When will the West Understand what is Actually Outrageous?

John R. Houk
© April 13, 2011

The Quran Burning incident sponsored by Pastor Terry Jones has moved into the old news of the past. The incident that occurred on March 19 caused an outrage in the Muslim world that resulted in Muslims attacking Christians and their property. This was particularly the case in Afghanistan in which some U.N. workers that I presume the crazed Muslims believed were Christians (chances are the U.N. workers were Western secularists more than practicing Christians) were assaulted, killed and beheaded.

Of course condemnations came from the West and even the U.N. which was levied at Muslims who were probably connected to the Taliban enemies American troops are fighting. Unfortunately though, the condemnations of the murdering Muslims were soon followed by denunciations of the considered outrageous act of burning the Quran from Western and American outlets.

I have to qualify my reason for saying “unfortunately”. I say unfortunately because I do not consider the Quran burning an outrageous act. I do consider Pastor Jones’ publicizing of the event and the national MSM picking up the story as bad judgment on Pastor Jones’ part.

Part of the mission of NATO coalition under American leadership to secure Afghanistan from the radical Islam of the Taliban and al Qaeda is to win the support of supposed sane minded Muslim citizens. This was the success point of the Iraq Surge that has rendered Islamic terrorism into incompetence and has given the new Iraq government a good path to govern their own nation without massive American troops entrenched into a quagmire of blood. The Muslim populace became weary of Islamic terrorism targeting Muslim citizens and began to choose American troops as the lesser of two evils in their perspective of living lives without daily violence and murders.

If the American strategy is similar in Afghanistan then the public nature of burning a Quran which was picked up on rapidly by Taliban propagandists did indeed harm the military mission in Afghanistan. In other words Burn the Quran day did not help our American troops fighting for the American way of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. Thus we see and hear of military leaders like General Petraeus condemning the Quran burning in no uncertain terms.

Now here is an angle to the Quran burning that I discovered thanks to (STOP) RadicalIslam.com. That website did a cross post of Raymond Ibrahim’s article entitled, “Destroying One Koran vs. Destroying Many Christians - Which is Worse?”

Ibrahim’s point is that the MSM went out of its way to condemn Pastor Terry Jones and the burning of the Quran as an evil incitement and a hate-act effrontery toward Islam. AND YET, the MSM never places front and center the worse effrontery toward Christianity of Muslim Supremacism continually persecuting Christians by suspending their civil rights, assault, property destruction (including Churches), defacing of Christian symbols of worship (INCLUDING THE BIBLE), forced conversions, murder and rape. These horrendous acts occur in the Muslim Middle East on a habitual basis. The persecution is not an odd exception to the rule. The persecution of Christians is THE RULE!

Pastor Terry Jones sponsored one Quran burning in 2011. Did you read that? ONLY ONE! If chose to look for it you will discover the persecution of Christians occurs at least on a weekly basis in the Muslim world. The Christian fear of persecution is undoubtedly on a daily basis in the Muslim world. A good place to check on the constant persecution of Christians is the website ironically named The Religion of Peace.

So let’s rethink this question in light of what really happens in the Muslim world: Which is worse – burning a Quran in America or the torturous daily fear of persecution in Muslim dominated nations?

Be sure to check out Raymond Ibrahim’s article on this kind of thinking.

JRH 4/13/11
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Destroying One Koran vs. Destroying Many Christians - Which is Worse?

By Raymond Ibrahim
April 8, 2011
(STOP) RadicalIslam.org
Originally Published: FrontPageMag.com

The now infamous Koran burning by Florida pastor Terry Jones has created hysteria in the Muslim world. In Afghanistan alone, some twenty people, including U.N. workers, have been killed and beheaded to screams of “Allahu Akbar!” Western leaders around the globe—including Obama and members of Congress—have unequivocally condemned Jones’ actions (without bothering to point out that freedom of expression is a prized American liberty). Many are even blaming the deaths in Afghanistan directly on Jones; Bill O’Reilley says he has “blood on his hands.”

Yet, as Western leaders rush to profess their abhorrence at what one American did to one inanimate book, let’s take a quick look at what many Muslims are doing to many living and breathing Christians around the Islamic world—to virtually no media coverage or Western condemnation:

• Afghanistan: A Muslim convert to Christianity was seized and, according to sharia’s apostasy laws, awaits execution.

• Bangladesh: A Christian man was arrested for distributing Bibles near Muslims. Since Wednesday, thousands of Muslims have been rioting, injuring dozens—not because of Jones, but in protestation of women’s rights.

• Egypt: A Muslim mob burned down another Coptic church and dozens of Christian homes; when Christians protested, the military opened fire on them while crying “Allahu Akbar,” killing nine. Another mob cut a Christian man’s ear off “according to sharia.”

• Ethiopia: Muslims went on a rampage burning down nearly 70 churches, killing at least one Christian, and dislocating as many as 10,000. Christians living in Muslim majority regions are being warned to either convert to Islam, abandon their homes, or die.

• Malaysia: Authorities detained and desecrated thousands of Bibles.

• Pakistan: Two Christians were shot to death as they exited church; a Christian serving life in prison for “blasphemy” died in his cell under suspicions of murder.

• Saudi Arabia: An Eritrean Christian has been arrested for sharing his faith with Muslims and is facing the death penalty; other missionaries continue to languish in Saudi prisons.

• Somalia and Sudan: Christian girls—including a mother of four—were recently abducted, raped, and killed for embracing Christianity.

It should be borne in mind that none of these atrocities were performed in retaliation to Jones’ Koran burning; they’re just business as usual in the Muslim world. Moreover, the above list is but a quick and cursory sampling of the very latest in Christian suffering under Islam. Were one to include persecution from just a few months back, one could also mention the jihadist attack on a Baghdad church, killing 52 Christians; the New Year’s eve Coptic church explosion, killing 21; Muslim rampages that destroyed several churches in Indonesia, Nigeria, and the Philippines; Iran’s “round up” of some 70 home-worshipping Christians; and Kuwait’s—a nation that owes its very existence to U.S. war sacrifices—rejection to build a church.

Then there are the countless atrocities that never make it to any media—the stories of persistent, quiet misery that only the victims and local Christians know.

One would have thought that all this was at least equally deserving of media attention and Western condemnation as the burning of a Koran. This is especially so considering that, whereas only Jones is responsible for his actions, many of the aforementioned savageries—arresting and executing Christian missionaries and Muslim apostates, destroying or outlawing churches, seizing and desecrating not one but thousands of Bibles—are carried out at the hands of Muslim authorities and governments deemed U.S. “friends-and-allies.”

Such is the surreal and increasingly irrational world we live in, where irate Muslims and groveling Westerners obsess over the destruction of one book while ignoring the destruction of many human lives; where a guaranteed and hard-earned American right—freedom of expression—receives a lot of condemnatory huffing and puffing from those charged with protecting it, while murderous, barbarous—in a word, evil—behavior is devoutly ignored.

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When will the West Understand what is Actually Outrageous?

John R. Houk
© April 13, 2011
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Destroying One Koran vs. Destroying Many Christians - Which is Worse?


Raymond Ibrahim is associate director of the Middle East Forum and author of The Al Qaeda Reader.
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