (strict Islamic) law as another piece in the puzzle to reconstituting the Islamic Caliphate.

WOW! Stupid statements like this are being made all of the time now, some even by heads of countries, so I would say that the time is short.

For the record, Israel will never cease to exist, but Islam will. Islam's Waterloo awaits them, and it will be final. Until then, I have no doubt that they will butcher great hosts of innocent people. They might even see their dreamed of Caliphate, but it will be extremely short and suffer a bloody ending by JESUS CHRIST HIMSELF!

[Shammu]

WOW! Stupid statements like this are being made all of the time now, some even by heads of countries, so I would say that the time is short.

For the record, Israel will never cease to exist, but Islam will. Islam's Waterloo awaits them, and it will be final. Until then, I have no doubt that they will butcher great hosts of innocent people. They might even see their dreamed of Caliphate, but it will be extremely short and suffer a bloody ending by JESUS CHRIST HIMSELF!

AMEN!!

Brother, I like using, islam's fireloo awaits them, and it will be final. For we know, the Lake of Fire is the final destination for those who have died for islam, and will die for islam in the future.

[nChrist]

AMEN!!

Brother, I like using, islam's fireloo awaits them, and it will be final. For we know, the Lake of Fire is the final destination for those who have died for islam, and will die for islam in the future.

That actually makes much more sense, and there certainly won't be any virgins waiting for them. All of it will be the smoking section, and there won't even be a choice between crispy or extra-crispy.

It's extremely sad that the powers over them have made it almost impossible for us to witness to them. Many wonderful Christians have died trying, and I feel quite certain that many more Christians will continue to die all over the world while attempting to share the GOOD NEWS OF THE GOSPEL OF GOD'S GRACE. This is still the most powerful message in the entire world, and the devil can't stand the message of JESUS CHRIST and the CROSS. So, I want to take every reasonable opportunity to keep sharing it. This thread is perfect because Muslims might be reading it.

GOOD NEWS!

1:  Romans 3:10 NASB  as it is written, "THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE; THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD; ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS; THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD, THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE."

2:  Romans 3:23  NASB  for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

3:  Romans 5:12  NASB  Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned--

4:  Romans 6:23  NASB  For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

5:  Romans 1:18  NASB  For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,

6:  Romans 3:20  NASB  because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.

7:  Romans 3:27  NASB  Where then is boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? Of works? No, but by a law of faith.

8:  Romans 5:8-9  NASB  But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.

9:  Romans 2:4  NASB  Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?

10:  Romans 3:22  NASB  even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction;

11:  Romans 3:28  NASB  For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law.

12:  Romans 10:9  NASB  that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved;

13:  Romans 4:21  NASB  and being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform.

14:  Romans 4:24 NASB  but for our sake also, to whom it will be credited, as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead,

15:  Romans 5:1  NASB  Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,

16:  Romans 10:10  NASB  for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

17:  Romans 10:13  NASB  for "WHOEVER WILL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED."

Thanks be unto GOD for HIS unspeakable GIFT!, JESUS CHRIST, our Lord and Saviour forever!

[Soldier4Christ]

There should be nothing more convincing than a report given by someone that has "been-there-done-that". Unfortunately there are those that have ruined this concept by telling falsehoods about there experiences for political or financial gain. This is not the case of Nonie Darwish who risks her very life in order for the world to know the truth.

Nonie's father was the head of the secret police for Egyptian dictator Gamel Abdel Nasser who in 1949 made him the head of the fedayeen in Gaza, the first terrorist army to attack Israel. Nonie's father was killed by the Israelis but when her brother's appendix burst and he had a choice of going to a hospital in Israel for care or a hospital in Gaza, he went Israel. He did so knowing that the Israelis would save his life, despite the fact that he was a Muslim from Gaza and his father was a terrorist dedicated to the destruction of Israel. No Jew could expect similar treatment from any Arab or Muslim state.

These facts opened Nonie's eyes to the genocidal and hypocratical hatred that was being instilled in Arab Muslims by their dictatorial and fascist regimes. She became the defender of Jews and the state of Israel and hence hated by all those who want to destroy the Jewish state. She has been the recipient of fatwas, death threats and assassination attempts.

The following is a speech given by Nonie Darwish, the founder of Arabs for Israel, at last night’s kickoff event at UC Berkeley for Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week. It is preceded by a short intro written by Nonie Darwish regarding her impressions of the events surrounding her speech. Nonie was shouted down before she began to speak. Insults were hurled at her. Raucous obstructors had to be ejected by police from the audience.

___________


Intro:

The atmosphere required extensive security -- which made me feel that without it I would have been physically hurt at UC Berkeley. The first statement from the Al-Jazeera representative to me was: “You are the most hated woman in the Arab world.” The hatred was also felt from the far leftist American audience. My response to the Al-Jazeera statement was: “Arab media spread a hate campaign against me after my book came out. Egyptian media, without reading the book, called me a traitor to my father because I support Israel. I love my father and I believe that if he had lived he would have been part of the peace treaty that Sadat had singed with Israel.” I believe Arab media is trying to misrepresent my views in order to silence me.

A man was sitting in the audience with a black sheer bag covering his head to protest ‘Abu Greib’ when the discussion had nothing to do with Iraq. There were screams from the audience: "Fascist," then "racist" then "Osama Bin Laden is a CIA agent." The noise was getting louder and I could not speak any more. I felt that even in America I am being silenced. My response was: “Who will speak for women who are stoned and for Muslims terrorized in radical Muslim countries? It is sad that I left oppressive Sharia Muslim culture, where I had no freedom of speech, only to find myself silenced in America, by groups who claim they are for free speech.”

The sad thing about this whole event was the feeling that radical Muslims and their far Left supporters would rather never criticize Islamic culture than stand up against the culture that flogs, stones, beheads and amputates limbs. Not offending a religion has become more important to the far Left (unless it is Christianity or Judaism) than human rights of Muslims and victims of terror. Honor killing and female genital mutilation can be tolerated -- but noone better dare utter the word "Islamo-fascism."

American universities are becoming tyrannical when it comes to Conservative values and to Arab Americans who dare to speak out against the culture of jihad. It does not matter how many people in my early life in Egypt suffered from honor killing, female genital mutilation and oppression of women, I must shut up on American campuses.

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

The Speech:

As an American woman of Muslim Arab origin, I cherish the freedoms America has given me; a right all too scarce in the Middle East where speaking for human rights, women’s rights, democracy and even peace with Israel, is a taboo with serious consequences.

In America, I learned that no ideology or religion is beyond questioning. Ideologies that don’t answer the hard questions will face intellectual bankruptcy. I would like to stress that this is not a discussion about the good and peace loving Muslims, but about an ideology of violence and hatred that has brought oppression, unrest, violence and terror to the Middle East and has now spread to the rest of the world. Radicals have made the slightest criticism, critical thinking and free inquiry an insult to Islam. Arab feminists, reformers and intellectuals are intimidated, threatened or killed. Even the late Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, was stabbed in Cairo in 1994 by a radical Muslim who claimed he insulted Islam. That is why we all must welcome an open discussion. The best weapon in the war on terror and Islamo-Fascism is the truth.

I’d like to start with my background. I was born and raised as a Muslim in Cairo, Egypt and the Gaza Strip; a time when President Nasser was committed to unify the Arab world and destroy Israel. In the 50’s, my father headed the Egyptian military intelligence in Gaza and started the Fedayeen, which means ‘armed resistance and self sacrifice’. They made cross-border attacks into Israel and caused death, damage and destruction. There were assassination attempts on my father in response to the terror.

One night Israel sent commandos to our heavily guarded home, but my father was not home. All the Israeli soldiers found were us, women and children. The Israeli soldiers left us unharmed.

I attended Gaza elementary schools. It is there that we learned hatred vengeance and retaliation; peace was never an option; but a sign of defeat and weakness. Jews were portrayed as less than human; I was told ‘don’t take candy or fruit from a stranger, it could be a Jew trying to poison you’. They filled our hears with fear of Jews; that made hatred come easy and terrorism acceptable, even honorable.

After two years of intense Fedayeen operations, my father was killed in the first targeted assassination in Gaza in 1956. I was 8 years old. In Nasser's famous speech to nationalize the Suez Canal, he hailed my father as a national hero, a ubgone19. President Nasser vowed that all of Egypt would take revenge and made no mention of the heavy toll of death and destruction brought upon Israel by the Fedayeen. My siblings and I were asked by top government officials "which one of you will avenge your father's blood by killing Jews." I felt very uncomfortable with a question. We were speechless.

After my father’s death, my mother had to face life alone with five children in a culture that gave respect only to families headed by a man. In the 50’s few women drove cars and she was criticized and called names for buying a car to take us to school. Arab women are expected to sacrifice their family by giving up their husbands and sons to martyrdom, but are given little respect to live their life with freedom and dignity.

I lived for 30 years in oppressive dictatorships and police states. I witnessed honor killing of girls (our maid), oppression of women and female genital mutilation. We regularly heard the cursing of non-Muslims from the pulpits of mosques. As a young woman, I visited a Christian friend in Cairo during the Friday prayers, and we both heard the verbal attacks on Christians and Jews from the loudspeakers. We heard "May God destroy the infidels and the Jews, the enemies of God. We are not to befriend them or make treaties with them." We also heard the worshipers respond "Amen". I heard ‘cursing prayers’ all my life from the pulpits of mosques -- and believe it or not if you grow up with cursing prayers, it can feel and sound normal. My Christian friend looked scared, and I was ashamed. That was when I first realized that something was very wrong in the way my religion was taught and practiced.

I moved to the US in 1978. In my first visit to a mosque in America, we were told not to assimilate in America and that Islam is here to become the dominant religion. I was told to cover up in Islamic clothes; but how can I do that when I have never worn Islamic clothes in Egypt? Women in Egypt until the 1980’s did not wear Islamic clothes.

In August 2001, I visited my birthplace, Cairo, Egypt. I was stunned to see how radical Islam had taken over. The level of anger and hate speech was alarming. I saw extreme poverty, pollution, hazardous material and garbage along the Nile. There was high unemployment, inflation and widespread corruption. But when I read Arab media, all I saw was Israel and America bashing. Citizens were unaware of Muslim against Muslim atrocities in Iraq, Algeria, Sudan etc. As a matter of fact, the term “Islamo-fascism” was coined by Algerian Muslims and ex-Muslims to describe the Islamic fanatics who slaughtered 150,000 fellow Algerian Muslims in the 1990s. Arab media have failed human rights of the ordinary Arab citiznes. They have no understanding of their role in defending the interest of the public; this mentality was created from an Islamo-Fascist environment that rejects change.Western media was also under-reporting the threat.

I was happy to return to the US on the evening of Sept. 10th. 2001. The next morning I saw the second airplane hit the twin towers, I knew ‘Jihad has come to America.’ Muhammad Attah was from Cairo, the same city I came from.

I called several friends in Cairo, they were all in denial and said ‘How dare you say that Arabs did this? Don’t you know this is a Jewish conspiracy?'

These were not radicals, but ordinary Egyptians who otherwise are very nice people. I hung up the phone and felt alone and disconnected from my culture of origin. Once again, my people are accusing the Jewish people of something we know very well, we Arabs have done ourselves. In any religion this is considered a sin, but in the eyes of radial Islam, Jews do not deserve the truth, justice or mercy. The Jews that we describe in our mosques, Arab textbooks and media don't exist. We, Arabs are fighting an imaginary Jew of our own creation. Israel is not perfect; no society is; but the way the Jews and minorities are treated by my people is tragic and a disgrace.

The global war we are fighting against Islamo-fascism and jihad is not just about bombs and hijacked planes; It’s also about tyranny and oppression of women. Oppression of women and support of terror are two facets of the same fundamentalist mentality. Islamic law – Sharia – that terrorists are fighting to impose upon the world, would create a global state of gender apartheid.

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

Under criminal Sharia, punishment could be flogging, stoning, beheading and amputation of limbs. Cruel and unusual punishment by Western and humane standards. Leaving Islam is punishable by death. If the State fails to kill an apostate, his death is guaranteed at the hands of a street mob. That makes Islam more than a religion; it is a one party state; and also an elaborate legal system, called Sharia, that can put you to death if you leave Islam. Sharia must guarantee there is no defection from the Berlin Wall of the Muslim State. Amazingly, the majority of Muslim countries don’t practice criminal Sharia because they cannot stomach it.

I have lived under Family Sharia for 30 years of my life. This is practiced in all Muslim countries; it allows only men the right to an easy divorce,  having up to 4 wives, allows wife beating, half the inheritance of a man to a woman and her testimony in court is only half valid. She is respected only when she shields her body, face and even her identity. As many as seventy-five percent of women in Pakistani prison are behind bars for the crime of having been raped. Sharia codified into permanent Law a 7th century Arabian Peninsula tribal culture for every Muslim in any culture for ever.

Under Sharia, the Muslim Khalifa or Amir, meaning leader, is exempt from being punished under Sharia. Islamic Sharia law is a dictator’s dream handed to him by Allah.

Polygamy has a devastating effect on family dynamics, husband/wife relationship and women relationships. Many Moslem men only have one wife, but the damage to wife/husband relationship has already been done in the Muslim marriage contract itself; where a man does not pledge loyalty to his wife and the wife cannot expect his loyalty. The marriage contract has 3 more spaces to be filled out by other women if the man wishes. That is why a good Muslim woman must accept her destiny under Sharia Law for one simple reason, challenging Allah’s Law is like challenging Allah himself.

In the latest Bin Laden tape, the terror guru was calling on Muslims in the West to increase their numbers through converting as many Americans to Islam and through immigration in order to accomplish, what he called, jihad from within. That is why Islamists in the West are pushing the envelope to see how far the West can take it. Some demand Sharia Law and even claim that Sharia is comparable with democracy.

In a Muslim parade in New York this September, right before the 6th anniversary of 9/11, Muslims carried signs saying “Muslims against Democracy and Western Values”, “the Holocaust is a hoax” and “Ban the Talmud”. They were selling books on jihad with an AK 47s on the cover. This comes from people who are complaining of Islamo-phobia. Do they think this will bring them sympathy and understanding?

A Muslim woman in Florida insists on covering her face for a driver’s license, cab drivers in Minnesota refuse to take passengers carrying wine from the duty-free shop, the 6 flying Imams who scared everyone on the airplane and are now suing. And lately demands for special faucets at the level of the feet in American schools for Muslim kids to Wada “wash” before praying.

I have lived in the Middle East for 30 years and have never seen special faucets for Wada in schools or universities, except in mosques. This only exists in Saudi Arabia. The deception is phenomenal. Islamists are pushing Wahabi Saudi values in America; values that I have never even seen in Egypt.

I have not come to America to become a Wahabi Saudi.

On Arab TV, I once saw a Muslim preacher telling little children that lying is not allowed except under three conditions 1- Lying to non-Muslims when it is in the best interest of Islam. 2- Lying to Muslims if it will end conflict between them. And 3rd: Lying to one’s wife to improve the relationship.

Lying thus has become an obligation in international relationships, Muslim relationships and family relationships. Any wonder why Muslims were silent after 9/11? Those who expose the lying game are considered traitors. By allowing lying, Muslims have created a culture unable to distinguish between lies from truth; truth has become a convoluted game of saving face for the best interest of Islam.

The Times of London reported that Muslim students in Britain are being taught to despise non-Muslims as ‘filth’. The Arabic word for this is ‘Nagas.’ That is why many Arabs believe that the existence of non-Muslims on Muslim land is a desecration or occupation.

US soldiers, at the request of Saudi Arabia, sacrificed their lives to protect it from Saddam. Under normal conditions that could have been met with appreciation, but instead, the Arab street reaction was “how dare the infidels desecrate Muslim land.” That is why America’s defense of the Muslims against the Serbs, the Afghani Muslims against the Soviet Union, feeding the Somali Muslims starved by their own leadership, all did not get the US any credit in the Muslim world; just the opposite, the more America tries to help stabilize the region, the more it is despised. Arab-Muslims do not want to be rescued by infidels. This is a proud culture that is easily shamed by feelings of dependency on the non-Muslims. This is the psychology of the Arab Street.

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

That is how the West is perceived. In the Judeo Christian culture they say: “we are all sinners” -- but in the Muslim culture “they are all sinners; but we are Muslims”. Non-Muslim are “Cafir”, non-Muslims are not innocent; they are viewed as sinners who need Islam and Islamists have given themselves the role of Allah to force Islam on the world, against their will, through the principle of Jihad.

Moslem clergy are constantly looking for the ideal Muslim State and cannot find it. They have failed miserably in stabilizing their society. Instead of being a source of comfort, stability and wisdom, they have become a source of hate, rage and subversion. To them, the solution is always an intifada, uprising, a coup d’etat, an assassination or violence on the streets. They have no respect for the legitimacy of any government and no government is Muslim enough for them; not even Saudi Arabia.

In this dynamic only tyrannical governments can survive. Leaders who want peace, modernity and reforms are assassinated, like Sadat. Every Muslim country is suffering from underground radical Muslim groups who are trying to overturn the government and the constitution, in their pursuit for the perfect Muslim state. That is why the Muslim world is in a constant turmoil, stagnation and conflict. Islamo-fascism is the end result.

America is very concerned since all of this is spilling to the rest of the world. In 1998 the same attitude was expressed by a Muslim leader who asked Muslims in America not to assimilate and said we are here to make the Koran the law of the land in America. What Arab leaders are suffering from is now moving to America and if that will continue our freedoms will erode. Islamo-fascist unrest, turmoil, destructive mentality and hatred of order and the rule of law is now here.

Arab governments have access to build mosques in the West, but give Americans no access to build churches or synagogues in Muslim countries. They finance Muslim and Middle East studies departments on American Universities -- but there is not one University in any of the 52 Muslim countries that have a Christian or Judaism Studies Department. They freely preach Islam all around the world, but imprison and kill Christian missionaries.

If this trend continues Bin Laden’s dreams of internal jihad within America will come true. If that happens America will never be the same again. We could see a large Muslim population congregate in London, Paris or Detroit demanding Sharia or else. If their demands are denied then they will demand a separatist movement; Chechnya can happen in the West. Islamic separatist movements are alive and well in Chechnya, the Philippines and other parts of the world. It caused India to split Pakistan away and give it to Muslims, but Islamic terrorism inside India has not stopped.

And now Islamists have caught the West in a time of political correctness and multiculturalism. By tolerating hatred and violence, the West is not doing Muslims or Islam a favor. Tolerating intolerance is not a sign of compassion; it is gross negligence.

To conclude: Religion, any religion, must adapt to the universal concept of Human Rights, freedom of choice of one’s religion, equal rights of women and minorities. As Arab Americans what are we going to do about it? Are we going to remain silent and defensive? We owe America honest answers. We need to inspire true reform in our culture of origin. There are 7 women in Iran right now awaiting death by stoning -- are we going to stand by them or are we going to fail them? Muslim converts out of Islam are in hiding; are we going to allow them to get killed under the name of Islam? Are we going to see the Egyptian Christian population continue to suffer discrimination?

If Islam is a religion of peace then we must demand better from our religious leaders. We’ve had it with the self-anointed intolerant Ayatollahs, Mullahs and Sheikhs who act like Allah and silence speech by issuing Fatwas of death.  I ask the support of the American Left. You should be our natural allies because we are the reformers and defenders of freedoms in the Middle East.

Western feminists must embrace a single standard for both the West and Muslim society. Feminists and everyone else concerned with human freedom must support Muslim dissidents, both male and female, who are risking their lives in a battle for women’s rights under Islam. I ask the support of the American left. You should be our natural allies because we are the reformers and defenders of freedoms in the Middle East.

Thank You.