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Moderate Muslim fails again!Reader comment on item: How the West Could Lose Submitted by Noah Wilk (United States), Mar 21, 2007 at 15:32 Moderate Muslim, is your debating tactic on the challenge of presenting us with a peaceful, happy, tolerant, and free Islamic country simply to throw a dart at a map of the Islamic world, and then write down whatever country you hit, while waiting for the rest of us to shoot your claims down? It seems that way. You clearly have not done a trickle of research, and your latest absurd claims once again force me to take you on a trip to the toolshed. So be it. You first claimed Malaysia and that was shot down utterly and irrefutably. Let's next tackle your claim of Morocco. First a short history lesson. In Morocco in the late 7th century, Islam takes over. Jews are subjected to dhimmitude by the Pact of Omar. In 1140's, Abu Yusuf Ya'qub al-Mansur forces Jews to wear special yellow veil. An account by Solomon Cohen dated January 1148 CE describes the Almohad conquests: "Abd al-Mumin ... the leader of the Almohads after the death of Muhammad Ibn Tumart the Mahdi ... captured Tlemcen [in the Maghreb] and killed all those who were in it, including the Jews, except those who embraced Islam. ... [In Sijilmasa] One hundred and fifty persons were killed for clinging to their [Jewish] faith. ... One hundred thousand persons were killed in Fez on that occasion, and 120,000 in Marrakesh. The Jews in all [Maghreb] localities [conquered] ... groaned under the heavy yoke of the Almohads; many had been killed, many others converted; none were able to appear in public as Jews." In the 1600s, Moulay Rashid forced horrendously high taxes on Jews merely for being Jewish, he burned one Jewish governor and his entire family burned alive to inspire terror in the Jews, and he ordered synagogues torn down. When Yazid took the throne in 1789, Jews were massacred, some were tied to the tails of horses and dragged throuh the city, and female jews were raped. He also imposed a severe tax on the surviving Jews. When Morocco went to war with Spain in 1859, the Muslims plundered the homes of Jews, raped the women, and slaughtered over 400 of them. In 1948, about 265,000 Jews lived in Morocco. riots against Jews broke out when Israel was declared a nation, and now there are only 5,000 8,000 Jews left. So as we can see, Morocco has a history of Islam being genocidal and brutal towards Jews. What about Morocco today? Currently, Morocco's unemployment rate is 12.1% and 19% of them are below the poverty line. They also employ child labor on a massive scale, with over half a million children forced to work. Illiteracy rate is around 50%, with 90% illiteracy in some areas. It belongs to the Arab League, famously anti-semitic and which endorses terror. Criticism of Islam is illegal. Christians cannot prozelytize, nor can they engage in political activity. Homosexuals are targetted as criminals and can face up to 3 years in prison for being gay. Muslim terrorists committed a suicide bombing that killed 45 and injured 100 in 2003. It has a political party called Al Adl wal Ihsane that is pushing for an Islamic Sharia state to replace the monarchy. News media is heavily censored. Hardly a place of education, literacy, prosperity, tolerance, and freedom. Once again your claim is absurd, ignorant, and in denial of reality. Shall we move on to Qatar next? Qatar is the host country of Al Jazeera, the terror-supporting media network and Qatar fully supports Al Jazeera's pro-terror propaganda. Qatar is exclusively Wahabist in its government. Women wear the black abaya gown in keeping with Islamic rule.Religous foreign mission groups are outlawed. Only Christians may rent space to engage in religious services. Other religions can only practice their religion in private homes. No non-Muslim religion is allowed to proselytize to Muslims. Conversion from Islam is still considered apostasy and carries a capital punishment (death sentence). Islamic instruction is compulsory in public schools. Bibles written in Arabic are not allowed. The government generally does not allow policital protests or demonstrations. The government censors and blocks internet access based on political, religious, and pornographic content. They censor news media that is deemed "hostile to Islam". Foreign magazines and newspapers are censored for material critical of Islam, and the Qatari newspapers are mainly owned by members of the ruling family and are censored via internal pressure to avoid anything critical of the ruling family or of Islam in general. Females are not allowed to provide citizenship for foreign spouses, although that rule does not apply towards males. Most corporal punishment prescribed by Sharia law in enacted (even though amputation is not allowed). Professional associations and unions are generally outlawed. No political party or international group critical of Islam or the Qatari government (or any other Arab government) is allowed. Government information is denied to the general public. Foreign domestic servants are subject to rape, torture, and other abuses, but fear reporting it due to retaliation. Foreign domestic servants are often enslaved and not allowed to change jobs or to leave the country. Domestic slavery and sexual slavery of imported girls is commonplace. Many of these foreign (non-citizen) workers are forced to work 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, with few or no holidays, no overtime pay, and no way to redress grievances.This enslavement and abuse of foreign workers is rampant and pervasive in Qatari society. The legal system is tolerant of men who commit assaults against women for "immodesty" or "defiant behavior". Qatar is also directly funding Al Qaeda to the tune of millions of dollars per year (in order to spare the country from attacks, supposedly, but the money is knowingly used to fund attacks in the West). Someone in an article I once read suggested that Qatar stands for "Quietly Aiding Terrorists And Rejoicing", and that statement fits. Once again, hardly what any sane person would consider a tolerant, peaceful, free society. Your claim of Qatar likewise fails the test of reality and thus reveals either your dishonesty on the matter or your ignorance of reality. Finally, let's take a peek at that Islamic paradise known as Mauritania, the Islamic country most well known for its hundreds of thousands of black slaves who serve their Muslim masters. Life expectancy in Muaratania is about 50 -53 years old (depending on which source you use) compared to 77-79 years in the USA. There are no synagogues in Mauratania. Sharia law is the law of the land. Article 11 of the Press Act strictly prohibits the publication of any information that contradicts or criticizes Islam. This law was repealed by the new government (technically), but the suppression continues in reality. Attempts at convert Muslims to non-Musim religions is viewed as undermining society and often entails punishment even though it is not technically legally outlawed. The government restricts the printing,importation, and distribution of Bibles and other non-Islamic material. According to the Development Programme Report on Literacy (2005), Mauratania has half the literacy rate of any Western country. Prison conditions in Mauritania are harsh, rampant with disease, abuse, and torture. Women are still discriminated against in Mauratania. Even today, the testimony of two women is necessary to equal the testimony of one man in court. Courts grant only half the indemnity to families of women who are killed, compared to men. Racism is rampant in Mauratania, with certain people denied access to voting due to skin color. Minimum monthly wage for adults was $77. American kids make more than that working one week part-time at McDonald's! So as is always the case, Moderate Muslim, you've thrown out patheticly absurd examples that are easily shot down. Each of the four countries you have presented so far (Malaysia, Mauratania, Qatar, and Morocco) are rampant with poverty, discrimination, religious intolerance, lack of freedom, low literacy rates, high unemployment rates, low life expectancies, supression of information and education, censorship, support for terrorism, and all the other problems commonly associated with Islamic society. I'll save you the embarrassment of any future attempts to rise to the challenge given to you. There are no peaceful, prosperous, free, tolerant, respectful Muslim countries. All of them are cesspools of intolerance, denial of freedom, denial of education, etc. It's time to face reality and admit that Islam has consistently failed to provide any sort of decent life for its adherents, and that Islamic society is inferior in every way to Western society because it lacks freedom, tolerance, and happiness. Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments". << Previous Comment Next Comment >> Reader comments (2112) on this item
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