RUTHFULLY YOURS

LONDON—Terrorism struck Britain anew on Saturday night as three knife-wielding men led a deadly rampage through the capital, plowing a van into pedestrians on London Bridge and stabbing multiple people nearby, before being shot dead by police.

Seven people were killed and at least 48 were hospitalized, some in critical condition, in what authorities quickly called terrorism—marking the third attack in the U.K. this year. No group claimed responsibility.

Just eight minutes after police responded to reports of the bridge incident, they confronted the attackers in Borough Market—an upscale bar and restaurant zone near the bridge—killing them in a hail of gunfire. That ended what witnesses described as a short but horrific few minutes in which the three men indiscriminately stabbed diners, pedestrians and revelers.

Police believe the three men were the only ones involved, but cautioned the probe was ongoing. London Mayor Sadiq Khan said police will bolster their presence in London on Sunday.

“This is a fast-moving investigation,” London’s Metropolitan Police Commissioner Cressida Dick said at a press conference, adding that “a very high priority for us is to identify” the attackers.

“We will be seeking to establish whether anyone else was working with, or assisting in any way, or helping in the planning of this attack,” she said.

Britain’s Conservative and Labor parties temporarily suspended campaigning for the nation’s general election on Thursday. Prime Minister Theresa May also called an emergency meeting on Sunday with senior officials. CONTINUE AT SITE

Only when groups such as Hizb ut-Tahrir tremble to make themselves known in public for fear of a confident citizenry showering them with virulent and open contempt will Australia finally have grasped that it need pay no more heed to opinion-page scolds and social engineers.

Pierre Manent must rank among our greatest living political philosophers. A professor at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, a one-time student of Raymond Aron, and a prolific author of books on the theme—more often than not—of what he calls “the political form,” Manent has been aptly described as a “Catholic Straussian,”[1] a designation which points to what must be about the most necessary, intriguing, and promising intellectual synthesis imaginable in our times. In facing the problems of our world—from the ongoing crisis of liberal democracy, to the threat of Islamic nihilism, and the erosion of sovereignty in an age of globalisation—it helps to have reflected on Manent’s presentation of the contemporary significance of the nation-state, in his Democracy without Nations?, or his poetic and rigorous exegesis of political forms more generally, in Metamorphoses of the City.

At first glance, Manent’s willingness to defend and honour the European nation-state in and of itself, as a civilised and liberal political form—he has written that “[t]he nation-state is to modern Europe what the city-state was to ancient Greece”[2]—should place him squarely in the camp of the Right. Yet his latest work, Beyond Radical Secularism, does not conform at all to the template popularised by right-wingers—men like Éric Zemmour, say—who denounce the dilution of French Republican culture in the wake of paramarxian politicking and heavy immigration from the Islamic world. Indeed, there is nothing Napoleonic about Manent; his works are too nuanced to please the Front National. If anything, in its pessimism, Manent’s argument in Beyond Radical Secularism comes closer to the Houellebecqian dilemma facing serious French conservatives who see that, in many cases, they may actually have more in common with traditional-minded Muslim newcomers than with the native-born chauvinists with their loud-mouthed nostalgia and militant secularism. Manent’s is a book of regimes and rapprochement.

Still, it is impossible to ignore the reality that an increasingly violent, menacing series of outbursts, perpetrated by individuals who have settled in France from predominantly Muslim nations, has marred the country’s journey towards a de facto demographic Eurabia in recent times, and Manent is nothing if not clear-eyed as to the nature of the problem confronting his country. In Beyond Radical Secularism, he makes explicit reference to the underlying politico-theological crisis:

The rights of man, as these have come to be understood throughout the course of the history of European nations, will be of little help in bringing Muslims to see their moral practices reasonably from a certain distance; as we now understand them, human rights imply the pure and simple disappearance of Islam as a form of common life. Muslims are too attached to their moral practices and to their religion to give into the temptation to become ‘modern individuals’ by disappearing as Muslims.[3]

Modernity issues its edict to all to give up their archaic attachments and embrace the “neutrality” of modern life. But this edict, as any student of the twentieth-century well knows, can just as often inspire a nihilistic response. Among Muslims, this response has come from that small minority of emasculated men who make a point of growing their beards long, reciting the Qur’an, and mixing explosives. Manent’s response to all this, however, is not to enjoin Islam to adapt, à la Ayaan Hirsi Ali. For if anything, such injunctions merely exhibit a doubling-down on the original error. Exasperated by the politics of fact-value distinctions, Manent bemoans that “when we are asked to adhere to the values of the Republic, nothing is asked of us.”[4] “The result,” in a depoliticised state, “is that everyone likes to proclaim these values, a money that may buy nothing, but at least costs nothing to print.”[5]

These empty “values” are but the common currency of centrism—in both its centre-Left and centre-Right varieties—and have no purchase on the loyalties of a political community. But what sets Manent apart from so many on the contemporary French Right is his adamant refusal to re-write his nation’s recent history or, in light of which, to play the unsuspecting victim. In reflecting upon the influx of North Africans and Middle Easterners, he dares to stress an unwelcome truth:

We did not impose conditions upon their settling here, and so they have not violated them. Having been accepted as equals, they thus have every right to think that they were accepted “as they were.” We cannot reverse this acceptance without breaking the tacit contract that has accompanied immigration over the last forty years.[6]

This is exactly what Western populations, having placidly accepted the political status quo for decades now, do not want to hear. They would prefer it if the vivid demonstrations of the incompatibility of post-Christian liberal democracy with a younger, energetic religious-group, were something utterly unforeseeable and simply perverse. But they are neither. And now the West suffers for it, unsettled and agitated by recent developments—developments which Manent is well-positioned to observe: he began writing his book in the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo murders in January 2015, and published just before the bloodbath in November 2015.[7]

An open letter to the new French Interior Minister, Gérard Collomb

Mr. Minister,

A 65-year old Jewish woman, a doctor, is attacked while asleep in her
home and tortured horrifically for more than an hour. She lives in a
modest apartment on Rue Vaucouleurs in Paris’s densely populated 11th
arrondissement. The murderer, who climbed into her apartment via the
balcony, attacks with incredible violence, resulting in about twenty
fractures all over her face and body.

He then throws her, dying, out of the third floor window. During the
entire time, the police, three armed officers present in the building
just outside the apartment door, do nothing. The neighbors (several
dozen) can hear the victim’s yells: they too do nothing. The French
media are alerted. They make no queries and do not report the murder.

Her name was Sarah. Sarah Halimi.

Sarah Halimi (Courtesy)

This horrific scene did not take place in 1942, before or after the
“Rafle du Veld’hiv” that rounded up Jews to be handed to the Nazis,
but rather on the night of April 3rd, 2017, in a tiny apartment close
to the “Bataclan” where an Islamist murdered more than 100 French
people. Cries of “Allahu Akbar” accompanied the scene. The following
Sunday, a silent march took place in the area. Youngsters from the
nearby quarters countered it with yells of “death to the Jews” and “we
own kalachnikovs.”

The Paris public prosecutor immediately cautioned against drawing
conclusions about the nature of the crime until the results of the
enquiry were made public. Who knows? An elderly Jewish lady savagely
slaughtered by a 27-year-old Islamist with many priors (drug
trafficking, assault): this could just be a dispute between neighbors…
Nevermind that the murderer, Kada Taore, from Mali, insulted the
victim on a regular basis, and that she had reported to neighbors how
frightened she was of him. “We are at war,” former Prime Minister
Manuel Valls proclaimed, “so that Muslims will no longer feel ashamed
and Jews will no longer be frightened.” Brilliant.

Mr. Minister, you have just taken up your position in a country where
it is once again possible to murder Jews without eliciting much
concern from our fellow Frenchmen and women. By the way, the men who
were in charge before you, both on the left and the right, preferred
not to look any further than the end of the broom with which they
swept the problem under the carpet. None were up to this challenge.
Will you be? On Sunday May 21, on i24NEWS,Sarah Halimi’s brother,
speaking with extraordinary dignity, said, “I have waited seven weeks
before saying anything. The absolute silence surrounding my sister’s
assassination has become unbearable.”

Islamist groups in Britain are undermining the fight against terrorism by peddling “myths” about the government’s key anti-radicalisation policy, according to the country’s most prominent Muslim lawyer.

Nazir Afzal, a former chief crown prosecutor, warned that an “industry” of Muslim groups was spreading misinformation about the Prevent strategy.

Mr Afzal, who prosecuted the Rochdale sex-grooming gang, also condemned “self-appointed” community leaders whose sole agenda was to present Muslims “as victims and not as those who are potentially becoming radicals”.

He singled out the Islamist-dominated Muslim Council of Britain, saying he was staggered that in the agenda for its annual general meeting last year there was “nothing about radicalisation and nothing about the threat of people going to Syria”.

“We all have a responsibility to stand…

He also took aim at “self-appointed” community leaders whose sole agenda was to present Muslims “as victims and not as those who are potentially becoming radicals,” singling out Britain’s largest Muslim umbrella group — the Islamist dominated Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) as an example.

The 54 year old, who resigned last week as chief executive of the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners, said he was shocked that the agenda at the group’s annual general meeting last year contained “nothing about radicalisation and nothing about the threat of people going to Syria”.

Among groups Afzal accused of lying about Prevent to discredit the counter-radicalisation programme are Islamist support group Cage, which has been described as a “terrorism advocacy group” by veteran journalist Andrew Gilligan, and Prevent Watch, a “community-based initiative” that supports “communities impacted by Prevent”.

Cage’s outreach director Moazzam Begg, a former Guantanamo Bay detainee who signed a confession admitting to having been an al-Qaeda recruiter, likened Islamic extremists to the Suffragettes at a 2015 event opposing the Prevent programme.

“Sadly, there’s an industry which is trying to undermine Prevent. Some of them don’t like anything that’s state-sponsored and some of them are Islamists”, Afzal said.

From France, Germany, Sweden, and other European nations come innumerable stories of Muslims apprehended after committing horrendous crimes only to be declared “mentally ill” (or who were just too “young” to be treated as adults) and so can’t be held responsible for the crimes. WNDreports, even though stabbing attacks, vehicle jihad, and suicide bombings are committed by individuals who are in full possession of their faculties and are in the right Islamic mind:

Is “mental illness” the new cover for jihadist attacks on the West?

Pamela Geller highlighted a story on June 2nd from France that caught my attention because it demonstrated just how far the “City of Light” (Paris) has gone over to “the dark side,” that is, to Islam.

“Muslim who screamed “Allahu akbar” while brutally murdering French Jewish woman may not be tried, “not in his right mind.” The story is taken mostly from The Times of Israel.

A Muslim man suspected in the violent murder of an elderly French-Jewish woman in Paris in early April may not face murder charges, as claims that he was not in his right mind when he committed the act are being considered.

The suspect has been hospitalized for psychiatric evaluation since his arrest for the murder of Sarah Halimi, 66, on April 4. His name has not been released but he is known to be a 27-year-old African Muslim and a neighbor of the victim.

Halimi was beaten severely before the suspect pushed her to her death out of the window of her apartment on Vaucouleurs Street in the heavily Muslim 11th district of Paris, considered a crime-ridden area.

His lawyer, Thomas Bidnic, told AFP on Wednesday that there was a strong chance he would not be held “criminally responsible” for the murder. The lawyer based this assessment on the medical advice of the suspect’s examiners.

What Western morality deems as criminal acts, Islam treats as acts of virtue, as professions of faith and adherence to a primitive “morality.” This is why I regard it as fruitless to try and instruct Muslims of the wrongness and evil of their actions when raping, murdering, and looting. That kind of concrete-bound mentality, especially one that was raised in a culture that permits anything in terms of dealing with others – and especially in dealing with “outsiders” or non-believers, i.e., infidels – is immune to “integration,” culturally and epistemologically. Muslim minds are arrested at nearly the level of chimpanzees in which there is also a “caste” system or pecking order.

Chimps are not conceptual creatures, and neither is the average Muslim that does not resort to violence to be loyal to his “faith.” It is the jihadists who take Islam literally who become predatory because of clashing priorities in their minds. But it’s difficult to predict when your average, non-intellectual Muslim will turn jihadist. Almost to a man, virtually every description of a jihadist who has committed some crime is that he was “quiet” and an otherwise “nice guy.”

I am more and more convinced that, aside from its totalitarian elements, Islam, from a psychological perspective, deliberately plants the seed of criminality in the average Muslim. The essence of any criminal act is the initiation of force – whether it’s robbery, rape, vandalism, etc., which is to wish for and take the unearned. I should think that would be obvious to the occasional reader of the last few weeks’ depredations, from the two Paris massacres to the rape of a 5-year-old girl in Idaho by “underage” Muslim boys I see nothing but an inculcated urge to kill, maim, to inflict pain and humiliation, and this urge is sanctioned by any number of Koranic verses and Hadiths. Here is a small handful of Islam sanctioned orders to commit crimes:

Violent verses from the Koran:

2:191-193: “And slay them wherever you come upon them, and expel them from where they expelled you; persecution is more grievous than slaying. But fight them not by the Holy Mosque until they should fight you there; then, if they fight you, slay them — such is the recompense of unbelievers, but if they give over, surely Allah is All-forgiving, All-compassionate. Fight them, till there is no persecution and the religion is Allah’s; then if they give over, there shall be no enmity save for evildoers.”

“The use of terror under this doctrine [luring and terrorizing] is a legitimate sharia obligation.” — Salman Al Awda, mainstream Muslim sheikh, on the Al Jazeera television show “Sharia and Life”.

Part of the tarhib or “terrorizing” side of this doctrine is to make a cruel example of those who do not comply with the requirements of Islam. That is the reason Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia and Iran, and entities such as ISIS, intentionally hold ceremonial public beheadings, floggings, and amputation of limbs.

Islamic jihad has always counted on people in conquered lands eventually to yield, give up and accept terrorism as part of life, similar to natural disasters, earthquakes and floods.

After terror attacks, we often hear from Western media and politicians that we must accept terrorist attacks as the “new normal.”

For Western citizens, this phrase is dangerous.

Islam’s doctrine of jihad, expansion and dawah (Islamic outreach, proselytizing) rely heavily on the use of both terror and luring. Targhib wal tarhib is an Islamic doctrine that means “seducing (luring) and terrorizing” as a tool for dawah, to conquer nations and force citizens to submit to Islamic law, sharia. It amounts to manipulating the instinctive parts of the human brain with extreme opposing pressures of pleasure and pain — rewarding, then severely punishing — to brainwash people into complying with Islam.

Most ordinary Muslims are not even aware of this doctrine, but Islamic books have been written about it. Mainstream Muslim sheikhs such as Salman Al Awda have discussed it on Al Jazeera TV. On a show called “Sharia and Life,” Al Awda recommended using extremes “to exaggerate… reward and punishment, morally and materially… in both directions”. “The use of terror under this doctrine,”‘ he said, “is a legitimate sharia obligation.”

People in the West think of terror as something that Islamic jihadists inflict on non-Muslims, and it is. But terror is also the mechanism for ensuring compliance within Islam. Under Islamic law, jihadists who evade performing jihad are to be killed. Terror is thus the threat that keeps jihadists on their missions, and that make ordinary Muslims obey sharia.

An online course for recruiting jihadists contains this description:

“Individual Dawa depends on eliciting emotional responses from recruits (and building a personal relationship). Abu ‘Amr’s approach illustrates a recruitment concept called al-targhib wa’l-tarhib, which is a carrot-and-stick technique of extolling the benefits of action while explaining the frightening costs of inaction. The concept was introduced in the Qur’an and is discussed by many Islamic thinkers exploring the best way to call people to Islam (several scholars, for example, have written books titled al-targhib wa’l-tarhib). According to Abu ‘Amr, recruiters should apply the concept throughout the recruitment process, but emphasize the benefits of action early in the process and the costs of inaction later.”

How can a religion seize so much power in a country? Before Islamists come to power, they make sham promises to every faith and political party. Using charm, manipulation, and community infiltration, they give the impression that they will be defenders of minorities, the poor, and local politics. Once they are in power, when it is too late to stop them, anyone who does not comply with their narrow view of religion and politics will be eliminated under the name of God and Islam.

The authorities engaged in hate speech and allowed hate crimes to be committed with impunity against Baha’is, and imprisoned scores of Baha’is on trumped-up national security charges, imposed for peacefully practicing their religious beliefs. Allegations of torture of 24 Baha’is in Golestan Province were not investigated. The authorities forcibly closed down dozens of Baha’i-owned businesses and detained Baha’i students.

It is not an “Iran problem”, it is an epidemic of hatred and violence that will continue to spread if something is not done to stop it.

They were quiet family, not politically minded, and they did not get involved in community unrest or gossip. Fear of people knocking on the door, or of a stranger showing up in the neighborhood with unknown intentions, drove them to withdraw from society. They were careful, so careful, that they barely mingled with anyone. They were our neighbors in Iran and trusted us enough to visit with us, until one day, they no longer did.

We checked on them out of concern. Their house was empty. There was no note, no goodbyes to anyone; they were just gone. Despite being our friends, they had never mentioned their last name. We had no way to track them down, to make sure they were safe and unharmed.

Then someone mentioned that they were from the Baha’i religious minority. He explained that the government had finally come for them. All of their fear and seclusion now had a reason. You could see how protective and careful the father was, how fearful and silent the mother was, and how their daughter would never venture far from home. I had thought their problem was just paranoia. In that moment, you see that you, too, have reason to be afraid.

May 14 is the ninth anniversary of the arrest of Bahai’s leadership which included the arrest of seven Baha’i leaders known as “Yaran” or “Friends in Iran”.

The Baha’i faith is monotheistic, but a religious minority in Iran. The Baha’i community has been peaceful and apolitical for a long time.