Saturday, January 17, 2015

European Terrorists Spew Hatred that Has Nothing to Do with Religion

The fallout continues from the Charlie Hebdo cover that led to the Paris terrorist attack leaving 12 people dead. There is a swelling tide of popular antagonism across Europe against radical Islam, as well as stepped-up police efforts to prevent terrorism, while protests against caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad across the Moslem world highlight the cultural divide that can no longer be papered over. Here are some of the latest episodes. ~~~~~ Today, French authorities tried to head off possible civil unrest and glorification of terrorism after the country's worst terror attacks in decades. They also agreed to the secret burial in unmarked graves of the two Kouachi brothers who attacked Charlie Hebdo and they banned an anti-Islamist demonstration in Paris after the Paris administrative tribunal ruled that Paris police were authorized to ban a Sunday "Islamists out of France" rally planned by two groups that promote secular and republican values. One group, "Secular Riposte," said on its website that it would hold a news conference on Sunday. Resistance Republicaine, the other group, said it would hold Sunday rallies in the southern cities of Bordeaux and Montpellier. ~~~~~ In Belgium, for the first time in 30 years, the government used paratroopers to reinforce police patrols at possible terrorist target sites in Belgian cities, including some buildings in Antwerp's Jewish quarter, a decision that came a day after anti-terror raids netted dozens of suspects in Belguim and other European countries. Belgian media reported that investigators were still looking for one man - a Belgian with Moroccan roots reported to be fighting with ISIS in Syria. European media reported that the man is in Greece. Federal magistrate Eric Van der Sypt declined to comment, but expressed "regret that the Greece factor had reached the media." AP later reported that it was told by Greek police that they have detained four suspected terrorists, including one who could be the man wanted by Belgian authorities as an alleged ringleader of a jihadist cell. One of the four men arrested "matches the description" of Abdelhamid Abaaoud - the man who Belgian authorities suspect was the mastermind behind the dismantled jihadist cell that police fought in Verniers, the official said. Photos, fingerprints and DNA samples are being sent to Belgium, and Greek authorities are waiting to see if the person is Abaaoud, according to the AP source. ~~~~~ And, as was predictable, there are demonstrations in the Moslem world against the Charlie Hebdo cartoons. Many of the demonstrations are in French-speaking former French colonies. ~~~~~ Stone-throwing demonstrators set fire to two churches in Niger's capital Niamey on Saturday. Five people were killed in Niger on Friday and five more today in protests over the cartoons. Protesters in Niamey attacked a police station and burned at least two police cars near the main mosque after authorities banned a meeting called by local Moslem leaders. Police responded with teargas. One demonstrator told Sky News : "They offended our Prophet Mohammed. That's what we didn't like. This is the reason why we demonstration. This is the reason why we have asked Moslems to come, so that we can explain this to them, but the state refused. That's why we're angry today." Demonstrations were also reported in regional Niger towns, including Maradi, where two churches were burned. Another church and a residence of the foreign minister were burned in Goure. Four Moslem preachers who had called the meeting in Niamey were arrested, according to French media. Protesters burned the French flag and set up roadblocks on streets in the centre of Niamey. The French embassy in Niamey warned its citizens not to go out on the streets. On Friday, churches were burned, Christian homes looted and the French cultural centre was attacked during the violence in Zinder, residents said. A police officer and three civilians had already been confirmed killed and a burned body was found today in a burnt-out church there. ~~~~~ Demonstrations against Charlie Hebdo occurred after Friday prayers in Mali, Senegal, Mauritania, Algeria and Yemen. Protesters in Senegal and Mauritania torched French flags, and Qatar and Bahrain warned that the cartoon on the cover of the latst Charlie Hebdo could fuel hatred. The cartoon features the Prophet holding a Je Suis Charlie sign under the headline "All Is Forgiven." ~~~~~ In Jordan's capital Amman, 2,500 protesters marched from Al Husseini mosque under tight security, holding banners that read "insulting the Prophet is global terrorism." In Algiers, there were clashes as up to 3,000 marchers chanted: "We are all Mohammed. In Istanbul, about 100 people gathered, some carrying photos of the Kouachi brothers. ~~~~~ In Karachi, Pakistan, people were injured when protesters clashed with police outside the French consulate. The nationwide rallies in Pakistan followed comments by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who led parliament in condemning the cartoons in Charlie Hebdo. One faction of the Pakistani Taliban has issued a statement praising the Islamist Kouachi brothers who carried out the Charlie Hebdo massacre saying: "They freed the Earth from the existence of filthy blasphemers." Insulting the Prophet carries the death penalty under Pakistan's blasphemy laws, and 14 people are currently on death row. ~~~~~ Dear readers, the most disheartening aspect of the turmoil we find ourselves in over the Charlie Hebdo cartoons is that there is no clear prohibition in Islam about depicting the Prophet, and until the 18th century artists made beautiful paintings showing him surrounded by angels and his companions. It seems that the general use of images in Islam - animals and people, as well as the Prophet - varies with the various branches of Islam. And it was the Taliban in 2005 who made images critical as the subject of a fatwah which forbade their use because they are a form of idol worship. Soon afterward, the Taliban destroyed the famous wall of Buddhas and began their campaign to wipe out all historically important statues and paintings in territories controlled by them. So, the world is once more being set against itself by fanatic terrorists who use and distort Islam to justify and fuel their jihad against Christians, Jews, Westerners -- and more moderate Moslems. Once more, we must say that this is terrorism not religion. And everyone - Christians, Jews, Westerners and Moslems - must present a united front in stamping it out.

11 comments:

  1. Would you say that they MAY be religious fanatics?

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    1. There’s been a lot of concern about how Muslims feel about the most recent Charlie Hebdo covers.

      What about the concern of the Jewish worldwide community for the deaths of the Jews in Paris a couple weeks ago? Does anyone care about them? They pretty much go unmentioned.

      And that’s the real problem from the Paris massacres. There is a hint (just a hint) of 1933 Germany/Europe here.

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  2. Since 9/11/2001, that lovely September day in NYC that all the cracks and crevices on the earth surface opened up and out poured all the evil that was bottled up; we have been talking about, waiting for, hypothesizing about its arrival – the level headed, peace loving, moderate Muslims voice to be heard.

    Fourteen later friends we are still waiting. Except for a lone mummer against radical terroristic Islamic actions in the dark of night there has been nothing. I gave up hope about 9/15/2001. But that’s me.

    This expanding nightmare that the free world has endured since 9/11 NEVER had anything to do with religion. It had everything to do with opportunity by a very large proportion of the Islamic faith to go on their long awaited killing spree and attempt to enslave the world.

    We the opponents, the Infidels, the freedom loving people, the West have failed and continue to fail to understand the severity of the war we are in. We look at it in 60 seconds spots on the evening news, as one incident like 9/11 to the latest mass murder in Paris – with many thousand inciudents spread in between.

    Our leaders are trying to find a calming end, a political correct disengage, a specific incident that will magically put an end to this encounter with evil. The answer, the only answer is too severally (95%) eliminate the terrorists, the soldiers of Mohammad, the jihadists, the ISIS, the whatever you wish to call them.

    Wake up and recognize the truth. Understand the truth. Face up to the truth. And the truth in this case is not about any religion or religious aspect.

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  3. Once again, Obama has tricked us into arguing a silly point. You can call them Islamists or blueberries, it makes zero difference. What we are talking about is terrorism that is being centrally coordinated by a class of people who have 1.6B members. We are talking about criminal incitement to unbelievably ugly violence, and we must get help from the members of this class of people to get it stopped. We are talking about people who hate us because of our religion.

    Call them what you want … they simply want to kill us.

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  4. You can say it a million times, and you'll always be right: Progressive socialists like Obama, Cameron, and Hollande don't care about facts. Of course 99% terrorist acts are carried out by Islamic jihadists. All the political correctness and "tolerance" in the world won't change that fact. And the Progressive Socialists Left/Political Correctness crowd will never acknowledge this fact, because it would mean their world view is now and always has been flawed and therefore they have been flawed and they're never wrong are they? Only always.

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  5. This war with the terrorists, the jihadists, these Islamic fundamentalists will end, but before it does many more will die. It is within our power to decide if mist of those deaths are our of theirs. And it is also within our capacity to determine greatly the length of time that this war does continue

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    1. What has happened to the great (and secretive) coalition that Obama put together to stop ISIS late last year?

      If (and it never did) this coalition of many EU countries ever was it seems to have disappeared into the night without any notice.

      I stand ready and willing to have someone prove to me with facts not just beliefs that we are being served by some world leaders that are “in bed” with the likes of the terrorists. In bed to the level of simply telling lies about actions against the likes of ISIS and al-Qaeda, and looking the other way. Instituting fool hearty plans simply as a smoke screen.

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  6. The reality of Islamist terrorism is more than the mere numbers revealed by their percentage of the 1.5 Billion members of the Muslim/Islamic faith, more than those they kill daily someplace around the world, more than the way they demonically go about their murdering. What it is about is the evil, the pure evil they represent.

    If there is 1, 100, 1 million (or more) actual “terrorists” in all the various terrorists organizations that are at very least tolerated by Islam … then the problems we face in combating and eliminating them is oh so much greater than our elected officials are letting on or understand.

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  7. We are allowing the terrorists, the jihadists, the Progressive Socialists to set the tone, to set the parameters, for the fight we are in.

    Where are our leaders voices at. We are constantly defending our positions, our values, and our goals. Whereas the terrorists and jihadists just keep slaughtering and slaughtering innocent civilians who refuse to take up their fught.

    And day after day someplace on this planet people violently die because we are allowing "evil" to set the parameters and establish the right and the wrong.

    A lot of our leaders and spokes person really are or should be openly on the side of the terrorists. Because in all honesty that is where they stand.

    "We gave met the enemy and he is in our camp"

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  8. Well the world was awakened to the long anticipated plan from the EU on stopping terrorism …”an anti-terrorism alliance with Arab countries” as announced by EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherni.

    Well I’m sure that all the citizens are now relaxed and confident that there will be no more Paris type of massacres.

    Ms. Mogherni must have received her ‘foreign policy’ training within the Obama White House.

    The way you stop a charging Cape buffalo is to shot it in its brain – which is only 12cm in size. A shot gun approach doesn’t work on the second largest killing manual on the African continent next to the Hippo. Nor will this EU plan of Ms. Mogherni work on stopping the radical jihadists terrorist that are already inside the walled fortress of the EU.

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  9. ‘Free countries are for peoples strong enough to defend them.’

    And as sad as it sounds most European countries are neither strong enough nor willing enough to defend themselves. Why? Because defending themselves carries a admittance that they have been wrong about many things mostly their immigration policies can’t hold water – just like the United States.

    In particular France could defeat the terrorists is obvious: To compel the majority of French Muslims to turn against the terrorists, the French authorities would have to make them fear the French state more than they fear the terrorists. That is a nasty business involving large numbers of deportations, revocation of French citizenship, and other threats that inevitably would affect many individuals with no direct connection to terrorism. In the short term it would lead to more radicalization. The whole project of integration as an antidote to radicalism would go down the drain. The effort would be costly, but ultimately it would succeed.

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