First the black flag of the Caliphate waving over the Vatican. Then the Colosseum in flames and a sea of blood that submerges it. Finally, the announcement of the Libyan caliphate that “we are south of Rome”.
In the propaganda videos of the Islamic State there are many prophecies about the fall and the conquest of Rome. There is a long Islamic tradition aiming at Rome, “Romiyyah”, aiming to make it the fourth holiest city of Islam (after Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem) and the base from which Islam will conquer the Western world. Rome is the greatest magnet of the mystical Islamic universe.
Roger Garaudy, the French intellectual who converted to Islam, in 1986 launched his challenge, boasting: “I’ll bring Islam to Rome”. The foundation of this prophecy is the thirtieth Sura of the Koran, called ar Rum, “Romans”. The fall of Rome is based on the myth of the Emperor Heraclius and a letter that he would have written to Muhammad, recognizing him as “the messenger of God”.
Ahmad ibn Hanbal, the founder of the Islamic Hanbali school (now in power in Saudi Arabia) reported among the “hadith”, the sayings of Muhammad, that the Prophet of Islam predicted that “the city of Heraclius (Constantinople) would fall first, then Rome”.
In 2003, Osama Bin Laden made a speech on “The new Rome” and three years later, in the footsteps of Pope Benedict’s Islamic speech at Regensburg University, Al Qaeda proclaimed: “Servants of the Cross, expect defeat, the Muslims will conquer Rome as they conquered Constantinople”. » | Giulio Meotti | Tuesday, March 10, 2015
