The Mosques and Bank Robbers of Paris
What does this horde of slaves,
Of traitors and conjured kings want?
For whom are these ignoble trammels,
these long-prepared irons?
While Jews are fleeing Paris due to Muslim violence and harassment, Robert Haroush, an Israeli businessman, decided to fund the reconstruction of a mosque in order to build a "bridge of peace". The shortage of mosques in Paris, is of course almost as grave as the surplus of intact cars that need burning. And the City of Lights needs more dark mosques, the way Baghdad needs more IED's. A Jew funding a mosque to promote peace, is as irrational as his printing up a 100,000 copies of Mein Kampf in 1939 to promote tolerance. Feeding hate does not bring peace. And for over a thousand years, the Koran has been the Mein Kampf of the Muslim world, teaching hate toward Jew and Christian, and the Mosque has been the rallying point for its hateful teachings.
Robert isn't the first gullible infidel to try and build bridges of peace. But the problem is that when you build a bridge, you had better have a good idea of what you will find on the other side. Building bridges with people whose sole use for bridges is to cross them in order to kill you, is nothing but an elaborate form of suicide.
Turkey's Thug in Chief, Erdogan, was quite explicit about the role of the mosque in Islam, saying; "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers." At the time the poem landed Erdogan in a Turkish prison. But time and enough faithful mustered from the barracks of mosques helped propel him to power. Where he has wasted little time pushing an Islamist agenda, which includes the persecution of non-Muslims and the growing escalation of hostilities with Israel.
Paris does have a barracks shortage, at least according to Dalil Boubakeur, of the Paris Mosque, who wants to abolish that whole pesky Separation of Religion and State thing in France, until the French taxpayers have paid for as many mosques as there are churches. Unlike Robert Haroush, Dalil Boubakeur who once said, "The West has dug its grave with its own teeth", at least does know what he's after. He wants more barracks. Which are useful things to have, if you're fighting a war. And if the West is willing to dig its grave by paying for them, so much the better.
But this raises the obvious question of why anyone would want to pay to renovate someone else's barracks. Even if the people in them didn't have any hostile intent toward you at the moment. And most especially if they do. Even a pacifist doesn't buy bullets for his enemy's gun. That act of folly is reserved not for those who will not fight, but for those who do not even understand that there is a fight. If former conflicts could be divided up into those who were for and those who were against, a sizable number of the present targets of the Clash of Civilizations insist on believing that nothing at all is going on. War, what war? We're having coffee here.
The bridgebuilders of peace would like very much to shift the Clash of Civilizations into an Accommodation of Civilizations, turning a conflict into a nice culture fair in which the French learn about Moroccan weaving techniques, North African Muslim immigrants learn the rules of a Republic, and everyone lives together happily ever after. All that requires is some accommodation on both sides. A recognition of the new reality. That the mosque belongs in Paris as much as the church does. Or as former French President and Mayor or Paris, Jacques Chirac put it; "The roots of Europe are equally Muslim and Christian."
The problem with this lovely expression of tolerance, is that this sort of accommodation only runs one way. The Muslim countries of the Middle East are not eagerly proclaiming that their roots are equally Muslim and Christian. It is rather hard to find a Muslim country where Christians actually are equal, or have any serious prospect of being so. In Egypt, the Copts are a persecuted minority. In the West Bank, the handover of Bethlehem to Muslim rule has seen the local Christian community begin to vanish. In Malaysia, churches are being burned for presuming to use Allah to mean god (which Muslims in the West assure us is exactly what Allah means). While Christians in the Muslim world remain a persecuted minority. While Jews who once fled Muslim countries for Europe, are now in turn being forced into a second-stage exodus from countries such as France who have developed a sizable Muslim population. Against this background, the true crisis is revealed to be a grave shortage of Parisian mosques.
While the Muslim world is not prepared to concede equality to the Christian or the Jew-- both are eager to make him equal partners in their societies. Not because Muslims have shown themselves eager and fit to be partners, but precisely because they have shown themselves to be not. This is not as much of a paradox as it seems to be.
Suppose a businessman walks into the Credit Lyonnais bank seeking a loan of 100,000 Euros. The bank will carefully examine whether he is a legitimate credit risk. They will demand to see all sorts of papers and documents to show that he can be trusted. And then the bank will offer a loan with a high interest rate. Or perhaps the loan officer will shrug, and wish him better luck finding the money somewhere else.
But now suppose that a robber from the street comes into the bank, armed and wearing a sizable bomb strapped to his chest, and demanding 100,000 Euros. No one will ask him for documents or proof that he is credit worthy. He is not at all credit worthy. And that is exactly the point. But instead the Bank President himself will step out, and try to negotiate with him. He will not send him packing, the way he did the legitimate businessman. Instead he will offer him a deal. Take 50,000 Euros. Half of what he is asking for. Interest free. No questions asked. Just as Chirac offered to agree that the roots of Europe are equally Muslim and Christian.
Robbers have a way of getting what they want. Whether they are robbing banks or entire countries. The normal laws of citizens do not apply to them. Through violence they make their own laws. And the society on which they have been inflicted either vigorously defends itself against them, or seeks to negotiate some form of compromise with them.
How does one compromise with a bank robber? Offer him half of what he wants. Israel did that. Now it's done to offering the robbers 90 percent of what they want. The robbers however continue to hold out for more. Which is reasonable behavior for robbers. It is not however reasonable behavior for bank managers to invest money in trying to appease the robbers, rather than in guards and alarm systems. But if one is more afraid of violence, than of losing what one has, such a compromise seems eminently reasonable.
There are two reasons why one would fear violence. Personal safety and moral confidence. The former suffers from physical cowardice. The latter from moral cowardice. But physical cowardice is much more severe an affliction than moral cowardice. For physical cowardice has its limits, but moral cowardice has no limits whatsoever. The physical coward is afraid, so long as he is in danger. The moral coward is afraid regardless of whether he is in danger or not. He stays up worrying over things that have nothing to do with him. He is afflicted with specters of guilt and phantoms of moral uncertainty. The physical coward knows that he has rights, but is afraid to defend them. The moral coward will not defend his rights because he does not believe that he has any. That is why the physical coward fears bank robbers, but the moral coward welcomes them. To the moral coward, the bank robber is a moral force because in a world of uncertainties, he is decisively certain about what he wants.
This is the power of the primitive. To the civilized man of little faith, the savage seems moral because of his simplicity. The savage has no doubts. He does not concern himself over the proper balance between religion and state. He does not worry himself over whether there is a god or not, and if his commands are moral or not. He simply says, The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers." And to the moral coward, such simplicity is both refreshing and unanswerable. Because moral cowards who tangle themselves in moral complexity, will often look backward to a simpler time in human development. To the reactionary lure of easy answers through primitivism.
In 1970, François Truffaut made a film called L'Enfant Sauvage or The Wild Child, about a feral child found naked in the wild. In the movie, he is taken to Paris and taught how to speak and live in human society. But L'Enfant Sauvage was actually based on the real life story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron, a feral child who despite best effort of France's experts could never be turned into a proper human being. The difference between the movie and reality is the same as between what we would like to think is possible, and what is actually so. In the world as we would like it to be, a feral child can be taught to speak French and use proper table manners and be just as one of us. In the world as it really is, a feral child will remain feral. So too Islam.
One cannot import an 8th century ideology rich with blood and death into 21st century Paris, and expect it to have proper table manners. Yet over and over again we insist on telling the story so that the savage is the hero, and the civilized man, the villain. Another more famous fictional adaptation of the Wild Boy of Aveyron, is Victor Hugo's novel, The Hunchback of Notre Dame. The heroes of The Hunchback of Notre Dame are the wild and primitive Quasimodo and Esmeralda, even Clopin, the uncivilized outsiders contending against the wickedness of the authorities.
The narrative of the Good Monster, the Noble Savage, the Wise Primitive contending against the evils of a corrupt and decadent civilization has been told and retold over and over again, many times beyond counting. But the stories we tell ourselves have a way of coming to life. And in the real life version of such stories, the civilization that nurtures us turns out not to have been nearly so ignoble as we led ourselves to believe, and the savages coming to free us from the burdens of reason and morality, are not nearly so nobly primitive as we wanted to think. Instead they are like us, in that they want what we have. The difference is that we are no longer willing to kill for it. But they are.
And so Paris has a mosque shortage. Galway will be getting its first mosque. A mega-mosque will rise near Ground Zero. Because you can never have too many barracks, even when you're winning the war. And while we try to be reasonable, they endeavor to be most unreasonable. Because when force is on your side, you don't need to be reasonable. You just press as hard and far as you can. Over and over again, until you win.
The mosque is the barracks of a different civilization. One that does not seek equality, but dominion. Whether through the simple demographics of the Immigration Jihad, or the violent confrontations of angry mobs and armed terrorists-- the question is not so much "how" as "when". The robber enters the bank and the negotiations begin. Violence is the wheel that keeps the negotiations turning, on and on. The vaults are emptied, one by one. And still the process continues. Until there is nothing left, and no longer anything to negotiate.
What! Foreign cohorts
Would make law in our homes!
Great God ! By chained hands
Our heads would bow under the yoke
You really want to see the establishment of an Islamic Republic in France?
Yes, but not only for France. I hope the whole world becomes Muslim.
Abdelkader Bouziane, Imam of Vénissieux
Spanish language translation at REFLEXIONES SOBRE MEDIO ORIENTE Y EL MUNDO
Brilliant and frightening and true.
Helen, Maalot, Israel
Among a lot of stuff that is raising concern, here is one that sums it up
It is related to Islam/Muslim expansion in the UK, and the very first serious opposition to Islam in the UK.
http://tundratabloid.blogspot.com/2010/06/george-galloway-threatens-edl-with.html
This is not going to end nicely.
Either we become an Islamic country, and are forced to leave the UK or live as dhimmis, or Muslims are forced to leave the UK.
Maybe Haroush is a new Tali Fahima in the making? Today he builds the bridge, tomorrow he crosses it just like sweet Tali.
Tragic.
If Haroush wanted to help Arabs he could have just donated his money to an organization that helps Arab victims of terrorism not set up a base camp for Muslim terrorists?
Muslim supporters eventually become like Frankenstein--the monster and creator one and the same.
While he's building a mosque in Paris as residents of one small French neighborhood held a block party called Sausage and Beer to defy Muslim pressures on them about drinking alcohol and eating pork.
I can't help but wonder what will happen when the Muslims move into nearby Germany and try to stop their Oktober Fest.
Very insightful and eloquent article:)
Tracy W said...
WHAT'S SO SHOCKING ABOUT JEWS TRYING TO INGRATIATE THEMSELVES WITH THE ARABS? The government of Israel does it every day.
That the clueless and in-denial Diaspora Jews want to build bridges for those who hate them is one thing.
That the terror-stricken Israelis want to do the same thing is INSANE.
And yet, every-single-day I read of efforts to treat murderous terrorists as simply misguided folk who need a little rehabilitation and TLC.
If Arabs are imprisoned at all, they are pampered like kings. Free education, TV, family visits, and other goodies. And then released ahead of time in one of those regular 'gestures' of dhimmitude.
Or better still: follow the leftist version that Jews should be nice to Arabs - terrorists or not - because after all, Jews are occupying their land.
I'm not saying all Arabs are terrorists or bad people, but even the most peaceful among them dream of a time when their 'militants' will throw the Jews into the sea.
You must know better than I how many inter-cultural programs there have been in Israel - to no avail. Integrated playgrounds. Integrated classrooms. Integrated neighborhoods. Affirmative action in the workplace. Generous funding of PA enterprises. And so on.
And to be even kinder to them, the government allows them to build as many illegal housing as they please without legal repercutions.
Or even yummier. It allows the construction of an entire Arab city (Ruwabi near Ramallah) at a time when Jewish construction is frozen. JNF donates trees.
I'm not advocating any extremist measures. But what is wrong with a little justice and foresight?
JUSTICE:
- How about applying criminal law evenly to Jews and Arabs for starters?
- How about allowing freedom of worship fairly so that Jews can pray on Temple Mount and other heritage sites?
- How about passing laws to curb unjust excesses of the High Court that favors Arabs over Jews and meddles in security issues that are none of their business?
FORESIGHT:
- Limit generous family benefits for polygamous families.
- Finance voluntary emigration of Israeli, PA and Gaza Arabs abroad.
- Criminalize the hiring of illegals.
And annex, annex, annex: Golan, Yesha, Jerusalem. This would be true justice. Jews are not occupiers. Jews are the legal owners of the land.
Khaled said...
"While the Muslim world is not prepared to concede equality to the Christian or the Jew-- both are eager to make him equal partners in their societies."
Aside from Saudi Arabia which a lot of Arab and Muslim countries condemn for it's intolerance, Christians and Jews DO have equal rights or at least as good as the others do in Muslim countries. Do not lie.
Robet Haroush is a good man. He is not a disgrace to Jews like you are. Contrary to the lies you wrote, Jews and Muslims co-operate a lot in Europe against anti-Semitism. The new Dutch premier Cohen was supported by Dutch Muslim. All Jews are not facists like you seem to be.
Really, which Muslim countries do they have equality in?
Egypt? Malaysia? I covered both of those in my article. The last Jews have fled Yemen. Do we even need to go into Iran and Pakistan. Or Indonesia and Sudan, which carried out genocide against Christian minorities.
In the vast majority of the Muslim world, Jews and Christians do not have the status that Muslims demand for themselves in Europe.
And the only Jews that Muslims will support are Dhimmis.
No, Daniel, Moslems will not support dhimmis. Dhimmis are TOLERATED, in exchange for "protection". Al Capone would recognize the arrangement.
"Aside from Saudi Arabia which a lot of Arab and Muslim countries condemn for it's intolerance, Christians and Jews DO have equal rights or at least as good as the others do in Muslim countries."
Ha Ha Ha!!!
That was rich!
Whenever the truth hurts - First, deny that there is any persecution. Make the claim that all other Muslim countries condemn Saudi Arabia for its intolerance. Then, give a glowing example of where Muslims are supporting a Jew in office and maybe another other example of some tolerant Muslims somewhere in this world. And last, but not least, vilify the speaker of the truth with terms like fascist. Now we have it on good authority, you Daniel are a fascist (or at least you seem to be) and a disgrace to Jews because you had the audacity to write about persecution in Muslim countries. Khaled must not have read the news about the bombings of churches in Iraq and the fearful Christian community leaving in droves. How about the increasingly intolerant situation for the church in Turkey - and it's only going to get worse as Turkey becomes more Islamized. These are stories that are in the mainstream news.
Khaled, I urge you to look at two websites: International Christian Concern, an organization the reports on the persecuted church all over the world and Persecution Project - an organization that is attempting to provide succour to the Christians in Sudan.
I suspect that we hear so much more about Christians being persecuted in these countries simply because the Jewish communities have diminished to the point where they're practically non existent. Daniel, please correct me on that if I'm wrong.
Yes, Jewish communities in the Muslim world have all but vanished. Syrian Jews were successfully smuggled out. The last Jews of Yemen are departing. The few communities that remain are fractions of what were.
Yikes! I can't believe I wrote "another other example." I'm a teacher and so when I read mistakes like that I cringe with embarrassment. That's what happens when you get in too much of a hurry and don't proof read.
I liked what Miriam said about Khaled's comment. Other Muslim countries condemn Saudi Arabia. That was indeed rich!
Keep up the good work. Love your website.
It frightens and appalls me to hear infidels claim awareness of the Islamic Jihad, announce that civilisation is under threat by the unrelenting curse of Islam, proudly follow with proposals on what needs to be done, and finish with an apology if their thoughts cause offence or seem extreme.
Fact one, if anyone's interested in a reality check over complacency enough to sleep soundly at night, the free world is under siege by the most insidious curse ever to befall Mankind, one that knows nothing of morality or niceties beyond the occasional token sweet words of peace and tolerance as it shakes down entire societies, towards a goal of domination. We know this, and yet continue to give not just money but of the quality of life that millions sacrificed theirs for us, whilst trembling with hope that we have given enough in this round to elicit those sweet words - that we have nothing to fear. Some would argue as I do, that we fully deserve the consequences of our own, determined folly.
Fact 2: Never mind the niceties, there is only one way to address the scourge of Islam, and that is to set aside democratic niceties for long enough to deal with it. Respond to its violence with a hundredfold, a bullet with a flamethrower and a bomb with a bombardment. However extreme that sounds, since it takes us back a century of our own history, it is less extreme than allowing our grandchildren to be meekly led into the 8th century.
Sure, some would argue that this constitutes a victory for Islam, since it has turned us also into savages. Meanwhile the left, liberals, progressives, or whichever other cloak they prefer, will squawk that this makes 'us' no better than 'them', and that collective punishment is not on, even as the evil of a dustbowl ideology continues to collectively punish us for loving life more than death in the name of its moon god.
Fact 3: The West has long lost the moral high ground, by cowardly sacrificing on the front line its most precious principles and values under the fraudulent pretext of maintaining the moral high ground.
Future generations, as they lose the right to think freely, will scoff at the quaint justifications we used to surrender, in order to protect the rights of the mass murderer in our lounge. Gandhi logic at its worst!
To Anon the Teacher--LOL. Don't be embarassed. I'm a writer and I make typos like that all of the time. I get distracted posting online.
BabbaZee said...
May the One True GOD of Israel bless your head, Sultan Knish
Daniel, I have been lurking here for some time, now. I love your articles and occasionally forward them to my friends with hopes that they will actually read them.
As usual, you are perfectly correct here in your analysis. I only wish more people would find their way to your site or that your brilliant articles would find their way to the readers of the mainstream newspapers.
"And annex, annex, annex: Golan, Yesha, Jerusalem. This would be true justice. Jews are not occupiers. Jews are the legal owners of the land."
Tracy: I agree, but can't see it as a reality. Israel is vilified by not just the Muslim world but also the international infidel community, for every action and often for simply existing. She is convicted on the fraudulent charges of having stolen land and of everythng from war crimes to genocide, among other traditional blood libels.
So yes, she may as well add to her list of charges, by annexing biblical lands which were taken in a conflict after the UN obligingly withdrew its forces believing the end of the Jewish State was a comforting foregone conclusion, which have since turned into terrorist havens and recruiting grounds, where its people are repressed by their own leaders while the world studiously looks the other way, and which would end the other red herring of 'illegal occupation' for which Israel is also despised.
That said, I believe both the logistics and consequences would fall between nightmarish and realistically impossible, even in terms of the Orwellian truespeak we are already used to. But it sure would be nice to have leaders with the spine to do a test run by annexing Jerusalem - fully and properly, and expelling by force if necessary those who do not recognise and pledge allegiance to their new homeland and its civic expectations. Otoh, that too is a misnomer, since a pledge means nothing when one is bound by Allah to perfidy. So, yes, it cannot be done, at least not before Islam sponsors an event that makes 911 seem like a Sunday picnic by comparison. Then, hopefully, Western snoozers will wake up for longer than a yawn.
"Aside from Saudi Arabia which a lot of Arab and Muslim countries condemn for it's intolerance, Christians and Jews DO have equal rights or at least as good as the others do in Muslim countries. Do not lie."
Khaled: Please provide a list of the many Muslim countries that condemn Saudi Arabia for its intolerance, or if that's too difficult, let's have your list of the Arab/Muslim countries where Jews and Christians enjoy equal rights with their Arab/Muslim neighbours.
Of the 56 OIC member nations, how many would you say is "a lot"? Shall we start with, say, 10? - 5? Still stuck? Go on then, let's have just 3, or at least break the ice with one, just for a laugh.
The logistics of it are entirely possible. This isn't Afghanistan, Sharon showed that it's possibly to quickly assert control. He just chose to go another way. The only serious problems are demographic.
I wish I could agree with the annexation of just Jerusalem if not the other territories as a reality, towards either the peace which we know is unreachable as long as Jews and emboldened, rights endowed Muslims share the same sky, or an easier continuation of business as usual with the Palestinians, the Muslim world, the UN, our fairweather friends in Europe and the US, and the hate filled liberal minions everywhere.
Aside from the demographics which we briefly touched on last year, within the current political, powerfully anti-Israel bordering on anti-Jew climate that's moving further into indifference if not overt contempt, there are only two catalysts that could alter the international community's determination to commit suicide by throwing itself under the bus, using Israel for a test run.
Within the confines of a forum, more likely of the two is a holocaust, one that dwarfs the horrors of WWII and shudders if not shatters the global economy and social/political structures. Probably against the US or Europe. Hopefully, this would shock enough of the snoozing masses into bothering to learn about Islam beyond the lies they have been spoonfed over decades by corrupt pc leaders and the media. Then it gets complicated - not an understatement - since the newly awakened would need to ultimately acknowledge that the planet is not large enough to accommodate both Islam and progress. It may require more than one such holocaust, the first being just enough to disturb those enjoying pleasant dreams.
Still, the consequences are not easy to imagine and difficult to cope with, since part of that recognition, within the context of our DNA clinging to democratic tradition and 'niceness', must include the realities that we are in the midst of a religious conflict, which is ironically the one thing our current crop of gutless leaders resolutely and unanimously agree on - to refute, and that regardless of actions or inaction, our way of life and civilisation itself are both going to be hurled backwards a century or perhaps two, at best. Then we fly off into several directions all at once, with often zero control of events, secure in the knowledge only that the outcome is unknowable, but adverse.
The second catalyst, spookily less likely of the two and which couldn't happen soon enough, is a feasible source of alternative energy to remove our dependence on fossil fuels and the shackles secured by majority Muslim and also other failed nation providers of oil and gas. While there is speculation that feasible 'out of the box' and taboo-for-discussion energy alternatives are already known, but stifled by political and power interests, we can take comfort in knowing for a fact that in time we will enjoy the benefits of a workable alternative energy, since it is an intrinsic part of our makeup to discover for progress.
Let's trifle with the fantasy that such a miracle fruit becomes available from tomorrow. What then? Aside from reshaping the world, there will still be the matter of Islam to contend with, and it is not going away anytime soon. Only, it would probably be easier to deal with the scourge when we are no longer subject to its blackmail and coercion for survival.
Dee: I could'nt think of a better solution, Israel made the desert bloom, how fitting to come up with an alternative fuel to oil that utilizes the similar existing machinery, brilliant, something to pray for, how better to silence the Saudi's and Iran and Putin's schemes. I have'nt been this excited in a while, thanks.
Greg RN