Vatican stands up to Islam

“Enough now with this turning the other cheek! It’s our duty to protect ourselves.” Thus spoke Monsignor Velasio De Paolis, secretary of the Vatican’s supreme court, referring to Muslims. Explaining his apparent rejection of Jesus’ admonition to his followers to “turn the other cheek,” De Paolis noted that “The West has had relations with the Arab countries for half a century…and has not been able to get the slightest concession on human rights.”

De Paolis is hardly alone in his thinking; indeed, the Catholic Church is undergoing a dramatic shift from a decades-old policy to protect Catholics living under Muslim rule. The old methods of quiet diplomacy and muted appeasement have clearly failed. The estimated 40 million Christians in Dar al-Islam, notes the Barnabas Fund’s Patrick Sookhdeo, increasingly find themselves an embattled minority facing economic decline, dwindling rights, and physical jeopardy. Most of them, he goes on, are despised and distrusted second-class citizens, facing discrimination in education, jobs, and the courts.

These harsh circumstances are causing Christians to flee their ancestral lands for the West’s more hospitable environment. Consequently, Christian populations of the Muslim world are in a free-fall. Two small but evocative instances of this pattern: for the first time in nearly two millennia, Nazareth and Bethlehem no longer have Christian majorities. The Vatican Confronts Islam by Daniel Pipes

Mark Alexander

Malaysia bans books on Islam by Armstrong and Esposito

The ban was ordered in accordance with the Printing Presses and Publications Act of 1984, which prohibits the reproduction or distribution of materials that disrupt peace and harmony. The banned books - six of which are in Malay, with the rest in English - include works of noted Islam scholars Karen Armstrong and John Esposito. Government bans 18 books on Islam and religion

Mark Alexander

St George is 'offensive' to Muslims, say many in the Church of England

His dragon-slaying heroics have kept his legend alive through the centuries.

But the Church of England is considering rejecting England's patron saint St George on the grounds that his image is too warlike and may offend Muslims.

Clergy have started a campaign to replace George with St Alban, a Christian martyr in Roman Britain.

The scheme, to be considered by the Church's parliament, the General Synod, has met a cautious but sympathetic response from senior bishops. Will George be slayed as England's patron saint? by Steve Doughty

Mark Alexander

'Come to jihad, my dear children!'

Egyptian cleric tells children's TV show: Come on to the jihad, encourages child-soldiers to join holy war by Yaakov Lappin

An Egyptian Islamic cleric working for the state ministry of religious endowment has used a children's television program to encourage young children to strive for holy war.

During program, made available by the Arabic translation service MEMRI, the cleric told a story about Muslim children in history keen to "sacrifice" themselves and kill "infidels" for the cause of Islam.

"Let's listen to a very beautiful story to learn about the courage of a child, and how, when a child is brought up in a good home, and receives proper education in faith, he loves martyrdom, which becomes like an instinct for him. He can never give it up," Sheik Muhammad Nassar told children on the program, which aired on the Al-Nas television channel. Egypt primes children for jihad

Mark Alexander

Weakness is as weakness does
My thanks to my friend, Always On Watch, for alerting me to this article from Yahoo News:

LONDON - Britain cannot defeat terrorism unless moderate Muslims do more to confront militancy in their own communities, Prime Minister Tony Blair said Tuesday.

Blair said the vast majority of Muslims abhorred terrorism and wanted to defeat it, but said they had to do more to counter what he described as the extremists' misplaced anger and grievances.

Moderates, he said, must "stand up against the ideas of these people, not just their methods."

"If you want to defeat this extremism, you've got to defeat its ideas and you've got to defeat in part a completely false sense of grievance against the West," said Blair, testifying before a House of Commons committee. "The government has its role to play in this, but honestly, the government itself is not going to defeat this."Blair: Muslims must confront militancy

Mark Alexander

Alarming admission: Blair's government has no policy on population

The Government has no policy for controlling the size of Britain's population, Tony Blair admitted yesterday.

Questioned by MPs, he refused to estimate the number of illegal immigrants in Britain, although a recent study calculated there could be up to 570,000.

"By the very nature that they are illegals makes it very difficult to have a precise estimate," Mr Blair said.

Tony Wright, the Labour MP for Cannock Chase, told Mr Blair that Britain's population had topped 60 million for the first time last year and was expected to rise 12 per cent over the next generation. The rises were equivalent to having a new Oxford, a new Middlesbrough and a new Ipswich every year, and migration was the main driver of the rise. Blair admits he has no policy on population

Mark Alexander

More hot air from Blair!

The government cannot alone root out extremism in Muslim communities and defeat the terrorism it creates, Prime Minister Tony Blair has said.

He hit back at claims ministers had done little to win Muslim "hearts and minds" since the 7 July London bombs.

He said he was "probably not the person to go into the Muslim community".

It was down to moderate Muslims to stand up to extremism and tell those with "grievances" against the West they were wrong, Mr Blair told MPs. Muslims 'must root out extremism'

Mark Alexander

Switzerland's neutrality: Sincere or hypocritical?
With thanks to European Kafir for drawing this very interesting article in the The Jerusalem Post to my attention:

Switzerland said Monday that Israel has been violating international law in its Gaza offensive by heavy destruction and endangering civilians in acts of collective punishment banned under the Geneva conventions on the conduct of warfare.

"A number of actions by the Israeli defense forces in their offensive against the Gaza Strip have violated the principle of proportionality and are to be seen as forms of collective punishment, which is forbidden," the Swiss Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

"There is no doubt that Israel has not taken the precautions required of it in international law to protect the civilian population and infrastructure," it said. The statement did not name the Geneva Conventions, but it referred to provisions of the 1949 treaty, which is regarded as the cornerstone of international law on the obligations of warring and occupying powers.

Switzerland, as the depository of the conventions, has a responsibility to call meetings if it finds general problems with the implementation of the treaty, but it does not have any special powers to interpret the document. Switzerland: Israel violating int'l law

Mark Alexander

Saudi Arabia: Your first choice destination for 'fun in the sun'

Photo of the Empty Quarter (Rub al-Khali) courtesy of Google Images

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Saudi Arabia seems an unlikely destination for fun in the sun.

Yet here was a Saudi prince at a tourism conference in neighboring Dubai, busily trying to sell his country as a vacation spot — provided visitors don't expect alcohol, women come robed, and everyone refrains from eating in public from dawn to dusk during the holy month of Ramadan.

And swinging singles need not apply. Women younger than 40 must be accompanied by their brothers or fathers.

Undaunted, the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, until recently accessible to only a handful of non-Muslim tourists, is opening its doors, beckoning curious world travelers to its mysterious and hidden treasures.

The change springs from the new policies of King Abdullah, who ascended the throne last August after the death of his half-brother, King Fahd.

Abdullah, a reformer, wants to show that his country is more than just the former home of Osama bin Laden and a breeding ground for Islamic extremism.

"He wants to show the world a different face to the kingdom. It's all part of a greater plan to open up the country, to show that though it is Arab and Islamic, it is also modern and moderate," said Mishari al Thaybi, a Saudi writer and analyst for the London-based newspaper Al Sharq al Awsat.

"Tourists are the best ambassadors for any country," Mishari added. Visit Saudi Arabia, but dress and behave appropriately by Lara Sukhtian

Mark Alexander

Happy Independence Day!

Flag courtesy of Google Images

I would like to take this opportunity to wish all our American visitors a very happy Independence Day.

Mark Alexander

Islam's "higher status"

PUTRAJAYA: Islam has a higher status than other faiths in Malaysia, said a lawyer holding a watching brief for the Malaysian Muslim Lawyers Association. Islam has higher status in Malaysia

Mark Alexander

When the public must be kept in the dark

Anti-terrorist police are tackling an "accelerating" number of plots by violent Muslim Jihadi extremists, according to Britain's most senior counter-terrorism officer.

Scotland Yard anti-terrorism branch is involved in an "unprecedented" 70 investigations, Peter Clarke the head of the Metropolitan Police Anti-Terrorist Branch and national co-ordinator for anti-terrorist investigations, warned yesterday. More than 60 people are facing trial on terrorist allegations. Two-thirds of those have been charged since last July.

In one of the most sombre and detailed statements yet on the threat to Britain from Islamic extremist terrorists, Mr Clarke, who is heading the inquiry into last year's July 7 bombings said the intelligence picture includes some "sinister" threats. "There are some 60 individuals awaiting trial in the UK for terrorist-related offences. This is unprecedented and the flow of new cases shows no sign of abating - if anything it is accelerating," he said. Terror plots accelerating, warns police chief by John Steele

Mark Alexander

TOSH from THE TIMES!

In the anguished weeks of debate and foreboding that followed the London bombings last July, dire predictions were made. British Muslims would become the targets of widespread intimidation and hate campaigns as the backlash against extremism took hold. Young British Muslims, it was said, would become further alienated from mainstream society, retreating into a paranoid world of conspiracy theories and religious fanaticism. The community would run into growing hostility and discrimination as perceptions of them as a Fifth Column closed opportunities and people’s minds. They would become isolated and embittered.

The predictions were wrong. British society, and London in particular, rose above crude revenge. Politicians, faith groups and ordinary citizens reached out to the Muslim mainstream in support, sharing their bewilderment and supporting them in the painful selfexamination of why their faith had bred such violence. There were some isolated hate crimes, but no general spiral into communal violence and entrenched hostility. Islam in Britain

Mark Alexander

Islamophobia: A Turkish viewpoint

The hostility towards Islam that is experienced in European countries started to emerge when the Soviet Union dissolved and the Warsaw Pact countries regained their independence. In those years the enemy concept of Communism and Marxism vanished and people who were in need to find a new enemy concept started looking at the 1.2 billion Muslims living in 57 countries. And certain Islamist organizations gave reasons for this approach. Islam phobia by Faruk Şen

Mark Alexander

Make Jihad on Israel, say British Muslim extremists

British Jihad group declares 'Israel is cancer, Islam is answer,' calls on followers to carry out holy war by Yaakov Lappin

Radical Muslims in Britain have blasted Hamas for failing to carry out a "real" Islamic holy war, and have called for a Jihad against Israel following the recent escalation of the Israeli – Palestinian conflict in the Gaza Strip.

A number of British-based Muslim organizations have in recent days called on followers to wage war on Israel.

"What the Jews are doing in Palestine today will no doubt disturb any true Muslim," a statement authored by 'Abdul Aziz al-Dimashqi' said on the website of the Saved Sect group.

"However, what hurts us equally as much is to see the Muslims in Palestine calling for an independent Palestinian state, Palestinian constitutions, man-made law, democracy, freedom and so on. Hamas… have no intention of establishing the sharia (Islamic code), and are only concerned with having their own nationalistic state," the statement said. UK Islamists: Make Jihad on Israel

Mark Alexander

Soccer displeases Allah!

UK jihadists attack 'religion of soccer,' warn Muslims against taking part in 'colonial crusader scheme' by Yaakov Lappin

A British jihadist website has warned Muslims against being drawn in to what they described as "the new religion of soccer."

The Saved Sect website, which calls on Muslims to work to establish an Islamic state in Britain, has attacked "football fever," saying that soccer has "captivated the masses, dedicating their time and effort towards it."

Comparing the allegiance of soccer fans to Islam and jihad, the organization said: "Football is the deen (religion) by which people live their lives by and are willing to die for. Their jihad is to fight against those who are arch rivals against their team. Their da'wah (call, invitation) is to publicize, defend and justify their team, inviting others to support them in this." Jihadist site: Soccer is against Islam

Mark Alexander

Immigration no solution

'We recognise the positive contributions immigration makes to the country and the economy," the Prime Minister's official spokesman said last week. "If we don't have migration, we don't have the growth from the economy that we all benefit from."

He was responding to some concerns about the rate of immigration raised by Frank Field, the Labour MP for Birkenhead - but Downing Street's claim that "if we don't have immigration, we won't have economic growth" has been stated over and over again since Labour took office in 1997.

If you repeat something often enough, you can perhaps make people believe it. What you cannot do is turn it from being false into being true. And the Government's claim about the economic benefits of immigration is false. As an academic economist, I have examined many serious studies that have analysed the economic effects of immigration.

There is no evidence from any of them that large-scale immigration generates large-scale economic benefits for the existing population as a whole. On the contrary, all the research suggests that the benefits are either close to zero, or negative. Never have we seen immigration on this scale: we just can't cope by Robert Rowthorn

Mark Alexander

O leaders! Harken!
In a brief, interesting and to-the-point letter published in the Galveston Daily News today, all our leaders really need to know:

The events in Florida in which the FBI arrested several followers of the “religion of peace” for conspiring to do America harm caused many to ask: Why would our own citizens want to do harm to America? Islam, Not Terrorism, Is Our Real National Enemy

Mark Alexander

Osama spews his venom again

Photo courtesy of the BBC

A new recording from al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden has been posted on an Islamist website.

He praised Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq killed three weeks ago, as a "lion of holy war".

The video, lasting 19 minutes, shows a still picture of Bin Laden, and moving pictures of al-Zarqawi.

Unnamed US officials said the recording was authentic. It is the fourth audio message Bin Laden has released since the start of this year.

However, no new video images of the al-Qaeda leader have appeared since October 2004.

Last week a video was broadcast purportedly showing the deputy leader of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahri, in which he paid tribute to Zarqawi and said his death would be avenged. New Bin Laden message is released

Mark Alexander

Islamophobia on the rise in Canada

Incidents of Islamophobia are on the rise following the arrest of 17 Toronto-area men and boys on terrorism charges, Ontario human rights commissioner Barbara Hall says. Islam attacks rising

Mark Alexander

Shocked Canada finds out what veiled women chat about!

MISSISSAUGA — When it came time to write up the premarital agreement between Zakaria Amara and Nada Farooq, Ms. Farooq briefly considered adding a clause that would allow her to ask for a divorce.

She said that Mr. Amara (now accused of being a leader of the alleged terror plot that led to the arrests of 17 Muslim men early this month) had to aspire to take part in jihad.

"[And] if he ever refuses a clear opportunity to leave for jihad, then i want the choice of divorce," she wrote in one of more than 6,000 Internet postings uncovered by The Globe and Mail.

Wives of four of the central figures arrested last month were among the most active on the website, sharing, among other things, their passion for holy war, disgust at virtually every aspect of non-Muslim society and a hatred of Canada. The posts were made on personal blogs belonging to both Mr. Amara and Ms. Farooq, as well as a semi-private forum founded by Ms. Farooq where dozens of teens in the Meadowvale Secondary School area chatted. The vast majority of the posts were made over a period of about 20 months, mostly in 2004, and the majority of those were made by the group's female members. Hateful chatter behind the veil

Mark Alexander

Row over Ayaan's immigration status brings down Dutch government

The Netherlands was without a government last night after the ruling coalition split over the behaviour of its immigration minister towards a prominent Somali-born Dutch MP.

Moves by the immigration minister Rita Verdonk to strip Ayaan Hirsi Ali of her Dutch citizenship and a successful legal campaign to evict her from her apartment resulted in international outrage against the Netherlands. It also touched off a political firestorm at a time when anti-immigrant sentiment is at a peak.

Last night, Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende, who only hours earlier was vowing to hold on, announced that he will tender the resignation of the Government to Queen Beatrix. The Government's smallest coalition member, D66, withdrew support from the coalition over Ms Verdonk's policies. Mr Balkenende's announcement ended 36 hours of political drama and came moments after three ministers quit the Cabinet following a vote earlier in the day by the D66 party in a no-confidence motion against the Government . Dutch government falls in row over MPs passport by Leonard Doyle, Foreign Editor for The Independent

Mark Alexander

Supreme Court plays the dirty on ol' George
Lawyers behaving badly! Wars can never be won this way! - Mark Alexander

Children play a game called "opposite day." Whatever someone says is taken to mean the opposite. Some Supreme Court justices have apparently never grown out of their appreciation of this game, to judge by their ruling in the Hamdan case involving military tribunals at Guantanamo Bay.

Last year, Congress (you might have heard of it — it writes the nation's laws) passed a bill signed into law by the president of the United States (he also should be familiar — the nation's commander in chief). It said that "no court, justice or judge" shall have the jurisdiction to consider habeas corpus applications of detainees at Gitmo. It would take a legal escape artist on par with David Blaine to wiggle out of that one, but, sure enough, five Supreme Court justices were up to the task.

The Supreme Court has an important role in our constitutional scheme, but it is not fit to, nor was it ever meant to, render fundamental judgments about matters of war and peace. For that we have the elected branches, primarily the executive, which has the flexibility and the focus to prosecute wars. But today's court knows no bounds. The Supreme Court at War by Rich Lowry for the Jewish World Review

Mark Alexander

Democracy, Freedom, and Islam

Islam supercedes nationality," says media mogul Rupert Murdoch. "You have to be careful about Muslims who have a very strong, in many ways a fine but very strong religion, which supercedes any sense of nationalism wherever they go," he told Channel Nine. Mr Murdoch was present at a function in Sydney that described him as the most influential Australian of all times.

It was indeed a bold remark from the media baron, considering the fact that mainstream media is sickeningly "secular". Is this an indicator of things to come? The Western media showed guts, even if misplaced, by republishing the cartoons of Prophet Mohammed in various newspapers across Europe, Israel, Australia and New Zealand. According to confidential sources, Prophet Mohammed's cartoons were republished across newspapers to preempt a reaction from the Islamic world.

The Western intelligentsia is increasingly becoming aware of the danger that West (along with rest of the world) faces from Islam. Niall Fergusson and Mark Steyn anticipate civil war (like French riots last October) taking place in European cities as Muslim demography burgeons and European population senesces. European demography will be ill-prepared to meet an Islamic challenge in, say, 2020. Can Islam be democratic? By Balbir K Punj

Then there's my own essay which first appeared on Saturday, November 12, 2006, on this very topic:

"Until 9/11, the western world was largely ignorant of the religion of Islam, of its goals, of its aspirations. Indeed, even since 9/11, most people, and that includes our politicians, would not score very highly in a test of their knowledge on the subject. It should be obvious to all thinking people that our politicians are actually unaware, dare I say blind, to the dangers that Islam will increasingly cause us. It is truly a case of the blind leading the blind! That means to say, uninformed and unthinking politicians leading an ill-informed electorate. But folks, this is what we have right now. The same can hardly be said of Muslims in the Islamic world, though; for their knowledge of Christianity far surpasses - even though much of their knowledge is quite distorted - any knowledge of Islam by the man in the street in the West." - ©Mark Alexander Islam: The Enemy of Democracy and Freedom

Mark Alexander

A Reader's Letter to an Editor

As with every apologist for Islam, Aboo Mohammed totally obfuscates the real issue facing Islam today, which is certainly not whether Mohammed wrote the Quran. Such a fool's enigma is a non-issue at present. If it be true that Mohammed did not write the Quran, this in no way exculpates the religion of Islam from both its atrocious past and its contradictory present-- contradictory in that its most passionate defenders constantly refer to Islam as "the religion of peace."

The real issue for Islam today, even since its conception , whose apologists indelicately aggrandize their claims to the realms of metaphysical truth by making reference to the Torah of Jewish people; Islam, whose theological germinations and hadiths were made efficacious through enervating the Jews, Judaism, more precisely, the Torah of the Jews; the real issue for Islam is the horrendous and bloody manifestations of this religion emanating from among those Muslim masses who have faithfully and traditionally adhered to its tenets. In light of such obvious imperfections, regardless of who actually wrote the Quran, whether Mohammed or his god, one prodigious detail remains clear to many thinking people in the Western world: wherever Islam sets its expansionist gaze, there also will be found, inevitably, anti-Jewish hatred, intermingled with intolerance of the non-Muslim, which, predictably, translates into Islam's irrevocable tradition of violence and bloodshed. To deter from this, Islam's shameful reality, to equivocate in the slightest, is to construct a sort of intellectual epidermis, a covering if you will, for the preservation of the animal Islam, a beast which has been grandiloquently appellated as "the religion of peace." Poetry it is not, and I find it difficult to comprehend how such an aggregation of primative hatreds could ever be interpreted as such. Apologist for Islam (Written by Michael Devolin)

Mark Alexander

Can British Muslims Change?
I think this audio clip about what's supposed to be going on in Britain's Muslim community is worth listening to. I wonder what you think of it.

From the New Statesman

Mark Alexander

I know the feeling!

Three years ago, I [Melanie Phillips] wrote a proposal for a book about the alarming resurgence of anti-Jewish feeling in Britain, the way this had been taken up by the left and the fact that this was undermining Britain’s ability to defend itself against global Islamist terrorism. My literary agent thought it was good stuff and sent it round. Every publishing house said no.

I was taken aside by a senior editor at a big-name imprint who was well-disposed towards me. ‘Drop it’, he said. ‘No British publisher will touch this’. Why? Because it defended Israel, already well on the way to becoming a pariah state, and worse still levelled the charge of anti-Jewish prejudice against the British intelligentsia.

I broadened out the proposal to include an analysis of what I thought was the true nature of the threat posed by the Islamic jihad; the back-to-front thinking in Britain which was turning Islamist aggressors into victims while western and Israeli victims were turned into aggressors; the role played in this process by multiculturalism; and the lethal threat this all posed to a free world under attack.

My agent sent this proposal to specifically Jewish publishers in the hope of touching a nerve. It touched one all right - the problem was it was the wrong nerve. ‘I don’t agree with this AT ALL so I won’t publish it’, said one. Another jovially observed: ‘I’d rather take ricin than publish this’. The battle to publish Londonistan

Buy Londonistan in the US
Buy Londonistan in the UK

Mark Alexander

Christians turning to 'martyrdom' for Islam!

Many Palestinian Christians identify with the struggle against Israel to such an extent that they find themselves on the side of Islamic fundamentalism. In some cases, Palestinian Christians have actually joined Islamic terror groups. Christian 'Martyr' for Islam

Mark Alexander

The Cartoon Controversy from the Jews' Perspective

In the Mohammed-cartoon controversy, the Western world faced fundamental questions that will continue to evolve in the coming years. These include: the nature of Western identity; the internal solidarity of the Western world; to what extent Western societies can be intimidated; how Muslim violence should be confronted; whether a Western Islam can evolve; to what extent some of the Muslims living in the West are a fifth column for a violent non-Western culture; and whether right-wing trends in the West will increase.

Israel and the Jews were drawn - almost inevitably - into the controversy between Muslims and the West once the violent protests against the cartoons rapidly accelerated in the first week of February 2006. This was yet another manifestation of the hard core of anti-Semitism that portrays the Jews as responsible for all evil in the world.

Western media contrasted Muslims' sensitivity about the cartoons with the stream of far more offensive anti-Semitic cartoons published in Muslim media. The Middle Eastern boycott of Danish firms also raised some questions about Danish boycotts of Israel.

Israel faces a serious risk of Western scapegoating as the Muslim-Western controversy develops over the coming years. In an increasingly unpredictable world, Israel may need to establish a rapid-analysis force to assess emerging global events. The Mohammed-Cartoon Controversy, Israel, and the Jews: A Case Study by Manfred Gerstenfeld

Mark Alexander

Adieu Ayaan!

Courtesy of the Ayaan Hirsi Ali Web-log

Her Dutch citizenship withdrawn, Ayaan Hirsi Ali is packing her bags for Washington. SPIEGEL spoke to her about leaving the Netherlands, her book project and the American Enterprise Institute, which has offered her a fellowship.

She apologizes for the mess in her apartment. But it's a mess that says volumes about her life. Still to be unwrapped bouquets, complete with messages of support, are strewn everywhere. A treadmill stands in the center of the room -- running in the nearby park would be way too risky. Newspapers lie scattered across the glazed white desk, her portrait on the front pages. She looks spiteful, with a touch of fear and anger in her eyes.

"I never really got a chance to settle down," says Ayaan Hirsi Ali as she steps into the small kitchen, "and yet I felt very much at home here." Now, though, the luxury apartment high above the roofs of The Hague -- her refuge from the death threats of Islamic fundamentalists -- has become foreign to her. The neighbors have sued her out of the building because they were tired of dealing with the security detail assigned to protect Hirsi Ali from attack. Even worse, the Dutch Minister of Immigration and Integration, Rita Verdonk, stripped her of her citizenship early last week, citing minor lies on Ali's citizenship application. A chapter in Hirsi Ali's life -- and an era in Dutch politics -- has come to an end. Settling Scores with Old Europe and Source: Der Spiegel By Gerald Traufetter

Mark Alexander

The Future of France: Islamic of Secular?

PARIS - Al Fath Mosque is in a scruffy immigrant neighborhood not far from the neon-lit kitsch of Pigalle. On Friday afternoons the mosque is jammed, and the overflow of worshippers - all men - spills into the streets.

Tourists who stumble on the scene reflexively reach for their cameras, struck by this unusual public manifestation of religiosity in a country where Christian belief has become passe.

In France and in almost every other European country, Christianity appears to be in a free fall. Although up to 88 percent of the French identify themselves as Roman Catholic, only about 5 percent go to church on most Sundays; 60 percent say they "never" or "practically never" go.

But Islam is a thriving force. The 12 million to 15 million Muslims who live in Europe make up less than 5 percent of the total population, but the vitality of their faith has led some experts to predict that Islam will become the continent's dominant faith.

Princeton University historian Bernard Lewis, the dean of American Middle East scholars, flatly predicts that Europe will be Islamic by the end of this century "at the very latest." In France, Islam and secularism spread as Christianity lapses by Tom Hundley

Mark Alexander

France Commemorates Muslim War Dead

Photo courtesy of the BBC

French President Jacques Chirac has marked 90 years since the Battle of Verdun by unveiling a monument to Muslims who fell in the key WWI battle.

The memorial is the first to Muslims who died in 300 days of clashes over the strategically located French town and in other World War I battles.

Mr Chirac hailed the French army in Verdun as "France in its diversity". France marks Muslim dead of WWI

Mark Alexander

Will Shari'ah come to Canada?

Mark Alexander

An important note to all my visitors
I have just taken the unprecedented step of deleting some comments on this website.

This is not something I do lightly, for I am committed to free speech. However, these deleted comments crossed the line of respectability. I cannot tolerate them any longer.

All are welcome to comment on this website: left-wingers, right-wingers, Jews, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Sikhs, people of all other religions, and people of no faith at all.

But one thing I ask is that comments be placed in a reasonable and rational manner, without vulgarities and profanities, and without any racist intent. Please do not overstep the bounds of respectability and decency, for to do so can be very offensive to others. Furthermore, arguments written in this manner are never enhanced in any way.

From now on, any comments which I feel overstep these limits will be erased as soon as possible.

Mark Alexander

Is this what the 'religion of peace' is all about?

I wonder how many of these demonstrators were arrested and charged after this demonstration? Is it really a strength of the West that we allow such demonstrations? Or should we, perhaps, start seeing this extreme tolerance as a weakness?

Video courtesy of You Tube

Mark Alexander

More softening of the brain? A disturbing glimpse into the mindset of some Texans

Courtesy of Google Video and Turn to Islam

Mark Alexander

Is this a classic case of softening of the brain?

Video courtesy of Google Video and Turn to Islam

Mark Alexander

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

In this very interesting interview by Danish television, Ayaan Hirsi Ali speaks out. It starts in Danish, but soons moves to English:

And here is the now famous short film, SUBMISSION:

Videos courtesy of Google Video

Mark Alexander

In the beginning there was darkness; in 2006 there is still darkness!

Images courtesy of Google Images

The world's scientific community united yesterday to launch one of the strongest attacks yet on creationism, warning that the origins of life were being "concealed, denied or confused".

The national science academies of 67 countries warned parents and teachers to ensure that they did not undermine the teaching of evolution or allow children to be taught that the world was created in six days.

Some schools in the US hold that evolution is merely a theory while the Bible represents the literal truth. There have also been fears that these views are creeping into British schools.

The statement, which the Royal Society signed on behalf of Britain's scientists, said: "We urge decision-makers, teachers and parents to educate all children about the methods and discoveries of science and foster an understanding of the science of nature. Knowledge of the natural world in which they live empowers people to meet human needs and protect the planet. World scientists unite to attack creationism by Sarah Cassidy

Mark Alexander

Blair: The Would-Be President!

Cartoon courtesy of Google Images

Tony Blair, mere Prime Minister, needs the trappings of President! He cannot stem the growth of Islam in the United Kingdom, but that doesn't matter! He can luxuriate in his Blair Force One instead!

One suspects that, like certain African heads of state, Tony Blair feels truly at ease these days only when he leans back in his upholstered seat and feels the jet engines propel him away from his own country, towards other lands where he is not responsible for the state of the streets and can luxuriate in the dignity of a world leader.

How galling, then, to have to travel in a rented plane, or, worse, on a scheduled service. How embarrassing to step on to the tarmac, to be greeted with all the courtesies of diplomatic protocol, from a jumbo jet bearing a commercial logo. How unlike the dignity of the American President!

Blair should check in like the rest of us

Mark Alexander

Osama bin Laden: A video
I would like to share this interesting video with you about Osama bin Laden:

With thanks to Who Is bin Laden?

Mark Alexander

When doing business with Saudis, use smoke and mirrors!

Photo courtesy of The Telegraph

The Government used "special accounting arrangements" on a controversial £20bn oil-for-arms deal with Saudi Arabia to make sure MPs were not able to vet it, The Daily Telegraph has learned.

The news comes as ministers put finishing touches to a multi-billion pound successor to the original Al-Yamamah arms deal, agreed in 1985 by Margaret Thatcher.

Controversy has raged over claims that millions of pounds were paid in bribes to secure the original contract.

Two years ago the Serious Fraud Office launched an investigation into the claims that bribes were paid by companies used by BAE Systems, one of the main beneficiaries of the deal, to win orders for equipment.

Government documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show that deal was structured to avoid Parliamentary scrutiny. Saudi deal 'hidden from MPs' by Christopher Hope

Britain's multi-billion pound Al-Yamamah arms contract with Saudi Arabia is the UK's biggest ever overseas defence order.

Yet little is known about it. The original deal was agreed by Margaret Thatcher, the then-prime minister, in 1985 and signed by Michael Heseltine and HRH Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud in the following year.

Analysts have estimated the value of the contract to be anything from £15bn to £150bn. Twenty years of smokescreen over Saudi deal by Christopher Hope

Mark Alexander

Disturbing images of suffering!
The following images were sent to me this morning from Australia by a friend. I want to share them with you. They show the suffering that went on in the Sudan in 1994 during the famine in that country. I dare say that it wouldn't take a photographer long to find similar images today.

The Sudan is largely an Islamic country. One can but ask oneself the question: What do the fabulously wealthy of countries like Saudi Arabia do to alleviate such suffering? Wouldn't they be better off spending their gazillions trying to alleviate such poverty and hunger than by spending it on trying to promote Islam in the West, trying to promote their religion where it is certainly NOT WANTED! By the way, for your information, the photographer that took these photos, Kevin Carter, committed suicide three months after taking them. From depression!

Mark

Ridiculous suggestions on Britain's race laws by Trevor Phillips

Photo courtesy of the BBC

The Chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality, Trevor Phillips, has shown that he has no understanding of the nature of the Jihad, and therefore no understanding of the danger posed to the West by Islam.

Britain's race laws need updating to help in the battle against terrorism, the chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) has said.

Trevor Phillips has called for a debate on positive discrimination in favour of Muslims applying to join the police.

In a speech to be delivered on Monday he will question whether the police are "fit for purpose" for anti-terror campaigns.

He will also say race relation laws are stopping diversification in the police.

Mr Phillips will emphasise that it is not just a matter of fairness and equality, but an issue of national security.

Muslim commitment

In the speech to be given at the Social Policy Forum at the Government Office for London, he will say that British Muslims are as committed to tackling "terrorism" as anyone else. Race law update needed, Phillips

Mark Alexander

Split in Anglican Communion looks increasingly likely

Photo courtesy of Google Images

A woman was last night elected as the first female leader of the American branch of Anglicanism in a historic but divisive development that could hasten the break-up of the worldwide Church.

The Bishop of Nevada, the Rt Rev Katharine Jefferts Schori, who is a leading liberal on homosexuality, is the first women primate in the history of Anglicanism.

Her role as Presiding Bishop is the equivalent of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Her surprise election was greeted with whoops of joy by pro-women campaigners at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church, where she was chosen by her fellow bishops in four hours of voting.

But conservatives predicted that she would lead the Episcopal Church further along its liberal path on issues such as homosexuality, and her election will dismay traditionalists opposed to women priests. Anglican crisis as woman leads US Church by Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent, in Columbus, Ohio

Members of the Church of England take pride in portraying it as able to tolerate a wide diversity of opinion. By extension, they would like to apply this judgment to the Anglican communion as a whole. However, as the general convention of the Episcopal Church in Columbus, Ohio, reminds us, such optimism in regard to the wider Church is looking more and more like wishful thinking.

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, the Bishop of Rochester, the Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, speaks dramatically of "virtually two religions in a single Church". A guest at the convention of the American branch of Anglicanism, he was dismayed to see its House of Bishops pass a resolution last Friday, without theological debate, in support of civil marriages for gay couples.

He believes that the Episcopal Church has departed so far from what is generally held to be Anglican theology that a point of no return has been reached. And he implies that Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, should recognise this fact by expelling it from the Anglican communion. The spectre of schism

Mark Alexander

Self-delusion wins no wars!
I have been alerted to two very well-written, and extremely accurate, essays on the threat of Islam, and how to deal with it. These essays were written a little while ago by my good friend and colleague Jason Pappas, whose weblog, Liberty and Culture has much to contribute to the war we are engaged in.

Please take a look at these. The first is long, but well worth the time it takes to read it. It is full of insight and facts. The second one is somewhat shorter, but no less important for that.

Do conservatives recognize the threat?

Rarely, in the course of history, has a nation gone to war while praising the enemy’s ideology. We can, however, see this absurd spectacle today. While terrorists attack our greatest cities in the name of Islam, we are told that these ideas have nothing to do with their actions. As Muslims cheer with joy throughout the Islamic world, we are told that we mustn’t rush to judgment and stereotype another culture. With each report of repression, misogyny, self-imposed poverty, anti-Semitic hatred, and suicidal glorification, we are told that they are human beings just like us – don’t judge! There is a pathological fear of saying anything negative about the motivating force driving our enemy: Islam.

At first this may seem like an exaggeration. But is it? We do condemn radical Islam but notice how we unduly minimize our criticism. We add the qualifier “radical” or “militant” to imply that it is something added to Islam. The problem must be this additional element – not Islam itself. Or we borrow a word from Christianity and call them fundamentalists as if there were differing versions of Islam. We presume fundamentalist Islam is spurned by the average Muslim, who, we imagine, sees this 7th century practice as a relic relevant to Mohammad’s time. How enlightened we imagine the modern Muslim!

Or we may complain that Islam needs some missing element that will transform it and bring it into the 21st century. We make a moral equivalence between Christianity’s failures centuries ago and Islamic backwardness today. If Christianity can move forward and adapt to the modern world, why can’t Islam? It must be this missing element, modernity, which Islam needs. It took Christians two thousands years to grow up, we are told; you can’t expect Islam to do that in 1400 years. At no point must we question the Islam religion itself.

The taboo against subjecting a religion to critical analysis is even greater when that religion is part of a foreign culture. Conservatives are quick to attack the relativism inherent in contemporary multi-cultural analysis – particularly on the left. There is indeed a wide-spread relativism and vitriolic anti-Americanism on the left but it is by no means universal. I will address this at another time. The contention of this article is that conservatives’ response to the Islamic threat is inadequate and they need to change if we are to fight this enemy effectively. The Conservative Response to the Islamic Threat. by Jason Pappas © September 5, 2004

Saudi Arabia spearheads the worldwide Islamist movement by the establishment of educational institutions around the globe dedicated to reawakening the jihadist ideology. A vast recruiting and training network produces hate-filled warriors eager to kill anyone in their path for the glory of Islam. Saudi powerbrokers finance global terror groups from Hamas to Al Qaeda. (See our review.) The time has come to reconsider our repugnant association with these duplicitous international criminals. What should we do in the face of this threat? Let’s start by severing all ties with Saudi Arabia – military, trade, travel, and diplomatic.

Impossible, you say? Given that 15% of our oil imports originate in Saudi Arabia, the idea of ending our Saudi trade relationship is deemed unimaginable or only possible in the distant future after the development of alternative sources of energy. Neither political party dares suggest such a move in the current context. Unfortunately, the economics is poorly understood but far worse, moral leadership is next to non-existent. First the economics:

Oil is a commodity. Like any commodity its price is determined by the market and it can be sold and resold any number of times. Oil isn’t made-to-order for a particular buyer like a custom suit from one’s personal tailor. The production, purchase, resale, and consumption of oil in today’s modern global economy are determined by market forces – not personal relationships. The path from producer to consumer is spontaneously rearranging. The Saudi Problem by Jason Pappas©

Mark Alexander

Sarkozy gets tough on immigration

Photo courtesy of the BBC

The upper house of the French parliament has passed a tough new immigration bill, weeks after it was adopted by the lower chamber.

The bill makes it harder for unskilled migrants to settle in France and abolishes the rights of illegal immigrants to remain after 10 years.

Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, who drafted the bill, says it will bring France into line with other countries.

Critics say it is racist and accuse Mr Sarkozy of pandering to the far-right.

Mr Sarkozy, who is seen as a potential contender in presidential elections next year, says France must be in control of immigration, rather than a passive recipient. French immigration bill approved

Mark Alexander