A Volunteer Human Rights Group – Choose Love, Not Hate – Love Wins
New SPLC report states racial supremacist groups rise to 900 in the U.S. – map of hate groups — related CNN report. See also our research web sites on the threat of racial supremacism.
See also SPLC Adobe Acrobat PDF file map of hate groups across America in 2008.
— “A defector from Germany’s hard-core neo-Nazi party the NPD has painted a chilling picture of the rise of new Hitler worshippers and their plans to build the ‘Fourth Reich'”… see more on story here… see also additional Aryan Nazi supremacism research.
There are no “good” or “moderate” supremacists. Supremacists may employ more or less destructive tactics, but their adherence to a supremacist ideology itself is never “good” or “moderate.” History has shown that supremacists consistently reject the idea that humanity has an inalienable right to equality and liberty. By definition and as shown by history, every identity-based supremacist group rejects such human rights — including such supremacists as white supremacists, Aryan Nazi supremacists, and extremists. Therefore, American government leaders who are responsible for equality and liberty should categorically reject such supremacist groups, nations, and adherents, right?
Yet, in the case of extremism, our governmental leaders continue to fail in this responsibility. Moreover, it is not only just American government leaders in denial about such supremacism, but also American mainstream media, foreign policy groups, and other aspects of society have joined an army of appeasement on extremism which threatens the very foundation of equality and liberty on which our nation exists.
In the past several weeks, we have seen American government officials calling for “reconciliation” with extremists in Afghanistan, and listening to the counsel of those who state that America must negotiate with “reconcilable” aspects of the extremist Taliban. We have seen American government officials alternately ignore and defend Pakistan’s surrender to the extremist Taliban in the northwest portion of Pakistan, where Pakistan has agreed to the Taliban’s demand to implement extremist Sharia law. We have heard the deafening silence by such American leaders as Pakistan extremists denounce democracy and advocate global extremist rule, with such Pakistani “peace” negotiators echoing the very sentiments of Al-Qaeda itself — as Osama Bin Laden seeks “the greater state of Islam from the ocean to the ocean, Allah permitting.”
We have seen the calls by Senators Kerry and Lugar for Americans to provide billions of dollars to Pakistan as a reward for such a surrender on human rights and Pakistan’s recent release of an individual who sought to spread nuclear weapons technology to other extremist nations. Moreover, we have seen American government leaders invite those who seek such surrender on extremism to America’s national capital for discussions and for entertainment of congressional leaders who support engagement with the Muslim Brotherhood and other extremist groups.
We have seen a growing pattern of new individuals added to American government foreign policy with a history of appeasement on such issues. We have seen American media spin reports on polls of global Muslims who support the extremist objectives of Al-Qaeda promoted as Muslims opposing Al-Qaeda’s “terrorist methods.” We have seen America media repeatedly refer to the idea of a “good Taliban,” while such media ignore the growing global crisis of extremism in threatening human rights and lives around the world.
But the larger crisis point that continues to build is the growing gap between American government leaders and mainstream media leaders who are willing to appease supremacism and surrender on equality and liberty — versus a growing number in the American public that are willing to defy supremacism and be responsible for equality and liberty.
With every new embarrassment, with every new outrage by such appeaser government leaders and mainstream media, those responsible for equality and liberty are becoming more determined to prove that the appeaser crowd will not represent America.
Apologist speakers are outraged that “Americans do not know the difference between Islamists, who have a clear goal of creating a national Islamic state, and terrorists who call themselves jihadists.” They are outraged that we recognize that extremists are extremists, no matter what their tactics are. Such apologists seek those supporting freedom to surrender, saying: “the only way to win a cosmic war is to refuse to fight in one.” They fail to understand that being responsible for equality and liberty is a human responsibility that doesn’t end – and as we have fought supremacism before, we will continue to fight supremacism in the future. We are responsible for equality and liberty – yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
1. The Evil of Supremacism is Never “Good” or “Moderate”
Could you imagine being led in World War II by those who wanted us to believe that there were “Good Nazis” versus “Bad Nazis”? Or to try to distinguish between “Extremist Nazis” versus “Moderate Nazis”? Or seeking the evolution of Aryan Supremacist Nazism into becoming a “mainstream” political ideology for “reconciliation” of “moderate Nazis”?
Similarly, where would we be in America’s civil rights today, if our national confrontation against white supremacists was led by those whose idea of defending equality and liberty was to try to distinguish between the “Good KKK” versus the “Bad KKK”? Or to try to suggest that our national strategy should be based on recognizing the difference between “extremist white supremacists” versus “moderate white supremacists”? Or seeking the continued tolerance of white supremacism as a “mainstream” political ideology for the vague goals of national “reconciliation”?
Imagine further if appeasers rationalized that such “reconciliation” with supremacists could be achieved by addressing “historical grievances” by such groups. Such as, perhaps entertaining the Nazi “grievances” regarding Czechoslovakia and Europe, or their “grievances” with Jews? Or entertaining white supremacist “grievances” calling for “separate but equal” segregation, concerns about federal government “meddling” in local white supremacist-based laws, or their “grievances” with blacks? What if our answer to Nazis and white supremacists had simply been to provide them with more “economic development opportunities” in the absurd belief that this would make them abandon their supremacist ideologies?
Such ideas are obviously absurd. The very term “moderate supremacist” is an oxymoron. A “mainstream” political ideology of Aryan supremacist Nazism or white supremacism would still be inimical to the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty. History showed the determination of the allied nations to crush Aryan supremacist Nazism throughout Germany after the war. History shows the determination of Americans to crush white supremacism in this nation in the 1960s, a war of ideas that continues against the fringe remnants even today. In both examples of confronting and defeating a supremacist ideology, we did not cave in to those who would call for “reconciliation” with “moderate” supremacists to return them to power and influence. All the “economic stimulus” in the world for Nazis or white supremacists would have never brought them to embrace equality and liberty.
But such nonsensical suggestions are exactly the direction that many seek to take us regarding extremism — as shown by the arguments that there is a “good” (or “reconcilable” Taliban). Such supremacist appeasers seek to deliberately ignore the lessons of history and the logic that any adult living in a 21st century democracy should readily know.
Yet this completely illogical, historically disproven approach is precisely the direction where many in the foreign policy community seek to take us regarding extremism — a direction that we are continuing to see regarding many of most dangerous nations that harbor extremism in the world.
2. The War of Euphemisms (W.O.E., again)
Can you imagine the euphemism masters defining Nazi supremacists as “German nationalists” or defining white supremacists as “racial purity defenders”? In dealing with extremism, it is worse than that. Such appeasers refuse to even acknowledge that the ideology of extremism exists at all.
They start disavowing that extremism exists by seeking to re-label extremism as something more palatable to public, so that their argument to appease and ignore supremacism doesn’t sound quite so absurd. Instead of a war of ideas that would defend the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty, the appeasers pursue a war of euphemisms, to confuse the public and obfuscate on the threat of extremism. Instead of challenging the supremacists, such appeasers have chosen to attack those who would defend human rights instead, with the inane argument that defending inalienable human rights is not “culturally sensitive” to supremacists.
To be more “culturally sensitive,” such appeasers prefer to use such terms as “extremists,” “fundamentalists,” etc. They attempt to argue that extremist activities are actually “anti-Islamic” activities, and that we are really challenged by “takfiri” or “hirabah,” not “jihadists.” They would rather talk about individuals and specific groups, and when such groups have unquestionably shown to be supremacist, then they try to argue that such extremist groups are “regional” as opposed to “transnational.” The last thing they want to do is “generalize” about a larger problem that would point to an ideological struggle, when they can suggest that all the extremist issues in the world are nothing but an endless series of disconnected, “isolated incidents.”
If the appeasers are challenged on this, they seek to prove that they are the only “experts” on such issues, and that anyone without a Ph.D. in Islamic studies working for a Saudi-funded program can’t possible grasp the endless “nuances” involved in fighting “extremism – fundamentalism – whatever euphemism they choose today.” They don’t think it is arrogant in the least to argue that they are sole possessors of knowledge or insight on such issues. The last thing that they want is to dignify mass public concerns about such issues, when clearly they believe public is too ignorant to grasp the obvious lessons from history on this. These imams of euphemisms believe that they have the sole right to declare fatwas on what is and is not a threat to America and human rights.
In 2008, we saw the movement within U.S. government leadership and the foreign policy cliques towards a policy of a “War on Extremism” (W.O.E.), where no matter what happened, those responsible were always “extremists.” In April 2008, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates embraced this idea declaring that “the enemy is extremism.” The group in the National Counter Terrorism Center who circulated a memo in March 2008 that stated when addressing extremist activity, government employees should never use such terms as “jihad,” “mujahedeen,” “caliphate,” or any term linked to Islam was (predictably) the “Extremist Messaging Branch.” None of them were embarrassed that 6 months prior to this, Osama Bin Laden himself came out as being against “extremists” — showing how utterly meaningless the term “extremism” was and remains today. Such a War on Extremism (W.O.E.) is part of a larger War of Euphemisms (W.O.E. again) that has continued into 2009 to try to suppress public debate on extremism and silence anyone who seeks to honestly identify the threat of extremism.
So now in 2009, we have gone beyond the national embarrassment of our leaders and government deliberately ignoring supremacist threats by simply calling them “extremists.”
We have now reached the pathetic state in the War of Euphemisms that our government leaders are listening to those arguing that there is a “good Taliban” and a “bad Taliban,” and incredibly, listening to calls by those who ask American government leaders to accept negotiations with “reconcilable” or “moderate” extremists.
3. The Nonsense of Negotiating with Supremacists
While many in the West for years have claimed that they “won’t negotiate with terrorists,” negotiating with supremacists is quite a different issue with some government leaders today, especially when they can control the public discussion enough with euphemisms to hide the fact that they are negotiating with supremacists.
But what exactly do you negotiate with supremacists about? Certainly not ideology, because supremacists are non-negotiable on their anti-freedom ideologies. So you are only left with negotiating about tactics, which is a particularly dangerous route when you are in denial and unwilling to define the threat and its ideology and unwilling to develop a strategy that addresses the overall ideological threat and enemy.
This remains the position of America’s government leadership when it comes to extremism. Refusing to acknowledging the ideology of extremism, such American government leadership’s focus jumps from country to country, group to group, situation to situation, throwing money and tactics to try to address the endless actions of extremists’ terrorist and political activities. A “war of euphemisms” forbids discussion on the “why” or the ideology behind such actions, focusing only on the tactics of the day, and the endless parade of details on “who, what, where, when” — always ignoring “why.” Such a desperate position of weakness devolves into a mere “whack-a-mole” approach of throwing whatever tactics sound good that day at the latest “crisis.” Such American governmental leaders are so under the control of “the crises” that they have resorted to discussions on negotiating with extremists, trying any tactic to try to “make things work.” Moreover, the appeaser influence in the foreign relations community is so pervasive that they have an endless parade of testimony and spin-doctoring of reports on facts about extremism, to ignore history, ignore the 9/11 Commission report, and ignore anything that doesn’t buttress the idea that hand-wringing negotiations with extremism is somehow a good and positive idea.
So what are America’s federal government leaders willing to sacrifice in terms of supremacist tactics to reduce supremacist terrorism?
Equality? Liberty? Human rights? Morality? Are these nothing more than bargaining chips with supremacists who threaten to use terrorist tactics?
Can you imagine if America’s federal government had decided to choose to negotiate with political “white supremacists” on tactics to stop white supremacist terrorism? Would it have been acceptable if America’s federal government negotiated with white supremacists to maintain segregated schools, public activities, and businesses, if “political” white supremacist leaders agreed to ask the KKK to stop blowing up black churches and stopped killing civil rights workers? Would such “peace negotiations” with supremacists have been morally acceptable to a nation committed to equality and liberty? And is there anyone so unschooled in American history to believe that such negotiations to institutionalize supremacism would have not led to even more supremacists and eventually more terrorism? In fact, Americans know from history that the Civil War was not enough. It took 100 years more of struggle to ultimately reach the national ideological confrontation with white supremacism to show the courage of our national convictions, and prove that we are a nation that believes that “all men are created equal.”
Is that commitment and sacrifice for sale now by those who would negotiate with extremists?
Do they, like the infamous Neville Chamberlain, believe that they can trade away land, human rights, hope for oppressed people, by letting supremacists grow in power and influence with the pleading hope that it will mean less terrorist threats for America? History also shows how those who sought to negotiate with Aryan supremacist Nazis fared, and the global tragic consequences for such moral failures to be responsible for equality and liberty. History shows that the appeasers of that generation, those who sought “peace for our time” at any price, allowed the Holocaust to happen, and allowed an ideology of supremacism to grow to where it could threaten not only Europe, but also attack the entire world. Every high school graduate knows this basic lesson in history.
But America’s federal government leaders who seek negotiations with extremists believe none of this history applies, and the lessons learned from those who sacrificed to defend equality and liberty should be ignored. Moreover, they will insist they are not fighting a threat of “extremists,” but merely a misunderstanding with some “extremists,” “fundamentalists,” “takfiri,” or whatever the euphemism of the day is. Furthermore, each extremist group is different they argue, with regional issues and grievances, and therefore we should disregard the endless calls for the creation of a global extremist caliphate, instead focusing on “local solutions” for isolated incidents. Should you point to the obvious, such government leaders will call upon an army of appeasers in the foreign policy community to spin their latest “engagement” report that says so. Rather than facing the facts, they create their own facts in a growing industry of appeasement that will brook no dissent.
4. We Won’t Take It Anymore – Supremacists and Their Appeasers Will Make Sure of That
Those who support such appeasement of extremism are dependent on the silence of the American public on these outrages. They feel empowered when they can make such outrageous claims as calling for “reconciliation” with extremists without massive public demand for their resignation or impeachment. They feel untouchable when they can publish and broadcast reports about a “good Taliban,” without public outcry from our veterans, their families, and the American people. They are counting on Americans to be so focused on economic and personal crises that they do not have the time, resources, or leadership to rebut their outrageous reports and actions. They believe the distraction and silence of the American people is our acquiescence and acceptance.
Their house of cards built on appeasing supremacism and “newthink” words such as “good” or “moderate” supremacism is going to fall. While the stewing outrage of the American public has not yet hit the boiling point, a movement to restore our national responsibility for equality and liberty is on the horizon. What the appeasers have not yet realized is that there is a growing number of Americans who have had enough, and are working tirelessly in their efforts to regain the leadership of America’s government and restore America’s image to the world as a people responsible for equality and liberty.
The endless series of outrageous activities and comments by those who appease extremism are frustrating to those who are responsible for equality and liberty. But like Al-Qaeda’s 9/11 attacks on America, the appeasers are also overreaching. The appeasers have miscalculated on how a reduced focus on Iraq and a greater emphasis on Afghanistan and Pakistan, the homes of the Taliban that aided Al-Qaeda attacks on America, would play to public opinion with calls for appeasement on extremism. The appeasers have misjudged the influence of UK diplomats calling for supremacist “engagement” versus the numbers of Americans rightly concerned about UK’s history of appeasement of extremism translating into growing threats towards American homeland security.
Disgraces by extremist appeasers involving Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the United Kingdom may begin to lead to the tipping point in driving the America public and other free people to activism. As CNN trumpets negotiations with the “good Taliban,” the national nausea over appeasers in the mainstream media and in American government is growing, and more and more consciences are being awakened.
Ultimately, this is why supremacists and their appeasers will always fail, and this is why those in support of the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty will always succeed. As America declared in 1776 in its Declaration of Independence, and as civilized nations agreed 60 years ago with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, equality and liberty are inalienable human rights. Free people recognize that supremacist ideologies — by opposing equality and liberty — also oppose humanity itself. These truths are indeed self-evident, and all supremacist ideologies are dependent on the lie that denies these self-evident truths.
The ever-controlling supremacist ideologies are also dependent on one other factor that will always destroy them… they must always have MORE. As an ideology that seeks to control every aspect of human life and thought, supremacists must always have MORE. So in the surrender of Pakistan in implementing strict Sharia law in its northwest, Islamic supremacist Sufi Mohammad was not content – he had to denounce democracy, he was compelled to call for extremist rule over all of the Earth. This example of the endless demands of Islamic supremacists can be seen also in the history of other supremacists. The Aryan Nazi supremacists were not just content in controlling all of Germany, then part of Europe, but were compelled to seek nothing less than to dominate the world. The history of American white supremacists shows that they were not content in merely controlling the voting rights of black Americans, or having segregated schools and public facilities, or institutionalizing white supremacism in society and business, they also had to kill black Americans worshipping in their own churches and attack black Americans who dared to seek their civil rights. Their sick lie of supremacism perverts their humanity — making them nothing more than soulless creatures that live only by the endless destruction, control, and dehumanization of others. They are truly the dark side of the human experience. But in their endless demand for MORE, supremacists always sow the seeds of their own destruction, and the disgrace of those who appeased them.
The world is not enough for supremacists – they must own your heart, your mind, your very soul. Their dark lie denying equality and liberty is so huge that they must paint every aspect of the world with their dark lie to prevent even a crack of the light of equality and liberty from shining in and reawakening the memory of humanity’s inalienable rights. But they will always lose their hopeless battle in denying who and what humanity is – equal and free. The light of truth will always shine again.
We know how this will ultimately end. History has shown the answer over and over again. Supremacists always overreach and destroy themselves. The words and actions of cowardly supremacist appeasers live on in infamy in history. Those who defy supremacism are remembered as champions of equality and liberty.
But every day that extremists grow stronger and more powerful, more lives are lost, more people are oppressed, more helpless suffer as victims.
It is not enough to wait for supremacism to ultimately fall.
Those responsible for equality and liberty must demand an end it to it. This is a responsibility that all free men and women must bravely undertake and carry on the battle for freedom that our forefathers started before us. It is our turn to carry the torch of truth about humanity’s right to equality and liberty against those who seek to cloak the world in a fog of appeasement and against those who seek to darken the earth with the evil of supremacism.
Will you join those who are responsible for equality and liberty?
Fear No Evil.
[Postscript – see also Sources documents for additional reading and background information.]
Group for news tracking on threat of white supremacism.
See also SPLC Intelligence Project, maps of white supremacist groups and news: KKK, racist skinheads, neo-confederates, and other white supremacists. See hate group map, and additional background.
See also news on the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) terror group, “Christian Identity” terror group, and research at AgainstNazi web site.
See Against Racial Supremacism Yahoo News group – for ongoing collection of reports on racial supremacism
Arkansas: “Another run at Arkansas passage of the Equal Rights Amendment is due to be filed shortly”
— February 24, 2009, Blog reports: “Another run at Arkansas passage of the Equal Rights Amendment is due to be filed shortly”
The speaker demanded that their supremacist ideology needed to be accommodated by the government, and called for a “new era.” The speaker said that his people must be allowed to have laws in place to support this supremacist ideology.
Perhaps you think I am referencing the grim situation for human rights in Pakistan, where the Taliban’s push for implementing an extremist version of Sharia law in northwest Pakistan has succeeded in obtaining surrender by the Pakistan government on this. The result is that the people in that part of Pakistan will soon be ruled by an extremist ideology with its own outlook, its own extremist version of Sharia laws, and its own extremist version of “justice.”
Perhaps you think I am remarking on the statements reported on February 18, 2009 in Pakistan by radical extremist Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Muhammadi (TNSM) chief Maulana Sufi Mohammad who attacked democracy stating, “From the very beginning, I have viewed democracy as a system imposed on us by the infidels. Islam does not allow democracy or elections… I believe the Taliban government formed a complete Islamic state, which was an ideal example for other Muslim countries. Had this government remained intact, it could have led to the establishment of similar Islamic governments in many other countries.” This is the same Sufi Mohammad who told news reporters that “democracy is against the teachings of the Holy Quran and Sunnah” and that he “regarded democracy a system of Kufr (unbelief).”
In fact, I am referring to both of these. But I am also referring to another man, at another time, and in another place – who echoed very similar sentiments.
It was February 18, 1939 – seventy years ago – with another supremacist group. Then it was in Czechoslovakia with a Dr. Kundt stating that he represented Germans with his National Socialist party beliefs of Aryan supremacism. You may remember them as the “Nazis.”
Seventy years ago, Dr. Kundt also demanded separate laws defying equality and liberty for his Nazi supremacist group, stating: “Germans must be allowed their own Nazi outlook, their own Nazi laws, their own Nazi habits, and their own Nazi justice. It is high time that these things were done. History does not wait. We, however, march on with the history of the new era, for our leader is Adolf Hitler. His will and his ‘Weltanschauung’ (philosophy) will from today dictate all the plans and arrangements of this house in Prague and will dictate every activity of the Urania.” History would later show the atrocities and evil wrought by allowing such supremacism to grow unchecked. Nazism was a supremacist ideology that sought the destruction of those who would defy it, sought a “final solution” for Jews, and sought to conquer the world as a transnational threat.
The similarities between 1939 and 2009 continue to grow daily.
The muted reaction by many of our government leaders to the latest growth of extremism in the nuclear weapon-armed nation of Pakistan mirrors such tenacious denial by these leaders on extremist views in America and around the world.
Their sickening silence is only exacerbated by their few public statements that demonstrate a shocking ignorance towards human rights and an outrageous contempt for the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty.
In response to the Pakistan surrender to the extremist Taliban’s demands for implementation of an extremist version of Sharia law in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has merely stated that she wants to see the Pakistan government’s “intention and the actual agreed-upon language.”
Mrs. Clinton wants us to suspend disbelief that she is unaware of the Taliban’s extremist version of Sharia law’s intention to suppress the equality and liberty of women, men, and children in Pakistan and around the world. She wants us to believe she doesn’t know about the UN report on growing global extremists’ violence against women. She wants us to believe she doesn’t know about how the Taliban has used their extremist version of Sharia law to justify threatening, murdering, and dumping the bodies of women in Pakistan. She wants us to believe she doesn’t know about the million pregnant women abused in Pakistan every year, or the news media reports of nearly 8,000 cases of abuses against women, including extremist “honor killings,” in Pakistan in 2008.
Just like we are supposed to suspend our disbelief that she is unaware of the Muslim women beaten and murdered in her state of New York — one last week who was beheaded by her husband, the CEO of Bridges TV, whose mission ironically was to “promote moderate Islam.” Yet even when this woman is killed for such a noble goal, we shrug our shoulders in deliberate denial that there was an extremist ideology perverting her religion used by her own husband to rationalize her murder.
While Mrs. Clinton may want us to suspend disbelief that she is unaware of all these world events as America’s Secretary of State, in fact, we know better. So does she. As U.S. Senator representing New York, she was a co-sponsor on Senate Resolution 711 condemning the death of a 13 year old girl in Somalia last October. The girl was stoned to death for her “crime” of being a rape victim. She was stoned to death by Somalian extremists following an extremist version of Sharia law, stating “We will do what Allah has instructed us,” while 1,000 looked on and watched. This is the same extremist version of Sharia law that Pakistan’s surrender will allow to be imposed on helpless women and children in Pakistan.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also wants us to suspend our disbelief as she speaks to leaders in Indonesia as a fellow “democracy,” when she deliberately ignores that too many of their citizens openly call for extremist violent jihad on other nations, publicly promote and distribute extremist literature and books, hold massive public rallies denouncing democracy and calling for the creation of a global extremist caliphate, and whose extremists behead Christian girls. She is meeting with Indonesia’s so-called “democratic” leaders who deny the existence of the extremist terror group Jemaah Islamiyah in their nation, and who seek to promote extremist finance. She also expects us to ignore the growth of an extremist version of Sharia law throughout Indonesia, and the continuing reports of Indonesian oppression of religious minorities in that “democracy.” Perhaps Mrs. Clinton forgot that democratic nations have democratic values, including honoring equality and liberty.
While Mrs. Clinton claims in Indonesia that “Islam, democracy and modernity cannot only coexist but thrive together,” Pakistan’s advocate for an extremist version of Sharia law, extremist Maulana Sufi Mohammad condemns democracy as un-Islamic and only for the infidel. And we don’t challenge this. We just pretend to not have heard it.
But Mrs. Clinton and her State Department have “no comment” on the growth of extremist version of Sharia law in Pakistan or the attacks on democracy by Maulana Sufi Mohammad.
At least, those were the initial comments by Mrs. Clinton’s State Department representative, Gordon Duguid. But then Gordon Duguid decided to defend Pakistan’s surrender to the extremist Taliban, stating: “The Islamic law is within the constitutional framework of Pakistan… I don’t know that is particularly an issue for anyone outside of Pakistan to discuss.”
Do extremists merely seek imposition of an extremist version of Sharia only in Pakistan, Somalia, and Indonesia? Hardly. Such extremists seek to conquer the entire Earth to submit to their supremacism – Asia, Africa, Europe, the United Kingdom, and North America.
As the Pakistan Daily Times reports, Maulana Sufi Mohammad’s goals for implementing an extremist version of Sharia are nothing less than seeking “supremacy of Islam over the entire world.”
But the U.S. State Department has “no comment” on this, nor do they think it is “an issue for anyone outside of Pakistan to discuss.”
Hillary Clinton’s State Department is continuing a craven position of “hear no evil, see no evil” regarding extremism that is becoming entrenched within appeasers among foreign policy cliques in Washington DC. This community of the blind and deaf are the same amoral individuals that have included Obama campaign foreign policy advisor Dennis Ross, who called for negotiations with the extremist Muslim Brotherhood back in September 2008.
The most disturbing report is by the Daily Telegraph and it states that the “US privately backs Pakistan’s ‘Sharia law for peace’ deal with Taliban.” The report quotes anonymous “American officials in Islamabad” that view surrender on an extremist version of Sharia law in Pakistan’s northwest as a possible tactic to divide members within the Taliban. The report continues that such surrender of human dignity and rights to extremism “reflected the ‘smart power’ thinking outlined by Hillary Clinton.” We can only hope that amoral tactians are not consciously empowering extremists with the delusion that sacrificing the helpless in Pakistan will satisfy extremists’ goals for world domination.
Does America’s State Department think that appeasing anti-human rights and anti-democracy extremists will yield “peace in our time”? Are American politicians so historically ignorant that they believe a policy of appeasement is “smart power”?
Whether such inaction on extremism is due to amorality, ignorance, or blindness – the responsibility does not change.
Pretending to be blind and deaf about extremism does not excuse their responsibility for its appeasement – any more than being blind and deaf about the Aryan supremacist Nazis in 1939 ended responsibility for its appeasement then. History shows the consequences of those failures.
This is the same U.S. government leadership whose president is the greatest beneficiary in America’s defiance against supremacism in history, who took his presidential vows on Lincoln’s Bible, and who spoke at Lincoln’s memorial – mere steps away from the words in marble that “all men are created equal.” Does his government view that equality and liberty are not a sufficient priority to defy extremism?
If President Barack Obama and his cabinet are responsible for equality and liberty, then it is time for them to wake up to the threat of extremism. Right now. It is 2009… the 1939 of our generation and it is time to confront extremism as its cancer grows around the world, and as shown by the recent “Homegrown Violent Extemism” video – in camps around the United States.
Will a future generation look back on the craven positions by today’s leaders on extremism like we do today on those who denied the threat of Nazism’s Aryan supremacism in 1939? Instead of saying “it is just like 1939,” will they say instead “it is just like 2009”? That is a legacy that our generation must prevent, and a future that we must take control of… before it takes control of us.
The 3 AM telephone call is ringing tonight in Washington DC. Will neither Barack Obama nor Hillary Clinton pick up the telephone and wake up — as equality and liberty itself are imperiled?
The emergency call on the threat to equality and liberty must be answered – by our government leaders – and by each of us as free men and women. We must heed the call – right now – no matter how inconvenient, no matter how tired we are, and no matter how frightening the responsibility is. That is what it means to be responsible for equality and liberty. That is what it means to be the home of the brave.
We have received the call to action as free people to be responsible for equality and liberty by defying extremism in America and around the world. Now it is time for us to act to get the message out to our fellow Americans and our leaders.
It is our judgment, our courage, and our wisdom today that we must prove in defending equality and liberty, and to show that…
We Must Fear No Evil.
Let us instead have ONE standard for Universal Human Rights – a Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Let us be Responsible for Equality And Liberty – for all.
February 18, 2009 — Pakistan extremist leading Sharia law negotiations in northwest with Taliban Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Muhammadi (TNSM) chief Maulana Sufi Mohammad who attacked democracy stating, “From the very beginning, I have viewed democracy as a system imposed on us by the infidels. Islam does not allow democracy or elections… I believe the Taliban government formed a complete Islamic state, which was an ideal example for other Muslim countries. Had this government remained intact, it could have led to the establishment of similar Islamic governments in many other countries.” Pakistan Daily Times report “Sufi wants Islamic rule worldwide.” Sufi Mohammad also told news reporters that “democracy is against the teachings of the Holy Quran and Sunnah” and that he “regarded democracy a system of Kufr (unbelief).”
Buffalo News City and Region reports:
Possibility of ‘honor killing’ mulled in Orchard Park slaying
Estranged husband charged with murder
By Fred O. Williams
NEWS STAFF REPORTER
Updated: February 17, 2009, 7:54 AM / 0 comments
* Coalition decries ‘honor killing’ label
* Religious speculation upsets imam in case of beheaded woman
* Prominent Orchard Park man charged with beheading his wife
* Orchard Park businessman charged in beheading of wife
* Prominent Orchard Park man charged with beheading his wife
The gruesome death of Orchard Park resident Aasiya Zubair Hassan— who was found decapitated—and the arrest of her estranged husband are drawing widespread attention, as speculation roils about the role that the couple’s religion may have played.
Muzzammil Hassan, 44, was arrested Thursday and charged with second- degree murder after telling police his wife was dead at the office of their television station in the Village of Orchard Park.
While Muslim leaders have urged against applying cultural stereotypes to the crime, advocates for women linked the killing to attitudes in Muslim societies.
“This was apparently a terroristic version of honor killing, a murder rooted in cultural notions about women’s subordination to men,” said Marcia Pappas, New York State president of the National Organization for Women.
She decried the scant national media attention paid to the story, which broke the same day as the commuter plane crash that killed 50 people in Clarence.
While domestic violence affects all cultures, Muslim women find it harder to break the silence about it because of a stigma, she said.
“Too many Muslim men are using their religious beliefs to justify violence against women,” she said.
After episodes of domestic violence, Aasiya Hassan, 37, filed for divorce Feb. 6 and obtained an order of protection barring her husband from their Orchard Park home, her lawyer, Corey Hogan, said.
She and her husband both worked at Bridges TV, a satellite- distributed news and opinion channel. They launched the station in 2004 in an effort to counter images of Muslim violence and extremism.
Nadia Shahram, a matrimonial lawyer in Williamsville, said that some Muslim men consider divorce a dishonor on their family.
A teacher of family law and Islam at the University at Buffalo Law School, Shahram said that “fanatical” Muslims believe “honor killing” is justified for bringing dishonor on a family.
While it has not been determined whether Aasiya Hassan’s death had anything to do with fanatical beliefs, the community should address the attitudes that make divorce particularly difficult for many Muslim families, Shahram said.
“I have not had one [case] where the husband wanted to settle outside of the court system,” she said.
In some interpretations, the Quran allows husbands to punish “disobedient” women, Shahram said, adding that this is a minority view.
An open community forum on the issue is scheduled from 3 to 6 p. m. Sunday at the UB Law School’s Moot Court on the North Campus in Amherst, she said. Imam Fajri Ansari, the leader of a Buffalo mosque, and other experts on Islam are scheduled to attend, she said.
Orchard Park police Monday continued to investigate last week’s death and remained quiet about its details.
Police believe that Aasiya Hassan died where she was found, in a hallway at the TV station’s offices on Thorn Avenue in the village, Police Chief Andrew Benz said.
The office was released as a crime scene Saturday, he said, but the effort to determine the murder weapon continued.
“We’re looking to make sure we find the weapon,” Benz said, adding that police don’t have a confession.
Muzzammil Hassan is scheduled to appear at a felony hearing in Orchard Park on Wednesday to determine bail.
A Family Court hearing today is expected to address the future of the couple’s two children, a girl age 4 and a boy age 6. Their grandparents, having traveled from Texas and Pakistan, are expected to attend, said John Tregilio, a lawyer for the children.
Muzzammil Hassan also has two older children, ages 17 and 18, who lived with the family on Big Tree Road in Orchard Park. The couple had been married eight years.
Naeem Randhawa, a documentary filmmaker in Dallas who worked with the Hassans, said it was apparent that their television venture was in trouble, but not their marriage.
He characterized Muzzammil Hassan as aggressive in a business sense, with fundraising efforts in the Muslim community that were necessary to keep the station going.
On a personal level, “he was not extremely talkative — he would sit back and listen,” Randhawa said. “He came across not as a passionate guy, [but] more reserved.”
Friends said they remember Aasiya Hassan as a vivacious and intelligent woman. For a time the couple owned a convenience store in Orchard Park where she would work, sometimes with her son.
Muzzammil Hassan graduated magna cum laude with an MBA from the Simon School of Business at the University of Rochester in 1996, according to biographical information on the TV station’s Web site.
In a 2005 interview with The Buffalo News, he said that the idea for the TV station was sparked two years earlier when the couple heard derogatory remarks about American Muslims on a radio talk show.
Our generation shares the responsibility to challenge supremacism and extremism in America and around the world. Our responsibility is based on our nation and our leaders’ accountability in defending our inalienable human rights of equality and liberty – which demands that we reject all supremacism, including extremism. Such accountability on human rights also requires that we challenge those in denial on this threat who seek our surrender to extremism abroad and at home. Failure to defy extremism will not only cost us our freedoms – it will also cost us our identity, as those who appease and support such supremacism will seek to use our nation’s influence and power as a weapon against freedom – as we have recently seen in other nations. To effectively defy Islamic supremacism, we must use our existing consensus in equality and liberty as a tool to ensure that extremism is treated like any other supremacist ideology that would seek to threaten our freedoms. We know that outrage against supremacism is not enough; we are responsible to act to defy such supremacist ideologies that threaten our freedoms and take a public stand against them.
1. Accountability to Human Rights Means Saying “No” to Extremism
Of all the many recent reports of extremism’s progress against equality and liberty, surely the most disturbing to me has to be the report of Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Qureshi’s audacity in telling U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke that the United States needs to start negotiating with “reconcilable elements” of the extremist Taliban in Afghanistan.
Did the U.S. government express outrage or anger such outrageous demands that the U.S. to negotiate with the same Taliban organization that aided and abetted Al-Qaeda in planning the 9/11 attacks on the United States? Did it walk out of such discussions? Most importantly, did America’s government vehemently say “NO”?
America’s history has taught us that there is no “going along” or “working with” “reconcilable elements” of supremacist ideologies. Supremacists are not “reconcilable” to the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty. Supremacists don’t compromise on their ideology, which is based on a lie that they are inherently superior to others. We know this. We have seen, fought, and defied such supremacism in this generation’s lifetime. We know that a supremacist offer of “separate but equal” means no equality at all. We know that a supremacist offer to reign in violent activities is a false promise that they cannot and will not keep. We know that the power of supremacism is only blunted when we confront and defy its ideology. We hold the truths as self-evident that all men and women are created equal and have the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty. Supremacists don’t.
Most of all, President Obama should know this lesson as well, if not more so, than others. He is the greatest beneficiary thus far in America of such defiance, such unwillingness to compromise with supremacism. Because others said “no” to supremacism, Barack Obama not only has his rightful human rights in America, but also he could fully realize the dream that “all men are created equal.”
But all of this history, knowledge, and wisdom is lost in the American government leadership’s position on extremism, an ideology that it refuses to acknowledge. Our leaders have forgotten that being accountable to human rights means saying “no” to supremacist extremisim.
Instead of “no” we hear a deafening silence from our government leaders to the greatest threat to the human rights of equality and liberty in the world. Instead of the American government expressing outrage at calls by the Pakistani government for America to negotiate with so-called “reconcilable” extremists, we have Mr. Holbrooke stating that “I am here to listen and learn.” Instead of Pakistan’s Foreign Minister’s outrageous recommendation defied, FM Qureshi praised his talks with Mr. Holbrooke as a “new beginning” in ties with the U.S., stating “this administration has a different approach and starts on a different footing, that was a very pleasant change.”
It gets worse. The Daily Telegraph reports that “Mr. Holbrooke is expected to support a new approach which will involve…. secret talks with ‘persuadable’ Taliban leaders and allies in Afghanistan.”
Supremacists know that cowards will always find an excuse as to why it is inconvenient to say “no” to supremacist ideologies. In fact, that is precisely what supremacists count on – those who are unwilling to hold them accountable for their violent ideology of hatred and lies, based on a cowardly fear to say “no” to their ideology. Every time you don’t say “no” to supremacism, its adherents interpret this as a cowardly way of saying “yes” that you will tolerate supremacism’s influence on human rights.
America’s actions in Afghanistan and Pakistan has increasingly become a swirling vortex of tactics without a strategy, without a consistently defined enemy, and without a moral stance on the extremist ideology that continues to fight us there. Our young men and women continue to be sent into battle without American military and governmental leadership’s accountability in honestly and seriously defining the enemy. The fundamental lesson that fighting supremacism requires a moral accountability in defying its ideology is lost on policy and tactical wonks who keep making the same mistakes over and over. Our soldiers can risk and sacrifice their lives, but our government and military leaders cannot gather the moral courage to say “no” to the ideology of extremism. In fact, such leaders fear to even use the very words, preferring to talk about “extremists” or resorting to the sophomoric term “bad guys.”
So when our leaders can’t say “no” to the ideology of Islamic supremacism, what should we expect from those who don’t view Islamic supremacism as an ideology that needs to be challenged?
Accountability to the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty demands that free men and women say “no” to all supremacist ideologies, including extremism. But instead, we continue to see our taxpayer dollars being used in discussions with those who seek our surrender.
2. The Diplomatic Initiative to Surrender to Extremism Abroad
What Pakistan Foreign Minister Qureshi’s comments demonstrate is precisely how little moral courage the advocates of extremism think Americans have. “Diplomats” such as Pakistani Foreign Minister Qureshi seek to help America retreat and surrender from a war that they believe America cannot even fight, let alone win. There is no surprise that Islamic Republic of Pakistan government officials would seek the U.S. to negotiate with such “reconcilable elements” of the extremist Taliban. As early as August 2007, former Pakistan President Musharraf called for the “mainstreaming” of the extremist Taliban.
The Islamic Republic of Pakistan has continued to allow the Taliban to develop a Sharia mini-state comprising portions of the Pakistan North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). Pakistan Prime Minister Adviser Rehman Malik has justified this, by stating that Pakistan decided to enforce Sharia in Swat upon its accession to Pakistan in 1962. Pakistan’s government leaders continue to appease extremism by offering full implementation of Sharia in these parts of Pakistan. Regardless, there has continued to be a litany of daily atrocities against humanity and human rights by the Taliban against the helpless and the hopeless.
But Pakistan leaders’ primary difference with the Islamic supremacist Taliban is in the Taliban’s tactics, not the Taliban’s goal to implement Sharia. In fact, approximately 75 percent of the Pakistan public consistently support such goals of implementing “strict Sharia” throughout all of Pakistan. Members of the Pakistan Army call the Taliban “patriots” and major Pakistan press organizations have run editorials calling the Taliban “sons of the soil” and “the upholders of the integrity of Pakistan.” This is why Pakistan’s “father of the Islamic nuclear bomb” A.Q. Khan was released and is viewed by many Pakistanis as a hero, not despite his black market efforts to spread nuclear weapons to our enemies, but because of it. Moreover, Pakistan’s own government oppresses equality and liberty with its own Sharia laws and anti-freedom laws that oppress individuals for Islamic “apostasy” and “blasphemy” — something that Pakistani legislators seeks to export around the world. So clearly, it is no surprise that Pakistani government leaders would make excuses for the extremist Taliban, even as U.S. Senator John Kerry and Senator Richard Lugar seek to have American taxpayers pay $1.5 billion dollars to Pakistan a year, which Pakistan demands without conditions. This is precisely how a bully would treat one considered to be a coward.
In the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, President Karzai’s repeated pleas for the Taliban to “reconcile” with its Islamic government have fallen on deaf ears, for the same reason. Since September 2007, Afghanistan President Karzai has been offering the Taliban a role in the Afghan government, and continues to seek such “reconciliation” with the Taliban today. The Taliban views that it is winning the war to recapture Afghanistan, why should it stop fighting? ABC, BBC, and ARD recently released poll results that shows that the Afghan public blame the US more than Taliban for violence; this poll also shows that only 8 percent of those polled view the Taliban as Afghanistan’s biggest problem. Without a defined ideological enemy of extremism and with American leaders accepting a policy of “reconciliation” towards the Taliban, it is no surprise that Afghanistan President Karzai asked in November 2008 when we could end the war in Afghanistan. What greater signals could our leaders send that we are determined to surrender? On November 25, 2008, the AP reported that President Karzai stated that “the international community should set a timeline to end the war in Afghanistan.” Karzai was quoted as stating “If there is no deadline, we have the right to find another solution for peace and security, which is negotiations.”
We can hardly be surprised by this. Who is the enemy in Afghanistan – the Taliban – unless we are seeking to negotiate with them? In October 2008, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was reported to have endorsed such a policy of “reconciliation” with the Taliban, as part of his “war on extremism” tactics. This appears to be a tactical direction that the Obama administration will also continue. U.S. government analysts have tried to make the fine distinction between the “Taliban” and “Al-Qaeda,” to allow a “political solution” with the Taliban that allows it to be viewed as separate from Al-Qaeda. The argument is that the Taliban represents a “regional” threat, whereas Al-Qaeda is a transnational threat, and therefore appeasing the Taliban is somehow an acceptable form of surrender. They deliberately ignore the fact that Taliban is a transnational threat (which continues to threaten Europe, U.S., Israel, and other nations) which does not recognize boundaries, seeks to create a global extremist caliphate, seeks jihad against the non-Muslim world, and shares the Islamic supremacist goal of implementing Sharia. Such appeasers ignore all of this so that they can lay the ground work for “peace in our time” with the Taliban. The moral failure remains the same, however. Such appeasement towards extremists and failure to confront the ideology will only expand the threat of Islamic supremacism. This appeasement will teach extremists that their tactics are working to continue to gain power and influence for Islamic supremacism.
Such a mentality of surrender is hardly limited only to Pakistan, Afghanistan, and American government officials. Leaders from other NATO countries have already sought to position themselves for surrender as well. On February 9, 2009, the United Kingdom also announced a new envoy to both Pakistan and Afghanistan, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, an Arabic speaker who has previously been Britain’s ambassador to Saudi Arabia. On October 2, 2008, the London Times reported about a memo that Sherard Cowper-Coles allegedly sent to a French diplomat “reportedly saying that the campaign against the Taleban insurgents would fail.” According to the Sherard Cowper-Coles memo reported by London Times: “the only realistic outlook for Afghanistan would be the installation of ‘an acceptable dictator.'” The UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (predictably) replied by stating that the reports of the Cowper-Coles memo were a “distortion” of his views. But this was immediately followed by a London Times commentary supporting such a view as reported regarding the alleged Cowper-Coles memo as “straight-talking.” Days later UK Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith echoed such sentiments stating “we’re not going to win this war,” followed by a chorus of agreement by other foreign policy leaders among European NATO nations. This is the same UK, whose former Defense Secretary Browne called for the Taliban to be “involved in the peace process,” whose MI6 engaged in negotiations with the Taliban in Afghanistan. In the United Kingdom today, the James Bond of the 21st century seeks to negotiate with, not confront, the enemies of freedom.
Can we be surprised that extremists are confident in America’s near-term surrender and withdrawal from challenging Violent Extemismists in Afghanistan and Pakistan, when American government leaders can’t even name the enemy and its Islamic supremacist ideology? When we fail to be accountable for human rights, supremacists expect the surrender of those who could defend equality and liberty, not only in foreign nations, but also in their own nations.
While some would look at individual nations or groups as the source of terrorist threats, the reality is much more troubling. The reality is that stopping extremist terrorism tactics from Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, etc., is not enough. The challenge is greater than such a tactical-based, “whack-a-mole,” reactive approach. The true challenge is to defy the ideology of extremism itself as a global threat to equality and liberty. extremism terrorism is simply a tactic of extremism adherents, and the failure to challenge the ideology itself demonstrates that that tactic is working.
Failure to recognize and defy extremism as part of our responsibility to be accountable for equality and liberty is the single worst mistake that a free nation can make. Such a failure not only will lead to a greater risk of terrorism, but also will lead to a deterioration of equality and liberty in a free nation itself.
3. The Ghost of a Extremist-Appeased Future
We can see the consequences of failing to be accountable for our responsibility in defending equality and liberty, by simply looking at the failures of another nation. What are the consequences of failing to defy extremism?
Imagine a nation notorious for being one of the major “exporters” of violent extremism in the world. Imagine a nation where extremists publicly support terrorist attacks on America, where violent extremists repeatedly plot mass-casualty terrorist attacks on the United States (not once, not twice, not just three times), where funding to groups fronting for terrorists is promoted by government officials, where foreign individuals representing terrorist organizations are allowed to enter the nation to speak on tours, and where known supporters of terrorist organizations freely make television and public conference appearances. Imagine a nation with a long history of providing a “covenant of security” for extremists, so notoriously well-known as an appeaser that Osama Bin Laden sought to live there. Imagine a nation whose protestors publicly seek to “Slay Those Who Insult Islam,” “Kill Those Who Insult Islam,” “Behead Those Who Insult Islam,” and “Butcher Those Who Mock Islam.” Imagine a nation where armed police run from Islamic protestors who call the police “cowards,” “kuffar (infidels),” and chant “Allahu Akbar” as they chase the police down the street.
Imagine a nation where America’s CIA is currently monitoring the efforts of 4,000 Violent Extemismists from that nation who are viewed to be a threat to American national security. Imagine a nation where 40 percent of the CIA efforts are concentrated on preventing attacks on the United States from that nation’s residents and citizens. Imagine a nation where America’s homeland security department has repeatedly warned about that nation’s citizens as a threat to American national security and has sought (unsuccessfully) visa restrictions to protect America from the threat of its citizens. Imagine a nation whose citizens are a concentration of extremist terrorism for their region, and are viewed as a “mainstay of global ‘jihad'” efforts around the world. Imagine a nation where its non-profit organizations publicly call for “jihad” and support Muslim violence.
Imagine a nation whose “security minister” calls for talks with Al-Qaeda and whose “security forces” negotiate with the Taliban. Imagine a nation whose “security” efforts involve promotion of an individual who supports Violent Extemism in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Israel, who seeks the creation of Islamic states, and who seeks “the triumph of the Taliban.” Imagine a nation where individuals listed as leading “counterterror” organizations come from the extremist Muslim Brotherhood and view Israeli children to be legitimate targets of Violent Extemismists. Imagine a nation where an Interpol-wanted, convicted terrorist advises on that nation’s “counterterrorism.” Imagine a nation where senior government employees are activists in extremist groups that seek to create a global caliphate and call for killing of American soldiers.
Imagine a nation where its primary “counter-extremist” organization publicly praises an individual that supports an international terrorist organization, is against freedom of religion, defends wife-beating, calls for the death penalty for adultery, and seeks the promotion of extremist Sharia. Imagine a nation whose primary “counter-extremist” organization leader defends the “right” of Violent Extemismists in Afghanistan and Iraq to wage war. Imagine a nation where its natives infiltrate American news organizations, universities, and counterterrorist organizations to offer a sympathetic view of extremists as a political force that should be engaged with and influence American security strategies and education. Imagine a nation where local law enforcement officers are expected to be trained on the importance of extremist Sharia law.
Imagine a nation whose leaders call on foreign nations to develop their constitution based on “Islamic law,” whose leaders seek the acceptance of Sharia law and Sharia courts in their own nation, and where Sharia courts operate today. Imagine a nation whose $18 billion extremist Sharia finance sector is one of the largest in the world and whose government aggressively promotes Islamic Sharia finance. Imagine a nation whose foreign minister calls for extremists to “channel” their efforts into gaining political power. Imagine a nation whose senior foreign policy analyst publicly rants about “f***ing Jews,” and calls for Israeli soldiers to be “wiped off the face of the Earth.”
Imagine a nation where 60 percent of its Muslim schools have Islamic supremacist links, where a third of its Muslim students freely admit their beliefs that killing in the name of Allah is justified, and where a significant percentage seek the incorporation of Sharia law into that nation’s law. Imagine a nation where school children are punished if they don’t take place in prayers to worship Allah, where Muslim children are asked if they hate Jews, and where school teachers are punished if they dare to seek to have joint assemblies of children – committing the “offense” of not providing segregated assemblies for Muslim children. Imagine a nation with schools where children are taught that Christians are “pigs” and Jews are “monkeys.” Imagine a nation where a significant number of Muslim youth openly admit to supporting organizations such as Al-Qaeda, and where a third believe that those who covert from Islam to another religion should be put to death.
Imagine a nation whose institutional and government leaders seek to silence those challenging extremism, not only of their own citizens, but also those from foreign nations, exerting pressure to silence people from and in other nations, including America. Imagine a nation where “extremists” are those who dare to challenge extremism.
Imagine that this list… is just barely touching the surface of the extremist infiltration and appeasement of such a nation.
Perhaps you think I am referencing Saudi Arabia, Iran, or Pakistan? No doubt you think I am referencing a nation that harbors those who seek the destruction of equality and liberty? Surely this is not a nation that you think America would have a “special relationship” with — except perhaps as an adversary?
In fact, the nation I am referencing is the United Kingdom.
This brief portrait of the endless failures by the United Kingdom to defy extremism and be accountable for defending equality and liberty – is to provide context towards the UK Home Office’s recent actions to deny Netherlands legislator Geert Wilders freedom to speak in the UK Parliament regarding Islam. Given the state of the UK, such actions by its government can hardly be a surprise.
The UK Home Office’s rank hypocrisy regarding Geert Wilders is pathetically embarrassing as the weakness of a government that has clearly surrendered to extremism. The UK Home Office claimed that its objectives in silencing Wilders was to “stop those who want to spread extremism, hatred and violent messages,” while its security minister calls for talks with Al-Qaeda, while it allows Hezbollah supporters to enter the UK to tour the nation, while its promotes an individual calling for Violent Extemism and supporting the Taliban, while it funds an organization that praises Egypt’s Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa (a known Hezbollah supporter and extremist). This is the same UK Home Office that allows its employees to be members of the extremist Hizb ut-Tahrir, which seeks the creation of a extremist caliphate, supports jihad, and whose leaflets have been reported by BBC to include “threats against Jews to “kill them wherever you find them'” — the same Hizb ut-Tahrir organization that reportedly radicalized British suicide bomber Omar Shariff — the same Hizb ut-Tahrir organization whose speakers state “democracy is un-Islamic.”
So this makes it clear that the UK Home Office’s use of the meaningless term “extremism” is merely a political ploy to silence only those who would challenge their efforts to maintain a “covenant of security” between the UK and extremists. There will be no silencing of former Al-Muhajiroun leader Anjem Choudary and the “Islam for the UK” group, who provided a forum on November 10, 2008 in the UK for Omar Bakri Muhammad , who told the audience “Do not obey the British law… We must fight and die for Islam.” “Islam for the UK” has another meeting scheduled for March 3, 2009 where it will seek to encourage Muslims to develop a global extremist caliphate. But this isn’t “extremism” for the UK Home Office. Nor did UK Home Office concerns about extremism halt a Muslim Brotherhood festival for the terrorist group Hamas in London on February 15, 2009. The fund raising Hamas festival in London included Wagdi Ghuniem, who has been thrown out or run out of most countries, except of course, the UK — the same Wagdi Ghuniem, who promotes Violent Extemism and calls Jews “apes.” Not surprisingly, this Muslim Brotherhood festival for the Hamas terrorist group also included so-called British “counterterror leader” Kamal Al-Helbawy, the “former” Muslim Brotherhood spokesman in UK, who supports attacks on Israeli children, and is viewed as “really respected” by British journalists in “counterterrorism” such as CNN’s Peter Bergen and Paul Cruickshank.
When one understands that the UK Home Office’s real agenda is to silence those who would point out their abject surrender to extremism, it is clearly no surprise that they would not want Geert Wilders to speak. It is also not surprising that other UK institutions have sought to silence Briton Douglas Murray and others; Mr. Murray, a challenger of extremism in the UK, was silenced by the London School of Economics in “the interests of public safety.”
But what you may not realize is the UK Home Office has also aggressively sought to influence debate in the United States as well. On June 24, 2008 in Washington, DC, the UK Home Office sent a representative to a George Washington University panel discussion that I was part of, regarding the definition of “jihad” to dissuade Americans from using the term “jihad” or “Islamist” when discussing extremist terrorism. In our nation’s capital, this foreign government sought to sway American debate to ignore the Islamic supremacist nature of Violent Extemism.
Two months later, I was told by a well-known American blog on counterterrorism subjects that the UK Home Office had written them in complaint of my articles regarding extremism in the UK and sought to have me silenced (an American). I was told that the representative of the UK Home Office was specifically angry about an article where I questioned why the Quilliam Foundation was publicly praising on their web site Egyptian Mufti Ali Gomaa – a known supporter of Hezbollah and extremism — while Quilliam claims to oppose “Islamism.” A few weeks before that Senators Kyl and Coburn had written then Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice asking why U.S. government funds were supporting ISNA’s meeting with this same Ali Gomaa. Like ISNA, the UK Home Office does not need such scrutiny of the facts, and this particular American blog chose to discontinue my articles on Violent Extemism and extremism. (Four months later, the Quilliam Foundation was given 1 million pounds sterling of British taxpayer funds — and their support for Ali Gomaa remains on their public web site.)
The UK Home Office’s agenda in protecting its “covenant of security” with extremism is not going to be limited to silence Americans in this country as well, and it will doubtless continue to use its resources and influence within this country to do so. This shows the stakes in failing to defy extremism — surrender will not only undermine support for equality and liberty, surrender will also alter your relations with free nations committed to being responsible for equality and liberty. While we must continue to support the resistance movement by individuals in the UK who are still committed to equality and liberty, we must recognize that the current British Home and Foreign Offices and their supporters have abandoned all pretense of commitment to equality and liberty, preferring appeasement and infiltration by the enemy. It has gone well down the road to becoming an enemy-occupied, collaborationist, “Vichy Britain.”
Moreover, some publicly promote their collaborationist credentials to impress extremists, as shown by the February 15, 2009 report of the Archbishop on Canterbury’s claims that he has persuaded “a number of fairly senior people” to support the growing incorporation of extremist Sharia law in the United Kingdom. Some wear their surrender proudly.
This is the treacherous, sinister, perverted future that would await free people who fail to be accountable in defying extremism; those who fail to defy it will eventually become a tool of the enemy to protect your “peace” through submission. Failure to defy extremism will not only cost us our freedoms… it will also cost us our identity.
In Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol,” there is the well-known story of Scrooge facing the “ghost of Christmas yet to come,” a grim reaper that points to Scrooge’s dishonor, disgrace, and grave. Scrooge asks “Are these the shadows of the things that Will be, or are they shadows of things that May be, only?”
This is the question to America regarding what we must learn from the grim and sad tale of the United Kingdom’s appeasement of Islamic supremacism. The deteriorating United Kingdom serves as a cautionary example of the future that awaits us, should we fail to be responsible for equality and liberty today.
Americans can choose another path. Our destiny remains in our hands. Our ability to forge a new path of defiance against extremism and in defense of equality and liberty remains the responsibility of our generation.
4. Consensus Building and Accountability
What does such responsibility for equality and liberty mean in terms of defying extremism? Does it mean building a consensus among the American public and our leaders on the threat of Islamic supremacism? Or does it mean being accountable for actively defying extremism in public? Certainly, it means both.
But our efforts at consensus building should not overlook that America already has a fundamental consensus on equality and liberty. We have declared such a consensus that “all men are created equality” and that all human beings have the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty – as our declaration of our very identity as a nation, and as a people. This is is who and what we are. We don’t need to build this consensus; we simply need to effectively use it. This American consensus is shared by nations around the world that adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. We, not just as Americans, but as humanity, hold these truths to be self-evident. Such declarations of our human rights form the international basis for our defiance of extremism.
Where this consensus in human rights still is not effective is in understanding the supremacist nature of our challenge today. In America, we have defied those who would teach white supremacism to our children in schools, exercise white supremacism in business and public activities, seek racial segregation, or seek to promote white supremacism in our laws and government. As a nation, we have proven that our government and the mass majority of our people understand and reject such supremacism. But this commitment and consensus has not yet been effectively applied to extremism.
It is our obligation as a free people, responsible for equality and liberty, is to demand – why not?
In America, a nation dedicated to equality and liberty, the individual freedom of thought of white supremacists does not translate into a national tolerance of white supremacism and racial segregation in our schools, our places of worship, our businesses, our non-profit organizations, our public events, our laws, and our government. Our freedoms do not permit hate and supremacism to overtake our inalienable human rights of equality and liberty. We do not and will not tolerate this.
Therefore, we must also demand that our religious freedoms are not warped to translate into a national tolerance of extremism and segregation in our schools, our public places, our businesses, our non-profit organizations, our public events, our laws, and our government. We must similarly demand that extremism must not overtake our inalienable human rights of equality and liberty. We must demand an end to the tolerance of this.
Our obligation in being accountable for defying extremism demands that, as a people responsible for equality and liberty, we publicly speak out against such extremism and call for an end to its sinister influences in America and around the world. The key in consensus building against the threat of extremism lies in utilizing the consensus of freedom that we already share today to defy and condemn those who would have a different standard that allows tolerance of extremism to undermine our unity in equality and liberty.
Our accountability in defying extremism requires that we demand the same standards for extremist practices, ideology, businesses, organizations, and messages – that we would have for any other supremacist organization that seeks to undermine equality and liberty. Our accountability must also reject the conscious “ignorance” by our leaders on extremism as a convenient excuse to avoid their responsibility to defy it. Ignorance is not an excuse. Such leaders understand that we are a nation committed to equality and liberty. They simply need to act consistently on the principles set down and the profiles of courage by our founding fathers, human rights leaders, and past presidents. It is time once again for the American public and our leaders to truly show the courage of our convictions as a nation responsible for equality and liberty.
5. The Wisdom to be Responsible for Equality And Liberty
If anyone in America should understand the need to be responsible for equality and liberty, it should be President Obama. If America had failed to maintain its steadfastness in defying white supremacism then, like it is caving on extremism now, Barack Obama not only would not be President today, we would still be fighting for his basic inalienable human rights of equality and liberty.
We fought that war because we believed then, as we must continue to believe now, that “all men are created equal” and because we view the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty as self-evident truths. Such a responsibility for equality and liberty was not just the responsibility of our founding fathers or of generations past. It is the responsibility that declares our identity as Americans and what America is. We must not forget the wisdom learned by the sacrifices of so many before us. We must not let the pain and frustration of our current times blind us to the wisdom of what we have learned in the past, and how such lessons can rescue equality and liberty today.
After Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed, Bobbie Kennedy told an audience: “My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He once wrote: ‘Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.'”
Such wisdom, that all men are created equal, remains hammered in stone in our nation’s capital and imbedded in our national soul yet today.
We have learned that wisdom from America’s own long, painful, bloody history in facing down supremacism that there is no “going along” with supremacists until someday they decide to “reform” on their own. That day will never come by wishful thinking. That day will never come if we don’t take a moral stand on the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty. It took America over 100 years of pain and suffering to learn that lesson. Going along, looking the other way, and wishing things were different will never make a difference.
We have the wisdom and the history to know that silence will never change supremacism.
But this knowledge is not enough. It is not enough to merely be outraged. It is not enough to merely be disgusted. It is not enough to merely be frustrated. It is not enough to merely write and speak to those who share our concern about supremacism.
Wisdom and our history demands that we act to defy supremacism, as we did in the past, and as we will in the future. There are many ways to act, to inform, to educate, to lobby our legislators, to contact our federal government on issues, and share information among ourselves. Such slow and steady working in education and consensus-building is admirable hard work of devoted defenders of liberty.
But what will it take to awaken our national shame to those who would appease extremism?
As others face prosecution for their willingness to defy extremism, isn’t it about time that we truly show some defiance of our own? Some inaccurately believe that the human rights movement against extremism “doesn’t have the numbers” to show public defiance. They believe that we don’t have enough people willing to take a public stand in support of equality and liberty, defying extremism. But as we have seen by others’ brave stands, all it takes to show defiance is merely one.
When will the sons and daughters of “the home of brave” rally in public against extremism? As women are abused and children are killed in America and around the world by extremists, where are the public protests demanding their protection? Why can sponsors of extremist Sharia finance continue to enjoy unfettered business as usual – without our protests throughout our nation? Why are our government representatives allowed to seek U.S. tax dollars to fund nations that support extremism – without our protest? Why are our government representatives allowed to talk to those who would appease the very Taliban who abetted attacks on our nation – without our protest?
The wisdom to be responsible for equality and liberty also demands our public defiance to those would appease and support extremism. We must stand and we must march.
We will never march alone. Even if one of us were to be the sole protestor of our defiance to extremism, we will be joined by the spirit of our founding fathers and of all those who have bravely stood defiantly against supremacism and in defense of equality and liberty. We stand together, yesterday, now, and tomorrow, united against extremism, and united in our responsibility for equality and liberty.
The dawn of our movement in public defiance of Islamic supremacism is on the horizon. It is time for us to stand together to own that responsibility and destiny.
We will Fear No Evil. We will Defy It.
[Postscript – see also Sources documents for references, additional reading, and background information.]
