Scripps Howard News Service column on World War IV

[longeyes]

If you want a peaceful religion join the Buddhists.

Tell it to the Tibetans. Maybe if they weren't so peaceful they'd still have a country.

 

[longeyes]

From what I understand about Islam is this: It does not condone offensive wars. It does not condone the killing of innocents (one of the greatest sins).

Theory is a beautiful thing.

And headless men (and women) tell no tales.

 

[longeyes]

And no, the tax in question was levelled against anyone the Caliph conquered. It was higher for non-Muslims than for Muslims, and it wasn't just "allowing" the religion...it bought active protection.

There's a word for that (not in The Book): extortion.

Badda bing!

 

[longeyes]

If renegade Muslims messed with a people who had settled with the Caliph, they had the Caliph to answer to. Which is part of the reason why Christians and Jews used to welcome the Muslims with open arms.

Long live The Godfather!

 

[shootinstudent]

Israel, Egypt, Persian, Phoenician, Greece, Rome, Byzantium, Ottomon, Brits and now Israel again.

I realize I'm missing some short periods in the middle but the last time the "Palestinians" as an ethnicity were even remotely self-determining they were warring pre-bronze age separate tribes.

You could use the same argument to deprive two thirds of the world's population of the right to self rule. A better way to frame the issue is this: Do you think it's just and in line with modern values to include a regime as one in another of the chain you listed???

The Palestinian Arabs recognized themselves as part of the greater Arab rule, and wanted to join the Arab League and be freed from UN and British rule. They had political organizations and an ethnic identity that mattered to them, which is clear if you go through the UN reports and over the british papers before then. I am a proponent of the UN partition plan, which I think could've secured a workable peace from the start...but it didn't happen because the proto-Israeli groups invaded the part that wasn't theirs immediately upon declaring independence. The continuing lack of recognition of the history and current situation is fueling the militants, and I think it's in the interest both of securing peace for Israel (and they deserve it, having sacrificed so much to build the most developed state in the region), and in discrediting the terror propagandists.

There's a word for that (not in The Book): extortion.

Badda bing!

All mandatory payments are at some level extortion. You need to take a step back and consider the context. In terms of the 7th century world, this was a very well advanced and tolerant system. That's not really relevant to what kinds of government we know how to run today, and it's also not really proof about any government today...talking about the Muslim Caliphate to prove something about Muslims today is like claiming that the Byzantine and Roman rulers were exemplars of western freedom and humanity.

 

[carebear]

Except that the descendents of the Romans and even the Byzantine/Ottomans have created secularized democracies that respect individual rights to freedom and self-determination and even worship while the descendents of the Cliphate are still on the whole hereditary monarchys and/or religious oligarchies/theocracies who still rule using the same code they had a thousand years ago.

The Muslim world never had a Reformation and has been paying the price ever since.

As for the Palestinians, I didn't see the Egyptians or Jordanians ceding the areas of their territory claimed by the P's outside of the Israeli conquests either, at least not until it became politically expedient to ease tensions with the West AND create a buffer to pester the Israelis and keep the P's from trying to overthrow their nations. No, they used them as shock troops to try to destroy Israel over and over again. Better they take the casualties.

 

[shootinstudent]

Except that the descendents of the Romans and even the Byzantine/Ottomans have created secularized democracies that respect individual rights

How long did that take?

the descendents of the Cliphate are still on the whole hereditary monarchys and/or religious oligarchies/theocracies who still rule using the same code they had a thousand years ago.

I disagree. This is a good article on modern Islamic radicalism in the middle east: http://www.meforum.org/article/14

What masquerades in some places as "traditional Islam" today is most certainly a modern invention.

As for the Palestinians, I didn't see the Egyptians or Jordanians ceding the areas of their territory claimed by the P's outside of the Israeli conquests either, at least not until it became politically expedient to ease tensions with the West AND create a buffer to pester the Israelis and keep the P's from trying to overthrow their nations.

The entire piece of land that the Palestinians were asking for, and that would've been used for division under the UN partition plan, is within Israel's borders or in the Occupied Zones.

No, they used them as shock troops to try to destroy Israel over and over again. Better they take the casualties.

The directions the surrounding arab states and the Palestinian groups have taken since the 40's has been nothing short of sick and twisted, definitely. It's no longer about self-determination for the power-mongers, but rather about Arab nationalism and a twisted vision of morality that celebrates attacks on old ladies at bus stops. I think it's a disgrace, and I think a substantive move towards reconciliation on the part of the Israeli and American governments will help to discredit and marginalize the hate-mongers like Hamas and Al Qaeda.

 

[carebear]

How long did it take for the West to Reform itself and grow a real civilization?

The process could be said to have begun with the stopping of Islamic Imperial aggression at Tours and continued during the counterattack against Muslim aggression (the Crusades) and the recapturing of traditionally Christion (or at least pagan) territory so I'd say the Islamic world has had an equal amount of time to Reform itself. it isn't like the "West" was this monolith that always acted smoothly in its own climb toward true civilization. The Muslims don't get a pass.

The problem is, they start pointing fingers at others and taking on the role of victim following Lepanto when the rise of the individual in the West put the first solid nails in their coffin of tyranny.

They could have sucked it up and realized they were losing because their culture was inadequate but instead they clung to a sinking spar and developed the jealousy of the West that fuels so much of the radicalism today.

As for the governments?

Sheikdoms, emirates and a "religious council"-led Persia are medieval forms of government. Whether they have perverted their theology is immaterial in explaining their primative governmental structures. Heck, at least adherence to tradition has an internal logic to it. Claiming the religion is changed kicks that particular leg out from under why they persist in obsolesence and doesn't replace it with anything.

The Palestinian Homeland?

Egypt at a variety of times held Gaza and the Sinai, Jordan the East and West bank. If they hadn't started a war they could have handed both territories off to the Palestinians in '48 and avoided much of the trouble since.

The West is and since the 1500's has been the very LEAST of the Arab (in particular) and Muslim (in general) world's problems. 99% of their troubles can be justly and easily laid at their own door(s).

 

[shootinstudent]

The process could be said to have begun with the stopping of Islamic Imperial aggression at Tours and continued during the counterattack against Muslim aggression (the Crusades) and the recapturing of traditionally Christion (or at least pagan) territory so I'd say the Islamic world has had an equal amount of time.

That is not a tenable position. 732 was in the thick of the darkness for the west, and more than 700 years of darkness followed it. The "traditionally Christian" territory was never recaptured, except for a brief period during the crusades (when the crusader armies were wiped out by militarily superior forces), and in Spain over a long, tortured period, that was followed immediately by that cultural highlight: the Spanish Inquisition.

They could have sucked it up and realized they were losing because their culture was inadequate but instead they clung to a sinking spar and developed the jealousy of the West that fuels so much of the radicalism today.

You honestly believe that they're just jealous today??? The culture was doing just fine. The European renaissance, especially in the sciences, has its roots in Islamic intellectual products. The Ottoman turks were definitely advanced...they had a system of imperial government (the Millet) that was vastly superior to anything the Europeans had at the time.

As for the governments? Sheikdoms, emirates and a "religious council"-led Persia are medieval forms of government. Whether they have perverted their theology is immaterial in explaining their primative governmental structures. Heck, at least adherence to tradition has an internal logic to it. Claiming the religion is changed kicks that particular leg out from under why they persist in obsolesence and doesn't replace it with anything.

The modern Iranian and Saudi Governments are not even remotely like the Caliphate, or the fractured states that followed, or the Ottoman empire. There is virtually zero resemblance. Read the article about the religion; it's not just a claim, it's pretty well documented.

Egypt held Gaza and the Sinai, Jordan the East and West bank. If they hadn't started a war they could have handed both territories off to the Palestinians in '48 and avoided much of the trouble since.

Read the linked thread. Egypt did not start the war in 48. The Zionist rebellion is what kicked off the war. What exactly would Egypt have gone to war against if there hadn't already been a rebellion???

The West is and since the 1500's has been the very LEAST of the Arab (in particular) and Muslim (in general) world's problems. All their troubles can be justly and easily laid at their own door(s).

Is that so? Well, I encourage you to look up Ibn Saud's Marauders, along with Muhammad ibn Abd Al Wahhab. Those are the founders of the modern Islamic radical movement as funded by Saudi Arabia. Who do you think funded their rise to power, and willingly recognized the terror state they created that is now Saudi Arabia? You might also look up such great names as TE Lawrence...

Hint: It wasn't the "Arabs" (who were actually experiencing a time of cultural liberalism and learning before the House of Saud arrived on the scene. The liberal culture remains in Lebanon.)

Britain and the US were more than happy to replace the turks with a bunch of gangsters in order to secure oil rights...and internationally funded Wahhabism is what we have to show for it.

 

[Werewolf]

The above is an erudite and interesting discussion but you know what it is irrelevant.

Cultures clash - that's history, that's now, that's the future. When they clash one wins and one loses. The winners make the rules and if history is any indicator the losers generally don't get to stick around for long after their defeat.

To all the apologists for western culture who hate us so much - buy a turban and move to Iran - I'm sure you'll enjoy all the religious and political freedoms they have there that the west doesn't. Oh yeah... don't forget the economic prosperity you'll enjoy.

To all those that say if we just understand them and why they hate us - good luck - I'm sure you'll attain understanding while they're gang raping your wife (afterall the way she dresses in her provocative western style means she's just asking for it) and hacking off your head to please Allah!

To the rest: You either are for western culture or you aren't. If you aren't get out or shut up - we don't need you. If you are then either believe the western way is best and resolve yourself to the fact that you may someday have to fight for it or get out.

Because one way or another the medieval barbarians that constitute middle eastern culture are coming for you - to convert you or kill you. They don't care one way or another.

 

[TheEgg]

<sigh> I have the answer to my question now, Shootinstudent.

It seems to me that you have swallowed the entire apoligia of the radical Muslim world. "It is always someone else who has driven us to our crimes."

 

[Cosmoline]

Britain and the US were more than happy to replace the turks with a bunch of gangsters in order to secure oil rights...and internationally funded Wahhabism is what we have to show for it.

All of the Muslim world's problems are the fault of the west--of course.

 

[shootinstudent]

All of the Muslim world's problems are the fault of the west--of course.

Strawman that doesn't change the point. It's not like we've been uninvolved in the middle east, and our involvement has contributed significantly to the current state of affairs. There is not a single "Muslim hotspot" in the world where colonialism and western power politics haven't appeared on the scene, suspiciously in between the older, more tolerant systems (you know, the Muslims who used to create safe havens for Jews fleeing European pogroms) and the new radical terror states.

I don't see how identifying the Arab terror leaders and how they came to power constitutes "blaming only the west".

 

[carebear]

Where do you get your history?

Spain: Pagan (Roman), Christian (Roman), Christian (post-Roman dark ages), invaded by Muslims who advanced and converted militarily down the previously pagan or Christian (Roman/post) North African coastline, resisted by the rump Christian kingdoms in the North for years until finally the invaders were slowly forced out/rolled back after Charles Martel's victory at Tours.

Christian Territory reclaimed

The Balkans: similar situation but used as a source of slaves for the Janissaries and civil Service by the Ottomon Empire until years of warfare reduced Islam's control

Christian Territory mostly reclaimed

Byzantium/Turkey: Traditional Eastern Christian stronghold, yes, never recaptured militarily but Western political and economic ideals hold tenuous sway.

Just because the West never recaptured and HELD the root territories of Judaism and Christianity cannot disguise the fact that those territories were forcibly invaded by a new Imperialistic religion that directly led to their becoming part of the Third World rather than successful modern nations. And the Crusades are about the last time the West lost big (albeit, at the end of incredible supply lines against superior numbers of opponents and while combatting political infighting) against Muslim armies. We must have done something right since then.

Speaking of which, if the West "owes" its success to Islamic thoughts and advances, why the heck haven't the nations of Islam been able to use them to succeed.

They ruled the known world for centuries while during the European dark ages my ancestors barely scraped by. Why are they losers now?

As for the Inquisition, as you say that was a horrific interlude in Western religious history which directly led to the Reformation of the church and long, bloody internecine wars that in the end led to the Renaissance and the political and humanitarian civilisation of the nations of Europe and the beginning of the dominance of the West.

The Islamic peoples apparently never got disgusted enough with the religious barbarism many of its adherents then and now excused as holy to decide to break the back of the religious leaders and secularize their governments. By retaining medieval theocratic ideals as equal to modern philosophical thought they hamstrung themselves.


As for direct lineage from the Caliphate? Strawman.

A hereditary Kingdom is a hereditary Kingdom. House of Saud or Sultan of Bahrain. A theocracy is a theocracy and the revolutionary council of Iran is a theocracy with final political say. Without an independently elected legislature tyranny is tyranny and no specious semantic games can change it.
for whatever reason, and it is in fact religious domination of political and philosophical thought, the peoples of Islamic countries never rose up to assert in blood their right to be free from their oppressors.

Sure, European history is littered with war and evil, but it certainly led to something far better than the serenity of unchanging tyranny the Muslim East has labored under.

 

[Cosmoline]

Speaking of which, if the West "owes" its success to Islamic thoughts and advances, why the heck haven't the nations of Islam been able to use them to succeed.

For the same reason the west had so much trouble taking advantage of thoughts and advances until after the Reformation. The Catholic Church was able to sanction those who dared to speak out against the accepted scientific dogma. In hindsight everyone--including most in the Church--agree that those were dark times. Having the Church in charge of scientific and intellectual matters was as bad for the Church in the long run as giving Popes their own military forces.

What we're seeing now is an Islamic world that cannot come to terms with reality. The response of many has been to retreat back to the 8th century and try to enforce brutal religious laws, in hopes that their Allah will then reward them by smiting the Great Satan and Israel. This is, unfortunately, not just the reaction of a tiny minority. It's been supported by millions across the Islamic world. In Iran, for example, it's a mistake to blame the revolution on US support of the Peacock Throne. The US supported many nasty dictators world wide during the cold war, but only the Islamic world chose to respond to this by returning to a religious dark age. This was not something done by a tiny minority, as the apologists would have you believe.

Even those well familiar with the west won't admit reality. They don't support a return to religious laws, but they *do* refuse to accept that the Islamic world is to blame for any of its problems. They instead blame western "colonialism" for the problems, and of course Israel which as we all know has take over nearly all of the Muslim world and turned them into newts with Jewish magic.

Until the Islamic world casts off the old religious dogma and steps into the modern world, it's going to be mired in poverty corruption and depression. This is not the fault of the west--it's solely the fault and responsibility of Islam itself. Put it this way. If the UK could sway US Presidential elections and prop up a dictator here--it would NOT be the fault of the UK. It would be solely OUR fault and solely OUR responsibility to take charge of our own destiny.

 

[shootinstudent]

carebear,

Use years for each event and you'll see the problem with your timeline.

North African coastline, resisted by the rump Christian kingdoms in the North for years until finally the invaders were slowly forced out/rolled back after Charles Martel's victory at Tours.

Charles Martel fought at Tours in 732. The last Muslim stronghold fell in Spain in 1492. I don't see what it is you think this proves.

The Balkans: similar situation but used as a source of slaves for the Janissaries and civil Service by the Ottomon Empire until years of warfare reduced Islam's control

What year did the Turks leave the Balkans? What year did it start being "Christian" territory? And....who perpetrated the most recent atrocities there? Hmmm...is the Bosnian conflict proof that Christian culture is backwards, because even in the 90's, christians saw fit to shoot little girls in the street just for being Muslim? If not, then why is the mess in the middle east proof that Islam is "medieval"?

Byzantium/Turkey: Traditional Eastern Christian stronghold, yes, never recaptured militarily but Western political and economic ideals hold tenuous sway.

You're forgetting Syria, Iraq, Armenia, and North Africa. "Western political ideals" hold sway in Turkey only because of the Muslim leadership that wanted it, not because of the Byzantine heritage.

Your generalizations like "a theocracy is a theocracy" are moot. It's like saying "a tax is a tax, therefore we have an ancient taxation system."

They ruled the known world for centuries while during the European dark ages my ancestors barely scraped by. Why are they losers now?

The Mongol invasions didn't help, and neither did it help when Europe went on a colonization spree that ripped the middle east and the Islamic east to pieces. Did you forget to google the Colonial period? It's the same story in Christian lands that have been colonized, with few exceptions. Maybe the reason they are in such dire straights is the same reason South America is such a mess.

Sure, European history is littered with war and evil, but it certainly led to something far better than the serenity of unchanging tyranny the Muslim East has labored under.

It wasn't unchanging tyranny. Your problem is that you are presuming that, because their societies now are backwards, this represents something static. That is not the case; the Islamic world has regressed. It was a pretty good place to live before the days of modern European colonization, especially if you were Jewish...in the past the Muslim states were the only ones that consistently protected Jews from pogroms, something the West didn't manage to achieve until after World War II.

I see this quite often. People have cartoon versions of history, and use it to draw conclusions about what exists today. That is certainly dangerous...it's what the Islamist radicals are doing, and look at where it's gotten them.

 

[Mongo the Mutterer]

shootinstudent -- history is wonderful, and can be viewed many ways through the prism of time.

This is the president of a soveriegn nation in today's world:

"He said that when people ask him if it is really 'possible for us to witness a world without America and Zionism?' he replies: '[Y]ou had best know that this slogan and this goal are attainable, and surely can be achieved.'"

If he indeed made this statement I would like you to answer for the "religion of peace" what he means. How do you think he plans to "achieve" it? Why is it his "goal"?

And, most importantly, why, in view of past history, should not Israel or the US take him at his word and consider this a declaration of war?

 

[shootinstudent]

Mongo,

Why do unelected, mostly religiously untrained politicians get to speak for "the religion of Peace"? Don't people here wonder why all these guys have terror squads and never face elections, if they have so much support in the Muslim world?

It is clear that the governments involved are dangerous. But since when are those folks the ones who speak for the whole religion?

 

[longeyes]

Islam is Was-lam, cut it anyway you want.

The proof of what Islam is is what they are achieving now, en masse, as a culture, not some sanitized and rosy-colored view of the past or the accomplishments of a handful of scholars who were aberrations even in their world.

 

[Mongo the Mutterer]

Mongo,

Why do unelected, mostly religiously untrained politicians get to speak for "the religion of Peace"? Don't people here wonder why all these guys have terror squads and never face elections, if they have so much support in the Muslim world?

It is clear that the governments involved are dangerous. But since when are those folks the ones who speak for the whole religion?

Then why are there FATWAs issued against the politicians? If the religious community doesn't agree, and the leader of an "ISLAMIST REPUBLIC" (which I believe Iran is), why don't they criticize and marginalize him.

BTW if there are "terror squads" in IRAN, why don't the Imams OUTSIDE issue the Fatwas??

 

[shootinstudent]

Then why are there FATWAs issued against the politicians? If the religious community doesn't agree, and the leader of an "ISLAMIST REPUBLIC" (which I believe Iran is), why don't they criticize and marginalize him.

BTW if there are "terror squads" in IRAN, why don't the Imams OUTSIDE issue the Fatwas??

You answered your own question on inside Iran. It's an undemocratic terror state that imprisons and kills people who speak out against the authority of the Mullahs.

As for the second....there are fatwas against the politicians, against terrorism, against political violence, and against religious coercion. Literally hundreds of them. Most Muslims in the world consider the particular type of religion followed by the Iranian leadership to be heretical and to have strongly unislamic overtones.

The reason you don't know that is that CNN isn't a register for rulings of Islamic law. To find that you'd have to look at Islamic sources....which no one seems to be doing. Odd, if you ask me, to make all kinds of claims about what Muslims are or are not preaching without touching ANY islamic sources at all.

 

[carebear]

Shootin,

The timeline proves my point. Christianity comes about 1st Century AD and is adopted by Constantine in what the 4th? Every piece of Roman territory thus was either pagan (from Christian and Jewish eyes anyway) and then Christian, except for the pagan then Jewish territories of the Palestinian coast. Islam arises only in the early 7th after Mohammed's vision from Gabriel.

From there his vision spreads like wildfire and eventually spreads with fire and sword, through the fractured infighting remnants of empire in most cases, across the ME, into the Balkans and down the N. African coast into Spain.

Therefore, EVERYWHERE Islam touched was traditionally held by another faith. So what that it took a weakend scattered Spain centuries to free itself from foreign domination, longer for the Balkans. The point is they were counterattacking the unwanted invasion of a foreign culture. They rose from far more hardship than Islam did and in a matter of centuries cast down these divine right rulers of the known world and relegated them to the dustheap of history.

 

[Mongo the Mutterer]

You answered your own question on inside Iran. It's an undemocratic terror state that imprisons and kills people who speak out against the authority of the Mullahs.

Hello??? last time I checked the Mullahs were Muslim leaders.

The reason you don't know that is that CNN isn't a register for rulings of Islamic law.

I quit watching the Communist News Network about 12 years ago, so it is hard for me to validate your sentance. However, If the rest of the Muslim community has a problem with the Iranians, they should speak out on any news entity available to them LOUDLY.

 

[shootinstudent]

Therefore, EVERYWHERE Islam touched was traditionally held by another faith. So what that it took a weakend scattered Spain centuries to free itself from foreign domination, longer for the Balkans. The point is they were counterattacking the unwanted invasion of a foreign culture. They rose from far more hardship than Islam did and in a matter of centuries cast down these divine right rulers of the known world and relegated them to the dustheap of history.

Interesting. You think the Spanish crown that perpetrated the Inquisition was a popular force, coming out of grassroots desire to get rid of those "foreigners" who had lived in Spain for 800 years??? I wonder why all the Jews who had been in Spain for even longer ran away en masse to the Muslim lands across the straits of gibraltar. The people who fought the Muslims at this time were divine right rulers, and their political touch wasn't gone (The Hapsburgs, that is) until WWI.

Turning the medieval European states into some kind of "cultural revolution" is silly. That was the height of brutality and incivility in Europe's history. They had all the nastiness of the Romans, combined with all the political sophistication of modern Haiti.

I'm sorry, but today's affairs notwithstanding, there is no justifying what the "Christian" conquistadors of Spain and Eastern Europe did. They took over, slaughtered every Jew and Muslim they could get their hands on, and instituted a religious system of rule and cronyism that caused hundreds and hundreds of years of warfare. "European stability" and civility before thye World Wars are a myth; they had some good ideas, but that part of the world was torn by violence, racism, and religious hatred just as much as the Islamic world is now plagued by the same issues.

I think it's good to remember our own European heritage in this context for two reasons:
1. So that we don't forget the horrific acts of intolerance our culture has proven capable of inspiring, and
2. So we remain committed to seeing redevelopment and end to terrorism in the Muslim world. Believing that such a thing will never be possible, and acting in accordance with that belief, is going to hand the terrorists a far greater victory than any they could win for themselves.

 

[shootinstudent]

Hello??? last time I checked the Mullahs were Muslim leaders.

You think that because you never checked it. Start by looking up the difference between Shi'at Ali and Sunni.

I quit watching the Communist News Network about 12 years ago, so it is hard for me to validate your sentance. However, If the rest of the Muslim community has a problem with the Iranians, they should speak out on any news entity available to them LOUDLY.

They have been. The problem is that you're not looking at the things they write. Muslims don't control the news networks in America, so short of buying full page ads in the sunday paper, why would you expect to see Muslim religious materials (and fatwas are entirely religious) in an American news article?