It’s easy to get the impression that the Muslims are less rigorous in upholding religious tolerance than we are.
First two suicide bombers murdered over 80 Christians and wounded 120 more in Peshawar. The explosions came as worshippers were coming out of the church after Sunday mass.
Then another Muslim gang took over a shopping mall in Nairobi and shot in cold blood everyone who wasn’t a Muslim – 62 people in all. Apparently the attack was led by the white widow of another murderer who had blown himself up (alas, along with many others) on 7/7.
To the credit of the Nairobi Muslims they didn’t decide who was and who wasn’t Muslim on looks alone. Instead they gave the eager participants a little quiz, not unlike what one sees on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?.
The salient difference was that there were no lifelines on offer. Answer correctly, and you may live. Don’t, and you die.
We know that exams cause undue stress, but this one must have taken the notion to a whole new level. The questions were designed to test the examinee’s knowledge of Muslim trivia.
One question was “What was the name of Mohammed’s mother?” Clearly anyone who didn’t raise his hand and shout, “Please, Miss! Aminah bint Wahb, Miss!” didn’t deserve to live.
The second question was, “Can you recite any verses from the Koran?” Apparently 62 students failed to answer correctly, possibly because they were distracted by the sound of Kalashnikovs being cocked. Or else they had somehow overlooked this vital aspect of their education.
In case you find yourself in a similar situation, you must do your homework. Now you know the name of Mohammad’s mother, you must, just in case, learn a few verses from the holy book her son dictated. Here’s a random selection for your delectation:
“Slay them [unbelievers] wherever ye find them…” (2:91); “We shall cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve.” (3:151); “Take them [unbelievers] and kill them wherever ye find them. Against such We have given you clear warrant.” (4:91); “The unbelievers are an open enemy to you.” (4:101); “Take not the Jews and the Christians for friends…” (5:51); “Slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them captive, and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush” (9:5); “Whoso fighteth in the way of Allah, be he slain or be he victorious, on him We shall bestow a vast reward.” (4:74); “…If they turn renegades, seize them and slay them wherever ye find them…” (4:89)
This should suffice to get you out of trouble – and perhaps explain why you could find yourself in that kind of trouble to begin with.
What’s also instructive is the reaction of our media to the two carnages. It’s conspicuous that much more prominence was given to the Kenyan carnage than to the Pakistani one. This even though the latter produced more corpses.
I’m sure there must be all sorts of possible explanations for this, but I can think of only one off the top. The Nairobi victims were slaughtered because they weren’t Muslims. The Peshawar ones lost their lives specifically because they were Christians.
In the eyes of our ‘liberal’ media – not that they’d ever say this out loud, not yet anyway – people who go against the grain of public opinion by obstinately sticking to their minority faith have only themselves to blame.
Religion, you see, doesn’t really matter to our ‘liberals’, and they can’t for the life of them understand how others may feel differently. You’re a Christian, I’m a Buddhist, he’s a Taoist, they’re Muslims, what’s the difference? All religions are equally good, which is to say equally irrelevant.
So if by ignoring Ramadan you put yourself in danger, don’t count on us to help you out. If you die as a result of worshipping Jesus Christ, it’s your own silly fault – see if we care.
Now the Nairobi victims weren’t murdered because they espoused a wrong religion. They were massacred because they didn’t espouse Islam.
That calls for much more empathy – after all, our ‘liberals’ don’t espouse Islam either. So the same thing could have happened to them. As to going to Sunday mass, they wouldn’t be caught dead doing that, as it were. So they’re on safe grounds there.
One wonders how many such crimes it’ll take for our opinion formers, and those whose opinions they form, to realise that the problem isn’t Islamist fundamentalism. It’s Islam, tout court.
Quite a few, would be my guess. And then many more for this lot to review their firm stand on multiculturalism and religious tolerance.
As it is, there’s a war to the death under way. Except that one side is fighting it and the other is making well-meaning noises. So who’s going to win? If you don’t know the answer, call a friend at one of our papers.