Truth & Terrorism

Zzzzzzzz

This blog has gone to sleep.  For now.

I'm working now at my other blog, Making Sense of Jihad.

You never know, however, like Rip Van Winkle, the League may wake up, cranky and energized.

Sister Leonella Sgorbati, RIP

Who would murder a nun in cold blood?

The nun, whose identify was not released, was shot in the back four times at the entrance to the Austrian-run S.O.S. Hospital in northern Mogadishu, said Dr. Mohamed Yusuf, a physician at the facility, which serves mothers and children.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which came hours after a leading Somali cleric condemned remarks by the pope that quoted a Byzantine emperor who characterized some of the teachings of Islam's founder as "evil and inhuman."

The head of security for the Islamic militia, Yusuf Mohamed Siad, said one man had been arrested and a second was being hunted. He said the killing might have stemmed from the uproar over the pope but stressed he didn't know for sure.

"They could be people annoyed by the pope's speech, which angered all Muslims in the world, or they could have been having something to do with S.O.S," he said. "We will have to clarify this through our investigation."

A Vatican spokesman called the nun's slaying "a horrible episode," the Italian news agency ANSA said.

"Let's hope that it will be an isolated fact," the Rev. Federico Lombardi said. He expressed hope Muslim anger would ease following Benedict's explanation Sunday that the quotation he cited did not reflect his personal opinion about Islam.

The nun, who spoke fluent Somali, was believed to be around 60 and had been working at the hospital since 2002, people at the hospital said, insisting on anonymity for fear of reprisals. She taught at the hospital and also looked after children, said one doctor.

Michelle Asks: Who Will Support the Pope?

"Who will stand up and say without equivocation [and declare]: I support the Pope"

=========================================

Like the Danish Cartoon insanity earlier this year, the current threats and violence against the Holy Father and Christendom in general have their source in the Muslim Brotherhood, specifically its spiritual leader, Sheik Yusuf Qaradawi.  As the London Times notes:

The murderous Muslim Brotherhood was the first out of the blocks, demanding that all Islamic countries cut their ties with the Vatican. The “liberal and moderate” Islamic scholar Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi (pro death penalty for homosexuals, female circumcision, suicide bombings against Jews and other similarly tolerant stuff) has insisted the Pope must apologise. Soon the placards will be out, the effigies, the foam-flecked demonstrators and attacks by adolescent suicidal nutters.

The Brotherhood is still the radical Islamist organization they were when founder Hasan Al-Banna said

He who dies and has not fought (ghaza - literally: raided) and was not resolved to fight, has died a jahiliyah death." No movement can succeed, Banna insists, without this dedicated and unqualified kind of jihad.

The hyper-violent mau-mauing being perpetrated by mostly illiterate, ignorant Muslims, is a reaction manufactured by Qaradawi and his clerical leaders in Islamists mosques all over the world.  It serves an important role in the Brotherhood's struggle for greater control of Islamic institutions throughout the Middle East.

Remember, the Brotherhood is still "persecuted" in most Middle Eastern countries.  Membership is illegal, and its members are often jailed, their assets are often subject to seizures.  I suspect that they are just as threatened by the American presence in Iraq and Afghanistan as is Al Qaeda and Iran.  It would explain, in part, Qaradawi and the Brotherhood's role in these violent, global mau-mauing incidents. Most of which have happened since 2003.   It's their way of flexing power through Western media.

In his Friday sermon, Sheik Qaradawi -- the most popular Muslim cleric in the world -- demanded an apology from the Pope.  This started the ball rolling, and as images from Friday prayer protests began to filter through the Western media it all seemed so spontaneous, but there was nothing spontaneous about it.

Players in the global jihad politics -- men such as Sheik Qaradawi and the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia (a paid representative of the Saudi royal family) -- have decided to face down the Pope.  This is not unexpected.  For years leaders of radical Islamist movements like the Muslim Brotherhood have been hinting at a clash with "Rome."   Qaradawi says as much in this fatwa:

In a fatwa posted on the website www.islamonline.net,[1] in response to a reader's question, Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi wrote of the "signs of the victory of Islam," citing a well-known Hadith: "… The Prophet Muhammad was asked: 'What city will be conquered first, Constantinople or Romiyya?' He answered: 'The city of Hirqil [i.e. the Byzantine emperor Heraclius] will be conquered first' - that is, Constantinople… Romiyya is the city called today 'Rome,' the capital of Italy. The city of Hirqil [that is, Constantinople] was conquered by the young 23-year-old Ottoman Muhammad bin Morad, known in history as Muhammad the Conqueror, in 1453. The other city, Romiyya, remains, and we hope and believe [that it too will be conquered].

"Rome" here can mean the West, as well as the seat of the Pope.  Either through ignorance (Muslim societies generally do not permit comparative religion studies), or through radical Islamist supremacist world view, most Muslims do not understand the distinctions in Christian practice.  We're all just Christians, and "Rome" is the center of Christendom.

On Saturday, a political leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohammed Habib, echoed Qaradawi:

"We want a personal apology (from the Pope). We feel that he has committed a grave error against us and that this mistake will only be removed through a personal apology," Muslim Brotherhood Deputy Leader Mohammed Habib told Reuters.

Expect more of this from MB leaders.  If they can  pressure the leader of Christendom to accommodate their authority, then their teaching and authority gain more legitimacy, and average Muslims will accept a greater role for the MB in spiritual and political life.

For the record, here is the Holy Father's speech.  To be honest, with a few exceptions, probably no Muslim leader (or NY Times editor) has read this speech and understood it.  The Holy Father is an erudite man, and he is teaching in a language of academic abstractions.  This is the language of Western "dialogue," and has no meaning for our Eastern enemy.

NOTE:  This is cross-posted at Making Sense of Jihad where I also ask another question...When will the US finally designate the MB a terrorist organization?

Persecution in Lina Joy (Roundup)

From AsiaNews (August 24):

Kuala Lumpur (AsiaNews) – Malaysia’s Federal Court has said it intends to take its time before passing sentence in the appeal of Lina Joy because the issue is “sensitive and needs careful examination.” Lina Joy’s appeal to have her conversion to Christianity officially recognized has been in the Federal Court for months. Meanwhile, pressure by Islamic extremists is intensifying daily: they are intent on preventing a positive outcome of the case that may pave the way for a “flight from Islam” by other believers. Recently, for example, the parish where Lina Joy was baptized learned it has a police record.

The parishioners of Our Lady of Fatima, Brickfields, where Joy was baptized, were informed about a police report against their parish. According to the Harakah fortnightly paper dated August 16-31, a man called Taib Hisham reported the church, claiming that Joy’s baptism went against Article 11 of the Constitution that says: “The law may control or restrict the propagation of any religious doctrine or belief among persons professing the religion of Islam.” Taib was supported in his initiative by the youth wing of the Islamic Party of Malaysia (known as PAS) and Islamic NGOs. Article 11 also guarantees religious freedom...

Islamic conservatives fear that if the judges allow her to leave Islam, this would open the floodgates to many other requests of Muslims wanting to change their faith. So while they wait for the sentence, they are taking their “precautions”.

Local sources said no effort is being spared to convince the Muslim community to take up a stand “in defence of Islam”. For example, several blogs and websites, exempt from censorship, are calling on people to pray and fast for a verdict that “spells a victory for Islam” in Malaysia.

From AsiaNews (August 29):

Lina Joy’s fight for religious freedom is turning into a fight for the right to live. The Muslim convert to Christianity and her would-be Christian husband have gone into hiding after extremists issued death threats against her for apostasy, this according to her attorney, Benjamin Dawson, who spoke in a recent interview to the New York Times. Victim of intimidation himself, Mr Dawson said that the best solution for the two was emigration.

Ms Joy, whose pre-conversion name was Azlina binti Jailani, met her fiancé, a Christian of ethnic Indian background, in 1990. Now she would like to get married and want her conversion to be officially recognised. Failing this, she would have to marry a Muslim and accept Islamic rules on marriage and inheritance.

For many years she has tried unsuccessfully to get Malaysia’s National Registration Department and then the courts to remove Muslim status from her identity papers. She was thus left with an appeal to the Federal Court, which is currently vetting her application. However, in Malaysia there are two, often conflicting, legal systems, one based on Islamic law; the other, on the constitution.

A Landlord Dispute?

From the Daily Times (Pakistan) via Rantburg:

Eyewitnesses said that the attackers from a nearby village had thrown hand grenades into the church, demolished a part of it, set ablaze two houses adjacent to the church, desecrated holy books, beaten up Christian men, children and women and torn off their clothes. They also took valuables from the church. Witnesses said that a number of Christian women fled the village while others took shelter in Muslims’ houses. Later, local Muslims came to rescue their Christian neighbours. The Muslims, who own about 10 houses in the 65-house Christian village, took their weapons out to rescue the Christian women and children. They opened fire at the attackers and made them flee. But the attackers took one Bashir Masih and his 25 cattle heads with them before leaving the village. Bashir, who lives in the house adjacent to the church, had tried to resist the attackers. As a result, they injured him critically and also ransacked his house. Bashir was still missing on Sunday evening.

Indonesia: Execution of Christians Delayed

From Western Resistance:

Central Sulawesi was involved in a virtual civil war between 2001 and 2002, in which 1,000 people were killed. This war was part of a wider war which raged in the Moluccan islands from 1999 to 2002. The instigator of this war was the Muslim militant Umar Jaffar Thalib and his army of paramilitary terrorists, the Lashkar Jihad. By the time Thalib had finished his campaigns of rampaging and massacres, 9,000 people had died. 3,900 Christians in the Moluccan islands were forcibly converted against their will, with most, male and female alike, forced to endure circumcision.

Though Lashkar Jihad was officially disbanded in 2003, reports from Poso and neighbouring locations suggest that its followers are still active, and are behind the recent campaigns of violence against Christians and Hindus.

Though Umar Jaffar Thalib ordered countless people to be brutally killed, including women and children, his trial in January 2003 for "sowing religious hatred" was a farce. He was acquitted. The Lashkar Jihad was said to have been formed with assistance of members of the government. While Thalib walks free and his "army" are also free, the situation of three Christians highlights both the despicable nature of the current president, and the disgraceful lack of justice for non-Muslims within Indonesia's legal system.

Three Catholics, Fabianus Tibo, Dominggus da Silva and Marinus Riwu were due to have been executed by firing squad at midnight last night. They were convicted of inciting religious attacks and committing premeditated murder of Muslims at Poso in May 2000. Even if they were guilty of such a crime, it is selective justice to penalise three individuals and allow Umar Jaffar Thalib to go unpunished.

No Charity (Continued)

Western Resistance, an essential blog for monitoring the struggle between Western civilization and radical Islam, recently reported on the case of South Korean Christians persecuted by Afghan clerics:

The Christians who had planned the three day "peace festival" were ultimately prevented from staging the event, which apparently was due to start on August 5. The event was to have included a medical conference and two football (soccer) matches at Kabul's Olympic Stadium between a Korean team and Afghanistan's national team.

The group belong to the Institute of Asian Culture and Development which has organised humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan since January 2002.

Ali Askar Laly, an adviser with the Afghan Football Federation, stated: "According to the information we have received, they wanted to do propaganda for Christianity here. Members of the nongovernmental organization that was bringing the [Korean football] team here were expelled from Afghanistan today. For that reason, it was not possible for [the Korean players] to come."

Central Asia director for the Institute of Asian Culture and Development, Kang Sung Han, has claimed misinformation had led to claims of the group proselytising, and the NGO is "shocked" by the negative reaction.

No Charity

Some Afghan clerics are calling for the deportation South Korean missionaries:

They are among about 1,000 South Korean Christians who have come to this deeply conservative Islamic nation on a mission they say is to help Afghans and not to preach Christianity. Another 500 are expected to join them soon.

Kang Sung Han, a member of the visiting group in Kabul said he was aware of the protest but said he and his countrymen had not come to to preach Christianity.

“They have come to travel to villages to teach people computer skills, teach them language and provide them educational and health facilities,” Han told Reuters.

A government official in Mazar-i-Sharif said authorities had seen no signs the Koreans were preaching Christianity.

In February, thousands demonstrated against the release of a Afghan man facing the death penalty for converting to Christianity from Islam.

Technorati Profile

Fr. Andrea Santoro

A dossier on a priest martyred by Islamic radicals in Turkey:

May Fr Santoro “become the seed of hope for building authentic brotherhood”