POLITICAL CORRECTNESS states that “Islam is a peaceful religion".   Is that true or a myth?

In my first article titled, “Muhammad & the Qur'an: A Man and Book of War, or Peace?”, we studied the life and teachings of Muhammad because the founder of any religion teaches and portrays the true identity and meaning of the religion.  We also examined the core teachings of the Qur’an since the holy book of any religion guides the lives, values, conduct and attitude of its followers. We also studied the history of the disciples of Muhammad to see if there is a pattern throughout history that proves the true beliefs of Islam.  For example, the disciples of Jesus became martyrs by giving up their lives to spread the gospel of love and forgiveness that Jesus taught.  They did not defend themselves or retaliate in hatred and vengeance.  The disciples of Jesus did not try to force people into accepting Jesus by threatening to cut off their heads, or forcing them to pay taxes to avoid being killed, and then requiring them to live under special laws against non-Muslims which are designed to be prejudice and humiliating.

Below are some excerpts from the book, “Philistine”, by Ramon Bennett:  “Islam is the antithesis of Biblical Christianity.  Christianity advocates love and compassion toward God and one’s neighbor; Islam promotes hatred and cruelty…Mohammed, the founder of Islam, wrote the Koran, the Moslem holy book.  It is a mixture of desert folklore and customs, revelations of Mohammed, and elements of teaching from both Judaism and Christianity…Not only have parts of the Koran been lost or deliberately removed, but ‘entire verses and chapters have been added to it’…The Koran also claims that Abraham was thrown into a fire by Nimrod. The mere fact that Nimrod died centuries before Abraham was born appears to be of no account! The Koran contains many such errors. As a young child Mohammed was nursed by a Bedouin woman by the name of Halima… ‘The child had had numerous fits, which made Halima think he was demon possessed.’  Early Moslem tradition records that when Mohammed was about to receive a revelation from Allah: ‘…he would often fall down on the ground, his body would begin to jerk, his eyes would roll backward, and he would perspire profusely…’ It was while Mohammed was in this ‘trance-like’ state that he received his ‘divine’ revelations…Mohammed had ‘an appetite for women’ and married 15 wives, including a ten year old girl.  He even married the ex-wife of his adopted son who was divorced from her husband specifically for that purpose. The marriage caused such a scandal that Mohammed received ‘divine’ revelation to the effect that he was married by Allah’s direct command…In February 1989, Salman Rushdie, a Moslem living in the United Kingdom, wrote a novel entitled ‘Satanic Verses’ which caused a worldwide storm among Moslems…The verses concerned Mohammed’s appeasement of the pagans in Mecca. He received ‘divine’ revelation that it was ‘perfectly proper to pray to and worship the three daughters of Allah: Al-lat, Al-Uzza and Manat.’ The verses caused another storm within Islam because it showed rejection of monotheism in favor of polytheism. But Mohammed later returned to monotheism and subsequently received revelation of Allah’s ability to ‘abrogate’, that is, cancel a past revelation and replace it with a ‘similar’ or ‘better revelation’. The ‘Satanic verses’ were not included in the text of the Koran after Mohammed’s death; they were ‘abrogated’. ‘The literature on the ‘Satanic verses’ is so vast that an entire volume could be written just on this one issue. Every general and Islamic reference work, Moslem or Western, deals with it as well as all the biographies of Mohammed.’…While Mohammed was trying to encourage the Jews to accept him as a prophet, Moslems prayed five times each day facing Jerusalem and also kept the Jewish Sabbath and other Jewish laws.  When it became increasingly obvious that the Jews were not at all interested in becoming his disciples, the incensed prophet changed the direction of prayer by turning his back to Jerusalem and faced Mecca instead. He also dropped the Jewish laws, and adopted the pagan Friday Sabbath in place of the Jewish Sabbath…Moslem scholar and statesman Ali Dashti writes: ‘The historical evidence is crystal clear that Mohammed adopted the pagan religious rite of a pilgrimage to Mecca to worship at the Ka’abah in order to appease the Meccan merchants who made a tremendous amount of money out of these pilgrimages. Thus, for financial and cultural reasons, Islam adopted the pagan pilgrimage to Mecca…The roots of Islam are buried in Arabia-in Mecca-in a square, stone building called the Ka’abah…In the Ka’abah, there were 360 jinn (genies-idols, angels and demons), one of whom was called Allah….’  ‘Allah is a purely Arabic term used in reference to an Arabian deity.’ ‘Allah was known to the pre-Islamic Arabs; he was one of the Meccan deities.’ ‘Allah-worship, as well as the worship of Baal, were both astral religions in that they involved the worship of the sun, the moon, and the stars.’ ‘In Arabia, the sun god was viewed as a female goddess and the moon as the male god…The name Allah was used as the personal name of the moon god.’ ‘Allah, the moon god, was married to the sun goddess. Together they produced three goddesses who were called ‘the daughters of Allah.’ These three goddesses were called Al-lat, Al-Uzza, and Manat [of the ‘Satanic verses’].’ It was the Jewish refusal to accept Mohammed as their prophet that instigated the raw Islamic hatred against them…Allah subsequently commanded Mohammed to destroy all the other idols in the Ka’abah, and thus Allah, the moon god, became Allah, and Islam,‘absolute submission’, was born…The Middle East is the homeland of Islam. It is where Islam was born…And in 1948, the Jews (whom Mohammed, the prophet of Allah, belittles in the Koran and urges his followers to kill) disposed Allah from a portion of his land…For this reason, 1948 became ‘the day of the greatest shame in the modern history of the Arabs.’ The ‘face’ of the Arab nation was ‘blackened’ with shame, as was the face of its god…No true Moslem can rest until Israel as a nation is obliterated, Allah, the god of Islam, has been dispossessed of a portion of his land, and his honor has been sullied, as has that of his ‘warriors’-Israel must be annihilated to restore that honor…The Koran forbids the existence of the Jewish state, and there can be no peace in the Middle East while it exists…Mohammed, who all Moslems revere, said, as he was dying: ‘Never do two religions exist in Arabia.’…Mohammed, the founder of Islam, who taught his followers that: ‘A day and night of fighting on the frontier is better than a month of fasting and prayer.’…Mohammed’s teachings urged his followers on, and still initiates, statements like the one previously cited from the Moslem cabinet minister, that ‘Violence is the Moslem’s most positive form of prayer.’ ‘Let the reader make no mistake; both the Jews and Christians are targeted for total annihilation, unless they are willing to submit to Islam…Christians must heed what Moslems in the Middle East chant in their demonstrations: ‘First we will fight the Saturday people; then we will fight the Sunday people.’ ‘…In their holy war against the infidels of the Judeo-Christian faiths, they declare that they will first reckon with the ‘Saturday’ (that is, conquer the Jews).  Then ‘Sunday’ will succumb to the conquering hordes of the prophet and his god, Allah. Islam will thus triumph over the ‘Christian’ world.’"

“Philistine”, by Ramon Bennett

“In 1831 Alexis de Tocqueville, a young French aristocrat and ambitious civil servant, made a nine-month journey throughout America.  The result was “Democracy in America,” a monumental study of the life and institutions of the evolving nation.  Tocqueville looked to the flourishing democratic system in America as a possible model for post-revolutionary France, believing that the egalitarian ideals it enshrined reflected the spirit of the age and even divine will.  His insightful work has become one of the most influential political texts ever written on America and an indispensable authority on democracy.”  Amazon.com  (Democracy in America - Editorial Review by Isaac Kramnick)

The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam

Alexis de Tocqueville on Islam:  “I studied the Quran a great deal.  I came away from that study with the conviction that by and large there have been few religions in the world as deadly to men as that of Muhammad.  So far as I can see, it is the principal cause of the decadence so visible today in the Muslim world and, though less absurd than the polytheism of old, its social and political tendencies are in my opinion more to be feared, and I therefore regard it as a form of decadence rather than a form of progress in relation to paganism itself.”  Pg 25

John Quincy Adams on Islam:  “In the seventh century of the Christian era, a wandering Arab of the lineage of Hagar [i.e.Muhammad], the Egyptian, combining the powers of transcendent genius, with the preternatural energy of a fanatic, and the fraudulent spirit of an impostor, proclaimed himself as a messenger from Heaven, and spread desolation and delusion over an extensive portion of the earth.  Adopting from the sublime conception of the Mosaic law, the doctrine of one omnipotent God, he connected indissolubly with it, the audacious falsehood, that he was himself his prophet and apostle.  Adopting from the new Revelation of Jesus, the faith and hope of immortal life, and of future retribution, he humbled it to the dust by adapting all the rewards and sanctions of his religion to the gratification of the sexual passion.  He poisoned the sources of human felicity at the fountain, by degrading the condition of the female sex, and the allowance of polygamy, and he declared undistinguishing and exterminating war, as part of his religion, against all the rest of mankind.  THE ESSENCE OF HIS DOCTRINE WAS VIOLENCE AND LUST:  TO EXALT THE BRUTAL OVER THE SPIRITUAL PART OF HUMAN NATURE…Between these two religions, thus contrasted in their character, a war of twelve hundred years has already raged.  The war is yet flagrant…While the merciless and dissolute dogmas of the false prophet shall furnish motives to human action, there can never be peace upon earth, and good will towards men.”  Pg 83

Winston Churchill on Islam:  “How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries!  Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy.  Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live.  A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity.   The fact that in Mohammedan law every women must belong to some man as his absolute property-either as a child, a wife, or a concubine-must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.  “Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities.  Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the Queen:  all know how to die.  But the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it.  No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.  Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith.  It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science-the science against which it had vainly struggled-the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome.”  Pg92

The Pentagon Breaks the Islam Taboo
By Paul Sperry - FrontPageMagazine.com
December 14,  2005

Now for the first time, a key Pentagon intelligence agency involved in homeland security is delving into Islam's holy texts to answer whether Islam is being radicalized by the terrorists or is already radical. Military brass want a better understanding of what's motivating the insurgents in Iraq and the terrorists around the globe, including those inside America who may be preparing to strike domestic military bases. The enemy appears indefatigable, even more active now than before 9/11.  Are the terrorists really driven by self-serving politics and personal demons? Or are they driven by religion? And if it's religion, are they following a manual of war contained in their scripture?

Dealing with the threat on a tactical and operational level through counter strikes and capture has proven only marginally successful. Now military leaders want to combat it from a strategic standpoint, using informational warfare, among other things.  A critical part of that strategy involves studying Islam, including the Quran and the hadiths, or traditions of Muhammad.  “Today we are confronted with a stateless threat that does not have at the strategic level targetable entities: no capitals, no economic base, no military formations or installations,” states a new Pentagon briefing paper I’ve obtained. “Yet political Islam wages an ideological battle against the non-Islamic world at the tactical, operational and strategic level.  The West’s response is focused at the tactical and operation level, leaving the strategic level  -  Islam - unaddressed.”

So far the conclusions of intelligence analysts assigned to the project, who include both private contractors and career military officials, contradict the commonly held notion that Islam is a peaceful religion hijacked or distorted by terrorists. They’ve found that the terrorists for the most part are following a war-fighting doctrine articulated through Muhammad in the Quran, elaborated on in the hadiths, codified in Islamic or sharia law, and reinforced by recent interpretations or fatwahs. “Islam is an ideological engine of war (Jihad),” concludes the sensitive Pentagon briefing paper.  And  “no one is looking for its off switch.”

“Strategic themes suggest Islam is radical by nature," according to the briefing, which goes on to cite the 26 chapters of the Quran dealing with violent jihad and the examples of the Muslim prophet, who it says sponsored “terror and slaughter”  against unbelievers.

“Muhammad's behaviors today would be defined as radical,”  the defense document says, and Muslims today are commanded by their “militant” holy book to follow his example.   It adds: Western leaders can no longer afford to overlook the "cult characteristics of Islam.”

It also ties Muslim charity to war.  Zakat, the alms-giving pillar of Islam, is described in the briefing as “an asymmetrical war-fighting funding mechanism.”  Which in English translates to: combat support under the guise of tithing. Of the eight obligatory categories of disbursement of Muslim charitable donations, it notes that two are for funding jihad, or holy war. Indeed, authorities have traced millions of dollars received by major jihadi terror groups like Hamas and al-Qaida back to Saudi and other foreign Islamic charities and also U.S. Muslim charities, such as the Holy Land Foundation.

According to the Quran, jihad is not something a Muslim can opt out of.  It demands able-bodied believers join the fight.  Those unable -- women and the elderly -- are not exempt; they must give “asylum and aid” (Surah 8:74) to those who do fight the unbelievers in the cause of Allah.

The internal document explains that Islam divides offensive jihad into a “three-phase attack strategy” for gaining control of lands for Allah. The first phase is the “Meccan," or weakened, period, whereby a small Muslim minority asserts itself through largely peaceful and political measures involving Islamic NGOs -- such as the Islamic Society of North America, which investigators say has its roots in the militant Muslim Brotherhood, and Muslim pressure groups, such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations, whose leaders are on record expressing their desire to Islamize America.

In the second “preparation” phase, a “reasonably influential” Muslim minority starts to turn more militant.  The briefing uses Britain and the Netherlands as examples.

And in the final jihad period, or “Medina Stage,” a large minority uses its strength of numbers and power to rise up against the majority, as Muslim youth recently demonstrated in terrorizing France, the Pentagon paper notes.

It also notes that unlike Judaism and Christianity, Islam advocates expansion by force. The final command of jihad, as revealed to Muhammad in the Quran, is to conquer the world in the name of Islam.  The defense briefing adds that Islam is also unique in classifying unbelievers as “standing enemies against whom it is legitimate to wage war.”

Right now political leaders don't understand the true nature of the threat, it says, because the intelligence community has yet to educate them. They still think Muslim terrorists, even suicide bombers, are mindless “criminals” motivated by “hatred of our freedoms,” rather than religious zealots motivated by their faith. And as a result, we have no real strategic plan for winning a war against jihadists.  The hardest part of formulating a strategic response to the threat is defining Islam as a political and military enemy.  Once that psychological barrier has been crossed, defense sources tell me, the development of countermeasures -- such as educating the public about the militant nature of Islam and exploiting “critical vulnerabilities” or rifts within the Muslim faith and community -- can begin.

“Most Americans don't realize we are in a war of survival -- a war that is going to continue for decades,” the Northcom official warns.”

Dear fellow human being:  It does not matter where you live or what your ideological, philosophical, and religious beliefs are, we all need to be concerned about Islam! (to be continued)

May God bless you and give you peace. Dr. Jonathan Hansen

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Dr. Jonathan Hansen
Founder and President

The Politically Incorrect Guide to ISLAM
(and the Crusades)
by Robert Spencer

CHAPTER 1: Muhammad: Prophet of War
Muhammad did not teach "peace and tolerance."  Muhammed led armies and ordered assassinations of his enemies.  Islamic tradition allows for negotiated settlements only in service of the ultimate goal of Islamic conquest.

CHAPTER 2: The Qur'an:  Book of War
The Qur'an commands Muslims to make war on Jews and Christians.  Oft-quoted tolerant, peaceful Qur'anic verses have actually been canceled, according to Islamic theology.

CHAPTER 3: Islam:  Religion of War
Muhammed taught his followers that there was nothing better (or holier) than jihad warfare. Muhammed told his men to offer non-Muslims only three choices:  conversion, subjugation, or death. These teachings are not marginal doctrines or historical relics - they are still taught in mainstream Islam.

CHAPTER 4: Islam: Religion of Intolerance
Islamic law mandates second-class status for Jews, Christians, and other non-Muslims in Islamic societies.  These laws have never been abrogated or revised by any Islamic authority.  The idea that Jews fared better in Islamic lands than in Christian Europe is false.

CHAPTER 5: Islam: Oppresses Women
The Qur'an and Islamic law treat women as nothing more than possessions of men. The Qur'an sanctions wife-beating. Islam also allows for child marriage, the virtual imprisonment of women in their homes, "temporary marriage" (i.e., prostitution - but only for Shi'ites!), and more.

CHAPTER 6: Islamic Law: Lie, Steal, and Kill
Islam's only overarching moral principle is "if it's good for Islam, it's right." Islam allows for lying, as well as stealing and killing, in certain circumstances.  This leads to large scale deception campaigns today.

CHAPTER 7: How Allah Killed Science
The much-ballyhooed "Golden Age" of Islamic culture was largely inspired by non-Muslims.  Core elements of Islamic belief militated against scientific and cultural advancement.  Only Judaism and Christianity, not Islam, provide a viable basis for scientific inquiry.

CHAPTER 8: The Lure of Islamic Paradise
The Qur'an describes Paradise in terms that make it clear that it is a place merely to indulge one's physical appetites.  September 11 hijacker Muhammad Atta packed a "paradise wedding suit" into his luggage on that fateful day.  Paradise is guaranteed only to those who "slay and are slain" for Allah.

CHAPTER 9: Islam - Spread by the Sword? You bet.
What is known today as the "Islamic world" was created by a series of brutal conquests of non-Muslim lands. These were of religious imperialism, not self-defense.  The early spread of Islam and that of Christianity sharply contrast in that Islam spread by force and Christianity didn't.

CHAPTER 10: Why the Crusades were Called
The Crusades were not acts of unprovoked aggression by Europe against the Islamic world, but were a delayed response to centuries of Muslim aggression, which grew fiercer that ever in the eleventh century.  These were wars for the recapture of Christian lands and the defense of Christians, not religious imperialism.  The Crusade were not called in order to convert Muslims or anyone else to Christianity by force.

CHAPTER 11: The Crusades: Myth and Reality
The Crusades were not early manifestations of European colonialism in the Middle East. The Crusader massacre of Jews and Muslims in Jerusalem in 1099 was a terrible atrocity, but it was nothing unusual according to the rules of warfare of the time.  The Crusades were not called in order to target Jews as well as Muslims.

CHAPTER 12: What the Crusades Accomplished - And what They Didn't
After the Crusades, the Muslims resumed their attempts to conquer Europe by jihad.  Christians were as responsible as Muslims for the Islamic conquest of Eastern Europe: They made short-sighted and ultimately disastrous alliances with jihad forces.  Western leaders who think non-Muslims can "win hearts and minds" among Islamic jihadists are similarly naive and shortsighted.

CHAPTER 13: What if the Crusades Had Never Happened?
Although the Crusades failed in their primary objective, they played a key role in staving off the jihad conquest of Europe.  The peoples who lived in the "tolerant, pluralistic Islamic societies" of old dwindled down to tiny, harassed, despised minorities.  Islamic distaste for unbelievers is a constant of Islamic history and persists today.

CHAPTER 14: Islam and Christianity:  Equivalent Traditions?
Most modern-day presentations of the Crusades are politically motivated, a historically nonsense.  The problem the world faces today is not generalized "religious fundamentalism" - it is Islamic jihad.  We will not be able to resist jihad without recovering pride in Western civilization.

CHAPTER 15: The Jihad Continues
Islam has not reformed or changed its traditional doctrines of jihad warfare.  Modern-day jihad groups are working to restore the caliphate as a means to further their war with the West.  These groups despise democracy as a Western import at odds with the caliphate and sharia.

CHAPTER 16: "Islamophobia" and Today's Ideological Jihad
The UN has condemned "Islamophobia" while turning a blind eye to atrocities committed by jihadists. The charge of "Islamophobia" is used to intimidate and silence critics of violent jihad in Islam.  Some groups are even trying to brand those who tell the truth about Islam and jihad as purveyors of "hate speech."

CHAPTER 17: Criticizing Islam May Be Hazardous to Your Health
One Australian state has outlawed speaking the truth about Islam....and Great Britain and other countries are contemplating similar law.  Violent Islamic intimidation has come to the West:  Filmmaker Theo van Gogh was murdered on an Amsterdam street for allegedly offending Muslims. Converts from Islam to Christianity must live in fear even in the United States.

CHAPTER 18: The Crusade We Must Fight Today
Europe could be Islamic by the end of the twenty-first century.  In order to defeat the international jihadist threat, the U.S. must reconfigure its alliance on the basis of where countries stand on Islamic jihad.

© 2008 World Ministries International