Sharia in Action

Here's yet another horror story from free and democratic Afghanistan. According to CNN:

Gunmen Spray Afghan Woman With Acid After Refusing Marriage

Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) — Gunmen attacked and sprayed an Afghan family with acid in their home after the father rejected a man’s bid to marry his teenage daughter, authorities said Thursday.

The gunmen broke into their home and attacked the 18-year-old daughter, her two sisters and their parents, according to authorities in Kunduz province.

All five received medical treatment, with the mother and two daughters later discharged, medical officials said.

The teenager is in intensive care and her father is still hospitalized, said Abdul Shokoor Rahimi, a doctor at the provincial hospital.

The attack came on the heels of her family’s refusal to marry off the teen to another local gunman.

A month ago, a gunman tried to marry the teenager, but her family turned him down and instead got her engaged to a relative, said Nadera Geya, head of women’s affairs in the province.

“A few nights back, a group of armed men … poured acid over her, on her two young sisters and her parents after beating up her father,” Geya said.

The whole family was brought to the hospital Monday, local hospital officials said.

An unrelated news item from Libya arrived in our inbox at about the same time. According to ANSAmed:

“The West should not fear Islamic law because it brings peace, justice and rights,” National Transitional Council (NTC) Youth Minister and well-known human rights defender in Libya Fathi Terbil told ANSA. Terbil made his remark in response to a question about the possibility of introducing the Sharia in Libya’s new Constitution.

These are reassuring words. But if you want to see the practical effects of the imposition of Islamic law, Afghanistan is an example of sharia in action. The Afghan constitution has officially enshrined sharia since 2004:

Article 2 [Religions]:

(1) The religion of the state of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan is the sacred religion of Islam.

Article 3 [Law and Religion]:

In Afghanistan, no law can be contrary to the beliefs and provisions of the sacred religion of Islam.

The CNN article doesn’t mention Islam, but Islam is very much an issue where “honor” violence is concerned. If the suspects in this case are ever apprehended, the judge will examine Islamic law as it applies to the attack. Throwing acid onto members of that family may be a violation of sharia, but it may not — we will have to wait and see. The precedents are not encouraging.

And sharia has now come to Libya. We are enjoined not to worry about that — Islamic law is alleged to be a force for good, bringing “peace, justice, and rights.” And so it does — as those words are defined under Islamic law:

• “Peace” means submission to Allah.
  
• “Justice” means the full implementation of sharia, whose jurisdiction is to include Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Since non-Muslims have very few rights under Islamic law, this form of “justice” should be viewed with trepidation by Christians, Jews, etc.
  
• “Rights” are defined by the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam, and not by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In other words, all human rights which Libyans enjoy will flow from sharia, and cannot contradict sharia.

It’s worth noting that the United States and NATO have now installed sharia-based constitutions in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. When the Muslim Brotherhood takes the reins in Cairo, we can expect to see a full-sharia constitution voted in for Egypt.

It pains me to point this out again, but the United States remains the most powerful agent in the world backing the implementation of sharia. This was true under the Bush administration, and it is even more true under the Obama administration.

Keep that fact in mind during next year’s election. If you think that voting in an establishment Republican president will bring a change of sharia-enforcement policy, you’ve got another think coming.


Hat tips: Insubria, J-PD.

The Political Persecution of Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff, Part 3

The final installment of my three-part series on the “hate speech” case against Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff has been published at FrontPage Mag. All three parts will be posted here tomorrow as a single article.

Below are excerpts from Part 3:

By the time the verdict was handed down, it had become obvious that the court was absolutely determined that Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff must be found guilty of something. The playing of the tapes — which showed that many of the recorded statements that had been used against Elisabeth had in fact been uttered privately — made the prosecution realize that the original charge would never hold up. To attain the desired outcome, the judge added a second charge of her own devising. A juridical move of this sort would have been unimaginable (and illegal) in the United States and many other countries, but it is quite legal in Austria.

The charge on which Elisabeth was eventually convicted was ludicrous on the face of it. Not only did she never say that Muhammad’s actions constituted “pedophilia”, but Muhammad’s actions — which were undisputed by the court — included having sex with a nine-year-old girl. If she had said what she was accused of, it would have been nothing more than the simple truth, and unexceptional from the standpoint of any normal person.

But the folks who run the Austrian system of “justice” are not normal people. They concocted the absurd rationalization that remaining married to the little girl past the age of 18 meant that Muhammad did not exclusively target children with his sexual attentions; hence he was not a “pedophile” by the strict psychiatric definition. Thus Elisabeth was wrong, even though she did not say it, and even though no ordinary citizen would disagree with her if she had said it.

Interestingly enough, this farrago of justice was made possible by the recognition of Islam as a state religion in 1912 through the law Islamgesetz, which had as its primary purpose the full integration of Bosnia-Herzegovina into the Austrian Empire. When Austria lost Bosnia in 1918, the law became irrelevant, but it has remained on the books until this day.

What might the long-term consequences of the verdict? As Henrik Ræder Clausen wrote at the time:

Fortunately law is logical, and thus one can rightfully deduce some consequences from the verdict:

1.		It can constitute a criminal offence to use a label wrongly, even if that usage is in line with how it is applied by the general public.
2.		The judge takes it as proven that Muhammad had a lasting sexual relationship with a minor. Strangely, she considers it an illegal denigration to apply the label ‘paedophilia’ to this behaviour.
3.		As the law is only concerned with “Religious teachings”, rather than “Founders of religion”, “Behaviour of religious persons” or similar things, this verdict must imply that the life and conduct of Muhammad — including his sexual conduct — constitute an integral part of the “Religious teachings” in Islam. This interpretation is in line with Qur’an 33:21 and fundamentalist readings of Islam.
4.		Under Austrian law, Islam has a remarkable degree of protection from criticism, and this verdict extents this protection to Muhammad, who is now protected from criticism. Other religions, say Buddhism, do not enjoy a similar protection of their teachings or founders.

Read the rest at FrontPage Mag.

Gates of Vienna News Feed 12/1/2011

Former President George W. Bush is traveling in Africa, and Amnesty International has called for his arrest. The human rights group says that Mr. Bush is guilty of ordering torture during his presidency, and insists that international law requires his apprehension while he is in Ethiopia, Tanzania or Zambia.

In other news, a Somali community leader in the Australian state of Victoria has requested that the state government institute Koranic courts for his people on the model of “Koori” courts, which were established to hear certain cases within the Aboriginal community.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to Barry Rubin, C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Insubria, KGS, Salome, Takuan Seiyo, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

A Brief History of the Transatlantic Counterjihad, Part VII

This is the final installment of an eight-part history of the Transatlantic Counterjihad. Links to the first seven parts are at the bottom of this post.

Once again, thank you to the Counterjihad Collective for undertaking this project.


A Brief History of the Transatlantic Counterjihad
by the Counterjihad Collective

VII. Observations and General Conclusions

In the Classical Liberal Tradition: The Transatlantic Counterjihad

Observers on the political scene and in the mainstream media generally refer to the opponents of sharia as “right-wing extremists”. Commentators routinely place anti-Islamization activists beyond the pale of acceptable political discourse, and always far to the “right”.

Nothing could be further from the truth: the Counterjihad stands squarely in the middle of the classical liberal tradition. Consider some of the characteristics of the anti-sharia movement:

• Civil Liberties. Those who oppose Islamization are strong advocates of civil liberties as defined by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. They are especially adamant about the right to speak and publish freely, since this right is the one most frequently infringed by states wishing to silence them. Their opponents, on the other hand, strive to constrain speech that criticizes Islam or sharia, or that offends Muslims. Such suppression helps enforce one of the most basic tenets of Islamic law.
  
• The rights of women. Critics of sharia object to the provisions of Islamic law that relegate women to second-class status, deny them the right to vote, reduce the weight of their testimony in a court of law, and otherwise infringe upon what the West considers their universal rights. Opponents of the Counterjihad take the illiberal position that Islam’s treatment of women is “cultural”, and therefore sacrosanct under the doctrine of Multiculturalism.
  
• The rights of homosexuals. Islam mandates severe punishments for homosexuality, including death. Critics of sharia strongly support the rights of gay people to have freedom in their intimate relations. Opponents of the Counterjihad are reduced to supporting Islamic regimes that put homosexuals to death.
  
• Religious freedom. Islam forbids its adherents to convert out of the faith, or to become atheists. This is termed “apostasy”, and the punishment prescribed by all major schools of Islamic jurisprudence, both Sunni and Shi’ite, is death. The Counterjihad takes the traditionally liberal position that freedom of religion is an absolute right, and a citizen may adopt any religion he chooses, or no religion at all. Critics of the Counterjihad are thus forced to support the right of Islam to punish apostates.
  
• Opposition to religiously-sanctioned violence. Violent warfare against infidels is prescribed by the Koran, the hadith, and the Sunna of the Prophet. All faithful Muslims are required to follow the example of Mohammed and wage war against non-Muslims, or give material support to those who do. Therefore, those who oppose the Counterjihad are supporting the Islamic right to wage jihad, which right is held not just by Islamic states, but individually, by all believers in Islam.

As may be seen from the above examples, supporters of the Counterjihad are staunch advocates for the classical liberal tradition in both its European and American forms. Opponents of the Counterjihad assume positions that are coercive and repressive. When taken to their logical conclusion, their policies are indistinguishable from those practiced by the Fascists, Nazis, and Communists during the 1930s.

This is not really surprising. To oppose the Counterjihad is, in a sense, to support jihad. Jihad, as understood by Islamic law, requires the imposition of sharia on the entire world by coercive totalitarian means. This is why the methods of governance employed by Islamic theocracies closely resemble those of fascist regimes. Islam found a brother ideology in National Socialism during the Second World War, and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem was one of Adolf Hitler’s most devoted supporters.

The Emerging Consensus: Multiculturalism has Failed

British Prime Minister David Cameron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy have all stated on various occasions that “Multiculturalism has failed”.

A number of political parties have emerged in Europe during the past ten years that make opposition to mass immigration and Multiculturalism one of their major political principles. Among them are:

Austria:		Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (Austrian Freedom Party, FPÖ)
Belgium:		Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest, VB)
Denmark:		Dansk Folkeparti (Danish People’s Party, DF)
Finland:		Perussuomalaiset (True Finns)
France:		Bloc Identitaire
Germany:		Die Freiheit (Freedom)
The Netherlands:		Partij voor de Vrijheid (Party for Freedom, PVV)
Norway:		Fremskrittspartiet (The Progress Party)
Sweden:		Sverigedemokraterna (The Sweden Democrats, SD)
Switzerland:		Schweizerische Volkspartei (Swiss People’s Party, SVP), also called Union Démocratique du Centre (Democratic Union of the Centre, UDC), Unione Democratica di Centro (Democratic Union of the Centre), and Partida Populara Svizra (Swiss People’s Party)
The UK:		British Freedom (BF), United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), and the British National Party (BNP)

In additional to formal political parties, numerous civic organizations and volunteer groups have sprung up to oppose Multiculturalism, sharia, and the Islamization of Europe. Among them are the English Defence League (and Defence Leagues in other countries inspired by the EDL), Pro-Köln (Germany), Bürgerbewegung Pax Europa (Germany), Alliance to Stop Sharia (France), Stop the Islamisation of Europe (based in Denmark), and numerous others.

Mainstream journalists such as Melanie Phillips (UK), Douglas Murray (UK), Mark Steyn (Canada), and Ezra Levant (Canada) have spoken out against Multiculturalism in much the same terms used by Counterjihad activists. In 2010 a German banker and member of the Social Democrats, Thilo Sarrazin, wrote a best-selling book, Deutschland schafft sich ab (“Germany Abolishes Itself”), which warned against the dangers of continued mass immigration into Germany, particularly Muslim immigration.

It becomes obvious that the Counterjihad’s political and social positions on Multiculturalism can hardly be described as fringe positions. They are fully mainstream, and half a century ago were commonplace in the West. It is only in the last thirty years or so that support for civil liberties and opposition to the repression of free speech have become “extremist”.

In the Tradition of Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, and John F. Kennedy

Today’s Transatlantic Counterjihad movement formed in late 2006 as British and American activists convened online to express their opposition to sharia. Within a few months the network of groups had expanded to include volunteers in Canada, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Germany, Italy, and other European countries.

The outlook binding these different groups together derived from a shared sense that Western Civilization was under grave threat from the encroachment of Islam and sharia law. Since the core of Western Civilization is European, and Islamization is far more advanced in Europe than in the United States or Canada, the movement has focused on resisting the advance of sharia in Europe.

Free speech is already being suppressed in Europe, as detailed above. Europeans who speak out on these matters may face official harassment, dismissal from employment, prosecution, fines, and imprisonment. Canada, through its infamous Human Rights Commissions, has put a similar chill on free speech.

The United States alone — however tenuously — retains the right to speak and publish freely, as guaranteed by the First Amendment of the Constitution. For that reason, much of the organizing and actions opposing sharia have originated and flourished in the USA. Americans who understand the gravity of the situation in Europe have reached out to their brothers and sisters across the Atlantic to offer help and support in their struggle to save our common civilization.

This transatlantic initiative is the most recent example of a long tradition of American outreach to Europe. American concern for the political and economic well-being of Europe began with Woodrow Wilson in the First World War, and was continued by Franklin Delano Roosevelt during the Second World War. Under Harry Truman the United States undertook a firm commitment to contain the threat of Soviet Communism and help Europe remain prosperous and free. The Marshall Plan and the Berlin Airlift were just some of the more obvious ways in which America acted to preserve European democracy. Fifteen years later, when John F. Kennedy visited Berlin, he reaffirmed that stance.

The Wall has been gone for more than twenty years, and there are many people in the United States who would prefer to return to traditional American isolationism concerning Europe. One of the most frequent comments made by American readers on internet news articles and blogs about Islam in Europe is that “Europe is lost” — that is, the situation there is too far gone for hope, and there is no point in concerning oneself about what happens to Europe. It is simply too late.

The Transatlantic Counterjihad has responded with a resounding “NO!” to such sentiments. The common bonds between Americans and Europeans are too strong and too important to be abandoned so easily. North America and Europe form the core of Western Civilization. If either continent should fall, the entire edifice would collapse.

The Transatlantic Counterjihad is the 21st century’s reprise of the Marshall Plan. In contrast to what happened during the Cold War, however, the current flow of aid runs in both directions. American freedoms are also under grave threat, as evidenced by recent attempts to impose the OIC’s proposed law against “defamation of religions” on the USA under the auspices of the UN. There may come a day when European hands will reach back across the water to give assistance to their American cousins struggling to protect their liberties from the encroachment of sharia. It is the job of the Counterjihad to help preserve European freedoms so that Europe may in turn help the United States and Canada.

This long, twilight struggle affects the entirety of Western Civilization. The Transatlantic Counterjihad maintains that we must all stand together if we are to prevail.


Previously:

2011		Nov		24		Part I, Introduction
				25		Part II, Conferences
				26		Part III(a), The Transatlantic Counterjihad at the OSCE
				27		Part III(b), The Transatlantic Counterjihad at the OSCE (cont.)
				28		Part IV, The Rosetta Stone Projects
				29		Part V, Official Opposition to the Transatlantic Counterjihad
				30		Part VI, Unofficial Opposition to the Counterjihad

Is Canada a Free Society?

As a follow-up to an earlier discussion about the attempted intimidation of SUN TV by a militant homosexual rights activist, Michael Coren talks to Mark Steyn about the sorry state of civil liberties in hyper-PC Canada:


Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for uploading this video.

Blackpool Mosque: Busted!

Another victory for Mosquebusters: a planning application for a new mosque has been unanimously voted down in Blackpool, the same northern English town where a young girl was groomed, pimped, killed, and turned into kebab.

Vlad Tepes has posted a report on the dedicated efforts of Gavin Boby of the Law and Freedom Foundation and Mosquebusters The text is reposted below; go over to Vlad’s place to see the photos.


Why do we always win: Blackpool November 29th 2011

If you oppose a mosque planning application you will win.

You’ve got to do it with confidence; you’ve got to laugh at the Council and Muslims’ nonsense about Islamophobia; and you’ve got to keep the pressure up.

If you do, you will win.

That is the lesson from Blackpool, 28th November 2011, when the Planning Committee were forced to refuse permission for the Noor a-Madina mosque.

And they refused it unanimously. The facts, strength of local opinion, and the professional help from Gavin Boby of the Law and Freedom Foundation, gave them no choice.

The Law and Freedom Foundation tried to film proceedings, but a burly guard stuck his gut in front of the camera and ordered it off. Filming committee meetings is quite legal, and encouraged by the government.

Here’s a still of his belly, with Councillors behind and Gavin Boby to the left: [photo]

Councils are opportunists. They love the PC gravy train, and like to pass mosque planning applications on the quiet, like a vicar passing gas at high tea.

The front-lady for the mosque is Mrs. Tasurraf Shah. We are not sure that she is so nice a person as she looks: [photo]

Their organ-grinder is the decidedly less inclusive Qari Muhammad Zaman Qadri. [photo]

Ms. Shah claims on her website:

“I am a member of the Race equality and planning cammitee @ the Town Hall. Im am a qualified Interpreter and would also want to give law facillity for Immagration here on the FYLDE.I am a mother of 7…”

Perhaps this is has something to do with the history of this case:

The Noor a-Madina mosque had operated unlawfully in the row of shop buildings at 189-199 Waterloo Road, FY4 2AE, since August 2010, and the Council allowed them to get away with it. This is standard mosque routine.

The registered owner — Mrs. Shah — launched an appeal to raise £1.5m to build a huge new mosque on the site.

In December 2010 Mrs Shah applied for planning permission to use the takeaway as mosque. This was refused. You would think this was the end of the story, but no.

Why the delay? Meetings between senior Council officers and Ms. Shah, “a member of the Race equality and planning cammitee @ the Town Hall”, resulted in the enforcement officer being told to hold off enforcement proceedings.

One year later, the application was back in front of the Planning Committee, and permission was refused. The Council Officers, who hoped to usher this one through, wrote a shameful report recommending that Councillors let the Officers grant the planning permission.

If they hoped this would get the Councillors off the hook, they were wrong.

Gavin Boby, acting for the Waterloo Road Residents’ Action Group, reminded the Councillors of the terrible highways dangers, and that Councillors would be held responsible are their decision.

The mosque describes itself as follows:

“Currently, there are two 200-person capacity buildings at the mosque; three remain under development”.

5 x 200 = 1,000 person capacity. With 4 parking spaces. And they had the gall to claim that there would be “adequate to cater for the number of visitors using the site at peak times”.

The disturbance to residents of the narrow Victorian terraced streets behind would have been unbearable, and it is heartless of the Council to allow it so long simply because the residents are neither rich nor used to creating a fuss.

Propagating Islamic doctrine is contrary to incitement law, public order law, hate speech law, and equalities law. You don’t need to be a lawyer to understand this: the Koran calls 3 times for unbelievers to be killed wherever they are found, and 14 times for them to be enslaved, including sex slavery.

If Councillors or officers assist something that is outside the criminal law, they risk criminal investigation, or being sued for doing something outside their powers

In the end, none of the Councillors could bring themselves to vote for planning permission: you could hear the crickets chirp when the chairman asked them to vote in favour of this vile application.

And it is vile, in the town of Charlene Downes, the 14-year-old girl plied with drugs, pimped, raped, murdered, her body disposed of in the foulest way imaginable, and her killers rewarded with a government payout of £250,000 each.

And the town of Paige Chivers, groomed, exploited, and ‘disappeared’ in Blackpool.

We only hope that their families will take no offence if we offer the work that has gone into opposing this mosque as an inadequate tribute to their memory.


Previous posts about Mosquebusters:

2011		Jun		10		Mosque Busting: English vs. American Styles
				20		The Central Role of Mosques in Islamic Political Doctrine
		Aug		4		Mosquebusted!
		Oct		9		A Win for Mosquebusters in Uxbridge
				9		No Megamosque for Dudley

The Political Persecution of Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff, Part 2

The second part of my three-part series on the “hate speech” case against Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff has been published at FrontPage Mag. All three parts will be posted as a single article at Gates of Vienna over the weekend.

Below are excerpts from Part 2:

Just before Christmas, an article about Elisabeth appeared in Wienerin, a glossy Austrian magazine similar to Vanity Fair. Some translated excerpts:

She is said to have incited hate against Muslims, and is before the court on a charge of incitement. But even a conviction will not silence Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff. S. M. Steinitz accompanied the new figurehead of the Islam critics to Copenhagen. And witnessed how Sabaditsch-Wolff made her trial a manifesto — and gained in political influence.

The prosecutor apparently did not consider it necessary to prepare for the trial. No, he said, he had no questions for the defendant. The tape recording of her comments, the basis for the charge against Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff, 39, he had only heard “in excerpts.” On this tape, covertly recorded by a reporter in the fall of 2009, can be heard how Sabaditsch-Wolff — during her seminar “The Fundamentals of Islam” — says to a participant, among other things, “Cardinals rape in spite of their religion. Muslims rape because of their religion.” Sponsor of the seminar: the Freedom Education Institute. A charge was laid after a report appeared in the weekly magazine, NEWS.

A year later in Room 31of the Vienna Regional Court: the prosecutor seems confident of success, almost bored. Even the onlookers do not doubt that a verdict will be reached quickly: Sabaditsch-Wolff — guilty of incitement and denigration of religious doctrines. Like Susanne Winter, the FPÖ representative who was convicted two years ago because of her comments about the founder of Islam. (“In today’s system, this Muhammad is a child molester.”)

But it was different this time…

Read the rest at FrontPage Mag.