Someone please explain to me the difference between these threats–the first two from Muslims directed against a French teacher who insulted the Prophet:
“You will never feel secure on this earth. One billion, three hundred thousand Muslims are ready to kill you.”
One of the threats came from a contributor to Al Hesbah, who wrote, “It is impossible that this day pass without the lions [jihadists] of France punishing him.”
The contributor called on his Muslim brethren in France to follow the lead of Muhammad Bouyeri, who murdered the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh after he made a film denouncing the plight of abused Muslim women.
“May God send some lion to cut his head,” the contributor said of Mr. Redeker, whom he described as a “pig.”
The following threats and boasts come from the Little Green Footballs (a stridently pro-Israel/ anti-Muslim site) comments section:
When is someone goimg [sic] to finally walk up to Ibrahim Hooper [executive director of the Muslim-American group CAIR] and put a bullet in his brain?”
LGF[since deleted]
Goat-fucking koranimals. Unlike my last war, this war, I may have to consider collecting a necklace of ears.
/loading more magazines/gotta finish post-FTX refit and weapons check.
LGF [since deleted]
How in heaven’s name does one side see itself occupying the high ground in this dispute? As far as I’m concerned, the Islamists and Islam-haters are both deeply tainted by hatred and barely repressed violence–even to the point of borderline homicidal rage.
The NY Times reports that a French high school philosophy teacher penned an especially virulent anti-Muslim commentary (French original here and English translation) in the conservative Le Figaro. For his trouble, Muslims have threatened and intimidated him so that he has gone into hiding:
Robert Redeker (French language site), 52, wrote in the center-right daily Le Figaro 10 days ago that Muhammad was “a merciless warlord, a looter, a mass-murderer of Jews and a polygamist,” and called the Koran “a book of incredible violence.”
…Mr. Redeker compared Islam unfavorably to Christianity and Judaism, although he admitted that the history of the Catholic Church was “full of dark pages,” and he criticized the hostile reaction to the pope’s remarks.
“Jesus is a master of love; Muhammad is a master of hatred,” Mr. Redeker wrote, adding, “Whereas Judaism and Christianity are religions whose rites forsake violence and remove its legitimacy, Islam is a religion that, in its very sacred text, as much as in some of its everyday rites, exalts violence and hatred. Hatred and violence dwell in the very book that educates any Muslim, the Koran.”
…“Islam tries to dictate its rules to Europe: opening swimming pools at certain hours exclusively for women, forbidding the caricature of this religion, demanding a special diet for Muslim children in school cafeterias, fighting for wearing the veil in school, accusing free thinkers of Islamophobia.”
What I find most deplorable in the argument against Islam is the historical amnesia that all anti-jihadists have about western religions. Every single one has dark strains of violence running right through their heart. How can we Jews see ourselves as pure as the driven snow when we have a story like the Rape of Dina in our canon? Or how about that would-be act of quintessential child murder: Abraham’s near-sacrifice of Isaac. Or the genocide committed against the Amalekites, Moabites and Jebusites? Or the murder of 29 Palestinians by Kahane follower, Baruch Goldstein? Christianity has the Crusades and Spanish Inquisition in which Jews were killed by their hundreds of thousands.
How can any reasonable human being (and one can assume that a philosophy teacher should have enough knowledge of sources to be aware of these events) then make this lulu of a statement:
Judaism and Christianity are religions whose rites forsake violence and remove its legitimacy…
Would any person who loves his or her religion wish that their tradition better lived up to its values of peace and love? Sure. Would any person work their tail off to ensure their religion lived up to these values in the contemporary world? You bet. But which person who is knowledgeable about religious history could make such a statement with a straight face? It is either a lie or an ignorant swindle as a statement of history.
It’s also worth dwelling on the twisted logic of Redeker’s commentary. When Muslims ask to be allowed to honor their traditions in a public setting they are viewed in the same way conservatives view homosexuals who demand protection against discrimination: somehow they are asking for special rights Thus by asking for the right to observe their rituals French Muslims are somehow imposing them on non-Muslims, a preposterous notion:
Islam tries to dictate its rules to Europe: opening swimming pools at certain hours exclusively for women, forbidding the caricature of this religion, demanding a special diet for Muslim children in school cafeterias, fighting for wearing the veil in school, accusing free thinkers of Islamophobia.
If Muslims believe that the sexes should be separated in public settings like swimming pools, then why is it an imposition for public pools in heavily Muslim neighborhoods to observe separate hours for men and women? As a non-Muslim I can swim at other hours if I wish or I can swim in a sex-segregated pool with Muslims.
Why does Redeker have the temerity to call halal (a set of Muslim rituals that specify permitted and prohibited foods) a diet as if Muslims were merely trying to lose weight. No, these are sacred rituals which all believing Muslims must observe just as believing Jews observe Kashrut. In our own society, efforts are often made to honor ritual observance in public settings like schools, prisons or airline flights. Why is it chutzpah for Muslims in France to expect similar respect?
Why should the concept of wearing a chador freak out French conservatives so? In this country, we allow Jewish children to wear kipot and Muslim girls to wear special clothing to public school. Why is this issue considered so divisive in France?
I realize that France prides itself on being a secular Republic from which religion is supposedly banished. Allowing Muslims to be treated any differently than any other religion would, in the view of some, contribute to the toppling of some of those cherished Republican values. But if France is anything like this country, I would bet that despite the French desire to insulate public discourse from religion–that Christianity has plenty of opportunity to make its presence felt outside the bounds of the Church.
Though I do not know France as well as I know Israel or the U.S., I’d be willing to bet that Muslims there are not asking for any privileges that are not already available to Christians or Jews.
Redeker graces himself with the moniker “free thinker” when he is anything but. He is an hidebound intolerant demagogue. And if Muslims are calling him an Islamophobe I think they are right. He is needlessly afraid that Islam will somehow cause the disintegration of his precious French culture, when it will do nothing of the sort. In fact, the values and traditions of Islam will enrich the French if they’d only relax and give it half a chance. And the converse is also true, that French Muslims will be changed for the better by their experience as members of French society.
Instead of being at war with each other, they should try living together and learning from each other.
Another tired old Cold War rhetorical trick is to equate any movement you don’t like with Communism:
As in the past with Communism, the West finds itself under ideological watch. Islam presents itself, like defunct Communism, as an alternative to the Western world. In the way of Communism before it, Islam, to conquer spirits, plays on a sensitive nerve. It prides itself on a legitimacy which troubles Western conscience, which is attentive to others: it claims to be the voice of the oppressed of the planet. Yesterday, the voice of the poor supposedly came from Moscow, today it originates in Mecca! Again, today, western intellectuals incarnate the eye of the Koran, as they have incarnated the eye of Moscow. They now excommunicate people because of Islamophobia, as they did before because of anti-communism.
This is nothing more than hysterical nonsense: Chicken Little saying “the sky is falling.” It posits a west so weak and tottering that a mere puff of wind from the Muslim faithful would be enough to send it crashing to earth. I believe that the west is much more resilient than Redeker gives it credit for. We have weathered worse threats in the historic past and we will weather threats in the future. None of them need threaten the existence of a liberal, enlightened and tolerant western liberalism.
Redeker fancies himself as someone whose arguments are so powerful that “western intellectuals,” “useful idiots” all (Redeker’s stale phrase), must “excommunicate” him from the club. If I were one of those intellectuals I wouldn’t even give him the satisfaction of expelling him. I’d just point out his idiocy in a public space like this one and move on.
I must caution that I do not approve of the violent Muslim response to Redeker. It is impermissible. No violence of any kind is acceptable in the midst of religious debate. All that being said, I do believe that people who make such irresponsible statements should face moral (not physical) consequences.
As I wrote about the Muhammed cartoons incident, our Supreme Court ruled that a man cannot falsely yell “Fire!” in a crowded theater and expect that his speech will be protected under the First Amendment. The dope in the theater, just like Redeker, is engaging in “unprotected speech.”
Redeker’s commentary falls into this category because it is base incitement to religious hatred. He certainly had a right to make stupid, unfounded accusations. But he also has a right to expect that he will make his opponents extremely angry. So this self-pitying complaint by him to fellow French conservative philosopher, Andre Glucksman, seems obtuse and self-serving:
It’s quite sad. I exercised my constitutional rights, and I am punished for it, even in the territory of the Republic. This affair is also an attack against national sovereignty – foreign rules, decided by criminally minded fanatics, punish me for having exercised a constitutional right, and I am subjected, even in France, to great injury.”
Yes, he has a constitutional right to say stupid things. But he has no right to expect that he will not face consequences for his stupidity. And as this French government official stated:
Education Minister Gilles de Robien…cautioned that a “state employee must show prudence and moderation in all circumstances.”
I find attractive the notion that in a society there are many sources of friction among the groups which comprise it. It is wise and prudent to attempt to find a way to navigate the shoals of this sea of divergent opinion without provoking our neighbors to fury. It is the interests of all of us to try to live together in temperance and tolerance and not to provoke our fellow merely because we can.
I am in favor of a free exchange of ideas. But I am also in favor of a certain degree of prudence and moderation especially when you know your views will stir great enmity. But Redeker appears to believe in complete license when it comes to expressing his views. This is chutzpah of the first magnitude.
I strongly disagree with Elaine Sciolino’s characterization of the debate in Europe:
The Redeker case is the latest manifestation in Europe of a mounting ideological battle that pits those who believe Islam and the Prophet Muhammad can be criticized in the name of free speech against those in the Muslim community who believe no criticism can be tolerated.
I think this is far too charitable to the Redekers of the world. I do not view what they are doing as criticizing Islam in the name of free speech. Rather, they are deliberately insulting Muslims because they detest their religion. They are at war with Islam because they view Islam as being at war with them. They dress up such incitement as free speech and drape themselves in their national flag and constitutional rights. To me, this is mere window dressing for their real intent which is the creation of a pliant western Islam or its banishment entirely from western society.
As for the second half of Sciolino’s statement: while SOME Muslims believe no criticism of Islam can be countenanced, I’m certain that this is NOT the view of the majority of Muslims. The vast majority of Muslims believe that their religion should be accorded the same level of respect as other western religions like Christianity or Judaism. They also believe that their religion, when attacked, should be characterized fairly and accurately. This is something none of the Muslim haters manage to do in their diatribes. I’d be pissed too if I was a Muslim. As a Jew, I sometimes get pissed when my own religion is misunderstood or mischaracterized especially in a public setting. Why is it treif for a Muslim to feel the same way?
There is nothing wrong with criticizing religions. I criticize my own and other religions here in this blog regularly. But I always try to do so by being as accurate as I can in characterizing the beliefs I am criticizing. I try to avoid the luridness and vitriol which characterizes diatribes like Redeker’s or Little Green Footballs. Why can’t the Islam-haters give the religion the respect it deserves even as they criticize it?
===>>>I’d be pissed too if I was a Muslim. As a Jew, I sometimes get pissed when my own religion is misunderstood or mischaracterized especially in a public setting. Why is it treif for a Muslim to feel the same way?
And do you react by burning down ambassies, killing priests or immams, destroying churches ?
Cute comeback, but here’s the fatal flaw in yr argument. I am one of the 99.9% of Jews who would not do such a thing. But what about the .01% who would? The Kahanes, Goldsteins, Weissgans, Amirs, Rubins, Krugels, & Natan Zadas of the Jews–all individuals who engaged in acts of terror against Arabs or Jewish “traitors”? What of them?
Just as there is a radical, homicidal fringe among Jews so there is among Muslims. Do you judge all of Judaism based on the actions of the radical extremists among us? If not, then why would you make such a sweeping overgeneralization regarding Muslims & Islam?
It’s not a question of what I would do, but rather a question of what the hateful intolerant Jews & Christians of the world do when they feel aggrieved by Muslims. They shoot into mosques containing hundreds of Ramadan worshippers as happened last week in Australia; or they spray automatic weapons fire into a mosque killing 29 Palestinian Muslims as Baruch Goldstein did a few yrs ago.
So if you’re trying to make the claim that aggrieved Jews and Christians don’t perform acts of violence as odious as some (a very small minority) Muslims do–that argument is shot to ribbons (oops! sorry for that unintended metaphor).
Richard didn’t no – but if you actually bother to read the post above – you would have seen how Baruch Goldstein reacted. And how about the way Tim McVeigh (who I would assume was a Christian reacted) – or a better example perhaps the IRA was rather pissed about how the Protestants were portraying Catholicism (and vice versa) in Northern Ireland…
I don’t deny that you’ve got crazy Christians and Jews that actually do criminal actions against muslims or even against each others, but these are isolated incidents, and the majority of Christians and Jews, or whatever other religion LOUDLY condemn those actions, and those people are judged and put away for good if they’re caught. As I said you don’t see big crowds of Jews or Christians rampaging everything in sight at the slightest insult that’s sent their way.
As for Redeker’s story, I am sorry but as a French citizen, I do not appreciate that this guy had to go into hiding because what he wrote did not please some histerical mollah somewhere in the world. I do not want islamic laws imposed on me by intimidation in my own country. The way things are going, that’s exactly what we’re going to get, if we don’t fight back : It starts with a silly Opera director canceling a show in Berlin, and soon enough we will have Voltaire’s books taken out of French libraries because some people will be worried that what he wrote 300 years ago could offend Muslims today. It already happened in England where ” the three little pigs” was removed from kindergarden classes in a school attended by Muslim kids. That’s crazy !
I see. Christians & Jews only commit “isolated” barbaric acts against Muslims. But Muslims commit the same acts in their thousands or millions? How many homicidal Muslims do you think there are in the world? As a proportion of their entire religious cohort, do you think there are more crazy Muslims than crazy Jews or Christians? If you do, you’re being neither fair nor honest.
And the majority of Muslims do as well. There are entire websites (linked in this blog in other posts & comment threads) devoted to Muslims who denounce religious violence & who promote tolerance. The fact that you could make such false assumptions about Muslims shows you know very little about Islam. Even a simple Google search will present many credible sites which contradict your prejudicial notions about the religion.
Not true. Jewish settlers commit the most heinous of crimes (beatings, murder, tearing down olive orchards, etc.) against Palestinian villagers and not only are the perpetrators unpunished, the Israeli Border Police laugh in the faces of the Palestinians if they dare register a complaint.
Until very recently, Jewish serial murderers received extremely light sentences for their crimes.
And you don’t see big crowds of Muslims “rampaging everything in site” either. If there are 1.3 billion Muslims, how many do you think are rampaging? Some certainly. A majority? Puh-leeze! A small percentage of all Muslims? Certainly.
I’m not French and I don’t appreciate it either. But the key is what do you do about it? Do you denounce Islam & all Muslims thereby driving a spike into the heart of any possibility of dialogue? Or do you denounce the threats against Redeker while also denouncing the hateful, spurious historical “facts” & arguments presented in his war against Islam?
Nice gross racist insult. What about some “hysterical” papal ‘mullah’ yakking it up about those terrible violent Muslims? You’d be right at home with Dick Cheney and George Bush. You could share Islamofascist jokes.
You’re full of crap. How are they imposed on you? It must be terrible to be forced to look at a woman dressed in a chador. Such oppression–I don’t know how you can stand it w/o taking a gun & blowing the poor woman’s head off. We have hundreds of thousands of women who wear chadors and men who wear yarmulkes in this country. Gotta tell you–the level of intimidation that the rest of my countrymen & women suffer fr. this is excruciating. In fact, Americans in their hundreds of thousands are organizing a counter-Muslim second American Revolution to take back our society and culture for the good ol’ Americans who still remain.
You should consider doing the same. Run those goddamn A-rabs outa yr country. Tell ’em where to go. Send ’em packing with their mealy prayer rugs & ratty Korans. That’ll teach ’em a lesson.
This is the only point w. which I agree with you. But the point is that the opera company’s artistic director made a stupid craven capitulation to imagined hysteria. Of course, we must stand up for our right to artistic expression as long as our art does not go out of its way to provoke & assassinate the character of Islam (which Idomeneo does not). But it would be foolish to extrapolate fr. one stupid decision that all of western culture is capitulating to Muslim “intimidation.”
===>>And you don’t see big crowds of Muslims “rampaging everything in site” either
Sorry but I did not dream the thousands of Muslims that went into a rampage in Syria, or Palestine, or Lebanon during the Cartoons hysteria, did I ? Or the 11 churches that were burnt in Nigeria. I did not imagine the 139 people that were killed because some hysterical Mollahs ( what else can you call those crazies who use their religious position to influence the masses in perpetutating those crimes in the name of their prophet!?!) told their folowers to go and kill the infidel. I did not dream those thousands of “moderate” Muslims that demonstrated in the streets of London with signs that read ” behead the infidel”, “Europe is the cancer, Islam is the answer” , “Exterminate those who slander Islam”, ” Europe take some lessons from 9/11″, and other niceties… And NO they were not just a few nuts, like those christians or jewish crazies that you mentioned : they were crowds…
“You’re full of crap. How are they imposed on you? It must be terrible to be forced to look at a woman dressed in a chador.”
I don’t care whatsoever what those ladies wear over their head, although I must say I find it amazing that when I was in highschool, 25 years ago, none of my Muslim friends did so, and now they all seem to… I have more of a problems when their young daughters, who are french citizens, are sent back to their countries to be forced into mariage… I have also a big problem when their leaders are trying to change the laws of France to forbid the right to blaspheme. I also have a big problem when they expect me to accept poligamy, because it’s ok with their religion ( and then, they also expect me to pay taxes to pay for them to have 16 kids…). I have a major problems when they show up at the emergency room and then demand, sometimes violently, that a female dr. or nurse for their wives ( or a male, for them) be found to take care of them, even if none is on call.
So to put it shortly, no I don’t want to “Run those goddamn A-rabs outa my country. Tell ‘em where to go. Send ‘em packing with their mealy prayer rugs & ratty Korans. That’ll teach ‘em a lesson.” I just want them to adapt to MY country and its way of life, and not the other way around… Is that too much to ask ?
===>>And the majority of Muslims do as well. There are entire websites (linked in this blog in other posts & comment threads) devoted to Muslims who denounce religious violence & who promote tolerance.
Well, guess what ! that’s not what one of the most influencial immam in France did about Redeker this week-end. The Rector of the Lyon Mosqee actually said that those death threats against Redeker were probably not from Muslims ( He said that he had ” the Utmost reservation about the origins of the threats…”). Sorry, but that does not cut it for me !
===>>>Of course, we must stand up for our right to artistic expression as long as our art does not go out of its way to provoke & assassinate the character of Islam (which Idomeneo does not)
Why give Muslims special treatment ??? Then you will have the Jewish nuts or the Christian nuts that are going to start doing the same kind of violent things to obtain the same censorship …
Ten years ago, we had the Salman Rushdie thing. A few years back, there was one incident where a Muslim organisation in Switzerland tried to prevent a theater from showing one of Voltaire’s play. No body reacted… In the last 12 months, we have already had 3 instances of fury over artistic or intellectual stuffs that happened not to please someone in the Muslim world. One of them , the Pope’s speech, was not even about what he actually said, but about what they misinterpreted him as saying : apparently, not only do you have to be careful about what you say, but you must also think of the way those people might completely misunderstand you. This is CRAZY, and we can’t give in into that crazyness !
PS :
I doubt very much that the threats against Reddeker that you mentioned at the beginning of your post have been deleted from those islmaist websites, the way LGF deleted the ones you compare them to… As I said, in our world we don’t approve of this kind of things !
OK, so you say “thousands” of Muslims “went on a rampage” in various Muslim countries. What does “rampage” mean? Or are you equating all Muslims who demonstrated against those who sully their religion as ipso facto “rampaging” regardless of how they behaved while demonstrating? Even with the “thousands” you mention–what percentage are those thousands of 1.3 billion Muslims worldwide? A majority? A minority? A tiny minority? Certainly that.
So you can quote a few signs demonstrators held aloft that were hateful. Were there no other signs that represented a more moderate view? Of course there were, but you wouldn’t know that because the sites where you pick up yr anti-Muslim propaganda wouldn’t feature anything favorable to Muslims.
I’m not in favor of forced marriages if they are against the daughter’s will. I presume that at least some & perhaps many of these women do not mind following a family tradition & religious custom regarding finding a marriage mate. But for those that do, I am heartily in favor of giving them support in resisting the practice.
But how can you legislate away such a custom which you might find objectionable? What can you do, compel the parents not to send the daughter to the family’s homeland? Prohibit the daughter from leaving the country? I don’t know about France, but here in this country we admire government which stays out of people’s private lives. We don’t relish a government which tries to tell people how to practice their religious customs. I know in France government can be more intrusive than here–but that’s not our way. Except for the during the reign of King George III who often seems to look toward your Louis-like monarchs for his lese majeste attitude toward governing.
Here’s another problem I have with anti-Muslim folk like you. In this country, most people’s attitude toward this would be: “Muslims want anti-blasphemy laws? Good for them. Let ’em try. If they can get a majority they can have them. But until they do by God there won’t be anti-blasphemy laws here. And I’ll do my damndest to ensure that there won’t ever be.”
Why are you so freaked out by Muslims using their constitutional rights as citizens to lobby for laws they find important to themselves? To me, this should be an obligation of a good citizen. A citizen who does not advocate for such legislation is doing himself and his fellow citizens a disservice.
Just because Muslims lobby for laws you find odious–big deal. Who cares? Let ’em lobby. There’s nothing illegal (yet) about lobbying. But you’re entitled to lobby back in the opposite direction. Why don’t you do that & stop whining about Muslims’ sheer effrontery in exercising their constitutional rights?
Again, this is an issue that should be dealt with legislatively, not through ideological assault. If the majority of yr countrymen & women don’t want polygamy then there won’t be polygamy. Oppose them in their efforts to pass such legislation. But don’t use the fact that they want to observe their religious customs as an axe with which to beat them over their heads.
Yes, they do and they should. You have a very quaint notion that you should only have to pay taxes to support the children of good honest poor French folk, but not scummy A-rabs. That’s an interesting concept. You see I support education, public health and social welfare efforts of my government. But I don’t support its military adventures. So what I’ll do is determine what percentage of my taxes would go to support our execrable foreign wars & I’ll refuse to pay that amount to the tax man when he comes knocking on my door. I think that stance should go over quite well with him, don’t you.
The whole notion of being a member of a society is that you have to compromise you beliefs and preferences for the greater good. You pay taxes for services you don’t believe in. You support your government because it tries to good for those in need–even those you find repellent. If you don’t accept having Muslims in France then maybe you should create a country devoid of them. Unfortunately, that couldn’t be France unless you want to bring back a nice man like Adolf Hitler or Marshall Petain who would put the darkies in their place.
Now, you’re being ridiculous. How difficult is it for a hospital to make male or female nurses available if religious laws of modesty forbid a woman to be examined by a male nurse or vice versa? In this, you are being highly insensitive & boorish.
As a matter of fact, it is. Immigration is a 2 way street. It enriches (not just materially) the immigrant (at least hopefully) and the nation to which he/she emigrates. Your customs will influence the immigrant and the immigrant’s customs will influence your country. And overall, it will make both of you better for the interaction. We here in the U.S. know this because the unavoidable fact of our immigrant experience is that it has made us the great nation we are (though this could end very quickly w. the changes our president has wrought).
There is no such thing as a nation which says to a potential immigrant: you will give everything to us; you will live as we tell you to and according to our rules; you will not expect anything from us except a paycheck; we will give you nothing beyond that. And if you don’t like it you can go to Hell. That’s one stupid, xenophobic country which follows those rules.
Well, isn’t that interesting. Two can play at that game. You cherry-pick the Muslim responses you detest & I can find a Muslim response that prove you wrong:
You have fallen into the precise trap I noted American homophobes fall into regarding gay rights campaigns which call for equal protection for homosexuals. They say gays want “special rights.” That’s crap. Do you mean to tell me that in the centuries during which your country has existed the majority religion has not insinuated itself into the pores of secular society? While I’m no expert on French culture & society, I can tell you that as a Jew I am deeply cognizant of the stranglehold which Christianity has over American life. You can’t go anywhere w/o being reminded that you are a little respected religious minority.
Little surprise that Muslims would feel this way in France. Little surprise that they would ask for respect for their customs and beliefs. And nothing wrong with it. The day when France rids itself entirely of the influence of majoritarian religion over daily life is the day when I stop calling for respect for Islam in French life.
You are poorly informed about not only what the Pope said in this speech but about his many other negative comments about Islam spoken over the course of many years. The Pope claims he quoted the Islamophobic Byzantine emperor w/o accepting the latter’s anti-Islamic premise. This is ludicrous. I have read the passage in question & it is crystal clear that Benedict largely agrees with the premise. Besides, he has said as much about Islam in other contexts. This Pope is inimical to non-Catholic religions. He is no John Paul II when it comes to interfaith dialogue. In fact, he’s a rather stereotypical hardline figure on the subject.
You will lose the game if you try to play on terms that argue that Islamists are worse than those at LGF. Charles Johnson probably deleted those comments because he received two phone calls from the FBI inquiring about them. Our police agencies don’t look favorably on people who make such threats or the websites which host them. If Johnson had a single honest bone in his body he would’ve banned the two commenters from his site. He has not done this and sees no reason why he should. As I wrote in another post, I ban people here for a lot less & I certainly would’ve banned someone, even a political ally, who’d uttered slurs such as these. The fact that he cannot bring himself to do so speaks volumes about his devout hatred of Muslims. As a blogger, I’d rather not live in the slime uttered by those on the far right or far left. For Johnson, it’s different. He’s a hog who loves to wallow in the ideological manure his readers produce.
===>>>OK, so you say “thousands” of Muslims “went on a rampage” in various Muslim countries. What does “rampage” mean? Or are you equating all Muslims who demonstrated against those who sully their religion as ipso facto “rampaging” regardless of how they behaved while demonstrating
I don’t know… what do YOU call burning churches, ambassies, Eu Offices, Kentucky Fried chicken restorants ? Peaceful demonstration?
===>>>So you can quote a few signs demonstrators held aloft that were hateful. Were there no other signs that represented a more moderate view? Of course there were,
Well, I can show you mine… Can you showme yours ??? 🙂
===>>>I don’t know about France, but here in this country we admire government which stays out of people’s private lives.
Well, in France we love government to interfere and legislate everything.
===>>>Here’s another problem I have with anti-Muslim folk like you. In this country, most people’s attitude toward this would be: “Muslims want anti-blasphemy laws? Good for them. Let ‘em try. If they can get a majority they can have them. But until they do by God there won’t be anti-blasphemy laws here. And I’ll do my damndest to ensure that there won’t ever be.”
Well, your problem is that you don’t understand the way things work. They’re not going to lobby, they’re going above the French laws, to the EU “human tights courts” or its UN equivalent, where they find all the help they can get from unelected officials that are going to decide whatever they want and then impose it to France as a new EU rule. I am sure you’re among the same people that cringe when the US refuses to submit to the international Courts, but you know what ? We in France surrender to whatever those decide, and as you put it, 1.3 billion Muslims have a lot of power, especially when they start using those scare tactics like they have with the cartoons, and Co. So whether or not I like it, my vote does not have muchpower anymore…
Poligamy : Again, this is an issue that should be dealt with legislatively, not through ideological assault.
Right… because you think they don’t do it just because the Law says so ??? What do you want the police to do ? Arrest those guys and their four wives ( the official one and the three others that register as single mothers ) . Which brings us to French welfare programs which generously gives you a monthly subsidy for every child you have under 18, whatever your income. Subsidy that I pay with my taxes. This guy we’re talking about with his three or four wives and 16 kids, does not need to work, because he can live pretty “nicely” on his “allocations familliales” which bring him thousands of Euros per month, and his “allocation logement” which provides him with part of the rent for his “wives” appartments, and the “free” medical services, that every French citizen is, especially if they are out of work … No I am not kidding. In the meanwhile, I have another life style : I only have 2 or 3 kids, because I work and I want my kids to have a great education, and I know I won’t be able to give it to them if I have 5 or 6 kids. BUT I am paying tons of taxes for the free loader that has figured out the French welfare system to a T and uses it to the max… Are all Muslims like that ? No, of course not… Many have just one wife, work, send their kids to school, etc… But there are plenty of them that are abusing the system, and believe me, the average blue collar french citizen is opretty much fed up with the whole thing ! Which explains why you end up with a Le Pen ( French extreme right leader, anti-semit, anti-arab, but amazingly very friendly with Saddam).
Mr Boubakeur also added that “dans tout cela plus d’agitation et de rodomontades que de menaces sérieuses” which translates by ” All of this is more fluff thant serious threats”. getting closer to what the other guy said about those threats probably not even from Muslims.
===>>>Do you mean to tell me that in the centuries during which your country has existed the majority religion has not insinuated itself into the pores of secular society?
I don’t care what so ever !!! Sure France is a “Chrstian ” country… and Saoudi Arabia is a Muslim contry. If I go live there, I’ll definitely live according to their way of living and respect their laws… I don’t think I will have much of a choice. I don’t ask Muslims to not practice their religion when they are in France. I just don’t want them to infringe on MY rights that MY parents ang grand_parents fought for. They got rid of the influence of religion in the laws of ma contry, and I intend for it to stay that way, no ifs and buts ! If they don’t like it, they can go back where they came from. Nobody is forcing them to stay.
===>>You are poorly informed about not only what the Pope said in this speech but about his many other negative comments about Islam spoken over the course of many years.
Well contrary to you, I read the whole thing in English and in French, and I understood it too. When you’ve done that, instead of “reading the passage in question” and thinking that it’s “cristal clear” what the pope thinks, we can talk about it some more. But until then, let me tell you that YOU are the one that’s “poorly informed” , not I.
Benedict XVI is changing the policy of the Vatican, because as you say it, John Paul II tried really hard to placate Muslims during his tenure. The result is that although the Church made big efforts to welcome Muslims in the Christian World, Christians have become less and less welcome in the Islam world during the same period ( I don’t have the statistics under hand, but believe me the number of Christians in the Middle east in the last 50 years has shrinked dramatically because of the persecutions they are submitted to). Obviously the policy is not working, and the pope has decided to ask for some reciprocity. It includes denouncing violence against Christians, instead of hushing it like it happened in the past. Interfaith dialogue is a two way street
I hate all religions equally. christians [sic]. koranimals (islamists). jews [sic].
All equally worthless. Religion is a human vehicle for control. Nothing more.
All of the freaks in this world who are so caught up in being concerned about whether or not everyone respects andloves their religion need to wake up.
I –for one — spend everyday trying to get religious pinheads to start fights with me so I can beat them down. Muslims are usually the best. I enjoy reminding them that fighting is hypocritical to their belief-system as I smash their head on the ground repeatedly.
Silly human, religion is for freakz.
First, I don’t condone violent rampages whether they be committed by Muslims, Jews or Christians. But I also don’t make the rather stupid assumption that the acts of hooligans represent all of Islam as you so foolishly do. Second, there is so much false, bogus anecdotal “evidence” of bad Muslim behavior that I don’t credit any accusations such as the ones you make unless verified by a trustworthy media source. I’m not saying the events you mention didn’t happen. But anyone can say anything on the internet & the anti-Muslim crowd loves nothing more than turning rumor & innuendo into “fact.” So whenever you cast aspersions I’d appreciate a source to authenticate yr charge.
Ah, I see. You don’t mind a French government legislating away the rights of Muslim citizens of yr country. But you sure as hell are pissed that the European Court of Human Rights might usurp France’s God-given right to put Muslims in their place. I’ve got news for you. The European legal & legislative system provides many benefits for France which I’m sure you take for granted. If it didn’t provide such benefits then your country wouldn’t participate. So you like the good things Europe offers. But you don’t like those nasty, intrusive things like telling you you’re violating the human rights of yr citizens. Tant pis.
And by the way, you’re way off the mark in accusing “the UN equivalent” of legislating anything for France. That’s not the way the UN works. It has no power to tell France what to do. Instead of flinging unfounded accusations like this one you’d be better off providing a source/link so I can understand what it is you’re complaining about.
Why do you have a problem with Muslims availing themselves of the Human Rights Court. If you have the right to bring a case there why shouldn’t they? Or is it possible your bringing a case would not be a violation of the system because your motives are good & pure, but somehow Muslims who’d do the same are violating the spirit of the system? Now that would be a double standard wouldn’t it?
I am cringing in my boots as I write this. I can hear their thundering hooves as they make their way to overrun our sovereign American shores. What are you afraid of? The average Muslim is no different than you or me. Yet you paint them as the dark menace lurking over our beautiful, pure western civilization. These stupid theories have been floating through the world for decades because frightened, narrow-minded people find them appealing. You must read Tom Buchanan’s views on race mingling from The Great Gatsby. You’d probably find him an attractive character despite the fact that he cheats on his wife Daisy and murders his adulterous lover in the novel. Tom is a man’s man who knows how to keep those darkies in their place.
This is preposterous. France is not composed of 1.3 billion Muslims. You sound as if your country is being inundated by the entirety of Islam. You have several hundred thousand or perhaps a million Muslim citizens. Your vote & those of other conservative French folk like you count just as much as the vote of any Muslim citizen. You live in a democracy. That means you take the good w. the bad. You hate Muslims & everything they stand for? Fine. But in order for you to receive the benefits of yr democratic society you have to live with the things you don’t like or else oppose them democratically & change them. That is, unless you wish to do away with your form of government & return to the blessed Sun King’s rule.
If France provided Muslims with all the opportunities available to folks like you (jobs, etc.) then Muslims would acculturate much more quickly into French culture & you’d have less problems of this sort. I don’t know how to handle polygamy as we have it in small pockets in this country. I don’t see any reason why you couldn’t arrest someone esp. if one of the wives objects to her status. But the main thing is trying to change these practices by providing incentives to Muslims to abandon them. Give them jobs, provide financial incentives for remaining monogamous. Do something positive instead of railing at the primitiveness of Islam & Muslims.
You couldn’t possibly credit this but some of these hateful Muslims are going to make enormous contributions to yr society. I know this because I am a child of immigrants as almost all Americans are. We came here much as Muslims came to yr shores: with nothing, speaking a foreign tongue, eating strange foods, unwashed, unwanted. But somehow we survived & prospered here. You will find that, despite your hysteria, Muslims will make their own mark for the good on French society.
This is silly. France has a fertility problem as your own nice white folk are not reproducing at a fast enough clip. So yr. government decides to incentivize fertility in order to produce more babies. But you’d have only nice white French women receive the subsidy & somehow prevent Muslims fr. receiving it because they reproduce like bunnies. Fair? No way! You give the subsidy to one, you give it to all. If you don’t like the system, then lobby to change it. Man, this is democracy. Use it. If you don’t it will use you in the sense that others will use their rights & leave you in the dust.
More willful blindness of yr part. What is the unemployment rate among Muslims? And I’m talking about Muslims who want to work? How many decent paying jobs are available for Muslims in yr country. If you claim that Muslims come to yr country to sit in cafes smoking their hookahs and diddle their wives to produce more children to put on the welfare rolls, you’re not only being racist but you’re closing yr eyes to the reality in yr own country.
Why don’t you do as we have done & condition social welfare payments on holding a job? But if you go that route you actually have to produce a job that a Muslim can get (which would be hard since there are so few currently in France).
Amazing how you can speak for the “average” French citizen. I note you’re only speaking for the blue collar French citizen. What about all the others? And if so many of yr compatriots agree w. you why aren’t they voting the Le Pens into the Elysee Palace? It must be that there are other threads of political discourse in yr country which disagree with your hateful prejudice. Thank God for that.
Regarding Boubakeur’s statements, neither you nor I know the nature of the intent behind the threats. I take them seriously. You take them seriously. We should. Boubakeur should too. But there is also a chance that he is right & that the threats were published by teenage malcontents with no ability or interest in making good on them. That’s why we have police–to investigate these things & tell us what’s behind them & how serious they are.
Here is an fuller interview with Time Magazine:
Boubakeur is not my rabbi. I don’t make the mistake you do of believing he must only say things with which I agree all the time. But generally, I’m content with the statements he made attacking the threats. You, instead nitpick because you refuse to believe that any Muslim leader really opposes violence & those who claim to are two-faced liars. That’s not the way I look at these things.
That’s not the way we look at things here. America is not supposed to be a “Christian country.” It is a country of many religions no one of which may claim dominance or control of the public sphere. You’d do well to take a leaf out of our book. France is only a Christian country because the majority of its inhabitants have been Christian historically. Spain is a Christian country, but once was a Muslim one. Things change. France will never become a Muslim country. But you & the rest of yr compatriots will have to get adjusted to a France with a significant Muslim minority. If both you & the Muslims can learn to live together even grudgingly then your nation will flourish. If you persist in yr hidebound notions of racial prejudice, then I pity yr country as it will decline into warring ethnic/religious factions. It’s your country to lose.
Such Know-Nothing stupidity reflects so poorly on you & yr argument. I’m afraid you will not be sending anyone back where they came from unless you’d like to turn your country into one of those basket case African nations which periodically expel hundreds of thousands of “foreigners” from their shores thus disrupting their economy & impoverishing the “pure bred” citizens who remain.
I am so glad I don’t have to live inside yr brain. It is such a dark, hateful place.
DO NOT misquote me and DO NOT mischaracterize my argument. YOU are the one who believes that John Paul “placated” Muslims. I DO NOT feel that way. So speak for yourself. John Paul reached out to other religions like Judaism & Islam. His efforts were sincere & reciprocated by those religions. Despite my strong disagreements with him on many issues, I could appreciate his work to find common ground with my own religion. The current Pope has set such efforts back immeasurably. Now, I have NO common ground with him whatsoever & I’m afraid I never will. He is an unyielding, hard-assed theological ideologue more interested in a triumphal view of Catholicism than a cooperative, tolerant one. Take him, he’s yours.
As aMuslim, I’m appalled by what’s happened in France recently. Most of all, I’m ashamed that so-called muslims would act against their faith so blatantly by directing death threats to someone who spoke against their faith, however horrible, misinformed and insulting his statements. But as Richard Silverstein said, while there may be a number of these violent attacks and threats, those acting in such a way do not represent the millions of Muslims around the world who DO NOT violently protest and, quite often, speak out to condemn these attacks but are rarely given any real airtime.
brubos, what has happened in your country is unfortunate – Muslims are required by their religions to respect the laws of the country they live in (as long at that does not require them to reject their faith) which, along the example you raised, means respecting any laws that prohibit polgamy, marriage under a certain age etc. However, from what I know, and again, that isn’t a lot, I don’t believe your country has been very…respectful of Islamic beliefs, choosing to categorize all Islamic beliefs as intolerant, backward, or subjugating. That doesn’t foster real interfaith dialogue. And the example I’d give is that of the hijab in French schools. It was quite a shock to learn that the French school system was actually banning young girls from wearing the hijab! Now, I agree, no female should be forced to wear anything she does not want to. Yet, forbidding those who actually WANT to wear the hijab (and believe that wearing one is required by their faith) from wearing one is quite hypocritical. If a girl’s parents, society or family can not force her to submit to wearing one, than neither should her school system. While I myself choose not to wear this traditional headcovering (and by the way I was never pressured to wear one or not and count myself fortunate to live in a society and with a family that does not force me to choose a specific type of dress) I know many women who are liberated, knowledgable, and independent who CHOOSE to wear the headcovering. If the adherents of the Jewish faith in French schools are permitted to wear caps or scarves, and Christians to wear crosses, then Muslims girls should be given the same liberty: to choose how they attire themselves and what outward symbols of faith they display (and for all these groups, no one should be forcing their views and symbols on others).
I suppose the point I’m getting to is my frustration – my frustration for the Muslim communities that act out so violently and unIslamically AND my frustration for those who place all Muslims in one camp. And finally, this Mr. Robert Redeker: what has happened to him and his family is tragic and unfortunate. But I will take this moment to peacefully mount my own protest and indignation against all that he said. He is doing no service to his beloved country. If he truly cared about preserving French heritage and culture, and the safety of his nation, he would not issue such vituperative and incorrect statements. I’m incredibly frustrated that so called Muslims twist Islamic teachings to carry out terrorist attacks and issue death threats, and, unfortunately in some cases, subjugate women etc. But sir, we can not have any dialogue across the various groups of Muslims and non-Muslims if we issue blanket, insulting statements. Nothing is good can ever come of that. And that includes not telling Muslims that they must “change” their faith, their tradition and in that case it may include allowing some women the opportunity to swim outside the presence of men. I quite honestly don’t understand how Muslims in your country are infringing on your rights….you’ve made blanket statements, including asking them to “get out YOUR country if they don’t like it”…which by the way only serves to feed the impression of immigrants in France and Americans like me and Richard Silverstein that frenchman like you are xenophobic and close-minded. But if I’m wrong and somehow your rights HAVE been infringed upon, please, enlighten us with examples. When you speak of a case of a few muslims taking advantage of welfare, etc, can’t you see how INFURIATING that is? Even though you acknowledge not all Muslims are like that, you just infuriated one who is otherwise in agreement with you, by implying that somehow ALL Muslims in France are either responsible for this misuse of welfare, or would at least rally around such an individual to push through some sort of legislation in the human rights court. You make very little sense to me.
-I’m a Roman-Catholic Filipino living in Oslo, Norway, where 4 out of five non-western foreigner is muslim. Having brown skin and black hair, I find it very uncomfortable when being labeled right away as a muslim and I am sick of having to explain to people that I am not without them raising an eyebrow. Why? Because deep in my mind I KNOW that when they classify me as muslim, the word “terror” is never far away.
-My religion does not teach me to hate those who think differently, but I am pissed off at how muslims all over the world have made it easy for “other brown people”, making an honest and having peaceful lives in europe, to be hated.
-Has anyone here ever had an intellectual religious debate with a muslim? None? Neither have I. The intellectual part is impossible. Every man of Islam I personally know (and I know quite a few) is willing and ready to kill if ANYONE tries to throw an insult at Mohammad, and would even make a similar threat to you for bringing it up. How many muslims have recieved death threats from christian organizations for insluting Jesus?
-I don’t think Islam is a bad Religion. It’s just poorly interpretated by those who teach it.
OK, OK so that “How many muslims have recieved death threats from christian organizations for insluting Jesus?” part was not so well thought about. But still, I agree with BRUBOS about the hundreds of thousands of muslims who went on protest from Norway to Turkey to Indonesia, burning embassies, threatening Scandinavians in predominantly Muslim countries, And please, how can you talk about “percentages” when reffering to the number of people needed to represent a Religion? During the charicature mess months ago, all Norwegian and Danish food products imported to Turkey (a predominantly Muslim country) went to rot when Islamic religious leaders proposed a boycott of all Scandinavian products. Now, how many of them were following “orders” and how many of them just felt on going on a diet?
“Not true. Jewish settlers commit the most heinous of crimes (beatings, murder, tearing down olive orchards, etc.) against Palestinian villagers and not only are the perpetrators unpunished, the Israeli Border Police laugh in the faces of the Palestinians if they dare register a complaint.”
You remind me of the joke about the downtrodden ghetto Jew reading the anti-semitic newspaper cause he wanted to see how powerful the Jewish People really were!
If the rest of your comments and assessments are as rooted in reality as the above description of Jewish settlers is, remind me not to go to you for professional advice, unless its in the area of writing poor fiction.
You know what… you should research what you talk about, because otherwise you do say a lot of BS …
1.) For the 11 churches burned down during the cartoons, it’s easy enough to find. Just google “cartoons + Churches burned’ and you find all kinf of relatively trustworthy sources like CNN, CBS or NPR. Here is a sample from the CBS article : Thousands of rioters burned 15 churches in Maiduguri in a three-hour rampage before troops and police reinforcements restored order, Nigerian police spokesman Haz Iwendi said. Security forces arrested dozens of people, Iwendi said.
Chima Ezeoke, a Christian Maiduguri resident, said protesters attacked and looted shopsowned by minority Christians, most of them with origins in the country’s south.
“Most of the dead were Christians beaten to death on the streets by the rioters,” Ezeoke said. Witnesses said three children and a priest were among those killed.
Those silly journalists used the word rampage too… I guess you would qualify the thing as a peaceful demonstration that got out slightly of hand…
2.) You’re the one that said you saw no problems in the fact that Muslims in France would lobby to change the laws to fit their religious laws because it is the democratic way… I tell you they don’t do that : they sue in the European Human Right Court, which is in the hands of people that have never been elected by French citizens. So those supra national bureaucrats get to decide what the French laws are going to be : Explain to me what’s democratic , here !!! And try and be logical… YOU mentioned in one of your first post, that you, in the US like for the government to be less rather than more involved in people’s life. So why the heck do you like having the UN or the European Human right court decide things for your country ??? Is that what you call less government ?
3.) ===>>>And by the way, you’re way off the mark in accusing “the UN equivalent” of legislating anything for France. That’s not the way the UN works. It has no power to tell France what to do.
Oh yeah ?
Guess what : the UN Human Right High commissioner, Louise Arbour appointed two UN experts on racism to carry out a detailed investigation into what Arbour characterizes as a “disrespect for belief”. Those guys actually came up with a report which criticized the Danish Government for letting the newspaper publish those cartoons ( as if a Governement should intervene into what a news paper sees fit to print !!! Or maybe you don’t have any problem with that either)… In their report they just “deplored” the violences that irrupted because of the cartoons.
In the meanwhile, the OIC (Organisation of Islamic Conference) was furiously lobbying for the UN to ” criminalize insults of Islam and its prophet”. As the Village Voice ( is that too much of a right wing newspaper for you ???) put it in the following article : “On February 9, the European Union called for a voluntary code of conduct to avoid offending Muslims. On the same day, Kofi Annan agreed with an OIC proposal mandating that a revised U.N. Human Rights Council “prevent instances of intolerance discrimination, incitement of hatred and violence . . . against religions, prophets, and beliefs.” The language is intentionally very broad.
This would enforce censorship by U.N. members and NGOs (nongovernmental organizations there) against purported defamation of Muslims in print and other forms of speech.”
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0608,hentoff,72237,6.html
4.)===>>>This is preposterous. France is not composed of 1.3 billion Muslims. You sound as if your country is being inundated by the entirety of Islam. You have several hundred thousand or perhaps a million Muslim citizens.
Wrong : most statistics put the Muslim population in France well above 5 millions. ( it’s illegal to ask people what their religion is so the census bureau can’t do that either). Some demographs even go as high as 10 millions. So, as I said, try and look up things before you give your pompous comments…
Any way my comment about “my vote having no power anymore, had nothing to do with the Muslim population, but with the fact that I don’t elect those people that make decisions for me in the several Europeean institutions… and I don’t like that, anymore than I like the EU subsidizing French agriculture. So don’t presume what I think about those things, because you would probably be very far from the truth !
5.) ===>>>You don’t mind a French government legislating away the rights of Muslim citizens of yr country
What are you talking about ? What rights did the french government take away from the Muslim citizens ??? Please enlighten me, I am really, really anxious to know !
6.)If France provided Muslims with all the opportunities available to folks like you (jobs, etc.) then Muslims would acculturate much more quickly into French culture & you’d have less problems of this sort.
You’re so very funny… You obviously have no clue about the French economy… And I don’t have time to tell you about it… But check it out, and please enlighten me on ways to improve, it, or better yet, send your suggestions to the French govenment ! God knows they could use some help to get out of the dirigist, anti-market economy they have been into for the last 30 years… It sure does not help in the creation of jobs !
A littel anecdote that I read for the 1st time today… Last year, a Charcutier ( That’s a butcher that specializes in pork meat, like roasts, hams, sausages”, was looking for a cook to help him in his shop . He placed an add with the the govenment employment agency ( ANPE). Those very astute bureaucrats sent him a young Muslim… To work with pork, all day long. But that’s beside the point because the Charcutier had hired a young lady a couple of days before, and she was starting her trial period that exact same morning. So he told the applicant that he had already found someone and sent him away. Well guess what , 5 month later, that young guy sued the Charcutier for racial discrimination, and won !!! The appeal about that case is starting today, that’s why I heard about it… But please don’t tell me that the french government does not do anything for them… By the way that same young guy was offered a job in another charcuterie a month after he won in court, and refused it because he would have had towork with pork… No I am not kidding. He has been “chomeur”( unemployed) for five years.
7.) ===>>> If you claim that Muslims come to yr country to sit in cafes smoking their hookahs and diddle their wives to produce more children to put on the welfare rolls, you’re not only being racist but you’re closing yr eyes to the reality in yr own country.
Really ? Because obviously you know much more about this than I do ? Please do tell me what your sources are !
France has had an unemployment rate around 10 % for many, many years. Why do you think that people that don’t speak or write the language, have no skilled whatsoever, immigrate to France, when there is no employment for 10 % of its population ? If you ever have a chance to talk to one of those French public servants that dole out all the welfare checks. let them tell you how those immigrant know perfectly well what money they are entitled to, much better than most native French ( and THAT includes Muslims people that have been born here, just in case you want to hurl that “racist” epithet to me again) do.
Because, you see, in 1974, Chirac, who was already prime minister ( we keep our politicians really , really long, and then wonder why nothing ever changes!) had the great
idea to propose a law that would allow the famillies of the Immigrants that were already in France to join them. It’s called the “Rapprochement Familial”, and it’s amazing how big those famillies are. I guess you can’t blame them because if I had a choice between living in Algeria or in France, or kenya and france, and given the fact that I can live pretty nicely on welfare in France, I would not hesitate either !
8.) I don’t see any reason why you couldn’t arrest someone esp. if one of the wives objects to her status. But the main thing is trying to change these practices by providing incentives to Muslims to abandon them. Give them jobs, provide financial incentives for remaining monogamous. Do something positive instead of railing at the primitiveness of Islam & Muslims.
See above, for those wonderfull ideas about jobs. One thing I wanted to add : When I was growing up, the Muslim that lived in france did not have these kinds of attitudes. They knew and abided by the laws of the land. I don’t remember ever seeing any lady with a hijab, or them having problems with the ways swimming pool were run. Boys and girls had PE together, and nobody ever complained about it. The radicalisation has been pretty recent. I personnaly do not care if someone wears a Kippa, a veil, or a cross. But you hear from lots of women that try and hepl Muslim women, that some of them do not have a choice. They are forced by their male brothers, cousins, their fathers to wear the Hijab, just like they are forced to go back to their country to marry someone they have never met. This is one of the reasons why that silly law about wearing a hijab, or a kippa or any sign of religion in school has been passed.
If you want to read something about all that, try to find a site in English that talks about an NGO called “Ni Pute Ni Soumise”, which translates into “neither prostitute nor submissive”.
9.)===>>>Amazing how you can speak for the “average” French citizen. I note you’re only speaking for the blue collar French citizen. What about all the others? And if so many of yr compatriots agree w. you why aren’t they voting the Le Pens into the Elysee Palace? It must be that there are other threads of political discourse in yr country which disagree with your hateful prejudice.
Well I happen to be French remember ? Maybe you don’t know about it, but for the las t Presidential election, Lepen got 22% of the vote. With this he managed to beat the Socialist prime minsiter who was running against Chirac, to the immense chagrin and shame of the left and the right. Most political analyst will tell you that Lepen got a lot of the old “communist” vote, and you dont find much more blue collar than that ! I
And by the way I have NEVER voted for Lepen and I never will.
10) That’s not the way we look at things here. America is not supposed to be a “Christian country.” It is a country of many religions no one of which may claim dominance or control of the public sphere. You’d do well to take a leaf out of our book. France is only a Christian country because the majority of its inhabitants have been Christian historically.
Well guess what France is not America , and vice versa.
France is Christian just in name and historically. The only Christian thing French people still care about are the Holly Days, which give them long week-ends. Basically French is 100% secular ( only 5% of the population actually goes to Mass ). And that’s why we don’t like it when other people try and impose their religion on us. French writers and artists have been mocking religion for centuries. They used to get in trouble for it, but they made a revolution, even several of them, and they finally got to the point were they did not lose their head for doing it. They don’t intend to give up this freedom anytime soon.
I understand that Muslims might not appreciate it , but as I said, if they can’t adapt to our way of thinking and living and to our laws, nobody forces them to stay here. I know you consider this as racist, but it really is not.
===>>>Such Know-Nothing stupidity reflects so poorly on you & yr argument. I’m afraid you will not be sending anyone back where they came from unless you’d like to turn your country into one of those basket case African nations which periodically expel hundreds of thousands of “foreigners” from their shores thus disrupting their economy & impoverishing the “pure bred” citizens who remain.
I am so glad I don’t have to live inside yr brain. It is such a dark, hateful place
Oh please, stop the rightousness and hollier-than- though attitude ! What if as a Catholic I wanted to impose on you that you should not have an abortion because it;s killing a baby and a sin, and I need to fight at all cost this kind of treatment of a human being ? Would you just sit down and take it without a fight ? If I decided that condoms are offending me and my religion, would you accept to have them removed from the pharmacy’s shelf, just because you respect my religion ?
I somehow doubt it very much !
Would you just let the statue of Mohammad be removed from ypou Supreme Court Building, because it is offensive to Muslims ?
===>>>JP II His efforts were sincere & reciprocated by those religions.
Yeah right ! Look at the statistics of the number of Christians that felt they had to leave the Muslim world were they had lived since 2000 years ago, in the last 25 years, and come back and talk to me about reciprocity !
And your diatribe about Pope Benedict shows how tolerant you are of other people’s opinions and religion ! What’s amazing is that you dare talk about my “hateful brain”.
Hi, A.Syed,
I am sorry that my posts appears to you as hateful because I really am not. France might not have shown much respect for the Muslim religion, but the truth is that France, like most of Europe, basically does not show any respect for any religion !!! We have a very secular society, where religion is mostly absent. You should read what most French people think of the Americans and their religion. You would probably be appalled too. As I said to Richard Silverstein our ancestors fought really hard to remove religion from our laws and republic and we basically all agree that religion belongs to the private spehere of the individual person. So we really, really do not appreciate that new comers to our contry try to send us back to the bad old times when blasphemy was punished, or when women did not have the same rights as men.
Of course I know that all Muslims are not like those violent people that make us so mad. But we are worried that very few of them actually voice their opinion and react to those violent acts by reaffirming their attachement to the values and laws of our Republic. We’re worried that more and more of the young girls have to wear the Hijab, whether they want it or not ( and many of them do not).
When I say that muslims ( some Muslims) want to infirnge on our rights, I talk about our most cherished right : the freedon of speech. we like to be irreverend. we like to mock, and our best writers through history have done so. When the director of the berlin Opera thinks she has to cancel a play because she is scared that it will offend Muslims, I get very upset. That same person would probably not cancel Madonna’s show, because she fakes a crucifiction in one of her scenes. I am scared that some crazy Christians will suddenly realize that by protesting violently and threatening mayhem, they can get the same results as the crazy Muslims.
The OIC ( Organisation of islamic conference) is lobbying really hard right now, to make balsphemy a crime for the whole world through the UN. I am sorry but in France we had that 200 years ago, and we don’t want to go back there…It’s fine with me if islamic countries have such laws, and I would definitley respect that if I visited there or lived there, but I don’t want that to become the law of my contry. That’s what I mean when I say that if Muslims don’t like that in France, they are welcome to go live somewhere else !
I am sorry if I upset you when I say that Muslims abuse our welfare system.. Of course no all of them do it, and of course they are not the only ones that do it ! But the Polygamy problem is very real, as is the problem of forcing young girls to wear the Hijab, whether they like it or not, or the problem of violent ourburst in hospitals when there is no Doctor of the “right sex” to take care of the sick, as is the probleme of excision of little baby girls. Many of us feel like we’re going backward instead of forward : out goes the equality of sex, out goes secularism, out goes freedom of speech. What next ?
If you came to me for professional advice I’d give you up as a hopeless case.
And speaking of “reality” (a subject you clearly know nothing about when it comes to Israel’s relations with the Palestinians), let me give you a cold, hard blast of it:
* Baruch Goldstein murders 29 in Hebron mosque
* Asher Weisgan murders 5:
* Eden Zada murders 4 Israeli Arabs
* Stoning Palestinian school children:
* Border Police murder Palestinian youth for sport:
* Border Police force shepherd to engage in bestiality:
* Settlers beat Palestinian olive growers with impunity
* Serial acts of settler violence:
Duh, you don’t remember the numerous times French have voted for various proposals related to European unity & the EU? I assure you that there is no way on earth that the Court could rule on matters concerning French people unless those same French people enabled the creation of Europe-wide entities like the Court through some authorizing legislation or vote. Your comment above shows yr ignorance of yr own country’s history regarding the EU.
You keep equating the UN & the European High Court. They are completely dissimilar institutions. I support the UN because it deals with issues that are, as you say, supranational. There are many critical issues facing the world which my country cannot deal with on its own.
Regarding European institutions you detest like the High Court & their alleged infringement with the rights of individual nations, you forget one critical fact of American history. We originally were, like your individual nation states, STATES. That is separate entities tied loosely to a weak national government. That didn’t work. So what did we do? We created a federal government with–you guessed it, a SUPREME COURT. States did not want to give up their power to a federal court in much the same way you rail about the European Court. But over time, our Supreme Court has superseded the state courts when it comes to national/federal matters. The individual states came to realize that having a single Supreme Court was better overall than having separate State high courts with supreme judicial authority.
In yr point #3 above you miss completely my point. I said the UN cannot tell France what to do. You say I’m wrong and what is yr proof? That a UN report criticized the Danish government over the cartoons. So how is criticizing a government telling it what to do? They’re not the same at all. The UN has nothing more than moral power in most cases (except in Section VII peacekeeping operations). It can suggest that a nation change its policy or behavior. But it can’t do much more than that.
The UN cannot criminalize anything outside matters like war crimes and genocide for which there is an International Court. Provide a source to document this statement. Further, the OIC can call for the UN to change its name to Muhammed for all I care. What matters is not that they lobby for something, but whether they have the power to make it happen. In this case, they don’t & your piteous whining on this subject is most unattractive.
This from Wikipedia:
You’re worried about 6.3% of yr population toppling yr precious way of life?? You’re pathetic!
Why don’t we start with the hijab? Why is that illegal? Why can’t a woman show respect for her religion if she wishes to? In our country, we respect (usually) religious traditions & don’t bat an eyelash over issues like this. In France, it seems to be a profound matter of state as to whether a woman is allowed to cover her head.
You provide me a single example of a government agency which provided a single job to a single Muslim and you expect that I’ll accept that this signifies France provides jobs for all Muslims who want them? You’re daft, man.
Do you know anything first hand & personally about Muslims in yr. country? Do you have a Muslim friend? Do you know anything about Islam or its customs (not fr. reading LGF or other propaganda sites, but rather fr. reading first hand Islamic sources)? Have you attended any lectures by Muslims about their religion? Have you visited a Muslim mosque to learn more about how Muslims live & what they believe?
Are you aware of the unemployment rate among French Muslims?
Do you think it’s so high because they enjoy a life of idleness? Tell me what French industries are clamoring to hire Muslims?
My God, I knew you were dense, but I didn’t know you were a complete idiot to boot. You seriously believe that poor immigrants came to France to get on the dole?! You really are hopeless. You’ve clearly never known or spoken to a new immigrant in yr life. You make generalizations about Muslims & their motivations for coming to France w. absolutely no first-hand knowledge whatsoever. You base yr opinions on the propaganda books & rags you read instead of trying to learn about a subject about which you clearly know nothing substantive.
These are the absolute same arguments used by white Americans against African-Americans & Hispanic immigrants. They are no more true here than they are in France. You are a hopeless xenophobic racist.
Boys & girls in PE together constitutes “radicalization?!” Have you lost yr mind completely?
I know about all that–it’s old news. Besides, aside from the shock of LePen polling such a number what does it really signify? He didn’t win. Didn’t even come close. So his ideas resonate with a significant minority of the voters. Jorg Haider’s ideas resonated for a time in Austria. And David Duke’s resonated for a time in Louisiana. But did that signify anything? No. It was a protest vote. Just as yr hysteria about immigrants is a short term issue distracting you & yr countrymen & women fr. the real & important issues facing yr country.
You know nothing about what it’s really like when a nation tries to impose its religion on a minority. Do you know about forced conversions of Jews during the Crusades and Spanish Inquisition. That is imposing a religion on someone. You’re whining is pitiful. The Muslims are not imposing their religion on you. If they put you at the stake & gave you a choice of Islam or death–that would be imposing their religion on you. Having to see a girl wear a chador or boys exercising separately fr. girls is an attempt by Muslims to live their lives according to their religious beliefs. The reason this irks you so is because you hate Muslim & Islam. If people like you actually tried to be open & tolerant with Muslims then you’d probably have a lot healthier set of interactions between them and the rest of your fellow French.
Spoken like a true racist: “who me, racist?? Couldn’t be. I don’t have a racist bone in my body.” LePen, Duke & Haider also swear they aren’t racists. But you all are (perhaps in slightly diff. ways).
Catholics DO want to do this here & I fight this tooth & nail. But that’s far diff. than what enrages you. You detest Muslims who merely wish to observe their own religion customs. No Muslim is telling you you can’t have an abortion. In all yr sorry list of grievances I have not heard a single one that affirmatively forced you to do something you viewed as wrong or immoral. All I hear fr. you is whining about how Muslims want to wear hijabs, separate genders in PE classes, etc. That is far diff. than the abortion example you used.
Oh, I see. A Pope can be an intolerant Catholic supremacist who treats my own religion & others less than respectfully & I must show honor & respect to him for that? Are you kidding? If a person respects me I respect them. If a Pope or Frenchman does not respect me, I don’t respect him. And people I don’t respect don’t get the kid glove treatment, I’m sorry to say.
Finally, yr last comment will be yr last word on this post. You’ve written reams & had ample opportunity to speak yr mind. Now our conversation here in this thread is complete. Please honor this request.
Most of those who judge Islam have never read the Quran. The Quran gives the following steps to curb the cycle of violence:
Ignore – perhaps the situation will diffuse by itself
say ‘peace’ and walk away
Give the nicest possible response so your enemy might become your friend
Only defend against aggression
Stop fighting when the aggression stops
Befriend those who do not fight you
Perhaps the Islamofascists should not judge others selectively by the actions of a few
I completely agree about stopping the discussion because it is completely impossible to discuss with you : just as you did when it came to the pope’s speech In Rastibonne you are very good at selecting a couple of phrases out of someone’s discourse and making them say what they have not said. I don’t know if you do it on purpose or if you’re just not smart enough, but it makes it very hard to have a civilized conversation with you.
For example I did not write : “Boys and girls had PE together, and nobody ever complained about it. The radicalisation has been pretty recent.” I had several other examples before the PE thing to show you that things were changing and a sign a radicalisation. This is how you interpreted my words :
Boys & girls in PE together constitutes “radicalization?!” You chose to redicule me by picking a couple of sentences out of the whole paragraph.
For statistics on French Muslim population, go on the French Wilkipedia, and you’l get this : La population musulmane est maintenant estimée par le ministère de l’Intérieur entre 5 et 6 millions au sein d’une population métropolitaine d’environ 63 millions d’habitants. 1,5 million d’entre eux seraient de nationalité française. Il ne s’agit cependant que d’une estimation, puisque le recensement des fidèles d’une religion est interdit par la loi française depuis une loi de 1872. Beaucoup de sociologues pensent que ce nombre ne reflète pas la réalité, et comptent plutôt une population de 8 millions de musulmans sur le territoire français (comparés aux 12 à 20 millions dans l’Union européenne).
That’ is basically what I told you in my previous post, and I had not even been on Wikipedia.
===>>>All I hear fr. you is whining about how Muslims want to wear hijabs, separate genders in PE classes, etc.
I am pretty sure I actually told you somewhere in there that I was against the law on religious signs in school, except for the fact that it might help some young girl to avoid wearing a Hijab if she were forced by her male relatives to do so. Once again either you did not understand what I said, or you chose to misinterpert it.
My WHINING is about Muslims wanting to prevent us from saying what we want and thinking what we think. Apparently you have a problem with free speech, since you obviously have mor affinitty with the “offended” Muslims than with the “offended” French. Here is what famous French writer Jacques Henric wrote in March about defending the right to “provoke” like the cartoonists did, and later Redeker did :
First, a little of etymology. Provoke : of pro « in front of, before » and of vocare “to call”. Provoke : to call , send for , to induce talk, provoke an answer which one does not like to give to a question considered embarrassing . To provoke is a precious mode of speech and thought. Just like Art and Litterature. No provocation? ok. Then let us throw in the garbage can, Sade, the libertine authors, Voltaire, Spinoza, the abbot Meslier, Averroès, Lautréamont, Rimbaud, Nietzsche,Dada, surrealist writings, Breton, Aragon, Battaille, Picabia, Dali, Genet, Rushdie, all the satirical press of every century…
Richard made a great suggestion. I personally have read the Qoran several times, in fact I studied it in depth under an Imam in the 70’s and again under more “critical” circumstances more recently. There are a couple of very instructive sites you might want to visit to learn more about the roots of Islam and the contents of the Muslim “Holy Book”. Try the following:
A relatively benign translation acceptable to most believing Muslims:
witness-pioneer.org/vil/
Some detailed “color commentary” placing the text in historical context:
islamundressed.com/
An in-depth theological analysis of the bankruptcy of the message in the Qoran by a radical Muslim clergy/scholar:
the-absent-truth.org/books/twentythreeyears.pdf
Enjoy, I found all the above facinating reading!
Yoel Iben-Ibrahim
Kurbet Yahud (Shilo, Benyamin)
I noticed that you included Irv Rubin in your rant about all those Jewish terrorists. Irv Rubin was never convicted of anything. Ever. He “attempted suicide” by cutting his own throat and THEN throwing himself of the tier in prison before he even got a hearing. Quite a feat. He died 11 days later, a man never convicted of anything. But to a self hating, lightweight like you he’s a terrorist. He was murdered. Earl Krugel was murdered in prison 3 years to the day after Rubin’s supposed suicide attempt. What a coincidence.
Do you do any independent research before spouting your crap?
Brubos, you demand “reciprocity” and civility & respect (really obsequiousness, but that’s another argument) from Muslims. But you have not an ounce of it yourself. After thousands of yr words were published here, I explicitly asked you to end this particular conversation and what do you do: you continue yr anti-Muslim rants.
I was going to ban you yesterday because I anticipated just such lack of respect for my request. But I said to myself: “let’s test & see whether Brubos is a mensch or someone beset by right-wing logorrhea.” You proved that you are logorreic.
For that you will be banned from participation in this blog for 30 days. Come back then & you can participate (though not in this thread). Or don’t.
Yoel: What does “more critical circumstances” mean? I find it highly doubtful that you studied critically with someone who didn’t have a theological/ideological agenda toward Islam. But prove me wrong if you can.
As for the sites, I don’t go in much for anti-Muslim propaganda (which is why I’ve removed the hyperlink while leaving the url address) here just as i don’t go in for anti-Jewish propaganda. The names of the websites alone reveal their bias. Why don’t you also balance the propaganda by providing a link to a website by someone like Tariq Ramadan who attempts to teach westerners about Islam in a non-ideological manner?
I’d like to know whether you’d trust the opinions about Judaism of a Muslim who claimed to study our religion w. an unspecified rabbi in the 1970s & who recommends sites like Judaism-undressed.com or Judaism-theabsenttruth.com as being worthy of study to get an so-called unvarnished view of our religion?
You opined that the “majority” of Muslims throughout the world have expressed condemnation of terrorism perpetrated by their coreligionists.
Now on one hand, justice and fairness demands that someone making the accusation towards opposite should have substantial proof to make their case.
Personally, I’m on the fence on whether the “majority” of Muslims have taken a stand one way or the other.
But what is your evidence that the “majority” have actually expressed condemnation?
I’ve written several thousand words in both this post & the comments threads so you’ll have to pardon me if I ask you to point to which specific passage of mine you’re referring to. What I do remember saying is that a tiny minority of Muslims are radical extremists. Even if you say there are thousands or tens of thousands of others who may sympathize with the radicals, that still doesn’t get you even close to a sizable minority of Muslims who are violent extremists.
What I dispute is the Islamophobes’ blanket denunciations of Islam & Muslims. They talk as if all Muslims are extremist because it is in the very nature of their religion to be so. Which is utter horsecrap.
Richard’s question
“I’ve written several thousand words in both this post & the comments threads so you’ll have to pardon me if I ask you to point to which specific passage of mine you’re referring to.”
It was here; after Burbos wrote:
“the majority of Christians and Jews, or whatever other religion LOUDLY condemn those actions,” (ie, condemnable actions committed by their respective coreligionists)
Richard responded
“And the majority of Muslims do as well”
That was the exchange I was referring to. Is there evidence to promote such a case?
On a related note
Those with a predisposition contrary to Islam and its followers will likely ignore any and all expressions of condemnation emanating from Islamic groups towards their coreligions involved with terror. In my opinion there have indeed been some strong condemnations from Islamic spokespersons.
However, conversely it often appears as if there’s apologists reflexively and defensively retorting that it’s self-evident that terrorism is condemned (when it may not be so even to the most objective observer) or that condemnations are entirely unreasonable.
One example was on the Ron Reagan Jr show (MSNBC?) an American Islamic leader (unfortunately can’t remember the name) who opined that after America apologizes for Hiroshima then he’ll consider his own version of contributions of contrition.
That’s why I’m on the fence on this issue.
Chag Sameach.
Jake: I find it interesting that you challenge me to prove that the majority of Muslims specifically condemn violence against non-Muslims, while you do not challenge Burbos’ statement that the majority of Jews or Christians condemn violence committed by their co-religionists. Why are you willing to accept Brubos’ assumption but not mine? Or are you not accepting her assumption either? Or do you assume her statement is true and assume mine is not (at least not w/o further evidence)?
I’m a little boggled that you would doubt that the majority of Muslims would oppose violence against non-Muslims. Anyway, I found this interesting Pew survey of Muslim/non-Muslim attitudes toward ea. other:
There is also a question about support for violence against civilians in defense of Islam. In 8 of 10 countries surveyed a majority say such violence is NEVER justified. In the other two countries the numbers are 43% & 45% who say they NEVER support such violence. The numbers who say they SOMETIMES would support such violence hover around 10-20%. They reach as high as 46% only in Nigeria. There is no finding for the question of whether the respondent support such violence “always.” I assume the reason for this is that almost none of them would answer yes to such a question.
I hope this finding answers yr question satisfactorily.
And btw, I agree with you about the inanity of the response about Muslim contrition & Hiroshima. A very stupid statement. But again, this is one rather stupid Muslim leader. We have lots of intolerant Jewish leaders too. Every time I hear such intolerance fr. the mouth of a Malcom Hoenlein or Alan Dershowitz or Marty Peretz I don’t say: “Gee, all Jews must have the hawkish, intolerant views that this guy espouses.” Just as you have to carefully explore the views of specific individual Jewish leaders to find the most responsible & cogent ones so you should do the same in the Muslim community.
I love to see people try to defend scum like Irv Rubin & Earl Krugel as lions of the Jewish people. Notice Jake carefully says Irv was never “convicted” of anything. That’s the equivalent of Nixon’s claim: “I am not a crook.” Just because you’ve never been convicted “ever” doesn’t mean you’re not one of the most homicidal, rage-filled & noxious Jews to have ever walked this earth (though perhaps Kahane gets the nod on this & Rubin is in 2nd place). Do I think that Rubin was a murdering Jewish terrorist? You bet.
And even to grant your lunar fantasy that Rubin was murdered…that doesn’t mean he WASN’T a terrorist. Lots of terrorists are murdered. Look at Zarqawi. My fondest dream would be having Rubin, Krugel & Zarqawi locked in a room in Hell together. None can exit until one of them murders another. And they have to do this, Groundhog Day-like, every day through all eternity.
As for Earl ‘Slime’ Krugel, I’ve written about him here in this blog. After the Alex Odeh assassination, Earl or possibly his brother Barry left a threatening phone message on my work answering machine (the ID on the voice was confirmed by an FBI agent for whom I played it) saying that I’d be the next “dead sand nigger.” I didn’t know at the time that the FBI already suspected the JDL, including Rubin & Krugel of involvement in that horrific crime. By the way, Earl Krugel personally threatened my life–how’s that for doing first hand “independent research?”
Here are some of the delightful things Irv Rubin has done or been accused of doing:
“Do I think that Rubin was a murdering Jewish terrorist? You bet.”
Who did he murder? Does it make no difference to you if someone’s convicted or not? The accusation is all that counts I guess for a morally confused individual as yourself. And you’re still firing blanks with your silly “quotes”. Of course being on the left means words are the only thing that counts.
“Violence in self-defense is absolutely justifiable.”
Irv Rubin interview, Los Angeles Times, November 9, 1995″
This is supposed to be an indictment of Rubin? You’re completely moronic. Btw, it was the ADL who had keys to Odeh’s office not the JDL. What do you think that was about?
“…Here’s another problem I have with anti-Muslim folk like you. In this country, most people’s attitude toward this would be: “Muslims want anti-blasphemy laws? Good for them. Let ‘em try. If they can get a majority they can have them. But until they do by God there won’t be anti-blasphemy laws here. And I’ll do my damndest to ensure that there won’t ever be.”
Why are you so freaked out by Muslims using their constitutional rights as citizens to lobby for laws they find important to themselves? To me, this should be an obligation of a good citizen. A citizen who does not advocate for such legislation is doing himself and his fellow citizens a disservice….”
What is freaky about anti-blasphemy laws is that one man’s blasphemy is another’s free speech. In a free country, free expression and speech are paramount. Free countries cannot force people of any faith or of no faith at all to conform to the dictates of another religion’s idea of what is blasphemy and what isn’t. How would you as a Muslim like to live in country where your belief that Jesus was a prophet but not the Son of God was punishable as blasphemy? How would you like to have to pay a fine or be jailed or even worse, be executed, because you say to your children that as Muslims you believe thus and thus and it happens to be blasphemy in another’s religion? The shoe doesn’t fit so well on your foot, does it?
Anti-blasphemy laws will come back on you as a blasphemer of someone else’s faith or other faiths will demand laws protecting their religion. Such laws will harm the free practice of your religion only because each faith’s doctrines contradict those of others, as competing faiths invariably do. Appreciate this paradoxes of free societies: free citizens of faith tolerate the so-called blasphemy of others in order to enjoy practicing of their own faith. You won’t find that in any theocracy or secular autocracy.
I think yr. point is well taken. I didn’t mean to say that if by some wild improbability Muslims in a western country managed to muster a majority to approve such laws that I would be happy about it. As I wrote, I would fight them like Hell. And I would urge an appeal of the legislation to the Supreme Court where I have confidence it would be repealed for precisely the reasons you provide.
Democracy is a very delicate & shaky structure. That’s why there are checks & balances. Congress can pass just about any law it wishes. But the Court has the final say as to whether these laws pass constitutional muster.
Irv Rubin was perfectly happy to see the murder of of Arabs & said so many times. I am convinced that he & Earl Krugel were intimately involved in the assassination of Alex Odeh as is the FBI. I don’t know whether they planted the bomb or made the bomb or only initiated the plot & left its execution to others. But either way their figurative footprints are all over the crime. The fact that the government never solved that case leaves me deeply saddened both for Alex’s wonderful family, for Arab Americans, & for those of us Jews who despise the JDL way of homicidal rage against Arabs.
Other JDL leaders who were close to Rubin WERE convicted of murder & imprisoned though they initially, I’m ashamed to say, tried to use Israel as a refuge from U.S. justice. There was an ethos of murder in that organization which was motivated & inspired by Rubin.
In most cases, I’d like to see a person indicted & convicted before I call him a murderer. I relax my standards slightly in Rubin’s case.
I note that Earl Krugel, his co-defendant in their final case together copped a plea for 20 years undoubtedly because he felt the case was airtight & he was liable to go away for longer if he didn’t. I firmly believe that Rubin would’ve been convicted as well. Now, theses charges only involved plotting to assassination Rep. Darrell Issa. But I have no doubt that had he not been caught, Irv & Earl would’ve succeeded.
I know fr. first hand information fr. a former ADL employee that the ADL engages (or at least engaged when he was employed there) in black bag jobs against groups they deemed as dangerous to Jews. It is entirely possible that the ADL had keys to Alex’s office. But a black bag job is different than murder. The ADL has never been credibly charged with murdering anyone. The same can’t be said for the JDL.
I didn’t call you a “moron” & you don’t have a right to hurl such insults in this blog (read the rule above the comment box). If you want to take a dump somewhere do it at yr own site. Do it again & you’ll be banned here.
This is a patently false statement. If the only Muslims you know are ones ready to kill you for insulting their prophet, then you must have the Al Qaeda phone book (if there is such a thing). Why don’t you branch out in life a bit & start by reading Tariq Ramadan’s website and then do a Google search for ‘Muslim tolerance’ or some other set of keywords that might open yr eyes to a different Muslim world than the twisted one you’ve been frequenting.