Multiculturalism Harasses Thilo Sarrazin

John R. Houk

© May 19, 2013

This article is a little difficult to read in my opinion; nonetheless the message is clear. A German got himself in hot water over going public that the non-German immigrants of the Turkish and Arab persuasion are increasing via the birthrate exponentially enough to overtake the homegrown European Germanic culture. And as that immigration population grows they are the ones that tend to live on the German government welfare.

That German is Thilo Sarrazin who has been a prominent German politician and now an important Executive Board Member of the German Bundesbank which is the central bank of the Federal Republic of Germany and as such part of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB).  

Evidently Sarrazin is both controversial and popular in Germany because of this book he wrote in 2010 which in English is rendered “Germany Abolishes Itself: How We Are Risking Our Country”. (I noticed Wikipedia has a different translation of this title: “Germany Is Doing Away With Itself”.)

This article is entitled “UN Pressures Germany to Bow to 'Hate Speech' Hysteria”. Evidently an agency of the United Nations the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) is the anti-Free Speech agenda to squash opinions such as those presented by Thilo Sarrazin. Here is an excerpt of the CERD mission from its website:

The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) is the body of independent experts that monitors implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination by its State parties.

All States parties are obliged to submit regular reports to the Committee on how the rights are being implemented. States must report initially one year after acceding to the Convention and then every two years. The Committee examines each report and addresses its concerns and recommendations to the State party in the form of “concluding observations”.

In addition to the reporting procedure, the Convention establishes three other mechanisms through which the Committee performs its monitoring functions: the early-warning procedure, the examination of inter-state complaints and the examination of individual complaints.

The Committee meets in Geneva and normally holds two sessions per year consisting of three weeks each.

The Committee also publishes its interpretation of the content of human rights provisions, known as general recommendations (or general comments), on thematic issues and organizes thematic discussions.

For more information about the work of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, click here.

The CERD decision placing pressure on the German government is 19 pages. You can read the entire pdf English translation document; however I think you can get the gist of how the U.N. is imposing Free Speech suppression according to how Americans view Free Speech from this small excerpt:

3.3 The petitioner argues that since Mr. Sarrazin is the former Finance Senator of the Berlin Senate and member of the Board of Directors of the German Central Bank, his authority leads to the perception that his statements are based on proven facts and, therefore, “the truth”. It adds that the effects of Mr. Sarrazin’s statements enhance prejudices of the majority towards the Turkish population and individuals of Turkish heritage, including their children. The petitioner submits that such racially discriminatory statements are not covered by the right to freedom of expression because the concerned group has a right to live without prejudices and general intolerance, and the freedom to exercise their rights should be respected. The statements made by Mr. Sarrazin should be assessed in the framework of the special social context of Germany, adding to the general pattern of incitement to racial hatred against the Turkish population, which in the circumstances can be even more dangerous than openly flaunted racism, which is easier to combat. With the termination of the investigation against Mr. Sarrazin, the petitioner claims that it was arbitrarily denied protection against racially discriminatory statements directed against it as a group of individuals of Turkish heritage and as the representative of this group and the propagation thereof represents a violation of articles 2 (1 (d), 4, (a) and 6.

So here’s the thing. The U.N.’s CERD is forcing Germany to comply with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) to prohibit all forms of criticism of Islam which is responsible for most of the world’s global terrorism.

Oops! I just violated U.N.’s campaign to protect Islam. Oh well, I’ll get over it.

JRH 5/19/13

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UN Pressures Germany to Bow to 'Hate Speech' Hysteria

By Andrew Harrod and Sam Nunberg

May 16, 2013

The Legal Project

Originally - Frontpage Mag

A recent decision by the United Nation's (UN) Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) foreshadows an ominous future for free societies should Muslim entities like the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) achieve their goal of having "Islamophobia" defined internationally as a form of prejudice.

Former German central bank board member Thilo Sarrazin has got himself in trouble with the UN, as the Turkish Union in Berlin-Brandenburg (Türkischer Bund in Berlin-Brandenburg or TBB) stated with satisfaction in an April 18, 2013, German-language press release. The spokesman of this German-Turkish interest group, Hilmi Kaya Turan, praised a February 26, 2013, "historic decision" by the CERD condemning Germany for not having prosecuted Sarrazin's criticism of Arab and Turkish immigrants.

Sarrazin, a member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands or SPD), produced a storm of controversy with his August 2010 book Deutschland Schafft Sich Ab: Wie Wir Unser Land aufs Spiel Setzen ("Germany Abolishes Itself: How We Are Risking Our Country"). In the context of this controversy, CERD's detailed 19-page decision extensively excerpted in English translation a fall 2009 interview with Sarrazin. In the interview, the Berlin magazine Lettre International discussed some of the upcoming book's themes.

CERD complained that "[i]n this interview, Mr. Sarrazin expressed himself in a derogatory and discriminatory way about social 'lower classes', which are not productive' and would have to 'disappear over time' in order to create a city of the 'elite'." Sarrazin specified that about 20% of Berlin's population depended on welfare payments, which he wanted to cut, "above all to the lower class."

Berlin's indigent included within the immigrant population a "large number of Arabs and Turks in this city, whose numbers have grown through erroneous policies, have no productive function, except for the fruit and vegetable trade." Compounding the problem for Sarrazin was a birthrate among Arabs and Turks about three times their percentage of the population. Sarrazin thereby saw "Turks…conquering Germany just like the Kosovars conquered Kosovo: through a higher birth rate." Sarrazin "wouldn't mind if" these immigrants "were East European Jews with about a 15% higher IQ than the one of Germans." Central to Sarrazin's thesis was the assumption that "human ability is to some extent socially contingent and to some extent hereditary." Sarrazin's "solution to this problem" was "to generally prohibit influx, except for highly qualified individuals and not provide social welfare for immigrants anymore."

As noted by CERD, Sarrazin's interview comments prompted on October 23, 2009, a criminal complaint by the TBB under the German Criminal Code's Article 130 against "Incitement to Hatred" (Volksverhetzung). Yet upon review, German prosecutors suspended their investigations on November 23, 2009, deciding that Sarrazin's views fell under the protection of free speech contained within Article 5 of Germany's Basic Law (Grundgesetz). Prosecutors quoted by CERD had judged Sarrazin's statements as a "contribution to the intellectual debate in a question…very significant for the public."

Following this domestic defeat, the TBB turned in 2010 to Article 14 of CERD's governing convention (Article 14), the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. Article 14 provides that the CERD may "consider communications from individuals or groups of individuals within" a consenting State Party's "jurisdiction claiming to be victims of a violation by that State Party of any of the rights set forth in this Convention." In response, CERD agreed with TBB that Sarrazin had made discriminatory comments and that the German "State party failed to provide protection against such discrimination." CERD thus wanted the "State party" to "review its policy and procedures…to give wide publicity to the Committee's Opinion," and to deliver "within 90 days, information from the State party about the measures taken."

CERD's decision did not involve Islam directly, for Sarrazin had referenced the ethnicity of Arabs and Turks, not their majority-Muslim faith. Yet CERD's decision noted various party submissions according to which in Germany the "labels 'Turks' or 'Arabs' are applied as synonyms for Muslims." Citing various evidence examples, CERD agreed with one submission that "Mr. Sarrazin's statements led to public vilification and debasement of Turks and Muslims in general."

Any such foreign judgment of a country raises sensitive questions of national sovereignty, particularly when involving limitations of free speech. Sarrazin's case was no exception, especially in light of CERD members mocked by the German conservative website Politically Incorrect as "torches of democracy and human rights." Analyzing this roster, Germans might well wonder what they could learn in equality under the law from members hailing from Algeria, Burkina Faso, China, Niger, Pakistan, Russia, Togo, and Turkey, among other countries.

The Sarrazin case exemplifies how international law and its institutional developments can impact domestic matters. Observers of the OIC, an international organization of 57 majority-Muslim nation-states (including "Palestine"), would be well advised to keep Sarrazin in mind when considering the OIC's longstanding campaign against "Islamophobia." This campaign would only too willingly extrapolate from Sarrazin's comments about Arab and Turk immigrants, however controversial, to a condemnation of criticizing Islamic ideas as well.

Defenders of free speech should beware. The transnationalist, multiculturalists and OIC have a new mechanism to override domestic legal hate speech decisions. Precedent is slowly but surely being set.

This article was sponsored by the Legal Project, an activity of the Middle East Forum.

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Multiculturalism Harasses Thilo Sarrazin

John R. Houk

© May 19, 2013

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UN Pressures Germany to Bow to 'Hate Speech' Hysteria

© 2013 The Middle East Forum.

About the Legal Project

The Middle East Forum has established the Legal Project to protect researchers and analysts who work on the topics of terrorism, terrorist funding, and radical Islam from lawsuits designed to silence their exercise of free speech.

Background

Researchers and analysts have been repeatedly targeted in legal actions, including… Read the Rest

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Huma Abedin, Muslim Brotherhood and Benghazigate?

John R. Houk

© May 18, 2013

Huma Abedin sneaked away from being Hillary Clinton’s Deputy Chief of Staff about the same time Rep. Michele Bachman along with Reps. Trent Franks, R-AZ, Louie Gohmert, R-TX, Thomas Rooney, R-FL, and Lynn Westmoreland, R-GA sent a letter to the Inspector General demanding an investigation of Abedin as a Fifth Columnist for the Muslim Brotherhood around July 12 or 13, 2012.

Why is Abedin’s stealth resignation important? After leaving Hillary’s political employ she became employed as a consultant for the State Department which according to the Shoebat Foundation means she no longer needed to make her tax returns public.

Hmm … Apparently Huma Abedin continued her role with Hillary just as a consultant to the State Department. Let’s see possible Muslim Brotherhood collaborator, Benghazigate cover-up, Ambassador Stevens negotiating with Libyan Islamists to deliver arms to Syrian rebel Islamists BUT maybe a MB arms diversion to Egypt to deliver the arms to Hamas. Yeah I know that is a lot of “ifs”.

Here is another “if”. What if Huma Abedin embroiled Hillary Clinton into the negotiations to transfer Libyan arms to either the Syrian Islamist Rebels or to Hamas or to both? Such a scheme would have to be signed off on by President Barack Hussein Obama. Therein would lay the reason for a cover-up: to save Obama from impeachment and to try to keep Hillary’s name sacrosanct for a run for the Dem nomination for President in 2016.

JRH 5/18/13

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Did Huma Abedin ‘quietly’ step down as Deputy Chief of Staff in same month Bachmann letter sent to IG?

By Shoebat Foundation

May 17, 2013

Shoebat.com

The title of a New York Times article by Raymond Hernandez reads, “Weiner’s Wife Didn’t Disclose Consulting Work She Did While Serving in State Dept.”. However, the headline for another story pops up in the eighth paragraph when a potentially very interesting claim is made. Take note of when Abedin allegedly stepped down as Deputy Chief of Staff for Hillary.

Via NYT:

Ms. Abedin reached her new working arrangement in June 2012, when she returned from maternity leave, quietly leaving her position as deputy chief of staff and becoming a special government employee, which is essentially a consultant. A State Department official said that change freed her from the requirement that she disclose her private earnings for the rest of the year on her financial disclosure forms. Still, during that period, she continued to be identified publicly in news reports as Mrs. Clinton’s deputy chief of staff.

Officials in the State Department and Clinton circles seem especially sensitive about the arrangement, and no one would speak about it on the record. Earlier this month, Mr. Weiner released a copy of the couple’s 2012 tax return showing that they had income of more than $490,000.

Is it a good thing to be afflicted with Islamophobia? Get the new book from Walid Shoebat, The Case FOR ISLAMOPHOBIA: Jihad by the Word; America’s Final Warning.

According to the Times’ sources, Abedin stepped down as Deputy Chief of Staff for Hillary in June of 2012 but continued to be identified as Hillary’s Deputy Chief of Staff – without any announcement by the State Department to the contrary – before Hillary stepped down as Secretary of State seven months later.

Something else happened in June of 2012 as well, the 13th to be exact. That is the date of a letter sent by Reps. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), Louie Gohmert (R-TX), Trent Franks (R-AZ), Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA), and Tom Rooney (R-FL) to the State Department’s Deputy Inspector General. That letter specifically named Huma Abedin and her familial connections to the Muslim Brotherhood:

“…the Department’s Deputy Chief of Staff, Huma Abedin, has three family members – her late father, her mother and her brother – connected to Muslim Brotherhood operatives and/or organizations. Her position affords her routine access to the Secretary and to policy-making.”

It is not clear if the letter had anything to do with Abedin ‘quietly’ stepping down at around the same time the letter was sent, largely because of the State Department’s secrecy.

The letter to the State Department’s IG office was one of five sent to various IG’s. Several individuals were named but by far, Abedin’s name caused the most controversy; her ties to the Brotherhood through her mother and brother – as well as her work at the IMMA – are indisputable.

Had an announcement been made in June of 2012 that Abedin was stepping down as Deputy, it clearly would have fueled the controversy. Nonetheless, two questions need to be answered:

1.) Why did Abedin step down as Deputy Chief of Staff when she allegedly did?

2.) Why was it kept secret for nearly a year?

As to the issue of secrecy, the subject of the New York Times article is Abedin’s refusal to disclose her consulting work while she was still at the State Department.

We have expressed – as have others – repeated interest in Abedin disclosing the contents of the Form 86 she should have completed prior to working as Hillary’s Deputy back in 2009.

It is also, indeed interesting that the news of Abedin’s ‘quiet’ departure comes at a time when the State Department is under quite a big microscope over Benghazi. Again, we have expressed – as have others – interest in knowing to what extent Abedin was involved in Benghazi-gate.

Then again, how silly of us. That was before we knew – as well as everyone else – that she stepped down in June of 2012.

Perhaps Anthony Weiner’s decision to run for mayor of New York City might start bringing some interesting things to light after all.

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Huma Abedin, Muslim Brotherhood and Benghazigate?

John R. Houk

© May 18, 2013

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Did Huma Abedin ‘quietly’ step down as Deputy Chief of Staff in same month Bachmann letter sent to IG?

© 2013 Walid Shoebat. All Rights Reserved.

About Shoebat Foundation

Born in Bethlehem of Judea, Walid's grandfather was the Muslim Mukhtar (chieftain) of Beit Sahour-Bethlehem (The Shepherd's Fields) and a friend of Haj-Ameen Al-Husseni, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and notorious friend of Adolf Hitler. Walid's great grandfather, Abdullah Ali Awad-Allah, was also a fighter and close associate of both Abdul Qader and Haj Amin Al-Husseini, who led the Palestinians against Israel. Walid lived through and witnessed Israel’s Six Day War while living in Jericho. As a young man, he became a member of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, and participated in acts of terror and violence against Israel, and was later imprisoned in the Russian Compound, Jerusalem's central prison for incitement and violence against Israel. After his release, he continued his life of violence and rioting in Bethlehem and the Temple Mount. After entering the U.S, he worked as a counselor for the Arab Student Organization at Loop College in Chicago and continued his anti-Israel activities. In 1993, Walid studied the Tanach (Jewish Bible) in a challenge to convert his wife to Islam. Six months later, after intense study, Walid realized that everything he had been taught about Jews was a lie. Convinced he was on the side of evil, he became an advocate for his former enemy. Driven by a deep passion to heal his own soul, and to bring the truth about the Jews and Israel to the world, Walid shed his former life and his work as a software engineer and set out to tirelessly bring the cause of Israel to tens of thousands of people throughout the world: churches and synagogues, civic groups, government leaders and media.

View all posts by Shoebat Foundation →

No Compulsion of Religion in Islam – It’s Poppycock

John R. Houk

© May 18, 2013

Many a Muslim in defending the theopolitical cult of Islam will quote this phrase to emphasize the propaganda and false perception that Islam is peace: There is compulsion in religion.

The phrase is straight from the Quran which Muslims consider the infallible directs words of Allah passed onto Mohammed who then shared them with his adherents. It can be referenced as Quran 2:256 or as Al-Baqara 256.

Here are a few English translations of Quran 2:256:

Muhammad Asad

THERE SHALL BE no coercion in matters of faith. Distinct has now become the right way from [the way of] error: hence, he who rejects the powers of evil and believes in God has indeed taken hold of a support most unfailing, which shall never give way: for God is all-hearing, all-knowing.

Pickthall

There is no compulsion in religion. The right direction is henceforth distinct from error. And he who rejecteth false deities and believeth in Allah hath grasped a firm handhold which will never break. Allah is Hearer, Knower.

Al-Muntakhab

Compulsion is incompatible with religion, therefore let there be no compulsion in religion. Now the path of righteousness has been distinguished from the path of error and holiness distinguished from vindictiveness. Therefore, he who rejects false beliefs and turns his attention to Allah with a religious mind, will have firmly grasped the eternal, unchangeable and most secure handhold which shall never separate, nor shall it suffer a break, and Allah is Sami‘un and 'Alimun.

** Read more translations from Islam Awakened

There are Muslim scholars of considerable weighty importance that have written the Quran 2:256 has been abrogated by Quran 9:29:

Sahih International: Fight those who do not believe in Allah or in the Last Day and who do not consider unlawful what Allah and His Messenger have made unlawful and who do not adopt the religion of truth from those who were given the Scripture - [fight] until they give the jizyah willingly while they are humbled.

Pickthall: Fight against such of those who have been given the Scripture as believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, and forbid not that which Allah hath forbidden by His messenger, and follow not the Religion of Truth, until they pay the tribute readily, being brought low.

Yusuf Ali: Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.

Shakir: Fight those who do not believe in Allah, nor in the latter day, nor do they prohibit what Allah and His Messenger have prohibited, nor follow the religion of truth, out of those who have been given the Book, until they pay the tax in acknowledgment of superiority and they are in a state of subjection.

Muhammad Sarwar: Fight against those People of the Book who have no faith in God or the Day of Judgment, who do not consider unlawful what God and His Messenger have made unlawful, and who do not believe in the true religion, until they humbly pay tax with their own hands.

Mohsin Khan: Fight against those who (1) believe not in Allah, (2) nor in the Last Day, (3) nor forbid that which has been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger (4) and those who acknowledge not the religion of truth (i.e. Islam) among the people of the Scripture (Jews and Christians), until they pay the Jizyah with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.

Arberry: Fight those who believe not in God and the Last Day and do not forbid what God and His Messenger have forbidden -- such men as practise not the religion of truth, being of those who have been given the Book -- until they pay the tribute out of hand and have been humbled.

** From Quran Arabic Corpus

You can understand why many Muslim scholars claim Quran 9:29 abrogates (or nullifies) Quran 2:256’s “There is no compulsion in religion”. According to 9:29 Muslims are to fight non-believers in Islam and Mohammed’s version of the Last Day. The Last Day meaning all non-Muslims will be confined to the torments of hell. Thus if you believe in the Muslim way you are worthy of death. That sounds like compulsion to me!

Fascinatingly there are Muslim scholars that claim 9:29 does not abrogate 2:256. This Muslim thinking works something like this: The fight against unbelievers is not an invocation to kill but rather to submit to the Islamic theopolitical culture as subservient. A lack of subservience does mean brutal measures up to and including death. So thinking is not compelling one to convert to Islam but create a dhimmi class that pays the jizya tax (poll tax to stay alive) in humiliation so that the dhimmi knows their place in Muslim world. Breaking the dhimmi deal requires punish according to how Islam has been violated or insulted. Guess what the conquered people chose to do rather than suffer the humiliations of dhimmitude. If you guessed conversion to Islam you are the big winner!

In essence dhimmitude was the long term path to convince the conquered to convert to Islam. The plan might be long term but it still is compulsion in religion.

Here are some thoughts written more articulately on the issue of abrogation or non-abrogation of Quran 2:256 by Quran 9:29:

Immediately following is the famous statement that “there is no compulsion in religion” (v. 256). Islamic spokesmen in the West frequently quote it to disprove the contention that Islam spread by the sword, or even to claim that Islam is a religion of peace. According to an early Muslim, Mujahid ibn Jabr, this verse was abrogated by Qur’an 9:29, in which the Muslims are commanded to fight against the People of the Book. Others, however, according to the Islamic historian Tabari, say that 2:256 was never abrogated, but was revealed precisely in reference to the People of the Book. They are not to be forced to accept Islam, but may practice their religions as long as they pay the jizya (poll-tax) and “feel themselves subdued” (9:29).

Many see v. 256 as contradicting the Islamic imperative to wage jihad against unbelievers, but actually there is no contradiction because the aim of jihad is not the forced conversion of non-Muslims, but their subjugation within the Islamic social order. Says Asad: “All Islamic jurists (fuqahd’), without any exception, hold that forcible conversion is under all circumstances null and void, and that any attempt at coercing a non-believer to accept the faith of Islam is a grievous sin: a verdict which disposes of the widespread fallacy that Islam places before the unbelievers the alternative of ‘conversion or the sword.’” Quite so: the choice, as laid out by Muhammad himself, is conversion, subjugation as dhimmis, or the sword. Qutb accordingly denies that v. 256 contradicts the imperative to fight until “religion is for Allah” (v. 193), saying that “Islam has not used force to impose its beliefs.” Rather, jihad’s “main objective has been the establishment of a stable society in which all citizens, including followers of other religious creeds, may live in peace and security” – although not with equality of rights before the law, as 9:29 emphasizes. For Qutb, that “stable society” is the “Islamic social order,” the establishment of which is a chief objective of jihad.

In this light verses 256 and 193 go together without any trouble. Muslims must fight until “religion is for Allah,” but they don’t force anyone to accept Allah’s religion. They enforce subservience upon those who refuse to convert, such that many of them subsequently convert to Islam so as to escape the humiliating and discriminatory regulations of dhimmitude — but when they convert, they do so freely. Only at the end of the world will Jesus, the Prophet of Islam, return and Islamize the world, abolishing Christianity and thus the need for the jizya that is paid by the dhimmis. Then religion will be “for Allah,” and there will be no further need for jihad. (Excerpted from Blogging the Qur’an: Sura 2, “The Cow,” verses 222-286; By Robert Spencer; Hot Air; 7/15/07)

Now here is the reason I thought it important to understand the Islamic notion of there being no compulsion of religion. Raymond Ibrahim wrote a no holds barred expose on how Muslims indeed compelled Christians to convert or die throughout the centuries to this present day. Ibrahim describes some savage historical incidents in which Muslims butchered Christians for not converting to Islam. The essay is entitled “Islamic Forced Conversions — Past and Present”.

JRH 5/18/13

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Islamic Forced Conversions — Past and Present

By Raymond Ibrahim

May 16, 2013

RaymondIbrahim.com

The Blaze

The lost history of Christians forced to convert to Islam—or die—is reemerging, figuratively and literally. According to the BBC: “Pope Francis has proclaimed the first saints of his pontificate in a ceremony [last Sunday] at the Vatican—a list which includes 800 victims of an atrocity carried out by Ottoman soldiers in 1480.They were beheaded in the southern Italian town of Otranto after refusing to convert to Islam.”

The BBC adds in a sidebar: “The ‘Martyrs of Otranto’ were 813 Italians beheaded for defying demands by Turkish invaders to renounce Christianity.  The Turks had been sent by Mohammed II, who had already captured the ‘second Rome’ of Constantinople.”

Historical texts throughout the centuries are filled with similar anecdotes, including the “60 Martyrs of Gaza,” Christian soldiers who were executed for refusing Islam during the 7^th century Islamic invasion of Jerusalem. Seven centuries later, during the Islamic invasion of Georgia, Christians refusing to convert were forced into their church and set on fire. Witnesses for Christ lists 200 anecdotes of Christians killed—including some burned at the stake, thrown on iron spikes, dismembered, stoned, stabbed, shot at, drowned, pummeled to death, impaled and crucified—for refusing to embrace Islam.

If history is shocking, the fact is, today, Christians—men, women, and children—are still being forced to convert to Islam.  Pope Francis alluded to their sufferings during the same ceremony: “As we venerate the martyrs of Otranto, let us ask God to sustain those many Christians who, in these times and in many parts of the world, right now, still suffer violence, and give them the courage and fidelity to respond to evil with good.”

Consider some recent anecdotes:

In Pakistan, a “devoted Christian” was butchered by Muslim men “with multiple axe blows [24 per autopsy] for refusing to convert to Islam.” Another two Christian men returning from church were accosted by six Muslims who tried to force them to convert to Islam, but “the two refused to renounce Christianity.”  Accordingly, the Muslims severely beat them, yelling they must either convert “or be prepared to die. . . . the two Christians fell unconscious, and the young Muslim men left assuming they had killed them.”

In Bangladesh some 300 Christian children were abducted in 2012 and sold to Islamic schools, where “imams force them to abjure Christianity.”  The children are then instructed in Islam and beaten. After full indoctrination they are asked if they are “ready to give their lives for Islam,” presumably by becoming jihadi suicide-bombers.  (Even here the historic patterns are undeniable: for centuries, Christian children were forcibly taken, converted to and indoctrinated in Islam, trained to be jihadis extraordinaire, and then unleashed on their former Christian families.  Such were the Janissaries and Mamelukes.)

In Palestine in 2012, Christians in Gaza protested over the “kidnappings and forced conversions of some former believers to Islam.” The ever-dwindling Christian community banged on a church bell while chanting, “With our spirit, with our blood we will sacrifice ourselves for you, Jesus.”

Just as happened throughout history, Muslims today regularly “invite” Christians to Islam, often presenting it as the only cure to their sufferings—sufferings caused by Muslims in the first place.

In Pakistan, a Christian couple was arrested on a false charge and severely beaten by police. The pregnant wife was “punched, kicked and beat” as her interrogators threatened to kill her unborn baby. A policeman offered to drop the theft charge if the husband would only “renounce Christianity and convert to Islam,” but the man refused.

In Uzbekistan, a 26-year-old Christian woman, partially paralyzed from youth, and her elderly mother were violently attacked by invaders who ransacked their home, confiscating “icons, Bibles, religious calendars, and prayer books.” At the police department, the paralyzed woman was “offered to convert to Islam.” She refused, and the judge “decided that the women had resisted police and had stored the banned religious literature at home and conducted missionary activities. He fined them 20 minimum monthly wages each.”

In Sudan, Muslims kidnapped a 15-year-old Christian girl; they raped, beat and ordered her to convert to Islam. When her mother went to police to open a case, the Muslim officer of the so-called “Family and Child Protection Unit,” told her: “You must convert to Islam if you want your daughter back.”

Indeed, because Christian females are the most vulnerable segments of Islamic societies, they are especially targeted for forced conversions. In 2012, U.S. Congress heard testimony about the “escalating abduction, coerced conversion and forced marriage of Coptic Christian women and girls [550 cases in the last five years alone].Those women are being terrorized and, consequently, marginalized, in the formation of the new Egypt.”

As my new book Crucified Again: Exposing Islam’s New War on Christians documents, wherever there are large numbers of Muslims—whether in the Arab World, Africa, Asia, or even in the West—Christians are being persecuted.  Forced conversions are the tip of the iceberg, and certainly not anomalies of history.

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No Compulsion of Religion in Islam – It’s Poppycock

John R. Houk

© May 18, 2013

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Islamic Forced Conversions — Past and Present

RAYMOND IBRAHIM, a Middle East and Islam specialist, is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum. A widely published author, best known for The Al Qaeda Reader (Doubleday, 2007), he guest lectures at universities, including the National Defense Intelligence College, briefs governmental agencies, such as U.S. Strategic Command and the Defense Intelligence Agency, provides expert testimony for Islam-related lawsuits, and has testified before Congress regarding the conceptual failures that dominate American discourse concerning Islam and the worsening plight of Egypt's Christian Copts. Among other media, he has appeared on MSNBC, Fox News, C-SPAN, PBS, Reuters, Al-Jazeera, CBN, and NPR.

The reproduction of any material or information originating on this website must include either a link to this website or cite the name of this website (RaymondIbrahim.com) as the source of the material or information reproduced. Violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

© 2013 Raymond Ibrahim | Empowered by Uhuru Network, LLC