Editor’s note: To get David Horowitz’s perspective on the OWS movement, see his recent lead feature, Communism Reborn. For the whole story behind Occupy Wall Street and how this movement marks a new phase in the rebirth of the communist Left, read the new broadside by David Horowitz and John Perazzo, Occupy Wall Street: The Communist Movement Reborn. This essential pamphlet exposes the roots, leaders and hidden agendas of the radical movement and its war on capitalism and free societies.

Having been anointed collectively as “Person of the Year” in 2011 by the desperate and irrelevant Time magazine, the unwashed masses of the Occupy movement seem to have let the dubious honor go to their collective head. Never known for their restrained, orderly behavior, the Occupiers have even begun turning against and repulsing their supporters among the religious left.

Initially, the Los Angeles Times pronounced the Occupy movement as “a predominantly secular undertaking,” although it did note that “some left-leaning religious groups see a golden opportunity in the Occupy movement, whose central message of greater economic equality resonates deeply among faith-based progressives.”

Sure enough, religious progressives did rush to anoint the movement as it began to swell. FrontPage contributor Mark Tooley noted that such religious left icons as Jim Wallis and Shane Claiborne rhapsodized about the Occupiers standing with Jesus in their defense of the poor, even resembling St. Francis of Assisi. “Whether or not the Wall Street Occupiers are ‘ordinary people,’” Tooley wrote, “much less resemble St. Francis, the Religious Left is bursting with pride over their naughty demands.” Wallis urged his followers to embrace the movement, literally:

Our faith communities and organizations should swing their doors wide and greet the Occupiers with open arms, offering them a feast to say “thank you” for having the courage to raise the very religious and biblical issue of growing inequality in our society.

By the beginning of December The Huffington Post asserted that “more than 1,400 faith leaders from around the country [had] signed a pledge of solidarity with Occupy protesters.” They conducted services and provided counseling, and their churches hosted Occupy meetings. Religious communities of all stripes rushed to offer the Occupiers shelter and solidarity:

In addition to spiritual ministry and space to assemble and sleep, religious communities have provided the Occupy movement with material support such as food, clothing, tents, blankets and heaters.

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams wrote that Jesus would be among the Occupiers of St. Paul’s Cathedral, and that the movement had prompted people to examine themselves and ask, “What would Jesus do?”

But the behavior of the Occupiers themselves belied all this spiritual praise. If the Occupiers did ask themselves “What would Jesus do?” then they apparently came to the conclusion that Jesus would expose himself, rape, urinate and defecate in public, endanger children, steal, trespass, trash public and private property, harass and denounce Jews, assault non-protesters and police, block traffic, take drugs, hurl Molotov cocktails and blood and vinegar, and more. Andrew Breitbart’s Big Government website has posted a jaw-dropping, ongoing “rap sheet” of the Occupy movement’s reprehensible if not actually criminal behavior that numbers well over 400 incidents. But that list hasn’t been updated for a month. To date, arrests at Occupy events number over 6,000, including over 400 in Oakland alone last weekend. By contrast, the Tea Party movement doesn’t even litter.

The Muslim world is threatened by religious fanaticism. The Western world is threatened by secular fanaticism.

Both seek to dominate society and to use state power to do so. Both seek to eliminate the Other — for Islamic fanatics, that means non-Muslim religions and secularism; for secular fanatics, it means Christianity and virtually any public invoking of God. The Islamists impose Sharia law; the American Civil Liberties Union and the left generally impose secular law. The Taliban wiped out public vestiges of Buddhism in Afghanistan; the ACLU and its allies seek to wipe out public vestiges of Christianity in America — as it did, for example, in Los Angeles County, when it successfully pressured the County Board of Supervisors to remove the tiny cross from the county seal. A city and county founded by Catholics — hence the name “The Angels” — was forced to stop commemorating its founders because they were religious.

This fanaticism has been on display most recently in the state of Rhode Island. This past Christmas, the governor, Lincoln Chafee, renamed the state Christmas tree a “holiday tree.” Though Christmas is a national holiday, for the secular fanatic, anything Christian — or, as we shall see, anything that relates to religion or God — must be banned from public life.

The latest expression of the secular equivalent of Islamism is the lawsuit brought against a Rhode Island high school, Cranston High School West, for allowing a banner, written by a seventh grader in 1963, to remain hanging on one of the school walls. An atheist student, along with the ACLU, brought the lawsuit and a judge ruled that it is unconstitutional for it to hang in a public school.

To appreciate how fanatical the student, the ACLU and the ruling are, you have to know the words on the banner. So here they are:

Our Heavenly Father

Grant us each day the desire to do our best, to grow mentally and morally as well as physically, to be kind and helpful to our classmates and teachers, to be honest with ourselves as well as with others.

Help us to be good sports and smile when we lose as well as when we win. Teach us the value of true friendship. Help us always to conduct ourselves so as to bring credit to Cranston High School West.

Amen

The idea that this prayer violates the Constitution of the United States is as much a mockery of the Constitution as it is of common sense. Only a fanatic can welcome the removal of such a non-denominational, sweet, moral exhortation from a high school wall. America is indeed as endangered by the ACLU as the Muslim world is by Islamists.

Last week, on Thanksgiving, President Obama delivered a message to the American people.  It ran eleven paragraphs and 503 words.  None of those words was God.  Obama thanked the men and women who defend the country; he thanked volunteers at soup kitchens.  All of that is well and good.  Thanksgiving is about celebrating community.  But more than anything, it’s about celebrating the benevolence of God.

At least that’s what George Washington said in declaring it a national holiday.  The day of Thanksgiving, he stated, was to “be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be– That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks–for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation …”

Upon seeing Obama’s God-less message, I tweeted, “Unreal that Obama doesn’t mention God in Thanksgiving message. Militant atheist. To whom does he think we are giving thanks?”

The “militant atheist” part of the tweet was based not only on Obama’s omission from the Thanksgiving message.  It was based on Obama’s long history of dislike for religion: his comment that small town Americans are bitter folks who “cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment”; his speeches in which he portrayed the Bible as out of touch and ridiculous, suggesting that the Sermon on the Mount would force the shutdown of the Defense Department; his support for radical Muslims at the expense of Coptic Christians in Egypt; the list goes on.

My tweet, needless to say, caused consternation on the left.  Aside from the usual nutcases who cannot write anything without four-letter words, liberal outlets like Mediaite and Gawker suggested I was crazy for mentioning Obama’s comments.

This wasn’t just the Obama Defense Mechanism kicking in.  This was something larger than mere politics.

On Sunday, I sat down to watch the Denver Broncos play the San Diego Chargers. I noticed the same sort of virulent anger as I had experienced after tweeting – only this time, it was directed at Denver QB Tim Tebow.  Now, Tebow isn’t the world’s greatest quarterback.  He’s not Aaron Rodgers or even Ben Roethlisberger.  He’s a mediocre passer and a good runner; he’s a possession QB.  He wins.  And he’s always polite.

What happens when a religion demonizes women and puts them out of sight and mind?

To attract young Jewish Americans to your politics you need to be young, vibrant…sexy?  Progressives have repurposed Judaism to suit their political needs and their marketing it with some good ol’ fashioned sex appeal.

My cantor is in his 80s.  He drives a silver Jag with a “Stop Pelosi” bumper sticker at 20mph and lovingly chuckles as he tells you that his wife of 60+ years is now studying Scientology.  “She’s still trying to find herself,” he says with a glint in his eye.  “One week in Auschwitz and I knew who I was.”

Over lunch last week he told me two stories.  The first was about a screenwriter who had approached him and asked if she could craft his survival story for Hollywood.  Never one to stare down an opportunity, he shared his story.  When he got to the part about the secret girlfriend he had in the camps, the screenwriter asked for more details.

“We discussed Plato,” the Cantor explained carefully, jaw set firm with a warning glare in his eyes.

Nuance was apparently not in her parlance.  The story needs sex, she explained.  Hollywood is loaded with Holocaust memoirs.  We need something that will really catch their eye—really appeal to their… senses.

In other words, for it to appeal to Hollywood’s desired younger demographic, we need to start sexing up the Holocaust.

My Cantor laughed at my observation and remarked, “What are you going to do?”

The second story he told me was about his latest batch of bar and bat mitzvah students.  “These kids could care less,” he observed.  “These Jewish schools, they teach no pride.  But,” he paused and shook off his displeasure, “what are you going to do?”

I’d say sex up the bar mitzvah, but we already have: It’s called the after-party.   Haven’t been to a chocolate fountain-laden, DJ dancer-thumping tween party in a while?  Just check out Keeping Up with the Steins.  But the sexing up of modern Judaism doesn’t stop there.

The Union for Reform Judaism offers a slew of youth programming in association with NFTY- the North American Federation of Temple Youth, a branch of Netzer Olami, the “worldwide youth movement of the World Union for Progressive Judaism.”  According to their website, Living NFTY entails the very Jewish ideas of vowing not to use your cell phone while driving, eradicating bullying, and educating communities about eating disorders.  Along with passing a resolution regarding conflict minerals at their latest national meeting, NFTY decided that this year’s study theme would be on the “Power of Personal Expression.”

Turning what was a community into a confederation of individual expression isn’t solely the responsibility of Reform Judaism and it doesn’t end after college graduation.  For Gen-X/Y/Z-ers, Jewish pop culture picks up the slack.  Initiated a few years ago with magazines like HEEB, movies like The Hebrew Hammer, and well-chronicled by Lisa Alcalay Klug in her book Cool Jew: The Ultimate Guide for Every Member of the Tribe, this “emerging” movement of Pop Judaism is keeping Jewish sexy—in a very progressive way.

Promoting “a new generation of organic, decentralized, and flexible structures,” Judaism’s Emergent sector touts “…online communities, the social justice orgs, political initiatives and culture creators.”  In other words, the Emergent movement is replacing the synagogue and community center with Facebook and Twitter, and the religion of Judaism with the politics of Progressivism.

Kung Fu Jew, writing at JewSchool.com (one of the bastions of the Emergent movement), recently attended TribeFest, sponsored by the Jewish Federations of North America.  Held in Las Vegas, the three-day symposium featured a keynote from the DNC’s new chief, Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, along with a series of panel discussions including the titles “Do You Have to Love Israel to Be a Good Jew?”  and “Rock the Vote: Engaging in Our Democracy.”  The “Rock the Vote” panel was a solo act featuring the head of Rock the Vote, an overwhelmingly pro-Obama non-profit that made no bones about using sex to encourage youth support for ObamaCare in 2009.  Commenting on the “young leader’s soiree,” Kung Fu wrote:

“…it certainly has caught our elders’ attention that large numbers of their children vote with their feet and leave the communal fold for alternate ventures.   …TribeFest is at long last an acknowledgement that the existing model isn’t sustainable.”

What is “sustainable” in the eyes of Emergent Jews?  Progressive organizations like J Street, the New Israel Fund, and Encounter; progressive-themed events like the NY Food Justice Seder;  and the insistence that the most democratic country in the Middle East somehow just doesn’t understand what “democracy” means—from a Progressive point of view.

Sustainable Emergent Judaism is more akin to a political movement with a religious façade than vice-versa.  Yet, not unlike their political adversaries, this Progressive Judaism makes careful use of their religion to justify their partisan motives.  Taking ideas expressed in Jewish liturgy, like Tikkun Olam, and refashioning them to suit an agenda of social justice, Progressive Judaism can refashion any cause into a seemingly Jewish one.  This helps to re-focus a Judaism built on the three pillars of G-d, Torah, and Israel, onto more popular, “sexier” causes like suffering Palestinians, bulimic teenagers, and diamonds in the Congo.  Naysayers to this emergent trend who dare to point out that these causes have nothing to do with learning about or growing in Jewishness can simply be accused of not being a good Jew, and suddenly an entire political movement has inerrant justification because it appears to the human eye that God is on their side.

Given this understanding, it should come as no surprise that my cantor’s students could care less about their Jewish inheritance, because they have absolutely no idea what a Jewish inheritance is.  They are aware of the fact that they are responsible for championing a variety of causes that, to the mind of an average American tween, seem incredibly remote at best.  Pop Judaism serves to fill in the gaps via the Internet, turning what once was a community-based faith into a confederation of politicized WiFi hotspots, and voila!  Sexy Judaism doesn’t just appeal to Hollywood anymore.

Guilt and familial obligation just don’t cut it for young Jewish Americans.  The religion of Judaism and the culture of Jewishness need to be, well, sexy.  For a growing number of Jewish American youth, sexy Judaism is progressive Judaism.  Leftists have finally found a way to make the ideology of Marx, Stalin, Che and Mao appealing to the younger demographic, and even palatable to the older crowd, simply by giving progressivism a Jewish veneer.  Who knew that in the process, any true Jewishness would disintegrate from the inside out?

Well, what are you going to do?

Although many won’t admit it, we are in the midst of an ideological war with Islam. And since the advantage goes to the side that fully realizes they are at war, the West is losing. The propaganda war is going in favor of Islam precisely because the West doesn’t realize it is supposed to be fighting one. The ability of Islam to rally much of the world behind its hatred of Israel is a telling indication of who is winning the war of ideas. As for war aims, it’s not clear that there are any. Even those who see the danger clearly rarely talk in terms of victory; they talk mainly in terms of resisting cultural jihad. You know you’re in trouble when your ideological opponent is a primitive seventh-century belief system, and yet the best that your top strategists hope for is to put up a good resistance.

As the Dracula-like return of Communist ideology demonstrates, an ideological war needs to be fought to complete and total victory. The enemy ideology should be so thoroughly discredited that no one—not even its former staunchest defenders, not even the most doctrinaire college professor—will want to be associated with it. In regard to Islam, then, our aim should go beyond simply resisting jihad; it should be the defeat of Islam as an idea. But, aside from inflicting crushing military defeats on Islamic powers, how do you accomplish that?

One answer is that you do all you can to force Muslims to question their faith in Islam. As Mark Steyn observes, “there’s no market for a faith that has no faith in itself.” He was speaking, of course, of the more mushy versions of Western Christianity—the post-Christian Christians who seem anxious to dialogue themselves into dhimmitude. But there’s no reason the concept can’t be applied to Islam. Surely the average intelligent Muslim has occasional doubts about the founding revelations. And just as surely he keeps them to himself, not only because he fears his fellow Muslims, but also because the rest of the world seems to be going along with the pretense that he belongs to a great religion. It may be time for the rest of the world to drop the pretense.

If one of your opponents’ core beliefs is that you need to be subjugated, why wouldn’t you want to foster doubts in his mind? Jihadists commit jihad because they correctly perceive that their religion calls them to it. As long as they are kept secure in the illusion that their faith is unassailable, they will continue the jihad by whatever means seem most expedient. They won’t question their faith—and neither will the majority of Muslims—unless they get used to the fact that it can be questioned and criticized.

One man who has done a lot to shake up the faith of Muslims is Fr. Zakaria Botros, a Coptic priest who hosts a weekly Arabic language TV program watched by millions of Muslims around the world. Among other things, the engaging Fr. Botros forces his Muslim audience to confront unflattering facts about their prophet. He also talks to them about the Christian faith—something that most Muslims know very little about, beyond some simple caricatures. Apparently he is very successful at what he does. According to reports he is responsible for mass conversions to Christianity.

Does such questioning of Muhammad’s character provoke anger among Muslims? Well, yes, it does. The elderly Fr. Botros has been labeled Islam’s “Public Enemy #1,” and a reported $60 million bounty has been put on his head. But, according to a recent piece by Raymond Ibrahim, “the outrage appears to be subsiding.” Ibrahim contends that Life TV (the satellite station that carries Fr. Botros’ program) “has conditioned its Muslim viewers to accept that exposure and criticism of their prophet is here to stay.” The first time a Muslim hears the moral flaws of the Prophet exposed, he may well be angry at the exposure. But how about the third time? The tenth time? The twentieth time? What initially provokes anger might eventually provoke doubts about Muhammad’s claims.

There are those who think that such efforts are doomed to failure—that Islam is too deeply rooted in the Muslim world. But deeply held beliefs are not always as deeply rooted as they seem. Thirty-five years ago it would have been non-controversial to say that the Catholic faith was deeply rooted in Ireland, but if you said it today you would be going out on a limb. More to the point, Islam itself was less “deeply rooted” 60 years ago in the Middle East than it is now. Consider this recollection by Ali A. Allawi, a former Iraqi cabinet minister:

I was born into a mildly observant family in Iraq. At that time, the 1950’s, secularism was ascendant among the political, cultural, and intellectual elites of the Middle East. It appeared to be only a matter of time before Islam would lose whatever hold it still had on the Muslim world. Even that term—“Muslim world”—was unusual, as Muslims were more likely to identify themselves by their national, ethnic, or ideological affinities than by their religion.

Deeply rooted? Perhaps you’ve seen that sequence of photos of the University of Cairo graduating classes for the English Department. The women of the Class of 1959 look like college students anywhere in the Western world circa 1959. They wear Western style skirts and dresses and no head covering. Ditto for the class of 1978. It could be the class of ’78 at the University of Chicago. But by 1994 half the women are wearing hijabs. By 2004 almost all the women are wearing hijabs and ankle-length clothing. So, sometime in the 1990’s educated Muslims apparently began to take their faith more seriously. They appear to take it very seriously now. But how “deeply rooted” is twenty years?

Given that the penalty for leaving Islam—or even criticizing it—can be death, we may be mistaking deeply rooted fear for deeply rooted faith. Moreover, the fact that Islam prescribes such harsh penalties for doubters suggests that the faith itself is not intrinsically convincing. As the Ayatollah Khomeini once said, “People cannot be made obedient except with the sword.” Any religion that needs so many external incentives—swords behind you, and virgins in your future—cries out to be questioned. Unfortunately, instead of exploiting its theological weaknesses the West insists on chivalrously shielding Islam from the kind of scrutiny that the West reserves for its own institutions and traditions. And with good reason. Because it’s generally understood, though rarely said, that Muhammad’s claims would not meet the tests of critical reason and historical evidence that we apply to the Judeo-Christian revelation. The much revered sufi theologian al-Ghazali wrote, “The dhimmi is obliged not to mention Allah or his Prophet…” You can see why. Curiosity didn’t kill Christianity, but curiosity would almost certainly kill the Caliphate—or, in our times, the hope for a resurrected Caliphate. Obliged not to mention the Prophet? Given the threat Islam poses to the world and to Muslims themselves, it’s beginning to look as though the obligation runs the other way. The world needs to take a much closer look at the Prophet and his claims. The Prophet is Islam’s main prop. If he is discredited, Islam is discredited. Hence, the mighty efforts by the OIC to make it a crime to blaspheme a prophet.

The Prophet’s integrity is not the only thing in doubt. Theologically speaking, Islam is a house of cards. The whole faith rests on the belief that Muhammad actually received a revelation from God. But where’s the proof? Were there any witnesses to this revelation other than Muhammad? Why should we take his word for it? Why were there so many revelations of convenience that worked directly to Muhammad’s personal advantage? Are there really dozens of renewable virgins awaiting young warriors in paradise, or was this revelation simply a clever recruitment tool manufactured by Muhammad to provide an incentive for following him? And why is the Koran, despite its flashes of poetic brilliance, put together like a soviet-era automobile? As an exercise in composition the Koran would not pass muster in most freshmen writing courses. Why can’t God write as well as the average college student?

Ordinarily it’s not a good idea to go around questioning other people’s firmly held beliefs. But these are not ordinary times, and Islam is no ordinary religion. As any number of observes have noted, it’s partly a religion and partly a supremacist political ideology—although no one seems to be able to say exactly what percent is political ideology and what percent is religion. Is it 50/50 or 60/40 or 80/20? Is it legitimate to criticize the political part of it, but not the religious part? How do you tell where the politics leaves off and the religion begins? Or are they so bound together that they can’t be separated?

If you remember “Joe Palooka,” the old comic strip series about a decent but not-too-bright heavyweight boxer, you might remember that one of Joe’s craftier opponents once tattooed his rather expansive stomach with the word “Mother” inscribed within a large heart. His midsection was his weak spot, of course, but he knew he could count on Joe to avoid hitting him there, Joe being too much of a gentleman to do otherwise. In On the Waterfront, Marlon Brando’s character refers to the place where failed fighters go as “palookaville.” Currently, our whole culture is in danger of ending up in “palookaville” because there are large areas of Islam we decline to examine out of a sense of delicacy that would be excessive in a Victorian matron. Islamic strategists are counting on polite Westerners not to hit them in their soft spot.

Islamic strategists invoke the supremacist principles of the Koran in order to stir up aggression against the Muslim world, yet any criticism of Islam is met with cries of, “No fair! You are blaspheming a prophet and his religion.” So far, the shame-on-you-for-criticizing-a-religion strategy has worked very effectively. Fortunately, a few, like Fr. Botros, aren’t buying into the ruse. He has enough respect for Muslims as individuals to realize that their religion should not be put beyond discussion. Many Muslims, especially Muslim women, suffer a profound sense of desperation: the feeling of being trapped in a 1400-year-old nightmare, with no way out. It’s difficult to see any convincing argument for propping up the system that oppresses them. On the contrary, it seems almost a duty to undermine that system—political and religious—and call it into question at every turn.

In past ideological struggles we wisely sought ideological victory—the discrediting of the belief system that inspired our enemies. Because the driving force behind Islamic aggression is Islamic theology, it makes no sense to treat Islamic theology like a protected species. Rather, we should hope that Muslims lose faith in Islam just as Nazis lost faith in Nazism and Eastern-bloc Communists lost faith in communism.

Of course, it would be all the better if, like Fr. Botros, we had something to offer them in its place. Winston Churchill once said that Greer Garson, for her role in Mrs. Miniver, was worth six divisions in the war against Hitler. It seems safe to say that Fr. Botros, for his role in instilling doubts about Islam and giving Muslims something solid in its place, is worth at least a couple of Departments of Homeland Security.

William Kilpatrick’s articles have appeared in FrontPage Magazine, First Things, Catholic World Report, National Catholic Register, Jihad Watch, World, and Investor’s Business Daily.

Prince Charles yesterday urged the world to follow Islamic 'spiritual principles' in order to save the environment.

In a high-profile speech, the heir to the throne argued that man's destruction of the world was contrary to the scriptures of all religions - but particularly that of the Islamic faith.

He said the current 'division' between Man and Nature had been caused not just by industrialisation, technological development and the relentless pursuit of economic growth, but also by our attitude to our relationship with Nature - which goes against the grain of 'sacred traditions'.

Charles, who is a practising Christian, spoke in depth about his own study of the Qu'ran [sic] which, he said, tells its followers that there is 'no separation between Man and Nature' and says we must always live within Nature's mean and limits

'From what I know of the Qu'ran [sic], again and again it describes the natural world as the handiwork of a unitary benevolent power,' he said.

'It very explicitly describes Nature as possessing an "intelligibility" and that there is no separation between Man and Nature, precisely because there is no separation between the natural world and God.

'It offers a completely integrated view of the Universe where religion and science, mind and matter are all part of one living, conscious whole.

'This suggests to me that Nature is a knowing partner, never a mindless slave to humanity, and we are Her tenants; God's guests for all too short a time.'

The prince was speaking to an audience of scholars at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, which attempts to encourage a better understanding of the culture and civilisation of the religion, of which he is patron....

As one would expect, this campaign is focused on external appearances, and not toward challenging allegedly "extremist" views among fellow Muslims. And it's predictably deceptive. Glowing generalities like the one on the car pictured above require readers to project their own cultural understanding of ideas like "women's rights" onto the propaganda presented to them.

Muhammad favored "women's rights," did he? But what was the extent of what he thought the rights of women were? Qur'an 4:34 allows men to hit their wives. Qur'an 2:23 says "our women are a tilth for you (to cultivate) so go to your tilth as ye will." Qur'an 2:282 says a woman's testimony is worth half a man's. And Sahih Bukhari 4.54.460 says "If a husband calls his wife to his bed (i.e. to have sexual relation) and she refuses and causes him to sleep in anger, the angels will curse her till morning."

"U.K. ad campaign launched to improve image of Muslims," by Scott Maniquet for the National Post, June 7 (thanks to Nicolei):

Let's face it, some religions do a good job getting their feel good message across, while for whatever reason, some others have a much harder time.

But probably no religion is in more need of a good public relations overhaul than Islam.

This became apparent in Britain when a recent poll found that 58% associated Islam with extremism and 50% associated it with terrorism. The poll also found that only 13% of respondents believed that Islam - called the "religion of peace' by its adherents - was based on peace.

And we all just pulled that idea out of our hats one day -- no particular reason at all.

In response, the Exploring Islam Foundation has launched a U.K. ad campaign to bolster public perception of the religion.

The Inspired by Muhammad campaign features photos of Muslim professionals next to catchy phrases like:

"I believe in social justice. So did Muhammad."

Again, that depends on your idea of justice. Subjugation of unbelievers? Cutting the hands off of thieves and stoning adulterers? Executing apostates?

"I believe in women's rights. So did Muhammad."

"I believe in protecting the environment. So did Muhammad."

A spokesman for Quilliam Foundation, a counter-extremism think tank which seeks to promote a "British Islam. . . free from the bitter politics of the Arab and Muslim world, told London's Independent:

"This campaign is important because it can help non-Muslims to better understand the faith that inspires and guides their Muslim friends, neighbours and colleagues.

"This initiative also helps British Muslims reclaim the Prophet Mohamed as a time-honoured guide for peace, compassion and social justice from those who seek to twist his teachings."

Right, vague generalities will let all the air out of "chapter and verse."

With 80% of Canadians agreeing with Quebec's proposed niqab ban, perhaps we will be seeing a similar campaign here in the future.

Since I wrote in HUMAN EVENTS on May 14 about the plans to build a giant 15-story mosque and Islamic Center next to Ground Zero, the deceptions and Islamic supremacist intentions of the mosque organizers have become more obvious. Yet Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York and the New York political establishment refuse to listen to the will of the people.

This why the Stop Islamization of America (SIOA) June 6 rally against the proposed mega-mosque is so important. The Islamic supremacists must not be allowed to do a victory dance on the hallowed burial ground of Ground Zero. They must be exposed and shamed until they withdraw their plans for the mosque.

Bloomberg framed it as a freedom of religion issue: "I think it's fair to say if somebody was going to try, on that piece of property, to build a church or a synagogue, nobody would be yelling and screaming. And the fact of the matter is that Muslims have a right to do it, too.... What is great about America and particularly New York is we welcome everybody, and if we are so afraid of something like this, what does that say about us?... If you are religious, you do not want the government picking religions, because what do you do the day they don't pick yours?"

While I agree that that the government should keep its nose out of religion, also believe that if the mayor really believes government should stay out of it, he shouldn't publicly take one side. But the mayor already has chosen sides, before plans for this mosque became public.

SIOA has called on Bloomberg many times to remove Omar Mohammedi, a lawyer tied to the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), from New York City's Human Rights Commission. Bloomberg keeps him on. And before Times Square jihad bomber Faisal Shahzad was caught, Bloomberg offered his opinion: that the would-be car bomber was probably a right-winger who was upset about Obamacare.

This is why I believe petitions to the mayor are a waste of time. But the June 6 rally will show him that he is on the wrong side of the will of the people because the people of New York know that the mayor is wrong.

This mosque is not about freedom of religion. It's about insulting America and the victims of 9/11 and establishing an international symbol for Islamic supremacism in New York. The mega-mosque will be the rallying cry for the universal caliphate--a shrine to jihad at the cherished site of Islamic conquest....

Read it all.

In the Family Way is our sub-blog devoted to bringing the Freedom Center’s messages to parents and families.

Rhonda Robinson is the associate editor in charge of it and she needs a few more people on her team who are concerned about families and eager to write about politics. The sub-blog also focuses on examining the intersection of religion and politics. Its writers will frequently challenge the so-called “Religious Left” who have hijacked religion for political purposes.

If you would like to apply to blog for In the Family Way then please contact us below. Tell us about you, your writing, and what you’d like to bring to the publication. High-potential contacts will be given the opportunity to apply

In this special edition of Frontpage Symposium, we have invited two distinguished guests to discuss the question: When does a religion become an ideology? Our guests today are:

Tawfik Hamid, an Islamic thinker and reformer who is the author of Inside Jihad: Understanding and Confronting Radical Islam. A one-time Islamic extremist from Egypt, he was a member of Jemaah Islamiya, a terrorist Islamic organization, with Dr. Ayman Al-Zawahiri, who later became the second in command of al-Qaeda. He is currently a senior fellow and chairman of the study of Islamic radicalism at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies.

and

David Satter, a senior fellow of the Hudson Institute and a visiting scholar at the Johns Hopkins University Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He was Moscow correspondent of the Financial Times of London from 1976 to 1982, during the height of the Soviet totalitarian period and he is the author of Age of Delirium: the Decline and Fall of the Soviet Union, which is being made into a documentary film. His most recent work is Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State.

FP: Tawfik Hamid and David Satter, welcome to Frontpage Symposium.

Mr. Hamid, let us begin with you. Make an introductory statement for us to get our discussion started: When does a religion become an ideology?

Hamid: A religion becomes an ideology when the followers of this religion cannot tolerate the existence of those who have different views or beliefs, and when they understand their religious text literally and refuse to accept any way of understanding the religion other than their own way of understanding.

FP: Thank you.

Dr. Satter how would you now build on Mr. Hamid’s statement?

Satter: I think another way of putting it is that a religion becomes an ideology when man-made dogma is treated as infallible truth.

Although there are adherents of all three major monotheistic faiths who believe that every word of the sacred texts is to be taken literally, for the post-Enlightenment rationalist mind, there is a distinction between transcendent moral truths, exemplified in the case of Judaism and Christianity in the Golden Rule and the Ten Commandments and the dogmatic contents of the religions expressed in their historical accounts and ritual requirements.

This distinction is important to bear in mind because transcendent moral truths are never the content of an ideology. An ideology contains an assertion about society that is treated as ultimate truth and applied indiscriminately to explain all aspects of political reality. Since transcendent moral truths owe their character to the fact that they are “over and above” society, they cannot contribute to the content of an ideology. In fact, the effect of an ideology is always to destroy true moral transcendence.

The ritual requirements or dogmatic assertions about history of a religion, however, are perfectly suitable for the construction of an ideology. The obligation in Islam to wage jihad, properly interpreted, can be made the basis of an ideology which treats waging war on unbelievers as the highest obligation of a Moslem and evaluates all actions in terms of the extent to which they support this sacred obligation. Other religions too have aspects that could become the material of an ideology. One example is the doctrine of the Jews as the “Chosen People.” Although this doctrine has never been used to justify the oppression of others, it could be.

A religion becomes an ideology when its man-made elements become an idée fixe and are seized upon as an idea that can be imposed on all political and social institutions in the interests of power. The temptation was explained best in Dostoevsky’s tale of the Grand Inquisitor where the inquisitor explains to Jesus the essence of an ideology’s appeal:

Instead of the strict ancient law, man had in future to decide for himself with a free heart what is good and what is evil, having only your image before him for guidance. But did it never occur to you that he would at last reject and call in question even your image and your truth, if he were weighed down by as fearful a burden as freedom of choice.

Laying down that burden may be easiest of all if the mental prison thereby created is constructed with the materials of supposedly sacred religious teachings.

Hamid: In general, I agree with many of the above views. I would like to add that, based on David’s analysis, I see that having an ideology is not by itself the problem. For example, the ideology of the chosen people — as he mentioned — was not used to oppress others.  It is the part of ideology that is used to oppress others, such as ‘violent Jihad’ in Islam that is actually causing the problem.

A good distinction that David made was the distinction between true moral transcendence and ideology. It is important to mention that one of the main problems in traditional Islam is that the pillars of the religion [to say Non G-d other than Allah and Mohamed is the prophet of Allah, the 5 prayers, the obligatory tax (Zakkat), the fasting of Ramadan and the pilgrimage (Haj)] are rituals rather than moral values. In other words, based on the traditional views within Islam, Bin Laden can be a good Muslim because he follows the 5 pillars of Islam. On the contrary, if the pillars of Islam include ‘you shall not commit murder’ or other moral values, Muslims would not have seen people like Bin Laden and the terrorists as real Muslims. The ideology and the religious dogma of the 5 pillars made many Muslims unable to use the transcendent moral truth to judge people like Bin Laden.

Regarding the view that ‘man had in future to decide for himself with a free heart what is good and what is evil,’ I agree with this but I will add that the inspired moral values from religion such as ‘you shall not commit murder and ‘you shall not steal’ should remain as the back bone for future moral values. We may change some practical applications for these values but the pillars for such values will remain — at least in the view of many — as inspired values via the creator (i.e. not man-made).

Regarding the statement that “Laying down that burden may be easiest of all if the mental prison thereby created is constructed with the materials of supposedly sacred religious teachings.” I have seen the practical application for this in our Islamic society when many in the Muslim world adopt Islam as an ideology as a reaction to the moral relativism concepts that flourished in the Muslim world in the 1950s and 60s partially due to the work of liberal movements. The Islamic societies could not tolerate the lack of clear borders or ‘prison’ for their mind and it was much easier for many in these societies to follow an ‘ideology’ with clear borders rather than having the burden of freedom of choice.

Satter: Muslims, of course, are not the only ones who seek “clear borders.” Very few people have the confidence to identify their fundamental moral values and apply them to the myriad of complicated situations with which life confronts us. Even the most educated people fall back on mental borders that are the product of past habit and unchallenged assumptions. The problem becomes much greater when the mental borders are ubiquitous and the product of a false universal theory – as in Nazism or communism – or the dogmatic contents of a religion as in the case of radical Islam.

We are also confronted with the problem of group dynamics. Ethical judgment is the property of an individual. Dogmatic rules guide the behavior of a group. They eliminate differences and mobilize people for common action. So to the difficulty of thinking for oneself is added in an ideological situation the emotional trauma of confronting the group. Under the circumstances, it is small wonder that fanaticism in power has such terrible force. It operates on the difficulty that people have, when challenged, of defending what is truly human in each of them, their ultimate moral sense.

So what can reinforce the moral sense of the individual in the face of religious or secular fanaticism? If I understand him correctly, Tawfik provides the answer with his reference to the five pillars of Islam, none of which deal with ethical values. I think we need to be very clear in distinguishing between dogma and genuinely transcendent values. In the case of Nazism and communism, the task was easier because there were no transcendent values. Communism prided itself on its rejection of metaphysics. But in the case of radical Islam, the fanatics can draw on an authoritative religious tradition. Every word of the Koran is treated as divine truth and the authoritative interpretation of the Koran is or, at least, can be seen as being implicitly terroristic.

It seems to me that, under these circumstances, we must insist on our ability to define terms. To be truly religious, values must be transcendent. They cannot be derived from a political objective, for example, creating a classless society or a restored Caliphate. They can’t be based on the hatred of outsiders whether capitalists or infidels because the tensions that these hatreds reflect owe their origin to society which higher values necessarily transcend. Where the measure of right or wrong is the interests of a group, whether the proletariat, Aryans or the ummah, we are dealing with man made dogma regardless of any pretended religious justification. Its absolutization creates an ideology not a religion and it should be treated as an ideology and not granted the legitimacy of a religion with which it actually shares nothing. In the case of Islam, this does not mean an attack on Islamic practices as such but only their use in the service of terror under which circumstances, the issue of transcendence becomes relevant. To search for meaning is only human but it can lead to barbaric conclusions if it proceeds without ethical guidance. In a nuclear world, we need to defend the distinction between higher values and dogma as a matter of fundamental self defense.

Hamid: I agree with the points that David mentioned and would like to add more applied points that relate to Radical Islam.

David raised the point of “Difficulty to think for oneself”. This is exactly what happened to me and to many members in the Radical organizations. We felt that we are like sheep that just need to follow the leader. Individual thinking was lost especially when the radical leaders discouraged us from ‘thinking’.

David considered the ummah concept as “a man made dogma regardless of any pretended religious justification”. This could be true however; Muslims see the ummah concept as a religious based one. It is vital to understand how Muslims see such a concept in order to be able to approach the problem and deal with it correctly. In this regard, it is also important to emphasize that Communism and Nazism were seen by most of their followers as manmade ideology. In Islam, the situation is completely different as most Muslims see the ideological component as a religious revelation from Allah. In the former situation (i.e. manmade ideology) it is much easier to change the ideology as you can prove it wrong. When the ideology, as in case of Islam, is processed at the subconscious and emotional levels of the brain (as a religion) rather than the high cortical levels (as the case of communism and Nazism) it is much more difficult to change it.

I completely agree with David about the need to have a clear distinction between religion

and Ideology. Islam that only works inside a mosque as a form of individual worship can be considered a religion. However, Islam that is used as a political power and a controlling system for the society must be treated as an Ideology. The West need to be clear about this issue, as giving the Ideological part of Islam (that promotes violence and control of others) the protection and privileges that are given to a religion can be catastrophic. This ideological part of Islam has to be fought as the case with fighting communism and Nazism. If we failed to make such a separation between Islam as personal type of worship and Islam (or its interpretations) as a political and driving force to dominate others we will not be able to control radical Islamic ideology in the future. In fact we may be actually giving support to the radical ideology if we gave it the advantages of a religion. Allowing the ideological part of Islam to flourish under the banner of religious freedom weakens the spiritual part of the religion itself and makes things more complicated.

Satter: Politics dominates our lives and there is always a temptation to make a religion out of politics. If a political objective has divine significance, it is worth dying for and, of course, worth killing for. Those obsessed with a political mission are fearless and resourceful. Relieved of the need to exercise individual moral judgment, they become ruthless spies, talented strategists and remorseless killers. This is why it is so important to show a political ideology in all its man made artificiality. Only in this way can an ideological movement be discredited.  One hopes that it will be harder to organize mass crimes on behalf of a system that has been shown to be not divinely inspired but man made. In any case, the effort offers some hope for the future.

FP: Tawfik Hamid and David Satter, thank you for joining Frontpage Symposium.

Luxembourg - The European Union and United States will protect the rights of all religions, including Islam, as they try to fight international terrorism, the two sides declared in a joint statement on Thursday.

Muslims across the EU and US say that they are being unfairly targeted, and their religion demonised, as part of the West's campaign against violent groups such as al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda and other Muslim groups that use Islamic texts and teachings to justify their actions are doing the "demonizing," in reality.

The two sides are determined to promote "environments where robust freedoms of religion and expression are enjoyed" and "international efforts to enhance dialogue and broaden understanding among civilizations," the statement said.

That declaration "sends a message to the world in general, and Muslim countries in particular, that we will defend and protect our values ... and that we will remain tolerant of other religions, beliefs and cultures," Spanish Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said after talks with EU counterparts in Luxembourg.

The meeting gave the EU's final approval to the declaration. Rubalcaba chaired the debate, as Spain currently holds the EU's rotating presidency.

The EU and US are both trying to improve their relations with Muslim communities as part of broader efforts to reduce radicalisation and terrorist recruitment in their own countries.

The two sides acknowledge the importance of "countering the threat of home-grown violent extremism" and "addressing legitimate concerns and grievances regarding civil rights and civil liberties from minorities and individuals, in order to build their opposition to violent extremists," their statement said....

Our SIOA protest against this mosque is on for June 6 at noon, outside Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan. Be there!

"Bloomberg defends Ground Zero mosque as freedom-of-faith issue," by David Seifman for the New York Post, May 29 (thanks to Pamela Hall):

In his fiercest defense yet of the mosque proposed near Ground Zero, Mayor Bloomberg declared yesterday that it must be allowed to proceed because the government "shouldn't be in the business of picking" one religion over another.

"I think it's fair to say if somebody was going to try, on that piece of property, to build a church or a synagogue, nobody would be yelling and screaming," the mayor said.

"And the fact of the matter is that Muslims have a right to do it, too."...

"What is great about America and particularly New York is we welcome everybody, and if we are so afraid of something like this, what does that say about us?" asked the mayor.

"Democracy is stronger than this. You know the ability to practice your religion was one of the real reasons America was founded. And for us to just say no is just, I think, not appropriate is a nice way to phrase it

". . . If you are religious, you do not want the government picking religions, because what do you do the day they don't pick yours?"...

Visit Newsreal

Faiza Ali, of the New York chapter of CAIR, has declared that Muslims can freely leave Islam without anything to worry about. Islam, she says, does not practice coercion and preaches that forced faith is not true belief. She has made this assertion in her criticism of Pamela Geller’s “Leaving Islam” ad campaign on city buses. The campaign is aimed at helping Muslims, like Rifqa Bary, who are fearful of leaving their religion due to Islam’s death penalty for apostasy.

Hmmm, if Faiza is right, I wonder what this poor family’s trouble is all about.

I have an idea, let’s start a fund to send Faiza Ali to Iran, and then to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.

Let her stand in the middle of a busy street, in each nation’s capital, and start announcing that she is a Muslim and that she is leaving Islam to become a Christian or, better yet, a Jew. Let her hand out some flyers denouncing Islamic teachings such as: “Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him.” (Bukhari 9.84.57).

We’ll pay for her whole trip if she agrees to prove her point with this little fun experiment. And when she makes it back after all the partying, clubbing, rest and relaxation (that she will hopefully be able to fit around her apostasy charade),  we will offer her a cash prize — on top of paying for her trip and the resources needed for the flyers, etc.

Who’s with me?

*

Meanwhile, watch Pamela Geller explain her campaign on Fox and Friends:

One of the many beliefs — i.e., non-empirically based doctrines — of the post-Christian West has been that moral progress is the human norm, especially so with the demise of religion. In a secular world, the self-described enlightened thinking goes, superstition is replaced by reason, and reason leads to the moral good.

Of course, it turned out that the post-Christian West produced considerably more evil than the Christian world had. No mass cruelty in the name of Christianity approximated the vastness of the cruelty unleashed by secular doctrines and regimes in the post-Christian world. The argument against religion that more people have been killed in the name of religion than by any other doctrine is false propaganda on behalf of secularism and Leftism.

The amount of evil done by Christians — against, for example, “heretics” and Jews — in both the Western and Eastern branches of Christianity — was extensive, as was the failure of most European Christians to see Nazism for the evil that it was. The good news is that Christian evils have been acknowledged and addressed by most Christian leaders and thinkers.

But there were never any Christian Auschwitzes — i.e., systematic genocides of every man, woman and child of a particular race or religion. Nor were there Christian Gulags — the shipping of millions of innocents to conditions so horrific that prolonged suffering leading to death was the almost -inevitable end.

The anti-religious Left offers two responses to these facts: The first is that modern technology made the Nazi and Communist murders of scores of millions possible; had the church been technologically able to do so, it would have made its own Auschwitz and Gulag. The second is that Nazism and Communism were religions and not secular doctrines.

The response to the first is that technology was not necessary for the Communist murders of over a hundred million innocent people in the Soviet Union, China, Cambodia and elsewhere. In Cambodia, millions were murdered with hammers, in Rwanda with machetes.

The response to the second is that Communism and Nazism were secular movements and to deny that is to tell a gargantuan lie. Even if one argues that Nazism and Communism were religions, they were nevertheless secular religions. That too many Christians morally failed when confronted with Nazism is true, but irrelevant to the fact that Nazism was in no way a Christian movement.

And now the post-Christian world is getting worse.

The moral news about the world in which we live is almost unremittingly negative.

Russia

Russia is devoid of a moral values system. Whatever moral role the Russian Orthodox Church played was largely extinguished during the seven decades of Communist suppression of religion. Today, pockets of religious morality notwithstanding, Russia is essentially a nihilistic state. Under the leadership of a former KGB director, Russia now plays a destructive role in world affairs. Russia today is characterized by major arms shipments to Syria, protecting Iran while it becomes a nuclear power, forcing its will on Ukraine and other neighboring states, and the violent suppression of domestic critics who shed any light on the organized crime syndicate that rules the geographically largest nation in the world.

Turkey

The Ataturk Revolution is being undone. Turkey, the country long regarded as the bridge between the West and Islam, is rapidly moving away from the West and to an increasingly anti-Western Islam.

Iran

Iran is ruled by the heirs of Nazism, if that word still means anything after being cheapened by the Left for decades, most recently by the Left’s comparison of Arizona to a Nazi state. The rulers of Iran boast of their desire to initiate a second Holocaust against the Jews, all the while denying that the first Holocaust took place. And the country’s treatment of Iranians who seek elementary human freedoms and of Iranian women is among the worst on earth.

Congo

According to all reports, nearly 6 million people have been killed in the Congo in the last decade. The great secular liberal hope in “humanity” and “world opinion” has once again been shown to be the false hope it is. World opinion and “humanity” have rarely done anything to help the truly persecuted.

But there is more to the Congolese genocide — the absence of reporting about it in the world’s media and its being a non-issue at the United Nations. If an Israeli soldier kills a rock-throwing Palestinian, or even worse, makes plans to build 1,600 apartments in east Jerusalem, the U.N., world opinion and the world media cover it as if it were the primary evil on earth. But the Congolese deaths are barely worth a mention.

Mexico

Mexico is fighting for its life against narcotics gangs that compete with Islamists in their sadism. Mexico could become the largest narco-state in the world. To be a good person in Mexico today, i.e., to oppose the drug lords in any way, is to put oneself in danger of being slowly tortured to death.

Europe

Europe long ago gave up fighting for or believing in anything other than living a life with as much economic security, as many days off and as young a retirement age as possible. World War I killed off European idealism. And whatever remained was destroyed by World War II. What I have written about the Germans is true for nearly all of Europe: Instead of learning to fight evil, Europe has learned that fighting is evil.

Other consequences of European secularism and the demise of non-materialistic ideals include a low birthrate (children cost money and limit the number of fine restaurants in which one can afford to dine), and appeasement of evil. Thus most European nations are slowly disappearing and nearly every European country has compromised Western liberties in order to appease radical Muslims.

Radical Islam

Polls taken in the Muslim world regularly report that about 10 percent of the world’s Muslims say they support radical Islam — meaning Islamic totalitarianism as practiced by the Taliban and terror as practiced by Al-Qaida. That means at least one hundred million people. Add to that the unspecified number of Muslims who support the Nazi-level and Nazi-like anti-Semitism promulgated in much of the Middle East and you have an enormous body of people committed to the death of the West.

China

As in Russia, traditional Chinese virtues were largely destroyed by Communism, and China, too, is essentially a nihilistic state whose government spends its vast sums of foreign currency in buying influence in some of the cruelest places on earth (Zimbabwe, for example) and protecting the genocide-advocating regime of Iran.

The United Nations

The net result of the United Nations is an increase in evil on earth. Whatever good is performed by some of its institutions, like the World Health Organization or UNICEF, that good is outweighed by the amount of evil the U.N. either abets or allows. It has supervised genocide in Rwanda, done nothing to stop genocide elsewhere (e.g., Congo and Sudan), gives a respectable forum to tyrannies, and is preoccupied with vilifying one of its relatively few humane states, Israel. Its contributing to human suffering is exemplified by Libya being elected to its Human Rights Commission and Iran’s election to its Commission on the Status of Women.

The United States

The United States was described by President Abraham Lincoln as The Last Best Hope of Earth. Most Americans agreed then. However, with the ascent of the Left in America — in our educational institutions, news and entertainment media, and arts world — fewer and fewer Americans believe this. On the contrary, the Leftist view of America, which pervades American life, is of a country deeply morally compromised by endemic racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, militarism, imperialism and a rapacious capitalism, leading to immoral levels of economic inequality.

As in Europe, these views are leading America to avoid offending its enemies. The American attorney general recently refused to answer a congressman’s repeated question about whether he believes that radical Islam might have been one factor motivating recent Muslim terrorists in America.

With America more interested in being like Europe and being liked rather than in fighting its enemies, more and more countries are identifying with America’s enemies than with America. Last week’s three-way hug among the leaders of Brazil, Turkey and Iran was a clear example of such.

Meanwhile, America is rapidly accumulating unpayable debts that will render it not very different from Greece. Indeed, California, once the grease of the American economy, has become the Greece of the American economy.

As the Left’s power increases, America’s power recedes — and the world further deteriorates. Under Democratic Party rule, the Last Best Hope of Earth has decided that the United Nations and Western Europe deserve that title, not the United States.

Those of us working to remove Democrats from power regard this November’s election as not only a referendum on the direction of America, but of the world itself.

Dennis Prager hosts a nationally syndicated radio talk show and is a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He is the author of four books, most recently “Happiness Is a Serious Problem” (HarperCollins). His website is www.dennisprager.com.

Let me begin by saying that I used to proudly identify myself as a liberal and a “progressive.” Growing up, I never believed Islam was a threat to the enlightened, Western world. I thought it was unfair to think Islam more evil or harmful than Christianity, Judaism, or any other world religion. But I have been mugged by reality and now view things in a wholly different light.

Part of what I now understand should have been perfectly obvious. The New Testament of Christianity is substantially kinder and more magnanimous than the Qur’an. The Old Testament/Torah, while filled with morally questionable verses, is balanced and made reasonable by the Jewish Oral Tradition. The Qur’an has neither of these qualities and is, simply put, a book morally on par to Hitler’s Mein Kampf. The following verses make it easy to understand why Islam, in contemporary times, is the most violent and sexist religion in existence:

Kill disbelievers wherever you find them. If they attack you, then kill them. Such is the reward of disbelievers. 2:191-2

We shall cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Their habitation is the Fire.  3:151

A woman is worth one-half a man. 2:282

These verses are oppressive in themselves.  In addition, however, they recently caused me to be assaulted. On my college campus, several groups had come together for a several-hours-long anti-Israel protest.  The most prominent of the protesters were, unsurprisingly, members of the radical Muslim Students Association (MSA) who provocatively shouted insults at passersby about Israel’s evil.

I couldn’t resist. I walked towards the grassy, green Heritage Hill, a campus free speech zone which attracts speakers and protesters from all across the political and religious spectrum. The student doing most of the talking was a brawny fellow standing in front of twenty or so  fake coffins representing innocent Palestinians murdered by Israelis.

I stood there and listened to the protestors as they ranted about Israel’s cruelty.  I kept thinking of all the countries surrounding Israel that commit human rights violations, that are of a magnitude much higher than anything Israel has done or does. Why not protest Saudi Arabia, which publicly beheads and hangs teenagers for being homosexuals? Why not protest Iran for being a completely fascist country that suppresses freedom of speech and tortures, murders, and brutalizes its citizens on a daily basis? Why not protest Pakistan and Afghanistan for their debasement of women and vile laws regarding rape and pedophilia?

But this protest was not about human rights.  It was about Jew-hatred. (The Qur’an says, in Surah 2:96, that “Jews are the greediest of all humankind. They’d like to live 1000 years. But they are going to hell.”)  I said as much and attracted quite a crowd. Both Muslim protesters and non-Muslim students interested in the demonstration came nearer. One student, his face contorted in rage, approached me and immediately began screaming. He demanded to know why I disrespected Islam and disagreed with their presentation.

I told him exactly what I felt–that the teachings of Islam and the Qur’an are filled with hatred and based on the teachings of a pedophile—Muhammad—who consummated relations with his youngest wife, Aisha, when she was not yet in puberty.

The Muslim student grew more and more enraged as I continued to speak. When I was finished, he cocked his arm back and attempted to punch me. By grabbing and restraining him, his friends saved me from any actual altercation.

This all leads to one question: Why is a club whose only ideology is radical hatred receiving school funding? Why is a club that engenders hatred towards Israel and Jews and threatens dissenters with violence receiving taxpayer dollars to spread their insanity? And most of all, why do universities like my own not make sure, in their rush to be politically correct, that the groups they support are not violent in their words and potentially in their deeds as well?

Anonymous is a student at the University of Arizona.

The position of the Muslim community in the face of all provocations seems to be: Islam is a religion of peace, and if you say that it isn't, we will kill you. Of course, the truth is often more nuanced, but this is about as nuanced as it ever gets: Islam is a religion of peace, and if you say that it isn't, we peaceful Muslims cannot be held responsible for what our less peaceful brothers and sisters do.

At the root of this stance is a desperate attempt to have it both ways, to reconcile Islam's teachings and the actions that stem from it with the religion's claims to be just, compassionate, and peaceful. Or at the very least, it is an attempt to convince non-Muslims that the two can indeed be reconciled, and that to believe otherwise is to be bigoted and hateful. In other words, it is emotional, political blackmail.

More on this story. "Fears of Muslim backlash amid cartoon row," by Phumza Macanda for Reuters, May 21:

A South African weekly on Friday published a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad complaining that his followers lack a sense of humour, angering Muslims and raising fear of reprisal attacks during next month's World Cup.

Whose prophet?

South Africa will host the month-long soccer tournament from June 11 and police have pledged to protect the 300 000 expected foreign visitors and the teams taking part.

The Mail & Guardian newspaper published a sketch by renowned South African cartoonist Zapiro after a court rejected an overnight bid by Muslim advocacy groups for an injunction to prevent the newspaper from printing the cartoon.

The cartoon depicts the prophet on a psychologist's couch saying that his followers do not have a sense of humour.

Muslims consider any depiction of the founder of Islam to be offensive. In 2005, a Danish newspaper published cartoons of Muhammad which were subsequently republished elsewhere, sparking violent protests that killed several dozen people.

South Africa's Muslim Judicial Council (MJC) said it would meet to discuss the cartoon, which it deemed highly offensive to the religious sensibilities of Muslims.

"It seems to be provocative in many ways on the very eve of the World Cup in South Africa, when we need peaceful co-existence and co-operation amongst religious communities in South Africa," said MJC President Ihsaan Hendricks.

"The M&G (Mail & Guardian) needed to understand that offending the South African Muslim community is offending the international Muslim community," he added....

And your point is...?

The excellent author and our good friend Brad Thor offers his thoughts via Breitbart's Big Hollywood (May 19), and his own contribution to the cause, displayed above.

Many people have asked if I am supporting "Everybody Draw Muhammad Day" tomorrow, May 20th. I am and two of the most moving arguments of why you should too come from the Huffington Post and Reason Magazine.

In response to Islamic reaction over the movie Fitna, which juxtaposes images of Muslim violence with passages from the Qur'an (the same passages Islamic terrorists cite as justification for their violence), writer Sam Harris at the Huffington Post penned one of the best critiques of Islam (and our refusal to engage it) I have ever read: Losing Our Spines to Save Our Necks. In it, Harris rightly points out:

The controversy over Fitna, like all such controversies, renders one fact about our world especially salient: Muslims appear to be far more concerned about perceived slights to their religion than about the atrocities committed daily in its name. Our accommodation of this psychopathic skewing of priorities has, more and more, taken the form of craven and blinkered acquiescence.

There is an uncanny irony here that many have noticed. The position of the Muslim community in the face of all provocations seems to be: Islam is a religion of peace, and if you say that it isn't, we will kill you. Of course, the truth is often more nuanced, but this is about as nuanced as it ever gets: Islam is a religion of peace, and if you say that it isn't, we peaceful Muslims cannot be held responsible for what our less peaceful brothers and sisters do. When they burn your embassies or kidnap and slaughter your journalists, know that we will hold you primarily responsible and will spend the bulk of our energies criticizing you for "racism" and "Islamophobia."

Our capitulations in the face of these threats have had what is often called "a chilling effect" on our exercise of free speech.

In Mark Goldblatt's Reason Magazine article this week The Poet Versus the Prophet he expands on many of Harris' arguments and states:

[O]ur tip-toeing around Islamic sensibilities is nothing more than plain, old-fashioned cowardice.... We lack the moral courage to walk the walk, to put our individual lives on the line in order to defend the principles of free thought and free expression--the very principles that allowed the Judeo-Christian West to leave the Islamic East in the dust, literally and figuratively, three centuries ago.

Goldblatt makes multiple excellent points throughout his piece and closes with:

Since 2001, many Americans have asked how they can contribute in a direct way to the war against totalitarian Islam. Now we have an answer. If it's legal, and likely to offend the radicals, just do it. That seems straightforward enough. But how many of us will have the nerve to stand up to a million or so Muslim dirtbags, and to scores of millions, perhaps hundreds of millions, of their fellow travelers and psychic enablers, and say in unison, You want to kill the Enlightenment, you're going to have to come through me.

Islam is not above question, criticism, critique, or examination. In fact, Islam is fourteen centuries overdue for some serious questioning, criticism, critiquing, and examination. People the world over need to be reminded that the freedom of speech most certainly includes the freedom to offend. The right of non-Muslims to draw pictures of Muhammad is equaled by a right just as powerful, the right of Muslims to ignore pictures they find offensive.

Though I can't believe I am going to quote Captain Jean Luc- Picard, there is no better way to express why tomorrow's world-wide event is so important:

"We've made too many compromises already, too many retreats. They invade our space and we fall back. They assimilate entire worlds and we fall back. Not again. The line must be drawn here! This far, no farther!"

While Picard goes on to say that he will "make them [the Borg] pay," that's not our job. Our job is to stand and defend free speech. No more outrageous outrage and Muslim grievance theater over cartoons, operas, and videos.

We will no longer retreat. We will no longer fall back. We will no longer demand from every other community on the face of the planet that they meet us on the playing field of civilized, rational discourse, yet carve out a special, protected, no-holds-barred zone for Islam.

It's over. This far and no farther. No more special treatment. It is time for Islam to come into the 21st century.

This is why I support "Everybody Draw Muhammad Day."

After speaking at the Vienna Forum in Austria on May 8, I traveled to Geneva, where through the kind offices of the Association for World Education and human rights activist David G. Littman, I was able to get into the Belly of the Beast and witness some of the proceedings.

It was the same day that Kuwait delivered its national report to the UN General Assembly Human Rights Council's Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review. This amounted to a report delivered by the country in question (Belarus was also up for this examination on that day), followed by comments by various other national representatives on the human rights situation in the country up for review.

This created some ghastly ironies, with Sudan, for example, commenting and making recommendations about the human rights situation in Belarus, but what I found most interesting was Kuwait's initial report, which contains a number of statements indicating that Sharia is supreme in Kuwait -- resulting in a precarious human rights situation for women and non-Muslims. But the wording was subtle, and of course none of the other state representatives picked up on any of this.

Here is a key example of that, from Kuwait's report:

Freedom of religion and belief

Article 2 of the Constitution of Kuwait states: "The State religion is Islam and the sharia is the main source of legislation. Laws are enacted in conformity with the sharia." Article 35 of the Constitution stipulates: "Freedom of belief is absolute. The State protects the freedom to practise religion in accordance with established customs and without prejudice to public order and public morals."

Based on this premise, the State grants the followers of all denominations of the revealed religions the freedom to practise their religion and to establish their own places of worship without any interference or restrictions, subject only to the maintenance of public order.

Subject only to the maintenance of public order is the key phrase here, for under that rubric enter in all of Sharia's restrictions on non-Muslim religious expression. Consequently we read in the 2009 International Religious Freedom Report for Kuwait that "religious minorities experienced some discrimination as a result of governmental policies and non-Sunni Muslims continued to find it difficult or impossible to obtain legal permission to establish new places of worship." Prohibiting non-Muslims to establish new places of worship is entirely in accord with Sharia.

And so it was just another day at the UN in Geneva, where unreality generally prevails:

Julia Gorin has a translation of a Swedish article on this: "Sweden: Suspects in Vilks attack are two brothers," from Republican Riot, May 19:

The 21 and 19 year old arrested on for the attempted arson attack against Lars Vilks house are brothers, reports Sydsvenskan. The 21 year old man was arrested in his mother's apartment in Landskrona. He was arrested early Saturday morning - suspected for attempted arson....

The 21 year old moved from Kosovo to Sweden with his family in the early 1990s. He's a religious Muslim and regularly visits the mosque. But his sister says she has difficulty accepting that her brother is now a suspect in the attack against Lars Vilks.

"He's extremely kind. Certainly he's religious, but that doesn't mean that he would do such a thing," she says....

Of course not!