Eid Ul-Adha Mubarak!

Eid Ul-Adha Mubarak

To The Muslim Ummah

From The Fundamentalist Connection

2. Surah Al-Baqara

196. And complete the Hajj or Umra in the service of God. But if ye are prevented (From completing it), send an offering for sacrifice, such as ye may find, and do not shave your heads until the offering reaches the place of sacrifice. And if any of you is ill, or has an ailment in his scalp (Necessitating shaving), (He should) in compensation either fast, or feed the poor, or offer sacrifice; And when ye are in peaceful conditions (again), if any one wishes to continue the Umra on to the Hajj, he must make an offering, such as he may afford, but if he cannot afford it, he should fast three days during the Hajj and seven days on his return, making ten days in all. This is for those whose household is not in (the precincts of) the Sacred Mosque. And fear God, and know that God is strict in punishment.

22. Surah Al-Hajj

36. The sacrificial camels We have made for you as among the Symbols from God: in them is (much) good for you: then pronounce the name of God over them as they line up (for sacrifice): when they are down on their sides (after slaughter), eat ye thereof, and feed such as (beg not nut) live in contentment, and such as beg with due humility: thus have We made animals subject to you, that ye may be grateful.

The Dust Of Dreams

Part 1: The Curse Of The Consumer Society

The world today has become a global village where travelling from one point to another is only a matter of cost, not time. The distance between the east and the west has shrunk to the point of irrelevance. This started during the industrial revolution in Europe. After the steam engine was invented, the transportation costs and times reduced drastically which facilitated rapid growth in Europe and subsequently in the rest of the world. Better communication methods allowed for rapid dissemination of ideas and started the intellectual growth of the entire humanity at an ever-increasing pace.

The Industrial Revolution had a profound impact on how people consumed things. Before the revolution, there was a scarcity of resources and products. But once the manufacturing of products started on assembly lines during the revolution, for the first time in human history, products were available in outstanding quantities, at outstandingly low prices, being thus available to virtually everyone. So began the era of mass consumption. The Industrial Revolution, thus, created an unusual economic situation where the economy of a nation depended on the consumption of resources by its populace. Hence, it is essential for a nation’s economy in today’s economic situation for the population to spend its savings to keep buying products. Thus, the concept of consumerism was born.

Consumerism is a social and economic order that encourages the purchase of goods and services in ever-greater amounts. Thus, ideally for the economy of a nation, its populace should spend its entire savings into buying things. Consumerism actually encourages indiscriminate buying of goods which we will scarcely use. It encourages consumption of expensive items by creating an aura of social status around it. Consumerism is usually considered a part of media culture. The consumerist ideology is strengthened by the endorsement of consumer products by people whom the society idolizes, aka the celebrities. They are a crucial cog in this wheel of deception that is consumerism. Emulating them is a core component of consumerism. It is human nature to emulate those whom they feel are superior to them. Consumers seek to emulate those who are above them in the social hierarchy. The poor strive to emulate the wealthy and the wealthy seek to imitate celebrities and other icons. This deception works as long as there are celebrities who endorse products. In today’s world, there is no dearth of celebrities who would do that in exchange for payment. The higher their popularity, the more they get paid for an endorsement. Their endorsement is evident of the desire of consumers to purchase products partly or solely to emulate people in the higher social strata.

In order for an entire population to become product-consuming machines, they must first be encouraged to save money. And in order that they may save an ever-increasing amount of money, they must first be encouraged to earn more and accumulate wealth. This is second nature to human beings and hence is very easy. They just need the right push and what better way to do this than to be constantly bombarded with the lives of celebrities through the media. This is why marketing is so effective. It creates a false aura around products when they are endorsed by celebrities.

Businesses target the wealthy consumers as they are the most susceptible and have the monetary means to buy expensive products. The taste and lifestyle of these upper class consumers trickle down to become the standard for consumers of all strata of the society. Since the primary target of businesses are the wealthy, the consumerist philosophy seeks to keep this strata of the society completely occupied. Encouraging greed among the populace will work in their favour. Recent statistics show us that they have been quite successful at that. Making a lot of money became the dominant reason for attending college beginning in the early 1990s. Prior to that, the dominant reasons were becoming an authority in a field or helping others in difficulty. This is a direct consequence to the rise of consumerism and materialism. As Madeliene Levine writes in ‘Challenging the Culture of Affluence’ [2007]:

“This shift in values is just one manifestation of a profound shift in American culture, away from values of community, spirituality, and integrity, and toward competition, materialism, and disconnection.”

Another consequence of consumerism is the concept of visual distinction: people in the higher strata of the society seek to distinguish themselves by the way they dress. The celebrities, being at the top of the pyramid, set the trends in today’s fashion-obsessed world. I fail to understand how the media describes the rags they wear as ‘fashionable’. If tattered jeans are fashionable, then you might as well say rag pickers are fashionistas too. As stated above, the wealthy will imitate celebrities and the middle and lower classes will imitate both the wealthy and the celebrities. The more they deceive themselves with false pride, the better consumers they become for the industry. The adverts play a big role in this. Sample the following piece from an unknown writer:

“People become used to the intrusion of advertising into their consciousness in the form of television or the massive bundle of advertising pulp that masquerades as a Sunday newspaper and so they fail to protect themself, or worse, their children from being seduced by it. Convinced that their self-worth is based on $500 athletic shoes or designer clothing, children are already on the road to spiritual dissatisfaction and resentment as well as a perception of diminished self-worth. When they become adolescents they are probably not going to be happy or productive even were they provided with an endless supply of things that few parents could afford. An extreme example of this is when some, usually poor adults, who could often better use the money for education, nutrition and improved housing, demonstrate their self-worth and strength of character by turning themselves into human billboards in plastic clothing advertising millionaire's sports franchises. Their children may, to the detriment of education, pin all hopes on an athletic "career", i.e. lots of money for endorsing consumer items.”

This is not a new phenomenon, as some would say. It has been around for some time. The book ‘The Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study of Institutions’ [1899] by the American economist and sociologist Torsten Bunde Veblen (d. August 3, 1929) is a good social critique on what he called ‘conspicuous consumption’. The term describes an irrational form of economic behaviour. In the seventh chapter titled “Dress as an Expression of the Pecuniary Culture”, Veblen writes:

“No line of consumption affords a more apt illustration than expenditure on dress. It is especially the rule of the conspicuous waste of goods that finds expression in dress, although the other, related principles of pecuniary repute are also exemplified in the same contrivances. Other methods of putting one's pecuniary standing in evidence serve their end effectually, and other methods are in vogue always and everywhere; but expenditure on dress has this advantage over most other methods, that our apparel is always in evidence and affords an indication of our pecuniary standing to all observers at the first glance. It is also true that admitted expenditure for display is more obviously present, and is, perhaps, more universally practiced in the matter of dress than in any other line of consumption. No one finds difficulty in assenting to the commonplace that the greater part of the expenditure incurred by all classes for apparel is incurred for the sake of a respectable appearance rather than for the protection of the person. And probably at no other point is the sense of shabbiness so keenly felt as it is if we fall short of the standard set by social usage in this matter of dress. It is true of dress in even a higher degree than of most other items of consumption, that people will undergo a very considerable degree of privation in the comforts or the necessaries of life in order to afford what is considered a decent amount of wasteful consumption; so that it is by no means an uncommon occurrence, in an inclement climate, for people to go ill clad in order to appear well dressed.”

To gain more out of consumers, an intricate web has been woven around consumer products. The principles of decency have been shaped to suit their needs. For example, the common perception about inexpensive products today is that they are defective in some way or they are not ‘worth it’. Veblen writes further:

“This spiritual need of dress is not wholly, nor even chiefly, a naive propensity for display of expenditure. The law of conspicuous waste guides consumption in apparel, as in other things, chiefly at the second remove, by shaping the canons of taste and decency. In the common run of cases the conscious motive of the wearer or purchaser of conspicuously wasteful apparel is the need of conforming to established usage, and of living up to the accredited standard of taste and reputability. It is not only that one must be guided by the code of proprieties in dress in order to avoid the mortification that comes of unfavorable notice and comment, though that motive in itself counts for a great deal; but besides that, the requirement of expensiveness is so ingrained into our habits of thought in matters of dress that any other than expensive apparel is instinctively odious to us. Without reflection or analysis, we feel that what is inexpensive is unworthy. "A cheap coat makes a cheap man." "Cheap and nasty" is recognized to hold true in dress with even less mitigation than in other lines of consumption. On the ground both of taste and of serviceability, an inexpensive article of apparel is held to be inferior, under the maxim "cheap and nasty." We find things beautiful, as well as serviceable, somewhat in proportion as they are costly. With few and inconsequential exceptions, we all find a costly hand-wrought article of apparel much preferable, in point of beauty and of serviceability, to a less expensive imitation of it, however cleverly the spurious article may imitate the costly original; and what offends our sensibilities in the spurious article is not that it falls short in form or color, or, indeed, in visual effect in any way. The offensive object may be so close an imitation as to defy any but the closest scrutiny; and yet so soon as the counterfeit is detected, its aesthetic value, and its commercial value as well, declines precipitately. Not only that, but it may be asserted with but small risk of contradiction that the aesthetic value of a detected counterfeit in dress declines somewhat in the same proportion as the counterfeit is cheaper than its original. It loses caste aesthetically because it falls to a lower pecuniary grade.”

A natural extension of the visual distinction concept is the ever-shrinking attire of women. The more skin you show, the more you look like today’s celebrities (whose attire is vulgar at best!). A consequence of this is the use of beauty products and surgical procedures to ‘enhance’ one’s bodily features. This has grown to become a multi-billion dollar industry and has seen a rise like never before in the last decade. Sample this from the Wall Street Journal:

“"Each year an estimated 1.5 million Americans choose to have nose jobs, tummy tucks or breast enlargements. Many of these people would be unable to afford these vital surgical procedures if it were not for the public spirited efforts of loan companies like Jayhawk Acceptance Corporation, a used car lender that has turned to covering the booming demand for elective surgery. Lenders in this field face an unusual challenge," explains the Wall Street Journal: "A lender can take a used car but can hardly repossess a face lift." Consequently lenders like Jayhawk have to charge a slightly higher interest rate, up to 22.5% to be exact. Says Michael Smartt, Jayhawk CEO: "We're capitalizing on America's vanity."”

One reason for this is that women’s clothes have shrunk to the most amoral standards. The more skin a woman shows, the more skin-care products and surgical procedures she is going to need. An equation can be derived out of this situation where the profits from such products are directly proportional to the amount of skin women show. Some would say it is the right of women to dress the way they please and many more would say it is an infringement of human rights to question their choice of clothing. But I am broaching the subject in the context of consumerism and I would not do justice to the discussion if I do not bring it up.

It is now an established principle that skin-care companies depend on women showing off their bodies. This can only happen if the clothes they wear allow greater amounts of skin to be shown. Ideally, they will have to shed some of their clothes in order to show more. But this will mean a loss to the apparel industry. What do they do? They come up with clothes which when worn show enough to keep their skin-care counterparts happy. Going by the theme of “cheap is nasty”, the cost of these new apparels is also sky-high. This way, celebrities buy expensive designer clothes which barely cover them and also use beauty products to cover up the rest of their skin. People who imitate them also do the same thing. It is a win-win situation for both the industries! Please correct me if it is any different from what is happening today.

A result of this ever-increasing vanity is an increase in the number of atrocities against women. When the topic of atrocities against women is taken up, people immediately think about Muslim countries and the supposed atrocities they commit against women. The oppression of Burkha-clad women by Taliban and the restrictions put on them come quickly to one’s mind. I am not saying I don’t condemn them, but what people fail to realize is that more number of women face atrocities in the consumerist-dominated world. Let’s take a look at the statistics of sexual assault in the United States, the global leader in propagating the consumerist philosophy.

A 2006 report from the U.S. Department of Justice titled “The Sexual Victimization of College Women” reports that 3.1% of undergraduates survived rape or attempted rape during a 6-7 month academic year with an additional 10.1% surviving rape prior to college and an additional 10.9% surviving attempted rape prior to college. With no overlap between these groups, these percentages add to 24.1%, or a shocking ONE IN FOUR! If we perform a statistical analysis, we can say that this is only one report and it may well be far away from the actual numbers. Let me then include some other reports which may give a better statistical figure.

Koss, Gidycz & Wisniewski published a study in 1987 where they interviewed approximately 6,000 college students on 32 college campuses nationwide. From this study 15% of college women answered “yes” to questions about whether they experienced something that met the definition of rape. An additional 12% of women answered “yes” to questions about whether they experienced something that met the definition of attempted rape. Thus, the total percentage of women who experienced sexual assault amounts to 27%.

In 1995 the CDC replicated part of this study. They examined rape only, and did not look at attempted rape. They found that 20% of approximately 5,000 women on 138 college campuses experienced rape during the course of their lifetime. Had they also examined attempted rape, the figure would certainly have reached about 28%.

If we take the mean of all the afore-mentioned reports, we get a figure that is close to 25% validating the One In Four figure. In a country which prides on being the best or among the best in every field, if one in four college-going women is sexually assaulted at least once in their lifetimes, something is most definitely wrong. If you take the entire spectrum of women in the United States, an estimated one in six women has been or will be sexually assaulted during her life. This assertion was made by Patricia Tjaden and Nancy Thoennes in their 1998 study "Prevalence, Incidence and Consequences of Violence Against Women Survey" at the National Institute of Justice & Centers for Disease Control & Prevention.

This is the price the United States pays to keep its consumerist economy afloat. One in six American mothers, sisters, daughters and wives are sexually assaulted at least once in their life. If this is the case with the most aggressive proponent of consumerism in the world, what will be the state of affairs of nations that aspire to be like it? Surely the day won’t be far away when one in six women in the world will be a victim of sexual assault. This is The Curse Of The Consumer Society that people have to live with.

Or do they? Astonishingly enough, there is a solution to this problem. But that will be discussed as an extension of this discussion in the second part of this article: The Dust Of Dreams Part 2.

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Next Post: The Dust Of Dreams

A look at how the West has influenced our way of thinking in every step we take in our lives. Our take on the curse of the consumer society and how to deal with it.

On 20th October, 2012.

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Atlas Burns

An account of the hatred that is burning the globe

The last few decades have seen rising mercury levels around the world. I am not talking about global warming here. I am talking about the proverbial hate-o-meter. The events of the past month re-affirm this fact. Career Islamophobes have been relentlessly trying to spread hate against Islam. And why wouldn’t they? Inflation is a world-wide phenomenon now and they must make their ends meet by whipping up frenzy and cashing in on it. Money only keeps coming if emotions are high in their line of work. And the bad boys have done it again! This time it is a hilarious movie, titled ‘Innocence of Muslims’, which is going to be their money spinner. At the forefront of these events is the shady character, Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, producer of the inaccurate and hopelessly tasteless film. The protests and killings in the Muslim world have given him recognition overnight.

I fail to understand the logic behind all the violence that has engulfed the Muslim world. Nakoula certainly is not the first person to express anti-Muslim ideas. He is just one link in a long chain. And the contents of the movie are nowhere nearly as blasphemous as the comments you find on sites like YouTube. If people want to take up arms over every expression made by misguided individuals, why not start protests for every comment on YouTube or for every post made on anti-Muslim sites? The answer is simple: there are way too many comments and posts on the Internet to merit protests of such scale.

The question that arises here is how do people decide what merits a protest? Is there any criteria or a scale that shows a threshold which, when exceeded, calls for a protest? The answer is NO. A majority of today’s Muslims are nothing but emotional puppets following their own ideologies based on their interpretation of the Word. They do not care what Islam teaches nor do they have the drive to introspect. They are driven by emotion while Islam teaches just the opposite: to control your emotions. And because of their actions, we have our lunatic Islamophobe buddies taking full advantage of such unfortunate (read Libya-like) events!

Islam is not an emotional religion. Being a Muslim, you don’t do something because you ‘feel’ like doing it. You do not worship God because you feel like worshipping Him. You worship because you are commanded by God to worship Him and Him alone. Muslims seem to have forgotten this today. The only thing that drives them is emotion and not a sense of submission to the Almighty. They look up to misguided idealists to lead them and forget that the ideal person to follow is Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) himself! Was the unfortunate incident in Libya inspired by the Prophet’s (pbuh) Hadith? Is it inspired by the Qur’an? Is there any verse or tradition of the Prophet (pbuh) which calls for the killing of innocent human beings? Well, some people (Islamophobes) would say yes to all these questions, but the fact that I am asking them means the answer is an emphatic no. These are the kind of unfortunate incidents that spawn many Nakoulas and inspire Islamophobes and their followers.

Coming to the other side of the story, Islamophobes will be delighted with these events. Muslims did exactly what they were expected to do! This has given Islamophobes the pretext to plan more such antics. For starters, more movies are planned which will, not surprisingly, be heavily biased against Islam and the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). I do not blame the Islamophobes for this. After all, it is all they have as a source of income. Verses taken out of context guarantee their books sell. No, I do not blame them. Nor do I harbor hatred towards them. In fact, I quite enjoy seeing their ignorance translate into articles on their blogs and websites. They claim to be experts on the Qur’an and the Hadith and dish out such crap in their books and blogs. No wonder they have a reputation of being loons!

Among all the Islamophobes out there, a few frequently catch my attention with their comments on Islam. I have listed a few of them below with some of their choicest comments. I advise you to sit back and enjoy their rants against Islam and Muslims. And don’t forget to have a popcorn tub next to you!

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1.      Pamela Geller: A woman who calls herself ‘The Voice of Reason’

Leading the pack of Islamophobes is this Jewish woman from United States who claims to be the voice of reason. Of course if we agree to that, we will have to agree to all her ravings which include the theory that U.S. President Barack Obama is the lovechild of Malcolm X! Her blog is named Atlas Shrugs. This blog is at the forefront of spreading hatred against Islam. Here are some of her (in)famous comments.

“This is an insult. This is demeaning. This is humiliating that you would build a shrine to the very ideology that inspired the attacks of 9/11. “ 

“As a Jew, I am offended to my core. Muslims have no right to invoke Moses and Abraham. This is a delegitimization of Judaism. It is offensive and vile. And while Jesus is not my guy, the same thing goes for him. It is a delegitimization of Christianity. These are not Muslim prophets. If people want to convert to Islam, goodbye Charlie. But leave my shiz alone. Vultures.”

“…3. Totalitarian symbols such as nazi swastikas, communist hammer and sickles, Islamic star and crescent, UNLESS CLEARLY CROSSED OUT OR DEFACED WITH A STOP SIGN” (sic)

“Nazis adopted the Muslim idea of Jihad – total destruction and complete annihilation in the spirit of a Holy War.”

“And I pray dearly that in the ungodly event that Tehran or its jihadi proxies (Hez’ballah, Hamas etc) target Israel with a nuke, that she retaliate with everything she has at Tehran, Mecca, and Medina.”

“All Muslim Chaplains are Jihadists.”

“Stop the Islamisation of Europe held a rally protest in what can only be described as an Islamic fortress in the heart of Harrow. I strongly urged Jews to attend. Islamic anti-semitism is more poisonous, more dangerous than even Nazism was to the Jews. This promise of Jewish genocide is made “sacred” by Islamic texts.”

“As the leading role the Islamic world played in the Holocaust comes out of the shadows and into the fore, and decent peoples recoil in the repulsion, it is necessary for Islamic media, 'scholars' and asshats-in-residence to rewrite history – as Islam has done so exceedingly and singularly well all throughout history.”

“Not to mention Europe. They exterminated all their Jews, but that wasn’t enough. Those monsters then went on to import the next generation of Jew killers. (This New Hatred Comes from Muslim Immigrants. The Jewish People are Afraid Now)”

2.      Debbie Schlussel: A woman who fights against Nazis and Muslims, who, she thinks, were perpetrators of the Holocaust.

Here is a Jewish woman who is an American attorney, film critic, political commentator, blogger and who thinks Hitler was inspired by the Qur’an! Her writing frequently targets the largely Muslim population of the Detroit suburb of Dearborn, which she refers to as 'Dearbornistan'.

“Rot in Hell, Osama Bin Laden. One down, 1.8 billion to go… many of ‘em inside U.S. borders, with the U.S. government at all levels kissing their asses.”

“Get ready to bend over for tens of thousands, possibly tens of millions, of new, mostly Muslim ANOs (Americans in Name Only) (pronounced, ‘Anus’).”

“Romney said that the way he’d stop Islamic extremism and regain Middle East respect for America was by giving Muslims 'more liberty' and 'the dignity of work.' Is this putz for real?! Sadly, yes.”

“This moron (Mitt Romney, Republican Presidential candidate, U.S.) actually still believes the crap we heard since 9/11 about how Muslims are extremists, not because of their hateful, extremist religion, but because they don’t have jobs????”

“The Muslim world is laughing at us that we think this (Osama Bin Laden’s killing) is a big deal, that this will do anything to change the lethal threat Islam and Muslims pose to the West.”

“There is tremendous racism against Black people in the Islamic world, which is why they continue to slaughter Blacks in Sudan. First, the Sudanese Arab Muslims raped, tortured, and slaughtered the Black Christians, and then–when there were almost no Christians left, they began to rape, torture, and slaughter the Black Muslims of Sudan.”

“I guarantee you the many American victims of aliens–specifically the largely third-world, mostly Muslim aliens–who eventually come here, take their jobs, honor kill people, etc. have shed far more than 22,000 tears.”

“It’s Official: No Matter Who Wins Prez Election, Illegal Aliens, Muslims Win”

3.      Robert Spencer: A (Pseudo) Islamic scholar and expert on Islam (with no credentials whatsoever to back his claims)

A Roman Catholic with a Greco-Turkish descent, this self-proclaimed (pseudo) Islamic scholar and expert on Islam(ophobia) is an American author and blogger. He thinks it is fun to be “deliberately combative and provocative.” His blog is named Jihad Watch to keep a tab on ‘Jihadists’ (terrorists, in his dictionary) who, if you believe him, are around 1.7 billion in number.

 “[My work is] dedicated to identifying the causes of jihad terrorism, which of course lead straight back into the Islamic texts. I have therefore called for reform of those texts...”

“The radicals actually do have a stronger theoretical, theological, and legal basis within Islam for what they believe than the moderates do.”

“Stop insisting that Islam is a religion of peace. This is false and falsehoods are never productive.”

“According to Umar, Hafsa, one of Muhammad's wives, had been angering the Prophet by talking back to him. So when Umar learned that Muhammad had divorced all his wives, he was not surprised; he exclaimed: ‘Hafsa is a ruined loser! I expected that would happen some day.’”

Some people can describe him better than me:

"Spencer's readers are carefully steered away from all contact with the Islamic interpretative tradition, which equals or exceeds that of any other religion, because any scholarly knowledge about Islam would expose all his extremist interpretations to ridicule."

- Robert Crane (Ex-Nixon Aide, author)

“The publications of Spencer belong to the class of Islamophobic extremism that is promoted and supported by right-wing organizations, who are perpetuating a type of bigotry similar to anti-Semitism and racial prejudice. They are to be viewed with great suspicion by anyone who wishes to find reliable and scholarly information on the subject of Islam.”

"[Robert Spencer] has no academic training in Islamic studies whatsoever; his M.A. degree was in the field of early Christianity"

- Carl Ernst (Islamic Scholar UNC)

“When it comes to Robert Spencer, scholars of Islamic studies outright dismiss him and his body of work. They call him an unreliable ideologue at best and a divisive bigot at worst.”

- Michael Kruse (Writer St. Petersburg Times)

“Robert Spencer is an extremist, right-wing anti-Muslim rabble rouser.”

- Robert Dreyfuss (Nation Magazine Editor, Contributor to Rolling Stone and Mother Jones)

“Robert Spencer is an anti-Muslim blogger…And yes, I do mean ‘anti-Muslim’ — Spencer long ago crossed the line from simply criticizing radical Islamists to relentlessly demonizing all Muslims. And the bigoted, hateful comments he allows at his website are beyond disgusting.”

- Charles Johnson (Former Ally and Friend of Robert Spencer)

“Robert Spencer, a prolific anti-Islam writer and a leading Islamophobe who is bent on distorting Islam and demonizing Muslims, has persistently argued that violence and terrorism employed by Muslim extremists is rooted in the Qur’an and its message. Spencer calls the Qur’an, a book sacred to Muslim, ‘the jihadists’ Mein Kampf,’ in reference to Hitler’s memoir.”

- Louay M. Safi (Islamic Scholar)

4.      Brigitte Gabriel: A woman who is a leading terrorism expert in the world and who provides information and analysis on the rise of global Islamic terrorism.

An American Christian originally from Lebanon, Brigitte Gabriels says that Islam keeps countries backward and that it teaches terrorism. To promote her views, she founded the ‘American Congress For Truth’ and ‘ACT! for America’ so that others may "fearlessly speak out in defense of America, Israel and Western civilization."

“The degraded state of Arab societies is caused by Islam.”

“The difference, my friends, between Israel and the Arab world is the difference between civilization and barbarism. It's the difference between good and evil [applause].... this is what we're witnessing in the Arabic world, they have no soul, they are dead set on killing and destruction. And in the name of something they call 'Allah' which is very different from the God we believe...”

“In the Muslim world, extreme is mainstream…”

“I was talking about how Palestinian mothers are encouraging their children to go out and blow themselves up to smithereens just to kill Christians and Jews. And it was in that context that I - that I contrasted the difference between Israel and the Arabic world, was the difference between democracy and barbarism.”

“The cancer is called Islamofacism. This ideology is coming out of one source: The Koran.”

5.      Daniel Pipes:  A suave political commentator who thinks anyone who speaks out against Israel is a terrorist.

Mr. Pipes is an American historian, writer and political commentator. He is the founder and director of the Middle East Forum and its Campus Watch project, and editor of its Middle East Quarterly journal.

“We should have a Muhammad cartoon a day.”

“There is a lot of warfare in Islam. There is and there will be warfare. Islam is not peace.”

“Jihad is the drive to conquer lands to bring under Muslim control.”

“The Palestinians must be made to understand in the deepest recesses of their consciousness that they are a defeated people.”

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The list goes on and on and on. There is no end to how much they can throw at Islam and Muslims. I am not going waste valuable time and energy to refute their statements and try to prove what Islam is not. Instead, I will focus on what Islam really is in my next posts.

I will not dissuade you from visiting their blogs and reading their books. By all means, do it. If you are a Muslim, it will only bring you closer to Islam. If you are not a Muslim, you have to see both faces of the coin and judge for yourself which of the two descriptions of Islam is true and accurate. But please make sure that you do not spread hate in the process. 

The Atlas is Burning already!

Afterthoughts:

1. Islamophobia denotes prejudice against, or hatred or irrational fear of, Muslims. The term dates back to the early 1900s, but its modern use originates during the late 1980s or early 1990s.
2. Islamophobia is not a new phenomenon. It existed even in the time of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). Only the term is new.
3. Islamophobia was recognized as a form of intolerance alongside Xenophobia and Anti-Semitism at the "Stockholm International Forum on Combating Intolerance".
4. The conference, attended by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson, the OSCE Secretary General Ján Kubis and representatives of the European Union and Council of Europe, adopted a declaration to combat "genocide, ethnic cleansing, racism, antisemitism, Islamophobia and xenophobia and to combat all forms of racial discrimination and intolerance related to it."

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