When extremists trust that time is on their side

...The radical Islamic focus on Israel serves as an easy rallying point for the masses in the Middle East and Europe; however, the goal of jihad for many Muslims extends beyond eliminating or subjugating Israeli Jews.

Mitchell Bard..
Gatestone Institute..
25 November '14..

What makes negotiations with Iran, ISIS, Hamas or any other Islamist group impossible is that their leaders believe they are acting according to the immutable word of God. America, Israel, other Muslims with whom they disagree, cannot do anything to satisfy them except "submit" (the Arabic word "Islam" means "submission"). As Egyptian cleric Muhammad Hussein Ya'qub said in a televised sermon in 2009, "If the Jews left Palestine to us, would we start loving them? Of course not. The Jews are infidels not because I say so but because Allah does... They aren't our enemies because they occupy Palestine; they would be our enemies even if they had not occupied anything."

Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and other terror groups do not conceal their intentions. The Hamas covenant explicitly calls for Israel's destruction and does not distinguish between Israelis and Jews:

Our struggle against the Jews is very great and very serious... It strives to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine... It is one of the links in the chain of the struggle against the Zionist invaders...

The Prophet, Allah bless him and grant him salvation, has said: "The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say, 'O Muslims, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him'".... There is no solution for the Palestine question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors. Palestine is an Islamic land.

Regrettably, this is why "solving the conflict with the Palestinians," or even recognizing a Palestinian State, will not bring peace and tranquility to the Middle East.

The radical Islamic focus on Israel serves as an easy rallying point for the masses in the Middle East and Europe; however, the goal of jihad for many Muslims extends beyond eliminating or subjugating Israeli Jews. According to caliph 'Umar ibn al-Khattab, any land previously occupied by Muslims cannot be surrendered. No single Arab regime -- or number of regimes acting together -- has the right to break this trust and give up any of this land, whether in Israel or Spain (Al-Andalus). Reconquering the lands is considered a solemn religious duty, but the obligation does not stop there; as an ISIS recruiter told Der Spiegel, the Koran says that one should kill or expel unbelievers wherever one finds them.

The Driving Engine of Israeli-Palestinian Conflict - Sunni Political Islam

...Arab Sunni Muslim identity, by contrast, is one predicated on triumph and conquest as the natural state of affairs, now accompanied by the humiliating, bewildering current state of failure and subjection. Hence the enormous, murderous rage at the present state of defeat to a people seen as naturally subordinate: the Jews. Hence the absolute refusal to accept history's apparent verdict, and the latest furious attempt to dislodge the enemy.

"What must not happen is that this political
conflict becomes a religious conflict,
" German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter
Steinmeier warned last week.

Jonathan Spyer..
Middle East Forum/PJMedia..
22 November '14..

An oft-repeated sentiment currently doing the rounds in discussions of the Israeli-Palestinian issue is that it is imperative that the conflict not become a "religious" one. This sentiment, guaranteed to set heads nodding in polite, liberal company, stands out even within the very crowded and competitive field of ridiculous expressions of historical ignorance found in discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian issue.

This sentiment is connected to the recent wave of terror attacks in Jerusalem, which are the result of Palestinian claims that Israel is seeking to alter the "status quo" at the Temple Mount. As this theory goes, up until now this conflict had mainly been about competing claims of land ownership and sovereignty, but it is now in danger of becoming about "religion," and hence turning even more intractable. So this must be prevented.

In objective reality, the conflict between Jews and Arab Muslims over the land area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea has been, from its very outset, inseparable from "religion."

On the Arab/Palestinian/Muslim side, recent events in the Levant (specifically in Syria and Iraq) ought to have taught us just how very flimsy and contingent the supposed "secular, national" identities of the local populations are. Both these identities have now largely been eclipsed, replaced by sectarian, ethnic, and religious markers of loyalty. As Professor Mordechai Kedar pointed out in a recent article, there is no reason to think that a "Palestinian" national identity is any stronger or more durable than either of these neighboring constructs.

This does not mean, of course, that the Arabic-speaking population of the area is not mobilized for struggle. The events of recent days suggest a murderous commitment to the fight. The engine for this commitment, however, is a religious one.

The engine is the determination to prevent the Jews from in any way, be it ever so minor, infringing on the situation of de facto Arab Muslim domination of the Temple Mount/ Haram al-Sharif area. This commitment is not a new development; it has in fact been the driving force of the conflict throughout.

The very first major instances of Arab Muslim violence against Jews in the 20th century were related to this self-same area. In 1929, it was precisely an attempt by Jews to assert Jewish prayer rights at the Western Wall that led to a furious Arab and Muslim counter-reaction. This reaction led to the slaughter of over one hundred Jews and the destruction of an ancient Jewish community (in Hebron).

The supposed threat to the mosques at the Haram al-Sharif and the alleged desire of the Jews to build the Third Temple continued to form a staple in Arab propaganda against the Zionists in the 1930s and 1940s. This was a time when the nascent Palestinian "national" movement was led by a man holding a position of religious authority: Jerusalem Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini.

This centrality of religion continued to fire the various movements fighting Israel. The very name "Fatah," for example, which is often – absurdly — described as a "secular" movement, is a religious term. "Fatah" is in Arabic a term literally meaning to "open," but is used in context to mean "to conquer a land for Islam."

Defeating the "Zionist" Olive Trees in Turkey

...Can countries go insane? If, in the Islamic thinking, Muslims will defeat Jews in the war before the Day of Judgment, why fight olive trees now? Why are olive trees Zionist trees and other trees are not? Will Muslims lose the war if olive trees do not betray the hiding Jews? If so, why is there a prophecy that says Muslims will win the war?

The uprooted olive trees of Yırca, Turkey, on
November 7, 2014.
 (Image source: Greenpeace Turkey)

Burak Bekdil..
Gatestone Institute..
16 November '14..

Islamists often come in two flavors: Those who would decapitate an infidel, take out his heart and eat it in front of cameras, like the jihadists in Syria; and those who have the same sentiments and goals but pursue smarter means to Islamize the whole universe through "de jure" methods, including the ballot box.

Turkey's leaders fall into the second category, but some Turks these days feature a third flavor: Non-Violent Idiocy.

Hamas's infamous charter, proclaimed in 1988, is a must-read for self-declared Western intellectuals who tend to "angelize" the terrorist group in order, often, to reinforce their own intellectual identities. The charter (or the Covenant) calls for the eventual creation of an "Islamic state in Palestine in place of Israel and the Palestinian territories, and the obliteration or dissolution of Israel."

It goes on by outlining Hamas's mission as: "The only way to engage in this struggle between the truth and falsehood is through Islam and by means of Jihad until victory or martyrdom." Here, obviously, "victory is killing the last Jew on earth; and martyrdom is getting killed by Jews [or Muslims of rival sects]."

In one particularly tragicomic passage, the charter defines "our struggle against the Jews" as "very great and very serious" It goes on to say: "The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews [and kill them]; until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees which will cry: O Muslims! There is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill him."

Apparently, some people take Hamas's prophecy literally. Last May, Muhammad al-Zoghbi, an Egyptian cleric, said in a television interview that "not a single Jew will remain on the face of this earth." When asked by his interviewer if the section about speaking trees and stones was an allegorical expression, al-Zoghbi replied: "Whoever says this is an allegory is wrong. The trees will actually talk. And the walls as well."

Apparently, some Turks have brought a totally unexpected dimension into the Islamic debate over the trees that will point to the last living Jews on earth. Despite a dubious source, a campaign ad circulating popularly in Turkish social media calls for a boycott against olive trees. Why? Read the campaign text:

"Shortly before the Day of Judgment, Muslims and Jews will fight a war. Eventually, Muslims will defeat the Jews. The Jews will hide behind the trees but the trees will betray them to the Muslims. But the olive trees will not. Because the olive tree is a Jewish tree. Today Israel encourages olive plantations in many countries. Because Jews know that olive trees will protect them. Israel has tried to prevent the uprooting of olive trees in Turkey. But our government, despite a court order that banned the uprooting, went ahead and foiled Israel's plans. In Turkey all olive trees should be uprooted within the next three years. That way we'll give a big blow to Israel. Our nation should join the campaign and do its part by not consuming olives."

That is the text. It invites everyone to join the campaign by visiting the hashtag "#zeytinalmiyoruz (We are not buying olives)." In conspiratorial thinking, the campaign may be the work of anti-Islamists who are trying to ridicule the Islamists. Regardless of whoever is behind the campaign, some pro-government Turks have already joined it, with tweets that demonize olives and olive trees.

Economist: Poverty Does Not Create Terrorists

Daled Amos
24 December '10

According to the Economist, terrorists are not typically from low income families with poor education. In fact, the results of a number of studies indicate that the cause comes from a different direction altogether:

Social scientists have collected a large amount of data on the socioeconomic background of terrorists. According to a 2008 survey of such studies by Alan Krueger of Princeton University, they have found little evidence that the typical terrorist is unusually poor or badly schooled.

Claude Berrebi of the RAND Corporation compared the characteristics of suicide-bombers recruited by Hamas and Islamic Jihad from the West Bank and Gaza with those of the general adult male Palestinian population. Nearly 60% of suicide-bombers had more than a high-school education, compared with less than 15% of the general population. They were less than half as likely to come from an impoverished family as an average adult man from the general population. Mr Krueger carried out a similar exercise in Lebanon by collecting biographical information for Hizbullah militants. They too proved to be better educated and less likely to be from poor families than the general population of the Shia-dominated southern areas of Lebanon from which most came.

There is also no evidence that sympathy for terrorism is greater among deprived people...

...[T]he poorest countries, those with low literacy, or those whose economies were relatively stagnant did not produce more terrorists. When the analysis was restricted to suicide-attacks, there was a statistically significant pattern—but in the opposite direction. Citizens of the poorest countries were the least likely to commit a suicide-attack. The nationalities of all foreign insurgents captured in Iraq between April and October 2005 also produced no evidence that poorer countries produced more insurgents. If anything, there was weak evidence the other way.

So what does terrorism correlate with?

(Read full "Economist: Poverty Does Not Create Terrorists")

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The Tree of Zionism

Daniel Greenfield
Sultan Knish
29 June '10

Helen Thomas suggested that Jews should go back to Poland and Germany. The Turkish flotilla headed to Gaza was more specific, radioing, "Go back to Auschwitz." But both are only bubbles on the surface of the larger narrative in the Muslim world that is widely redistributed by the left and the far right, that Jews are foreign strangers to the land. On the surface this would seem to be plainly absurd. Israel is not some sort of obscure footnote in history or some forgotten fragment of the past that has to be looked up in an encyclopedia.


Both of the world's two dominant religions derive their background from Israel. David and Solomon, the kings of Israel, are considered prophets in both Islam and Christianity. Jewish history is indivisible from the history of Christianity and Islam. No believer in either religion can deny the history of the Jewish people, without also denying their own scriptures and faith. Which means that the current state of affairs in which Muslims and some Christians pretend that Israel came out of nowhere in the 1940's after the world felt guilty about the Holocaust, is an obscene bit of chutzpah.

Israel was not created after the Holocaust. It was recreated after the fall of the Ottoman Empire opened the door for peoples who had been formerly living under the Ottoman boot to rebuild and govern their own countries. The irony is that Israel is only one short entry on the list of countries that were to be created after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire, and that list includes most of the Arab world. It also includes countries that could not successfully able to gain independence at the time, such as Armenia. Zionism was simply another national liberation movement, one of many that gained new momentum after the breakup of the Ottoman and Austria-Hungarian empires.

The anti-Zionist narrative insists that Jews are foreigners because they came from the diaspora. However the very word "diaspora" highlights the fact that the Jewish returnees were members of a religious and ethnic group that had been forced to leave the region, and were now coming back. Nor were Jews unique in this regard in the post-Ottoman period. There also was and is a large Armenian diaspora around the world. Even today there are more Armenians living outside Armenia than inside it. This does not negate the rights of Armenians to their homeland or make them foreigners. There are other similar diasporas of peoples from the territory of the Ottoman Empire.

The majority of Jews living in Israel today are refugees or the children of refugees from Muslim countries, from the USSR and from Nazi occupied Europe. That diaspora is continually ignored in favor of sneers about "Settlers from Brooklyn". Yet the same media that forcefully pushed this mischaracterization, did not apply the same standards to American Arabs who moved to the Palestinian Authority in the mid 90's (before moving back once they experienced the shakedowns and corruption of Arafat's cronies). That diaspora was somehow more legitimate than the Jewish one. This is the prejudice at the heart of the case against Israel.

It is natural for Arab Muslims to feel that they have more right to Israel, than the Jews do. Conqueror peoples tend to feel that way. It is certainly commonplace in the Muslim world. That is Turkey's attitude when it denies rights to its Kurdish minority. Iran's attitude when it denies rights to the Azeri minority. Regarding Israel, this repressive attitude finds support in the Koran, from Mohammed's persecution of the Jews, and his insistence that Islam had replaced Judaism and Christianity, and that non-Muslims had no right to govern Muslims.

But the idea that a conqueror people have more rights to a land than the indigenous inhabitants whom they usurped and oppressed, is a bizarre perversion of liberalism's own doctrines.

(Read full article)

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Obama and the War against Israel

David Horowitz and Jacob Laksin
National Review Online
21 june '10

No other country in the world faces an array of existential threats such as the nation of Israel confronts daily. The world’s only Jewish state is also its most precarious. Geographically tiny, Israel is surrounded by theocracies that reject its very existence as a “nakba” — a catastrophe — and call for its destruction. To carry out this malignant ambition, anti-Israel Islamists have mobilized three rocket-wielding armies, sworn to wipe Israel from the face of the earth.


First and most aggressive among them is the Gaza-based Hamas, a fanatical religious party committed in its official charter to obliterating Israel and killing its Jews. Hamas is the creation of the Muslim Brotherhood, the inspirer of al-Qaeda and the global Islamic jihad, whose official motto declares: “Death in the service of Allah is our highest aspiration.” In Gaza, Hamas has created a terrorist state and a national death cult whose path is martyrdom and whose goal is openly proclaimed: “O, our children: The Jews — brothers of the apes, assassins of the prophets, bloodsuckers, warmongers — are murdering you, depriving you of life after having plundered your homeland and your homes. Only Islam can break the Jews and destroy their dream.”

Given that hatred for Jews is the animating passion of the Hamas militants, their response to Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 was not surprising. Far from greeting this as a gesture of peace, Hamas regarded the Israeli withdrawal as a surrender to its terrorist attacks and an opportunity to escalate them. In the days and months following the withdrawal, Hamas launched 6,500 unprovoked rocket strikes on towns and schoolyards in Israel before the Israelis decided to strike back.

(Read full article)

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