In The Lost And Found Box

Paradise is our native country, and we in this world be as exiles and strangers.
Richard Greenham (1535-1594)

 

 

 

The Chinese Claim The Uighurs Were Forced To Accept Islam (No Kidding)

The Chinese Claim The Uighurs Were Forced To Accept Islam — Are They Wrong?

By Hugh Fitzgerald – on August 12, 2019

(Horrific knife attack kills 29, injured 143 at a railway station in Kunming by Uyghur “separatist” jihadis.)

As is well known, with its usual ruthlessness the Chinese government has been trying to put the practice of Islam by the Uighurs of Xinjiang in a straitjacket. It has, for example, made it harder, or in some cases impossible, for the devout to observe Ramadan. The Chinese government in 2017 passed laws requiring all restaurants to stay open during Ramadan. Further, it has forbidden teachers, civil servants, and all those working in the public sector from observing Ramadan, and if any are caught doing so, the government ominously warns,  “they will be dealt with.”

Then there is the requirement that all “old’ Qur’ans, published before 2012, be handed in to the government’ only the “new Qur’ans” distributed by the Chinese government are permitted.The reason for this is that in 2012 the Chinese government published these “new” Qur’ans, heavily censored, with the “meaning’’ of the verses that remained annotated by government experts so as to lessen their anti-infidel message.

Muslims in Xinjiang must request government permission to go on the hajj. They are asked to register their age, job, health, and economic status. Strict guidelines are put in place for applicants, who must be aged between 50 and 70 and have lived in Urumqi, the region’s capital, for at least five years. They are thoroughly investigated by the government for their political views; anyone who has displayed the slightest hint of being politically unreliable is denied permission to go on the hajj.

All those who apply to go on the hajj must also pledge allegiance to the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and to national unity (and therefore against Uighur independence).

Indeed, Muslims who travel abroad for any reason, not just for the hajj, upon their return are subject to particular scrutiny, especially if they have spent any time in Muslim countries. More than one million have been placed in re-education centers.

As for other restrictions on Islam, in Xinjiang imams have been subject to public humiliation by being forced to dance en masse in public, and at the same time, have been forced to take an oath to keep children away from religion. As public servants, paid by the state, the imams were forced to brandish the slogan that “our income comes from the CKP not from Allah.” Many of the imams were forced to wave Chinese flags during their ordeal. Speeches are made — it’s unclear from the reports if these were by Chinese government officials or by government-approved imams — in which young people are told both to stay away from mosques and that prayer is harmful to one’s health. Teachers throughout Xinjiang have been instructed to teach children to shun religious study; retired teachers have been posted outside mosques during Ramadan to prevent students from entering.

Mosques have been required to push Communist propaganda, swapping inscriptions about Muhammad for red banners that declare, “Love the Party, Love the Country.”

Muslim men have been required to shave “abnormal” or “religious” beards; punishment is strict; one man was sentenced to six years in jail for refusing to do so. Names given to children must not be “religious.” Twenty-nine names have been banned so far, such as Islam, Saddam, Mecca, Quran, Jihad, Medina; all are now strictly forbidden.  Women may not wear any veils that cover the face; even women wearing only the hijab have been prevented in some parts of Xinjiang from using busses. Muslims are required to listen to the official state television (i.e., that carry anti-Muslim, and pro-Communist propaganda), and cannot prevent their children from attending state schools.

And of course we all know that more than a million Uighurs are now interned in re-education camps where they are subject to endless lessons attacking religion in general, and Islam in particular.

Given this record, it is understandable that 22 countries — though not a single Muslim one (for the Muslim states are afraid of Chinese economic retribution)– denounced the Chinese mistreatment of the Uighurs. But should we completely reject everything the Chinese have claimed about the Uighurs? They claim that the Uighurs are not a Turkic people. That is both true and false, They are not solely a Turkic people, but they are partly a Turkic people. Genetically they are a mix of of the Han Chinese and the Turkic peoples of Central Asia who lived and intermarried in the far western marches of China.

A white paper released in late July  by China’s State Council Information Office — the Government’s propaganda arm — presents the ruling Communist Party’s interpretation of history, claiming “Islam is neither an indigenous nor the sole belief system of the Uyghur people.” Is either of those claims false? Islam is indigenous only to the Middle East;  Islam arrived in western China when a local ruler, Tughlugh Timur Khan, converted to this foreign faith in the mid-14th century. Many of his subjects then followed his example .Furthermore, Islam is “not the sole belief system of the Uighur people.” That too is true; the Uighurs had been Tengriists, Manichaeans, Buddhists, and Nestorian Christians long before they became Muslims.

The Chinese White Paper also claims that Islam spread into Xinjiang by “the Arab Empire.” How did Islam spread out of Arabia, if not by the  Arabs warriors who subdued the rest of the Middle East, and all of North Africa, and then Spain, until they were finally defeated in central France by Charles Martel at Tours in 745? It was the warriors of an expanding “Arab Empire” who conquered Sassanian Persia. How did Islam arrive in Hindustan? Not through peaceful missionaries but through Muslim warriors, ghazis, who made many attempts at conquest before succeeding. It is understandable that the Chinese might identify this as the “Arab Empire” even if, by the time Muslim warriors reached from the western marches of China, very few were Arabs. To the Chinese the Muslims in Central Asia could be seen as ruling what could be regarded as an extension of the original “Arab Empire” in the Middle East. Islam was, as Anwar Sheikh has written, the “Arab national religion”; among Arabs it remains a vehicle for Arab supremacism; non-Arab Muslims, too, recognize the special status of Arabs within Islam.The Qur’an was given to a 7th century Arab, and in his language. The Qur’an ideally must be read in Arabic. Muslims turn five times a day, prostrate in prayer, toward Mecca, in Arabia. They are required, once in their lives, if financially able, to make the hajj to Mecca. Many non-Arab Muslims adopt Arab names and even false Arab lineages, as the many Pakistanis who affix a “Sayyid” to their names to indicate a factitious descent from the Quraysh, the tribe of the Prophet. That is why claiming that the Muslims in Central Asia formed part of an “Arab Empire,” while not ethnically accurate, makes a certain kind of religio-cultural sense. The Arabs were the first among equals; Islam was “the gift of the Arabs,” non-Arab Muslims assumed Arab names, and claimed Arab descent.  Given the primacy among Muslims of the Arabs, an Islamic empire, even if ethnically diverse, could be described by the distant Chinese as an “Arab Empire.”

The Chinese report on the Uighurs issued in late July claimed that the Turkic Uighur people “endured slavery” at the hands of “the Turks.” It is true that beginning in the mid-18th century there was a flourishing slave trade, within the Ottoman Empire,  and there were certainly Uighurs, as well as many other peoples, who supplied slaves to the Ottoman slave markets. And it appears that only the Turks — that is, the Ottomans — enslaved the Uighurs. History thus bears out the Chinese claim that the Uighur people “endured slavery’” at the hands of “the Turks.”

 

The Chinese report also claims that “Conversion to Islam was not a voluntary choice made by the common people, but a result of religious wars and imposition by the ruling class.” As for “imposition by the ruling class,” when Tughlugh Timur Khan in the mid-14th century converted to Islam, many of his subjects followed suit. The principle of “cuius regio, eius religio” — “the ruler’s religion becomes that of his realm”– as the Chinese maintain, applied to the Uighurs as to other peoples. The claim that conversion to Islam was also the result of religious wars — rather than the work of peaceful missionaries — is hardly surprising. War was the main way that the Arab tribes had spread their faith from the mid-seventh century on, and war — violent Jihad — remained the chief means of spreading the faith that came to dominate that vast expanse of territory from Islamic Spain through North Africa, the Middle East, Hindustan, and then to far western China.

The Chinese have certainly terribly mistreated the Uighurs. But that does not mean that their claims about the original islamization of the Uighurs are untrue. Uighurs were of many other faiths before they accepted Islam, not an indigenous faith but a foreign import. Islam was a late-comer to the area, and Uighurs  became Muslims in one of two ways: either through being conquered by Islamic peoples in “‘religious wars,” after which they would be  forcibly converted, or by having their rulers –such as Tughlugh Timur Khan in the mid-14 century — convert to Islam, which in turn led many of his subjects to follow suit  and peacefully accept the new faith (“imposition by the ruling class”). Some Uighurs were, like many other peoples, enslaved by the Ottomans (“the Turks”)’but here the Chinese claim is too sweeping, implying that all the Uighurs were treated thus  (“Uighurs were enslaved by the Turks”).

The Uighurs may speak a Turkic language, but they are not a purely Turkic people. They are  Sino-Turkic, distinct from either the Turks and the Chinese. Simply look at their photographs and you can see just how Chinese are many of their facial features, and how unlike the Turks in Turkey they look. They are a genetic blend, but it is the Chinese element that is more pronounced.

When the Chinese claim that Islam was “not the sole belief system of the Uighur people” they are absolutely correct. The Uighurs were Tengiists, Manichaeans, Buddhists and Nestorian Christians long before they accepted Islam.

Were the Chinese wrong? They claimed that the Uighurs are not a ‘Turkic” people. True, they are a Sino-Turkic people. They claimed that Islam spread among the Uighurs through religious wars or the “imposition by the ruling class.” True; wars of religious conquest spread Islam throughout central Asia as they had in so many other places; sometimes a ruler’s conversion would lead to the conversion of his subjects; that was what was meant by the “imposition by the ruling class.” Islam was “not indigenous to the area” but was brought by Muslim warriors, just as the Chinese claim. Islam was “not the sole belief system of the Uighur people”; long before Islam arrived the Uighurs were of many different faiths– Tengists, Manichaeans, Buddhists, and Nestorian Chistians.

The Chinese often mislead, but when they happen to be telling the truth, or telling part of the truth, as  they do about the Uighurs and Islam, why not recognize that, rather than consign them permanently to the outer darkness, without examining the accuracy of what they are saying? And if they properly identify how Islam  spread — through wars, or a ruler’s whim — surely that is useful knowledge. Condemn the Chinese all you want for their methods of ‘re-education”  but don’t dismiss those of their remarks about the Uighurs, the Turks, and Islam that just happen to be true.

THE GELLER REPORT (2019)

The Chinese Claim The Uighurs Were Forced To Accept Islam — Are They Wrong? (Part 1)

The Chinese Claim The Uighurs Were Forced To Accept Islam — Are They Wrong? (Part 2)

Commentary on Tommy Robinson’s Recent Imprisonment For Reporting The Truth

Tommy Robinson was sent back to jail/prison on Thursday, July 11, 2019. After being denied a trial by jury, a panel of two judges had convicted Robinson of multiple charges because he discussed the activities of an Islamic rape gang outside Leeds Crown Court. The judges then sentenced him to nine months in prison for journalism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVAAwZc4gxg

Acts17Apologetics

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wdRhZV3Ofc

Blaze TV

 

Daydreaming

www.youtube.com/watch

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A Frucful Unholy Alliance…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morton_Gould

In Search Of Eden

 

Archaeologist David Rohl claims to have found the site described in Genesis as “Eden” in a lush valley beneath an extinct volcano in northern Iran. The Jerusalem Report (February 1, 1999) broke the story in the article — “Paradise Found.”
Ten miles from the sprawling Iranian industrial city of Tabriz, to the northwest of Teheran, says British archaeologist David Rohl, he has found the site of the Biblical garden . . . “As you descend a narrow mountain path, you see a beautiful alpine valley, just like the Bible describes it, with terraced orchards on its slopes, crowded with every kind of fruit-laden tree,” says Rohl, a scholar of University College, London, The Biblical word gan (as in Gan Eden) means `walled garden,’ ” Rohl continues, “and the valley is indeed walled in by towering mountains.” The highest of these is Mt. Sahand, a snow-capped extinct volcano that Rohl identifies as the Prophet Ezekiel’s Mountain of God, where the Lord resides among `red-hot coals’ (Ezekiel 28:11-19). Cascading down the once-fiery mountain, precisely echoing Ezekiel, is a small river, the Adji Chay (the name of which also translates in local dialect as ‘walled garden’). The locals still hold the mountain sacred, Rohl says, and attribute magical powers to the river’s water.
In order to make the journey to this most remote location, one must travel from western Iran, north through the Zagros Mountains of Iranian Kurdistan, down Mt. Sahand, and into the fertile Adji Chay valley. The Jerusalem Report article gives a number of geographical locations. What made Rohl look in this location in the first place? One factor was that he read about it in ancient Sumerian cuneiform clay tablets held by the Museum of the Orient in Istanbul. The other factor was the work of the late, little-known British scholar Reginald Walker. The ancient tablets described a 5,000 year-old route to Eden. He has been researching the location since the late 1980’s through academic documents.
In April 1997 Rohl did something very remarkable to prove his point. He set out from the Iranian town of Ahwaz, near the northern tip of the Persian Gulf, with only his jeep driver for company. According to the article:
They traveled north toward Kurdistan through what Rohl calls `lawless’ terrain, trusting to luck to avoid the various guerilla factions active in the region. Rohl followed a route, documented in the Sumerian cuneiform epic `Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta,’ supposedly taken 5,000 years earlier by an emissary of the Sumerian priest-king of Uruk. The emissary had been dispatched to Aratta, on the plain of `Edin’ — known to Sumerians as a land of happiness and plenty — to obtain gold and lapis lazuli to decorate a temple that Enmerkar was building in Uruk. The cuneiform epic describes the dutiful emissary’s three-month trek on foot via seven passes through the Zagros Mountains, to the foothills of Mt. Sahand — the southern edge of Rohl’s Eden — and his successful procurement of the required valuable.
The Garden described in the Bible places the headwaters of four rivers in it: the Tigris, the Euphrates, the Gihon, and the Pishon. Obviously, the Tigris and Euphrates are well-known rivers, but the other two have been real problems in the past. Rohl has identified them as the Araxes and Uizhun which puts the headwaters of all four rivers in his Eden. Interestingly, the Uizhun, Rohl’s equivalent to the Pishon which the Bibles identifies with gold, is known locally as the Golden River, and meanders between ancient gold mines and lodes of lapis lazuli.
Making his case even stronger, Rohl says that he has found the “Land of Nod” which the Bible describes as “East of Eden.” Nod was Cain’s place of exile after the murder of his brother Abel. Today the area is called “Noqdi.”
But it doesn’t end there because a few kilometers south of Rohl’s Nod, at the head of a mountain pass, lies the sleepy town of Helabad. Formerly it was known as “Kheruabad,” which means “settlement of the Kheru people.” He believes that this could be a permutation of the Hebrew word keruvim that is translated as “Cherubs.” These people were a tribe of fearsome warriors whose token was an eagle or falcon.
Modern scholars have argued that the Genesis stories were just myths and should be looked upon in an allegorical sense. Rohl’s discovery is now essentially seeking to push back the start of history all the way to the beginning of the Book of Genesis. Since the Bible scrupulously documents the specifics of the garden’s location and its surroundings, says Rohl, why shouldn’t we take those descriptions at face value? “I consider the Bible a historical document just like the writings of Herodotus or a text of Rameses II,” says Rohl. “It’s ridiculous to throw it in the dustbin just because it’s a religious text. If so strong a tradition evolves out of the past, it is likely to have a genuine geographical setting.”

YouTube C.B.

Knights Templar – Lebanese Christian Resistance

Knights Templar – Lebanese Christian Resistance

Tribute to the Christian Knights of Lebanon
A Christian Knight would rather die on his feet than fall to his knees in submission

Music can change the world, because it can change people.

Kurdish pop-sensation Helly Luv filmed her latest music video on the front lines against ISIS and spoke about her dream for an independent Kurdistan.

Helly Luv was born Helan Abdulla in Urmia, Kurdish Iran, in 1988. Her family moved to Finland, where the young Helan won a scholarship to the best dance school in Finland and won a contract with NIKE Women. At the age of 18, she moved to America to pursue a music career, and at the end of 2013, she released her breakthrough hit “Risk It All.”

She received death threats for the controvertial music video but remained defiant, releasing “Revolution” in 2015.

Helan also runs an animal charity called Luv House, to protect animals in Kurdistan.

She graciously agreed to speak with Clarion Project Research Fellow Elliot Friedland about her life, her music and her passion for Kurdistan and the battle against the Islamic State.

Clarion Project: Since you were born in 1988, the Middle East has been mired in conflict. How has being connected to this near-constant violence affected you personally?

Helly Luv: Well the first thing that effected me was that my family had to escaped from our home, from our land and start a new life in a unknown country.  Growing up in Europe, I always knew and felt that I was different from other kids, and that I was a immigrant and home was somewhere else.

Screenshot from ‘Risk it All’ music video.

Clarion Project: In the video for your hit single “Risk It All,” you say, “This video was inspired by my strong, beautiful Kurdish people who never stop fighting for our country and independence.”

How do you see your part in the struggle for an independent Kurdistan? What does that dream look like to you?

Luv: All us Kurds, we share the same dream of a free, independent Kurdistan. We are the largest nation without our own country, and I feel like it’s my duty as a artist to fight for it.

Maybe my weapon won’t be the gun, but I have a voice and I can send the message to other millions of people who don’t know the struggle of the Kurdish people.

Watch “Risk it All”:

Clarion: How to you maintain your connection to Kurdistan while living in America? What do you love most about Kurdish culture?

Luv: I travel a lot because of my work, but I try to visit Kurdistan often. What I love about Kurdistan most is the hospitality. You can find even the poorest person in Kurdistan, but he will offer you his last meal.

Screenshot from ‘Revolution’ music video.

Clarion: Let’s talk about your latest song “Revolution.” What inspired you to make it?

Luv: When this war first happened with ISIS, I wanted to fight and protect Kurdistan. I also wanted the whole world to know what was going on in Kurdistan.

I could have shot this music video in Hollywood, Los Angeles, where I live, but I wanted to show the true face of the war, so I had no other options then to go to the war area and shoot everything there.

We were about three km away from the ISIS militants and all the people escaping in the video are real victims of ISIS. The tanks and weapons are all real and, of course, the Peshmargas are real soldiers.

The video is very violent,but it’s the truth. It’s the real story of Kurdistan fighting against ISIS.

Screenshot form ‘Revolution’ music video

Clarion: Did you get to meet and speak with any Peshmerga fighters while you were filming “Revolution” in Iraq? What was the morale of the people like there?

Luv: What touched me was seeing these ordinary people, male and females, simply just walking past us carrying their weapons and going to the last outpost and fight against ISIS, without any kind of military training or even good weapons.

They were there night and day, through rain, cold, heat and many of them didn’t return. Seeing that broke my heart to pieces every time.

Many times we had to cancel and leave the filming locations because the war started to take over and the bullets were flying too close to us.

Even in the war zone, the Peshmargas kept their strong positive energy. Talking to them made us feel safe because they were so confident. The only thing they would complain about was wanting more powerful weapons.

Kurdish Peshmerga firing on Islamic State positions

Clarion: You have received death threats from Islamist groups for perceived infractions of modesty. How do you deal with that? What message do you have for those trying to silence you?

Luv: Yes it is also true, I have been on their “most-wanted” list, but I believe anyone would be listed there wanting for freedom, peace and justice.

The death threats come mostly from social media, but I don’t listen to them. I want this war to stop, and I want peace for my country. If I can get the message out to other millions of people who probably don’t know what is going on here, especially the young generations, I accept putting my life at risk for my country and people.

To me it is an honor and privilege, because it means I am as powerful as their weapons.

My message to them is very clear, they can just look at the video 🙂

Copyright: Helly Luv

Clarion: How can people from around the world best support the Kurdish struggle?

Luv: The  most important think is to not close your eyes to these events and think that its not affecting you because you’re not living in that country. As long as there are wars and terrorist groups like ISIS, we are all in danger.

Kurdistan has 1.8 million refugees at the moment, and there are donations you can make to organizations, or you can start your own donations.

Social media has huge power, you can send one message to whole world through one click. Some people think sharing subjects like this on social media doesn’t have a power, but it does more then you think.

Clarion: Lastly, what is it about music and dance that you feel has such a positive power it can change the world?

Luv: Music and dance has power, and through music the world can hear the voice of millions of other people. If music goes against evil, it might not be as loud as a weapon, but music will live forever.

Music can change the world, because it can change people.

 

 http://www.clarionproject.org/analysis/kurdistan-luv#

Muslim Brotherhood To Commemorate Genocidal Jihad At DC’s National Cathedral

Kurdish resistance fighters say they can beat Islamic State forces without help from foreign boots on the ground. Just need Support !

RT’s Paula Slier reports from the front line in Northern Iraq where Kurdish resistance fighters say they can beat Islamic State forces without help from foreign boots on the ground.

 

 

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan

 

 

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan

Kurdish Civilians: ‘ISIL is Afraid of Us’

“Paradise Lost” Kurdish Civilians: ‘ISIL is Afraid of Us’

 

Paradise is our native country, and we in this world be as exiles and strangers.
Richard Greenham (1535-1594)

 

English: Oh foes who watch us, the nation whose language is Kurdish is alive
It cannot be defeated by makers of weapons of any time
Let no one say the Kurds are dead, the Kurds are alive
The Kurds are alive and their flag will never fall
We are the sons of the red colour of revolution
Our history is one filled with blood
Let no one say the Kurds are dead, the Kurds are alive
The Kurds are alive and our flag will never fall
We are the sons of the Medes and Kai Khosrow
Our homeland is our faith and religion
Let no one say the Kurds are dead, the Kurds are alive
The Kurds are alive and our flag will never fall
The Kurdish youth has risen like noble warriors
To draw the crown of life with blood
Let no one say the Kurds are dead, the Kurds are alive
The Kurds are alive and our flag will never fall
The Kurdish youth are ever-ready
And always prepared to sacrifice their lives
To sacrifice their lives, to sacrifice their lives.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan

 

I Slam You All Summit

                

Islamic Center Of Geneva

104, rue des Eaux-Vives 1207 Genève – SUISSE – http://www.cige.org/cige/

Said Ramadan (Arabic: سعيد رمضان‎; April 12, 1926 – August 4, 1995)

was the son-in-law of Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Said Ramadan was a major figure in that organization and was expelled from Egypt by Gamal Abdul Nasser for his activities. He moved to Saudi Arabia where he founded the World Islamic League, a charity and missionary group. He then moved to Geneva, Switzerland, before finishing a dissertation at the University of Cologne in 1959. In 1961 he founded the Islamic Center in Geneva, a combination mosque, think tank, and community center. His son Hani Ramadan now runs that center. Another son, Tariq Ramadan is prominent in international Islamic affairs and academics.

Said Ramadan’s US connections included Malcolm X and Dawud Salahuddin.

MISSION

Drawing on the relevant resolutions of the ICFM’s, an OIC Group in Geneva has been established to help further improvement of Solidarity and Coordination among Member States.

The objectives of establishing this group, are: to consolidated the spirit of solidarity among the Members States; to enhance the Group’s potential by the involvement of their Ambassadors and experts in negotiations and decision making process; to coordinate the position and views of the OIC countries and harmonize their positions in the different foras and International meetings of the UN Agencies and specialized institutions, to contribute, as cross-regional Group to international decision making process.

The OIC Group in Geneva was also established to increase the effectiveness of the work of the OIC Missions aimed at promoting efficient cooperation and coordination among Members States on issues concerning Muslim Ummah.

Some keys factors in advancing the objectives of the Group are:

– Maintaining a clear vision on the work of the OIC Group

The principles and goals enshrined in the OIC Charter, the guidance of the OIC conferences; and the indicative spirit of the Group, materialized through its dealing with United Nations Agenda in Geneva constitutes the main component of the vision. In addition, resolution n° 40/30-P of the 31ICFM, entitled “Adoption by the Islamic States of a Unified Stand at International For a” also serves as a directive on Various aspect of the Group’s activities including defining mandates and scope of work as well as setting priorities and submitting of recommendations.

 …

http://www.oic-un.org/oic_geneva.asp

OIC Ramps Up Islamophobia Campaign

This entry was posted on February 28, 2013, by :

 http://iranaware.com/2013/02/28/oic-ramps-up-islamophobia-campaign/

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has long been on the forefront of the Islamist mission to establish the equivalent of Islamic blasphemy laws in the West.  Now, during its 12^th Islamic Summit held in Cairo February 7-8, 2013, the OIC set forth new and creative ways to silence, and ultimately criminalize criticism of Islam.

The OIC is a 57-member state organization that claims to represent 1.5 billion Muslims around the globe.  As the second largest international organization in the world, behind only the UN, and as the largest Islamic organization in the world, it is obviously quite powerful.  Though it is arguably the largest voting block in the UN, most people have never heard of it.

One of the OIC’s primary aims for at least the last fourteen years has been the international criminalization of speech that is critical of any Islam-related topic, including Islamic terrorism, Islamic persecution of religious minorities and human rights violations committed in the name of Islam.

Since 1999, the OIC has set forth UN resolutions that would “combat defamation of religions.”  These resolutions condemned criticism of religion, but in the OIC’s interpretation, it applied only to Islam.  True statements of fact constituted no exception.

Support for the resolutions declined once the United States and other Western countries caught wind of the true meaning of “defamation of religions” and its inevitable chilling effect on freedom of expression.

In 2011, at the State Department’s request, the OIC drafted an alternative resolution that was intended to retain freedom of expression and still address the OIC’s concerns about alleged Islamophobia.  The result was Resolution 16/18 to Combat Intolerance Based on Religion or Belief.

The US State Department and numerous Christian organizations were elated, believing that the OIC had abandoned its mission to protect Islam from so-called “defamation,” and instead replaced it with the goal of protecting persecuted religious minorities from discrimination and violence.  In other words, many assumed a paradigm shift away from providing legal protections to a religion and toward legal protections for people.

But the OIC had some very creative interpretations of the language embodied in the new resolution.  By its manipulation of words such as intolerance and incitement, giving new meanings to what many thought was plain English, the OIC made it clear that it had not dropped its ultimate goal of protecting Islam from “defamation.”

Almost immediately upon its passage and the passage of a similar resolution in the General Assembly, the OIC set out on the unconventional task of “implementing” Resolution 16/18, contrary to the norm of leaving UN resolutions in the realm of the theoretical.

Unfortunately, the U.S. State Department acted as a willing accomplice in this effort, holding the second “Istanbul Conference” in December of 2011.  But, in its implementation phase, rather than moving toward the preservation of free expression, the OIC successfully moved the process in the opposite direction:  toward speech restrictive policies.

Though the U.S., thus far, has not pushed for the enactment of “hate speech” laws, it has “advocated for other measures to achieve the same result.”  Indeed, at this Administration’s behest, all national security training materials and policies “de-link” any interpretation of Islam from Islamic terrorism.  Many U.S. government agencies have now made it verboten to mention Islamic terrorism or assert anything negative about Islam.

The OIC’s task is easier in the EU countries, most of which already have some sort of hate speech restrictions.  They vary from country to country.  Some are cast as laws against the “denigration of religions”; some are “hate speech” laws; some are “public order” laws and some are “incitement to religious hatred” laws.  Additionally, the penalties can range from civil fines to jail time depending on the country.  The U.S. is the last hold out on retaining true freedom when it comes to matters of speech.

This past February, the OIC held an Islamic Summit, a high-level meeting held every three years.  It is the OIC’s largest meeting.  Heads of State and high ranking officials from member states attend.  The purpose of the meeting is to provide guidance pertinent to the realization of the objectives provided for in the OIC Charter and to consider other issues of importance to member states and the Islamic Ummah.  This year’s theme for the agenda was “The Muslim World:  New Challenges and Expanding Opportunities.”

Though the summit focused largely on Syria, Mali, and the “Palestinian issue,” the OIC also made it clear that it would ramp up its efforts to defeat “Islamophobia.”

The OIC is fastidiously working on the creation of legal instruments to address and combat “Islamophobia.”  Renewing its commitment to mobilize the West to comply with Islamic blasphemy laws, the OIC vowed to push for nation states to enact laws that will criminalize the “denigration of religions” during in its next Istanbul conference, anticipated to take place this June.

Further, it is requesting that the UN start an international mechanism that could serve as an “early warning system” against instances of discrimination and intolerance on religious grounds.  Specifically, the OIC is proposing the creation of an observatory at the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights, presumably analogous to the Observatory on Islamophobia that the OIC already maintains.  The difference would be that the new observatory would be overseen by an internationally sanctioned entity (the UN) and would expand to all religions.

It is fair to say that since Islamist organizations have coordinated campaigns across the world that encourage and solicit reports of either real, feigned, staged or imagined incidents of “Islamophobia,” the new “empirical data” that such an observatory would collect, would still be drastically skewed.  No other religion has a worldwide campaign instructing its members to report unpleasant truths as “bigotry” or to complain about slights as minor as “hostile looks.”

Additionally, the OIC is continuing to use the language embodied in pre-existing legal instruments in order to make it harder for Western countries to object.  For example, Resolution 16/18 mirrors some of the language in the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).  ICCPR, Article 20 states “the advocacy of religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence shall be prohibited by law.”  The U.S. rightly signed a reservation to this clause, effectively opting out, insisting that Americans retain the right to exercise their First Amendment freedom of speech.

Further, though Article 20 makes such speech illegal, it leaves the definition of these terms open to interpretation and does not specify that the illegality must be criminal in nature.  Despite this, Rizwan Saeed Sheikh, spokesman for the OIC Secretary General, insists that pursuant to Article 20 the “denigration of symbols or persons sacred to any religion is a criminal offense.”

Such claims are indicative of the legal and linguistic gymnastics that the OIC will use to achieve its goal to “combat defamation of Islam” and to export Islamic blasphemy laws, labeling them as something aesthetically easier to swallow.

At the Summit, OIC members also unanimously elected Iyad Madani to the post of OIC Secretary General.  His term is to commence in 2014 when current Secretary General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu’s term expires.  This is the first time that the OIC will be headed by a Saudi.

Though the current OIC regime is comprised of sticklers for Islamic blasphemy laws and staunch advocates for the obliteration of Israel, it is likely that the OIC will become even more extreme under Madani.  Compared to the Wahabbis in Saudi Arabia, Ihsanoglu and gang can be considered reformers pushing “Islam lite.” The election of a former Saudi Minister to head the largest Islamic organization in the world and lead the UN’s most powerful voting bloc is a bad omen of what’s to come.  Indeed, it would come as no surprise if under its new leadership, the OIC’s old leadership would be labeled “Islamophobic.”

“Paradise Lost” : AGHET – A Genocide – ARMENIA

“Paradise Lost” : AGHET – A Genocide – ARMENIA

Paradise is our native country, and we in this world be as exiles and strangers.
Richard Greenham (1535-1594)

AGHET -ARMENIA – A Genocide !!!

 

ENGLISH DESCRIPTION: AGHET [produced by NDR (German public television)], a new award-winning documentary made by German filmmaker Eric Friedler compellingly proves the truth of the genocide of the Armenian people. Using the actual words of 23 German, American and other nationals who witnessed the events, and armed with archival materials, AGHET expertly takes on the challenge that PM Erdogan hurled at the world by stating: »Prove it.

AGHET incorporates never-before-seen footage and documents – making it one of the best researched and presented documentaries on the Armenian Genocide. More than just a historic retelling of the Genocide, the film also delves into the ongoing campaign of denial that the Turkish government has mounted since these events occurred in World War I.

AGHET was debuted on NDR in April, 2010. Friedler has assembled an impeccable cast, who bring to life the original texts of German and U.S. diplomatic dispatches and eyewitness accounts, interspersed with never-before-seen footage of the Genocide and its political aftermath. The film, applauded by Nobel Prize laureate Gunter Grass, has sparked renewed debate throughout Europe. It is now being showcased around the world on television, in major film festivals and has been seen by members of the U.S. Congress. AGHET represents a significant contribution to political and cultural awareness not only for Armenians worldwide, but also more importantly for the non-Armenian world community.

http://aghet-1915.tumblr.com/

 

 

http://www.armenica.org/

Thought for the Day

 

No Word No Language No Soul..
Where is God ?
Where is MEN !

Espace détente, poésie, judaïsme et lutte contre la désinformation

Massacre syrien _______________________________________________________

Le mois dernier, un groupe de Scandinaves a levé les amarres d’un port suédois pour naviguer vers le Moyen-Orient, sous prétexte de l’aide humanitaire. Le brouillard nordique a probablement obscurci leur choix de destination. La boussole morale de ces autoproclamés « humanitaires » s’est dirigé vers Gaza et non la Syrie.

Les flottes des flottilles, ferries, yachts, voiliers et catamarans, et même des canoës et qui ont mis les voiles pour Gaza ces dernières années, sont des rivaux de taille face à l’Armada espagnole. Pourtant, on pourrait soutenir que les flottilles humanitaires sont nécessaires pour la Syrie, où plus de civils ont été assassinés par le régime d’Assad qu’il n’y a eu de personnes tuées lors du tremblement de terre en 2011 au Japon, de mort lors pendant l’Ouragan Katrina et des victimes lors du 11 septembre (le tout confondu !).

Le conflit en Syrie est également 4 fois…

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“Paradise Lost” : The Murder of Coptic Christians

Paradise is our native country, and we in this world be as exiles and strangers. Richard Greenham (1535-1594)

The World Through Rose Colored Glasses (with video)

Posted on August 28, 2012 by lburt

By Gadi Adelman:

The photo accompanying this article was taken in central Cairo on October 13,  2011. Nearly 3,000 Egyptian mourners gathered in honor of Coptic Christians who  were among 25 people murdered during a demonstration over an attack on a  church.

Those who don’t want to believe this is actually occurring in the 21 Century  won’t. No matter how many pictures or videos make it out some people just will  dismiss it all as Islamophobic lies.

I had no intention of covering this story this week, I’ve written about the  murder of Coptic Christians before as well as those being murdered in other  countries as well. Over two years ago in April 2010 my article “No  Big Deal, Just Some People in Africa, Right?” was about the murder of  Christians in Nigeria at the hands of Islamists.

This all started when someone posted a picture on my  Facebook page.

I read the denials of the stories, pictures and videos of the Crucifixions of  the Egyptian Coptic’s and decided to set the record straight.

One individual posted a comment under this picture on my Facebook page,

this isn’t in Egypt. stop telling lies about EGYPT. you jews will never  remove hatred from your hearts to EGYPT

The National Post reported that none of these stories were true either.  Author Jonathan Kay wrote an article  on August 22 that “Egypt’s “crucifixion” hoax becomes an instant Internet myth”.  He starts his article with,

Have you heard the one about how Christians are being nailed up on crucifixes  and left to die in front of the Egyptian presidential place?

It’s a story worth dissecting – not because it’s true (it isn’t), but because  it is a textbook example of how the Internet, once thought to be the perfect  medium of truth-seeking, has been co-opted by culture warriors as a weapon to  fire up the naïve masses with lies and urban legends.

“Fire up the naïve masses with lies and urban legends”, really? Well Mr. Kay  I suggest some light reading for you. It’s this year’s Annual Report from the  U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.

The cover of the report shows a similar picture to the one I chose for my  story. You know the one, where “nearly 3,000 Egyptian mourners gathered in honor  of Coptic Christians who were among 25 people murdered during a demonstration  over an attack on a church.” I guess it was Photo-shopped.

But what is more interesting than the cover picture is who makes up this  agency and what the report  contains.

The website  U.S.  Commission on International Religious Freedom explains this on the ‘about’  page,

USCIRF is an independent, bipartisan U.S. federal government commission.  USCIRF Commissioners are appointed by the President and the leadership of both  political parties in the Senate and the House of Representatives. USCIRF’s  principal responsibilities are to review the facts and circumstances of  violations of religious freedom internationally and to make policy  recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State and Congress.

So let’s understand from the outset that those involved with this agency are  handpicked by the President and made up from both political parties. So for all  you naysayers out there argue with them, not me.

I saw this coming long before Hosni Mubarak was ousted. Back in February of  2011 while those in the Obama administration were saying that the Muslim  Brotherhood wouldn’t place a candidate in the Egyptian elections, I wrote in my article  “A Series of Unfortunate Re-Runs”,

The Muslim Brotherhood has been waiting for an opportunity like this for over  60 years and it is not something they are going to let slip by. Since the fall  of the Ottoman Empire in 1924 and the founding of the Muslim Brotherhood only 4  years later in 1928 there has never been an opportunity such as this for a  return of a Caliphate and you can bet your life the Brotherhood is working  harder than any other group or government to see that this happens.

So now that the Muslim Brotherhood leader, Mohamed Morsi has become the  President of Egypt is it really any surprise that we see Coptic Christians being  murdered for no other reason than they are Christian?

It appears to be no surprise to those that wrote the annual  report from the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom either.  The report is 331 pages and from start to finish this report is a “who’s who” of  Islamic countries.

The second paragraph of page one starts off with Egypt,

In Egypt, an epicenter of the Arab Spring, hope turned to dismay, as human  rights conditions, particularly religious freedom abuses, worsened dramatically  under military rule.   Authorities continued to prosecute and sentence  citizens charged with blasphemy and allowed official media to incite violence  against religious minority members, while failing to protect them or to convict  responsible parties.  Law enforcement and the courts fostered a climate of  impunity in the face of repeated attacks against Coptic Christians and their  churches.  Rather than defending these minorities, military and security  forces turned their guns on them, using live ammunition against Coptic  Christians and other demonstrators, killing dozens and wounding hundreds in  Maspero Square.

Page two continues with just a few instances,

To be sure, religious freedom abuses harm members of religious majorities and  minorities alike.  But make no mistake:  across much of the world,  persons associated with religious minority communities often are harmed the  most.  Even when violations do not include or encourage violence, intricate  webs of discriminatory rules, regulations, and edicts can impose tremendous  burdens on these communities and their adherents, making it difficult for them  to function and grow from one generation to the next, potentially threatening  their existence.  For example, while an electoral democracy, Turkey fails  to legally recognize religious minority communities, such as the Alevis, the  Greek, Armenian, and Syriac Orthodox Churches, the Roman Catholic and Protestant  Churches, and the Jewish community.  Furthermore, Turkish officials meddle  in these communities‘ internal government and education and limit their worship  rights.

But as I stated earlier it is a “who’s who” of Islamic countries. The report  explains those countries that are of particular concern,

The first section highlights countries which USCIRF recommends that the State  Department designate as countries of particular concern (CPCs) under IRFA  (International Religious Freedom Act) for particularly severe violations of  religious freedom.

The countries that make up the “CPCs” are listed on page 4,

For the 2012 Annual Report, USCIRF recommends that the Secretary of State  designate the following 16 countries as CPCs: Burma, the Democratic People‘s  Republic of Korea (North Korea), Egypt, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan,  the People‘s Republic of China, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Tajikistan, Turkey,  Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.

Those countries that you would expect to see on this list are not mentioned  are because they are already listed as “CPCs”,

Afghanistan, Belarus, Cuba, India, Indonesia, Laos, Russia, Somalia,  Venezuela

The report then writes a chapter for each country of concern, but for this  article I am concentrating on Egypt since that appears to be the source of these  “internet myths”.

On page 50 of the report are the agencies “Findings” in Egypt,

FINDINGS: Over the past year, the Egyptian transitional government continued  to engage in and tolerate systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of  freedom of thought, conscience and religion or belief.

Serious problems of discrimination, intolerance, and other human rights  violations against members of religious minorities, as well as disfavored  Muslims, remain widespread in Egypt. Violence targeting Coptic Orthodox  Christians increased significantly during the reporting period.  The  transitional government has failed to protect religious minorities from violent  attacks at a time when minority communities have been increasingly  vulnerable.  This high level of violence and the failure to convict those  responsible continued to foster a climate of impunity, making further violence  more likely.  During the reporting period, military and security forces  used excessive force and live ammunition targeting Coptic Christian  demonstrators and places of worship resulting in dozens of deaths and hundreds  of injuries.  The government also continued to prosecute, convict, and  impose prison terms on Egyptian citizens charged with blasphemy.   Implementation of previous court rulings – related to granting official identity  documents to Baha‘is and changing religious affiliation on identity documents  for converts to Christianity – has seen some progress but continues to lag,  particularly for Baha‘is. In addition, the government has not responded  adequately to combat widespread and virulent anti-Semitism in the  government-controlled media.

Understanding that this report was published in February of this year a lot  more deaths have occurred during the last 6 months. As noted in the above  section of the report,

This high level of violence and the failure to convict those responsible  continued to foster a climate of impunity, making further violence more  likely.

Unfortunately they were correct. The report continues,

Religious freedom conditions have not improved in most areas and attacks  targeting religious minorities have continued.  In 2011, violent sectarian  attacks, targeting primarily Coptic Orthodox Christians, have resulted in nearly  100 deaths, surpassing the death toll of the previous 10 years combined.   During the transitional period, the lack of adequate security in the streets has  contributed to lawlessness in parts of the country, particularly in Upper  Egypt.

Read more at Family Security Matters

FamilySecurityMatters.orgContributing  Editor Gadi  Adelman  is a freelance writer and lecturer on the history of  terrorism and  counterterrorism. He grew up in Israel, studying terrorism and  Islam for 35  years after surviving a terrorist bomb in Jerusalem in which 7  children were  killed. Since returning to the U. S., Gadi teaches and lectures  to law  enforcement agencies as well as high schools and colleges. He can be  heard  every Thursday night at 8PM est. on his own radio show “America Akbar”  on Blog  Talk Radio.  He can be reached through his website gadiadelman.com.

Watch this dramatic video showing the suffering of the Egyptian Copts posted by Walid Shoebat:

FROM : http://counterjihadreport.com/2012/08/28/the-world-through-rose-colored-glasses-with-video/

Does He ?

..Be My Brothers and Sisters Keeper .. ????!!!!

Which Brothers ..Brother ?

Because he sound not only like a “newbie” but also with a very different “grow up” then a Christian one.. forgot the word “love” but :

he speak of Duty !

he speak of Code of Behaviour !

he speak of Bargain ! you do this and you get that !

he speak of being in a Building, but nothing of Being !

This is not Christianity This is Recipe !

So Obama Administration helped the current Government in Egypt… and in Egypt..

The Brothers and Sisters ARE WELL Kept and Taking Care Of !

The Ottoman Empire may long been dead, but the discrimination and oppression it inflicted continues..

AlanaKalanaian

In Turkey, the rights of all Turkish citizens are treated equally is governed by a constitution founded on secular principles that Turkey established in 1923. 

Created by a man named Mustafa Kemal who is referred to as simply “Ataturk.”

Ataturk went to great lengths to reform his nation who were basically the puked out Turkish remains of the Ottoman Empire.

So how come Turkey is constantly taking steps to make sure one day non-Muslims will have the same rights as Muslims?

It is kind of depressing that in the year 2017 there are still people who are facing huge amounts of discrimination in their country.

During the Ottoman era, not many Turks at the time believed in concepts like equality.  The best some Turks could muster was not making their superiority over Armenians as well as all non-Muslims an issue, while other Turks made it a point to never let them forget…

View original post 689 more words

+ Until the Last Breath +

Posted on August 20, 2012 by lburt

by Justin O Smith

From an accurate historical perspective, the Arab world, other than the Arabian Peninsula, was claimed by Islam through conquest and seizure of land. This includes Turkey and Egypt, which at one time were both 90% Christian, and “Palestine”, which before the Muslim conquest was known as Judea, Sumeria and Canaan …populated by Jews and Christians. And to this day, a cultural and civilizational war has persistently been waged against the West, because the West knows that Islam has no true basis in the Abrahamic passages and European theologians were the first true interpreters of Christianity …a Christianity as distorted or betrayed as one may view it… but Christianity; Islamists want a war that strikes at our soul, our way of life and our philosophy of life… Our Freedom!

Unfortunately, the Islamists and other enemies of America are aided through the Immigration Act of 1965, which is a liberal Democrat and ACLU initiative from the Johnson era that withdrew the use of quotas and screening for education, skills, and criminal activities, as well as any adherence to radical political views in opposition to democracy. As a result, subsequent groups of immigrants entering the U.S. have been significantly poorer, less educated and skilled and offering less to the growth and prosperity of America. And many, such as the Hispanic illegal aliens riding the “Illegal Alien Bus” into Nashville last Thursday, many of which wore masks (because their cause/actions were so noble and honorable?), have little or no regard for U.S. law; or, they are like the tens of thousands of Somalians, Egyptians, Saudis, Palestinians, Bosnians and many others across America who have brought with them jihadists and the warped Islamic Sharia ideas that mock Judeo-Christian principles and violate our civil rights and the U.S. Constition.

Most Americans would be shocked to find that U.S. immigration policy regarding refugees has essentially been entrusted to the U.N High Commissioner for Refugees which predictably favors Muslims, who face no religious persecution in their home countries, while refusing refugee status for Christians facing real persecution and the threat of certain death for their religious beliefs. This travesty has occurred due to the inordinate influence of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the U.N.’s largest bloc of nations and one of the world’s largest intergovernmental organizations; the OIC is tied to the Muslim Brotherhood, and likewise, it is dedicated to “eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within.”

Tariq Ramadan, renown Islamic scholar and terrorist/terrorist sympathizer, states, “Muslims are bound by the law in their country of residency to the degree that they are not compelled to act against their Muslim consciences.” So, to what extent does their “Muslim conscience” compel them to violate the laws of their host nation?

Currently the Obama administration is allowing entire Muslim communities to enter the U.S., due to his own Islamophilia and coercive Islamists’ argument that in order for them to be more tolerant of the West and Christianity, the U.S. must become more tolerant and sensitive towards Sharia values and Islam; one must also consider that the Obama administration may be doing a quid pro quo to acquire cheap oil in exchange for loosened immigration policies for Muslims, much in the same manner as occurred throughout the European Union after the 1975 Strasbourg Treaty, since U.S. dependency on Arab oil has increased by 20% this year. And, just as these policies have failed in Europe, they will certainly fail here, and they will serve to establish a monstrous Islamic empire of oppression within the 21st century, rather than one of free peoples!

In France, public officials meet with imams at the edge of Roubaix’s Muslim district, because these imams have “declared” the area to be “Islamic territory”. In Britain, the government has acquiesced to Muslim demands for Sharia law in areas like Bradsford. This same dynamic is seen in Copenhagen, and the Muslims in Belgium already view the Brussels neighborhood of Sint-Jans-Molenbeek as under Islamic jurisdiction, with Belgians not welcome.

This April, islamofascists took to the streets in Luton,U.K. in protest over the arrest of the wife of a terrorist convicted of a bombing three years earlier. Chants of “British government go to hell” and “British police go to hell” were conspicuous, as well as signs declaring “Sharia law will rule the UK”, just as CAIR suggests will happen in the U.S.; in June, a man was beheaded by the new Islamist government of Tunisia for apostasy; two weeks ago in Mali, the islamofascist “revolutionaries” controlling Timbuktu casually lopped off the hand of a man merely accused of theft, and over the past two weeks, ten U.S. Armed Forces members were murdered/assassinated by Afghani police force “insider attacks” (our allies?)… yes indeed… Islam… “the religion of peace, tolerance and mercy!”

Retired General W.G. “Jerry” Boykin remarked a short time back, “Take a walk through Dearborn and you’d think you were in the middle of Islamabad.” Recently in ‘The Tennessean’, it was suggested that, with hundreds of thousands of Muslims, Dearborn,MI has few Islamic related problems, even though just over a month ago Christians were actually stoned inside its city limits… Yes! Right here in the middle of America!… In part, the suggestion is true only because they represent the majority in this area, however there have been several terror plots squashed in this community and several “honor killings” that were not intercepted, since 2004; in conjunction, Sharia law has persistently been introduced into Dearborn’s city codes, phenomena America has witnessed in too many of its cities.

Islamic expansion only needs the hordes of immigrants who daily arrive by jets and ships. And it needs time, patience and new generations to grow. British Muslim terrorists of  “July 7″ were second and third generation. The French rioters in the fall of 2005 were second, third and even fourth generation. Even here in the U.S. we have witnessed second and third generation Muslims turn to terrorist activities and membership in Al Qaeda.

The first steps in this war are waged through immigration, fertility/procreation, presumed multiculturalism, and Islamic demands: the Islamic holidays, the five prayers’ interruptions, the halal meat/food, the Sharia compliant schools, the face covered also on identity papers to begin with: then follows the Islamic marriage, the polygamy, the stoning of women, and assets deemed offensive to Islam removed from museums and libraries and archives and continuing… until?

Hirsi Ali was ritually circumcised by her grandmother without the knowledge or approval of her father. Although she grew up Muslim, she left Islam and escaped from Kenya to the Netherlands, and she eventually worked with a think-tank researching the lives of Dutch Muslim women. Due to many uncivilized and harsh cultural norms taught by imams and Islamic ”scholars”, Ms Ali now advocates for closing Islamic schools and curbing Islamic/Muslim immigration. As an ex-Muslim, Hirsi Ali fully understands and credibly expounds upon the inherent dangers of allowing any form of Sharia to enter a civilized nation’s infrastructure… And some of our Rutherford County and Tennessee State officials want to legitimize Sharia compliance in our schools?… Really?!? Shouldn’t we be listening to people such as Ms Ali… the real experts… Islam’s victims?!?

War Islam wants? Good. As far as I am concerned, war is and war will be… until the last breath.

Justin O. Smith is a concerned citizen with a B.S.-MTSU/ International Relations & Cultural Geography, ex-firefighter, U.S. Army and freelance writer.

Also published in TCU Nation

But Taken From :

http://counterjihadreport.com/2012/08/20/until-the-last-breath/

Paradise Lost: “Stand up, stand for Jesus, ye soldiers of the cross.”

Paradise Lost: “Stand up, stand for Jesus, ye soldiers of the cross.”

Paradise is our native country, and we in this world be as exiles and strangers. Richard Greenham (1535-1594)

Muslim extremists threw acid on Bishop Umar Mulinde outside his church near Kampala.(2011)

Tunisian Muslims sever the head of convert to Christianity (In June 2012)

and Before Yesterday (August 12 2012) :

His Crime ? He did convert to Christianity : Source by a French Site here :

http://www.christianophobie.fr/breves/une-photo-qui-fait-froid-dans-le-dos?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Christianophobie+%28Observatoire+de+la+christianophobie%29

Stand Up, Stand Up For Jesus

August 14, 2012  By Rebecca Hamilton

What would it take to make you deny Christ?

Would you deny Jesus to save your life? Would you deny Him to save your child’s life?

What would it take for you to turn your back on Jesus?

Christians die for their faith all over the world, right now, this minute. Christians are raped, splashed with acid, stoned, beheaded, sold into slavery every minute of every day because they refuse to deny Jesus. They are the martyrs of our times, and we, who are not facing martyrdom, do very little to support them.

That doesn’t mean that those of us who are safe, fed and fat are not challenged in our soft and cozy faith. It just means that the challenges come at us in more subtle, less costly ways that we  don’t always recognize. Take, for instance, the insistent request in certain circles that we not “offend” people of other faiths or no faith by talking about our Jesus. This kind of gentle push to deny Our Lord can come from surprising sources, sources which disarm us by who they are.

My friend and fellow public catholic, Linda Caswell, is an example. Linda is the founder and director of All Things New, an Oklahoma ministry which engages in the life-saving work of rescuing, sheltering and healing women from sex trafficking and prostitution. Linda makes a lot speeches about sex trafficking and prostitution in many different venues. When she was asked to speak at a large mainline church near one of Oklahoma’s two major universities, she assumed that this particular speech would be on Christian-friendly grounds.

A few days before the speech the church’s assistant pastor emailed her. He asked her to avoid mentioning Jesus or talking about her faith in her speech. He said that people from many faiths, including people of no faith, would be in the audience, and his church didn’t want to offend them by talking about Jesus. Linda emailed back, telling him, no, she couldn’t do that. If that was his requirement, he would have to find another speaker.

When the pastor did not reply to her email, she sent another. When he didn’t reply to that, she was in a quandary. Was she supposed to show up for the speech or not? She finally decided to go ahead and show up and see if they still wanted her to speak. She went, prepared to leave if that was what they wanted.

When she got there, no one told her to leave, but she wasn’t exactly welcomed, either. The associate pastor who had sent the email and his senior pastor huddled on the other side of the room, glancing at her while they talked and rolled their eyes in what anyone who’s been treated this way would recognize as distaste. Despite their obvious contempt and woeful lack of hospitality, they let her speak.

She talked about how Jesus had saved her from the same thing from which she was working to rescue other women. She said straight out that her ministry was based on faith in Christ. Of course, she also (and mostly) talked about the horrors of sex trafficking and what we can do to stop it. No one in the audience raised any objections.

So. Two “pastors,” men who are supposed to be shepherds of Christ’s flock, try to stop a woman from saying the name Jesus while speaking to a gathering in their church. They do this in a church that has the image of Christ in its stained glass windows and the name of Christ on its altar. I could do a whole post on that. But the real point is that my friend didn’t let them bully her into silence about Jesus. She stood firm. She refused. She got dissed by two “men of God” for her effort, but I have to think that God Himself was pleased with her.

This leads me back to my first question: What would it take to make YOU deny Christ?

Assuming that you are not one of the people who is facing death for standing for Jesus, what would it take to make youdeny Him?

Would you do it to keep your job?

Would you do it to keep or get government funding for your ministry?

Would you do it to satisfy government regulations that conflict with your faith so you could keep your ministry’s doors open?

Would you do it to avoid having your classmates, co-workers, even your family, belittle, mock and make fun of you?

Would you do it to avoid the humiliation of a public trashing on the internet and by media talking heads?

Would you do it to avoid being labeled a “bigot,” a “hater,” or a fool?

Would you do it to get into a fraternity or sorority?

Would you do it to get a date with the best looking, most popular guy or girl in school?

Would you do it to get an “A” from that professor who talks about “theists” and claims that only atheists are rational?

What would it take to make you deny Christ? Before you answer, consider this: You’ve already done it. I have. You have. We all have.

I don’t think there’s one Christian in our entire American culture who hasn’t at one time or another gone along to get along in matters of faith. We’ve kept quiet; at family dinners, political gatherings, in the classroom, on the job. We’ve laughed at jokes belittling God or Christians, even when we felt dirty for doing it. We’ve joined in and repeated these jokes ourselves.

We have all denied Christ in the simplest way possible; by what we’ve said and what we haven’t said. I’ll talk another time about how we deny Him with what we do. For now, let’s just stop and consider how many times and in how many ways each of us has denied Him with what we’ve said or not said.

Public Catholics get pushed every day to deny Christ. We are bullied, badgered, belittled, mocked and shamed for our faith as a matter of our daily work. In the case of politicians, most of this is a not-so-subtle attempt to change the way we vote on issues of public policy. The interesting thing is that it works. Not with me. I’ve kept my mouth shut to keep the peace when I shouldn’t have. But nobody ever bullied me into voting against my faith. I just won’t do it.

Linda Caswell is also a Public Catholic. She’s not an elected official, but her work and ministry place her in the public eye. She passed the test with that speech. I’ve seen her pass the test over and over again.

I think the reason the two of us are so stubborn about this is that Jesus forgave us for so much. He loved us from death to life and we know it. Deny Him? Deny the One Who saved us from the living pit of our self-made hells? No. The very thought is anathema.

If you came to Christ by an “easier” way, you may not realize quite so graphically what He saved you from. You may not feel to the marrow of your bones that you owe a debt you can never repay. You may even think, as some Christians evidently do, that it was God’s lucky day when He got you. It may be easier for you to overlook the seemingly small requests to accede to the larger culture and keep quiet about Jesus. Maybe, down deep where not even you know it, the truth is that Jesus doesn’t matter to you as much as the good opinion of the people around you.

Besides, you ask, what good would it do? After all, you are just a drop of faith against the tsunami of secularism and nihilism that is rolling over our society. What does it matter in the great scheme of things what you do?

The answer is simple: It matters to Him.

We are called to be the leaven, the mustard seed, the light and salt that brings the Kingdom. It does not matter who you are or what you do, you will be faced each day with opportunities to speak for Jesus or keep silent. You will decide a thousand times in every thousand days you live to either stand up for Jesus or sit down and say nothing. That may seem like a trial, but it is in reality the great opportunity to speak for Christ which is available to every one of us in our present world. It is your chance to do something that matters for Christ.

I am not talking about being strident. This is not a call to lecture, hector, speechify. What I am suggesting is that we, all of us, every Christian man, woman and child, stop being silent when Our Lord is attacked, when our faith is belittled, when the only Hope of humankind is drug through the mud of incivility and debasement that has become our public debate. Most of the time, all you have to say is, “I am a Christian, and I am not comfortable with this discussion.” That will cause an uneasy silence, but it will also make the point.

Every once in a while you may come across one of those devil-driven souls who feel a sense of self-righteous entitlement when it comes to attacking Christians. They may turn on you and say ugly, degrading things to you and about you. If you are female, they may even band together with others of their kind in an attack on you as a girl or a woman.

I can tell you from personal experience, that is hard to take. I’ll blog another time about Christian men who stand by and do or say nothing while this happens. It’s enough for now to tell you that I have been called every degrading name our misogynist culture uses to attack women, including all the vicious names for women’s body parts. Ironically, most of this was done in the name of “women’s rights.” It was a way of punishing me for converting to pro-life.

It hurts. It has to hurt. But remember: They did the same thing to Jesus. He warned us about this. He said that if they did it to Him, they would do it to us, too. It is not a curse to suffer for Jesus. It is a privilege. As Jesus told us, “rejoice and be glad,” when people attack you for standing up for Him. They are giving you the Kingdom of Heaven.

There’s an old hymn that goes, “Stand up, stand for Jesus, ye soldiers of the cross.”

In our world, we might better sing, “Don’t be embarrassed by Jesus. Don’t be ashamed of His Name.”

“Stand up, stand for Jesus, ye soldiers of the cross.”

‘Stand Up for Jesus’ was the dy­ing mes­sage of the Rev­er­end Dud­ley A. Tyng to the Young Men’s Christ­ian As­so­ci­a­tion…The Sab­bath be­fore his death he preached in the im­mense ed­i­fice known as Jaynes’ Hall, one of the most suc­cess­ful ser­mons of mo­dern times. Of the five thou­sand men there as­sem­bled, at least one thou­sand, it was be­lieved were ‘the slain of the Lord’…The fol­low­ing Wed­nes­day, leav­ing his stu­dy for a mo­ment, he went to the barn floor, where a mule was at work on a horse-pow­er, shell­ing corn. Pat­ting him on the neck, the sleeve of his silk stu­dy gown caught in the cogs of the wheel, and his arm was torn out the roots! His death oc­curred in a few hours…The au­thor of the hymn preached from Eph. 6:14, and the…verses were writ­ten simp­ly as the con­clud­ing ex­hor­ta­tion. The su­per­in­tend­ent of the Sab­bath school had a fly-leaf print­ed for the child­ren—a stray co­py found its way into a Bap­tist news­pa­per, from that pa­per it has gone…all over the world.

Jewish Refugee Day Daniel Khazoom. Farhud (Baghdad Pogrom, 1941).

Jewish Refugee Day: Save the date, even if you’re Ashkenazi!

August 4, 2012

The following essay (originally published at the Jerusalem Post) was written by Michelle Huberman, Creative Director of ‘Harif‘: an Association of Jews from the Middle East and North Africa.

Jews who fled Iraq register upon arriving in Israel in 1951

Landmark news [last] week: Israel has approved a special memorial day to be set aside in the Jewish calendar to mark the exodus of Jews from Arab countries. On this Jewish Refugee Day, students will learn about the 850,000 Jewish refugees who fled from their native Arab countries since the establishment of the State of Israel.  Here at Harif (the UK association of Jews from the Middle East and North Africa), we have worked tirelessly with other organisations across the globe to lobby for this day.

Co-founder of Harif, Lyn Julius stated “We are absolutely delighted, this was a long time in coming, but a great breakthrough and congratulations to Danny Ayalon.  Over half of the population of Israel  are there because of what happened to their parents and grandparents.  My parents went through a traumatic exodus from Iraq in 1950-51 and it’s important for the entire Jewish people, not just Sephardim, to remember that until they were forced to flee, these Jews lived continuously in the region centuries before it became known as the Arab world.”

This key achievement can be credited to Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon. He stated: “a new memorial day would correct a historical injustice by finally recognising the hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees and victims who were persecuted and forced to leave their homes in Arabs countries”. The recommended date for the commemoration is the anniversary of the “Farhud,” the massive pogrom against the Jews of Iraq which broke out on the Jewish holiday of Shavuot on June 1–2, 1941. During the pogrom, at least 170, and up to 780, Iraqi Jews were murdered

Daniel Khazoom. Farhud (Baghdad Pogrom, 1941).

 Ayalon said that “the Arab League should recognise the historical fault of Arab countries and these countries should bear responsibility for expelling the Jews and turning them into refugees.”

It is quite unbelievable that in Israel, where over 50% of the Jewish population have Sephardi/Mizrahi roots, that their history is not being taught in schools. But that’s about to change.  Ayalon stated that on the new memorial day, “we will remember the 850,000 Jewish refugees who were forced to flee from Arab states. This would not just be a symbolic act; in our blood-soaked region, remembrance carries a political and diplomatic meaning. The Palestinians are speaking about refugees at length.  Then we will too. While our refugees have assimilated into society, the Palestinian refuges have always been, and still remain, no more than a propaganda tool for their leaders.”

Dr Ada Aharoni, the Founder and President of IFLAC, one of a group of activists including JACI who campaigned for a memorail day in Israel, told me – Ayalon has forgotten one important aspect – how this story can promote peace, which is the central point of a memorial day. “Narratives of the past can greatly help us with problems in the present, mainly, the promotion of peace with our neighbours, and the struggle against anti-Semitism that is spreading in the world.”

Indeed – as I myself discovered when I showed the film The Forgotten Refugees (directed by Michael Grynzspan) to an audience of mainly Arab students at SOAS in London – raising awareness of the forced exodus of the Jewish refugees has the power to change minds and help promote reconciliation.

Joe Shaki, an Israeli expat living in London, felt this was a fantastic step forward, but he was cynical. Would Israel  be able to change the attitudes of the Ashkenazi elite? He still feels bitter that his family lost their considerable wealth in Baghdad and suffer poverty in Israel. “The Jews from Arab countries are still feeling the effects of the Farhud even today and many are still struggling within Israeli society.”

The challenge for us at Harif is to mark this day in the UK too. We’re hoping that the Jewish establishment in the Diaspora will take on this new day. Our predominantly Ashkenazi community simply don’t feel connected when it comes to Sephardi issues. People I meet can’t quite understand how I (an Ashkenazi woman) can be interested in Sephardi matters when it doesn’t directly concern me.

But it is impossible to have a grasp of Middle Eastern politics and hope to make peace without understanding how the Jews were treated when they lived as ‘dhimmis’ under 14 centuries of Muslim rule, especially in Yemen and North Africa. So many of our community believe that they previously lived as equals with their neighbours. But their status only really improved in the colonial era.  Films like The Silent Exodus and The Forgotten Refugees spotlight a menacing tide of 20th century pro-Nazi Arab nationalism, sweeping away all minorities before it. I know these films have changed my understanding of the conflict.

When you listen to their stories, you begin to understand why the Israeli Sephardi/Mizrahi community are so tough in their politics. Much tougher than their Ashkenazi cousins. And with good reason. They have nothing but their Israeli passports. There are no Polish grandparents through whom to claim an EU passport and retreat when times get hard. They have their backs to the wall, as they fight, work and protect the State of Israel. There is no alternative. No return to Iraq, Yemen, Syria, Egypt and Libya. Naive campaigns for coexistence at any cost created by the privileged in the West reflect neither their history nor their tragedy.

H/T : http://iranaware.com/2012/08/06/8088/

Taken From : http://cifwatch.com/2012/08/04/jewish-refugee-day-save-the-date-even-if-youre-ashkenazi/

Syria : At Last ! Some Finally Understand The Truth And Not The Media !!!

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Syria : At Last ! Some Finally Understand The Truth And Not The Media !!!

ALEPPO, Syria and BEIRUT, Lebanon — As evidence mounts that foreign Islamists are fighting alongside Syria’s increasingly radicalized rebels, Christians in Aleppo and elsewhere are taking up arms, often supplied by the regime.

“We saw what happened to the Christians in Iraq,” Abu George, a Christian resident of Aleppo’s Aziza district told GlobalPost. “What is going on in Aleppo is not a popular revolution for democracy and freedom. The fighters of the so-called Free Syrian Army are radical Sunnis who want to establish an Islamic state.”

While the 30-year-old shopkeeper said he had not received any direct threats from Syria’s Sunni Muslim rebels, he fears a repeat of Iraq’s sectarian bloodletting.

Since the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, the UN Human Rights Council estimates around half of Iraq’s 1.4 million Christians have fled the country, driven out by nearly a decade of church bombings, kidnappings and sectarian murder.

The plight of Christians in Iraq has long worried Syria’s estimated two million Christians, around 10 percent of the population. The nightmare of similar persecution has led them to support the secular regime of President Bashar al-Assad, which presents itself as a defender of minorities.

With Syria now gripped by civil war and the Assad regime fighting for its survival, however, Christians like Abu George fear retribution, already occuring in some parts of the country, from the Sunni-led rebels they refused to back.

In Qseir, a town of some 60,000 people southwest of Homs, which has been under siege by regime forces for at least seven months, mosques recently rang out with the call for all Christians, who numbered around 10,000, to leave.

The breakdown of inter-communal relations in Qseir stems from both rising fundamentalism among Sunni fighters and the widespread belief that Christians had been collaborating with the Assad regime.

Just 10 miles from the border with Lebanon, Qseir Sunni fighters are increasingly radicalized. Some openly identify themselves as mujahadeen fighting for an Islamic Caliphate rather than simply the overthrow of the Assad dictatorship.

“We fight to raise the word of God,” said Abu Salem, a 29-year-old Syrian from Qseir, recuperating recently in the no-man’s-land border between Lebanon’s northern Bekaa Valley and Syria.

As shells exploded less than a mile away, the former cement mixer showed photos on his mobile phone of Osama Bin Laden and the latest videos from Al Nusra Front, the little known jihadi group that has claimed responsibility for many of the biggest bombings to hit Damascus since January.

“After the regime is toppled this will be the first stone in building the Islamic Caliphate and Syria must adopt Islamic law,” he said.

The skinny fighter said his group, the Mujahedeen Brigade, was led by a Syrian who fought against US troops in Iraq’s Fallujah. Abu Salem said he received money from Syrian expatriates in the Gulf and that it came with the greeting that is commonly used by ultra-conservative Salafists.

While Abu Salem’s claims were impossible to verify, there is little doubt that Qseir’s Sunni fighters have grown increasingly radicalized over the past six months.

Abu Ali, a military intelligence officer who defected to the rebels and was first profiled by GlobalPost last November, and then again in a video published in March, now leads Qseir’s Wadi Brigade, one of the town’s largest and strongest rebel groups.

Interviewed regularly over Skype over the last six months, Abu Ali has expressed increasingly fundamentalist and intolerant views. He once called for foreign military assistance. But now he says that if international forces join the fight against Assad, “they would be the ones we target, even before the regime.”

Injured by shrapnel at least twice since joining the fight in Qseir last December, Abu Ali has grown a thick beard. Increasingly conservative, he criticized a Muslim reporter for smoking during a Skype call, citing the current period as a time of “holy war.”

Abu Ali said he supported the call for Christians to leave Qseir, accusing them of collaborating with the regime.

In interviews with more than a dozen Qseir residents, a Wall Street Journal reporter recently discovered a vicious cycle of murder and kidnap between Sunni and Christian families, triggered by claims that Christians were acting as regime spies. Almost all Qseir’s Christians have now fled, with many taking shelter in makeshift tents in the northern Bekaa valley.

“I used to work as a legal consultant, but now I live like a beggar here in Lebanon,” said a woman who gave her name as Marta and who said her husband had been kidnapped. She said her home in Qseir had been taken over by rebels and destroyed.

Abu George, from Aleppo, said officials from the ruling Baath Party had offered prominent Christians in Aziza and other Christian-majority areas of Aleppo “AKs and pistols” late last year. The weapons, they were told, were to protect themselves against the “armed gangs” the regime claimed to be fighting.

For the first year of Syria’s uprising, Aleppo remained largely untouched by the mass protests seen in opposition strongholds like Homs and Hama.

Today, however, Abu George sees the regime’s control over Aleppo as slipping, directly threatening his community.

“The armed fighters took over the Midan police station, very close to the Christian quarters. There are no police there now, so how can we live? We see on TV armed young men with beards shouting, ‘God is great!’ and calling for jihad. We have the right to defend ourselves.”

The exact number of Christians in Aleppo, a city of three million people, is not known but estimates vary between 100,000 and 250,000.

Like Abu George, Abu Omar al-Halaby was a shopkeeper who has taken up arms. But Abu Omar is a Sunni, a fighter with the Brigade of Unification, one of the largest rebel groups holed up in Aleppo’s Salah Adeen quarter.

Speaking to GlobalPost, Abu Omar said his unit had deliberately not deployed in Christian areas in order not to inflame communal tensions. “We are very concerned for civilians and have been working to get people out and to safety,” he said.

Abu Omar said he wanted the right “to go to a mosque, have a long beard and practice my Islamic duties freely” and said much of his motivation to fight stemmed from the religious persecution he saw his father suffer under Hafez al-Assad, Syria’s former dictator.

“My father was arrested for 15 years just because someone who hated him wrote a report to the security services, accusing him of being a member of the (banned) Muslim Brotherhood,” he said.

“He was not, but he was a religious man who spent time at the mosque. A piece of paper took him away from us. Three months after he was released from prison, he died.”

As religious and sectarian hatred intensify, Syrian rebels are being joined by foreign jihadis, some of whom have reportedly fought in Iraq, Afghanistan and even Yemen.

Last week, a Dutch and a British photographer in northern Syria were released from captivity at what they said was a training camp for between 30 and 100 foreign jihadis, who repeatedly threatened to kill them.

“They were only foreign jihadis; I don’t think there was one Syrian among them,” Dutch photographer Jeroen Oerlemans told the New York Times. “All day we were spoken to about the Quran and how they would bring sharia law to Syria. I don’t think they were Al Qaeda, they seemed too amateurish for that. They said, ‘We’re not Al Qaeda, but Al Qaeda is down the road.'”

Standing guard at the Salama border crossing near Turkey, a rebel known as Abu Sadiq told GlobalPost last week that since they had seized that and other crossings on Turkish and Iraqi borders, “more Arab fighters had entered the country to fight with us against the Assad regime.”

Abu Sadiq said the foreign fighters included men from Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Algeria and Libya and that many he had met said they were inspired to come to Syria after seeing the news on the massacres in Houla and Homs.

“We try to keep the non-Syrian fighters out of sight as we don’t want them hurting us with their radical ideas. The Assad regime brings Shiites from Iran, Iraq and Lebanon and Russian military experts so we have the right to ask for help from Sunni nations,” Abu Sadiq said.

“The regime made this a sectarian war against the Sunnis. Syria is not Afghanistan, but right now we need help from anyone.”

By Hugh Macleod and Annasofie Flamand www.globalpost.com

©
2012, Assyrian International News Agency