Complete version of precedent Year of the Pig

In the Sidney Morning Herald 26 January 2006:

China's ruling Communist Party has banned images and mention of pigs in TV advertisements airing over the lunar new year to avoid offending the country's Muslims, an advertising agency said on Friday.
"We were told by the CCTV (China Central Television) censorship team that the CCTV advertising department announced a new regulation on pigs in its internal document," an executive at the Shanghai-based Mindshare agency said.
The ban also applies to cartoons and traditional paper-cut images of pigs, and to slogans such as "golden pig brings you fortune" and "wish you a happy pig year", the executive said.
He said the decision was taken "in order to avoid nationality conflicts" and issued by Li Changchun, a top party propaganda official and a member of the party's elite Politburo.
"The regulation only applies to advertisements," a staff member in the CCTV advertising department said, refusing to answer further questions.
CCTV and other state broadcasters normally run dozens of popular variety shows and other special programs before and during the one-week national holiday to mark the lunar new year.
The Year of the Pig begins on February 18.
China officially has 21 million Muslims among its 1.3 billion people, about half of them from the Hui group which predominates in poor north-western areas but is spread across the country.
Some 7.5 million Uighurs, most of whom are Muslims, form the largest minority in China's Central Asian region of Xinjiang.
The Communist Party retains control over religious activity and all mosques must register with the Islamic Association.
It protected "normal religious activities" in its 1982 constitution, after all religion was forcibly suppressed during the communist fundamentalism of the 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution.
The government now gives concessions to Muslims and ethnic minorities under its "one-child" family planning policy and has recruited more officials from minorities.
Local conflicts sometimes erupt between Hui Muslims and the Han Chinese majority and are more common between Uighurs and Han in Xinjiang.

Muslims in Taiwan

About Islam in Taiwan, a 2001 article link, but still instructive, with thanks to Anon:

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/feat/archives/2001/10/02/105417

No pigs on Chinese cartoons anymore ?

Posted on jihad-watch.org

From the Sidney Morning Herald (whose headline gets the nod, but thanks to all who sent this in from various sources):
China's ruling Communist Party has banned images and mention of pigs in TV advertisements airing over the lunar new year to avoid offending the country's Muslims, an advertising agency said on Friday.
"We were told by the CCTV (China Central Television) censorship team that the CCTV advertising department announced a new regulation on pigs in its internal document," an executive at the Shanghai-based Mindshare agency said.
The ban also applies to cartoons and traditional paper-cut images of pigs, and to slogans such as "golden pig brings you fortune" and "wish you a happy pig year", the executive said.
So, all you Western teachers who were planning big multi-cultural celebrations of Chinese New Year, watch out. It may be that in your local school district, too, Muslim traditions trump Chinese ones. Perhaps it would be best to spend Chinese New Year quietly working on times tables with your students.
Posted by Anne at January 26, 2007 08:31 AM

Central Asia

Copied from www.iwpr.net 17th January 2006

Radical Islam in Central Asia
16-Jan-07
A United States intelligence report concludes that the political situation in Central Asia is conducive to the development of radical Islam in the region, and that this makes countries in the region unreliable partners for the US. Political observers in the region have criticised the analysis behind the findings, saying they are based on stereotypes. On January 11, US National Intelligence Director John Negroponte delivered his annual report on global security risks. In the section on Central Asia, the report says repression, political stagnation and corruption are characteristic of regimes in the region, and create fertile conditions for radical Islamic sentiment and movements to emerge. Furthermore, the report says, these factors cast doubt over the reliability of these countries as partners in the energy sector and the “war on terror”.The US is the biggest investor in Kazakhstan’s energy sector, and has had a military airbase in Kyrgyzstan since 2002.Observers in the region interviewed by NBCentralAsia are not prepared to go along with Negroponte’s view.“Central Asia should not be compared with the Middle East or other regions where the Islamic factor plays a significant role,” said Kazakstan-based political scientist Eduard Poletaev. Poletaev believes much of the expert analysis on the role of Islam in Central Asia has long been based on stereotypes that often lack foundation. For instance, he said, the predictions by some experts that radical Islamists could become more active in Kyrgyzstan after the March 2005 revolution, and also in Turkmenistan after the death of President Saparmurat Niazov in December 2006, failed to materialise. Other commentators argue that even if an outburst of radical Islamic sentiment remains a possibility, it will be drive more by social and economic hardship than by political repression. “Political repression can of course contribute to the rise of radical Islam,” said Abdujalil Abdurasulov, a journalist based in Kazakstan. “But Islam's influence is growing not because our rulers are despots, but because it offers people a way of coping with the social and economic difficulties of the transitional period.”Ishenbay Abdrazakov, the head of the Kyrgyz Foundation for Political Studies, researches also agrees with this opinion. “Many people now give Islamic a hearing, primarily because social realities fail to match up to the hopes of ordinary people nowadays, especially in rural areas where most of the population lives on the brink of poverty,” he said.(News Briefing Central Asia draws comment and analysis from a broad range of political observers across the region.) Radical Islam in Central Asia
16-Jan-07
A United States intelligence report concludes that the political situation in Central Asia is conducive to the development of radical Islam in the region, and that this makes countries in the region unreliable partners for the US. Political observers in the region have criticised the analysis behind the findings, saying they are based on stereotypes. On January 11, US National Intelligence Director John Negroponte delivered his annual report on global security risks. In the section on Central Asia, the report says repression, political stagnation and corruption are characteristic of regimes in the region, and create fertile conditions for radical Islamic sentiment and movements to emerge. Furthermore, the report says, these factors cast doubt over the reliability of these countries as partners in the energy sector and the “war on terror”.The US is the biggest investor in Kazakhstan’s energy sector, and has had a military airbase in Kyrgyzstan since 2002.Observers in the region interviewed by NBCentralAsia are not prepared to go along with Negroponte’s view.“Central Asia should not be compared with the Middle East or other regions where the Islamic factor plays a significant role,” said Kazakstan-based political scientist Eduard Poletaev. Poletaev believes much of the expert analysis on the role of Islam in Central Asia has long been based on stereotypes that often lack foundation. For instance, he said, the predictions by some experts that radical Islamists could become more active in Kyrgyzstan after the March 2005 revolution, and also in Turkmenistan after the death of President Saparmurat Niazov in December 2006, failed to materialise. Other commentators argue that even if an outburst of radical Islamic sentiment remains a possibility, it will be drive more by social and economic hardship than by political repression. “Political repression can of course contribute to the rise of radical Islam,” said Abdujalil Abdurasulov, a journalist based in Kazakstan. “But Islam's influence is growing not because our rulers are despots, but because it offers people a way of coping with the social and economic difficulties of the transitional period.”Ishenbay Abdrazakov, the head of the Kyrgyz Foundation for Political Studies, researches also agrees with this opinion. “Many people now give Islamic a hearing, primarily because social realities fail to match up to the hopes of ordinary people nowadays, especially in rural areas where most of the population lives on the brink of poverty,” he said.(News Briefing Central Asia draws comment and analysis from a broad range of political observers across the region.)

China raids terror camp in Xinjiang

Copied from Jihad Watch 9 Jan. 2006

See also : http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6244577.stm

China says terror raid finds ties abroad
An update on this story. Identifying the international groups alleged to be involved will help deflect the charge by human rights groups that this conflict is simply another indigenous independence movement, comparable with that of, say, Tibet. By Alexa Olesen for AP:
BEIJING - Police found links to international terrorist groups during a raid on an alleged terror camp in China's restive western Muslim region last week, the Foreign Ministry said Tuesday.
Police said they raided a training camp run by the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, or ETIM, in the mountainous Xinjiang region on Friday, killing 18 suspects and arresting 17 others.
"There is a large amount of evidence that shows, including evidence we got from this raid, that the ETIM is associated with international terrorist forces," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao.
He also said that the group "planned, organized and carried out a series of violent terrorist activities in China."
Liu gave no specific details about the alleged evidence or attacks and did not say which overseas terror groups those arrested were linked to. China has said before that ETIM has links to al-Qaida.
China labels ETIM as a terrorist organization, as does the United States.
Song Hongli, director of the general office of the Xinjiang Public Security Bureau, said Monday that one police officer was killed and another was wounded during the raid.
The official China News Service reported the raid occurred in Akto County — an area about 120 miles east of China's border with Kyrgyzstan.
Police seized 22 grenades, parts for 1,500 more grenades as well as guns and handmade explosives, the Xinhua News Agency said. The report cited Xinjiang police spokeswoman Ba Yan as saying that the suspects operated mines near the camp to raise funds, but did not specify what sort of mines.
Liu said the 17 arrested suspects would be handled according to the law, but didn't say where they were being held or what charges they faced.
China has long said that militants among the region's dominant ethnic Uighurs are leading a violent Islamic separatist movement in Xinjiang. The Uighurs are Turkic-speaking Muslims with a language and culture distinct from the majority of Chinese.
Critics accuse Beijing of using claims of terrorism as an excuse to crack down on peaceful pro-independence sentiment and expressions of Uighur identity.
About two dozen Uighurs were captured by U.S. forces in Afghanistan following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
China has demanded their return, but the United States fears they might face persecution there. Five Uighurs were sent to Albania last year after no other country would accept them.

Jihad in China 7th and 8th century CE

For an narrative - a bit incoherent - but informative on often forgotten or ignored events in Central Asia and Western China go to : http://www.islam-watch.org/HistoryOfJihad/JihadInChina.htm

Vipassi

Read on a blog

Read today on a blog:The Chinese calculation is twofold: 1. Power. China is more than happy to avoid involvement in the ME issue because they see it as an excellent opportunity to drain wealth and resources from the West, and principally from the US. It also has the net effect of having the US focused on a different 'enemy' (many of you will recall that as recently as 2001, China was still considered the next big enemy of the west). They believe that eventually the West will defeat extremism in the ME, but at great cost. During that period, China will continue to develop and grow, and will be the dominant world power when all is said and done. 2. Control. China and Afghanistan share a border. Al qaeda had many converts in Afghanistan. One of the original operations were clandestine attempts to set up recruitment centers and mosques in far west china (where the govt. has the least authority etc). The Chinese response was to kill anyone they suspected of participating in this activity, and dump the bodies back in Afghanistan. The Chinese have made it clear, in the only language that terrorists understand, that they will not tolerate the spread of islam into their world. Al qaeda now believes that China will be the last front in the war. They dare not attack China until everyone else is subjugated.e ME issue because they see it as an excellent opportunity to drain wealth and resources from the West, and principally from the US. It also has the net effect of having the US focused on a different 'enemy' (many of you will recall that as recently as 2001, China was still considered the next big enemy of the west). They believe that eventually the West will defeat extremism in the ME, but at great cost. During that period, China will continue to develop and grow, and will be the dominant world power when all is said and done. 2. Control. China and Afghanistan share a border. Al qaeda had many converts in Afghanistan. One of the original operations were clandestine attempts to set up recruitment centers and mosques in far west china (where the govt. has the least authority etc). The Chinese response was to kill anyone they suspected of participating in this activity, and dump the bodies back in Afghanistan. The Chinese have made it clear, in the only language that terrorists understand, that they will not tolerate the spread of islam into their world. Al qaeda now believes that China will be the last front in the war. They dare not attack China until everyone else is subjugated.

Will China buy Saudi Arabia ?

Reuters Nov 27, 2006Saudi Alignment with China? by A.HammondThis new alignment has also seen China boosting ties with six booming Gulf Arab states, including oil producers Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.China National Offshore Oil Co. (CNOOC) is in talks with Qatar for liquefied natural gas supplies, PetroChina is studying plans with Kuwait to build a refinery and petrochemical complex in South China, and Aramco is negotiating refinery joint ventures in China.China's economic thrust has coincided with a time when U.S. prestige in the Arab world is at a low ebb due to the Iraq war and U.S. support for Israel.In addition, once-cosy U.S.-Saudi ties have not fully recovered from the shock of the September 11 attacks in which 15 of the 19 suicide hijackers were Saudis.This has hit the oil-for-security "special relationship" long based on the role of U.S. military forces as guarantor of Saudi Arabia's safety, largely to protect huge Saudi oilfields.Saudi Aramco was the largest supplier of oil to China for the last four years, in addition to being the biggest supplier to India, Japan, South Korea and Singapore.China has even started discussions with Aramco to provide it with a strategic oil reserve, opening up the possibility of future tension over global access to Saudi crude oil.Chietigj Bajpaee, research associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C., said China risks being seen as trying to "lock up" Saudi oil at the expense of Washington, or India, another Asian tiger economy with a billion-plus population and a voracious appetite for oil."(China and the United States) have an increasingly symbiotic relationship," Bajpaee said. "This has led to fears in the United States that China is encroaching into its 'sphere of influence' and undermining relations with its traditional allies."NO POLITICS REQUIREDTies with China come with the added advantage of no political expectations, unlike those with Western countries which periodically pursue a rights agenda with Saudi Arabia.Despite Beijing's atheist communist ideology and Saudi Arabia's status as the birthplace of Islam, both governments are authoritarian and brook no dissent.Chinese labor could become more common in the Gulf, as governments tire of Indian and Pakistani workers becoming vocal about their lack of rights in countries they helped to build.Yet analysts say the Gulf still needs the United States."Trade relations between China and the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) countries are expected to grow and go beyond the current $32 billion dollar estimate that they reached in 2005 in various commodities and services," Younsi said, pointing to a possible free trade deal."But the problem for GCC monarchies is they know they cannot rely on China for their security and this is why they still want to maintain a close relationship with Washington," he said.Saudi government adviser Nawaf Obaid agreed."Realistically, it will be very hard for China to compete with the United States politically and militarily in the region, especially when it comes to the vital U.S.-Saudi 'special relationship'," he said.

Data on Chinese Muslims

Asia Times Sept. 6, 2006 (www.atimes.com):Reliable data are difficult to obtain, but China's estimated 20 million to 30 million Muslims may in fact be the second-largest religious community in the country, after the 100 million or so Buddhists. Islam in China is moreover in the process of a strong revival, spurred on by increasing trade links with the Middle East that have ended the centuries-long isolation of Chinese Muslims from the wider Islamic world. Orthodoxy among Chinese Muslims is on the rise as ever larger numbers go on hajj and youngsters return from their studies abroad in Muslim countries. Nonetheless, Chinese Islam retains characteristics that set it apart. The communist revolution with its emphasis on gender equality has left its mark here. Mao Zedong famously said that "women hold up half the sky", a lesson China's Muslims seem to have imbibed well. Female imams such as Nu Ahong and exclusively female mosques such as Nu Si play a unique role in the Middle Kingdom. Islam in China has a long tradition stretching back more than 1,200 years. The largest community among the Chinese Muslim groups is the Hui. Numbering about 10 million, the Hui are descendents of Middle Eastern traders and their converts who first traveled to China along the silk route during the Tang Dynasty (AD 618-906). Centuries of isolation meant that they blended in with the largely Confucian and Buddhist Han Chinese who make up more than 90% of the modern nation's population. The Hui speak Mandarin and look like Han. The primary way of telling the two communities apart has traditionally been the absence of pork, a meat that is the primary staple for Han, from the diet of Hui Muslims. The Hui are also not to be confused with the other large Muslim minority group in China, the Uighurs, who are of Turkic ethnicity and live mostly in the western autonomous region of Xinjiang. Ningxia Hui autonomous region, a northern region flanked by the Gobi Desert, is home to 1.8 million Hui Muslims, or 35% of the autonomous region's total population. Ningxia has some 700 officially licensed imams and more than 3,000 mosques. According to Ma Xiao, vice president of the Islamic Association of Ningxia, there are currently more than 5,000 manla, or young Islamic disciples, studying Arabic and Islamic doctrine part-time in the autonomous region. Certain restrictions continue to apply on Islam, as on all religions, in China. For example, proselytizing is strictly forbidden and children below the age of 18 are not permitted to receive religious instruction at all. Moreover, all imams must be licensed by a government-approved body and accept the superiority of the state over any religious authority. Nonetheless, as a visit to virtually any part of Ningxia will reveal, the Hui embrace their faith with enthusiasm. In recent years, Ningxia has benefited from donations worth millions of US dollars from the Saudi Arabia-based Islamic Development Bank, which has enabled a facelift for The Islamic College in the regional capital Yinchuan, as well as the establishment of several Arabic-language schools. Interest in Arabic is booming so much so that even the Ningxia Economic Institute has begun to offer three-to-four-year-long Arabic courses. Ningxia University also opened an Arabic-language department last year. At the Xi Guan Mosque in Yinchuan, more than 300 students have begun to study Arabic since the mosque started offering a free language course two years ago. A third of these are women. Aged mostly between 30 and 70, they say the chance to study Arabic brings them closer to their religion. "Earlier we were too busy just making a living. Now that we are richer, we have more time to focus on the spiritual, and by learning Arabic I can read the Koran in the original. As a Muslim this is my duty," said Song Xiulan, a 40-year-old housewife. A hundred miles east of Yinchuan in the small town of Ling Wu, 50 other women, their heads covered with scarves, sit in a room reciting verses in Arabic from the Koran. They are being taught by Yang Yuhong, one of two female imams at the Tai Zi Mosque. Yang received her title from the Islamic Association four years ago. She is one of about 200 certified female imams in the autonomous region. Yang says she does not see anything un-Islamic about the concept of female imams: "There are many things that are easier for women to talk about with other women. And everyone, man or woman, has a duty to study and understand the religion." But this new tradition of female imams in China is less revolutionary than it first appears. While the women are granted the title of imam, they are still not allowed to lead men in prayers. Their role is more that of a teacher, and their students are exclusively female. "The women imams are respected people whom the community looks up to, but of course they do not have the same religious powers as men. Men and women are equal but their roles are different," said Ma from the Islamic Association. Ling Wu's Tai Zi Mosque has been rebuilt four times in the past 20 years. During the Cultural Revolution (1966-76), most places of worship were demolished, and Tai Zi suffered the same fate. Since the 1980s, however, a religious renaissance accompanied by increasing prosperity has led to the local Muslims donating enough money for four major expansions of the building. Ma Zian, the mosque's head imam, is now 80 years old. "I have seen everything: the pre-revolution period, the communist accession and the Cultural Revolution. I can tell you that at last we are quite free to practice our faith. It's so much better for us now," he said. But as is often the case in China, the driving force behind this Islamic revival is economic. "Other provinces have ports and natural resources. In Ningxia we have Muslims. This is our competitive advantage," said Chen Zhigang, deputy director general of the Investment Promotion Bureau of Ningxia. To exploit this "competitive advantage", the regional government organized for the first time a massive Halal Food Exhibition last month, through which it aimed to establish connections between the food industries of Ningxia and the Middle East. Chen said contracts to the tune of 10 billion yuan (US$1.25 billion) were signed during the four-day-long exhibition. In Ningxia, Islam and trade are blending in a delicate mix to the benefit of both religious and secular life. But while the Hui Muslims' Arabic-language skills and cultural affinity with the oil-rich Middle East are now being seen by the authorities as a valuable economic resource, the stronger sense of group identity among the Hui fostered by these renewed linkages with the Islamic world is leading to new challenges. In the past the Hui were among the least orthodox Muslims in the world. Many smoked and drank, few grew beards, and Hui women rarely wore veils. Increased contact with the Middle East, however, has wrought changes. Thousands of Hui students have returned from colleges in Arab countries over the past few years and they have brought with them stricter ideas of Islam. Mosques in Ningxia have now begun to receive worshippers five times a day, more Hui women have taken to wearing headscarves, and skullcaps are in wide evidence. There is a strong identification among the Hui community today with the wider problems of the Islamic world. "It's American policy that has given all of us Muslims a bad reputation," said Yang, Tai Zi Mosque's female imam, quivering with indignation. "We are a peace-loving religion, but look what they [the Americans] have turned us into. Look what lies they spread about us," she continued. The 50 women surrounding her all nodded slowly in assent. For many non-Muslim Chinese, this identification of the Hui with communities outside of China is problematic. "Earlier the Hui were just like us except they didn't eat pork. Now they think they are very special. They think of themselves as foreigners," a Foreign Office official in Ningxia complained. The Hui are exempt from China's one-child policy, and affirmative-action schemes reserve special seats for them at universities and government departments. In interior regions such as Ningxia that have been left out of the economic boom of China's coastal region, competition for jobs is intense and resentment against the Hui's "special" privileges is increasing. Confrontations between the two communities are often sparked by minor incidents. In 2004, for example, large parts of Henan province were placed under curfew after fighting between Hui and Han left dozens dead. The fighting began when a Hui man bumped into a Han girl with his vehicle and refused to pay compensation. "The main job of every government official in Ningxia these days is to keep the peace with the Hui," said the Foreign Office official. For the Hui, greater freedoms and contact with the wider world mean they must undertake the difficult task of negotiating among their increasingly complex identities: at once Muslim, Hui and Chinese. For the Han, the challenge is to foster Hui culture without alienating the community from the rest of Chinese society. The manner in which both sides address these challenges will be key to the maintenance of social stability in China in the coming years. Pallavi Aiyar is the China correspondent for The Hindu.

Not only the US or the West or what China does better

Although I agree with Greg Davis' statement according to which "America is certainly much better off than Europe today for two reasons: first, her Muslim population is much smaller (maybe 5 million despite what some people say); second, she is still largely Christian" I do not think that "it will [only] be left to America to nail the colors to the mast". First public opinion is waking up in Europe too; it is already becoming more difficult for imigrants from Muslim countries to get a visa even if it should become impossible, unless they formally give up their religious ideology or are persecuted in their country for being "apostates". To compensate for Europe temporary demographic deficit we should rely on immigration from Eastern European and other non-muslim countries in Asia (Vietnam, China, Laos...) or South America.Second a large part of the world is still "muslimfree" : the Far-East. If that area of the world proves less naive than we have been, those technically "polytheist" countries, where people are still very much attached to their traditional values and beliefs will be in the coming years, decades or centuries, the real retreat ground for the "free world" in the global battle that is menacing.One of the Chinese government policies that seems especially pertinent to me, as it shows indeed a deep understanding of Islam, is that referred to in a bulletin from Human Rights Watch (which disaproves of it) on 11 April 2005, under the title : China: Religious Repression of Uighur Muslims . In that long article we learn that "The Chinese government vets... what version of the Koran is acceptable".That means indeed that the Chinese authorities in charge of religious education have at least taken the pain to read the Koran - which most probably their Western counterparts probably never did. And if there are "expurgated versions" of that book, it is that while reading it they identified in it the numerous passages (insults to unbelievers, call to murders, apology of lying to, and deceiving, non-muslims) that are not only against the most basic values of the human species but also a direct threat to the public order and social peace of any society, nation or state. As the Chinese do not feel any compulsion to be tolerant to Islam as one of the "people of the Book", as we to often did, very consequently they forbade versions of the Koran that could inspire inimical and dangerous thoughts to the very sensitive minds of young readers.Here are the reference of the complete article:http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/04/11/china10447.htm>

The Nature of the Threat

To summarize and better document the nature of the present threat I would like to paste from Jihad Watch the following interview of Gregory M. Davis, author of Religion of Peace? by Jamie Glazov at FrontPage, before going on with how China, and other countries of the area, including Vietnam, Thailand, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and India are dealing with Islam and their Muslim minorities and how their attitude may, or not, evolve under the pressure of their increasing need for oil.My stongest wish is of course that all who feel they have something to contribute on the subject would find this blog, read it and contribute to its content.Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Gregory Davis, the managing director of Quixotic Media and producer of the feature documentary Islam: What the West Needs to Know. He received his Ph.D. in political science from Stanford University. He is the author of the new book Religion of Peace? Islam's War Against the World.FP: Gregory Davis, welcome to Frontpage Interview.Davis: Thanks for having me.FP: What motivated you to write this book?Davis: The book is a direct result of the documentary and seeks to expand on the latter's material. My old friend, Bryan Daly, and I had the opportunity to make a small movie and we wanted to tackle something that no one else had, something of social import that was poorly understood. The facile way in which politicians, commentators, and academics dismiss Islam as a 'religion of peace' indicated to us that there was more that needed to be said on the topic. The Muslim terrorists claim to be doing the will of Allah, while Western leaders insist that Islam is peaceful. The obvious question was: who is right? There is no a priori justification to assume that peaceful Muslims represent authentic Islam while violent Muslims do not.FP: How would you interpret the West's illusions about Islam?Davis: The West is guilty of the ages-old error of projection, of imposing its own ideas, beliefs, and aspirations onto the other guy. When Westerners approach Islam, they imagine that it is a religion like others that they are familiar with - like, say, Christianity. They see Islam as basically another item on the religious menu available in an integrated world. What they fail to understand, however, is that Islam is decidedly outside the Western tradition and therefore Western assumptions are inapt when assessing it.In Islam: What the West Needs to Know, we talk with Robert Spencer, Walid Shoebat, Bat Ye'or, Serge Trifkovic, and Abdullah Al-Araby, who all affirm that the most important aspect of Islam not understood in the West is that Islam is less a personal faith than a social and political plan for organizing humanity - really, a system of government.It was only in the West that religious power developed in parallel with secular power but distinct from it thanks largely to the doctrinal distinction in Christianity between giving 'to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God's what is God's.' While religious and secular power have certainly commingled at times in the West, it is fully possible for the two to coexist separately. But in Islam, there has never been a distinction between religion and political power; the two are inseparably united. An Islamic society is invariably a theocracy ruled by Sharia (Islamic) law, which is understood as God's prescribed legal code for all mankind, based on the commandments of the Koran and the precedents set by Muhammad.There can be no question of the type of government in Islam because Islam is a government, which Allah through Muhammad has ordained to comprehend the entire earth. Once the political nature of Islam and its universal pretensions are grasped, it is not hard to see why Muslims and Muslim societies are so hostile toward the rest of the world.FP: The Islamization of Europe is occurring at a lightning speed. What do you make of it?Davis: It is truly astonishing that a civilization as organized and materially powerful as Europe today is voluntarily going to its death. The Europeans could certainly forestall the Islamization of their continent, but so far they have shown no stomach for it. Already portions of Europe's metropolitan areas are de facto Islamic states ruled by Sharia law - the London Telegraph mentioned this the other day with remarkable equanimity.The Parisian police have admitted that they are in the early stages of a civil war. The negative growth rates of the native Caucasian populations mean that Europe is committing generational suicide while its Muslim populations continue to grow very rapidly. While Muslims in Europe are still poorly organized and outside the conventional halls of power, they nonetheless posses something invaluable that Europe does not: faith. Europe has lost its faith and with it the will for self-preservation. The Europeans who fought to defend Europe through the centuries during the major waves of jihad knew what they were fighting for. They had faith in their God and in the inherent legitimacy of their civilization. Their successors today are freely throwing away what their forebears gave their lives to preserve. It is a tragedy on a civilizational scale and should be a cautionary tale for those of us in North America.FP: So is there any possibility of building democracy in the Islamic world?Davis: In a word, no. If one means by democracy nothing more that some kind of nominal electoral process, then technically there are already democracies in the Islamic world, but that definition is not terribly meaningful. If ones means democracy as an open society on the Western model with freedom of speech, religion, and equality before the law, then the answer is categorically no. As we saw in the elections held in the West Bank and Gaza, the will of the people there is for Islamic government.It is possible to have elections in an Islamic country as long as Sharia law is not violated - which is hardly what we would call democracy. Democracy implies some sort of pluralism, which is the very antithesis of a Sharia state. Installing genuine democracy would first require a program of de-Islamization, which would be simply impossible.The only means of achieving a form of secularism in an Islamic country is through the sort of repression we see today in Egypt, Pakistan, even Turkey. In Islam, there can be no freedom of religion, freedom of speech, equality of the sexes, or anything that transgresses the highly specific dictates of Sharia law. Any kind of popular movement by Muslims is by nature away from secular, genuinely democratic principles and toward a theocratic, Sharia state. While there are nominal Muslims who would prefer Western democracy to Islamic Sharia - such as those who fled the Iranian Revolution in 1979 - they are being false to their faith, and in any Islamic context, they will not stand against their more aggressive, orthodox counterparts.FP: What do you think the U.S. needs to do in this terror war in general and in Iraq in particular?Davis: The 'war on terror' is misnamed. Terrorism is a tactic, not a goal. It would have been absurd to have declared war against 'sneak attacks' after Pearl Harbor but this is essentially what we have done. It is the goal of Islamic terrorism that we need to understand, and this requires an understanding of Islam itself. Islam and its faithful adherents are trying to undermine our secular governments with the ultimate aim of replacing them with Sharia.Terrorism is a means to this end as are Islamic proselytizing, fund-raising, lobbying, education, etc. As during the Cold War, we are under attack from a hostile political ideology that does not operate in the same moral universe as we do. Broadly speaking, we need to develop a program of containment that will operate on all levels of government policy.At this point, it seems to me premature to get too specific with respect to policy because the full magnitude of the problem is still so poorly understood. Every Western mainstream statesman, academic, or commentator who opens his mouth on Islam bends over backwards to affirm its peacefulness. Even Western religious leaders, who really ought to know better, continue to demonstrate a depressing lack of understanding and penchant for appeasement.With respect to Iraq, the main problem there was and is our fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of Islam. There was good reason that someone as brutal as Saddam Hussein rose to the top in that society. In the Islamic world, the most powerful force is not some universal desire for human freedom but the will of Allah and the example of Muhammad. Until we grasp this overarching fact, our policy toward Iraq and the rest of the Muslim world will be fundamentally flawed.FP: But at the same time, we need to reach out to Muslims who are truly on our side and who truly want to democratize and modernize their religion. What do you think is the best way for us to do that?Davis: Encouraging democratic or popular forces in the Islamic world is to encourage the resurgence of orthodox Islam with all that entails, namely, Sharia and jihad. Rather than democratizing the Muslim world we should be seeking to secularize it. Contrary to the Western experience, democratization and secularization are not at all synonymous in an Islamic context. To encourage secularization, we will have to deal with undemocratic forces. During the Cold War, we were willing to deal with unsavory characters as long as they forestalled the much worse alternative of Communism. We should take a similar stance with respect to Islam. Secularists in the Muslim world should be encouraged and accommodated, though their success in any Islamic context may necessitate a decidedly undemocratic approach.I believe that the best way to help nominal Muslims who value peacefulness over Islam is to get them to confront the violent nature of their faith and to reject it. In Islam: What the West Needs to Know, we interview a prominent former Muslim and terrorist who left, and there are many other cases so it is possible.Obviously, we are not going to convert Muslims en masse to something else, so this is effective at only the individual level. But the unhappy fact is that as long as a Muslim affirms that 'There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet', he is open to the call of jihad even if he never heeds it. We have seen numerous examples of this in the West, such as the American youths from Lackawana, NY, who were turned into aspirant terrorists by a Koranic study group. We must bear in mind - contrary to the protestations of the ruling class - that Muslims who want to de-politicize Islam, who desire societies organized on secular lines rather than according to Sharia, are heretics within their own faith.I have spoken with such Muslims and, while they are much to be preferred over the true-believing jihadists, the illogic of their enterprise is readily apparent. Within any Islamic context, their position will always been tenuous at best, which makes them inherently unreliable allies. In the current climate of opinion, I think such 'Muslims' do more harm than good in permitting wishful-thinking Westerners to persist in the myth that Islam can be pacified. To secularize or pacify Islam would require it to jettison two things: Muhammad and the Koran.This is a harsh reality but one we must face. Islam has existed in its violent form for nearly 1400 years and were are kidding ourselves if we think we are going to undo that basic fact. It may be painful for the idealists, but there will likely never be a time of genuine peace where the Islamic and non-Islamic worlds live in harmonious coexistence. As during the Cold War, an uneasy truce may be the best we can hope for - but that's better than losing.FP: Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the war and conflict we face?Davis: Power is a function of capability and will. Right now we have plenty of the former but little of the latter. The jihadists' situation is the opposite, but with time we can expect them to acquire greater capability through the diffusion of military technology and the growing wealth of oil-rich Dar al-Islam. If the West possessed the will, there could be no doubt as to the outcome. But right now we are still trying to fight an antiseptic war against a nameless adversary. Islam has declared war on us while we have declared war on 'terror'. The magnitude of the problem is still totally misunderstood. If the demographic trends of the past three decades continue in Europe, that continent will be majority Muslim in several generations' time. If we think we have problems with the Islamic world today, wait until Dar al-Islam reaches from the Pacific to the English Channel.In short, I am not optimistic. For the West to win, it will have to rediscover the reasons for winning, the reasons that the West and its heritage are worth preserving. Sadly, there seems to be no one today of public eminence capable or willing to articulate the merits of Western Civilization, which would be the first stage in mounting a defense. So far, Islam's atrocities - the Armenian genocide of the early 20th century, the increasing number of rapes of unveiled women in European cities, even spectacular episodes of terrorism such as 9/11 - have not managed to shake the West out of its complacency.There is going to have to be a sea change in the West's self-interpretation if it is going to survive. It increasingly seems that, as Europe sinks, it will be left to America to nail the colors to the mast. America is certainly much better off than Europe today for two reasons: first, her Muslim population is much smaller (maybe 5 million despite what some people say); second, she is still largely Christian. It is should be easier for Americans to understand the danger of Islam because they can better empathize with the religious motivation of Muslims. Even her leaders, however, have yet to face up to reality.FP: Greg Davis, thank you for joining us.Davis: Thank you.

Oil

For oil is the real reason we have tolerated so much from Muslim countries and people. From what other ethnic, cultural or religious group would a civilization, that was still in the middle of the XXth century at the top of its might, have tolerated the threats and demands for special treatment that islamic countries or societies, just freed from the colonial yoke, very early inflicted to their global partners ? From the Chinese? The Bantous? The Eskimoos? The Australians aborigenes? The Jeovah Witnesses?Terrorism is not new! It does not date from 9/11. Remember Lockerbie. It was in the 80s', more than 20 years ago. Remember the numerous plane hijackings by Palestinians. Remember the Salman Rushdie affair, in the late eighties. And we can even go back much further.Why did the French invade Algeria? Because its special envoy, in charge of expressing the displeasure of the French Government in relation to "la course" - that is the activity of Algerian pirates in the western Mediterranea, assailing ship in high seas and taking staff and passengers as prisoners and/or hostages - was slapped in the face by the Turkish Bey of Algiers!Why did the West discovered the world and colonized large parts of it from the XIVth century on? Because the road to its ancient trade partners in Asia - India and China - was cut by an already hostile and threatening Islam . That was what triggered European powers to look for an other road to India and led them to discover Africa, central and south, and America, that new India!Hopefully the increasingly agressive stand recently taken by Islam and sone Muslim countries will be the occasion for an other decisive "progress": giving up the use of non-renewable fossil fuel for cleaner, safer, cheaper and less alienating sources of energy, while depriving global islam from its main lever and intimidation tool.Why were the Crusades launched ? Because, Chistian pilgrims to Jerusalem were being abused, harassed, insulted and otherwise mistreated by the muslim authorities and or population in Palestine.But five hundred years of western dominance have been sufficient to make us forget the nature of our old enemy, an enemy that is now well entrenched in our walls!Oil is at present the key. As soon as our dependance on it is cut, you will suddenly see the most outspoken defenders of tolerance towards Islam and Muslims become less vocal. Love of one's comfort and fear to have to give up parts or whole of it has always been a feature of sedentary societies. To that relatively tame fear we must now add the much more realistic one of having to confront, in our own countries, the anger of Europe's, America's or India's Muslims, whenever they feel slighted or insulted . Fear and conformism are indeed potent factors in shaping public opinion.

How will China deal with Global Islam ?

The world is discovering in awe the Muslim threat, and the West, with its multiculturalist liberal ideology begins to realize to what amount it has been naive, presomptuous and... arrogant in believing that it could integrate Muslim immigrants programmed by a faith, based on a book, that makes them deeply hostile to the rest of the human kind until it turns to Islam, willingly or by force. The only religion indeed that consider lying to, and deception of "unbelievers" as virtues.In this blog I do not intend to replicate the already numerous sites dealing with the subject. Among the best and best known, http://www.jihadwatch.org/, http://www.faithfreedom.org/. and http://www.islam-watch.org/, the last two being managed by former Muslims, or "apostates".Many in the West, but also in India, wonder if it is not already too late. A citizen from an EU country living in Eastern and South Asia, I am simply wondering if this part of the world that has remained (almost) indemn so far - Nepal, China, Laos, Kampuchea, Vietnam, Korea will be more insightful than we have been, considering the surge of the demand for oil in the economy of these countries. Will they be able to resist the urge of blindly concluding cheap and fast deals with countries like Iran, Soudan or other Muslim oil producing countries?