Muslim violence

[1John2_26]

In mosques throughout Palestinian cities, clerics condemned the cartoons. An imam at the Omari Mosque in Gaza City told 9,000 worshippers that those behind the drawings should have their heads cut off.

"If they want a war of religions, we are ready," Hassan Sharaf, an imam in Nablus, said in his sermon.

Why do Muslims react so violently to harmless things like "insulting and insensitive cartoons?"

Will Islam ever join the world in debate rather than reacting with violence and war?

Muslims Again Protest Muhammad Caricatures

By QASSIM ABDEL-ZAHRA, Associated Press Writer

Tens of thousands of angry Muslims marched through Palestinian cities, burning the Danish flag and calling for vengeance Friday against European countries where caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad were published.

Angry protests against the drawings were spread in the Muslim world.

In Iraq, thousands demonstrated after Friday mosque services, and the country's leading Shiite cleric denounced the drawings. About 4,500 people rallied in Basra and hundreds at a Baghdad mosque. Danish flags were burned at both demonstrations.

Muslims in Turkey, Pakistan, Indonesia and Malaysia demonstrated against the European nations whose papers published them.

The caricatures, including one depicting the Muslim prophet wearing a turban fashioned into a bomb, were reprinted in papers in Norwegian, French, German and even Jordanian after first appearing in a Danish paper in September. The drawings were republished after Muslims decried the images as insulting to their prophet. Dutch-language newspapers in Belgium and two Italian right-wing papers reprinted the drawings Friday.

Islamic law, based on clerics' interpretation of the Quran and the sayings of the prophet, forbids depiction's of the Prophet Muhammad and other major religious figures even positive ones to prevent idolatry. Shiite Muslim clerics differ in that they allow images of their greatest saint, Ali, the prophet's son-in-law, though not Muhammad.

Danish Prime Minister Fogh Rasmussen, in a meeting with the Egyptian ambassador, reiterated his stance that the government cannot interfere with issues concerning the press. On Monday, he said his government could not apologize on behalf of a newspaper, but that he personally "never would have depicted Muhammad, Jesus or any other religious character in a way that could offend other people."

Early Friday, Palestinian militants threw a bomb at a French cultural center in Gaza City, and many Palestinians began boycotting European goods, especially those from Denmark.

"Whoever defames our prophet should be executed," said Ismail Hassan, 37, a tailor who marched through the pouring rain along with hundreds of others in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

"Bin Laden our beloved, Denmark must be blown up," protesters in Ramallah chanted.

In mosques throughout Palestinian cities, clerics condemned the cartoons. An imam at the Omari Mosque in Gaza City told 9,000 worshippers that those behind the drawings should have their heads cut off.

"If they want a war of religions, we are ready," Hassan Sharaf, an imam in Nablus, said in his sermon.

About 10,000 demonstrators, including gunmen from the Islamic militant group Hamas firing in the air, marched through Gaza City to the Palestinian legislature, where they climbed on the roof, waving green Hamas banners.

"We are ready to redeem you with our souls and our blood our beloved prophet," they chanted. "Down, Down Denmark."

Thousands of protesters in the center of Nablus burned at least 10 Danish flags. In Jenin, about 1,500 people demonstrated, burning Danish dairy products. Hundreds protested in Jericho, and protests were held in towns throughout Gaza.

Fearing an outbreak of violence, Israel barred all Palestinians under age 45 from praying at Jerusalem's Al Aqsa Mosque compound, Islam's third holiest site.

Nevertheless, about 100 men chanting Islamic slogans and carrying a green Hamas flag demonstrated outside Jerusalem's Old City on Friday afternoon. The crowd scattered when police on horseback arrived, and some of the protesters threw rocks. Police broke up a second demonstration at Damascus Gate with tear gas and stun grenades.

In Iraq, the country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, decried the drawings but did not call for protests.

"We strongly denounce and condemn this horrific action," he said in a statement posted on his Web site and dated Tuesday.

Al-Sistani, who wields enormous influence over Iraq's majority Shiites, made no call for protests and suggested that militant Muslims were partly to blame for distorting Islam's image.

He referred to "misguided and oppressive" segments of the Muslim community and said their actions "projected a distorted and dark image of the faith of justice, love and brotherhood."

"Enemies have exploited this ... to spread their poison and revive their old hatreds with new methods and mechanisms," he said.

The drawings were first published in September in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. The issue reignited last week after Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador to Denmark and many European newspapers reprinted them this week.

The Jyllands-Posten had asked 40 cartoonists to draw images of the prophet. The purpose, its chief editor said, was "to examine whether people would succumb to self-censorship, as we have seen in other cases when it comes to Muslim issues."

The 12 caricatures have prompted boycotts of Danish goods, bomb threats and demonstrations in front of Danish embassies across the Islamic world. Muslims have also directed their anger at other European countries, with Palestinian gunmen briefly kidnapping a German citizen Thursday and surrounding European Union headquarters in Gaza.

Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was quoted as saying the caricatures are an attack on "our spiritual values" which have damaged efforts to establish an alliance between the Muslim world and Europe.

Hundreds of Turks emerging from mosques following Friday prayers staged demonstrations, including one in front of the Danish consulate in Istanbul.

"Hands that reach Islam must be broken," chanted a group of extremists outside the Merkez Mosque in Istanbul.

In Jakarta, Indonesia, more than 150 hardline Muslims stormed a high-rise building housing the Danish Embassy on Friday and tore down and burned the country's flag.

Pakistan's parliament unanimously voted to condemn the drawings as a "vicious, outrageous and provocative campaign" that has "hurt the faith and feelings of Muslims all over the world." About 800 people protested in Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, chanting "Death to Denmark" and "Death to France." Another rally in the southern city of Karachi drew 1,200 people.

Fundamentalist Muslims protested outside the Danish Embassy in Malaysia, chanting "Long live Islam, destroy our enemies."

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw criticized European media outlets for republishing the caricatures as demonstrators prepared to take to the streets of London.

____

Associated Press Writers Qassim Abdul-Zahra and Sinan Salaheddin in Baghdad, Iraq; Selcan Hacaoglu in Ankara, Turkey; Benjamin Harvey in Istanbul, Turkey; Maria Sanminiatelli in Rome; Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark; Munir Ahmad in Islamabad, Pakistan; and Irwan Firdaus in Jakarta, Indonesia, contributed to this report.


Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

[jcrawford]

That's why God raises up Islamic armies

So you're agreeing with Osama that god is on the side of the terrorists?

Not at all. God is on the side of peaceful Christians, Jews and Muslims and certainly not on the side of secular abortion terrorists like Bill and Hill Clinton and their political supporters, who along with the SCOTUS authorize medical doctors to kill Christian, Jewish and Muslim babies in their mother's wombs. Violence begets violence and 40 million murdered American babies are crying out in the still of the night for God's retribution and justice.

[jcrawford]

Though Christians send millions of dollars to Israel yearly, missionary proselytizing is illegal in Israel. But Christians and Jews today have a good relationship. And according to the "Noble Qur'an," always have been: "Friends of each other."

The hatred of the secularist/humanist towards Christians is well documented but here is some Islamic info:

Yes, I know all that, but that is what secular governments in Western countries are allowing to happen. They don't care how many Christians are butchered in foreign and faraway lands as long as the oil sheiks are in their hip pocket so that the automobile industry may continue to flourish in their respective regimes. Even Christians don't care about other Christians in their own countries and are only interested in how well the stock market is doing or whether their favorite sports team won its last game if they were too busy working to watch it.

Christian pastors are only interested in their own little flocks and their church treasury and have voluntarily handed over the power of social and family government to the secular abortionists who scare the living daylights out of them should they dare interfere with secular politics. When was the last time you saw or heard of a clergyman applying for a teaching position in a public school? Not in your lifetime, right? It's ok to discriminate against the clergy teaching in public schools and the only time public schools are open to the clergy is when the seccies allow them to vote for their favorite secular politician. What a joke. We need more Muslims in America to help us Christians teach secular politicians and lawyers a few religious lessons.

[Wyvern]

If you want the clergy to teach in public schools which clergy are you talking about? In the U.S. we have large communities of nearly every religious group there is, which is why we should be thankful that our founding fathers who were all christian had the wisdom to create a religion neutral constitution which allows everyone to have their faith as long as it does not impinge on the faiths and rights of others.

[jcrawford]

If you want the clergy to teach in public schools which clergy are you talking about?

Whichever clergy wants to teach their religious beliefs in public schools, since it is illegal for the government to discriminate in hiring practices on the basis of sex, race and religion. Since Christian clergy are all too happily ensconced in their own little parishes and parsonages, maybe some Muslim clerics will apply for the jobs and sue the hell out of the state which refuses to hire them on the basis of religious discrimination.

In the U.S. we have large communities of nearly every religious group there is, which is why we should be thankful that our founding fathers who were all christian had the wisdom to create a religion neutral constitution which allows everyone to have their faith as long as it does not impinge on the faiths and rights of others.

Where is that baloney written in the USC? I don't think the "founding fathers" would have approved of some medical doctor killing their kids in their wives wombs before they even knew she was pregnant. Not if they were Christian or Muslim Fathers, anyway. The Founding Fathers of the Christian Church would probably have found the USC anathema to their Christian Constitution.

[Wyvern]

So given your beliefs jcrawford what would you do if your child came back from school one day happily extolling the wonders of Satanism that their teacher taught them?

I dont know what country you're living in but doctors won't and don't perform unasked and unwanted abortions, but if you can find some proof of this practice please do the AMA along with a number of other organizations would be very interested.

[Jose]

Not as long as the corrupt politicians they vote for continue to deny their clergy the right to teach religion in public schools. The public schools belong to the clergy as much as anyone else, no?

So let's bring on the Comparative Religion course, so all of these clergy, ministers, mullahs, wiccans, and satanists can teach. This won't satisfy you, though--you want only one religion taught, and you want it taught instead of science. We might note, by the way, that the corrupt politicians who were voted for are now in the majority in both houses of Congress. Perhaps you're right; we should throw 'em out, and bring in people who are not so narrow-minded.

The hatred of the secularist/humanist towards Christians is well documented

You have said this before, but have never supported it with evidence. I would ask if you consider the acts of violence in our city to be a reflection of secularist/humanist hatred of Christians (and I list all of the violence I can recall over the last few years):

• the killing of a Korean student by a fundamentalist Christian, on the basis of the fact that the Korean wasn't "white"
• the fire-bombing of our mosque
• the beating of gay men "because they are sinners"
• the picketing of local Baptist churches because some of their members support a law protecting military funerals from violent protest, which was carried out by a Christian fundamentalist church from a different state, on the basis of their claim that military deaths in Iraq are god's punishment of the US for harboring homosexuals
• the vandalism of public health clinics

I could go on, but won't. These are not acts by secularists or humanists, but by religious fundamentalists. As I see it, this type of violence follows a pattern:

The Pattern of Religious Violence

• A religious sect/denomination/group interprets current problems in the world as the result of failure to follow god's teachings sufficiently strictly
• This group "goes back to basics" and resurrects the ancient laws from their religion
• To figure out which ancient laws are valid, they declare their interpretation of the holy book to be Right, and based on literal, inerrant reading of the book.
• Through several generations of training their children in this philosophy, we arrive at the current situation in which members of this religion honestly believe that they are doing god's work.
• Because doing god's work is "answering to a higher power" than mere secular law, and because of the honest belief that failure to adhere to strict religious law is the cause of the world's problems, members of this group feel justified in doing whatever it takes to protect their religion and to force others to their beliefs if possible.
• Because other religions, in particular, violate the tenets of the group's strict religious law, they are particularly vulnerable to violent attack.

I think that we can read through this little list and see in it some semblance of the historical rise of Islamic Fundamentalism and the violence wrought by the most extreme believers. I wonder if we might also see in it a hint of explanation of, say, Mormon violence (eg. the kidnapping and enslavement of young girls, that we have read in the news in recent years). I also wonder if we can see a hint of explanation for some of the violence mentioned in my first little list. That is: Is the issue really Muslim violence, or violence based on religious fundamentalism and intolerance?

[1John2_26]

Jose,

You and any anti-Christian-secualrist have my total support to lockup anyone that commits a physical act of violence on another person. I am a Bible-believing fundamentalist Christian and see the partial truth represented in your post.

But secularists have indeed spawned so much violence against Christians that even Muslims have picked up on it. What? No one in the secular world has lifted a finger to cry out for the Christians slaughtered daily by Muslims. Christians that are exactly what secularists demand! Silent and unarmed.

Just a click away is the Voice of the Martyrs and many other "Christian" organizations attempting to document the rising numbers of dead and murdered Christians ignored by secularists and hidden in graves by Muslims or left on the road as a warning.

And secularists are not holding out any hope towards Christians securing peace anytime anywhere. The power of secularism is growing alongside Jihadist terror.

Just one more "educated eliltist" view among the one-sided voice of intolerance towards Christians.

Some even revel in their hatred as a "higher calling." Literally.

Muslims are fighting their secular friends on this one as they both have the end of Christianity in sight.

I wonder if Muslims know what Harris really thinks of them?

The End of Faith, by Sam HarrisThe Clash of Faith and Reason
This important and timely book delivers a startling analysis of the clash of faith and reason in the modern world. The End of Faith provides a harrowing glimpse of mankinds willingness to suspend reason in favor of religious beliefs, even when these beliefs inspire the worst of human atrocities. Harris argues that in the presence of weapons of mass destruction, we can no longer expect to survive our religious differences indefinitely. Most controversially, he maintains that "moderation" in religion poses considerable dangers of its own: as the accommodation we have made to religious faith in our society now blinds us to the role that faith plays in perpetuating human conflict. While warning against the encroachment of organized religion into world politics, Harris draws on insights from neuroscience, philosophy, and Eastern mysticism in an attempt to provide a truly modern foundation for our ethics and our search for spiritual experience.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Winner of the 2005 PEN Award for Nonfiction

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason by Sam Harris is a genuinely frightening book about terrorism, and the central role played by religion in justifying and rewarding it. Others blame "extremists" who "distort" the "true" message of religion. Harris goes to the root of the problem: religion itself. Even moderate religion is a menace, because it leads us to respect and "cherish the idea that certain fantastic propositions can be believed without evidence". Why do men like Bin Laden commit their hideous cruelties? The answer is that they "actually believe what they say they believe". Read Sam Harris and wake up.

Richard Dawkins, The Guardian

"The End of Faith articulates the dangers and absurdities of organized religion so fiercely and so fearlessly that I felt relieved as I read it, vindicated, almost personally understood Harris writes what a sizable number of us think, but few are willing to say in contemporary America This in an important book, on a topic that, for all its inherent difficulty and divisiveness, should not be shielded from the crucible of human reason."

Natalie Angier, The New York Times Book Review (read the full review)

"Sam Harris launches a sustained nuclear assault A bold and exhilarating thesis The End of Faith is a brave, pugilistic attempt to demolish the walls that currently insulate religious people from criticism The End of Faith is badly needed..."

The Independent (U.K.) (read the full review)

"This book will strike a chord with anyone who has ever pondered the irrationality of religious faith Even Mr. Harriss critics will have to concede the force of an analysis which roams so far and wide, from the persecution of the Cathars to the composition of George Bushs cabinet."

The Economist (read the full review)

"[Harris] writes with such verve and frequent insight that even skeptical readers will find it hard to put down."

The San Francisco Chronicle (read the full review)

"A radical attack on the most sacred of liberal preceptsthe notion of tolerance [The End of Faith] is an eminently sensible rallying cry for a more ruthless secularisation of society."

The Observer (U.K.) (read the full review)

"Harris tour de force demonstrates how faithblind, deaf, dumb, and unreasonedthreatens our very existence. His expos of faith-based unreasonfrom the religious fanaticism of Islamic suicide bombers to the secular fanaticism of Noam Chomskyis a clarion call for reasoned debate in this age of terrorism. THE END OF FAITH shows how the perfect tyranny of religious and secular totalitarianism demonizes imperfect democracies such as the United States and Israel. A must read for all rational people."

Alan Dershowitz, professor of law at Harvard and author of America on Trial.

"Here is a ringing challenge to all Americans who recognize the danger to American democracy posed by the political alliance of right wing religion and politics and the failure of the tepid and tentative responses by liberal persons of faith. While one might dispute some of the claims and arguments presented by the author, the need for a wake up call to religious liberals is right on the mark."

Joseph C. Hough, Jr., President of Union Theological Seminary, New York

"At last we have a book that focuses on the common thread that links Islamic terrorism with the irrationality of all religious faith. THE END OF FAITH will challenge not only Muslims but Hindus, Jews and Christians as well."

Peter Singer, professor of philosophy at Princeton and author of The President of Good and Evil: The Ethics of George W. Bush.

"Do we need another book on the conflict between reason and faith?
Yes, if it is as well-written as Sam Harriss The End of Faith."

New Scientist

[1John2_26]

It's so interesting to see the Gospel lumped with Islaimic terrorists. It's a fascinating thing to watch "real" satanism at work.

jcrawford wrote:
Not as long as the corrupt politicians they vote for continue to deny their clergy the right to teach religion in public schools. The public schools belong to the clergy as much as anyone else, no?

Could we have sound Christian teachers and not "liberal theologians" and "liberal scholars" for a change? It would be a very popular class to see that kind of actual religion comaparison.

This won't satisfy you, though--you want only one religion taught, and you want it taught instead of science.

You mean pregnant women will not give birth to human children? Do you mean the digestive tract is a sexual organ? Science is no enemy to a Christian that believes in the Bible.

We might note, by the way, that the corrupt politicians who were voted for are now in the majority in both houses of Congress.

And the minority party is anti-Christian.

Perhaps you're right; we should throw 'em out, and bring in people who are not so narrow-minded.

Start by electing James Dobson to the senate. His theology and scientific views are in accord.

1John2_29 wrote:
The hatred of the secularist/humanist towards Christians is well documented

You have said this before, but have never supported it with evidence. I would ask if you consider the acts of violence in our city to be a reflection of secularist/humanist hatred of Christians

Really? You consider ganster life a deply religious experience because they have the virgin Mary tattooed on their backs? You think the misogyny and fatherless children inherent in the real world is a Born-Again morality? Please go to a Promise Keepers meeting and stop learning about Christians through Air America dn on Micael Moore's website. Liberals obviously have given up Christ.

Jose wrote:
(and I list all of the violence I can recall over the last few years):
the killing of a Korean student by a fundamentalist Christian, on the basis of the fact that the Korean wasn't "white"
the fire-bombing of our mosque
the beating of gay men "because they are sinners"
the picketing of local Baptist churches because some of their members support a law protecting military funerals from violent protest, which was carried out by a Christian fundamentalist church from a different state, on the basis of their claim that military deaths in Iraq are god's punishment of the US for harboring homosexuals
the vandalism of public health clinics
I could go on, but won't. These are not acts by secularists or humanists, but by religious fundamentalists. As I see it, this type of violence follows a pattern:

The Pattern of Religious Violence
A religious sect/denomination/group interprets current problems in the world as the result of failure to follow god's teachings sufficiently strictly
This group "goes back to basics" and resurrects the ancient laws from their religion
To figure out which ancient laws are valid, they declare their interpretation of the holy book to be Right, and based on literal, inerrant reading of the book.
Through several generations of training their children in this philosophy, we arrive at the current situation in which members of this religion honestly believe that they are doing god's work.
Because doing god's work is "answering to a higher power" than mere secular law, and because of the honest belief that failure to adhere to strict religious law is the cause of the world's problems, members of this group feel justified in doing whatever it takes to protect their religion and to force others to their beliefs if possible.
Because other religions, in particular, violate the tenets of the group's strict religious law, they are particularly vulnerable to violent attack.
I think that we can read through this little list and see in it some semblance of the historical rise of Islamic Fundamentalism and the violence wrought by the most extreme believers. I wonder if we might also see in it a hint of explanation of, say, Mormon violence (eg. the kidnapping and enslavement of young girls, that we have read in the news in recent years). I also wonder if we can see a hint of explanation for some of the violence mentioned in my first little list. That is: Is the issue really Muslim violence, or violence based on religious fundamentalism and intolerance?

You deny the influence of godless school teachings carving immorality into an already unfounded and violent mind.

Darwinism hasn't wiped away original sin nature that is so evident in man "kind." Again, research will show the science behind Biblical beliefs founded on experience and not mythology or egotstical socialism of "do what thou wilt but hurt none."*

I'll compare the decent Christian life led by Bible-believing Christians against the rise of secular morality anytime. But you'll have to open your eyes. Do you really want to compare street life to Church life? Do you think that multitude of people living the "night life" in bars and back alleys and brothels are "Christians?"

How many scientists are hard at work right now at MIT literally inventing weapons of mass destruction?

Yes, let us compare secular violence to Christian life.

All the humanist professors on earth will eventually fall to "new laws" to control man "kind" seperated from God.

Let's see: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3071965/

Infiltrating Europe's shameful trade in human beings
MSNBC.com exposes a sexual slavery network

Sitting in a brothel bedroom in Velesta, a town synonymous with forced prostitution that police and experts consider one of the most dangerous places in Europe, Olga said that her "owner" would kill her for telling a reporter about her state of captivity. But the cruel conditions under which she is held, and her deteriorating mental and physical health, compelled her to speak out.

Her head hung in shame, Olgas dark brown eyes welled with tears. She brushed back her long black hair, revealing a fair complexion flushed with anger at her fate. "There is only one word for this," she said. "Slavery."

In the heart of Europe
Farther along the trafficking pipeline, hundreds of women and girls are smuggled into Europe every day and forced onto the streets of cities like Hamburg, Paris, London and Amsterdam.

Amsterdam, a city synonymous with hedonism, is perhaps best known for its legalized sex industry, in which prostitutes pay taxes and undergo regular health exams. The citys Red Light District is a virtual Disneyland of sex with only European Union passport holders allowed to ply the trade.

* Interesting that that belief is shared by humanism and witchcraft. Very interesting to "observe."

[juliod]

How many scientists are hard at work right now at MIT literally inventing weapons of mass destruction?

I note that in your spew you substitute "scientist" for the derogatory "humanist" in this question. Why is that?

Is it because you know it would be silly to accuse "liberals" (aka "feminists", "homosexuals", "Humanists", "atheists") of being deep in the weapons industry?

How many liberals work at Los Alamos in the nuke labs? How many humanists at Dugway, building bio-weapons? How many feminists do you see designing thermobaric bombs to burn and asphixiate the enemy?

No, it's conservatives (particularly religious conservatives) who want to kill and maim, torture and bomb.

What's the difference between us and the islamic terrorists? We are much better at killing and maiming than they are. Stick that up your "christian morality".

DanZ

[1John2_26]

Believe me I mean liberal-secualrist/humanist when I use scientist. Same ilk usually.

What's the difference between us and the islamic terrorists? We are much better at killing and maiming than they are. Stick that up your "Christian morality".

Like Samaritan's Purse or Operation Blessing? Or the myriads of other Christian organizations feeding, clothing and providing medical care for the world's poor?

Up that Christian morality? Please. Use either Visa or Mastercard.

Remember that Christian Doctor's and Nurse's have been shot by Muslim's for just being Christian and working at Clinics in Muslim countries. Notice they didn't shoot back. I think it's been a few hundred years since Christians carried guns while on missionary work. And even then it was for lions and other dangerous critters that don't listen well to pleas for mercy.

World Medical Mission, the medical arm of Samaritan's Purse, serves Christian hospitals and clinics in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East by arranging short-term mission trips for physicians, dentists, and other medical personnel who volunteer for ministry overseas. We also provide and install critically-needed equipment and supplies to hospitals and clinics, and conduct programs that help meet the needs of pregnant mothers and babies as well as children and adults with disabilities.

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AIDS is no respecter of age. We support many orphanages that give loving care to children affected by this disease.

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Please pray:

that the church would respond with the compassion of Jesus Christ to all those who are affected by the HIV/AIDS crisis.

for Prescription for Hope conferences, that God would grant the attendees wisdom and effective ministries.

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