Yale Daily News

Could someone attending this conference tell us what Omar Ahmed meant when he said the following:

“Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Qu’ran should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on earth.”—Omar Ahmed CAIR (Council for American Islamic Relations) Founding Chairman

Good luck on getting an explanation to that. It's a religion of peace and good will! At least that's what the PC crowd will chant as they run you off campus on a rail.

Good point, Ali. Oh wait... actually, you're not very intelligent. Now I know why you couldn't make the conference. My best regards to the other lowest common denominators (or "LCDs" as we call them).

Warmly,

Johnson (pronounced "Yon-sun")

When will the infidels on campus have a conference on what to do about the radical Muslim question?

Yon-sun,

You're right, I'm not very intelligent.

That's why I'm asking a smart guy like you what Omar Ahmed meant when he said the following:

“Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Qu’ran should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on earth.”—Omar Ahmed CAIR (Council for American Islamic Relations) Founding Chairman

Yon-sun,

Duh...what did a smart guy like Bertrand Russell mean when he said the following? TIA.

“Bolshevism combines the characteristics of the French Revolution with those of the rise of Islam…. Marx has taught that Communism is fatally predestined to come about; this produces a state of mind not unlike that of the early successors of Mahommet…. Among religions, Bolshevism is to be reckoned with Mohammedanism, rather than with Christianity and Buddhism. Christianity and Buddhism are primarily personal religions, with mystical doctrines and a love of contemplation. Mohammedanism and Bolshevism are practical, social, unspiritual, concerned to win the empire of this world.” —Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) Liberal icon

Congratulations #3, you just entirely ignored the question and instead insulted a person making a very civil and legitimate query. Doing wonders for your cause, there, bud.

Sarcastically,

An LCD

Did Bertrand Russell read Arabic? So how does he know what Islamic texts actually say? Right.

Earth to Yo-sun, come in please. This is Houston Yo-sun are you still here or did you go to visit the 27 virgins in outer space?

Why won't the Muslim Ivy League geniuses answer my questions?

Here's another one in case I stymied ya'll with the earlier questions...What did a smart guy like John Quincy Adams mean when he wrote:

“Adopting from the new Revelation of Jesus, the faith and hope of immortal life, and of future retribution, he [Mohammed] 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 a 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 characters, 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.” [The words in caps are as originally printed].— John Quincy Adams (1767-1848) Sixth President of the United States

i'm sorry, what is the point of screening comments if ali can post such blatantly hateful things on the boards? "did you go to visit the 27 virgins in outer space?" i KNOW (or at least really hope) you wouldn't let a comment deriding the second coming pass.

as to ali's points, they are irrelevant. the men you have quoted were obviously highly intelligent, but that doesn't make them in any real position to comment on the merits, flaws, or complications of islam. (john quincy adams is an especially bizarre choice of authorities on the subject. a devout christian who lived in the 18th century referred to mohammed as having "[degraded] the condition of the female sex" - but he was really smart, so it must be true!!!... wrong.) as to your first question - while i had never heard of the man/quotation in question, a simple google search revealed that that statement has been highly contested (ahmed denied having ever said it immediately after it was published). furthermore, even if he did say that and believe it, i should hope that you are not really so simple as to think that the views of one muslim american stand in for the views of all muslims. perhaps before provoking yale's muslim students, you might actually think of ways to present your views in a less contemptuous and offensive manner.

By@6 uses one of Muslims standard excuses, i.e., non-Arabic speakers cannot judge Islam because we do not know Arabic, and without understanding Arabic we cannot possibly understand Islam. How can you argue with logic like this!

"The Qur'an Can Only be Understood in Arabic"

The Muslim Game:

The Qur’an can only be fully understood in Arabic. One cannot criticize Islam unless they know Arabic.

The Truth:

Of all the efforts to artificially insulate Islam from intellectual critique, this is probably the most transparent. Unfortunately, for those Muslims craving reassurance from the more embarrassing passages of the Qur’an and Hadith, this cheap tactic of arbitrarily dismissing anything they disagree with still comes at a heavy price, since Islam cannot be protected in this way without sacrificing the claim that it is a universal religion.

In the first place, it is fundamentally impossible for anyone to learn a language that cannot be translated into the only one they do know, which means the apologists who insist that “one must learn Arabic” in order to understand the Qur’an are committing a logical fallacy. Either the Arabic of the Qur’an is translatable (in which case there is no need to learn Arabic) or it is not (in which case it can never be learned by the non-native speaker).

Think deeper. While every language has its nuances, how is that Arabic is the only one with words and phrases that are literally untranslatable? More importantly, why in the world would Allah choose to communicate his one true religion for all men in the only language that cannot be understood by all men – including all Muslims, since most do not speak Arabic?

Even more suspicious is that this amazing linguistic “discovery” was only recently made – and that it corresponds quite remarkably with the contemporary rejection of Islamic practices that were considered acceptable up until the religion’s recent collision with Western liberalism. In fact, there is an astonishing correlation between the argument that hidden and alternate meanings exist to unflattering Qur’anic passages (justifying slavery, the inferior status of women, sexual gluttony, holy warfare, wife-beating, and religious discrimination) and the level of embarrassment that modern scholars have about the presence of such verses in the Qur’an!

No other world religion makes this claim about itself or its holy texts. While the Bible is distributed pretty much as is by various Christian groups, for example, it is rare to find a Qur’an that does not include voluminous and highly subjective footnoted commentary deemed necessary to explain away the straightforward interpretation of politically-incorrect passages.

(Part II follows...)

@#9 HATE SPEECH!

(Halliburton! Halliburton!)
/sarc

I would like to hear an explanation too.

(Part II)

include voluminous and highly subjective footnoted commentary deemed necessary to explain away the straightforward interpretation of politically-incorrect passages.

An additional problem for the apologists is that they want to have it both ways. On the one hand they declare that (for some strange reason) the perfect book can't be translated and that Allah's perfect religion thus cannot be understood by most of humanity without a battery of intercessors and interpreters. Then they turn around and blame the reality of Islamic terrorism on this same "necessary" chain of intermediaries by claiming that the Osama bin Ladens of the world have simply gotten bad clerical advice, causing them to “misunderstand” the true meaning of the Religion of Peace (in the most catastrophic and tragic way imaginable).

Of course, another irony here is that, as a Saudi, the Qur’an-toting Osama bin Laden is a native Arabic speaker – as are most of the leaders and foot soldiers in his al-Qaeda brotherhood of devout Muslims. In fact, many critics of Islam are Arabic speakers as well.

At this point there is only one avenue of escape open to the beleaguered apologist – the weak claim that the Qur’an can only be understood in Classical Arabic, an obscure Quraish dialect which has not been commonly used in over a thousand years and is only known by a few hundred people alive today (generally Wahabbi scholars, who are - ironically enough - accused of taking the Qur'an 'literally').

Although it is hardly plausible that the differences between classical and modern Arabic are such that peace and tolerance can be confused with terrorism, even if this were true, it merely begs the question all the more. Why would such a “perfect book” be virtually impossible for the rest of us to learn - and susceptible to such horrible "misinterpretation" on an on-going basis?

Really, it isn't hard to see through this childish game, particularly since the rules are applied only to detractors and not to advocates. Apologists never claim that Arabic is a barrier to understanding Islam when it comes to lauding the religion, no matter how less knowledgeable those offering praise are than the critics.

Obviously, the real reason for this illogical myth is that, for the first time, the information age is making the full history and texts of the Islamic religion available to a broader audience, and it is highly embarrassing to both Muslim scholars and their faithful flock. Pretending that different meanings exist in Arabic is a way of finding solace and saving face.

I love you, #12! That's the best comment yet.

I read the following some time ago at the newsgroup forum alt.religion.islam. "islamsucks@techemail.com wrote: Islam is such a sick evil joke it is funny, get this, besides being a self admitted pedophile the Koran proves Mohammed also kept slaves and approved raping them. The question no muslim will ever answer is why should slavery and the rape of slaves be illegal today if Mohammed said it was OK. No muslim will provide a straight forward answer to this question because, whether they will admit it or not, if they did it would expose the absolute foolishness at the core of the evil pagan moon cult of islam." And since the previous poster will undoubtedly argue I will quote from the Holy Koran done into English, on the subject of slavery, with commentary. "The Quran in Sura 23:5-6 says: 5 [Most certainly true believers] . . . guard their private parts scrupulously, 6 except with regard to their wives and those who are legally in their possession, for in that case they shall not be blameworthy. (Sayyid Abul A’La Maududi, The Meaning of the Quran, vol. 3, p. 237) The key words are "those who are legally in their possession." Maududi (d. 1979) is a highly respected commentator on the Quran, and he interprets the plain meaning of the clause, saying that sex with slave-girls is lawful. Maududi writes: Two categories of women have been excluded from the general command of guarding the private parts: (a) wives, (b) women who are legally in one’s possession, i.e. slave-girls. Thus the verse clearly lays down the law that one is allowed to have sexual relation with one’s slave-girl as with one’s wife, the basis being possession and not marriage. If marriage had been the condition, the slave-girl also would have been included among the wives, and there was no need to mention them separately. (Ibid. p. 241, note 7) The main point in this section, which Maududi overlooks or refuses to criticize, is that Muhammad himself endorses not only the entire institution of slavery, but also sex between male owners and their female slaves within this institution. But how can he and devout Muslims criticize their prophet without seriously damaging Islam? But Muslims must do this, if they think clearly and critically, and for the good of humanity. It should be noted that Sura 70:29-30, also revealed in Mecca, uses nearly the identical words as Sura 23:5-6. Men must guard their private parts from everyone but their wives and slave-girls, meaning that men may have sex with both "categories" (Maududi’s word)."

TL;DR

If knowledge of Arabic is worthless to the study of Islam, why do Ph.D. programs at Yale, Princeton, and Harvard on the Near East and Islam make it a pre-requisite for admission into their programs? Not only is Arabic not enough for the study of Islam at Yale, Harvard, and Princeton, but they require a second Near Eastern language as well: Persian, Turkish, or Urdu.

Imagine how absurd it would be if someone that didn't read English read the U.S. Constitution in Chinese and then claimed that he was an expert in American law.

That, sir, is you.

Good job w/ the copypaste. You're a real scholar.

What's your point, tat Mohammed was like the founding fathers of America?

Several examples are then offered from the Bible as well as Judeo-Christian history. Two examples especially—one biblical, the other historic—are often cited as paradigmatic of the religious violence inherent to both Judaism and Christianity and usually put an end to the debate of whether Islam is unique in regards to its teachings and violence.

The first is the military conquest of the land of Canaan by the Hebrews (c. 1200 BC), which has increasingly come to be characterized as a "genocide." Yahweh told Moses:

But of the cities of these peoples which Yahweh your God gives you as an inheritance, you shall let nothing that breathes remain alive, but you shall utterly destroy them—the Hittite, Amorite, Canaanite, Perizzite, Hivite, and Jebusite—just as Yahweh your God has commanded you, lest they teach you to do according to all their abominations which they have done for their gods, and you sin against Yahweh your God (Deuteronomy 20: 16-18).
So Joshua [Moses' successor] conquered all the land: the mountain country and the South and the lowland and the wilderness slopes, and all their kings; he left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as Yahweh God of Israel had commanded (Joshua 10:40).

The second example revolves around the Crusader wars waged by Medieval European Christians. To be sure, the Crusades were a "counter-attack" on Islam—not an unprovoked assault as is often depicted by revisionist history. A united Christendom sought to annex the Holy Land of Jerusalem, which, prior to its conquest by Islam in the 7th century, was an integral part of Christendom for nearly 400 years.

Moreover, Muslim invasions and atrocities against Christians were on the rise in the decades before the Crusades were launched in 1096. For example, in 1071, the Seljuk Turks had crushed the Byzantines in the pivotal battle of Manzikert and in effect annexed a major chunk of Byzantine Anatolia (opening the way for the eventual capture of Constantinople centuries later). A few decades earlier, the Fatimid caliph al-Hakim desecrated and destroyed a number of important churches—such as the Church of St. Mark in Egypt and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem—and decreed several even more oppressive than usual decrees against Christians and Jews. It is in this backdrop that Pope Urban called for the Crusades:

From the confines of Jerusalem and the city of Constantinople a horrible tale has gone forth and very frequently has been brought to our ears, namely, that a race from the kingdom of the Persians [i.e., Muslim Turks]…has invaded the lands of those Christians and has depopulated them by the sword, pillage and fire; it has led away a part of the captives into its own country, and a part it has destroyed by cruel tortures; it has either entirely destroyed the churches of God or appropriated them for the rites of its own religion (from the chronicles of Robert the Monk).
Nonetheless, history attests that these Crusade

Hiya!
If I crib talking points from other websites that does make me an expert on the Islam?

kthanxbai!11

What did Pat Robertson mean when he said,

"If Christian people work together, they can succeed during this decade in winning back control of the institutions that have been taken from them over the past 70 years. Expect confrontations that will be not only unpleasant but at times physically bloody.... This decade will not be for the faint of heart, but the resolute. Institutions will be plunged into wrenching change. We will be living through one of the most tumultuous periods of human history. When it is over, I am convinced God's people will emerge victorious."

For the record, that decade was the 90s, and Pat was wrong, but it's in the nature of many religions to look toward a future in which all of humanity unites in belief of its central tenets. I'm not too worried about it.

Also, how many liberals really idolize Bertrand Russell? How old are you? And do you think it would be that hard to pull up quotes from non-Muslims disparaging Christianity? I'm pretty sure I could find some by Tom Jefferson, if you're interested.
Here's a quickie: "Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity."

I just like that the mere fact of Muslims convening gets you so worked up that you have to go on the attack here.

Here is the short answer:

The violence in the Old Testament (and there is plenty of it) is limited to those ancient times, places and peoples. Christians were never bound by those violent injunctions, and Jews have not been bound by them since ancient times. By contrast, the violence in the Koran is phrased in general and is valid for all of eternity. For example, when the Koran says that non-Moslems are the open enemy, there is no restriction on that. It means all non-Moslems for all time. There is nothing like that in the Old Testament.

And here is the long answer:

http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/06/raymond-ibrahim-are-judaism-and-christianity-as-violent-as-islam.html

One wonders the response were non-Muslims to act like this:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2010/02/025556.php

One wonders why Muslim conferences do not draw the same type of emotional, religion-based (and coordinated) outbursts.

One wonders...

Or this:
http://tinyurl.com/y975sgn

Or the shouting of "Kill the Jews":
http://tinyurl.com/yhse8qr

@#24

Thank you: that article explains the difference better than I ever could, esp. with the succinct "prescriptive (Islam)" versus "descriptive (J-C)."

Here is the crux:
"The fundamental error is that Judeo-Christian history — which is violent — is being conflated with Islamic theology — which commands violence."

That really is it.

Again, thanks for the pointer.

I find it hilarious that an article on an Islamic Conference held at Yale has attracted such an undistinguished and immature group of anti-muslim xenophobes to the comments board.

To Ali, your poorly argued screed and cherry-picked quotes expose you as a Euro/Amerocentric bigot worthy of a time slot on 24/7 American media outlets. For a scholar of Islam to even waste their time deconstructing everything you said and took out of context would be sad.

Have you ever studied Arabic? I have and there is a reason it is regarded as one of the most difficult languages in the world. The problems with transliteration and interpretation of Arabic cut both ways; it makes for criticism of non-Muslims who take the words of the Quran at face value just as much as it it makes for criticism of Muslims who do the same.

Not once in your pseudo-intellectual rant did you at all address the content of the actual article, which was about a peaceful conference intended to stimulate rational discourse on Islamic issues? Did you attend the event? Have you even ever been around Muslims in moderate or democratic nations to see how it is often practiced?

And Heironymus, I really wish you would stick a fork in it and call it a day. Your reductionist comparison of Christianity to Islam is laughable.

Case in point "The fundamental error is that Judeo-Christian history — which is violent — is being conflated with Islamic theology — which commands violence."

Give me a break.

Before you go and attack Hieronymus, you should know that she is a former Muslim, so she really knows what she's talking about. Arafat, on the other hand, is clearly an anti-semite.

@#28
Had you understood my post, you would have realized that it referred back comment #24, which pointed to a lengthy article in The Middle East Quarterly (not known for its "poorly argued screed[s]." I chose one useful quote from that article. If you would like to read the full "laughable" "reductionist" essay, here is the full link:
http://www.meforum.org/2159/are-judaism-and-christianity-as-violent-as-islam

Oh, #28, I forgot to add: wa aleikum a'salaam. Dig, ya akhi?

Yale '08 wrote:

"Have you even ever been around Muslims in moderate or democratic nations to see how it is often practiced?"

Is this what you have in mind:

http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/10/uk-muslim-protesters-threaten-geert-wilders-well-have-his-head.html

Or were you thinking more along the lines of this:

“Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Qu’ran should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on earth.”—Omar Ahmed CAIR (Council for American Islamic Relations) Founding Chairman

And these are the students who will protest a visit by a cartoonist, but not a word to even attempt to explain the comment. The Islam of Omar Ahmed is a religion of radicals, there is no talking with them, no reaching an understanding and no meeting ground. They use our own laws against us to spread thier hate and convert the next wave of home grown jihadists. Then they use threats to stifle any opposition, as Yale's surrender shows it works quite well. We're no longer willing to fight, might as well get it over with and put a minaret up in place of Harkness Tower.

My apologies to Hieronymus (though he is beyond arrogant and often incapable of simply stating his position removed from haughty prose). My last comment was aimed at Arafat, whose articles from Jihad Watch are one-sided drivel. JW acts as if they are about reforming Islam, but they are actually out to prove Islam and Muslims as a group of inferior sub-humans. It's a bastion of neoconservative tripe and propaganda instigated by writers who are incapable of separating Islamic practice and humanity from Islamic politics today.

Arafat, you're article on the so-called 'prescriptive' nature of Islam is garbage. I read it. It's garbage and hate.

Arafat,

the article you posted from Jihad Watch states this:

"What about all the oppressed Christians and Jews, not to mention Hindus and Buddhists, of the world today? Where is their religiously-garbed violence?" Unlike the near daily headlines emanating from the Islamic world, there are no records of practicing Christians, Buddhists, or Hindus crashing explosives-laden vehicles into the buildings of oppressive (e.g., Cuban or Chinese communist) regimes, all the while waving their scriptures in hand and screaming, "Jesus [or Buddha or Vishnu] is great!"

Interesting, because HInduism under the BJP in India has been at times incredibly violent, to both Muslims and Christians. The 2003 BJP-incited Gujarat riots against Muslims and the 2008 BJP-incited anti-Christian riots should bear testimony that proves Ibrahim's argument terribly wrong.

Furthermore, what about a Zionist-controlled Israel and the 1,400 Gazans who were slaughtered, many of them innocent women and children?

Finally, Ibrahim fails to mention that post 9/11, the Bush Administration, NeoConservatives, and the Religious Right in America rallied behind Christian rhetoric of religious and cultural superiority to justify two wars in the MIddle East which have left hundreds of thousands of innocent Muslims dead.

Interesting Arafat. Thanks for the clarification!

Wow! Way to not answer the question. Your're an excellent debater.

@27: Ask Professors Gerhard Bowering, Frank Griffel, Dimitri Gutas, Beatrice Gruendler about that. They'll all disagree with you. Also, I could literally cite 100s of Muslim sources--in Arabic, Persian, Turkish, and Urdu--in languages you can't read to refute you but you already know that.

Polemics are fun, no?

Did you really go to Yale, or are you one of those Christian fundamentalists who proselytize on campus and shoot abortion doctors to save "lives"?

questionable xtns?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2STDH14aJVk

I totally agree w/ 17. How come none of you have addressed his point?

@31 Shalom uv'racha achi. YOU dig?

Arafat, for the love of God, please explain to us why you started this entire comments board off on a sour and antagonistic note?! We all know you are doubling as both "Arafat" and "Ali" It's an insult to any practicing Muslim that a xenophobe anti-muslim like yourself would appropriate such monikers.

Anyone with two seconds of time to google Omar Ahmed, would quickly realize the controversy and context of his statement. How does it relate to the content of the YDN article or the actual conference at Yale?

I see that you have not been able to answer me as to your JW article's fallacies (e.g. claiming dissenting Muslim today exercise some unique form of violence in comparison to Hindus, Christians. etc).

Are you capable of rational thought? Or is the only way you can validate your hatred for Muslims through websites of dubious distinction, such as Jihad Watch?

Hieronymus,

Hieronymus: "Had you understood my post, you would have realized that it referred back comment #24"

OK Hieronymus, if you're so frustrated that I can't understand you here is some advice from a Yale graduate: humble yourself and speak in plain English. Can the witty sarcasm and the extensive prolix of the mouth. If you feel the need to overcompensate on a Yale comments board by ladling every sentence with confusing prose and pompous rhetoric, then you only have yourself to blame if simpletons like myself cannot understand what it is you're saying and to whom your directing it towards.

You lose the effectiveness of your argument.

Furthermore, I am not Muslim, and no Hieronymus. you are not my "ackhi".

"Arafat, for the love of God, please explain to us why you started this entire comments board off on a sour and antagonistic note?!"

Yale '08,

I started the thread because I thought that at a gathering such as this one, filled with so many gifted Muslims, I could finally get an answer to what Omar Ahmed meant when he said Islam came to America to become the dominant force in this country.

I suppose I got my answer, eh? I suppose since his language is originally Arabic he simply made a slight mistake in verbalizing his intent.

Yes. I'm sure that's what it was.

@42 ZOMG how dense are you?
"Anyone with two seconds of time to google Omar Ahmed, would quickly realize the controversy and context of his statement. How does it relate to the content of the YDN article or the actual conference at Yale?"

Plz tell me you didn't go to school here, and you're a Xtn Fundi who married his cousin and has nothing better to do w/ his time.

Love,
Bob

"Bob": I do not understand the purpose or intent of applying my moniker to the above post, which is neither directed at me nor anything I have written or even commented on.

Please stop posting using my sobriquet; I like sounding unduly pretentious. It makes me feel better about myself.

xo
Hieronymus

"Behead those who insult Islam!"

http://michellemalkin.com/2010/02/12/not-again-another-mohammed-cartoon-conflagration/

ISLAMIC CRUSADES
630 – Muhammad conquers Mecca
636 – Muslims conquest of Syria, and the surrounding lands, all Christian
637 – Muslim Crusaders conquer Iraq
638 – Muslim Crusaders conquer and annex Jerusalem
638 – 650 Muslim Crusaders conquer Iran
639 – 642 Muslim Crusaders conquer Egypt.
641 – Muslim Crusaders control Syria and Palestine.
643 – 707 Muslim Crusaders conquer North Africa.
644 – 650 Muslim Crusaders conquer Cyprus, Tripoli, and establish Islamic rule in Iran, Afghanistan, and Sind.
673 – 678 Arabs besiege Constantinople, capital of Byzantine Empire
691 – Dome of the Rock is completed in Jerusalem
710 – 713 Muslim Crusaders conquer the lower Indus Valley.
711 – 713 Muslim Crusaders conquer Spain and impose the kingdom of Andalus
732 – Muslim invasion of France is stopped at the Battle of Poitiers / Battle of Tours. The Franks, under their leader
Charles Martel (the grandfather of Charlemagne), defeat the Muslims
785 – Foundation of the Great Mosque of Cordova
789 – Rise of Idrisid amirs (Muslim Crusaders) in Morocco; Christoforos, a Muslim who converted to Christianity, is executed.
800 – Autonomous Aghlabid dynasty (Muslim Crusaders) in Tunisia
807 – Caliph Harun al—Rashid orders the destruction of non-Muslim prayer houses &
of the church of Mary Magdalene in Jerusalem
809 – Aghlabids conquer Sardinia, Italy
813 – Christians in Palestine are attacked
831 – Muslim Crusaders capture Palermo, Italy; raids in Southern Italy
837 – 901 Aghlabids conquer Sicily, raid Corsica, Italy, France
869 – 883 Revolt of black slaves in Iraq
909 – Rise of the Fatimid Caliphate in Tunisia; these Muslim Crusaders occupy Sicily, Sardinia
928 – 969 Byzantine military revival, they retake old territories, such as Cyprus (964) and Tarsus (969)
937 – Church of Holy Sepulcher is burned down by Muslims; churches in Jerusalem are attacked
960 – Conversion of Qarakhanid Turks to Islam
969 – Fatimids (Muslim Crusaders) conquer Egypt
973 – Israel and southern Syria re-conquered by the Fatimids
1003 – First persecutions by al—Hakim; the Church of St. Mark in Fustat, Egypt, is destroyed
1009 – Destruction of the Church of the Resurrection by al—Hakim
1012 – Beginning of al—Hakim’s oppressive decrees against Jews and Christians
1050 – Creation of Almoravid (Muslim Crusaders) movement in Mauretania; Almoravids (aka Murabitun)
are coalition of western Saharan Berbers
1071 – Battle of Manzikert, Seljuk Turks (Muslim Crusaders) defeat Byzantines and occupy much of Anatolia
1071 – Turks invade Palestine
1073 – Conquest of Jerusalem by Turks
1075 – Seljuks (Muslim Crusaders) capture Nicea and make it their capital in Anatolia
1076 – Almoravids (Muslim Crusaders) (see 1050) conquer western Ghana
1086 – Almoravids (Muslim Crusaders) send help to Andalus, Battle of Zallaca
1090 – 1091 Almoravids occupy all of Andalus except Saragossa and Balearic Islands

LIST OF MAJOR ISLAMIC ATTACKS & PLOTS ON AMERICA…before 9/11
Some people ignore that Islamics have been attacking the United States long before September 11, 2001.
Here is just a sampling:
1979 Iran Hostage Crisis: seizure of US Tehran Embassy, Iran (Nov 4, 1979 for 444 days)
1983 Bombing of US Beirut Embassy, Lebanon (April 18, 1983)
1983 Bombing of US Marine barracks, Beirut, Lebanon (Oct 23, 1983)
1983 Bombing of US Kuwait Embassy (Dec 12, 1983)
1984 Bombing of US Beirut Embassy (again) (Sept 20, 1984)
1984 Kuwait Airlines Flight 221 hijacked to Tehran – American passengers murdered (Dec 3, 1984)
1985 Hijacking TWA Flight 847 hijacked to Beirut (June 14, 1985)
1985 Hijacking cruise ship Achille Lauro, wheelchair-bound American is thrown overboard & killed (Oct 7, 1985)
1986 Bombing Berlin disco frequented by US servicemen (April 5, 1986)
1988 Bombing Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, 100’s murdered (Dec 21, 1988)
1993 First bombing World Trade Center, New York City, 7 Killed, 1,042 wounded (Feb 26, 1993)
1993 Foiled NY Landmarks plot by Omar Abdel Rahman to blow up the Holland and Lincoln tunnels
and other New York City landmarks
1993 Attempted Assassination of Pres. Bush Sr. during visit to Kuwait (April 14, 1993)
1993 Black Hawk Down: shot down US helicopters in Mogadishu, Somalia,
during Operation Restore Hope (Oct 3-4, 1993)
1994 Plot to assassinate President Clinton during visit to the Philippines
1995 Failed Project Bojinka by Ramzi Yousef to blow up a dozen US airliners over the Pacific (end in Jan 1995)
1995 Bombing US military headquarters, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (Nov 13, 1995)
1996 Bombing Khobar Towers, Saudi Arabia, housing U.S. foreign military personnel (Jun 25, 1996)
1998 Bombing U.S. Nairobi Embassy, Kenya, Africa (Aug 7, 1998)
1998 Bombing U.S. Dar es Salaam Embassy, Tanzania, Africa (Aug 7, 1998)
1999 Foiled LAX Millennium plot by Ahmed Ressam to bomb Los Angeles International Airport
(Ressam was arrested at US Canadian border)
2000 Failed USS The Sullivans bombing that was refueling in the port of Aden, Yemen. (Jan 3, 2000)
2000 Bombing USS Cole in the port of Aden, Yemen, 17 U.S. Navy sailors murdered (Oct 12, 2000)
(The USS Cole was not engaged in any combat during this period)
2000 Bombing plaza across from US Manila Embassy (Dec 30, 2000)
2001 9/11 attacks: World Trade Center, Flight 93, Pentagon, 3000+ murdered (Sept 11, 2001)

Will Politically Incorrect Opinion Become a Hate Crime?

Let’s cut to the chase. Will criticizing, even *discussing* Islam, become a crime? It already is in Ireland, France, Netherlands, Canada, and Muslims at the UN want the entire world to abide by Islamic sharia law.
When the truth is deemed politically incorrect, a crime has already been committed.

http://creepingsharia.wordpress.com/2010/02/10/will-politically-incorrect-opinion-become-a-hate-crime/

Also, employing "lawfare," radical Islamic groups in the US are intimidating the media with the cost of defending defamation suits in order to stifle criticism:

G-d I love Alan Dershowitz

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/libertycentral/2010/feb/09/libel-reform-radical-islamic-groups

Allahu Akbar and Allah al-Karim?? OK, Arafat/Ali, time to give it a rest. You've proved that the only way you can argue is through historical anachronisms (and inaccuracies) or by using a selective list of terrorist acts that lacks any political context or reference to US foreign policy.

Pray tell, what were some of the political and strategic causes for those attacks? Find it interesting that the ALL of those attacks targeted the US only? If you can't see the connections and ask the bigger questions then it's further proof to me, and to all the others here who have discredited your arguments over and over, that rational interlocution with you is a hopeless endeavor. Go away and take your slanted xenophobia with you!