Jastor,

I have no doubt that the reluctance to use the term Islamic terrorist (or in some cases just to use the word terrorist) is the modern day version of Orwell's Newspeak. I also think that the attempt to discover something about Islam on the basis of Islamic terrorism is about as valid as asserting some truth about Second Temple era Judaism based on the terrorism of the Sicarii.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sicarii 

The simple fact of the matter is that Islam has elements that encourage terrorism and condemn terrorism, just as Christianity has elements of hatred for Jews and love for Jews. I'm sure that Baruch Goldstein and Yigal Amir based their murderous acts on elements within Judaism just as a founder of Gush Emunim Rabbi Froman supports peace with the Palestinians based on his Jewish beliefs.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menachem_Froman 

The point is not the belief system but how and what people select from it to justify their acts. 

Look, when I go to the supermaket on Tuesday, I buy milk and veges and on Thursday I buy chicken. On neither day do I buy beer unless it is during the summer months. You cannot explain why I buy the things I buy on the basis that the supermarket offers them. And if I can't find what I want at that supermarket, I go to another. Terrorists take from the belief systems what they need to justify their acts. The belief systems don't cause their acts.

Habesor

I can easily reword the title of the thread and it would be befitting:

"Abusing language to squelch debate about terror in the name of Democracy"

I think some politicians and their parrots eat mind controlling substances in their food. Face expressions are perfect, the body language faultless.. If we all ate parrot food we'd even believe things they say.

Terror in Libya at the moment in the name of Democracy brought by US and NATO.

Terror in Syria at the moment and according to opposition who alone tell truth on which UN relies it is Assad killing its citizens. Opposition is too busy feeding parrot food to the Democratic western world. Bush ---oh, no, Assad, should be charged for human rights violations.

 Democracy is opium of the masses.

Jastor,

I am operating under a time constraint so I will limit my response to two things. First, me buying beer is never a random act, but I can't say as much about some people's impulse buying.

Second, you wrote:

"I can't believe that you would disagree that the Hamas Charter proves that when they fire missiles from Gaza into Israeli civilian areas it is not a random act like your shopping for beer. It is very much a direct result of their ideology that the Jewish state must be destroyed at all costs and that Jewish lives mean nothing in the face of their understanding of Islamic ideology. 

If so, isn't it clear that ideology drives them?"  

Ironically it was reading the Hamas charter that started me questioning the role of Islam as a motivating element of Hamas terrorism. The pattern of the Hamas charter is to quote some element of Islamic writing, such as a Hadith or the Koran and then explain it in a way that justifies their politics. However, they had a problem in that they wanted to make the war against the Jews take on universal importance by making the Jews the source of all evil in the world. There was nothing (apparently) in Islamic sources which could justify this idea so they went out shopping in other belief systems and found the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a nice Christian European source and quoted that in their Charter.

Now contemplate that for a moment, Jastor. A supposedly fundamentalist Islamic movement, which rejects everything modern and Western, basing a fundamental truth on a Christian European ideological source. If the Hamas are driven by Islam, why do they need to go to a Christian European source for motivation and justification. Could it be that Islam does not offer such a justification and that is why these Islamic fundamentalists, who want to purify Islam from all Western pollution dipped so deeply  into this particular European sewer to justify themselves. And if so, how can we argue that it is Islam which motivates them.

Habesor     

Mar 30, 2012 -- 1:06AM, habesor wrote:

Jastor,

I am operating under a time constraint so I will limit my response to two things. First, me buying beer is never a random act, but I can't say as much about some people's impulse buying.

Second, you wrote:

"I can't believe that you would disagree that the Hamas Charter proves that when they fire missiles from Gaza into Israeli civilian areas it is not a random act like your shopping for beer. It is very much a direct result of their ideology that the Jewish state must be destroyed at all costs and that Jewish lives mean nothing in the face of their understanding of Islamic ideology. 

If so, isn't it clear that ideology drives them?"  

Ironically it was reading the Hamas charter that started me questioning the role of Islam as a motivating element of Hamas terrorism. The pattern of the Hamas charter is to quote some element of Islamic writing, such as a Hadith or the Koran and then explain it in a way that justifies their politics. However, they had a problem in that they wanted to make the war against the Jews take on universal importance by making the Jews the source of all evil in the world. There was nothing (apparently) in Islamic sources which could justify this idea so they went out shopping in other belief systems and found the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a nice Christian European source and quoted that in their Charter.

Now contemplate that for a moment, Jastor. A supposedly fundamentalist Islamic movement, which rejects everything modern and Western, basing a fundamental truth on a Christian European ideological source. If the Hamas are driven by Islam, why do they need to go to a Christian European source for motivation and justification. Could it be that Islam does not offer such a justification and that is why these Islamic fundamentalists, who want to purify Islam from all Western pollution dipped so deeply  into this particular European sewer to justify themselves. And if so, how can we argue that it is Islam which motivates them.

Habesor     

First, I don't think they cited the Protocols to find a justification they did not have on their own, but to show that -- hey, look even the Christian world thinks these Jews are seeking world domination. 

There are many other things in the Hamas Charter, based entirely on Islamic teachings that they use to justify their actions. E.g. it says that after the Muslims conquered the Middle East after the last of the crusades the land became "sanctified" as Muslim land. Therefore, any non-Muslims who try to settle there independent of Islamic rule are valid targets of jihad. And by jihad they mean the Islamic equivalent of crusade, which has a long histsory and includes violence of all sorts, no long term peace treaties, only hudnas to regain strength to carry on the crusade/jihad, etc. Hamas and the current day Islamists did not make up these ideas. Maimonides himself was a victim of them in the form of the Almohads. 

In short, even if you eliminate from the Hamas Charter the reliance upon the Protocols you have many other Islamic writings and traditions that they rely on to justify violence, oppression, conquest and all the other lovely things the world has come to equate with their brand of Islamism. 

The Charter of Allah: The Platform of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas)

“In the Name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate You are the best community that has been raised up for mankind. Ye enjoin right conduct and forbid indecency; and ye believe in Allah. And if the People of the Scripture had believed, it had been better for them. Some of them are believers; but most of them are evil-doers. They will not harm you save a trifling hurt, and if they fight against you they will turn and flee. And afterward they will not be helped. Ignominy shall be their portion wheresoever they are found save [where they grasp] a rope from Allah and a rope from man. They have incurred anger from their Lord, and wretchedness is laid upon them. That is because they used to disbelieve the revelations of Allah, and slew the Prophets wrongfully. That is because they were rebellious and used to transgress.” Surat Al-Imran (III), verses 109-111

Articles of the Hamas Charter

Article One: 
The Islamic Resistance Movement draws its guidelines from Islam; derives from it its thinking, interpretations and views about existence, life and humanity; refers back to it for its conduct; and is inspired by it in whatever step it takes.

Article Two: 
The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the wings of the Muslim Brothers in Palestine. The Muslim Brotherhood Movement is a world organization, the largest Islamic Movement in the modern era. It is characterized by a profound understanding, by precise notions and by a complete comprehensiveness of all concepts of Islam in all domains of life: views and beliefs, politics and economics, education and society, jurisprudence and rule, indoctrination and teaching, the arts and publications, the hidden and the evident, and all the other domains of life.

Article Five: 
As the Movement adopts Islam as its way of life, its time dimension extends back as far as the birth of the Islamic Message and of the Righteous Ancestor. Its ultimate goal is Islam, the Prophet its model, the Qur’an its Constitution. Its special dimension extends wherever on earth there are Muslims, who adopt Islam as their way of life; thus, it penetrates to the deepest reaches of the land and to the highest spheres of Heavens.

Article Six: 
The Islamic Resistance Movement is a distinct Palestinian Movement which owes its loyalty to Allah, derives from Islam its way of life and strives to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine. Only under the shadow of Islam could the members of all regions coexist in safety and security for their lives, properties and rights. [i.e. dhimmitude or death]

Article Seven:

Hamas has been looking forward to implement Allah’s promise whatever time it might take. The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! there is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him! This will not apply to the Gharqad, which is a Jewish tree (cited by Bukhari and Muslim).

Article Eight: 
Allah is its goal, the Prophet its model, the Qur’an its Constitution, Jihad its path and death for the case of Allah its most sublime belief.

Article Eleven: 
The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that the land of Palestine has been an Islamic Waqf throughout the generations and until the Day of Resurrection, no one can renounce it or part of it, or abandon it or part of it. No Arab country nor the aggregate of all Arab countries, and no Arab King or President nor all of them in the aggregate, have that right, nor has that right any organization or the aggregate of all organizations, be they Palestinian or Arab, because Palestine is an Islamic Waqf throughout all generations and to the Day of Resurrection. Who can presume to speak for all Islamic Generations to the Day of Resurrection? This is the status [of the land] in Islamic Shari’a, and it is similar to all lands conquered by Islam by force, and made thereby Waqf lands upon their conquest, for all generations of Muslims until the Day of Resurrection. 

Article Fifteen: 
When our enemies usurp some Islamic lands, Jihad becomes a duty binding on all Muslims. In order to face the usurpation of Palestine by the Jews, we have no escape from raising the banner of Jihad. This would require the propagation of Islamic consciousness among the masses on all local, Arab and Islamic levels. We must spread the spirit of Jihad among the [Islamic] Umma, clash with the enemies and join the ranks of the Jihad fighters. The ‘ulama as well as educators and teachers, publicity and media men as well as the masses of the educated, and especially the youth and the elders of the Islamic Movements, must participate in this raising of consciousness.

Article Eighteen
The women in the house and the family of Jihad fighters, whether they are mothers or sisters, carry out the most important duty of caring for the home and raising the children upon the moral concepts and values which derive from Islam; and of educating their sons to observe the religious injunctions in preparation for the duty of Jihad awaiting them.