Conservative peer Baroness Warsi of Dewsbury, named Britain’s most powerful Muslim woman, has been pelted with eggs during a visit to Luton.

Baroness Warsi was taking part in a walkabout in the predominantly Muslim Bury Park area of Luton when she was confronted by a group of protesters.

The male protesters accused her of not being a proper Muslim and supporting the death of Muslims in Afghanistan.

Baroness Warsi, who was hit by at least one egg, debated with the men.

The shadow minister for community cohesion and social action was then taken into a nearby shop.

‘Views challenged’

Baroness Warsi told the BBC that the men were “idiots who did not represent the majority of British Muslims”.

She said these type of protesters “bring Muslims into huge disrepute”.

“I stood up to this group and said I challenge your views,” she told BBC News.

“They just weren’t prepared to listen. They shouted. I said if you want to have this debate, listen.”

She continued her walkabout with a police escort.

One of the protesters against Baroness Warsi, Sayful Islam, told the BBC they were “against everything she stands for”.

He said: “She is not a practising Muslim. Clearly by looking at her she does not represent Muslims.”

He said he and his fellow protesters did not throw the eggs at her.

Baroness Warsi was named as one of the most powerful women in The Power List - chosen by a panel led by Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

The award was set up to celebrate high performers in business, the arts, media, voluntary and public sectors.

Tom Friedman had an especially fatuous column in Sunday’s New York Times, which is saying something given his well-established capacity for smug self-assurance. According to Friedman, the big challenge we face in the Arab and Islamic world is “the Narrative” — his patronizing term for Muslim views about America’s supposedly negative role in the region. If Muslims weren’t so irrational, he thinks, they would recognize that “U.S. foreign policy has been largely dedicated to rescuing Muslims or trying to help free them from tyranny.” He concedes that we made a few mistakes here and there (such as at Abu Ghraib), but the real problem is all those anti-American fairy tales that Muslims tell each other to avoid taking responsibility for their own actions.

I heard a different take on this subject at a recent conference on U.S. relations with the Islamic world. In addition to hearing a diverse set of views from different Islamic countries, one of the other participants (a prominent English journalist) put it quite simply. “If the United States wants to improve its image in the Islamic world,” he said, “it should stop killing Muslims.”

Now I don’t think the issue is quite that simple, but the comment got me thinking: How many Muslims has the United States killed in the past thirty years, and how many Americans have been killed by Muslims? Coming up with a precise answer to this question is probably impossible, but it is also not necessary, because the rough numbers are so clearly lopsided.

Here’s my back-of-the-envelope analysis, based on estimates deliberately chosen to favor the United States. Specifically, I have taken the low estimates of Muslim fatalities, along with much more reliable figures for U.S. deaths.

To repeat: I have deliberately selected “low-end” estimates for Muslim fatalities, so these figures present the “best case” for the United States. Even so, the United States has killed nearly 30 Muslims for every American lost. The real ratio is probably much higher, and a reasonable upper bound for Muslim fatalities (based mostly on higher estimates of “excess deaths” in Iraq due to the sanctions regime and the post-2003 occupation) is well over one million, equivalent to over 100 Muslim fatalities for every American lost.

Figures like these should be used with caution, of course, and several obvious caveats apply. To begin with, the United States is not solely responsible for some of those fatalities, most notably in the case of the “excess deaths” attributable to the U.N. sanctions regime against Iraq. Saddam Hussein clearly deserves much of the blame for these “excess deaths,” insofar as he could have complied with Security Council resolutions and gotten the sanctions lifted or used the “oil for food” problem properly. Nonetheless, the fact remains that the United States (and the other SC members) knew that keeping the sanctions in place would cause tens of thousands of innocent people to die and we went ahead anyway. 

Similarly, the United States is not solely to blame for the sectarian violence that engulfed Iraq after the 2003 invasion. U.S. forces killed many Iraqis, to be sure, but plenty of Shiites, Kurds, Sunnis, and foreign infiltrators were pulling triggers and planting bombs too. Yet it is still the case that the United States invaded a country that had not attacked us, dismantled its regime, and took hardly any precautions to prevent the (predictable) outbreak of violence. Having uncapped the volcano, we are hardly blameless, and that goes for pundits like Friedman who enthusiastically endorsed the original invasion.

Third, the fact that people died as a result of certain U.S. actions does not by itself mean that those policy decisions were wrong. I’m a realist, and I accept the unfortunate fact that international politics is a rough business and sometimes innocent people die as a result of actions that may in fact be justifiable. For example, I don’t think it was wrong to expel Iraq from Kuwait in 1991 or to topple the Taliban in 2001. Nor do I think it was wrong to try to catch Bin Laden — even though people died in the attempt — and I would support similar efforts to capture him today even if it placed more people at risk. In other words, a full assessment of U.S. policy would have to weigh these regrettable costs against the alleged benefits to the United States itself or the international community as a whole. 

Yet if you really want to know “why they hate us,” the numbers presented above cannot be ignored. Even if we view these figures with skepticism and discount the numbers a lot, the fact remains that the United States has killed a very large number of Arab or Muslim individuals over the past three decades. Even though we had just cause and the right intentions in some cases (as in the first Gulf War), our actions were indefensible (maybe even criminal) in others. 

It is also striking to observe that virtually all of the Muslim deaths were the direct or indirect consequence of official U.S. government policy. By contrast, most of the Americans killed by Muslims were the victims of non-state terrorist groups such as al Qaeda or the insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Americans should also bear in mind that the figures reported above omit the Arabs and Muslims killed by Israel in Lebanon, Gaza, and the West Bank. Given our generous and unconditional support for Israel’s policy towards the Arab world in general and the Palestinians in particular, Muslims rightly hold us partly responsible for those victims too.

Contrary to what Friedman thinks, our real problem isn’t a fictitious Muslim “narrative” about America’s role in the region; it is mostly the actual things we have been doing in recent years. To say that in no way justifies anti-American terrorism or absolves other societies of responsibility for their own mistakes or misdeeds. But the self-righteousness on display in Friedman’s op-ed isn’t just simplistic; it is actively harmful. Why? Because whitewashing our own misconduct makes it harder for Americans to figure out why their country is so unpopular and makes us less likely to consider different (and more effective) approaches.

Some degree of anti-Americanism may reflect ideology, distorted history, or a foreign government’s attempt to shift blame onto others (a practice that all governments indulge in), but a lot of it is the inevitable result of policies that the American people have supported in the past. When you kill tens of thousands of people in other countries — and sometimes for no good reason — you shouldn’t be surprised when people in those countries are enraged by this behavior and interested in revenge. After all, how did we react after September 11? 

MOHAMMED SAWAF/AFP/Getty Images

Part 5: Jihad in America, Muslim prime directive…

Islam grows so powerful in Europe; few dare expose its underbelly, its provocative actions, its arcane rituals and its final obsession: submission of all people to Islamic precepts.  Why?  They could get killed in their own country by core Islamic extremists living in Europe.

Peter Wagner wrote, “When talking about “The Religion of Peace,” detractors will point to other verses in the Koran that contradict the hateful ones.  What most people are unaware of is that in Islam there is the “law of abrogation.”

“Basically, when Mohamed or Allah have said something contradictory, and there are lots of those, the last command takes precedence over the earlier command and renders the earlier command null and void.  Since the books of the Koran are not in chronological order one needs to know which command came last.   Much of the “kill the infidel” stuff is the more recent commands.

“Part of the problem with “peaceful Muslims” is that none will repudiate the “kill the infidels” commands of their god and prophet because to do so would make one worse than an infidel with another command by Allah to put the apostate to death.  In fact, “Radical Islamists” are nothing more than true believers doing exactly what Mohammed and Allah are telling them to do.  The “peaceful Muslims” are actually the unbelievers and the Jihadists are the true believers.  Check the ‘murtadd’; it also explains why “peaceful Muslims” won’t condemn the Jihad at Fort Hood. If you want personal proof, when talking to a Muslim, ask them to condemn and repudiate the grossly hateful and kill-the-infidel stuff in the Koran.  You will get some interesting answers.”

Whereas true Christians “turn the other cheek, love their enemies, do unto others…” etc.  True Muslims kill the infidels.  Both are just doing what their god and prophet told them to do.

From two years ago, the six Fort Dix terrorists followed their progression of jihad on America.  They followed the tenets of fundamentalist Islam.  As their numbers grow in America, more fundamentalist Muslims force their way into every sector, every level and every aspect of American society.  Whether by legal means, or violent— they continue on a quest that may take decades.

Muslims, if anything, prove clever.  Those now in the U.S. know their power grows in numbers, and also aware that they are “in competition” with the burgeoning Hispanic-Latino population.   Muslims, therefore, reproduce at a rate that is much higher than other groups in the U.S.

Their methods in the U.S. — use our Constitution to their advantage.  Once they gain outright population power, they intend to revert to Sharia Law.

Fundamental to the obligations of every Muslim are the Five Pillars of Islam.

The “Muslim Nation” works the implementation of Sharia law in France at this moment— where the French have given up on whole city sections in Paris.  They’re working it in Holland. They tried it in Australia, but officials rebuked them.  They will keep pressing until success.

France elected their first non-socialist president in a long time.  The nation of France prepares for an internal war— an insurrection.

Up to one hundred thousand Muslims immigrate (legally and illegally) into the United States annually, now numbering seven to eight million— brought to us by an “Open-Borders” Congress that supports the injection of jihad into this nation.  Most arrive as naturalized citizens, sponsored by relatives already here.   Meanwhile, each Muslim works double-time to increase the Muslim birth-rate in the U.S.

Former President Bush, in 2008, signed a bill (”immigration waiver exception”) to accept 25,000 Iraqi Sunni refugees into America.  President Obama signed another $20.3 million bill to bring in more Muslims from Palestine.  I’ll bet they’re going to make a happy bunch of campers on American soil!

Ignorance in the U.S. electorate is NOT bliss

No one stops them; precious few understand what is going on; no one speaks out.  Given enough time, every American faces jihad within his or her own community.

In 1908, President Teddy Roosevelt said,

“The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing as a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities.”

It will prove interesting when the Muslims spreading from East to West across America meet the reconquista La Raza Mexicans spreading west to east.  Both groups maintain a mission of conquest.  Both sustain a resolve to make America their own.

The Fort Dix Six— signs of things to come.

How can we stop Islam’s conquest of America?  Simple: Stop all immigration from Middle Eastern and African countries immediately.  Anything less equals national suicide.

TOTAL moratorium on all immigration for ten years

On the other hand, if you are one of the tens of millions of Americans that remain oblivious— trusting in the proverbial tooth-fairy— you invite national suicide— right along with the entire Open Borders advocates.

We rush toward an insurrection in the U.S. as the Muslim and Catholic (Hispanic-Latino) powers finalize their plans to confront one another.   My guess; this mess will explode in 2011–2015, after the U.S. Congress district boundaries are thrown into chaos as a result of the 2010 census.

What we choose not to know or deny can hurt us— in fact, kill us.

To turn this mess around, we need urgent and radical actions;

1.  Take total control of our borders, using the U.S.M.C. for seven years.

2.  Construct a world-class PHYSICAL security-fence along our southern border.

3.  Implement a total immigration moratorium, for ten years.

4.  Investigate, prosecute, and punish the criminals who entice and employ foreign-nationals.

5.  Investigate, prosecute, and punish the 630,000 criminal-aliens who have absconded, ignoring lawful orders to submit to deportation.

6.  Investigate, prosecute, and punish the criminals who entice and employ foreign-nationals (the root-cause).

7.  Temporarily double the size and staff of the U.S. District Courts, U.S. Immigration Courts, and the U.S Attorney Offices—and build temporary tent-city jails-prisons along our southern border, with built-in courtroom facilities.

8.  Reinvent the DHS.

9.  Put the U.S. Marshal Service and DOJ-FBI in charge of the DHS-ICE function in the interim.

10. Carefully and thoroughly (10-finger prints and iris scan) add each illegal alien to our NCIC-IAFIS date base as they voluntarily repatriate, and leave the U.S.

11. Put a benevolent leader in the new post of U.S. Immigration Czar.

12. Author a world-class U.S. Immigration Strategic Plan that includes a “U.S. Sustainable Immigration Policy of 100,000 or less annually” after a 10 year moratorium.

13.Aggressively (this is a major, gigantic new-paradigm effort) train & educate U.S. children– “grow-our-own”– to work the high-tech, manufacturing, and agricultural jobs as we emerge from the current “immigration chaos.”

Our nation stands in the cross hairs of cultural and national suicide.  If we continue on our current path, we’re finished as a nation of laws, as a cohesive people, as a language and as a peaceful civilization.

Part 6: treatment of Muslim women by Muslim men.

I reflected during the weekend on our Muslim brothers/sisters, they had their festival(last 27th, 28th) – the remembrance of when a ram was miraculously provided for father Abraham to use in sacrifice instead of his son.

I had to greet a couple of people, neighbors, passers by around me Happy Holidays, Barka de Sala (thats the only Islamic greeting I know). And especially the Muslims, I watched as they went to pray last Friday, and I quite loved the idea that entire families trooped to the prayer ground near my house, decked in new and colorful outfits. It struck me that I didn’t find any Ibo/Igbos among those trooping to the prayer ground. I began to wonder if there are / if there aren’t any Muslims who are Ibos/Igbos, and vice-versa – or perhaps, if there are, and they are not the serious type.

I’ve done a 3–day(Friday, Saturday, Sunday) question and answer and the general conclusion is that the average Ibo/Igbo is a Christian. With the word ‘average’ quite notable, I asked Why?. “They were colonized as Christians and it has continued since then”. “Colonized as Christians” left me wondering if there has been a conscious passing of Christianity from Ibo/Igbo father to son / mother to daughter since ‘colonization’ – much like the story of the house of the Rechabites in the Bible; or perhaps the ‘average Ibo/Igbo’ is just a Christian by default – the typical /average Pastors kid, who is a Christian from the womb. Not that I doubt their(Ibo/Igbo) profession of Christian faith, I was just curious why there are no Islamics among them.

One of my respondents though gave me an answer I didn;t expect: “if you see Ibo wey say he be Muslim, the guy na guy-man, na money hin dey find. Tomorrow, you go find the guy for Church, he go tell you say he be Pastor.”

While I would take the above answer with a grain of salt, I do not suppose there hasn’t been any Ibos/Igbos who have crossed over from Christianity to Islam – just like there are a lot of Muslims who have become Christians among the Yorubas and Hausas. Perhaps there are, who are in the hiding.

Anyway, I would like to gather more information on my above observation: why are there no Ibo/Igbo Muslims?

your comments are appreciated.

Comments

View comments:
1. 4 Bat E Bird says:
   November 30th, 2009 at 2:00 pm

   They want none of that fonduementalism.

   Sorry, I’ll get my coat.

2. 3 yampster says:
   November 30th, 2009 at 1:09 pm

   All those swiss army wives

3. 2 Anorak says:
   November 30th, 2009 at 12:54 pm

   Craters

4. 1 June says:
   November 30th, 2009 at 12:33 pm

   They have holes in their cheese, too - oh those naughty Swiss

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Here’s a big exerpt from the imam’s speech. Watch the entire thing to make sure you’ve got the correct “context”.

Note how he gives as little credit as possible to the Jew - “however small”.

====================================================

I’d like to tell you a very nice story. Once there was a Muslim who lived next to a Jew. The Muslim saw in the Jew a measure of goodheartedness – however small – and he wanted to find any way to make him convert to Islam. So he went to him and asked: “Don’t you feel the need for Islam? Why don’t you become a Muslim?” The Jew said: “The only thing preventing me from becoming a Muslim is that I love drinking alcohol. I would have become a Muslim ages ago, but the only thing stopping me is that I am an alcoholic.”

The Muslim devised a plan. He said: “No problem – become a Muslim, and continue to drink.” The Muslim didn’t meant this, of course, but he said to him: “Become a Muslim, and continue to drink.” The Jews said: “Fine.” He said: “I proclaim that there is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah.” The Muslim said to him: “Now you have become a Muslim. If you drink alcohol, we will carry out the punishment for drinking alcohol on you, and if you renounce Islam, we will kill you.”

Scrambling to contain its fallout, the Swiss government said that the ban was a violation of the right to freedom of religion to all peoples.

“These guarantees are binding on Switzerland under international law,” Widmer-Schlumpf said.

“The fundamental freedom of religion and conscience applies to all religions.”

The Justice Minister stressed that the ban was not a rejection of Swiss Muslims.

“The vote must not lead to mutual distrust,” she said.

“Marginalization and exclusion on the basis of religious and cultural differences would be devastating for an open country such as Switzerland.”

The minister said that the ban could be appealed at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

“We will have to deal with the consequences of a possible decision by the court to approve the appeal,” she said.

The Green Party has already announced that it was considering an appeal against the minaret ban.

Measured Response

Switzerland’s Muslims called for a measured reaction to the minaret ban.

“We need some time to evaluate the situation and look into its future repercussions,” said Maizer.

He warned that a violent reaction to the ban would be useless and counterproductive.

“We call for a responsible response to see where the initiative proponents would go and whether they would seek more restrictions on Swiss Muslims.”

Hani Ramadan, the head of the Islamic Center in Geneva, also called for calm.

“The ban was a big surprise for Switzerland’s Muslims,” he told IOL.

“This requires Muslims to build bridges and seek frank and calm dialogue with fellow Swiss.”

The Swiss leader also called on Muslims worldwide to respond calmly to the ban.

“We urge the Muslim world for calm response in order to help understand the reasons behind the Swiss support for the ban.”

Yousef Abram, a mosque imam in Geneva, echoes a similar call.

“The coming phase will be difficult and Muslim organizations have a lot to do to build bridges with Swiss society.”

Islam is the second religion in Switzerland after Christianity, with Muslims estimated at nearly 400,000.

There are nearly 160 mosques and prayer rooms in Switzerland, mainly in disused factories and warehouses.

Only four of them have minarets, none of them used to raise the Azan, the call to prayer, which is banned.

In the Quran it says: 

4:3 If ye fear that ye shall not be able to deal justly with the orphans, Marry women of your choice, Two or three or four; but if ye fear that ye shall not be able to deal justly (with them), then only one, or (a captive) that your right hands possess, that will be more suitable, to prevent you from doing injustice

Polygamy in practice long before the time of the revelation of the Quran and Islam. Men had multiple wives sometimes as many as up to nine or even twenty. Many people are under the misconception that polygamy began with Islam and Islam gave men permission to more than one wife. At a recent Dawah conference at Masjid At-Taqwah Imam Siraj Wahaj stated that “The Quran gave limits to what was already in practice and made it more just for the women and commanded the men to treat their wives equally.” Stated Imam Siraj. Another question was asked well why give them the permission at all and Imam Siraj stated that “ We as Muslims sometimes do not always question what Allah does but in his divine wisdom prophesied that in the last days there would be one man for every fifty women.” By giving men the limitations or the amount of up to four wives, the Quran also specified the rights that each wife has over her husband. During Pre-Islamic times men who were kings or who were very wealthy treated women like property and had harems. When Islam came into practice it gave women who choose to be in a polygamous marriage their equal rights as well as experience the consequences when they did not strive to treat their wives equally. 

People in Western society often have a negative viewpoint on polygamy in Western society, however before slavery and colonization in West Africa, men had sometimes had multiple wives, and all the children born in a polygamous marriage were all rightful heirs to their father’s property after he died. Even as recent as twenty years ago men had four wives in Ghana West Africa and the children benefited from being able to obtain love and affection from each wife. Brother Umar from Ghana, West Africa grew up in a household were his late father had four wives. He has had many fond memories as a child growing up in such a household. “The beautiful thing about it was that even if my biological mother was not in the house to directly take care of us I had my moms co-wives who would sometimes feed us, bathe us and play with us.” Brother Umar grew up thinking that all the wives at first were blood sisters because since his father treated them all well they got along very well. Later on when he was older and was able to understand the nature of their relationship he noticed a little jealousy amongst the wives. “The jealousy was very subtle though and that is natural.” Brother Umar from his fathers marriage has 25 other siblings with his mother having seven children. The children never wanted for anything and all were able to seek education travel abroad and work or have their own businesses. “In the Quran the mother is the most honored and I had the privilege of having a mother multiplied times four.” He stated with fondness in his heart. 

In Western society men are forced to stay monogamous even if they are able to take care of more than one wife. In the West men sometimes end up in extra martial affairs and have children born out of wedlock. Sometimes the women stay in the marriage even when they discover the affair is going on and their husband will not remain monogamous. Sometimes this is out of love for the husband or fear of financial loss obtained from the marriage. If the laws of Western society allowed men and women to have a choice to have these kind of relationships, men could be open and honest with the wives and let them know before entering the marriage that they are not the monogamous type. Then the woman can have the choice to decide to pursue the relationship or not. With the shortage of men to women, especially with men dying in wars women fear being alone and not having a mate. 

Some women however enter polygamous marriages knowing that they will be able to have time for themselves as a second wife when the husband spends time with the other wife. Sister Hadayai Majeed a dynamic middle aged sister who is the co-founder of the Baitul-Salaam network has been the second wife to her husband for nine years now. She enjoys the time that being a co-wife gives her. “When my husband goes to his first wife for the three days that she is due it gives me the time to spend with other sisters. I can plan trips away from home knowing he is not going to be there.” The only thing she wished she can change is the way that the West views polygamy. “There is a lot of hypocrisy in the West. You are taught to turn your head to a man’s cheating with many women however you are to condemn him for being honest and taking on other wives which actually gives everyone involved the dignity that they deserve. From Sister Hadiyah’s experience in being in a polygamous marriage she advices sisters to evaluate their relationship and know all their rights given to them by Allah in the Quran. “It is always advisable that if your husband approaches you about taking on another wife and you are in agreement with it that he has the other person to take a blood test prior to the marriage.” She stated. She also stated that in Islam there is no compulsion. “The practice of polygamy is not for everyone. No one has to participate in it if they choose not to be a part of a plural marriage. We all have our rights and can make choices that are good for us.” 

Another couple who wished to remain anonymous expressed both the advantages and disadvantages of polygamy. The wife who has been married to her husband for sixteen years. She first met her husband at the age of seventeen and wanted to marry him at that time when she had first taken her Shahadah. Her husband at the time was already married and her mother who was not Muslim did not approve of her marrying. So she later met her husband at the age of twenty-three and has been married to him since then. “The advantages of being in a polygamous marriage is that I get to have my space, I can invite sisters over to spend the night and I get to miss him and prepare for him after the four nights he has been home to his other wife.” Another advantage is that if you have a good co-wife then you can get help with the children and the house hold responsibilities The disadvantage of being in a polygamous marriage is that when I need something from my husband financially, I may have to wait depending on how urgent my co-wife needs are. 

When I asked the husband who is also an Imam of the community about the advantages and disadvantages of polygamy he stated that it can help when you have a business and the wives are talented. “When I was married to the four wives they each helped me with the business, one was good with managing money, the other was good for typing, while the other was able to manage the office.” The disadvantage is that it can be costly and if the wives are not mature then your marriage can be a living hell. The advice that the wife gave to sisters who are entering a polygamous marriage is that “be mindful of the first wives feelings and do not try to take the place of the first wife because it can backfire on you. The husband stated to the brothers “If you are entering a polygamous marriage to boost your ego then I would advise you not to go into it because polygamy is not a joke.” The husband advised that a brother has to be very mature to be in a polygamous marriage.

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