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THE NEW ISLAMISTS
By Daniel Johnson
New York Sun, NY
Oct 25 2007
History never quite repeats itself, but - like a bad remake of a great
movie - the news sometimes feels very old. That sense of deja vu is
hard to escape in Europe and the Middle East, because these are regions
with long recorded histories, where almost anything that happens has
some kind of precedent. It is easy to dismiss the significance of
events with a weary shrug of the shoulders: "We've been here before."
Easy, but wrong. So, for example, it would be easy to underestimate
the importance of the Israeli airstrike against Syria on September 6.
But what little evidence that has emerged so far suggests that this
was in fact a hugely significant action by Israel. The operation not
only nipped in the bud a nuclear threat to regional security, but also
challenged America and other western countries not to shy away from
the measures that would be necessary to stop Iran's nuclear program
in its tracks. For a second time - the first was its destruction of
Iraq's nuclear facilities in 1981 - Israel has done a huge favour,
not only for the West but for the world. The silence of Israel's most
vociferous critics denotes tacit consent.
It is even easier to ignore Turkey's threat to invade the Kurdish
provinces of Iraq. When Saddam ruled Iraq, there were many reprisals
by the Turkish military against Kurdish cross-border raids and
terrorist attacks. So what is new about the present crisis? The
answer is that Iraq is now a democracy, and Turkey is now ruled by
an Islamist government. Democracies don't go to war with each other.
When Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited London this
week, his British counterpart Gordon Brown tried to reassure him that
Turkey was still on track to join the European Union. But Mr. Erdogan
knows that this is eyewash. Islamist Turks are not prepared to make
concessions on any of the ethnic problems bequeathed from the Ottoman
era. Their hysterical reaction to a purely symbolic resolution on
the Armenian genocide which Congress hasn't even passed yet is proof
that, nearly a century later, the massacre of 1.5 million Christians
by their Muslim compatriots is still unmentionable.
The new Islamists, indeed, are even more intolerant than the old
Ottomans, whose observance of sharia law was lax and whose oppression
of their numerous Christian and Jewish subjects was mitigated by
incompetence. Turkey is now almost 100% Muslim and increasingly
influenced by more militant, anti-Western forms of Islam. Turks
may want access to the European economy but they do not want to be
integrated into European culture. Threatening the fledgling Iraqi
democracy with invasion is reminiscent of Hitler's bullying of
Czechoslovakia - and the response from the West has been the same:
appeasement. Sometimes, what appears to be "historic" reveals itself
to be nothing of the kind. Such a case is the recent letter from
138 Islamic scholars to the Pope and other Christian leaders. This
was presented in the media as an appeal for peace and mutual respect,
emphasizing what the "peoples of the book" have in common. This is the
line also being promoted in a major advertising campaign in London,
the slogan of which is: "Islam is peace." The only trouble with this
campaign is that it is funded by Islamists who support terrorism
against Israel and America.
In the case of the letter, what appears to be a peace offering turns
out, under scrutiny, to be an implied threat. The letter demands that
Christians accept the identity of the teaching of the Koran and the
Bible on the oneness of God and the love of neighbour. Leaving aside
the profound problem of the Trinitarian conception of the Christian
God, there is a theological gulf between Muslim and Christian doctrines
on the relationship of faith and reason - as Pope Benedict made clear
in his Regensburg lecture last year. But the ulema - the Islamic
religious authorities - have always been the main barrier to any
attempt to reconcile rationality with the literal interpretation of
the Koran.
It was they who crushed Islam's contribution to science and philosophy
nearly a millennium ago. It is they who justify the present jihad
against the West and the persecutions of tens of millions of Christians
and others across the Muslim world.
Now these same scholars make no mention of the many passages in the
Koran that denounce Jews and Christians - or, indeed, the entire
doctrine of jihad. Their olive branch comes with the proviso that
Christians, not Muslims, are the aggressors: "As Muslims, we say to
Christians that we are not against them and that Islam is not against
them - so long as they do not wage war against Muslims on account of
their religion, oppress them and drive them out of their homes."
For Christians to accept this document as the basis for negotiation
would be tantamount to accepting the monstrous lie that Muslims are
everywhere under attack from the West.
Fortunately Benedict XVI is too good a theologian to be bamboozled by
such rhetoric. He has consistently said that relations with Islam must
be based on reciprocity. Without an honest acknowledgement that Islam
is not suffering persecution, that on the contrary its adherents are
everywhere persecuting other faiths with the full support of their
religious leaders, there can be no serious dialogue.
So the ulema's offer of reconciliation proves to be an ultimatum -
the same one that Mohammed himself uttered in 632: "I was ordered
to fight all men until they say: 'There is no god but Allah.'" The
clerics who claim leadership over Islam behave as if their faith had
stood still since the 7th century. Those who defy history are doomed
to become history.
By Daniel Johnson
New York Sun, NY
Oct 25 2007
History never quite repeats itself, but - like a bad remake of a great
movie - the news sometimes feels very old. That sense of deja vu is
hard to escape in Europe and the Middle East, because these are regions
with long recorded histories, where almost anything that happens has
some kind of precedent. It is easy to dismiss the significance of
events with a weary shrug of the shoulders: "We've been here before."
Easy, but wrong. So, for example, it would be easy to underestimate
the importance of the Israeli airstrike against Syria on September 6.
But what little evidence that has emerged so far suggests that this
was in fact a hugely significant action by Israel. The operation not
only nipped in the bud a nuclear threat to regional security, but also
challenged America and other western countries not to shy away from
the measures that would be necessary to stop Iran's nuclear program
in its tracks. For a second time - the first was its destruction of
Iraq's nuclear facilities in 1981 - Israel has done a huge favour,
not only for the West but for the world. The silence of Israel's most
vociferous critics denotes tacit consent.
It is even easier to ignore Turkey's threat to invade the Kurdish
provinces of Iraq. When Saddam ruled Iraq, there were many reprisals
by the Turkish military against Kurdish cross-border raids and
terrorist attacks. So what is new about the present crisis? The
answer is that Iraq is now a democracy, and Turkey is now ruled by
an Islamist government. Democracies don't go to war with each other.
When Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited London this
week, his British counterpart Gordon Brown tried to reassure him that
Turkey was still on track to join the European Union. But Mr. Erdogan
knows that this is eyewash. Islamist Turks are not prepared to make
concessions on any of the ethnic problems bequeathed from the Ottoman
era. Their hysterical reaction to a purely symbolic resolution on
the Armenian genocide which Congress hasn't even passed yet is proof
that, nearly a century later, the massacre of 1.5 million Christians
by their Muslim compatriots is still unmentionable.
The new Islamists, indeed, are even more intolerant than the old
Ottomans, whose observance of sharia law was lax and whose oppression
of their numerous Christian and Jewish subjects was mitigated by
incompetence. Turkey is now almost 100% Muslim and increasingly
influenced by more militant, anti-Western forms of Islam. Turks
may want access to the European economy but they do not want to be
integrated into European culture. Threatening the fledgling Iraqi
democracy with invasion is reminiscent of Hitler's bullying of
Czechoslovakia - and the response from the West has been the same:
appeasement. Sometimes, what appears to be "historic" reveals itself
to be nothing of the kind. Such a case is the recent letter from
138 Islamic scholars to the Pope and other Christian leaders. This
was presented in the media as an appeal for peace and mutual respect,
emphasizing what the "peoples of the book" have in common. This is the
line also being promoted in a major advertising campaign in London,
the slogan of which is: "Islam is peace." The only trouble with this
campaign is that it is funded by Islamists who support terrorism
against Israel and America.
In the case of the letter, what appears to be a peace offering turns
out, under scrutiny, to be an implied threat. The letter demands that
Christians accept the identity of the teaching of the Koran and the
Bible on the oneness of God and the love of neighbour. Leaving aside
the profound problem of the Trinitarian conception of the Christian
God, there is a theological gulf between Muslim and Christian doctrines
on the relationship of faith and reason - as Pope Benedict made clear
in his Regensburg lecture last year. But the ulema - the Islamic
religious authorities - have always been the main barrier to any
attempt to reconcile rationality with the literal interpretation of
the Koran.
It was they who crushed Islam's contribution to science and philosophy
nearly a millennium ago. It is they who justify the present jihad
against the West and the persecutions of tens of millions of Christians
and others across the Muslim world.
Now these same scholars make no mention of the many passages in the
Koran that denounce Jews and Christians - or, indeed, the entire
doctrine of jihad. Their olive branch comes with the proviso that
Christians, not Muslims, are the aggressors: "As Muslims, we say to
Christians that we are not against them and that Islam is not against
them - so long as they do not wage war against Muslims on account of
their religion, oppress them and drive them out of their homes."
For Christians to accept this document as the basis for negotiation
would be tantamount to accepting the monstrous lie that Muslims are
everywhere under attack from the West.
Fortunately Benedict XVI is too good a theologian to be bamboozled by
such rhetoric. He has consistently said that relations with Islam must
be based on reciprocity. Without an honest acknowledgement that Islam
is not suffering persecution, that on the contrary its adherents are
everywhere persecuting other faiths with the full support of their
religious leaders, there can be no serious dialogue.
So the ulema's offer of reconciliation proves to be an ultimatum -
the same one that Mohammed himself uttered in 632: "I was ordered
to fight all men until they say: 'There is no god but Allah.'" The
clerics who claim leadership over Islam behave as if their faith had
stood still since the 7th century. Those who defy history are doomed
to become history.