ISLAM AND TERRORISM (6-2004)

Tomorrow is the day that the U.S. is supposed to hand over 
control of Iraq to a new interim Iraqi government. And in 
celebration, Iraqis have been doing what Iraqis do best – 
terrorizing.

In fairness, not all Iraqis are terrorists. But nearly all 
of them are Muslims, and so too are almost all terrorists. 
That’s not meant to be a statement of intolerance or 
racism; it’s simply a fact.

It is also a fact that of all the world’s religions, only 
Islam specifically promotes terrorism as a means to and end 
in its holiest book, the Koran. For example, “Allah said, 
‘A prophet must slaughter before collecting captives. A 
slaughtered enemy is driven from the land. Muhammad, you 
craved the desires of this world, its goods and the ransom 
captives would bring. But Allah desires killing them to 
manifest the religion.’” Or how about, “I shall terrorize 
the infidels. So wound their bodies and incapacitate them 
because they oppose Allah and His Apostle.”

Of course, the official position of all civilized Western 
governments is to accept Islam as a peaceful religion. In 
fact, most Muslims will tell you theirs is a religion of 
peace, especially Muslims who live outside the Middle East.

But just as those self-professed Christians who engage in 
hypocrisy, self-righteousness, and judgment of free 
thinkers don’t really have a grasp of what it means to be 
Christian, many Muslims also have a skewed view of their 
religion.

It’s true that the vast majority of Muslims, even in the 
Middle East, do not engage in terrorist acts. But that 
doesn’t mean they have a problem with it when it happens. 
How else would one explain the regaling in the streets by 
Muslims throughout the Arab world shortly after the 9-11 
terrorist strike?

President Bush has led this nation into a war on terror. 
And, as a reaction to the worst terrorist attack in U.S. 
history, a war on terror seemed justified. It still does. 
But is a war on terror winnable? 

Since the U.S. attacked Afghanistan and wiped out the 
Taliban, the al Quada network may have been temporarily 
decentralized, but it was by no means wiped out. In fact, 
there are probably as many, or more, al Quada terrorists 
today as there were pre-9-11.

In Iraq, our military went in and wiped out Saddam’s troops 
in short order. Less than a year later, we captured the old 
dictator himself. But has our job in that country gotten 
any easier since then? No, it has actually gotten more 
dangerous as terror attacks are carried out almost daily. 
Muslims are killing not only U.S. soldiers, but other 
Muslims.

Muslims take their cues from their prophet, Muhammad. But 
author Craig Winn, who has done considerable research on 
the subject, portrays Muhammad more like a pirate than a 
prophet. He writes, “The five oldest and most trusted 
Islamic sources don’t portray Muhammad as a great and godly 
man. They reveal that he was a thief, liar, assassin, mass 
murderer, terrorist, warmonger, and an unrestrained sexual 
pervert engaged in pedophilia, incest, and rape. He 
authorized deception, assassinations, torture, slavery, and 
genocide.”

Of course, Winn is a Christian apologist, so it’s no wonder 
his slant on Islam is rather negative. But, his own agenda 
aside, his depiction of Islam as a warlike and violent 
religion is not without its merits.

Yes, Christianity and Judaism both have violence in their 
pasts, too. But the Crusades were primarily in response to 
the earlier conquest of northern Africa and southern Europe 
by the Muslims. And, although there are some instances in 
the Old Testament where God commanded his people to wage 
war, it was always against a single and depraved enemy. 
Islam’s call to terror is open-ended and targets pretty 
much anybody who is not Muslim.

With a billion people in their fray, the Muslim world is 
not likely to run short on terrorists for a long time. The 
war on terror will not be over quickly. And it may never be 
won. Just be advised.