Islam's Unholy War

I used to think there was substance to the notion that the attacks on Israel were due to the "desperation" of the so-called Palestinians. I have long since abandoned that theory. The most recent murder-suicide attack on Haifa simply demonstrates the refusal of the Islamic Jihadists to accept peace on any terms. It betrays the irrational hatred of Jews in particular and of all other faiths in general.

There is an inherent, distinctly American, resistance to understanding that the war being fought by "terrorists" is a war by fundamentalist Muslims against Christianity, Judaism, as well as Hinduism and Buddhism. Islam, from its establishment by Mohammed was and is a "political" religion determined to rule the world.

The killing of infidels, i.e., anyone who is not Muslim, is acceptable in the eyes of those who adhere to the strict interpretation of Wahabbism, the Saudi version of Islam on which it has lavished billions of dollars to advance worldwide. It is why the Saudis continue to fund terrorism and why fifteen out of the nineteen Islamists who flew commercial jets into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were Saudis.

There are many examples of this relentless enmity to all other faiths. It can most vividly been seen in the fate of Egypt's fifteen million Copts, Arab Christians whose history dates back to the earliest years of Christianity. A visit to www.copt.net or www.freeegypt.com is an education in the way, in just this one Muslim nation Christians are oppressed and killed. An estimated 1.5 million Copts have been forced to flee their homes as the result of the continued assaults. The sites also carry news of comparable intolerance and violence in many other Muslim nations that include the Sudan, Pakistan, Lebanon, and Indonesia, to name just three.

A friend of mine, a Copt, tells a familiar story of oppression that ultimately forced him to flee Egypt. In Muslim nations, Christians literally live at the whim of Muslim rulers. Copts are routinely killed or jailed in Egypt. The headlines tell the story elsewhere. Last year, in September, gunmen killed seven people at a Christian charity in Karachi, Pakistan. In May, twelve Christians were killed in a pre-dawn attack in Ambon, Indonesia. Contestants in the Miss World contest in Nigeria were forced to flee for their lives as Muslim riots resulted in the killing of hundreds of Christians.

This is the fate that awaits all nations if they fall victim to the insanity of the Islamic Jihad that is loose in the world today.

The history of Islam is a history of war and aggression against all "non-believers." It is a history of Islam's initial, swift spread throughout the Middle East and Africa in the century following the death of Muhammad in 632 AD. It is the history of its failed effort to conquer Europe and India. The freedoms that Europeans and Americans fought to establish over the centuries do not exist in any Muslim nation with the exception of Turkey and, even there, it is tenuous.

Under the rule of the Taliban, ancient, priceless statues of Buddha were deliberately destroyed in Afghanistan. Freedom had ceased to exist in that nation until the United States liberated its people.

However, little is reported regarding Israel's and the Middle East's vanishing Arab Christians. In his book, The Body and the Blood, Charles M. Sennott, documents the relentless war on Christian Arabs. Christianity flourished in the Holy Land after Constantine made it the official religion of the Roman Empire in the early fourth century. In recent times, the Muslim contempt for Christianity was vividly seen when Palestinian terrorists seized the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, trashing it, and holding out until freed to leave Israel in a deal to spare the church.

To this day, Muslims claim Jerusalem as the third of their holy cities after Mecca and Medina. They claim that Mohammed rose to heaven from the Dome of the Rock, a site held sacred by Jews, even though Mohammed never physically left Arabia. Jerusalem, where the Jews built their ancient temple and where Jesus was crucified, was desecrated by Muslims when they were in control. Only the bravery and sacrifice of the Israelis has prevented further desecration.

For Islam, the world today has become one great slaughterhouse in which no Christian, no Jew, no Hindu, no Buddhist, and no one worshiping any other faith has the right to life. Even Muslims who value peace and tolerance live in fear for their lives. We are not fighting "terrorists." We are fighting the Islamic Jihad. We are fighting for the right of Christians, Jews and all other faiths to worship freely.

Alan Caruba is the author of "Warning Signs", a new book published by Merril Press. His weekly column is posted on The National Anxiety Center's Internet site, www.anxietycenter.com.

Copyright, Alan Caruba, 2003

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