ISIS from Islam

Great Debates
61

I don’t quite see in what way neighbouring Muslim countries “foster” Daesh. From what I can tell, the crazies have no allies, in fact they’re quite diligent in getting hated by everyone.
As for what should be done about it : they have no infrastructure, no industry, no R&D, their ideology all but insures they’re never getting any, and they’re quite busy beheading each other for purity infractions. They also have no standing army to speak of, and again no genuine way to get any - they’re not building shit, they rely on a loot-based model.

So the comparisons with Nazi Germany are even less warranted than ever. Any determined combined arms offensive would wipe them out in a jiffy, from anyone. The problem isn’t there, it’s the after-conflict - the nation building, the occupation etc… that’s where the cost/reward calculation comes into play. And I reckon that part might go over more smoothly coming from a local power . I’d put my money on Iran since they’ve always wanted to be the big play-makers in the region, though maybe Turkey might be motivated to do it after Daesh has wiped out the Kurds… or whatever regime rises from the ashes of Syria, legitimacy by conquest has always been a big seller.
However considering a lot of Daesh’s recruitment power stems from Western aggression real or imagined, I really don’t see America wading in with its big boots (…again) helping much. A supporting/financing/advising role might be OK.

62

Well that’s the big question: Who stays to rebuild and police? It’s a huge commitment, open ended, and you know it can’t be us.

And you’d be surprised how the various counties in the region foster this. The Saudi’s fund pro Sunni groups that get out of hand. Qatar, Yemen, Iran. They all fund and encourage groups for dominance in the region. We shouldn’t be expected to clean up their messes.

63

We can ignore the valteron, his hatreds are well known and he gets offended by bibles in hotels…

I think I would since so often the claim depends on what persons who speak not one word of arabic and have no knowledge of the region besides reading the poletmics assert.

It is very strange to see a list that includes the Yemen, the poorest arab country, as funding anything… And then to see the Iran in a list with the Qatar, although they are Shia and not Sunni…

So you have a list of place you have heard of as with problems and have a grand mythology of these supporting the DAESH…

Ah and then here Haykel is in fact making the same points which I have made already. It seems to me that a journalist with little understanding has deformed statements.

64

I have no problem recognizing that perhaps hundreds of millions of Muslims are peaceful, non-violent people.

The problem is that these non-violent and peaceful people have convinced themselves that their religion is in essence a religion of peace, because that is what they would like it to be. They, and the non-Muslim apologists who defend Islam, have first of all decided that since many Muslims are black or brown people, critics of Islam must be racists.

Secondly, they want to believe that all religions, including Islam, are promoters of peace, love, compassion, respect and universal brotherhood. As Sam Harris has pointed out, putting all belief systems under the same word “religion” is like putting all physical activity, from lawn bowling to extreme fighting, under the heading “sports”.

These apologists who cannot accept that Islam contains, from its very inception, a heavy element of achieving world supremacy through war, cruelty, violence and intolerance. NOTHING in the Koran urges loving our enemies, loving unbelievers, or in any way recognizing that unbelievers have human rights. On the contrary, the Koran urges crucifixion and enslavement to those who refuse the offer to convert, and death for apostates.

I am convinced that many peaceful Muslims and their supporter-apologists simply choose to ignore what contradicts their illusion of “peaceful Islam”. An example of this is supplied by Bernard Haykel, a professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University who Wood, in his Atlantic Monthly article, quotes extensively to justify his claims. While Haykel has been quoted in this thread as a way to refute Wood’s viewpoint, because he does not agree with 100% of what Wood dsays, the following quote is instructive:

*"Haykel . . . . . .explained he was specifically referring to two groups of people who declare ISIS unIslamic: Muslims he says are “just ignorant” of Islam’s legal and political history, and Christians who engage in what he called “the Christian tradition of interfaith dialogue” and declare Islam a “religion of peace.”

Haykel singled out CNN talk show host Fareed Zakaria as an example of the former, who recently said that ISIS’s public execution of a Jordanian pilot by burning him to death — which at least one prominent Muslim cleric in the Middle East also decried as “away from humanity, much less religions” — is “entirely haram,” or forbidden in Islam.

“That’s actually factually wrong — the burning apostates is in the [Islamic] legal code,” Haykel said."*

There you have it in a nutshell. Fareed Zakaria would LIKE to believe Islam is a religion of peace, and so he just closes his eyes to the opposite. I have had liberal Muslims argue that there is NO punishment for leaving Islam. And they maintain this in spite of clear Sharia that specifies the death penalty for apostasy, in spite of polls showing 80% support in some countries for this punishment, and in spite opf the fact that 32 Muslim countries have such penalties ranging from prison to DEATH.

65

[QUOTE=Valteron]
These apologists who cannot accept that Islam contains, from its very inception, a heavy element of achieving world supremacy through war, cruelty, violence and intolerance. NOTHING in the Koran urges loving our enemies, loving unbelievers, or in any way recognizing that unbelievers have human rights. On the contrary, the Koran urges crucifixion and enslavement to those who refuse the offer to convert, and death for apostates.
[/QUOTE]

That’s not just wrong, that’s *aggressively *wrong.

Also, there is no such thing as “clear Shariah”, and the fiqh regarding apostasy, as with pretty much everything Islam, varies from place to place (and from hadith to hadith even - sometimes Muhammad is cross, sometimes he’s OK with it ; interpret as thou wishests).

66

I have never understood the idea that unless some particular cruelty or abomination in Islam is agreed with by 100% of Muslims, it is somehow wiped off the table and no longer up for discussion. The majority of Muslim countries (32) punish apostasy, which is a clear violation of human rights. This from the same countries who claim THEIR freedom of religion is infringed upon if someone draws a cartoon of Mohammed.

67

So tell me something : obviously you don’t truck with them namby-pamby egghead “nuances”, but are you at least aware of the general concept ?

68

I heard a very few people talk about the “religion of peace” in the fall of 2001. Since that time, the only time I encounter the claim is among people out to foment hatred of Islam, not from Muslims or defenders of Islam. Certainly no one in this thread has made any such claim. This is a straw man argument that has no serious basis.

Another straw man argument. No one, here, has posted anything resembling that claim. It is easy to refute stuff that has not actually been posted, but it hardly makes any serious point in the discussion.

As to Haykal’s claim, it would be intersting to see him support that, given the following Hadith:

So, in the early days of Islam, one leader burned apostates, but he was rebuked by another who invoked the name of the Prophet to condemn and forbid that action. What is Haykal’s source?

69

You may ignore Valteron if you choose.
You may refute Valteron’s posts with facts and logic of your own.

You will not encourage other posters to “ignore the valteron” in this forum. That is akin to a personal attack and is outside the bounds of this forum.

[ /Moderating ]

70

Your quote just says that you should kill them [apostates] by some other method. Are we arguing whether the Koran says they should be killed or not or whether they should be killed by burning vs killed by some other method?

71

Tom, with all due respect, I fail to see how your own recollections of how often you heard people using the expression “religion of peace” should be our guide to how often it has been used. There are entire debates on chat rooms and on YouTube over whether Islam can be called a religion of peace. Sam Harris, the late Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins have also at various times, well AFTER 2001, squared off with Muslims claiming it is a religion of peace.

You also allege that I am making a straw man argument because I am addressing claims that others on this thread have not made. Ironically, that is in itself a straw man argument, since my post of earlier today (#64) clearly begins with the explanation that such claims are made by peaceful Muslims who would like to believe their religion is peaceful. I never claimed these Muslims are posting on this thread. To be specific, I said, in my posting:

".* . . . . perhaps hundreds of millions of Muslims are peaceful, non-violent people.

The problem is that these non-violent and peaceful people have convinced themselves that their religion is in essence a religion of peace. . . . . *."

So what is the point of telling me that posters on this thread have not made that claim, when I am not saying that at all?

72

Is there a difference between “fomenting hatred” of something one perceives as a danger and warning of it as a danger? People in democratic countries from Churchill on down to the anti-fascist in the street were accused of “fomenting hatred” against Germany throughout the 30s. And oh yes, the vast majority of Germans did not support Nazism, so I guess there was nothing to worry about, now was there?

73

That’s the second Godwin point for this thread. Who wanna go for the hat trick ?

74

Since Tomndebb has graciously supplied us with a Hadith, let us examine how it might be used in Islam. The Hadith says: According to Anas ibn Malik, the Prophet said, “Help your brother whether he is oppressor or oppressed.”

According to Anas, after the Messenger of God said, “Help your brother whether he is oppressor or oppressed,” Anas replied to him, “O Messenger of God, a man who is oppressed I am ready to help, but how does one help an oppressor?” “By hindering him doing wrong,” he said."

Right now there is a young Saudi named Raif Badawi, [URL=“Raif Badawi - Wikipedia”]father of three, whose wife and children are refugees in my country, Canada. He was arrested in 2012 on a charge of insulting Islam through his blog and other charges including apostasy. He is rumoured to be an atheist, and Wikipedia lists his religion as “unknown”. He was sentenced to 1000 lashes and ten years in prison plus a fine in 2014.

Now, is Badawi an “oppressor”??? He could indeed be considered one. You see, many Muslims have objected to cartoons of Mohammed and even serious criticisms of Islam as oppressing them in the practice of their religion. In other words, if I exercise my freedom of speech to say “Mohammed sucked camels” I am somehow reputed by Muslims to be oppressing them. This is WHY it is considered OK to kill Danish and French cartoonists, because these people are seen as oppressing Islam. Saudi Arabia recently defined atheism as a form of terrorism, believe it or not.

So, if I am a good Muslim who wishes to justify what is being done to Raif Badawi, I will find that Hadith very useful. Badawi, by his apostasy and his criticism, is oppressing Islam. But he is my brother as well and I must help him. How? How does one help an oppressor?" “By hindering him doing wrong,” said the Prophet. I guiess 1000 lashes and 10 years in jail would hinder that oppressor, right?

75

As the Wikipedia article on Godwin’s Law notes “. . . . Godwin’s law itself can be abused as a distraction, diversion or even as censorship, fallaciously miscasting an opponent’s argument as hyperbole when the comparisons made by the argument are actually appropriate.”

I am not, for example, entering into a debate about municipal parade permits by saying, “So you like parades, well so did Hitler!”.

I am saying that people who see their world threatened by the growing power and expansion of a monstrous and aggressive ideology of fanaticism have a right and a duty to ring the alarm bells. But I have also noted that such people are often attacked as hate-mongers by those who close their eyes to the danger.

I don’t think you need to be a genius to see a possible comparison with a situation in the 30s, do you?

76

Awww, I know, baby. The only moral Godwin is your Godwin.
I already explained a handful of reasons (among *oh my god *so many) why the situations are completely dissimilar the first time somebody trotted it out, but thanks for playing, chief.

Also, growing power ? World threatened ? For fuck’s sake, get a grip, man.

77

Are you asking me if I see modern parallels to a situation where in Europe a religious minority was vilified, their religious beliefs distorted, normal people’s beliefs unfairly linked to those of a truly monstrous regime, and tales were told of how they represented a growing menace to Western Civilization? Sure, I see the comparison. But I didn’t want to get all Godwin on you.

78

Valteron pointed to Haykel saying that “burning” was authorized by Islamic Law. I was challenging that statement.
Killing apostates was something that has happened, periodically, throughout the history of Islam, much like the murdering of heretics among Christians. That is hardly something that can be denied by either group.

79

I am not a baby, and I am not a chief. And I would ask you to speak to me with respect, as I have done in addressing you. And please tell me where I said my Godwin was the only “moral” one?

80

Val, with all due respect, I fail to see why we should pay any attention to Islamophobes who constantly raise the issue when it is mostly used by Islamophobes and does not appear in any serious discussion by Muslims.