THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XII, Issue # 231, November 2, 2010
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
OFFENSIVE JIHAD: THE ONE INCONTROVERTIBLE
PROBLEM WITH ISLAM
By Raymond Ibrahim
JIHAD AL-TALAB: THE ISLAMIC IMPERATIVE TO WAGE WAR AGAINST & MILITARILY SUBJUGATE THE
NON-MUSLIM WORLD -- MUSLIMS NAIVELY OPERATING ON THE ERRONEOUS ASSUMPTION THAT THE NON-MUSLIM
WORLD DOES NOT READ, MONITOR, OR PAY ATTENTION TO ISLAMIST CALLS FOR MASS MURDER, AGGRESSION,
CONQUEST, & TYRANNY -- THE NEED FOR MUSLIMS, WHILE IN THEIR PRESENT STATE OF MILITARY WEAKNESS, TO
EXERCISE RESTRAINT, SUPPRESS THEIR OPEN & PUBLIC DISCUSSION OF OFFENSIVE JIHAD, & THEREBY AVOID CONSTANTLY
REMINDING THE INFIDEL WORLD OF MILITANT ISLAM'S LONGTERM STRATEGIC GOAL OF GLOBAL CONQUEST &
IMPOSITION OF SHARI'A LAW ON THE ENTIRE WORLD
FULL STORY:
A recent MEMRI report titled Arab Columnists: Stop Talking About Offensive Jihad, [1] alludes to the ultimate
problem between Islam and the non-Muslim world: offensive jihad, or jihad al-talab the Islamic imperative to subjugate
the world. The report opens by saying: "One dominant theme during Ramadan in the Arab world is the discussion, in the
media and in religious circles, of the commandment of jihad and the obligation therein to wage war against the infidels."
It then focuses on two recent op-eds, written by Arab-Muslims, that discuss the need to suppress Muslim talk of
offensive jihad.
One writer, Khaled Al-Ghanami, states that the "wiser" supporters of offensive jihad believe that Muslims "must sit and
wait until the era of our strength returns." In the meantime, according to these Muslims, "there is nothing shameful about
taqiyya [deception] until the time is ripe." Al-Ghanami bemoans the fact that such Muslims operate naively "on the
assumption that the world doesn't read, doesn't monitor
and is not paying attention to the calls for killing, tyranny, and
aggression that we are spreading."
Similarly, Abdallah Al-Naggar writes: "Today, the Muslims' circumstances are different [i.e., they are weak], and talk of
this aspect [of jihad] requires a smart approach, one that stresses the aspect of self defense, instead of aggression and
onslaught," since discussing offensive jihad "arouses the enmity of people"; thus, "there is a need for wisdom [i.e.,
kitman] in our impassioned discussions of war and battles."
These writers are insightful enough to understand that Islam's imperative for Muslims to wage offensive jihad is the one
insurmountable obstacle for peace between Muslims and non-Muslims. Best not to keep reminding the infidel world,
then.
Consider: most of the things Islam gets criticized for lack of democracy, male-female relations, draconian punishments,
etc. are intra-cultural to Islam; that is, they affect Muslims alone. As such, it is for Muslims to decide on their utility;
for it is the responsibility of every culture to reform itself from the inside, not through outside "help" or coercion, the
former mistrusted, the latter resented. Modern constitutional democracy in the West developed only after the people of
the West wanted it bad enough to fight for it themselves, and only after centuries of bloody but internal conflicts.
Feminism was not forcefully imported from some alien civilization but homegrown in the West. Pragmatically speaking,
then, so long as Sharia's mandates affect Muslims alone, non-Muslims have no legitimate grievances.
And this is the dividing line: what one culture maintains as "right" and "normal" for itself is acceptable. However, when
one culture tries to apply, through force, those same principles onto other cultures whether the West trying to import
liberalism to Islam, or Islam trying to spread Sharia-style Fascism to the West that is objectively wrong. After all, the
age-old argument that "we must supplant your ways, with our better ways, for your own good," works both ways, and,
in fact, has been an oft cited justification for offensive jihad since the Seventh Century. Or would the reader be
surprised to learn that jihadists (i.e., terrorists) regularly posit their war as an expression of altruism to "liberate"
Westerners from their self-imposed "delusions"? Even Al-Qa'ida partially justifies its jihad against America for being "a
nation that exploits women like consumer products"; for not rejecting the "immoral acts of fornication, homosexuality,
intoxicants, gambling, and usury." In short, if the "white man's burden" is to "civilize" Muslims, the "Muslim man's
burden" has long been to "civilize" Western man, namely, by enforcing Sharia law. To justify the one is to make
allowance for the other.
Yet, while cultures continue to quarrel over the philosophical position of man, one fact remains: all humans secular or
religious, Muslim or non-Muslim, from antiquity to today agree that being forced to uphold a particular lifestyle
against their will is wrong, bringing us right back to our topic: the purpose of offensive jihad is to do just that
forcefully impose a particular way of life on non-Muslims, culminating with dhimmitude for those who, after being
conquered, refuse to convert to Islam.
Worse, offensive jihad is part and parcel of Islam; it is no less codified than, say, Islam's Five Pillars, which no Muslim
rejects. The Encyclopaedia of Islam's entry for "jihad" states:
"[The] . . . spread of Islam by arms is a religious
duty upon Muslims in general. . . . Jihad must
continue to be done until the whole world is
under the rule of Islam. . . . Islam must completely
be made over before the doctrine of jihad can be
eliminated."
Scholar Majid Khadurri (1909-2007), after defining jihad as warfare, writes that jihad "is regarded by all jurists, with
almost no exception, as a collective obligation of the whole Muslim community."
Even that chronic complainer, Osama bin Laden, makes it clear that offensive jihad is the root problem:
"Our talks with the infidel West and our conflict
with them ultimately revolve around one issue,
and it is: Does Islam, or does it not, force people by
the power of the sword to submit to its authority
corporeally, if not spiritually?"
"Yes. There are only three choices in Islam: (1)
either willing submission (conversion); (2) or
payment of the jizya [2], through physical, though
not spiritual, submission to the authority of Islam;
(3) or the sword for it is not right to let him [an
infidel] live. The matter is summed up for every
person alive: Either submit [convert to Islam], or
live under the suzerainty of Islam, or die." [3]
Clearly, then, it is in the Muslim world's interest to keep the West ignorant of the fact that, irrespective of all Muslim
grievances real or feigned nothing less than Islamic law itself mandates a state of constant hostility. Indeed, if the
implications of offensive jihad were fully embraced, humanity might be compelled to view the Muslim world as a
perpetual, existentialist threat, in need of preemptive containment. That said, and considering the willful ignorance of
the West's political elite who are guided less by objective facts and more by their "feel-good" ideals Muslim talk
of offensive jihad, no matter how loud or ubiquitous, will likely continue to fall on deaf ears.
NOTES:
[1] Middle East Media Research Institute.
[2] A special poll tax paid by non-Muslims residing in an Islamic state, paid in return for their protection by the state
from outside aggression and as material proof of their acceptance of subjection to the state and its laws.
[3] The Al-Qa'ida Reader, page 42.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Islamism & Jihadism -- The Threat of Radical Islam
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
Middle East -- Arabs, Arab States,
& Their Middle Eastern Neighbors
American Foreign Policy -- The Middle East
International Politics & World Disorder:
War, Peace, & Geopolitics in the Real World:
Foreign Affairs & U.S. National Security
Page Two
Page One
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
Counterterrorism & U.S. National Security
U.S. National Security Strategy
Raymond Ibrahim, a historian of Islam, Islamism and the Middle East, is the Associate Director of the Middle East Forum,
a guest lecturer at the National Defense Intelligence College, and the editor of The Al-Qa'ida Reader, a collection
of tranlations of key texts and documents of the Islamist movement. Ibrahim's translations of the religious texts and
political propaganda comprising this collection help readers comprehend the origins, development, history, and serious
danger of the Islamist war doctrines of Usama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, the Founders of Al-Qa'ida and
implacable enemies of the U.S.A. and the West.
The foregoing article by Raymond was originally published in Pajamas Media, October 28, 2010, and
can be found on the Internet website maintained by the Middle East Forum, a foreign policy think tank which seeks to
define and promote American interests in the Middle East, defining U.S. interests to include fighting radical Islam,
working for Palestinian Arab acceptance of the State of Israel, improving the management of U.S. efforts to promote
constitutional democracy in the Middle East, reducing America's energy dependence on the Middle East, more robustly
asserting U.S. interests vis-ΰ-vis Saudi Arabia, and countering the Iranian threat.
(URL: http://www.meforum.org/2767/offensive-jihad)
Republished with Permission of the Middle East Forum
Reprinted from the Middle East Forum News
mefnews@meforum.org (MEF NEWS)
October 30, 2010
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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