Prepared by:

Khurrum Awan, Muneeza Skeikh, Naseem Mithoowani

LLB (Osgoode Hall Law School – 2007)

Ali Ahmed

LLB Candidate (Osgoode Hall Law School - 2008)

Daniel Simard

LLB Candidate (Osgoode Hall Law School - 2009)

The objective of this document is to detail the general anti-Islam and anti-Muslim content of articles published by Maclean’s Magazine. We will demonstrate that Maclean’s is engaging in a discriminatory form of journalism that targets the Muslim community, promotes stereotypes, misrepresents fringe elements as the mainstream Muslim community, and distorts facts to present a false image of Muslims. This document and its conclusions are based upon a selection of articles found in Maclean’s Magazine between January 2005 and July 2007. Extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix attached to this document. At the end of each article, the reader will also find a brief commentary and listing of assertions contained in the relevant article.

It is submitted that Macleans’ publications vis-à-vis the Muslim community are: (1) promoting Islamophobia and fear of Muslims; (2) representing Muslims as violent people who are prone to engage in violence and are incapable of living peacefully in their host societies; (3) casting suspicion on Muslims at large as potential terrorists, extremists, and radicals; (4) representing the presence and growth of Muslims in Western societies as a threat to the Western values of democracy, freedom, and human rights; (5) Attempting to import a racist discourse and language into mainstream discourse in Canadian society; (6) Attacking multiculturalism and religious freedoms; (7) attacking laws that provide protection to identifiable communities from the type of discriminatory journalism that Macleans is engaging in; (8) condemning any and all efforts by politicians, law enforcement, media and other institutions to reach out to Muslim communities and to exercise sensitivity.

The articles supporting the comments made in this section include, but are not limited to: "The Future belongs to Islam," "Wake up Ostriches: Islam’s in an expansionary phase," "Wake up Europe. It may already be too late," "What should I do, Imam," "Celebrate tolerance, or you’re dead," "Feeding the hand that bites them," "The War on Terror is the real Women’s Issue," and "I begged to confess." Relevant extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix.

One of the central themes in these articles include the allegation that the Muslim community, including the Canadian Muslim community, is part of a global Muslim conspiracy to takeover Western societies and impose an oppressive form of Islamic law on them; a war is underway between Muslims and non-Muslims and Muslims need to be viewed through this lens as potential enemies. This alleged Muslim conspiracy is juxtaposed with the assertion that Muslims are flooding Western society through immigration and higher than average fertility rates in order to instill fear that Muslims will in fact takeover Western and Canadian societies and impose an oppressive form of Islamic law on all citizens. Fear of Muslims is also promoted by raising doomsday scenarios about what will transpire when the alleged impending Muslim takeover occurs: Muslims will burn books and libraries, women will be forced to wear the Muslim veil, Christians will be expelled from their countries, Jews will be massacred, Muslim religious police will enforce Islamic norms on the population, honour killings of women will become common practice, and women will be unable to vote.

Other examples of fear mongering include:

• The extent of the terrorist threat to Canada is grossly exaggerated by presenting unsubstantiated allegations of fact: Canada has allegedly been infiltrated by Muslim terrorist, bases of anti-Canadian and anti-Western hatred have been set by Canadian Muslims, and a high number of Muslim Canadians have devoted themselves to "radical Islamism" and have acquired "combatant status" with terrorist enemies.
• Private and public places of worship such as private homes and universities are alleged to be centers of radicalization and terrorist planning.

The articles supporting the comments made in this section include (but are not limited to): "The Little Mosque that couldn’t," "Clooney isn't touching this one," "A Twilight zone of Insanity," "Far better to be at the Zoo than this Circus," "The future belongs to Islam," and "Finally, someone who cares about Christians." Extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix.

A central theme of these articles is the portrayal of Muslims as violent people who are incapable of living peacefully in their host societies. This portrayal is accomplished in several ways including through false assertions, distortions, and the presentation of fringe elements as being representative of Muslims at large. Examples of these false portrayals include:

• The inappropriate comments and jokes of a supposed British Muslim comedian are used to represent that Muslims in general lack sensitivity towards the victims of 9/11, and that they believe in drinking blood and killing non-Muslims.
• The extent of protests that occurred in some predominantly Muslim countries following the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in Denmark, are grossly exaggerated to represent that the most Muslims reacted in a violent manner to these publications.
• The gross exaggeration of some unfortunate incidents of persecution of Christians in some predominantly Muslim countries to represent that Muslims at large condone and engage in the persecution of religious minorities.
• The distortion of facts regarding the conflict to portray it as a religiously and racially motivated war in which Muslims are killing Christians and Arabs are killing Blacks. Muslims and Arabs are presented as engaging in genocide based solely on religious and racial motives.
• A single incident of juvenile violence perpetrated by three Muslim youths in Belgium is used to represent that European Muslim youth are the primary perpetrators of juvenile violence in Europe due to their religious identity, and to allege that Muslims have taken over Belgium.

The articles supporting the comments made in this section include (but are not limited to): "The Future belongs to Islam," "Q&A with Terrorism Expert David Harris," "The Church Dance that Snowballed," "Twilight Zone of Insanity," "Finally, someone who cares about Christians," "Far better to be at the Zoo than this Circus," "A ‘Canadian Spy’," "I Begged to Confess," "The Making of a Canadian Terrorist," and "Wake up, Ostriches, Islam’s in an expansionary phase." Extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix.

A prominent feature of these articles is that Muslims at large are presented as potential terrorists and extremists. This portrayal is accomplished by using false assertions, distortions, and generalizations. Examples include:

• A "substantial number" of Western Muslims are alleged to share the basic goals of terrorists, namely the imposition of an oppressive branch of Shariah law on Western society and its citizens. No evidence is presented for this assertion although it is probable that it is a gross misrepresentation based on the support by a large number of Muslims for the use of religious arbitration to settle some family law matters. Such support would hardly qualify as a sharing of terrorist goals as alleged by Maclean’s.
• 80% of Canadian Muslims imams are alleged to be "radical" based on the assessment of an Italian imam who visits Canada "every now and then." This allegation is linked to the further (racist) assertion that Muslims at large have a culture of handing over their kids to radical imams in order to radicalize them. These two false allegations are combined to assert that the Canadian Muslim population is mostly radicalized.
• The assertion that there exists an extremist fringe among Canadian Muslims and that this fringe will shape the Canadian Muslim community to also become radical. It is also alleged that young Canadian Muslims at large are being indoctrinated with fundamentalism, being indoctrinated by extremist clerics, and being indoctrinated to impose Islamic law over non-Muslim westerners.
• The background of a prominent historical figure in the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood movement is distorted to convey the message that Muslims at large hate basic manifestations of Western culture (such as a Church social event) potentially causing them to form global terrorist organizations.
• The allegation that a violent and extremist brand of Islam has "metasized" and "swallowed" up all the moderate forms of Islam and Muslims. As a result, all or almost all Muslims are extremist and radical.
• The arrest of 17 Muslim men in the GTA in June 2006 is presented as a reflection on Canadian Muslims as a whole.

The presentation of Muslims at large as potential terrorists, extremists, and radicals is also accomplished by way of lengthy articles focusing undue attention on the backgrounds and religious devotion of some Canadian Muslims who have been detained on suspicions of terrorism. In some cases these men have not been tried or convicted but this does not deter Maclean’s from presenting material in a manner that casts suspicion on all Canadian Muslims. Examples include:

• The Muslim prayer, the Koran, and religious education are presented as a fundamental part of the training of a number of Al-Qaeda operatives.
• Engaging in lawful advocacy for a legitimate Canadian Muslim organization is presented as one of seven standard steps to becoming a terrorist.
• Undue attention is focused on the background of a Canadian man detained in Afghanistan on suspicion of fighting for the Taliban, in a manner that casts suspicion on all Canadian Muslims as potential terrorists, traitors, and Taliban collaborators.
• While narrating the alleged torture of a Canadian man while in custody in Saudi Arabia, it is alleged that the detainee’s beatings were interrupted only by "Muslim calls to prayer." The effect is to juxtapose a fundamental Muslim and Islamic practice with uncivilized and horrendous behaviour.

The articles supporting the comments made in this section include (but are not limited to): "The War on Terror is the real Women’s issue," "Q&A with Terrorism Expert David Harris," "The Church Dance that Snowballed," "Why are Teachers trashing Western Values," "Finally, someone who cares about Christians," and "Wake up, Ostriches, Islam’s in an expansionary phase," Extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix.

One of the central themes of these articles is the assertion that Muslims at large are intolerant of Western culture and traditional Western values. Examples include:

• The background of a prominent historical figure in the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood movement is distorted to convey the message that Muslims at large possess an inherent hatred of basic manifestations of Western culture, such as a Church social event. This hatred has the potential to cause them to form global terrorist organizations aimed at destroying manifestations of traditional Western culture.
• The reaction of some Muslims to the Pope’s comment regarding the Prophet Muhammad is grossly distorted to represent that Muslims at large responded to these comments in a violent manner. The context of the Pope’s comments is exploited to allege that Islam is a "medieval system" that has not reconciled itself with reason, and that Muslims are an uncivilized people incapable of engaging in a reasonable discussion with the Pope.

Another central theme of these articles is the portrayal of Muslims at large as people who possess values that share nothing in common with Western values such as freedom, democracy, and human rights. Muslims then are portrayed as people whose presence and growth in Western society poses a threat to these Western values. Examples include:

• The use of an alleged quote by a Muslim caliph to represent that Muslims at large believe in burning books of learning. Their rationale for this belief is that if the books disagree with the Quran then they regard them as worthy of burning; if they agree with the Quran then they regard them as superfluous.
• The use of some unfortunate incidents in some predominantly Muslim countries to represent that Muslims in general suppress and oppress women. A growing Muslim population is posited as posing a severe threat to women’s rights. In particular, Muslims are alleged to believe that men are better than women, and to believe that honour killings of women are acceptable. It is also alleged that a growing Muslim population in the West will result in women being prevented from participating in protests, women being forced to wear burqas, and women being assaulted and abused by Muslims unless they are wearing "Islamic coverings."
• A focus on the countries of origin of the parents of 17 Muslim men arrested in the GTA on suspicion of plotting a bomb attack to represent that Muslims at large possess values that share nothing in common with Western values.
• The assertion that Muslims at large do not share the values of a liberal democracy such as tolerance and pluralism.

The articles supporting the comments made in this section include (but are not limited to): "The War on Terror is the real Women’s issue," "Q&A with Terrorism Expert David Harris," "The Church Dance that Snowballed," "Why are Teachers trashing Western Values," "Finally, someone who cares about Christians," and "Wake up Ostriches: Islam’s in an expansionary phase." Extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix.

A notable feature of Maclean’s journalism has been the publication of alleged statements of facts and generalizations about Muslims which can only be described as racist and xenophobic. Added to this has been an attempt to promote the work of writers and "intellectuals" broadly recognized as promoting hatred and Islamophobia. The publication by a reputable national magazine of these racist and xenophobic statements represents an attempt to normalize the use of a racist language and to legitimate the work of writers and "intellectuals" broadly recognized as promoting hatred and Islamophobia. Examples include:

• The historical conquest by a Muslim monarch of the present day city of Istanbul is used to represent that present day Muslims at large believe in the sodomizing and beheading of Europeans..
• The representation that Muslims at large engage in sex with minors and animals.
• The assertion that Muslims utilize useful products imported from the West while providing only extremism and terrorism in return.
• The representation that a large number of Muslims are "sheep-shaggers."
• The assertion that Canadian Muslims have a culture and "community of religion" in which they hand over their children to radical imams so that they may be radicalized.
• The assertion that Muslims are prone to going berserk, that a Muslim mob is one of the easiest things to ignite, and that Muslims are prone to rioting.
• A recognized Islamophobe (Oriana Fallaci), broadly recognized by several European countries and global institutions as a promoter of hate and racism against European Muslims, is depicted as a heroic figure who is trying to save Europe from an impending Muslim takeover and whose views need to be paid attention to by Canadians.
• Recognized Islamophobes such as Robert Ferrigno, Bruce Bawer, and Claire Berlinski are accorded broad coverage. The credentials and qualifications of these individuals are praised in order to convey their racist views as fact and truth and in order to provide them the guise of legitimacy.

The articles supporting the comments made in this section include (but are not limited to): "The Future belongs to Islam," "Why are Teachers trashing Western Values," "Wake up Ostriches: Islam’s in an Expansionary Phase," "Celebrate tolerance or you’re dead," "A Twilight Zone of Insanity." and "The Press Darling who became the Jew." Extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix.

A central theme of these articles is the message that multiculturalism and its social impact is facilitating a Muslim takeover of Western societies and threatening national security and Western values. Examples include:

• The assertion that social democratic states are susceptible to being taken over by Muslims as a result of their social democratic policies. These social democratic policies have removed Western societies’ survival instinct against the Muslims.
• The assertion that as a result of multiculturalism, Muslims have far too much freedom of movement in Western society.
• The assertion that a policy of multiculturalism is incapable of making Muslims citizens in the West loyal to their countries of citizenship and that it encourages Muslims to join the "Jihad" being waged by Muslims to takeover the world including the West.
• The allegation that a growing Muslim population in Western countries facilitates the propagation of the Muslim "Jihad" against the West.
• The allegation that Western values are under threat due to the accommodation of the religious practices and rituals of Muslims at universities and other public places.
• The representation that America will be an Islamic Republic by the year 2040 unless it returns to its Christian roots.
• The allegation that the promotion of multiculturalism in Canadian schools and universities is permitting "propaganda" to be taught, and is facilitating the Muslim takeover of Canadian society.

Therefore, in order to save themselves from the impending Muslim takeover, Western societies must get rid of multiculturalism, large social programs, Muslim immigration, and the teaching of diversity and equality in the educational system. These solutions are advocated for in a number of the articles identified above, and in particular in the following articles: "The Future belongs to Islam," "Wake up Europe. It may already be too late," "What should I do Imam," "Celebrate tolerance or you’re dead," and "Why are teachers trashing Western values."

The articles supporting the comments made in this section include (but are not limited to): "Celebrate Tolerance, or you’re dead," "Why are Teachers trashing Western Values," "Wake up Ostriches: Islam’s in an Expansionary Phase," "A Twilight zone of Insanity," and "The Press darling who became the Jew." Extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix.

A prominent feature of these articles is a consistent attack on human rights codes and other laws that are meant to protect Muslims and other identifiable groups from the kind of discriminatory material being published by Maclean’s and that provides Muslims and other groups the means to seek a legal remedy when they are subjected to such discriminatory publications. These laws are alleged to exist solely for the purpose of protecting Muslims and to permit them to persecute writers. Examples include:

• The misrepresentation of legal action taken by Muslims and European authorities against Oriana Fallaci for the publication of hateful and Islamophobic material, as an exploitation of the legal system by Muslims.
• The misrepresentation of laws prohibiting hateful and discriminatory publications as laws designed solely to permit Muslims to win lawsuits by invoking bogus claims of religious and racial discrimination.
• The misrepresentation of legal action taken by Muslims against the authors of discriminatory publications as ganging up by Muslims in order to persecute writers and launch lawsuits on frivolous grounds.
• The misrepresentation that the Danish cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a suicide bomber were not published as a result of Canada’s laws prohibiting racial and religious incitement (as opposed to racial and religious sensitivity).

The articles supporting the comments made in this section include (but are not limited to): "Far better to be at the Zoo than this Circus," "The Future belongs to Islam," and "Q&A with Terrorism Expert David Harris." Extracts from these articles can be located in the Appendix.

A central theme of these articles is to condemn politicians, law enforcement, and media for any kind of sensitivity and outreach to Muslim communities. In particular, any efforts to speak out against Islamophobia and the association of the Muslim community at large with criminal elements engaged in criminal acts are strongly condemned. The message is that Islam and Muslims are a collective problem and that they should be identified as such by politicians, law enforcement, and media. The following extracts provide some examples:

• "... Political correctness in counter-terrorism could kill us. To listen to security officials at press conferences practically presenting a burlesque on the theme of political correctness is devastatingly unnerving. What we were hearing was surreal. It's also unprepossessing to see police officers and other public officials indulging in theological moonlighting. I do not want to hear from my local cop a detailed analysis of the relevance of Islam to violence."
• "You may vaguely remember seeing some flaming cars on the evening news toward the end of 2005. Something going on in France, apparently. Something to do with -- what's the word? -- "youths." When I pointed out the media's strange reluctance to use the M-word vis-à-vis the rioting "youths," I received a ton of emails arguing there's no Islamist component…"
• "…A mayor/police commissioner/spokesperson will issue an urgent call to a becalmed Canada, urging Canadians to beware of the backlash they are in absolutely no danger of expressing."

We are deeply concerned about the content and nature of Maclean’s journalism. Unfortunately, this kind of journalism has become increasingly pervasive in Canada in the last few years and has, in our view, been the leading factor in the growth of Islamophobia and anti-Muslim sentiment in Canadian society.

The media portrayal of Muslims and Islam is widely recognized as a significant factor in the promotion of Islamophobia and anti-Muslim sentiment. The European Policy Centre has noted that, through media coverage, Muslims have been inherently linked to fundamentalism and find it almost impossible to free themselves from these preconceived linkages between Islam and radicalism. A January 2003 report by the UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, entitled "Situation of Muslim and Arab peoples in various parts of the world in the aftermath of the events of 11 September 2001,",noted that the way in which news providers treated the events of 9/11 had a significant negative effect on the image of Arabs and Muslims. North American media was found to persistently make "outrageous categorizations and generalizations while neglecting differences" with respect to Muslims. A report published by European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC), titled "Summary Report on Islamophobia in the EU after 11 September 2001," noted that the European media had played a role in promoting Islamophobia in the EU. According to the report, the media holds an "inherent negativity" towards Islam and Muslims. It continues that Islamophobia is seen by the Western media to be unproblematic, that sensationalism is a "cornerstone" of reporting with respect to Muslims and Islam, and that an inappropriate and disproportionate focus on extremist elements in the Muslim community exist, which erroneously portrays these fringe elements as the mainstream of indigenous Muslim populations. The Report on Islamophobia in the EU noted that the negativity of the media was pervasive - historical and contemporary stereotypes were an integral feature of media coverage, Images and stereotypes of Muslims and Islam seemed to be "so deeply embedded and almost necessary to media coverage, that Islamophobia is almost a natural process," and accuracy and inaccuracy had become "increasingly blurred" so that real Muslims and their stereotypical constructs "[had] become indistinguishably one."

It is submitted that all the characteristics identified in the above reports as being indicative of discriminatory publications that promote Islamophobia, can be found in a substantial number of articles published by Maclean’s. Simultaneously Maclean’s has refused to allow representative Muslim organizations and voices to rebut the anti-Muslim and Islamophobic content of its articles. In particular, its editors have informed us that it would rather go bankrupt than allow us to publish a response to the flagrantly anti-Muslim article "The Future belongs to Islam" which is now the subject of a number of human rights complaints.

In conclusion, Maclean’s is engaged in publishing flagrantly Islamophobic and anti-Muslim articles while refusing the request of Muslim organizations to publish a response to these articles. This refusal indicates that Maclean’s magazine is motivated by an anti-Muslim and anti-Islamic agenda rather than the promotion of open and free debate on issues related to indigenous Muslim communities, immigration, multiculturalism, and terrorism. In light of this agenda and its record of discriminatory publications, we appeal to schools, colleges, universities and other public institutions to condemn Maclean’s and to cancel their subscriptions to Maclean’s. It is clear that when it comes to issues related to Canadian Muslims and Muslims in general, rather than being regarded as an "educational" magazine Maclean’s should be regarded as a case study in Media Islamophobia.

Mark Steyn | Oct 20, 2006

The Muslim world has youth, numbers and global ambitions. The West is growing old and enfeebled, and lacks the will to rebuff those who would supplant it. It's the end of the world as we've known it. An excerpt from 'America Alone'…

Sept. 11, 2001, was not "the day everything changed," but the day that revealed how much had already changed. … If you'd said that whether something does or does not cause offence to Muslims would be the early 21st century's principal political dynamic in Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium, France and the United Kingdom, most folks would have thought you were crazy. Yet on that Tuesday morning the top of the iceberg bobbed up and toppled the Twin Towers.

This is about the seven-eighths below the surface -- the larger forces at play in the developed world that have left Europe too enfeebled to resist its remorseless transformation into Eurabia and that call into question the future of much of the rest of the world. The key factors are: demographic decline; the unsustainability of the social democratic state; and civilizational exhaustion.

…

The median age in the Gaza Strip is 15.8 years.

Once you know that, all the rest is details. If you were a "moderate Palestinian" leader, would you want to try to persuade a nation -- or pseudo-nation -- of unemployed poorly educated teenage boys raised in a UN-supervised European-funded death cult to see sense? ...

...

Experts talk about root causes. But demography is the most basic root of all. A people that won't multiply can't go forth or go anywhere. Those who do will shape the age we live in.

…

You might formulate it like this:

By "will," I mean the metaphorical spine of a culture. Africa, to take another example, also has plenty of young people, but it's riddled with AIDS and, for the most part, Africans don't think of themselves as Africans: as we saw in Rwanda, their primary identity is tribal, and most tribes have no global ambitions. Islam, however, has serious global ambitions, and it forms the primal, core identity of most of its adherents -- in the Middle East, South Asia and elsewhere.

Islam has youth and will, Europe has age and welfare.

…

The children and grandchildren of those fascists and republicans who waged a bitter civil war for the future of Spain now shrug when a bunch of foreigners blow up their capital. Too sedated even to sue for terms, they capitulate instantly. Over on the other side of the equation, the modern multicultural state is too watery a concept to bind huge numbers of immigrants to the land of their nominal citizenship. So they look elsewhere and find the jihad. The Western Muslim's pan-Islamic identity is merely the first great cause in a world where globalized pathologies are taking the place of old-school nationalism.

For states in demographic decline with ever more lavish social programs, the question is a simple one: can they get real? Can they grow up before they grow old? If not, then they'll end their days in societies dominated by people with a very different world view.

… But there is a correlation between the structural weaknesses of the social democratic state and the rise of a globalized Islam. The state has gradually annexed all the responsibilities of adulthood -- health care, child care, care of the elderly -- to the point where it's effectively severed its citizens from humanity's primal instincts, not least the survival instinct. ... Big government is a national security threat: it increases your vulnerability to threats like Islamism, and makes it less likely you'll be able to summon the will to rebuff it. We should have learned that lesson on Sept. 11, 2001, when big government flopped big-time and the only good news of the day came from the ad hoc citizen militia of Flight 93.

…

In Thomas P. M. Barnett's book Blueprint For Action, Robert D. Kaplan, a very shrewd observer of global affairs, is quoted referring to the lawless fringes of the map as "Indian territory." It's a droll joke but a misleading one. The difference between the old Indian territory and the new is this: no one had to worry about the Sioux riding down Fifth Avenue. Today, with a few hundred bucks on his ATM card, the fellow from the badlands can be in the heart of the metropolis within hours.

Here's another difference: in the old days, the white man settled the Indian territory. Now the followers of the badland's radical imams settle the metropolis.

And another difference: technology. In the old days, the Injuns had bows and arrows and the cavalry had rifles. In today's Indian territory, countries that can't feed their own people have nuclear weapons.

But beyond that the very phrase "Indian territory" presumes that inevitably these badlands will be brought within the bounds of the ordered world. In fact, a lot of today's "Indian territory" was relatively ordered a generation or two back -- West Africa, Pakistan, Bosnia. Though Eastern Europe and Latin America and parts of Asia are freer now than they were in the seventies, other swaths of the map have spiralled backwards. Which is more likely? That the parts of the world under pressure will turn into post-Communist Poland or post-Communist Yugoslavia? In Europe, the demographic pressures favour the latter.

The enemies we face in the future will look a lot like al-Qaeda: transnational, globalized, locally franchised, extensively outsourced -- but tied together through a powerful identity that leaps frontiers and continents …

We can argue about what consequences these demographic trends will have, but to say blithely they have none is ridiculous. The basic demography explains, for example, the critical difference between the "war on terror" for Americans and Europeans: in the U.S., the war is something to be fought in the treacherous sands of the Sunni Triangle and the caves of the Hindu Kush; you go to faraway places and kill foreigners. But, in Europe, it's a civil war...

Four years into the "war on terror," the Bush administration began promoting a new formulation: "the long war." Not a good sign. In a short war, put your money on tanks and bombs. In a long war, the better bet is will and manpower. The longer the long war gets, the harder it will be, because it's a race against time, against lengthening demographic, economic and geopolitical odds. By "demographic," I mean the Muslim world's high birth rate, which by mid-century will give tiny Yemen a higher population than vast empty Russia. By "economic," I mean the perfect storm the Europeans will face within this decade, because their lavish welfare states are unsustainable on their post-Christian birth rates. By "geopolitical," I mean that, if you think the United Nations and other international organizations are antipathetic to America now, wait a few years and see what kind of support you get from a semi-Islamified Europe.

…In Japan, the demographic crisis exists virtually in laboratory conditions -- no complicating factors; in Russia, it will be determined by the country's relationship with a cramped neighbour -- China; and in Europe, the new owners are already in place -- like a tenant with a right-to-buy agreement.

…

At first it doesn't sound too bad: compared with the United States, most advanced societies are very crowded. If you're in a cramped apartment in a noisy congested city, losing a couple hundred thousand seems a fine trade-off. The difficulty, in a modern social democratic state, is managing which people to lose …

...

So what will happen? There are a couple of scenarios: whatever Japanese feelings on immigration, a country with great infrastructure won't empty out for long, any more than a state-of-the-art factory that goes belly up stays empty for long. At some point, someone else will move in to Japan's plant.

…

… In the industrial age, manpower was critical. In the new technological age, manpower will be optional -- and indeed, if most of the available manpower's Muslim, it's actually a disadvantage…

…

... For these people, their primary identity was not as American colonists but as British subjects. For others, their new identity as Americans had supplanted their formal allegiance to the Crown. The question for today's Europe is whether the primary identity of their fastest-growing demographic is Muslim or Belgian, Muslim or Dutch, Muslim or French.

That's where civilizational confidence comes in: if "Dutchness" or "Frenchness" seems a weak attenuated thing, then the stronger identity will prevail. One notes other similarities between revolutionary America and contemporary Europe: the United Empire Loyalists were older and wealthier; the rebels were younger and poorer. In the end, the former simply lacked the latter's strength of will.

Europe, like Japan, has catastrophic birth rates and a swollen pampered elderly class determined to live in defiance of economic reality. But the difference is that on the Continent the successor population is already in place and the only question is how bloody the transfer of real estate will be.

… But in the same three decades as Ulster's "Troubles," the hitherto moderate Muslim populations of south Asia were radicalized by a politicized form of Islam; previously formally un-Islamic societies such as Nigeria became semi-Islamist; and large Muslim populations settled in parts of Europe that had little or no experience of mass immigration.

On the Continent and elsewhere in the West, native populations are aging and fading and being supplanted remorselessly by a young Muslim demographic. Time for the obligatory "of courses": of course, not all Muslims are terrorists -- though enough are hot for jihad to provide an impressive support network of mosques from Vienna to Stockholm to Toronto to Seattle. Of course, not all Muslims support terrorists -- though enough of them share their basic objectives (the wish to live under Islamic law in Europe and North America) to function wittingly or otherwise as the "good cop" end of an Islamic good cop/bad cop routine. But, at the very minimum, this fast-moving demographic transformation provides a huge comfort zone for the jihad to move around in ... When a European jihadist blows something up, that's not in defiance of democratic reality but merely a portent of democratic reality to come. He's jumping the gun, but in every respect things are moving his way.

You may vaguely remember seeing some flaming cars on the evening news toward the end of 2005. Something going on in France, apparently. Something to do with -- what's the word? -- "youths." When I pointed out the media's strange reluctance to use the M-word vis-à-vis the rioting "youths," I received a ton of emails arguing there's no Islamist component, they're not the madrasa crowd, they may be Muslim but they're secular and Westernized and into drugs and rap and meaningless sex with no emotional commitment, and rioting and looting and torching and trashing, just like any normal healthy Western teenagers…

… Take that media characterization of those French rioters: "youths." What's the salient point about youths? They're youthful. Very few octogenarians want to go torching Renaults every night. It's not easy lobbing a Molotov cocktail into a police station and then hobbling back with your walker across the street before the searing heat of the explosion melts your hip replacement. Civil disobedience is a young man's game.

In June 2006, a 54-year-old Flemish train conductor called Guido Demoor got on the Number 23 bus in Antwerp to go to work. Six -- what's that word again? -- "youths" boarded the bus and commenced intimidating the other riders. There were some 40 passengers aboard. But the "youths" were youthful and the other passengers less so. Nonetheless, Mr. Demoor asked the lads to cut it out and so they turned on him, thumping and kicking him. Of those 40 other passengers, none intervened to help the man under attack. Instead, at the next stop, 30 of the 40 scrammed, leaving Mr. Demoor to be beaten to death. Three "youths" were arrested, and proved to be -- quelle surprise! -- of Moroccan origin. The ringleader escaped and, despite police assurances of complete confidentiality, of those 40 passengers only four came forward to speak to investigators. "You see what happens if you intervene," a fellow rail worker told the Belgian newspaper De Morgen. "If Guido had not opened his mouth he would still be alive."

No, he wouldn't. He would be as dead as those 40 passengers are, as the Belgian state is, keeping his head down, trying not to make eye contact, cowering behind his newspaper in the corner seat and hoping just to be left alone. What future in "their" country do Mr. Demoor's two children have? … With hindsight it seemed as parochially Flemish as could be imagined. Not anymore. The week before Mr. Demoor was murdered in plain sight, bus drivers in Sint-Niklaas walked off the job to protest the thuggery of the -- here it comes again -- "youths." In little more than a generation, a town has been transformed.

... The "youths" get ever more numerous, the non-youths get older. To avoid the ruthless arithmetic posited by Benjamin Franklin, it is necessary for those "youths" to feel more Belgian. Is that likely? Colonel Gadhafi doesn't think so:

…

In a few years, as millions of Muslim teenagers are entering their voting booths, some European countries will not be living formally under sharia, but -- as much as parts of Nigeria, they will have reached an accommodation with their radicalized Islamic compatriots, who like many intolerant types are expert at exploiting the "tolerance" of pluralist societies. In other Continental countries, things are likely to play out in more traditional fashion, though without a significantly different ending. Wherever one's sympathies lie on Islam's multiple battle fronts the fact is the jihad has held out a long time against very tough enemies. If you're not shy about taking on the Israelis and Russians, why wouldn't you fancy your chances against the Belgians and Spaniards?

"We're the ones who will change you," the Norwegian imam Mullah Krekar told the Oslo newspaper Dagbladet in 2006. "Just look at the development within Europe, where the number of Muslims is expanding like mosquitoes. Every Western woman in the EU is producing an average of 1.4 children. Every Muslim woman in the same countries is producing 3.5 children." As he summed it up: "Our way of thinking will prove more powerful than yours."

Adopting a fear mongering tone, this article focuses on the influx of Muslim immigrants into Europe and North America. It explicitly and implicitly states that this influx poses a threat to the fabric of Western society, to democracy, and to human rights due to the religious identity and beliefs of Muslims in general. Another significant theme contained in the article is that there is allegedly an ongoing war between Muslims and Non-Muslims, that Muslims are part of a global conspiracy to take over Western societies, and that Muslims in the West need to be viewed through this lens as the enemy. Finally, other all-encompassing and negative generalizations are made about the Muslim population in the West, which are enumerated below

Assertions and Implications:

1. Muslims are imposing or attempting to impose Shariah law on all societies in which they live. In particular, Muslims living in the West desire to force all Westerners to live under an oppressive branch of Shariah law.
2. A "substantial number" of Muslims living in the West share the basic goals of terrorists; one of these objectives is the imposition of an oppressive branch of Shariah Law on Western societies.
3. Muslims looking to commit terrorist acts have a support network within mosques in general, that encourage them to commit such acts.
4. There is an interconnected, global network of mosques that are engaged in a violent struggle against Western society. In fact, the presence of mosques conclusively indicates that a substantial number of Muslims are committed to perpetrating terrorist acts.
5. Muslims are multiplying too quickly in Europe and North America. Further, they are radical, inspired by "Jihad", incapable of being loyal citizens of Western and European societies and are bent on conquering the world.
6. Radical Muslims are settling all over metropolises in the West.
7. Muslim populations in South Asia, Nigeria, and elsewhere are radicalized and large numbers of Muslims from these areas have moved to Europe, bringing with them their radical ideas.
8. Muslims living in the West are incapable of being loyal citizens of Western societies. As a result of this disability, Muslims living in the West are likely to join the global "jihad" being waged by Muslims against the West.
9. A policy of multiculturalism is incapable of making Muslims living in the West loyal to their countries of citizenship. Therefore, they join the "jihad" being waged by Muslims to take over the world including the West.
10. Muslims living in the West are waging a war and struggle against their countries and societies of residence, which is analogous to the struggle being waged by the Palestinian and Chechen resistances against the Israelis and Russians.
11. There is a global war between Islam and Muslims on one side and the West on the other side.
12. The growing Muslim population in the West has resulted in and poses an increasing threat to National Security.
13. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 occurred due to the presence of Muslims in Western societies.
14. The growing Muslim population in Western countries facilitates the propagation and movement of the Muslim "Jihad" against the West.
15. Islam has replaced communism as the primary threat to Western societies.
16. Muslims are attempting to colonize the West in a manner similar to that in which the "white man" colonized "Indian territory", implying that Muslims could potentially do to Westerners what the "white man" did to the Aboriginal peoples.
17. A growing Muslim population in Western societies will result in more terrorist acts, greater violence, and a suppression of human rights and Western Liberal democratic values.
18. Muslims have a collective agenda of taking over the world, including the West.
19. Muslims have already transformed Europe into "Eurabia".
20. Muslim populations possess "youth and will". These two factors combined with the Muslim agenda of taking over the world and Europe’s allegedly aging and welfare-dependant society, means that Muslims will in fact take over the West.
21. Social democratic states are susceptible to being taken over by Muslims as a result of their social democratic policies which have removed Western societies’ survival instinct (against the Muslims).
22. The "unfortunate" element of a social democratic state is that the Muslim population does not decline over time.
23. A bloody civil war could ensue in Europe as a result of the growing number of European Muslims.
24. A war is already underway in Europe, being fought by non-Muslim Europeans against Europeans. Further, this war is the same as the war being waged against the Taliban in Afghanistan and insurgents in Iraq. As a result European Muslims are equivalent to Taliban and Iraqi insurgents.
25. In a few years, European will be "semi-Islamified" meaning that parts of it will be living under Shariah law or will have been taken over by Muslims
26. European Muslims are the "new owners" of European society and are behaving like "tenant[s] with a right-to-buy agreement"
27. Muslims will inevitably take over Europe; the only issue left to be determined is how "bloody" the transfer of power in Europe, to Muslims from non-Muslims, will be.
28. The number of Muslims in Europe is expanding like "mosquitoes".
29. Belgium no longer belongs to the Belgians: it has already been taken over by Muslims.
30. Non-Muslim Belgian kids have no future in their country due to the presence of Muslims.
31. Japan will inevitably be taken over by Muslims
32. Compared to non-Muslims, Muslims are incapable of being loyal citizens of western societies.
33. Belgian and European Muslims are and will be incapable of being sufficiently Belgian or Europe.
34. Muslims living in Western societies are "foreigners".
35. As a result of multiculturalism and in general, Muslims have far too much freedom of movement in Western society
36. As a result of their religious identity Muslim youth living in the West are more likely to commit acts of violence as compared to other (non-Muslim) youth.
37. Most or all juvenile crime in Europe is perpetrated by Muslim youth.
38. All countries and regions with pre-dominantly Muslim populations qualify as "Indian Territory", implying that they are backward and lawless societies.

As a result of the foregoing, non-Muslim Westerners must beware of Muslims and get rid of multiculturalism. The influx of Muslim immigrants should be remedied by prohibiting any further immigration of Muslims into the West in general and into Canada in particular.

Barbara Amiel | Feb 16, 2006

With the exception of a brief moment at the University of Prince Edward Island's student newspaper, no Canadian publication, including this magazine, showed the Danish cartoons of Muhammad that caused worldwide violence by Muslims. To justify this omission, "responsible" was a favorite word, "respect" a close second. Foreign Minister Peter MacKay managed both, plus a drum roll of "diversity," "understanding," "sensitivity" and "freedom of expression."…

Perhaps one needs to have lived under sharia to get it. Canadians haven't, but Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali has. The point, she explained, was that illustrators in Denmark could draw Jesus, Moses or God but were afraid for their lives to draw Muhammad. Journalists should not, and could not, cave in on this, she insisted. I'll hazard that one reason for the cartoons' suppression here is that publication is probably against our religious/racial incitement laws -- Minister MacKay's "freedom of expression" notwithstanding …

... The Danish Islamist group that ignited the issue was organized by Ahmed Abu-Laban, a 60-year-old Palestinian immigrant residing in Copenhagen with links to a Muslim Brotherhood cleric, Yusuf al-Qaradawi…

... Displays of Islamist violence cower European governments who are currently in a tense impasse with Iran and Hamas. Violence gives Islamists around the world a boost.

There's a lesson here should the winterized Canadian ostrich take its head out of the snow. If there is not a radical course correction, Europe will become Islamized within the lifetime of our children. As in the days when the Mughals conquered India and the Ottomans went up to the gates of Vienna, Islam is once more in an expansionary phase.

The birth rates of Western Europeans are low, those of Muslims high, and one does not have to be a great prophet to know what happens if a people cannot reproduce themselves. In January's New Criterion, Mark Steyn writes after watching a Washington abortion rally that "women marching for their 'reproductive rights' . . . might like to ponder demographic realities." As he says, the chances of Gloria Steinem's successors being able to chant "Keep your Bush off my bush" from under burkas are slim.

Normally, a people don't willingly acquiesce in the demise of their own culture, especially one as agreeable as Western democracy, but you can see how it happens. Massive Muslim immigration takes place and at the time, no one gives much thought to consequences... Little attention was paid to integration, and Muslims may not have been ready to integrate anyway

… Some immigrants don't want to integrate. Britain has Muslim MPs and affirmative action programs -- and yet has had bad race riots...

... We have made laws and allowed practices in our universities and workplaces that in the name of so-called human rights have denied the very values we claim to defend. Surrendering such values to pressure groups is a critical weakness of liberal democracy.

Canada has a relatively small Muslim population. Moderate Muslims are probably the majority, but in a time of expansionism, the fringe determines the course. Young Muslim Internet sites in Canada extol the merits of fundamentalism; cite extremist clerics as role models. Chat rooms discuss the virtues of the Islamic state.

Moderate Muslims are by and large excellent citizens who move easily in the mainstream. But some cities are developing exclusively Muslim areas in which old country values are reinforced. Canada is a culture in its own right and not a tabula rasa on which large groups of newcomers may impose their values.

The primary themes of this article are that Islam and Muslims are poised to take over the West and that they pose a threat to "Western" values such as freedom, democracy, women’s rights, etc. The article also proposes some solutions to this "problem".

The article focuses on the protests that occurred in some pre-dominantly Muslim countries after the publication of the Danish cartoons depicting the Prophet (p.b.u.h) as a suicide bomber. The extent of the protests, particularly violent protests, is grossly exaggerated in order to imply that all Muslims who participated in any kind of protest (including peaceful protests) anywhere in the world were "Islamists" bent on taking over the West. Focusing on these protests, the author states that these protests are evidence that Muslims and Islam are posed to takeover Canada.

The impending Muslim takeover is portrayed as being similar in nature to the military conquests by the Muslims of India and Europe (i.e. violent and oppressive) --- the growing Muslim population in Canada and the West pose a threat of violent military conquest of Western societies.

The article also alleges that women’s rights in Canada will be suppressed and crushed by a growing Muslim population – in particular, women will be forced to wear burqas and will be unable to engage in protests.

In terms of solutions, the article proposes that the religious practices of Muslims should not be accommodated in Universities or Workplaces (since they pose a threat to "Western" values), and that Muslim immigration should be stopped.

A noteworthy allegation in the article is that extremist Muslims will soon from the majority of Canadian Muslims. The reason for this is that there is an alleged extremist fringe among Canadian Muslims which will shape the Canadian Muslim community to become radical.

1. The Canadian public are like ostriches who need to wake up and realize that Islam is "in an expansionary phase" i.e. it is looking to take over Canadian society.
2. "Worldwide violence" was wrought by Muslims as a result of the Danish cartoons
3. The laws against religious and racial incitement in Canada, which provide protection to Muslims, should be abolished.
4. The Muslims protesting the publication of the Danish cartoons were radical / fanatical Muslims or Islamists attempting to take over the West
5. The protesting of the Danish cartoons was part of an Islamist conspiracy.
6. The protesting by Muslims of the publication of the Danish cartoons should serve as a warning to Canadians. The protests indicate that Europe will be taken over by Muslims and Islam within the current generation.
7. Currently Islam is in an expansionary phase which is analogous to the military takeover of India and large parts of Europe by the Muslim Mughals and Ottomans respectively. Muslims and Islam are accomplishing this military conquest through high birth rates and immigration
8. As a result of the growing Muslim populations in the West, women’s rights in the West will be crushed, women will be forced to wear burkas, and women will be unable to engage in protests.
9. Race riots in Britain were due to the desire of Muslims to not integrate into British society ---systemic discrimination against Muslim minorities had no role to play.
10. Muslims do not wish to integrate into the societies in which they are living.
11. Respecting the religious observances of Muslims in universities and workplaces have resulted in a denial or elimination of "Western" values.
12. There is an extremist fringe among Canadian Muslims and this fringe will shape the Canadian Muslim community to also become radical.
13. Young Muslims in Canada are being indoctrinated with fundamentalism, are being indoctrinated by extremist clerics, and are being indoctrinated to impose Islamic law over non-Muslim Westerners.
14. Cities in Canada are developing exclusively Muslim areas; some areas in Canada are becoming no-go areas for non-Muslims.

MARK STEYN | Apr 05, 2006

…

"With the onset of the Iraq War and European opposition, many Americans embraced a severe anti-European attitude. 'To the list of polities destined to slip down the Eurinal of history,' wrote Mark Steyn in the Jewish World Review, 'we must add the European Union and France's Fifth Republic.' "

…

Until now. Two books have just hit the shelves -- While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within by Bruce Bawer, and Menace In Europe: Why The Continent's Crisis is America's, Too by Claire Berlinski. In media-speak, two of anything makes a trend …

... Bawer and Berlinski, both genuine American Europhiles, have a serious purpose: in his titular evocation of the young JFK's book on pre-war European appeasement, While England Slept, Bruce Bawer makes plain that he wants to wake Europe up -- and, if it's too late for that, then at least to wake up America. Neither is a xenophobic yahoo: Berlinski "divides her time" -- as the book jackets say -- between Paris and Istanbul; she has a doctorate in international relations from Oxford. Bawer is a homosexual who moved to the Continent because he was weary of the theocratic oppressiveness of redneck America and wanted to live his life in the gay utopia of the Netherlands. Alas, when he got there he found the gay scene had gone belly up and, theocratic oppressor-wise, Pat Robertson has nothing on some of the livelier Amsterdam madrasas…

... But in 20 years' time Europe will be an economically moribund demographic basket case: 17 Continental nations have what's known as "lowest-low" fertility -- below 1.3 live births per woman -- from which no population has ever recovered.

… The trap the French political class are caught in is summed up by the twin pincers of the fall and spring riot seasons. The fall 2005 rioters were "youths" (i.e. Muslims from the suburbs), supposedly alienated by lack of economic opportunity. The spring 2006 rioters are "youths" (i.e. pampered Sorbonne deadbeats), protesting a new law that would enable employers to terminate the contracts of employees under the age of 26 in their first jobs, after two years.

...

The only question about Europe is whether it's going to be (a) catastrophically bad or (b) apocalyptically bad, as in head for the hills, here come the Four Horsemen: Death (the self-extinction of European races too self-absorbed to breed), Famine (the withering of unaffordable social programs), War (civil strife as the disaffected decide to move beyond mere Citroën-torching), and Conquest (the inevitable victory of the Muslim successor population already in place). I'd say option (b) looks the better bet, for a few if not all Continental nations: united they'll fall, but divided, a handful might stand a chance.

...

And, if even Murray's too much, go back to the granddaddy of them all -- Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Recounting the Muslim march on France 1,300 years ago, Gibbon writes:

"The decline of the French monarchy invited the attack of these insatiate fanatics. The descendants of Clovis had lost the inheritance of his martial and ferocious spirit; and their misfortune or demerit has affixed the epithet of lazy to the last kings of the Merovingian race. They ascended the throne without power, and sunk into the grave without a name. . . . The vineyards of Gascony and the city of Bordeaux were possessed by the sovereign of Damascus and Samarcand; and the south of France, from the mouth of the Garonne to that of the Rhone, assumed the manners and religion of Arabia."

Commentary:

This article focuses on the riots that occurred in France in 2005 by some disaffected and unemployed youth in some French cities. The author implies that these riots were caused by Muslim youth, as a result of their religious identity (as opposed to other factors such as unemployment, etc). Assuming a fear-mongering tone, these riots are portrayed as a sign on the impending Muslim take-over of European societies. The Muslim takeover is in turn portrayed as an "apocalypse" or doomsday scenario for Europe. The article states that there will be an inevitable conquest of Europe by Muslims through the European and French Muslims living in European and French society.

1. Intolerance and homophobia against gays has grown in the Netherlands due to Muslims.
2. There will be a Muslim "conquest" in Europe as a result of the local Muslim population already in place
3. Due to the growing number of Muslims in Europe there will be a Muslim conquest of Europe and France. This conquest will be similar to that of the "Muslim march" on France 1300 years ago.

MARK STEYN | Feb 23, 2006

At the speed history's moving right now, you gotta get your futuristic novels in fast, and Robert Ferrigno's is the first in the potentially extensive genre of Islamotopian fiction. In Prayers for the Assassin, the fun starts on the inside cover: a map of the Islamic Republic of America in the year 2040. The nation extends over most of the north and west of the Lower 48. Chicago, Detroit and the East Coast cities are ruined and abandoned, Mount Rushmore is rubble, and Seattle is the new capital. Catholics remain as a subordinate class to their Muslim rulers. The evangelicals -- the "peckerwoods" -- are hunkered down in a breakaway state called "the Bible Belt" (the old Confederacy), where they still have the Second Amendment and the original Coca-Cola formula: up north, they have to make do with Jihad Cola, which sucks big time... And in the most intriguing detail on the map, there's a dotted line heading through Washington state to B.C. marked "Rakkim's route to Canada" -- the new underground railroad along which he smuggles Jews, gays and other problematic identity groups to freedom across the forty-ninth parallel...

… Saying "Imagine the U.S. under a Muslim regime" is the easy bit, creating the "State Security" apparatus and Mullah Oxley's "Black Robes" -- a Saudi-style religious police -- is only marginally more difficult. It's being able to conceive the look of a cul-de-sac in a suburban subdivision -- what's the same, what's different -- that determines whether the proposition works or not. Ferrigno has some obvious touches -- the USS Ronald Reagan is now the Osama bin Laden -- and some inspired ones -- the Super Bowl cheerleaders are all male -- but it's the rich layers of detail that bring the world to life. In one scene, a character's in the back of a cab and the driver's listening to the radio: instead of Dr. Laura and Dr. Phil, it's a popular advice show called "What Should I Do, Imam?" It doesn't have any direct bearing on the plot but it reinforces the sense of a fully conceived landscape…

The Islamic Republic came into being 25 years earlier in the wake of simultaneous nuclear explosions in New York, Washington and Mecca: "5-19-2015 NEVER FORGET." A simple Arabic edition of the Koran found undamaged in the dust of D.C. now has pride of place at the House of Martyrs War Museum. On the other hand, the peckerwoods retrieved from the wreckage the statue of Jefferson, whose scorched marble now graces the Bible Belt capital of Atlanta. But what really happened on that May 19? Was it really a planet-wide "Zionist Betrayal"? Ferrigno's story hinges on the dark secret at the heart of the state, which various parties have kept from the people all these years. Car chase-wise, it's not dissimilar to Fatherland, Robert Harris's what-if-Hitler-won-the-war novel, in which a 1960s Third Reich is determined to keep its own conspiracy hidden. And in the sense that both plots involve the Jews, plus ça change -- in life as in art.

…

It's not an unprecedented arc: Hitler followed Weimar -- or, for fans of Cabaret, prison camps followed transvestites in cutaway buttocks. There's an extremely fine line between "boldly transgressive" and spiritually barren, and it's foolish of secular Western elites to assume their own populations are immune to the strong-horse pitch. There's a reason that Islam is the fastest-growing religion in Europe and North America, while, say, the Anglicans are joining Broadway up a chi-chi gay dead end. In Europe, it's demography that's ushering in the Islamification of a continent. In America, Ferrigno posits conversion:

"Jill Stanton's proclamation of faith while accepting her second Academy Award would have been enough to interest tens of millions of Americans in the truth of Islam, but she had also chosen that moment in the international spotlight to announce her betrothal to Assan Rachman, power forward and MVP of the world champion Los Angeles Lakers. Celebrity conversions cascaded in the weeks after that Oscars night. . ."

... What gives Prayers for the Assassin an unsettling compelling power is the premise behind that fictional Oscar speech. As that cop says, "Muslims were the only people with a clear plan and a helping hand." If it's a choice between the defeatism and self-loathing of the Piss Christified West and a stern unyielding eternal Allah, maybe it's Islam that will prove the great seducer.

The purpose of this article is clear from its title. Yes another piece of fear-mongering vis-à-vis Muslim, the author reviews a book alleging that America will be taken over by Muslims by the year 2040. Muslims will allegedly perpetrate a nuclear attack on the United States. Popular icons of American culture such as the super bowl and the Academy awards will allegedly be performed in accordance with Muslim norms, the US will split up as a country, Christians will be removed to a separate company, Jews will be targeted and will have to flee Muslim persecution, Jews will be massacred by the Muslims, and an oppressive religious police will impose Islamic norms and values on Americans. Further this scenario is presented as a viable and certain outcome since Muslims and Islam are allegedly taking over Europe and North America at the present time. The only possible way to avert this alleged takeover is for the West to return to its Christian roots and to resist the Muslims.

On the whole articles promotes fear of Muslims and makes racist and false misrepresentations of Muslims and their culture.

1. American will be an Islamic Republic by the year 2040 – there will be a Muslim / Islamist takeover
2. As a result of the Muslim takeover, there will be a break for prayers during the Super Bowl, the stadium will have a stereotypical Muslim name, and the fans will be forced to watch the game in a Muslim prayer posture
3. Due to the Muslim takeover, the US will have split into different countries and states. Much of the country will be destroyed, there will be a Christian state, there will be a Muslim state in which will be filled with ideas of Jihad, and Jews and other minorities will have to be smuggled into Canada to escape from the Muslims who will be out to eliminate them
4. As a result of the Muslim takeover there will an oppressive religious police enforcing Islamic / Muslim norms on the population, important US icons [such as the USS Ronald Reagan] will be renamed after Osama bin Laden, no females will be allowed to be cheerleaders, and popular American radio and television talk show hosts will have been replaced by Muslim imams
5. The Muslim takeover of American will occur in a violent way through a nuclear attack on the US. A copy of the Quran that will survive the nuclear attack will be placed in a War Museum that will be built by the Muslims. On the whole this Muslim takeover will be like that of Hitler’s and the Third Reich’s takeovers Europe; Jews will be accused of various false conspiracies and will be massacred by the Muslims
6. Muslims and Islam are taking over Europe and North America; Europe is becoming "Islamified".
7. As a result of the Muslim takeover, the star basketball player for an iconic American basketball team will be a Muslim. Further, a popular American actress, while accepting an Academy award will announce her conversion to Islam and announce her marriage to the Muslim star basketball player for the Los Angeles Lakers. Her conversion and announcement will inspire tens of Millions of Americans to do the same furthering the Muslim takeover.
8. A Muslim takeover is quite feasible – Islam will prove to be the "great seducer" and will takeover the West. The West needs to return to its Christian roots in order to resist the Islam / Muslim takeover.

MARK STEYN | Apr 28, 2006

Over in Sweden, they've been investigating the Grand Mosque of Stockholm. Apparently, it's the one-stop shop for all your jihad needs: you can buy audio cassettes at the mosque encouraging you to become a martyr and sally forth to kill "the brothers of pigs and apes" -- i.e. Jews. So somebody filed a racial-incitement complaint and the coppers started looking into it, and then Sweden's chancellor of justice, Goran Lambertz, stepped in. And Mr. Lambertz decided to close down the investigation on the grounds that, even though the porcine-sibling stuff is "highly degrading," this kind of chit-chat "should be judged differently -- and therefore be regarded as permissible -- because they were used by one side in an ongoing and far-reaching conflict where calls to arms and insults are part of the everyday climate in the rhetoric that surrounds this conflict."

In other words, if you threaten to kill people often enough, it will be seen as part of your vibrant cultural tradition -- and, by definition, we're all cool with that. Celebrate diversity, etc…

Diversity-wise, Europe is a very curious place -- and I mean that even by Canadian standards. In her latest book, The Force of Reason, the fearless Oriana Fallaci, Italy's most-read and most-sued journalist, recounts some of her recent legal difficulties with the Continental diversity coercers. The Federal Office of Justice in Berne asked the Italian government to extradite her over her last book, The Rage and The Pride, so she could be charged under Article 261b of the Swiss Criminal Code. As she points out, Article 261b was promulgated in order to permit Muslims "to win any ideological or private lawsuit by invoking religious racism and racial discrimination. 'He-didn't-chase-me-because-I'm-a-thief-but-because-I'm-a-Muslim.' " She's also been sued in France, where suits against writers are routine now. She has had cases brought against her in her native Italy and, because of the European Arrest Warrant, which includes charges of "xenophobia" as grounds for extradition from one EU nation to another, most of the Continent is now unsafe for her to set foot in. (Publications targeting the Muslims in general should not be classified as xenophobia) What's impressive is the range of organized opposition: the Islamic Centre of Berne, the Somali Association of Geneva, the SOS Racism of Lausanne, and a group of Muslim immigrants in Neuchâtel, just to name a random sampling of her Swiss plaintiffs. After the London bombings and the French riots, the commentariat lined up to regret that European Muslims are insufficiently "assimilated." But, in fact, at least in their mastery of legalisms and victimology, they're superbly assimilated. One might say the same of the imam who took my chums at The Western Standard to the Alberta Human Rights Commission over their publication of the Danish cartoons.

Signora Fallaci then moves on to the livelier examples of contemporary Islam -- for example, Ayatollah Khomeini's "Blue Book" and its helpful advice on romantic matters: "If a man marries a minor who has reached the age of nine and if during the defloration he immediately breaks the hymen, he cannot enjoy her any longer." I'll say. I know it always ruins my evening. Also: "A man who has had sexual relations with an animal, such as a sheep, may not eat its meat. He would commit sin." Indeed. A quiet cigarette afterwards as you listen to your favourite Johnny Mathis LP and then a promise to call her next week and swing by the pasture is by far the best way. It may also be a sin to roast your nine-year-old wife, but the Ayatollah's not clear on that.

Kinky as this is, it has nothing on Fallaci's next circle of cultural diversity -- the weirdly masochistic pleasure European leaders get out of talking themselves down and talking Islam up. Beginning with the German foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher at the 1983 Hamburg Symposium for the Euro-Arab Dialogue, Signora Fallaci rounds up a quarter-century's worth of westerners who've insisted that everything you know was invented by Islam: paper, medicine, sherbet, artichokes, on and on and on . . .

"Always clever, the Muslims. Always at the top. Always ingenious. In philosophy, in mathematics, in gastronomy, in literature, in architecture, in medicine, in music, in law, in hydraulics, in cooking. And always stupid, we westerners. Always inadequate, always inferior. Therefore obliged to thank some son of Allah who preceded us. Who enlightened us. Who acted as a schoolteacher guiding dim-witted pupils."

This, it seems to me, is the most valuable contribution of Oriana Fallaci's work. I enjoy the don't-eat-your-sexual-partner stuff as much as the next infidel, but the challenge presented by Islam is not that the cities of the Western world will be filling up with sheep-shaggers. If I had to choose, I'd rather Mohammed Atta was downriver in Egypt hitting on the livestock than flying through the windows of Manhattan skyscrapers. But he's not. And one reason why westernized Muslims seem so confident is that Europeans like Herr Genscher, in positing a choice between a generalized "Islam" and "the West," have inadvertently promoted a globalized pan-Islamism that's become a self-fulfilling prophecy...

Once upon a time we used to understand this. I've noticed in the last few years that, if you pull any old minor 19th-century memoir off the shelf, the en passant observations about Islam seem more informed than most of the allegedly expert commentary that appeared in the year after 9/11. For example, in Our Crisis: Or Three Months at Patna During the Insurrection of 1857, William Tayler wrote, "With the Soonnees the Wahabees are on terms of tolerable agreement, though differing on certain points, but from the Sheahs, they differ radically, and their hatred, like all religious hatred, is bitter and intolerant. But the most striking characteristic of the Wahabee sect, and that which principally concerns this narrative, is the entire subservience which they yield to the Peer, or spiritual guide."

…. Had William Tayler been around when the Islamification of the West got under way and you'd said to him there was a mosque opening down the street, he'd have wanted to know: what kind of mosque? Who's the imam? What branch of Islam? Old-school imperialists could never get away with the feel-good condescension of PC progressives.

…

Just so. In 1946, Col. William Eddy, the first U.S. minister to Saudi Arabia, was told by the country's founder, Ibn Saud: "We will use your iron, but you will leave our faith alone."

William Tayler might have questioned whether that was such a great deal. The House of Saud used the Americans' "iron" to enrich themselves and export the hardest, most unyielding form of Islam to the Balkans and Indonesia and Britain and North America.

This resurgent Islam -- promoted by a malign alliance between Europe and the Saudis -- is a much better example of globalization than McDonald's. In Bangladesh and Bosnia, it's put indigenous localized Islams out of business and imposed a one-size-fits-all Wahhab-Mart version cooked up by some guy at head office in Riyadh. One way to reverse its gains would be with a kind of antitrust approach designed to restore all the less threatening mom 'n' pop Islams run out of town by the Saudis' Burqa King version of globalization…

This article attempts to promote the hateful and racist views of an Italian writer, Oriana Fallaci, wanted in several countries in Europe for the publication of hate material against Muslims and cited by the United Nations as a promoter of racism and xenophobia against European Muslims. Ms. Fallaci is portrayed as a fearless and heroic figure who is authoring "magnificent screeds" on how Europe can "save" itself from Muslims. Her citing by several countries and institutions for the promotion of hatred is attributed to the alleged Muslim persecution of journalists and the Muslim exploitation of the legal system.

Flagrantly racist and false statements are made about Islam and Muslims. Muslims are portrayed as people who condone and engage in sex with minors and animals, and who wish to sodomize and massacre Europeans.

Another feature of this article are its attacks on laws prohibiting hateful and discriminatory publications against identifiable groups. According to the author, these laws are being exploited by Muslims to persecute writers who narrate the "truth" about Muslims.

Finally, the article is filled with Mr. Steyn’s usual misrepresentations and fear-mongering vis-à-vis Muslims: mosques are portrayed as "one-stop shop[s]" for "Jihad", violence is portrayed as an inherent part of Muslim culture, the "Islamification" of the West is alleged to be underway and the only contributions of pre-dominantly Muslim societies to the world is alleged to be extremism and radicalism.

1. Mosques are a "one-stop shop" for Muslims looking to wage a "Jihad" against the West.
2. Mosques generally and commonly promote the killing of Jews.
3. Muslims commonly threaten to kill innocents; violence and threats have come to be recognized as part of the Muslim "cultural tradition" and are therefore accepted by Western society under the guise of diversity.
4. Oriana Fallaci is really a fearless and heroic figure who is being harassed by law enforcement for no good reason.
5. Oriana Fallaci is wanted in several European countries for the promotion of hatred and racism against Muslims only because Muslims have ganged up on her and are exploiting the legal system to their advantage.
6. Laws have been made in Europe in order to permit Muslims to win lawsuits by invoking bogus claims of religious and racial discrimination.
7. Muslims routinely launch meritless lawsuits against writers.
8. Muslims rallying against Islamophobic publications are really attempting to persecute writers for no good reason.
9. Muslims refuse to assimilate into or to accept Western culture; but they are expert at exploiting the legal system and portraying themselves as victims in order to gain advantage - Canadian Muslims are an example of this: they took the Western Standard to the Alberta Human Rights Commission without good reason.
10. Ms. Fallaci’s books are really "magnificent screeds" on how Europe can "save" itself from Muslims
11. Ms. Fallaci’s books contain lots of "facts" about Muslims. These facts include their beheading and sodomizing of Europeans and their belief in having sex with minors and animals.
12. Muslims’ attempts to promote an appreciation understanding of their culture and history are actually motivated by a superiority complex and a desire to portray non-Muslim Westerners as inferior, inadequate, stupid, and dim-witted.
13. Muslims are "sheep-shaggers";
14. A "globalized pan-Islamism" has developed
15. The "Islamification" of the West is under way due to Muslim immigration.
16. Muslims want to use Western products but do not want the West tampering with their faith
17. Muslims use the useful products of the West. The only thing they provide to the West in return is extremism and terrorism.
18. A "Burqa-King" (extremist and radical) version of Islam has been exported all over the world so that today’s Islam and Muslims are radical and extremist.

...

Bookshops currently have Phillips's most recent work, Londonistan, on their shelves. Canadians ought to race to buy it... The title Londonistan is the mocking name that radical Muslims now use for London, a play on the names of various state sponsors of terrorism.

…

Londonistan takes no prisoners. Phillips spotlights the perversity of the modern human rights movement; the limp, lost church leaders; bias of the media and politicians in thrall to appeasement; prejudice and Muslim intimidation. This is an account of how London became Londonistan, and by extension, how Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa are on a similar path. Canadian readers will recognize the elements that nurture radical Islam, right down to the trendy mayors, politicians and police chiefs who refuse to say the word "Islam" in reference to terrorist attacks except to condemn perceived Islamaphobia. "For Phillips," wrote British journalist Daniel Johnson in Commentary, "Britain is a nation in denial about Islam, about terrorism, about Israel, and above all about itself." Canada is not far behind.

This article has three purposes: one is to promote a recognized anti-Muslim / Islam book. The second is to build on the book’s message to allege that Canada is a county filled with Muslim terrorists, radicals, and extremists. The third purpose is to condemn any kind of sensitivity and outreach to the Muslim community by politicians, media, law enforcement, and other institutions.

The article misrepresents the British Muslim community at large as being extremist and radical. It then implies that the whole Canadian Muslim community is also extremist and radical, and that Canada will soon be filled with Muslim terrorists and extremists due to its alleged commonalities with Britain. The commonalities are identified as cultural and religious sensitivity and outreach to Muslim communities by politicians, media, and law enforcement. The author’s purpose is to prevent and reverse any outreach and sensitivity towards Canadian Muslims.

Hmmm. If you are the target of a predatory ideology, you can't stop it by being apolitical. The lamb cannot say to the wolf for the mouse to the hawk as it swoops down, "Hey, I'm apolitical." Well, I suppose the mouse can, but it won't get it very far. Having said this, discovering the right thing to do about problems like the current challenge Islam presents is more difficult…

Mark Steyn's brilliant book America alone is about this very question. The father said he had stopped after reading its first 10 pages because, "I agree with them and he said everything on those pages." Reminds me of the legendary caliph's remark on the destruction of the great library at Alexandria: "What does it matter? The books either said the same thing as the Koran in which case they are superlluous or they disagree with it in which case they should be burned.". The very ammunition this father needed to arm himself and his children with in order to fight the ideas dangerous to them both was in the body of Steyn's book, not just the introduction. The devil is in the details.

And the devil, as this father will discover when his child gets to school, is in our education system. Good teachers remain, but others are involved in the culture wars on the wrong side, attempting to trash Western values…

…

The groundwork was laid in the late '70s when the cult of multicultualism took hold. In 1977, the Ontario Ministry of Education issued its new heritage and multicultural guidelines. Grades 7 to 10 were now to "develop a sympathetic understanding of the problems facing Third World nations anil to fill out charts discovering the 'bias' and 'prejudice' immigrants face in Canada." Thus began a new victimology.

History courses and multicultural programs were to develop "the concept of multiculturalism as a modern approach to dealing with cultural diversity which establishes each group's right to cultural uniqueness... and full participation in building the Canada of the future." …

…

By 1979, the major Canadian textbook publishers had published their own handbook. Textbooks for Everyone. Accordingly, "all publishers are alert l'or bias and all learning materials are scrutinized carefully lor any evidence, however inadvertent, of invalid racial, sexual, ethnic, religious, occupational and class assumptions." ...

Those who created or studied under this regime are today working in schools and universities. They are the people at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education churning out "resources" for the "inclusive" curriculum-books on "tools for empowering young children" (or "how to teach ahoiu all forms of bias") and tracts to "promote race, sex, class and age equity" in Grades é to S.

Now, this mentality focuses on the almost entirely bogus issue of "lslamophobia" rather than the issue of lslamism; on the evils of Israel and America rather than the values of Western liberal democracy, which both those countries generally uphold. Il we don't believe and teach our own values, how can other cultures respect them?

That's not an apolitical question and cannot be resolved by an apolitical answer. The devil is in the details. So is salvation.

This article is directed against the Canadian educational system: its teaching and promotion of multiculturalism, tolerance, and respect for all cultures is allegedly facilitating the Muslim takeover of Canadian society. The author continues to raise doomsday scenarios about how the Muslims are about to take over Canadian society, how "Western" values are under threat due to the growing number of Muslims, and how the world will change when this alleged Muslim takeover occurs. In particular, the author asserts that when the Muslims takeover Western societies they will burn books of learning because they will either view these books as unnecessary (if they agree with the Quran) or view them as contradicting the Quran (and therefore worthy of burning)..

Finally the author advocates solutions to the "problem" of Muslims and Islam. She endorses the solutions advocated by his Mark Steyn in his book "America Alone" and encourages Canadians to read this (flagrantly anti-Muslim) book so that they and their children may also learn how to deal effectively with the "problem". The solutions advocated include a crack-down on multiculturalism, a moratorium on and reversal of Muslim immigration, and the removal of accommodation for Muslim religious practice. The first article in this appendix is an extract from the book promoted by the author in this article.

1. Islam presents a challenge to the West
2. Muslims believe in burning books of learning; their rationale is that if the books agree with the Quran they are superfluous and unnecessary; if the books disagree with the Quran then they are worthy of being burnt. Further since Muslims are taking over Western societies, this outcome is likely to occur.
3. Mark Steyn’s book, "America Alone" provides the solution to the Muslim / Islam problem – crack down on multiculturalism, Muslim immigration, and Muslim religious practices. Non-Muslims and their children need to adopt Steyn’s ideas in order to deal with the Muslim / Islam problem.
4. Good teachers are those who trash Muslim values – unfortunately there are not enough of such teachers in the Canadian educational system.
5. The current educational system in Canada is facilitating the Muslim takeover of Canada.
6. There is no bias and prejudice facing [Muslim] immigrants.
7. Schools are teaching propaganda that is allowing Muslims to takeover Canada.
8. Canadian textbooks should not be reviewed for racial, sexual, ethnic, religious or class-based stereotypes
9. Islamophobia is a bogus phenomenon: it does not exist and has been invented to focus attention away from the issue of "Islamism".
10. Upholding the values of liberal democracy requires cracking down on Muslim values; Muslims by implication do not share the values of liberal democracy.
11. Salvation from the Muslim / Islam problem lies in the details of the book "America Alone" authored by Mark Steyn.

American taxpayers are bankrolling a Latin American leader who's clearly no friend

MARK STEYN | May 17, 2006

…Many Latin American countries are imploding rather than developing. The region's most influential leaders are thugs. It is a magnet for Islamist terrorists and a breeding ground for hostile political movements… The key leader is [Hugo] Chávez, the billionaire dictator of Venezuela who has declared a Latino jihad against the United States."

...

…

This message of this article is that there is a global war underway between Muslims and non-Muslims. It attempts to rally its non-Muslim readers to this alleged war. It does so by lamenting an alleged alliance that exists between Islam / Muslims and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. This alliance is alleged to be similar to the genocidal pact formed between Hitler and Stalin prior to the second world war – the implication is that Muslims and Hugo Chavez are plotting to wage a genocidal war against the West. It also furthers it’s war message by indicating that the Russians and Chinese need to join the Americans in the process of kicking "Islamobutt" – the reason is that the Russians and Chinese must join is that Muslims are waging war against all predominantly non-Muslim societies; t these societies must therefore join forces to take on the Muslims.

The fear mongering tone of the article is evident from the allegations that South America is filling up with Muslim terrorists, and the radical and extremist Islamic schools have been established in Ontario.

1. South America is filling up with Muslim terrorists; there is a "Latino Jihad" underway against the United States.
2. There exists an alliance between Muslims and Hugo Chavez which is analogous to the alliance between Hitler and Stalin, and which can cause much damage to Western world.
3. Saudi Arabia is funding radical and extremist Islamic schools in Ontario, meaning that extremism and radicalism is prevalent in Ontario.
4. There is a clash between Islam and the West; American taxpayers are funding third parties to this clash such as Venezuela.
5. American are not being as vigorous in the process of kicking "Islamobutt" as they should; the Russians and Chinese also have problems with Muslims, but they will not be too concerned about human rights in "sorting them out once and for all".

MARK STEYN | Feb 05, 2007

The other day I was giving a speech in Washington and, in the questions afterwards, the subject of Little Mosque on the Prairie came up.

"Muslim is the new gay," I said. Which got a laugh. "That's off the record," I added. "I want a sporting chance of getting home alive." And I went on to explain that back in the nineties, sitcoms and movies began introducing gay characters who were the most likeable and got all the best lines, and that Muslims were likely to be the lucky beneficiaries of a similar dispensation. In both cases, the intent is the same: to make Islam, like homosexuality, something only uptight squares are uncool with.

… it seemed a reasonable enough assumption that nine times out of 10 the joke would be on the "irrational" prejudices and drearily provincial ignorance of the Saskatchewan hicks.

…

Fair enough. Never mind that, in the real Canada, the talk-radio guy would be off the air and hounded into oblivion by the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission; and that, instead of looking like Rick Mercer after 20 minutes on a sunbed and being wry and self-deprecating and Toronto-born, your typical Western imam is fiercely bearded, trained in Saudi Arabia, and such linguistic dexterity as he has is confined to Arabic; and that airline officials who bounce suspicious Muslims from the flight wind up making public apologies and undergoing sensitivity training; and that, in the event they do bust up a terrorist plot, the Mounties inevitably issue statements saying this in no way reflects on any particular community in our glorious Canadian mosaic, particularly any community beginning with "Is-" and ending with "-lam"; and that the most prominent Canadians "volunteering" for good works in Afghanistan were the Khadr family…

...

But in this cross-cultural gag-fest, what of the jokes on the other side? Well, these are the cuddliest Muslims you've ever met. They're not just moderate Muslims, they're moderately funny! Not screamingly funny like, say, Omar Brooks, the British Muslim comic whose boffo Islamostand-up routine was reported in the Times of London last year:

He didn't bring the house down literally. He leaves that to Mohammed Atta…

... This is the point, of course: the Muslims on the show are scaled down, from a global security threat to warm low-key domesticity, to all the same generation-gap and battle-of-the-sexes japes as every other hi-honey-I'm-home sitcom…

… You don't have to look hard to find comedy in the Muslim world. In a debate at Trinity College, Dublin, recently, the aforementioned Omar Brooks said that Muhammad's message to non-believers was: "I come to slaughter all of you." He meant it, but come on, you'd have to have a heart of stone not to weep with laughter. Warming to his theme, he said, "We are the Muslims. We drink the blood of the enemy, and we can face them anywhere."

He won't be getting a call from Little Mosque any time soon. But, on the other hand, he is a genuine practising Muslim, which is more than can be said for any of the cast of the Cob’s sitcom. The Muslim members of ACTRA decided to sit this thing out, and so every warm fluffy moderate Muslim on the show is played by a Protestant or Catholic, Italian or Indian... So today, Muslim funnymen are happy to stand up in public and threaten to drink your blood but won't risk doing anodyne CBC sitcoms. Which is also pretty hilarious when you think about it.

As for my throwaway that "Muslim is the new gay," well, Washington isn't like Swift Current. D.C.'s a sleepy backwater with not much going on. So, on a slow news day, a Beltway reporter picked up on the line and sought a reaction from a local Islamo-big shot, Hady Amr. Predictably enough, Mr. Amr denounced my observation as "inappropriate":

Oh, dear. You try to pay a compliment and it gets taken as a beheading offence. Zarqa Nawaz has done her best, but for most of her co-religionists Islam remains no laughing matter.

This article by Mark Steyn is written for the sole purpose of ridiculing the sitcom, Little Mosque on the Prairie, about a Muslim family residing in Saskatchewan. The article’s message is that the sitcom is part of an effort to make Muslims appear moderate, "cool", and just like the people next door. According to Steyn, this representation of Muslims is false; the truth is that Muslims at large are not moderate, are radical, and are "a global security threat". The sitcom then is allegedly trying to deceive the Canadian public from the truth about Muslims. In particular, Steyn portrays the alleged inappropriate jokes and comments of a Muslim British comic to represent that Muslims at large demonstrate no sensitivity towards the victims of 9/11, and that they are inherently violent people who believe in drinking "blood" and killing non-Muslims.

Assertions and Implications:

1. Even a small joke ("Muslim is the new gay") related to Islam and or Muslims results in your life being put in danger.
2. The sitcom, "Little Mosque on the Prairie" is part of a campaign to hide the "truth" that Muslims and Islam: that they are radical, violent, and extremist. The intention of the show is to make Islam, just like homosexuality, normal and acceptable.
3. The sitcom attempts to crack jokes about "irrational" prejudices about Muslims. But in reality, these prejudices are perfectly rational and not prejudices at all.
4. In Canada today, you cannot say anything about Muslims without being put into "oblivion".
5. The ordinary Imam in the West has a "fierce" beard, is trained in Saudi Arabia, and is fluent only in Arabic.
6. Muslims are obtaining undue and unwarranted cultural sensitivity from law enforcement (ridiculing of any kind of sensitivity towards the Muslim community)
7. The only kind of activity Muslim Canadians are engaging in, in Afghanistan, is terrorist activity
8. Churches in Canada are emptying out while mosques are filling up.
9. Moderate Muslims are a rarity; Moderate Muslims who are actually funny are an even greater rarity.
10. Muslim comics generally crack jokes belittling terrorist events like those of 9/11.
11. Muslim comics are aligned with the 9/11 hijackers.
12. The show attempts to "scale down" the Muslims from "a global security threat" to warm "low-key domesticity" --- the show is trying to deceive the Canadian public away from the "fact" that Muslims are a global security threat and into believing that Muslims are just like the average person next door.
13. The real Muslims are "no laughing matter": they believe that they have to kill non-Muslims and drink their blood everywhere.
14. The actors playing the moderate Muslims on the show are not really Muslims. This fact indicates that there are no moderate Muslims.
15. Actual Muslims comics talk about drinking blood and killing non-Muslims, but are not prepared to play moderate Muslims on CBC.

MARK STEYN | Jan 09, 2006

…

From the Associated Press:

"Multan, Pakistan -- Nazir Ahmed appears calm and unrepentant as he recounts how he slit the throats of his three young daughters and their 25-year-old stepsister to salvage his family's 'honor' . . ."

... But the "honour killings" are getting closer. In London last summer, the police announced they were re-opening investigations into 120 deaths among British Muslim girls that they'd hitherto declined to look at too closely on grounds of "cultural sensitivity." There's a small flurry -- enough almost to form a new category for the Governor-General's Awards -- in books itemizing the violence to women, gay men and other approved groups in the new EUtopia: Claire Berlinski's Menace In Europe and Bruce Bawer's While Europe Slept are a staggering accumulation of riveting vignettes, like the non-Muslim girls in les banlieues of France opting to wear veils and other Islamic coverings to lessen the likelihood of being abused and assaulted in the streets.

Which issue will impact more women's lives? The lack of female pipefitters? Or the combination of factors at play in those French -- and Belgian, and Scandinavian, and maybe even Canadian -- suburbs? Yet Western feminists sing the ancient songs of long-won revolutions as relentlessly as drunks on St Patrick's Day: "Have fewer children, later in life," advises Joan Peters. That's the strategy that demographically's delivering western Europe into the hands of a culture far more patriarchal than a 1950s sitcom dad.

"Keep your Bush off my bush!" chanted the ladies on Washington's Mall a year ago at the Million-Abortionist March or whatever it was called. If any of those women still exercise their "reproductive rights", they might want to ponder the likelihood of any girl born today being able to prance around demonstrations in the Eurabian Paris or Brussels of 2030 or 2040 yelling "Hands off my bush!" C'mon, gals! Anyone can beat up post-feminist neutered Western males. Why not pick on a target worth the effort?

This article flagrantly misrepresents some unfortunate incidents involving Muslims to represent that Muslims and Islam at large oppress and suppress women. The first incident is a factually incorrect quote from a Kuwaiti politician. This quote is presented as evidence that Muslims at large believe that Men are better than Women and therefore unworthy of basic rights such as the right to vote. The second incident is the honour killing by a Pakistani man of his wife and daughters. Although this incident was broadly condemned across Pakistani society and the perpetrator was dealt with appropriately by the Pakistani justice system, honour killings are portrayed as representing the reality and culture of Muslims at large.

The article continues to allege that as a result of the growing Muslim population, honour killings are now common in Europe, that non-Muslim women are being abused and harassed by Muslims in Europe unless they are dressed in "Islamic coverings", and that women will soon be unable to protest or participate in political rallies.

1. Muslims believe that Men are better than Women
2. Muslims believe that honour killing of women is acceptable.
3. Many European Muslims are now engaging in honour killings.
4. Non-Muslim girls and women are forced to wear veils and other "Islamic coverings" in France to save themselves from being abused and assaulted in the streets by Muslims.
5. The growing Muslim populations in France, Belgium, and Scandinavia have resulted in a severe threat to women’s rights. In particular there is a growing chance of women being killed in the name of honour or of them being assaulted / abused.
6. Feminists and feminism are "delivering" Western Europe into the hands of the Muslims and their culture.
7. As a result of the growing Muslim population in the West, women will be unable to participate in protests by the year 2030.
8. By 2030 Europe will have become "Eurabia".
9. Feminists need to be "picking" on Muslims and their culture as opposed to "picking" on "post-feminist neutered Western males".

MARK STEYN | Sep 21, 2006

…

This poignant vignette occurs in Lawrence Wright's masterful work The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road To 9/11 ...

But I was wrong. The human comedy in The Looming Tower is very illuminating. …

…The Looming Tower is a family tree of jihad, the chain connecting some weirdsmobile in Cairo with another in Riyadh and then Islamabad and then Hamburg and London and pretty much everywhere. One thing it demolishes is the lazy leftist trope that the "root cause" is poverty. The penniless yak herds aren't the problem. The very first words of the very first chapter are "In a first-class stateroom on a cruise ship bound for New York . . ." It's 1948 and inside the first-class stateroom is Sayyid Qutb, the first of a grand parade of privileged middle-class Westernized Muslims for whom a mis-wired encounter with the modern world is enough to make them hot for jihad. There's a sad inevitability when al-Qaeda's head honchos are ready to give up on 9/11 because they haven't any Muslim Westerners who can pull it off, and just at that moment a Hamburg engineering student called Mohammed Atta shows up. In the jihad, somebody always shows up, somebody middle-class and prosperous and educated and perfectly assimilated except for an urge to self-detonate on the London Underground.

It's tempting to think history might have turned out a little differently had that drunken floozy on the ship not come on to Sayyid late one night or the nurse in George Washington University Hospital not been showing quite so much cleavage. But reading of Qutb's sojourn in America in the late 1940s you begin to wonder whether the girl really did come on to him or if the nurse truly disclosed to him the particulars of what she sought in a lover. His disgust at the lasciviousness of America is vaguely reminiscent of the old joke about the spinster who complains that the young man across the street strips naked in full view every night: when the cop says he can't see anything, she explains you have to climb up on the wardrobe and crane your neck up over the skylight. If you're looking for it as assiduously as Qutb was, you'll find it everywhere.

The title of Wright's book comes from the Koran's fourth sura, the one Osama quoted in a speech on the eve of 9/11:

"Wherever you are, death will find you,

Even in the looming tower."

In an Islamist grievance culture, the tower doesn't have to be that tall to loom. The tragedy in Wright's book is that across little more than half a century a loser cult has metastasized, eventually to swallow almost all the moderate, syncretic forms of Islam. What was so awful about Sayyid Qutb's experience in America that led him to regard modernity as an abomination? Well, he went to a dance in Greeley, Colo.: "The room convulsed with the feverish music from the gramophone. Dancing naked legs filled the hall, arms draped around the waists, chests met chests, lips met lips . . ."

In 1949, Greeley, Colo., was dry. The dance was a church social. The feverish music was Frank Loesser's charm song Baby, It's Cold Outside. But it was enough to start a chain that led from Qutb to Zawahiri in Egypt to bin Laden in Saudi Arabia to the mullahs in Iran to the man arrested in Afghanistan on Sept. 11. And it's a useful reminder of how much we could give up and still be found decadent and disgusting by the Islamists. A world without Baby, It's Cold Outside will be very cold indeed.

The content of this article reflects its sensationalist title. It’s message is that Muslims possess such an inherent hatred of Western civilization that even basic manifestations of Western culture, such as a church social event, can cause them to form a global terrorist network aimed at destroying the western world and basic elements of its culture. The effect is to cast suspicion on Muslims as aliens who hate Western culture and are prone to resorting to acts of terrorism inspired by this alleged hatred.

The article’s message is conveyed by focusing on Sayyid Qutb, a Muslim intellectual who was a leading figure in the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, a moderate and peaceful group committed to bringing about a genuine and moderate Islamic revolution in Egypt. The article falsely alleges that Mr. Qutb and his ideas founded a terrorist movement and caused the formation of Al-Qaeda. The inspiration for Mr. Qutb’s formation of a terrorist organization is alleged to be his witnessing of a dance at a Church. This experience of Mr. Qutb is presented as conclusive evidence of the "fact" that even a basic encounter with Western culture is sufficient to make Muslims at large "hot for jihad" against the West and that Muslim university students are available in large numbers to commit acts of terrorism against Western societies.

A noteworthy element of this article is the flagrant distortion of the meaning and context of a Quranic Surah to allege that the events of 9/11 were directly inspired by the Quran.

1. The root causes of terrorism are Islam and Muslims in general: a Muslim’s encounter with a basic manifestation of Western civilization is sufficient to fill them with hatred and cause them to become terrorists ("hot for jihad"). Further, such Muslims are not an isolated case: there is a "grand parade" of them.
2. It is very easy to find a Muslim university student from a prosperous and educated background ready and willing to engage in an act of terrorism against the West.
3. Western Muslims actively look for what they perceive as acts of immorality. Therefore they are bound to find imagined signs of immorality and then to resort to terrorism
4. The events of 9/11 were directly inspired by the Quran.
5. There exists a "culture" of grievance in Islam and in Muslims; Muslims do not need much provocation or ignition to resort to acts of terrorism
6. A violent and extremist brand of Islam / Muslims has "metasized" and "swallowed" up all the moderate forms of Islam and of Muslims. Therefore, there are barely any moderate Muslims or moderate forms of Islam.
7. Muslims despise Western culture: looking at dances and music fills them with rage / hatred which drives them to commit acts of terrorism.
8. Basic manifestations of Western culture, such as a church social event, causes Muslims to develop a world-wide terrorist network.

LINDA FRUM | Jun 13, 2006

You have said that Canadians are in denial about terrorism. After the events of last week, do you still believe that's true?
... We've had warnings and indications for a great many years that extremists -- particularly Islamic extremists -- have infiltrated and targeted us, yet we persist in pretending that this is not a particularly pressing threat.

In your opinion, how radicalized is the Canadian Muslim population? What kind of numbers are we up against?
Well, of course, it's impossible to assess -- there is no poll measuring the support for Wahhabism amongst our communities. But one can look at some of the statements by genuinely moderate clerics concerning the situation in North America. Imam Palazzi has claimed that 80 per cent of mosques in Canada are under the influence of radicals, though he does not by any means appear to suggest that 80 per cent of Canadian Muslims are themselves radical.

Who is Imam Palazzi?
He's an Italian imam and he comes to Canada every now and then...

So do you trust Palazzi's assessment? Why would he have a sense of things in Canada?
... But it's a genuine question. And I guess a larger, related question is on what are they basing that assessment. My answer, unfortunately, is I really don't know. So I can't certify the validity of those stats.

But the underlying premise is that our country is full of radicalized imams -- leading a non-radicalized population?
But that won't last long.

Because the imams are so influential?
That's right. Especially if you're dealing with a culture, a community of religion that's inclined to idealize "men of God" -- clerics -- and hand their children over to such folk for extended periods, you can predict what the outcome could be...

Like the Dutch are now doing?
... But one thing that's of great concern is the sheer number of people coming in: 230,000 people a year in the immigration stream, and refugees above and beyond that. That number has gone from 500 in 1977 to about 29,000 this year. That sets up a situation where some populations might be tempted to form self-isolating ghettos, particularly if there should be a significant supremacist inclination to the group...

But in the case of radical Islam, we are not prepared to call it for what it is.
That's a key point. In terms of facing the enemy, we must first face the facts. And our ability to face those facts is completely blocked by official efforts to obfuscate the nature of the adversary. I was disbelieving when I listened to some of the briefings by police and security officials who refused to pronounce the "I" and "M" words -- Islam or Muslim -- or their derivatives…

They're very proud about that. They think it proves what nice people they are.
… This idea of not defining the enemy concerns me. In order to position ourselves to deal with an enemy we must understand the enemy's doctrine and mindset. And we can't do that if we don't recognize the realities. But a secondary aspect is that it also … offers special treatment to one ethno-cultural or religious group over all others, and that would be very satisfying to some of the fifth- and maybe sixth-column organizations that seem bent on Islamicizing Canada…

It's so unnerving because we know that they are determined to commit the mass murder of Canadians . . .
... Political correctness in counter-terrorism could kill us. To listen to security officials at press conferences practically presenting a burlesque on the theme of political correctness is devastatingly unnerving. What we were hearing was surreal. It's also unprepossessing to see police officers and other public officials indulging in theological moonlighting. I do not want to hear from my local cop a detailed analysis of the relevance of Islam to violence.

Is part of the problem that the police don't want to speak in a way that will inspire "backlash"?
One of the terrible developments has been the extent to which radical self-styled Islamic representative organizations in Canada have exaggerated and even fabricated scare stories about imagined anti-Muslim behaviour or threats... In doing so, I believe it has enhanced the prospects for recruitment of otherwise moderate Muslims by extremists.

You are saying that some cases of "backlash" have been exaggerated with the purpose of fuelling the fire?
In general there's been near-hysteria on the part of certain national Canadian, Arab and Islamic organizations claiming all kinds of abuse rather than trying to bring Muslims more constructively into the fold...

Let me return to the question of what we as a society can do to better protect ourselves against Islamic fanatics. Is it your opinion that CSIS and the RCMP have enough resources for this kind of "homeland protection"?
... Immigration is just such a huge factor -- it's hard to imagine how, on the basis of relatively stable investments in national security, our security side is going to be able to keep up...

So what you are really saying is that in order to protect ourselves, we have to be honest about the true nature of our problem?
That's right, without honesty we're lost. And the enemy knows that too, and that's why some of their sophisticated elements are playing us for all we're worth

The purpose of this publication is to provide coverage to an individual with clear anti-Muslim prejudices in order to convey the impression that the Canadian Muslim population is generally radicalized and poses a severe threat to Canada’s national security. Muslims are portrayed as people who do not share the Canadian values of freedom, democracy, and human rights and as a result pose a threat to these values. In addition, the article calls for a moratorium on Muslim immigration to Canada in order to address the alleged threat to Canadian national security and to Canadian values from Muslims at large. Finally, the publication calls for an end to any kind of outreach and sensitivity towards the Muslim community by law enforcement and intelligence.

The evidence provided for the allegation that the majority of mainstream Muslims are "radical" or about to be "radicalized" is egregiously suspect. First, 80% of Muslims clerics are alleged to be "radical" on the basis of the assessment by an Italian "Imam", who visits Canada "every now and then". Second, the interviewee makes a racist assertion that Canadian Muslims have a "culture" or "community of religion" by which they "hand over" their kids to radical imams. Finally, these two allegations are combined to assert that radical Imams will soon radicalize over 80% of the Canadian Muslim population.

With respect to immigration, the publication alleges that Muslim immigration to Canada is "out-of-control". Further, since Muslims (allegedly) do not share the values of a liberal democracy (tolerance, pluralism, etc) their immigration to Canada increases the danger to national security and Canadian values. The result again, is the promotion fear of Muslim immigrants and citizens of Canada.

Another theme of this publication is that law enforcement agencies need to stop being sensitive to the Muslim community – Muslims and Islam at large are the problem and they need to be clearly identified (as the problem) by law enforcement agencies.

1. "Islamic" extremists have infiltrated and targeted Canadian society
2. 80% of Canadian mosques are under radical influence
3. The Canadian Muslim population will soon be radicalized.
4. Canadian Muslims have a "culture" and "community of religion" prone to handing over their kids to radical clerics for extended periods of time in order to be radicalized.
5. Money is pouring into the Canadian Muslim community from radical sources.
6. The rates of Muslim immigration to Canada are "out-of-control".
7. Canadian Muslims do not share liberal, pluralistic, democratic, live-and-let-live, Charter-type of values and/or consider them anathema --- therefore Muslims should not be permitted to immigrate to Canada.
8. Muslim immigrants are inclined to set up "self-isolating ghettos"
9. Muslim communities have a "significant supremacist inclination"
10. Law enforcement agencies need to target and identify Muslims and Islam as a problem in order to deal effectively with terrorism.
11. Canadians need to identify the enemy: Islam and Muslims.
12. Canadian Muslims are receiving special treatment as compared to other ethno-cultural groups.
13. Canadian Muslim organizations are bent on "Islamicizing" Canada i.e. imposing Islam over non-Muslim Westerners
14. There are a large number of Muslims looking to commit the mass murder of Canadians
15. There is no such thing as backlash towards Canadian Muslims
16. Canadian Muslim organizations are grossly exaggerating and fabricating stories of anti-Muslim behaviour and Islamophobia in order to attain advantages for Muslims.
17. Fictional tales of Islamophobia propagated by Muslim organizations have enhanced the chances of recruitment of Muslims by terrorist organizations.
18. To deal with terrorism Canadians need to be honest about the problem: the problems are Islam, Muslims, the large number of Muslims in Canada, and the high rates of Muslim immigration to Canada.

BARBARA AMIEL | Feb 07, 2006

One of the easiest things to start off is a Muslim mob…

Any Hollywood director can depict Christ as an adulterer or the Virgin Mary nude without fear of Christians taking up Kalashnikovs. But when Jyllands-Posten published a dozen cartoons of Muhammed, the paper faced bomb threats and thousands of demonstrators.

By October, ambassadors from 10 Muslim countries -- who assumed Denmark was run like their own fiefdoms -- were demanding the Danish government take the newspaper "to task." An Islamic group in Pakistan offered a bounty for the murder of the illustrators. A group of radical Danish imams produced a 43-page booklet on Danish Islamaphobia and toured the Middle East. The booklet contained three extra cartoons -- Muhammed with a pig's snout, a dog raping a praying Muslim and Muhammed as a pedophile devil. Who actually drew them is uncertain, but a Muslim is more likely to know his religion's most poisonous slights…

Followers of radical Islam seem prone to attacks of "the must." Most of the time they work quietly at their jobs, running their shops or doing whatever it is they do. Then, one day, like the Indian bull elephant in George Orwell's essay, they go berserk. Perhaps the madness was jump-started by the urging of the Saudi imams, but suddenly much of the Muslim world spun out of control.

Saudi Arabia withdrew its ambassador from Denmark. Libya and Syria closed their embassies. The EU offices in Gaza were occupied by masked Arab gunmen firing into the air (no tears for Eurocrats, but one wished it had been in a better cause). The Arab League demanded the UN pass a binding resolution. Danish goods were boycotted. Geographical dyslexia took hold as Muslim threats were levelled at Swedes as well as Norwegians and Danes. All blonds look alike in a jihad.

... Riots took place in Jakarta. In Qatar, Bill Clinton seized a quote opportunity to ask rhetorically if anti-Semitism was going to be replaced by Islamaphobia.

Unlike Europeans, Canadians are hampered in evaluating the issue by being unable to see the cartoons -- censorship being what it is in this country. Which presents another small dilemma. As a former newspaper editor myself, the idea of publishing a juvenile scribble of something held sacred by a large number of people is simply not on…

European editors discovered backbone -- briefly. The tabloid France Soir printed the Danish cartoons as well as one showing various religious divinities with the caption, "Yes we have the right to caricature God." "Imagine a society that added up all the prohibitions of different religions," France Soir intoned. "What would remain of the freedom to think, to speak and even to come and go?" Not much, demonstrated the paper's Egyptian owner, who fired its managing editor the same day. The cartoons also appeared in Spain, Italy and Norway. The BBC flashed them. British newspapers did not. The London bombings are raw on British nerves and there is some anecdotal evidence that Muslim newsagents in the U.K. are under threat from Islamists if they distribute papers deemed to be antagonistic.

"In the West, one discovers different moral ceilings," editorialized the pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat, claiming that a Danish cartoon about a rabbi would never have been published. Probably not. But it's hard to attribute this to some nefarious view of Islam. It is not followers of radical rabbis blowing up trains in Europe, but the followers of radical imams. To be surprised by resentment against beliefs that breed people who blow you up on the way to work is unrealistic. Minimally, these events will elicit sarcastic cartoons.

This article focuses on the publication of the Danish cartoons, portraying the Prophet Muhammad as a suicide bomber. It sensationalizes and grossly exaggerates the extent of protests that occurred in some parts of pre-dominantly Muslim countries to convey that Muslims are inherently violent people with an uncivilized culture. Although protests did occur in many pre-dominantly Muslims countries, the persons participating in these protests represented an extremely small fraction of the Muslim population. Further, the majority of these protests were peaceful protests which in turn represented an inherent right of all peoples including Muslims to express their displeasure. However, the protests against the publication are collectively labeled as a violent "jihad" and the entire Muslim world is falsely represented as having "spun out of control" due to the publication of a set of "harmless" cartoons.

A noteworthy element of this article are the racist generalizations made about Muslims and Arabs in this article in order to portray them as violent and uncivilized peoples. It states for example that one of the easiest things to "ignite" is a Muslim mob, and that Muslims are prone to spinning "out-of-control". While discussing the alleged occupation of EU offices in Gaza by "masked" men, it places specific emphasis on their assumed Arab identity ("masked Arab gunmen firing into the air"). Similarly, it emphasizes the Egyptian background of a French newspaper owner who allegedly fired the editor of his newspaper for publishing the Danish cartoons.

1. It is really easy to ignite a Muslim mob; Muslims are prone to rioting and are uncivilized / violent people.
2. Muslims are prone to going berserk – the entire Muslim world "spun out of control" due to the publication of the Danish cartoon.
3. The protests against the publication of the cartoons were actually a violent "jihad". This "jihad" included means of protest broadly recognized as legitimate and peaceful: the closing of embassies, passing of resolutions, and a boycott of Danish goods.
4. The Danish cartoons which represented the Prophet Muhammad, and by implication all Muslims, as suicide bombers should have been published in Canada
5. The owner of the French newspaper which published the cartoons, fired his editor only because the owner was an Egyptian / Arab, and for no other reason
6. Muslims are blowing up trains across Europe; therefore it is perfectly legitimate to draw cartoon depicting all Muslims in general as suicide bombers

BARBARA AMIEL | Oct 02, 2006

Pope Benedict XVI dropped one of his Prada shoes recently. Quoting the Emperor Manuel II Palaeologus on the "evil and inhuman" decree of Muhammad to spread Islam by the sword, he suggested that there's not much talking ground between Christianity, a faith that has reconciled itself with reason, and Islam, a medieval system that has not.

The common sense of Benedict's observation was self-evident. Modern Christianity has a mild creed, a diminished view of its exclusivity, and is tolerant of disbelievers. Islam does not share these characteristics.

…

… Hierarchy tames, too. The Pope runs the Catholics; Lutherans and Anglicans have national head boys. This is not the same as Islam, where self-appointed clerics can set up shop at the local mosque.

The veracity of the Pope's quote was demonstrated by the response: rioting Muslims, attacks on churches, threats on the Pope's life, including calls for his crucifixion, and the murder of a nun and some Assyrian Christians. Islam's jihadists don't worry when their actions match a Byzantine emperor's rhetoric: jihadists conquer by fear. The very thought of angry Muslims sends shivers up spines, especially the morally scoliotic ones of our elites. …

But the Pope had a parallel message. Finally there appears to be someone in Christendom who isn't resigned to Christians being harassed, imprisoned, tortured and even executed in Islamic countries simply for their beliefs. This Pope has his eye on the beleaguered flock living under Islamofascism. No one else appears to care a whit about them.

…The UN's special rapporteur on freedom of religion gets less attention. Never mind Sudan, the list of anti-Christian societies is lengthy. Coptic Christians in Egypt have their churches torn down, but the rapporteur can't give much detail because the Egyptian government will not answer her request for a visit. Christians have their homes attacked or are jailed in Muslim countries across the globe from Indonesia to northern Nigeria, but no General Assembly debates on the matter.

… it's dangerous to publicly practise Christianity or convert from Islam virtually anywhere in the Middle East except Israel…

A Christian pastor was abducted while walking home. His head was shaved, his clothing exchanged for the traditional shalwar kameez, and after an injection he woke up "suspended by his legs from an iron girder with his hands tied behind his back. He was reportedly severely beaten with long wooden sticks and given drugs again." …

Concerned Muslim intellectuals worry about Islam's refusal to reconsider the Koran in light of modernity. But they are the moderates, and by definition are the movement's centre, not the steering edge. Direction comes from the far-out rudder…

The Pope has already met with Muslim representatives to attempt a dialogue. The sad part is that such language lessons usually go one way. Islam is unlikely to learn to talk like the Pope, but the Pope may yet learn to talk like an ayatollah. We wait for another Prada shoe to drop.

The purpose of this article is to portray Islam as an unreasonable religion and Muslims as uncivilized people who commonly discriminate against Christians. The author uses the controversial comments made by the pope in which quoted a Christian emperor’s views regarding the Prophet Muhammad and Islam, to further her own purpose of smearing Islam and Muslims. Islam is termed to be an unreasonable religion, a religion which has not reconciled itself with reason, a religion that owns an army / collection of Jihadists, a religion that has refused to reconsider itself "in light of modernity", a religion that is driven and shaped by it’s "extremist fringes", and a religion that is incapable of engaging in a reasonable conversation with the Pope.

It is well known that a small proportion of Muslims reacted to the pope’s comments violently; however the overwhelming majority protested peacefully or did not protest at all. The article however distorts the facts: a violent response is implied to have been the common and widespread response of Muslims.

The author continues to use the pope's comments as an excuse to slander Muslims and Islam about the poor treatment of some Christians in some pre-dominantly Muslim societies. While it is true that religious minorities have experienced discrimination and persecution in some pre-dominantly Muslim countries, this discrimination and persecution is misrepresented as being broadly condoned by Muslims. The extent and frequency of this discrimination and persecution is also grossly exaggerated. The message conveyed is that Islam is an uncivilized religion and that Muslims are an uncivilized and intolerant people who condone oppression and violence and are intolerant of religious minorities living in their societies.

1. Islam is a "medieval system" that has not reconciled itself with reason.
2. Muslims at large responded to the pope’s comments in a violent way indicating that Muslims are in fact a violent people. A violent response to the pope’s comments was in fact the common response of the Muslims.
3. Islam is a religion that has an army / collection of Jihadists.
4. Christians are being harassed, imprisoned, tortured and executed in pre-dominantly Muslim countries for their beliefs. Such persecution is widespread (as opposed to constituting isolated incidents) in "Islamic" countries.
5. The persecution of Christian in pre-dominantly Muslim countries is inherently "Islamic" (i.e grounded in Islam).
6. Christians living in predominantly Muslim societies are living under "Islamofascism" or oppressive Islamic law.
7. The efforts of Western Protestants and the United Church to highlight the commonalities between Islam and Christianity are "ludicrous" because no commonalities exist between Islam and Christianity --- Islam is not really a tolerant religion.
8. Islam calls for the forced conversation of Jews to Islam.
9. Pre-dominantly Muslim societies are anti-Christian societies; Muslims at large discriminate against Christians.
10. In pre-dominantly Muslim countries, the destruction of Churches, the jailing of Christians, and attacks on Christians are common occurrences and are broadly condoned.
11. Practicing Christianity is dangerous in all pre-dominantly Muslim countries in the Middle East.
12. Christians are commonly abducted, tortured and forced to convert to Islam in Pakistan.
13. Islam refuses to reconsider itself "in light of modernity"
14. Islam is driven and shaped by its alleged extremist fringes and not it’s moderate center.
15. Islam is incapable of engaging in a reasonable conversation with the Pope

Given a choice between zoo animals and terrorists, there is no contest. The more interesting animals live in the zoo

BARBARA AMIEL | Jun 14, 2006

.... I know what's happening back in the world of media Homo sapiens as they come to grips with this alleged terrorist plot. A lot of creatures, not half as efficient at digging up things as these Malayan tapirs, will be snuffling around in front of TV cameras looking for "root causes." At least one bushy-bearded man in a black coat will be scolding Canadians for something or other.

A mayor/police commissioner/spokesperson will issue an urgent call to a becalmed Canada, urging Canadians to beware of the backlash they are in absolutely no danger of expressing.

...

Repetitive movements by polar bears are a given in the zoo world… When people make such repetitive stereotypical movements, they are usually diagnosed as suffering from a mental illness.

After the arrests, a lot of human beings made a lot of repetitive noises. We were reminded, as if we needed to be, that the security and safety of Canada is as much in the interests of Canadian Muslims as anyone else. True enough, but a bird's-eye view. Three paces closer to the cement wall, officials, including those from CSIS, explained that the arrests were no reflection on any specific community or "ethnocultural group," a mouthful of a category which didn't really paper over the fact that all their arrests were of Muslims, not Zoroastrians or Baha'is, largely of immigrant parents from parts of the world that bear very little resemblance to Switzerland. The grey beard of Montreal's Egyptian-born imam Salam Elmenyawi, head of the Muslim Council of Montreal, was much in evidence as he angrily claimed that the uncovering of this alleged plot has exposed the routine racism directed toward Muslims.

In 1980, I attacked Canadian notions of multiculturalism in my book Confessions ...

I remain convinced of this. Perhaps it's wishful thinking, but I believe Canadian Muslims would take to the streets -- not in a march against Canadian racism -- but solely and utterly to condemn and expunge Wahhabism and Islamism from their mosques. Except none of the self-appointed Muslim leaders would dare or even want to organize such a march. And none of our simpering officials would ever mention that that is the problem, not us.

This article focuses on the arrest of 17 Muslim men in the GTA in June 2006 (who have not as yet been convicted) to assert that the arrests are a reflection on Canadian Muslims as a whole, that Canadian Muslims do not share "Western" values, that Canadian Muslims do not have a "Canadian" appearance, and that Canadian Muslims largely support extremism, terrorism, and radicalism. In particular, the author falsely alleges that extremism and radicalism are common at mosques in Canada and that Muslims broadly support these phenomena.

1. The arrest of the 17 Muslim men in the GTA for planning a terrorist attack reflects on all Canadian Muslims (as potential extremists and radicals).
2. Canadian Muslims whose ancestry originates from pre-dominantly Muslim societies have values that share nothing in common with "Western" values and ideals.
3. The typical Muslim appearance consists of a bushy-bearded man in a black coat.
4. Muslims are usually "scolding" Canadians about their inadequacies.
5. There was no such thing as a backlash against Muslims due to the arrests in the GTA; Politicians and Police should not be concerned about backlash against Muslims.
6. Support for terrorism, extremism, and radicalism are common in Canadian mosques. All Canadian Muslims should be protesting against this alleged extremism and radicalism. However, it is impossible to expect Canadian Muslims to protest this alleged "Wahabism" and "Islamism", implying that Canadian Muslims support these phenomena.
7. Canadian politicians and law enforcement refuse to recognize that the "problem" with respect to the threat of terrorism is the Canadian Muslim community in general.

BARBARA AMIEL | May 16, 2006

Back from his late-April visit to Darfur, actor George Clooney was asked by HBO's Bill Maher if the bloodshed in Sudan's terrible conflict "has anything to do with race?" I held my breath but needn't have bothered. George and Bill weren't touching that one. They managed, as most commentators do, to talk about the genocide of "a people" by "them" without giving away who exactly are the "people," who are the "them," and why them are doing it to the people.

… The conflict is between Arabs and black Africans, although self-identification as African is a convoluted matter in ethnically mixed Sudan. The word "sudan" means "land of the blacks" in Arabic, which is how the Sudan got its name when the Arabs arrived there after conquering Egypt. Language can reveal a great deal about attitudes, and the common word used in Arabic for black is "abd," meaning slave.

…

In the early Islamic world, while slaves came from many lands, North Africa was the primary source of unskilled ones. As white slaves became increasingly difficult to get (Russian expansion in the 18th and 19th centuries dried up slaves from central and eastern Europe), the Ottomans turned more to Africa.

Slavery's legacy gives modern Sudan an Arabic-speaking and Muslim north and an African south that is not Arabic in its language (over 100 local languages exist) and is predominantly Christian and animist. Darfur, in the west of Sudan, is Muslim, but its inhabitants are racially akin to the south Sudanese -- and race is the major fault line in this genocide. To a Western eye, the differences in complexion are unremarkable, but in the Sudan, just as in the Caribbean, shade is very important.

…

British colonialism managed Sudan by keeping its north and south -- Arabs and Africans -- as separate as possible. English became the language of the south; Arabic that of the north. After independence was granted in 1956, the process of "Sudanization" was recognized by the Africans as little more than "northernization," meaning money and power to the Arab-Islamic north. Fighting between the two sides continued from 1955 until 1971, when the south was granted qualified autonomy. This ended with the imposition of sharia law over all Sudan in 1983 and a fundamentalist frenzy of flogging and amputation. Ten non-Muslim states in the south were later officially exempted from sharia. Various peace initiatives have sputtered along unsuccessfully for years, together with hair-raising massacres.

Nothing brings out the barbarism in human beings like racial and religious conflicts. Human beings shoot, bomb and send millions to gulags in national and ideological conflicts. In racial and religious wars they prefer to inflict more agonizing deaths, as well as mutilation, amputation, humiliation and rape. In Darfur, local militias of Arabs, called janjaweed, backed by Sudanese government forces, have created two million refugees and hundreds of thousands of mangled dead.

This article distorts the facts regarding the conflict in Darfur. The conflict, which is in fact a conflict over land and natural resources, is portrayed as a religiously and racially motivated war in which Muslims are killing Christians and in which Arabs are killing Blacks. Historical events and conflicts in Sudan are misrepresented as religiously and racially motivated events in which Muslims and Arabs targeted non-Muslims and non-Arabs due to their religious and racial identities. The purpose is to present Muslims and Arabs as violent and intolerant people who are unable to live in peace with other religions and races and who historically enslaved and massacred other races and religions.

1. Muslims are behind the violence and killings in Darfur which they are perpetrating due to their own religious identity and due to the religious identity of the victims (as Christians)
2. The Arabs regard Blacks as slaves and treat them as such.
3. The Arabs use racist terminology to describe Black people.
4. Muslims imported slaves from North America in large numbers.
5. Muslims enslaved Africans in large numbers.
6. Slavery is the reason why the North of Sudan is Muslim, while the South is Christian & non-Muslim.
7. Arabs need to be kept separate from other ethnic groups in order to prevent massacres and conflicts.
8. Muslims imposed Shariah law over all of Sudan and then went on a "fundamentalist frenzy" of flogging and amputation targeted at Christians. "Hair-raising" massacres, mutilation, amputation, and rape have been perpetrated by Muslims against Christians in Sudan.

The Making of a Canadian Terrorist - From small-town boy to al-Qaeda assassin

Anonymous. Macleans. Toronto: Aug 22, 2005.

…Jabarah is an example of what intelligence services are calling the "new generation of jihadists." They are the children of middle-class immigrants to Europe and North America, and were either born or raised in the West. Educated and computer-literate, these recruits have much to offer their terrorist masters, including perfect English and Western passports. For the rest of us, they offer an enigma. In Bell's words, Jabarah had "money, family, friends, security and a, good education: so how did he become a terrorist?" ...

...

Mohammed had first met him before moving to Canada. Since then, Abu Gaith had fought in Bosnia and returned to Kuwait with videotapes of the fighting and training that had gone on there. In 1996, he showed the videos to Mohammed and Anas. … Next, the video explains the causes of this situation, concluding that if only Muslims would return to the Koran, everything would be fine. It ends with an impassioned exhortation to fight the Jews, the Americans and their allies.

... They were both ripe for recruitment, especially Mohammed, who was separated from his parents during his visits to Kuwait. Moreover, by the late 1990s, the Niagara region was becoming a magnet for Islamic extremists. Montreal and Toronto had long been the hubs of Canada's Sunni terrorist networks, but in 1999, Fateh Kamel, the Algerian-Canadian leader of the Montreal jihadi organization was arrested in Jordan and sent to France to stand trial. Some associates of the Groupe Fateh Kamel sent letters to police threatening a biological or chemical weapons attack on the Montreal subway... Some of its members left Montreal to escape the heat; a handful of them drifted to Niagara.

Those who settled in the area included Abdellah Ouzghar and a few "jihadist returnees," those who had fought in Islamic holy wars in Afghanistan and Bosnia and had come back home, where they served as role models for youngsters. Mohammed and Abdul Rahman began mingling with veterans of the holy wars in Afghanistan and Bosnia. They soaked it right up, and soon they were speaking the harsh rhetoric of jihad at the mosque.

Mohammed started raising money for Chechnya, much like his grandfather had raised money for Algerian fighters and Palestinians. That was an important milestone for Mohammed. Recruiters know that it is best to ease someone into terrorism, to start them out with duties that help the cause without killing. Terrorists recruited out of the West often start out as sympathizers. Their involvement begins in support organizations engaged in lawful advocacy, but over time they are pulled toward a radical, violent core, often with the help of a friend or family member. Next comes indirect involvement in violence, such as attending paramilitary training camps. That is followed by some rite of passage into the world of violence... Then comes the terrorist training, followed by an oath of allegiance to the leader and his cause and finally, a mission. These are the seven steps to hell. And Mohammed Jabarah was going all the way.

...

Entrusting young boys to Abu Gaith, Mohammed's recruiter, was like leaving them in the care of a child molester...

…

His jihad had begun.

Then the military training began.

...

There was hand-grenade training…At last the weary men would say their evening prayers at 8 p.m. ...

… The recruits-their days spent in harsh training, their nights in cold tents, all in pursuit of God's agenda-lived such a harsh existence that their lives seemed but a small sacrifice.

…

…Abdul Rahman left for Kuwait while Mohammed returned to Kabul to study the Koran and take a course on Islam.

... In February 2001, CSIS got its first tip about two Kuwait-born brothers who had been doing a lot of talking about jihad, hanging out with veteran Muslim fighters and raising money for Chechnya...

…

AT SOME POINT, recruits had to make a critical choice: Were they willing to go all the way, to give themselves to Osama? If so, they would have to pledge bayat, the secret oath of allegiance. ... The original bayat, found by U.S. investigators in Bosnia, reads: "The pledge of God and His covenant is upon me, to listen and obey the superiors, who are doing this work, in energy, early rising, difficulty, and easiness, and for his superiority upon us, so that the word of God will be the highest, and His religion victorious."

Jabarah was ready.

An appointment was arranged and he had an audience with the "Most Wanted" in Kandahar. They sat together, and Jabarah told bin Laden that he was ready to join al-Qaeda. He explained that he had excellent English language skills, a "clean" Canadian passport and that he had done well at his al-Qaeda training courses... Osama then asked him to swear an oath to al-Qaeda, which Jabarah did.

He swore the martyr's oath.

… Undeterred by the mass murder in New York, Jabarah carried on with the planning for the Singapore attacks: six truck bombs would explode simultaneously at locations around the city. Local jihadists would do the planning and preparations, but Arab suicide bombers would be brought in by Jabarah at the last minute to carry out the operation.

…

HE SLEEPS NO MORE than six hours a night. He spends his days exercising and studying. He has a daily fitness routine and passes the remaining hours reciting the Koran and reading books about history and Islam...

... His letters ooze with bitterness. They are filled with the rhetoric of his al-Qaeda masters, about "believers" and "infidels" and not being "bitten by the snake twice."…

… And Jabarah is not a stupid young man. "Mohammed Mansour Jabarah is one of the most intelligent terrorists we have seen," says Rohan Gunaratna, a Singapore-based scholar and renowned al-Qaeda expert who knows the case intimately. "He had the education, the contacts, the training and the motivation to become another mastermind."

This article places undue attention on the religion and background of a detained terrorism suspect in a manner that casts suspicion order on all Canadian Muslims as potential terrorists. This undue attention is clear from:

1. The sensational headline: "The making of a Canadian terrorist - From Small Town boy to Al-Qaeda"
2. The representation of the Muslim prayer, of Islamic education, and of the Quran as a part of terrorist training.
3. The allegation that engaging in lawful advocacy for a legitimate Canadian Muslim community organization is one of seven standard steps to becoming a terrorist.
4. The emphasis on an alleged Al-Qaeda oath taken in God’s name by Al-Qaeda recruits.

The article also places suspicion on Canadian Muslim institutions such as mosques as potential recruiting centers for terrorists. It does so by portraying the mosque as a center for fund-raising for global resistances and conflicts, as a common point of contact between Muslim fighters and Muslim youth, and as a place where the "rhetoric of jihad" is common. Finally, the article raises fear of Muslims by making unsubstantiated allegations that grossly exaggerate the extent of the terrorist threat in Canada: a new "generation" of terrorists consisting of the children of Muslim immigrants has grown, coordinated terrorist "networks" are operating in Canada, Montreal and Toronto are the "hubs" of Muslim terrorist "networks", the Niagara region is a center of "Islamic" extremism, and Muslim "Jihadists" are allegedly serving as "role models" for Canadian Muslim youngsters.

1. There is a new "generation" or wave of terrorists consisting of the children of middle-class (Muslim) immigrants to Europe and North America, born or raised in the West.
2. There are "terrorist networks" operating in Canada. Further, Montreal and Toronto are the "hubs" of these "terrorist networks".
3. The Niagara region is a center for "Islamic extremists".
4. Muslim terrorists and "Jihadists" return to Canada from "Islamic holy wars" in Afghanistan and Bosnia and serve as "role models" for Canadian Muslim youngsters.
5. There is a particular type of rhetoric known as the rhetoric of Jihad, and this kind of rhetoric is commonplace at Canadian mosques.
6. Engaging in lawful advocacy within or as part of Canadian Muslim advocacy organizations is one of "seven steps to hell" i.e. one of the seven steps to becoming a full-blown terrorist.
7. Muslims prayers and Quranic study are a fundamental part of terrorist training.
8. There are veteran Muslim fighters in Canada propagating Jihad and fund-raising for it.
9. Taking an allegiance in the name of God is a fundamental part of terrorist training.
10. Canadian Muslims with good English language skills and a Canadian passport are good recruiting targets for Al-Qaeda

Still, some details about Qureshi's life, pre-arrest, are starting to emerge. He spent his childhood in England, reportedly in Manchester, before he and his family (his parents and at least one sister) immigrated to Canada. News reports said the family lived in several cities across the country before arriving in Calgary from Prince Albert, Sask., about six years ago. His father, Dr. Zia Qureshi, originally from Pakistan, is a popular family doctor who runs a medical clinic out of a strip mall in Calgary's northeast quadrant, an area of the city that is home to a large Muslim population. According to his listing with the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta, Qureshi is proficient in a number of languages beyond English, including Arabic, Hindi, Farsi and Urdu. Sohail's mother, originally from Iran, is the receptionist at the clinic. Several attempts to contact Qureshi's parents were rebuffed.

Syed Soharwardy, president of the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada and a Calgary resident, told Maclean's that last November, during a chat, a member of the city's Pakistani community asked him in a matter-of-fact way whether he knew a Dr. Qureshi, whose son, the man said, had adopted extremist views…

At about the same time last year, Sheik Alaa Elsayed, a Calgary imam, received a call from a local father begging him to talk with his son, who was determined to fight with insurgents in Afghanistan…

If Qureshi was working with insurgents in Afghanistan, it will certainly not shock Canadian authorities. Since 9/11, the country's spy service, CSIS, has repeatedly issued public warnings about the growth of homegrown terrorism -- the rise of radical, anti-Western Islamists living in the very country they despise. Many are second-generation Canadians, young men and women who are recruited and radicalized online. That appeared to have been the case last June, when police arrested 18 suspected terrorists in Toronto -- many of them in their teens and twenties -- who were allegedly plotting a bomb attack on Canadian soil. "We're not really coming to grips with the fatal truth about the infiltration of Canada and the development of a base of anti-Canadian hatred and anti-Western hatred within our own neighbourhoods," says David Harris, a former chief of strategic planning for CSIS. "On top of all the documented instances of Canadians who have devoted themselves to radical Islamism, including combatant status with the enemy, it would hardly be surprising if there were yet another combatant dedicated to our demise."

Or dedicated to funding our demise. In the fiscal year ending March 2006, terrorist groups funnelled an estimated $256 million through Canada, according to the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC), the federal anti-money-laundering agency…

In the meantime, the country's Muslim leaders find themselves forced, yet again, to answer for the alleged violent aspirations of one of their own. "It is important not to single out an instance and generalize it to a rule," says Sameer Zuberi, a spokesman for the Canadian Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR-CAN). "And I think it's important to remember that sometimes these things are more perceived than real." …

Tarek Fatah, one-time director of communications for the Muslim Canadian Congress, says the growing prominence of smaller places of worship at universities and in private homes contributes to radicalization. "These are literally like secret societies that you go in," he says. "None of these networks can be identified. Nobody knows." Qureshi might know. But he isn't talking. He chose to walk back to his jail cell rather than set the record straight.

His rap sheet, however, speaks volumes about what he faces, especially the last two words printed on the bottom of the page: "Canadian spy."

This articles focuses on the background of a Canadian Muslim man allegedly detained in Kabul for cooperating with the Taleban (but not yet tired or convicted) to cast suspicion on all Canadian Muslims as potential terrorists, extremists, and radicals. Undue attention is focused on the background of the detainee to convey the message that there is a high likelihood of the children of educated Muslim immigrants resorting to terrorism. The title is sensationalized in order to question the loyalty of a large number of Canadian Muslims: the detainee is alleged to be part of a large and coordinated network of Canadian Muslims backing the insurgency in Afghanistan although no evidence is presented of this assertion.

The articles also grossly exaggerates the extent of the terrorist threat to Canada by presenting several unsubstantiated allegations of fact: anti-Western Islamists are increasing in Canada, Canada has been infiltrated by Muslim terrorists, bases of anti-Canadian and anti-western hatred have been set up Muslims in Canadian neighbourhoods, a high number Muslim Canadians have devoted themselves to "radical Islamism" and have acquired "combatant status" with terrorist enemies.

Finally, the article’s fear mongering purpose is extended to places of worship and universities and in homes: they are alleged to be centers of radicalization and terrorist planning.

Two years ago, Canadian William Sampson emerged from a prison in Saudi Arabia with a horrific tale of torture at the hands of sadistic interrogators, who forced him to confess to crimes he didn't commit.

.In Confessions of an Innocent Man: Torture and Survival in a Saudi Prison, Sampson claims, for the first time, that not only was he savagely beaten for months on end, he was also repeatedly raped by his captors…

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Sampson's story begins in December 2000, when he was arrested in front of his Riyadh home by security officers investigating a rash of car bombings that had left one British engineer dead and several others severely wounded. The Saudis were working on the theory that the bombings were part of a turf war between Western bootleggers, fighting for control of the illegal alcohol trade. In fact, the bombings were likely the work of Islamic terrorists attacking Westerners. But because Sampson was friends with some owners of illegal "social clubs" where booze was illegally sold, he was caught up in the Saudi dragnet.

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Much of the book consists of a meticulous reconstruction of marathon beatings interrupted only by Muslim calls to prayer, and meal breaks…

Sampson describes a surreal merry-go-round in which his accusers tortured him, then lectured him on the depravity of his crimes, then tried to cajole him into confessing. When he insisted he was innocent, that he had killed no one and was not a spy, his captors would explode in rage and begin the cycle anew. Finally, after six days without sleep and in constant pain, Sampson was broken. "I screamed and begged to confess, to tell them what they wanted to hear, but my entreaties seemed to fall upon deaf ears," Sampson writes. "The beating continued, blows fell across my feet, buttocks, and scrotum, no matter how loudly I screamed my willingness to comply." When the abuse finally stopped, Sampson was told to write out an admission that he planted and detonated the bomb that killed British engineer Christopher Rodway.

He hoped that with this confession, even if it was false, his agony would stop. Though he knew he would almost certainly be sentenced to death by beheading, he was beyond fear -- death would be a release from the hell he found himself in. But for Sampson the greatest pain and indignity was yet to come. Shortly after he made his first confession, Sampson claims he was dragged to an interrogation room where two Saudi "investigators" raped him. When he lost control of his bowels after the assault, his attackers shoved his face into the mess and severely beat him yet again. It was "the violation of my last vestige of physical and thus psychological integrity," he writes. "When finally I was lowered to the floor, I was a gibbering tear-sodden wreck, with no resemblance to what had once been a man." Sampson had written before about physical beatings, but his horrifying account in the book is the first time he has revealed any sexual abuse while in prison.

Over the next several months, the torture sessions continued as his captors demanded more and more detail be added to his confessions, dragging more innocent men into an implausible plot of revenge and espionage, dictated by his tormentors. Finally, he was forced to say he was a British spy working to destabilize the Saudi regime. Again and again Sampson was dragged into a private room, bound, beaten until his legs, back and genitals were a collage of black and purple bruises, then returned to his solitary cell.

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Twice he was taken before a Saudi court, without legal representation, where he refused to recognize the judges and denounced Saudi Arabia as a "politically corrupt, socially regressive, morally bankrupt, and genetically degenerate" country and insulted Muhammad as a "false prophet."

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The Saudi government, however, has maintained that Sampson is a liar and a killer. In letters written to both the National Post and Globe and Mail two years ago, then-ambassador Mohammed Al-Hussaini said Sampson was never tortured.

This article is written for the purpose of promoting a book that depicts Saudi Arabia and Muslims in a negative light. While torture and disregard for human life is unacceptable, intolerable and a grave injustice, an overwhelming amount of coverage provided by Maclean’s Magazine to events in pre-dominantly Muslim countries focuses on such unfortunate events. Further, such events are narrated in a manner which links them to Muslims at a religious level and which represents the events as being broadly condoned by Muslims. For example, the article alleges that Mr. Sampson’s beatings at the hands of his interrogators were interrupted only by "Muslim calls to prayer". The purpose again is to juxtapose Muslims and Islam with uncivilized and horrendous behaviour and is completely unnecessary to convey Mr. Sampson’s unacceptable treatment.