LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
ِMarch 14/2011

Bible Of The Day
 Mark 1/35-45: "Early in the morning, while it was still dark, he rose up and went out, and departed into a deserted place, and prayed there. 1:36 Simon and those who were with him followed after him; 1:37 and they found him, and told him, “Everyone is looking for you.” 1:38 He said to them, “Let’s go elsewhere into the next towns, that I may preach there also, because I came out for this reason.” 1:39 He went into their synagogues throughout all Galilee, preaching and casting out demons. 1:40 A leper came to him, begging him, kneeling down to him, and saying to him, “If you want to, you can make me clean.” 1:41 Being moved with compassion, he stretched out his hand, and touched him, and said to him, “I want to. Be made clean.” 1:42 When he had said this, immediately the leprosy departed from him, and he was made clean. 1:43 He strictly warned him, and immediately sent him out, 1:44 and said to him, “See you say nothing to anybody, but go show yourself to the priest, and offer for your cleansing the things which Moses commanded, for a testimony to them.” 1:45 But he went out, and began to proclaim it much, and to spread about the matter, so that Jesus could no more openly enter into a city, but was outside in desert places: and they came to him from everywhere."

Latest analysis, editorials, studies, reports, letters & Releases from miscellaneous sources
Islam and Western Democracies/AINA/March 13/11
Scholar Sheds Light on Christian Persecution/By: Hank Beckman/March 13/11
Canada Welcomes Arab League Resolution on Libya/March 13/11
Canada Condemns Brutal Killing of Five Israelis in West Bank Settlement/March 13/11
An Interview with Lebanon's Prime Minister Najib Mikati/TIME/March 13/11

Latest News Reports From Miscellaneous Sources for March 13/11
Gemayel: We're Not Counting on Foreign Developments, Arms Cannot Last Forever/Naharnet
Geagea: 2nd Cedar Revolution Won't Yield until Hizbullah Disappears/Naharnet
March 14: The Uprising of Dignity is Against Oppression and Assassination/Naharnet
Syria denies sending weapon shipment to Gaddafi/Xinhua
Zahra tells Aoun he won't be sleeping from now on/iloubnan.info
Lebanese mark uprising against Syria's domination/Washington Post
Qadiri says March 14 does not want Hezbollah to surrender/iloubnan.info
Miqati: Changes to Tribunal Should be Done Through Consent of All Lebanese/Naharnet
Aoun: March 14 Luring Hizbullah to Use Weapons Against it/Naharnet
Report: Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades of Imad Mughniyeh Claims Responsibility for Israel Attack/Naharnet
Report: Cabinet Lineup to be Announced in a Few Days as Miqati Receives Arab Support/Naharnet
Indictment Amendment Means its Release Date Will be Delayed/Naharnet
Process to Elect New Patriarch Underway, Predictions that he Will be Elected Today/Naharnet
Pietton: We Will Compare Ministerial Statements of Miqati and Hariri's Governments/Naharnet
Miqati: Changes to Tribunal Should be Done Through Consent of All Lebanese/Naharnet
Report: Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades of Imad Mughniyeh Claims Responsibility for Israel Attack/Naharnet
 

Gemayel: We're Not Counting on Foreign Developments, Arms Cannot Last Forever
Naharnet/Phalange Party leader Amin Gemayel on Friday urged the March 14 forces to "clearly declare" a stance on "the topics of truth and sovereignty, not for vengeance but rather to spare Lebanon further tragedies," stressing that Hizbullah's arms cannot last forever. "We're raising the issue of weapons because we want to preserve the existence of the Lebanese entity, and we hope all Lebanese would realize the meaning of the (March 13) rally, which will represent a broad Lebanese demand for a free, sovereign and independent country," said Gemayel, on the eve of an expected mass rally to commemorate the March 14 anniversary. "The rally will stress the Lebanese people's right to self-determination, in the vein of the recent events in some Arab countries, where people have decided their future," Gemayel added in an interview on MTV. He described Sunday's rally as "part of the major Arab transition towards democracy." "That's why it is an opportunity for everyone to exit the big prison and let no one think that they can impede Lebanon's progress through weapons." Gemayel stressed that the March 14 coalition was not "counting on foreign developments." "We're rather counting on our steadfastness, the thing that truly boosts the confidence of the world in us," he added.
Beirut, 11 Mar 11, 23:17

March 14 Supporters Gather in Beirut in Show of Force Against Hizbullah's Arms
Tens of thousands of March 14
Naharnet/supporters gathered at Beirut's Martyrs Square on Sunday at a rally aimed at sending a message to the Hizbullah-led alliance about the people's rejection of the party's weapons.
An Nahar daily said that scores of people camped at the square after midnight to guarantee a close place near the podium from where March 14 leaders, headed by Caretaker Premier Saad Hariri, will address the crowds. Convoys could be seen across the country heading to the capital, blaring songs and displaying pictures in support of slain ex-Premier Rafik Hariri.
The March 14 leadership has asked demonstrators to carry the Lebanese flag only in hopes for a show of force, six years to the day after the 'Cedar Revolution' protest which the alliance said was the prototype for "peaceful, democratic" change in the Arab world. Hariri visited the square on Saturday night to inspect preparations for the rally. His Future News channel has repeatedly aired a short video in which a Hizbullah member climbs a pole, takes down a Lebanese flag and replaces it with the party's yellow standard. Another clip shows gunmen opening fire on Lebanese troops with the tagline: "We want no army in Lebanon but the Lebanese army." Red billboards urging supporters of the Hariri camp to head downtown on Sunday lined highways across the capital, bearing slogans such as "NO to assassinations," "NO to oppression" and "NO to the rule of arms." Another billboard, which no party has yet claimed responsibility for, has surfaced in the capital, reading: "Israel too wants to topple arms." The rally was held amid a heavy deployment of soldiers and security forces in Beirut neighborhoods and at its entrances to guarantee that the event would be free from violence.(Naharnet-AFP) Beirut, 13 Mar 11, 07:06

Hariri: From Now on, Possession of Arms, Decision of War and Peace Should Only Be under State's Control
Naharnet/Caretaker Prime Minister Saad Hariri criticized on Friday the possession of arms outside the Lebanese state, saying that it's true that those possessing weapons have the power to launch an assault, but those who are just are more powerful than all violence and arms. He said during a speech at Qoreitem: "From now on, the possession of weapons, decision of war and peace, and defending the country should only be under the state's control." "There is no need to remind the silent majority of the criminal incidents these arms have committed in Lebanon," he added. "The Lebanese' decision is only in their hands. The decision of their weapons, is not in their hands, but in the hands of the external forces that provide them with arms, finance and press on them to make the weapons dominate our lives, and control our country, its resources and future," he noted
Hariri stressed: "Justice does not need arms. All it needs is your minds, hearts, and voices. Only fear of the truth needs weapons and only the oppressors will falter without the power of the arms." Addressing the March 8 camp, he asked: "Why do you fear the truth?" in the assassination of former Prime Minister Saad Hariri.
"Those fearing the people finding out the truth fear the people as much as they do the truth," the prime minister said.
"The Lebanese want to live and work in freedom. They share the dreams of all martyrs to achieve freedom without violence and the use of arms," he added.
"The arms will fail before those who broke the wall of fear in 2005 and destroyed what they have been dreaming of for 30 years," he noted.
Addressing the March 13 rally, he said: "You, the Lebanese, will announce to the whole world on Sunday that your dignity and the dignity of your country and your state, your dreams and ambitions, your revolution and your principles that you have defended and paid for with the blood of the martyrs are not available for any deal or trade-off."
Furthermore, Hariri said: "The days of blackmailing us with the Taif Accord are over as we were the first who demanded its implementation and they should remember that it is based on the state having the exclusivity of possessing arms." Addressing the Shiites in Lebanon, he stated: "We are not just partners in the same country because we have been and always will be partners in blood. We have sought reconciliation because no one among us is working against the Shiites."
"The Shiites in Lebanon were the first who rose up against the use of weapons. Didn't Imam Shamseddine forbid the Lebanese from resorting to weapons against their fellow citizens?" he asked. "We commit to Imam Shamseddine's declaration and Imam Sadr's rejection of arms. Don't get carried away with claims and rest assured that no statelet can take the place of the Lebanese state and our democratic system," he continued. Hariri concluded: "Our future is the hostage of the arms and we will declare this on Sunday and continue on saying it until Lebanon is victorious." Beirut, 11 Mar 11, 19:02

Geagea: 2nd Cedar Revolution Won't Yield until Hizbullah Disappears
Naharnet/Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea said at the Cedar Revolution's sixth anniversary on Sunday that the second Cedar Revolution won't succumb until Hizbullah disappears.
Geagea addressed March 14 supporters gathered at Martyrs Square saying: "We only want the Lebanese state to govern; we won't rest until the state within the state concept vanishes and the state is established." "We will not accept for our destiny to remain controlled by someone else, we will not accept for our decisions to be made by parties which reside beyond our borders, we will not accept for our economy to remain paralyzed, we will not accept for our history to remain distorted, and we reject any harm against the Lebanese army," Geagea said.
The LF leader reiterated to the crowds gathered at the square "we are seriously attempting to get the Lebanese out of the swamp … we are attempting to restore life back to normal."
Geagea reassured the Lebanese that the blood of March 14 martyrs will not be wasted, saying "the tribunal, since its establishment, has suffered violent attacks even before it began to show results, in a desperate attempt to stop its work." "Yes to the state alone resisting for all the Lebanese," he said. Beirut, 13 Mar 11, 13:16

Miqati: Changes to Tribunal Should be Done Through Consent of All Lebanese
Naharnet/Premier-designate Najib Miqati has reiterated that the Hizbullah-led alliance did not put preconditions when it nominated him and stressed he wants "to rescue the nation."
He said he did not seek the position. His love for Lebanon forced his hand. "When I saw what was happening in the country, the deadlock, I said it's time to stand. The real motivation is to rescue the nation." "There were no preconditions to my nomination," Miqati told TIME magazine. "If I want to change anything about the process of the tribunal, it has to be done in dialogue and with the consensus of all Lebanese." That may be the case, but members of Hizbullah's coalition certainly expect him to come around to their point of view, said TIME.
"What we want is for him to rescue Lebanon and to protect the resistance from the indictments," said Development and Liberation bloc MP Qassem Hashem. "If the tribunal is targeting the resistance, he will reject the indictments," he said. Beirut, 13 Mar 11, 09:36

Minister Cannon Condemns Brutal Killing of Five Israelis in West Bank Settlement
(No. 97 - March 12, 2011 - 7:45 p.m. ET) The Honourable Lawrence Cannon, Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs, today issued the following statement on the killing of five Israelis, all members of the same family, in the West Bank settlement of Itamar: “Canada strongly condemns this criminal act of terror against the Israeli people,” said Minister Cannon. “The brutal killing of the five Israelis, including children, cannot be justified. “Our sympathies are with the victims’ families and friends and the people of Israel. These heinous acts of terror cannot be tolerated. The murderer must be held accountable, and we hope the Palestinian Authority will cooperate fully in the investigation.”

Canada Welcomes Arab League Resolution on Libya
(No. 98 - March 12, 2011 - 9:25 p.m. ET) The Honourable Lawrence Cannon, Minister of Foreign Affairs, today welcomed the Arab League’s resolution calling for the imposition of a no-fly zone over Libya: “Canada welcomes the decision by the Arab League calling for a no-fly zone over Libya.
“In light of the grave and deteriorating situation in Libya, and Muammar Qadhafi’s reckless disregard for the lives of the Libyan people, this resolution clearly signals that Qadhafi does not have support in the region. He is isolated and ignoring the will of the international community.
“Canada again calls on the Qadhafi regime to cease its appalling attacks on the Libyan people. We reiterate our call that Qadhafi step down immediately.
“Canada will continue to work closely with our like-minded partners to explore the full range of options that might be available to us.”

Islam and Western Democracies
http://www.aina.org/news/20110312194748.htm
3-13-2011 1:47:55
Assyrian International News Agency
September 11 was a wake-up call for me personally. I recognised that I had to know more about Islam.
In the aftermath of the attack one thing was perplexing. Many commentators and apparently the governments of the "Coalition of the Willing" were claiming that Islam was essentially peaceful, and that the terrorist attacks were an aberration. On the other hand one or two people I met, who had lived in Pakistan and suffered there, claimed to me that the Koran legitimised the killings of non-Muslims.
Although I had possessed a copy of the Koran for 30 years, I decided then to read this book for myself as a first step to adjudicating conflicting claims. And I recommend that you too read this sacred text of the Muslims, because the challenge of Islam will be with us for the remainder of our lives - at least.
Can Islam and the Western democracies live together peacefully? What of Islamic minorities in Western countries? Views on this question range from näive optimism to bleakest pessimism. Those tending to the optimistic side of the scale seize upon the assurance of specialists that jihad is primarily a matter of spiritual striving, and that the extension of this concept to terrorism is a distortion of koranic teaching[1]. They emphasise Islam's self-understanding as a "religion of peace". They point to the roots Islam has in common with Judaism and Christianity and the worship the three great monotheistic religions offer to the one true God. There is also the common commitment that Muslims and Christians have to the family and to the defence of life, and the record of co-operation in recent decades between Muslim countries, the Holy See, and countries such as the United States in defending life and the family at the international level, particularly at the United Nations.
Many commentators draw attention to the diversity of Muslim life-sunni, shi'ite, sufi, and their myriad variations-and the different forms that Muslim devotion can take in places such as Indonesia and the Balkans on the one hand, and Iran and Nigeria on the other. Stress is laid, quite rightly, on the widely divergent interpretations of the Koran and the shari'a, and the capacity Islam has shown throughout its history for developing new interpretations. Given the contemporary situation, the wahhabist interpretation at the heart of Saudi Islamism offers probably the most important example of this, but Muslim history also offers more hopeful examples, such as the re-interpretation of the shari'a after the fall of the Ottoman empire, and particularly after the end of the Second World War, which permitted Muslims to emigrate to non-Muslim countries[2].
Optimists also take heart from the cultural achievements of Islam in the Middle Ages, and the accounts of toleration extended to Jewish and Christian subjects of Muslim rule as "people of the Book". Some deny or minimise the importance of Islam as a source of terrorism, or of the problems that more generally afflict Muslim countries, blaming factors such as tribalism and inter-ethnic enmity; the long-term legacy of colonialism and Western domination; the way that oil revenues distort economic development in the rich Muslim states and sustain oligarchic rule; the poverty and political oppression in Muslim countries in Africa; the situation of the Palestinians, and the alleged "problem" of the state of Israel; and the way that globalisation has undermined or destroyed traditional life and imposed alien values on Muslims and others.
Indonesia and Turkey are pointed to as examples of successful democratisation in Muslim societies, and the success of countries such as Australia and the United States as "melting pots", creating stable and successful societies while absorbing people from very different cultures and religions, is often invoked as a reason for trust and confidence in the growing Muslim populations in the West. The phenomenal capacity of modernity to weaken gradually the attachment of individuals to family, religion and traditional ways of life, and to commodify and assimilate developments that originate in hostility to it (think of the way the anti-capitalist counter-culture of the 1960s and 70s was absorbed into the economic and political mainstream-and into consumerism), is also relied upon to "normalise" Muslims in Western countries, or at least to normalise them in the minds of the non-Muslim majority.
Reasons for optimism are also sometimes drawn from the totalitarian nature of Islamist ideology, and the brutality and rigidity of Islamist rule, exemplified in Afghanistan under the Taliban. Just as the secular totalitarian-isms of the twentieth century (Nazism and Communism) ultimately proved unsustainable because of the enormous toll they exacted on human life and creativity, so too will the religious totalitarianism of radical Islam. This assessment draws on a more general underlying cause for optimism, or at least hope, for all of us, namely our common humanity, and the fruitfulness of dialogue when it is entered with good will on all sides. Most ordinary people, both Muslim and non-Muslim, share the desire for peace, stability and prosperity for themselves and their families.
On the pessimistic side of the equation, concern begins with the Koran itself. In my own reading of the Koran, I began to note down invocations to violence. There are so many of them, however, that I abandoned this exercise after 50 or 60 or 70 pages. I will return to the problems of Koranic interpretation later in this paper, but in coming to an appreciation of the true meaning of jihad, for example, it is important to bear in mind what the scholars tell us about the difference between the suras (or chapters) of the Koran written during Muhammad's thirteen years in Mecca, and those that were written after he had based himself at Medina. Irenic interpretations of the Koran typically draw heavily on the suras written in Mecca, when Muhammad was without military power and still hoped to win people, including Christians and Jews, to his revelation through preaching and religious activity. After emigrating to Medina, Muhammad formed an alliance with two Yemeni tribes and the spread of Islam through conquest and coercion began[3]. One calculation is that Muhammad engaged in 78 battles, only one of which, the Battle of the Ditch, was defensive[4]. The suras from the Medina period reflect this decisive change and are often held to abrogate suras from the Meccan period[5].
The predominant grammatical form in which jihad is used in the Koran carries the sense of fighting or waging war. A different form of the verb in Arabic means "striving" or "struggling", and English translations sometimes use this form as a way of euphemistically rendering the Koran's incitements to war against unbelievers[6]. But in any case, the so-called "verses of the sword" (sura 95 and 936)[7], coming as they do in what scholars generally believe to be one of the last suras revealed to Muhammad[8], are taken to abrogate a large number of earlier verses on the subject (over 140, according to one radical website[9]). The suggestion that jihad is primarily a matter of spiritual striving is also contemptuously rejected by some Islamic writers on the subject. One writer warns that "the temptation to reinterpret both text and history to suit 'politically correct' requirements is the first trap to be avoided", before going on to complain that "there are some Muslims today, for instance, who will convert jihad into a holy bath rather than a holy war, as if it is nothing more than an injunction to cleanse yourself from within"[10].
The abrogation of many of the Meccan suras by the later Medina suras affects Islam's relations with those of other faiths, particularly Christians and Jews. The Christian and Jewish sources underlying much of the Koran[11] are an important basis for dialogue and mutual understanding, although there are difficulties. Perhaps foremost among them is the understanding of God. It is true that Christianity, Judaism and Islam claim Abraham as their Father and the God of Abraham as their God. I accept with reservations the claim that Jews, Christians and Muslims worship one god (Allah is simply the Arabic word for god) and there is only one true God available to be worshipped! That they worship the same god has been disputed[12], not only by Catholics stressing the triune nature of God, but also by some evangelical Christians and by some Muslims[13]. It is difficult to recognise the God of the New Testament in the God of the Koran, and two very different concepts of the human person have emerged from the Christian and Muslim understandings of God. Think, for example, of the Christian understanding of the person as a unity of reason, freedom and love, and the way these attributes characterise a Christian's relationship with God. This has had significant consequences for the different cultures that Christianity and Islam have given rise to, and for the scope of what is possible within them. But these difficulties could be an impetus to dialogue, not a reason for giving up on it.
The history of relations between Muslims on the one hand and Christians and Jews on the other does not always offer reasons for optimism in the way that some people easily assume. The claims of Muslim tolerance of Christian and Jewish minorities are largely mythical, as the history of Islamic conquest and domination in the Middle East, the Iberian peninsula and the Balkans makes abundantly clear. In the territory of modern-day Spain and Portugal, which was ruled by Muslims from 716 and not finally cleared of Muslim rule until the surrender of Granada in 1491 (although over half the peninsula had been reclaimed by 1150, and all of the peninsula except the region surrounding Granada by 1300), Christians and Jews were tolerated only as dhimmis[14], subject to punitive taxation, legal discrimination, and a range of minor and major humiliations. If a dhimmi harmed a Muslim, his entire community would forfeit protection and be freely subject to pillage, enslavement and murder. Harsh reprisals, including mutilations, deportations and crucifixions, were imposed on Christians who appealed for help to the Christian kings or who were suspected of having converted to Islam opportunistically. Raiding parties were sent out several times every year against the Spanish kingdoms in the north, and also against France and Italy, for loot and slaves. The caliph in Andalusia maintained an army of tens of thousand of Christian slaves from all over Europe, and also kept a harem of captured Christian women. The Jewish community in the Iberian peninsula suffered similar sorts of discriminations and penalties, including restrictions on how they could dress. A pogrom in Granada in 1066 annihilated the Jewish population there and killed over 5000 people. Over the course of its history Muslim rule in the peninsula was characterised by outbreaks of violence and fanaticism as different factions assumed power, and as the Spanish gradually reclaimed territory[15].
Arab rule in Spain and Portugal was a disaster for Christians and Jews, as was Turkish rule in the Balkans. The Ottoman conquest of the Balkans commenced in the mid-fifteenth century, and was completed over the following two hundred years. Churches were destroyed or converted into mosques, and the Jewish and Christians populations became subject to forcible relocation and slavery. The extension or withdrawal of protection depended entirely on the disposition of the Ottoman ruler of the time. Christians who refused to apostatize were taxed and subject to conscript labour. Where the practice of the faith was not strictly prohibited, it was frustrated-for example, by making the only legal market day Sunday. But violent persecution was also a constant shadow. One scholar estimates that up to the Greek War of Independence in 1828, the Ottomans executed eleven Patriarchs of Constantinople, nearly one hundred bishops and several thousand priests, deacons and monks. Lay people were prohibited from practising certain professions and trades, even sometimes from riding a horse with a saddle, and right up until the early eighteenth century their adolescent sons lived under the threat of the military enslavement and forced conversion which provided possibly one million janissary soldiers to the Ottomans during their rule. Under Byzantine rule the peninsula enjoyed a high level of economic productivity and cultural development. This was swept away by the Ottoman conquest and replaced with a general and protracted decline in productivity[16].
The history of Islam's detrimental impact on economic and cultural development at certain times and in certain places returns us to the nature of Islam itself. For those of a pessimistic outlook this is probably the most intractable problem in considering Islam and democracy. What is the capacity for theological development within Islam?
In the Muslim understanding, the Koran comes directly from God, unmediated. Muhammad simply wrote down God's eternal and immutable words as they were dictated to him by the Archangel Gabriel. It cannot be changed, and to make the Koran the subject of critical analysis and reflection is either to assert human authority over divine revelation (a blasphemy), or question its divine character. The Bible, in contrast, is a product of human co-operation with divine inspiration. It arises from the encounter between God and man, an encounter characterised by reciprocity, which in Christianity is underscored by a Trinitarian understanding of God (an understanding Islam interprets as polytheism). This gives Christianity a logic or dynamic which not only favours the development of doctrine within strict limits, but also requires both critical analysis and the application of its principles to changed circumstances. It also requires a teaching authority.
Of course, none of this has prevented the Koran from being subjected to the sort of textual analysis that the Bible and the sacred texts of other religions have undergone for over a century, although by comparison the discipline is in its infancy. Errors of fact, inconsistencies, anachronisms and other defects in the Koran are not unknown to scholars, but it is difficult for Muslims to discuss these matters openly.
In 2004 a scholar who writes under the pseudonym Christoph Luxenberg published a book in German setting out detailed evidence that the original language of the Koran was a dialect of Aramaic known as Syriac. Syriac or Syro-Aramaic was the written language of the Near East during Muhammad's time, and Arabic did not assume written form until 150 years after his death. Luxenberg argues that the Koran that has come down to us in Arabic is partially a mistranscription of the original Syriac. A bizarre example he offers which received some attention at the time his book was published is the Koran's promise that those who enter heaven will be "espoused" to "maidens with eyes like gazelles"; eyes, that is, which are intensely white and black (suras 4454 and 5220). Luxenberg's meticulous analysis suggests that the Arabic word for maidens is in fact a mistranscription of the Syriac word for grapes. This does strain common sense. Valiant strivings to be consoled by beautiful women is one thing, but to be heroic for a packet of raisins seems a bit much!
Even more explosively, Luxenberg suggests that the Koran has its basis in the texts of the Syriac Christian liturgy, and in particular in the Syriac lectionary, which provides the origin for the Arabic word "koran". As one scholarly review observes, if Luxenberg is correct the writers who transcribed the Koran into Arabic from Syriac a century and a half after Muhammad's death transformed it from a text that was "more or less harmonious with the New Testament and Syriac Christian liturgy and literature to one that [was] distinct, of independent origin"[17]. This too is a large claim.
It is not surprising that much textual analysis is carried out pseudonymously. Death threats and violence are frequently directed against Islamic scholars who question the divine origin of the Koran. The call for critical consideration of the Koran, even simply of its seventh-century legislative injunctions, is rejected out of hand by hard-line Muslim leaders. Rejecting calls for the revision of school textbooks while preaching recently to those making the hajj pilgrimage to Mount Arafat, the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia told pilgrims that "there is a war against our creed, against our culture under the pretext of fighting terrorism. We should stand firm and united in protecting our religion. Islam's enemies want to empty our religion [of] its content and meaning. But the soldiers of God will be victorious"[18].
All these factors I have outlined are problems, for non-Muslims certainly, but first and foremost for Muslims themselves. In grappling with these problems we have to resist the temptation to reduce a complex and fluid situation to black and white photos. Much of the future remains radically unknown to us. It is hard work to keep the complexity of a particular phenomenon steadily in view and to refuse to accept easy answers, whether of an optimistic or pessimistic kind. Above all else we have to remember that like Christianity, Islam is a living religion, not just a set of theological or legislative propositions. It animates the lives of an estimated one billion people in very different political, social and cultural settings, in a wide range of devotional styles and doctrinal approaches. Human beings have an invincible genius for variation and innovation.
Considered strictly on its own terms, Islam is not a tolerant religion and its capacity for far-reaching renovation is severely limited. To stop at this proposition, however, is to neglect the way these facts are mitigated or exacerbated by the human factor. History has more than its share of surprises. Australia lives next door to Indonesia, the country with one of the largest Muslim populations in the world[19]. Indonesia has been a successful democracy, with limitations, since independence after World War II. Islam in Indonesia has been tempered significantly both by indigenous animism and by earlier Hinduism and Buddhism, and also by the influence of sufism. As a consequence, in most of the country (except in particular Aceh) Islam is syncretistic, moderate and with a strong mystical leaning. The moderate Islam of Indonesia is sustained and fostered in particular by organisations like Nahdatul Ulama, once led by former president Abdurrahman Wahid, which runs schools across the country, and which with 30-40 million members is one of the largest Muslim organisations in the world.
The situation in Indonesia is quite different from that in Pakistan, the country with one of the largest Muslim populations in the world. 75 per cent of Pakistani Muslims are Sunni, and most of these adhere to the relatively more-liberal Hanafi school of Islamic jurisprudence (for example, Hanafi jurisprudence does not consider blasphemy should be punishable by the state). But religious belief in Pakistan is being radicalised because organisations, very different from Indonesia's Nahdatul Ulama, have stepped in to fill the void in education created by years of neglect by military rulers. Pakistan spends only 1.8 per cent of GDP on education. 71 per cent of government schools are without electricity, 40 per cent are without water, and 15 per cent are without a proper building. 42 per cent of the population is literate, and this proportion is falling. This sort of neglect makes it easy for radical Islamic groups with funding from foreign countries to gain ground. There has been a dramatic increase in the number of religious schools (or madrasas) opening in Pakistan, and it is estimated that they are now educating perhaps 800,000 students, still a small proportion of the total, but with a disproportionate impact[20].
These two examples show that there is a whole range of factors, some of them susceptible to influence or a change in direction, affecting the prospects for a successful Islamic engagement with democracy. Peace with respect for human rights are the most desirable end point, but the development of democracy will not necessarily achieve this or sustain it. This is an important question for the West as well as for the Muslim world. Adherence to what George Weigel has called "a thin, indeed anorexic, idea of procedural democracy"[21] can be fatal here. It is not enough to assume that giving people the vote will automatically favour moderation, in the short term at least[22]. Moderation and democracy have been regular partners in Western history, but have not entered permanent and exclusive matrimony and there is little reason for this to be better in the Muslim world, as the election results in Iran last June and the elections in Palestine in January reminded us. There are many ways in which President Bush's ambition to export democracy to the Middle East is a risky business. In its influence on both religion and politics, the culture is crucial.
There are some who resist this conclusion vehemently. In 2002, the Nobel Prize Economist Amartya Sen took issue with the importance of culture in understanding the radical Islamic challenge, arguing that religion is no more important than any other part or aspect of human endeavour or interest. He also challenged the idea that within culture religious faith typically plays a decisive part in the development of individual self-understanding. Against this, Sen argued for a characteristically secular understanding of the human person, constituted above all else by sovereign choice. Each of us has many interests, convictions, connections and affiliations, "but none of them has a unique and pre-ordained role in defining [the] person". Rather, "we must insist upon the liberty to see ourselves as we would choose to see ourselves, deciding on the relative importance that we would like to attach to our membership in the different groups to which we belong. The central issue, in sum, is freedom".[23]
This does work for some, perhaps many, people in the rich, developed and highly urbanised Western world, particularly those without strong attachments to religion. Doubtless it has ideological appeal to many more among the elites. But as a basis for engagement with people of profound religious conviction, most of whom are not fanatics or fundamentalists, it is radically deficient. Sen's words demonstrate that the high secularism of our elites is handicapped in comprehending the challenge that Islam poses.
I suspect one example of the secular incomprehension of religion is the blithe encouragement of large scale Islamic migration into Western nations, particularly in Europe. Of course they were invited to meet the need for labour and in some cases to assuage guilt for a colonial past.
If religion rarely influences personal behaviour in a significant way then the religious identity of migrants is irrelevant. I suspect that some anti-Christians, for example, the Spanish Socialists, might have seen Muslims as a useful counterweight to Catholicism, another factor to bring religion into public disrepute. Probably too they had been very confident that Western advertising forces would be too strong for such a primitive religious viewpoint, which would melt down like much of European Christianity. This could prove to be a spectacular misjudgement.
So the current situation is very different from what the West confronted in the twentieth century Cold War, when secularists, especially those who were repentant communists, were well equipped to generate and sustain resistance to an anti-religious and totalitarian enemy. In the present challenge it is religious people who are better equipped, at least initially, to understand the situation with Islam. Radicalism, whether of religious or non-religious inspiration, has always had a way of filling emptiness. But if we are going to help the moderate forces within Islam defeat the extreme variants it has thrown up, we need to take seriously the personal consequences of religious faith. We also need to understand the secular sources of emptiness and despair and how to meet them, so that people will choose life over death. This is another place where religious people have an edge. Western secularists regularly have trouble understanding religious faith in their own societies, and are often at sea when it comes to addressing the meaninglessness that secularism spawns. An anorexic vision of democracy and the human person is no match for Islam.
It is easy for us to tell Muslims that they must look to themselves and find ways of reinterpreting their beliefs and remaking their societies. Exactly the same thing can and needs to be said to us. If democracy is a belief in procedures alone then the West is in deep trouble. The most telling sign that Western democracy suffers a crisis of confidence lies in the disastrous fall in fertility rates, a fact remarked on by more and more commentators. In 2000, Europe from Iceland to Russia west of the Ural Mountains recorded a fertility rate of only 1.37. This means that fertility is only at 65 per cent of the level needed to keep the population stable. In 17 European nations that year deaths outnumbered births. Some regions in Germany, Italy and Spain already have fertility rates below 1.0.
Faith ensures a future. As an illustration of the literal truth of this, consider Russia and Yemen. Look also at the different birth rates in the red and blue states in the last presidential election in the U.S.A. In 1950 Russia, which suffered one of the most extreme forms of forced secularisation under the Communists, had about 103 million people. Despite the devastation of wars and revolution the population was still young and growing. Yemen, a Muslim country, had only 4.3 million people. By 2000 fertility was in radical decline in Russia, but because of past momentum the population stood at 145 million. Yemen had maintained a fertility rate of 7.6 over the previous 50 years and now had 18.3 million people. Median level United Nations forecasts suggest that even with fertility rates increasing by 50 per cent in Russia over the next fifty years, its population will be about 104 million in 2050-a loss of 40 million people. It will also be an elderly population. The same forecasts suggest that even if Yemen's fertility rate falls 50 per cent to 3.35, by 2050 it will be about the same size as Russia - 102 million - and overwhelmingly young[24].
The situation of the United States and Australia is not as dire as this, although there is no cause for complacency. It is not just a question of having more children, but of rediscovering reasons to trust in the future. Some of the hysteric and extreme claims about global warming are also a symptom of pagan emptiness, of Western fear when confronted by the immense and basically uncontrollable forces of nature. Belief in a benign God who is master of the universe has a steadying psychological effect, although it is no guarantee of Utopia, no guarantee that the continuing climate and geographic changes will be benign. In the past pagans sacrificed animals and even humans in vain attempts to placate capricious and cruel gods. Today they demand a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions.
Most of this is a preliminary clearing of the ground for dialogue and interaction with our Muslim brothers and sisters based on the conviction that it is always useful to know accurately where you are before you start to decide what you should be doing.
The war against terrorism is only one aspect of the challenge. Perhaps more important is the struggle in the Islamic world between moderate forces and extremists, especially when we set this against the enormous demographic shifts likely to occur across the world, the relative changes in population-size of the West, the Islamic and Asian worlds and the growth of Islam in a childless Europe.
Every great nation and religion has shadows and indeed crimes in their histories. This is certainly true of Catholicism and all Christian denominations. We should not airbrush these out of history, but confront them and then explain our present attitude to them.
These are also legitimate requests for our Islamic partners in dialogue. Do they believe that the peaceful suras of the Koran are abrogated by the verses of the sword? Is the programme of military expansion (100 years after Muhammad's death Muslim armies reached Spain and India) to be resumed when possible?
Do they believe that democratic majorities of Muslims in Europe would impose Sharia law? Can we discuss Islamic history and even the hermeneutical problems around the origins of the Koran without threats of violence?
Obviously some of these questions about the future cannot be answered, but the issues should be discussed. Useful dialogue means that participants grapple with the truth and in this issue of Islam and the West the stakes are too high for fundamental misunderstandings.
Both Muslims and Christians are helped by accurately identifying what are core and enduring doctrines, by identifying what issues can be discussed together usefully, by identifying those who are genuine friends, seekers after truth and cooperation and separating them from those who only appear to be friends.
NOTES:
[1]. For some examples of this, see Daniel Pipes, "Jihad and the Professors", Commentary, November 2002.
[2]. For an account of how some Muslim jurists dealt with large-scale emigration to non-Muslim countries, see Paul Stenhouse MSC, "Democracy, Dar al-Harb, and Dar al-Islam", unpublished manuscript, nd.
[3]. Paul Stenhouse MSC, "Muhammad, Qur'anic Texts, the Shari'a and Incitement to Violence". Unpublished manuscript, 31 August 2002.
[4]. Daniel Pipes "Jihad and the Professors" 19. Another source estimates that Muhammad engaged in 27 (out of 38) battles personally, fighting in 9 of them. See A. Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad by Ibn Ishaq (Oxford University Press, Karachi: 1955), 659.
[5]. Stenhouse "Muhammad, Qur'anic Texts, the Shari'a and Incitement to Violence".
[6]. Ibid.
[7]. Sura 95: "Then, when the sacred months are drawn away, slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them, and confine them, and lie in wait for them at every place of ambush. But if they repent, and perform the prayer, and pay the alms, then let them go their way; for God is All-forgiving, All-compassionate."
Sura936: "And fight the unbelievers totally even as they fight you totally; and know that God is with the godfearing." (Arberry translation).
[8]. Richard Bonney, Jihad: From Qur'an to bin Laden (Palgrave, Hampshire: 2004), 22-26.
[9]."The Will of Abdullaah Yusuf Azzam", www.islamicawakening.com/viewarticle.php? articleID=532& (dated 20 April 1986).
[10]. M. J. Akbar, The Shade of Swords: Jihad and the Conflict between Islam and Christianity (Routledge, London & New York: 2002), xv.
[11]. Abraham I. Katsch, Judaism and the Koran (Barnes & Co., New York: 1962), passim.
[12]. See for example Alain Besançon, "What Kind of Religion is Islam?" Commentary, May 2004.
[13]. Daniel Pipes, "Is Allah God?" New York Sun, 28 June 2005.
[14]. On the concept of "dhimmitude", see Bat Ye'or, The Decline of Eastern Christianity under Islam: From Jihad to Dhimmitude, trans. Miriam Kochman and David Littman (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, Madison NJ: 1996).
[15]. Andrew Bostom, The Legacy of Jihad: Islamic Holy War and the Fate of Non Muslims (Prometheus Books, Amherst NY: 2005), 56-75.
[16]. Ibid.
[17]. Robert R. Phenix Jr & Cornelia B. Horn, "Book Review of Christoph Luxenberg (ps.) Die syro-aramaeische Lesart des Koran: Ein Beitrag zur Entschlüsselung der Qur'ansprache", Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies, 6:1 (January 2003). See also the article on Luxenberg's book published in Newsweek, 28 July 2004.
[18]. "Hajj Pilgrims Told of War on Islam", www.foxnews.com, 9 January 2006.
[19]. The World Christian Database (http://worldchristian database.org) gives a considerably lower estimate of the Muslim proportion of the population (54 per cent, or 121.6 million), attributing 22 per cent of the population to adherents of Asian "New Religions". On the WCD's estimates, Pakistan has the world's largest Muslim population, with 154.5 million (or approximately 96 per cent of a total population of 161 million). The CIA's World Fact Book (http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook) estimates 88 per cent of Indonesia's population of 242 million is Muslim, giving it a Muslim population of 213 million.
The Muslim proportion of the population in Indonesia may be as low as 37-40 per cent, owing to the way followers of traditional Javanese mysticism are classified as Muslim by government authorities. See Paul Stenhouse MSC, "Indonesia, Islam, Christians, and the Numbers Game", Annals Australia, October 1998.
[20]. William Dalrymple, "Inside the Madrasas", New York Review of Books, 1 December 2005.
[21]. George Weigel, The Cube and the Cathedral: Europe, America and Politics without God (Basic Books, New York: 2005), 136.
[22]. For a sophisticated presentation of the argument of the case for the moderating effect of electoral democracy in the Islamic world, see the Pew Forum's interview with Professor Vali Nasr (Professor of National Security Studies at the US Naval Postgraduate School),"Islam and Democracy: Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan", 4 November 2005, http://pewforum.org/events/index.php?EventID=91.
[23]. Amartya Sen, "Civilizational Imprisonments", The New Republic, 10 June 2002.
[24]. Allan Carlson, "Sweden and the Failure of European Family Policy", Society, September-October 2005.
By Cardinal George Pell
www.energypublisher.com
Cardinal George Pell is the Archbishop of Sydney. This speech was given to a meeting of Legatus, a membership association of American Catholic business owners by Cardinal George Pell of Australia on the theme of Islam and its challenge to the Christian Church and the world.
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Scholar Sheds Light on Christian Persecution
By Hank Beckman
http://napervillesun.suntimes.com
 3-13-2011
Assyrian International News Agency
With the only Christian in Pakistan's government murdered outside his mother's home, Coptic Christian churches being burnt in Egypt, and Iraq's Christian population reduced by about half of its 1.4 million total of 25 years ago, the future for many Christians in the Muslim world looks at best uncertain.
Dr. Walid Phares wants the Chicago area to be aware of the ongoing persecution and Saturday stressed the unknowns of the political situation in many countries in the region. He is particularly anxious about what type of government might replace any overturned regimes.
"Are they really going to be democratic?" Phares asked. "Will they give rights to minorities … will they be better or worse?"
Phares was the keynote speaker at "The Persecuted Church: Christian Believers in Peril in the Middle East."
The daylong conference was sponsored by the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America, and held at the Double Tree Guest Suites in Downers Grove.
Phares, born in Beirut, is an attorney and Ph.D. holder who teaches at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C., has authored several books on the Middle East, and serves as an adviser to both the Homeland Security Administration and the U.S. House Anti-Terrorism Caucus.
Phares called for a concerted effort to bring awareness to Americans of the plight of Christians and other minorities in the Middle East, joking that he would call it, "The Chicago Initiative."
Phares outlined the modern history of the region, asking why so many other regions had agitated for freedom in the last generation -- he noted democracy movements in Europe, Latin America and South Africa -- while so many Middle Eastern people still lacked basic freedoms. "It has to do with policy," he said, stressing that decision makers were often subject to bad advice, advice informed by substandard education about the Middle East in American universities.
Phares noted that money donated to American universities from Middle Eastern sources, particularly from Iran and Saudi Arabia, misinformed education about the region, saying the money came "with strings attached."
He also faulted the American media for failure to report on the plight of Christians and other minorities in the region, saying media tended to view any conflict in the area through the lens of the ongoing Arab-Israeli conflict.
While he listed several areas where Christians suffered persecution in the region, he singled out Iraq, noting that as a country that has direct U.S. influence, we had "an obligation to help provide protection for Iraqi Christians … they are in direct and clear danger of destruction."
The event began at 9 a.m. with individual testimonies from witnesses to the persecution of Christians in the region.
Particularly vivid were the accounts of attacks on Coptic Christians in Egypt, including the recent arson to St. George Church and the destruction of homes in the Christian community. "We are definitely disappointed and disheartened," said Dr. Refaat Abdel-Malek, a prominent member of the Chicago Coptic Christian community. He stressed that the Egyptian police "sort of disappeared all of a sudden" when the attacks occurred. "That all happened with the army in front of the church watching," Abdel-Malek said.
Kamal Ibrahim, also a Coptic activist, framed the problem as one of the governing philosophy of Egypt. "We need to think of their constitution," he said, noting that there has been no mention of the section of the Egyptian constitution that mandates the primacy of Islam. "We need to look at a new constitution."
Speaking of the young people of Egypt and the way they stood up to the Mubarak regime, Ibrahim did offer a glimmer of hope. "That was so powerful and I'm proud of them," he said.
Juliana Taimoorazy is an Assyrian Christian who immigrated to the United States from Iraq. She noted that persecution of Assyrian Christians had been a regular feature of the region since the rise of Islam and had become worse since the fall of Saddam Hussein.
She pointed out that the United States government had "yet to establish a policy" to protect the Iraqi Christians.
Taimoorazy bristled at the notion that Assyrian Christians were minorities in Iraq, saying, "We are the indigenous people of that country."
Kitty Weiner represented Congressman Peter Roskam, R-Wheaton, and pointed out the diversity of the audience of almost 400 people. "Look at all the different cultures that are in this room," she said.
After lunch, a panel discussion included several Christian leaders. Some of them were more optimistic than others about the prospects for Christians to live peacefully in their ancestral homelands.
Dr. Carl Moeller of Open Doors USA noted that a recent PEW Research poll showed strong majorities of the Egyptian people favored death penalties for apostasy from Islam and stoning for adulterous women. "If we have democracy, what kind of government will be produced?" he asked.
But Todd Nettleton, media director for The Voice of Martyrs, detected a ray of hope. "Democracy can lead to more Islam but Islam may lead to Christianity," he said.
As evidence he noted that, even with Islam seemingly on the rise in many of the regions undergoing unrest, interest about Christianity is also peaking among young people in the Middle East.
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An Interview with Lebanon's Prime Minister Najib Mikati
By Nicholas Blanford / TIME
Beirut Sunday, Mar. 13, 2011
In an atmosphere of revolutionary change in the region, TIME spoke to Lebanon's new prime minister Najib Mikati about the challenges of governing his fractious nation. Mikati, who is a Sunni Muslim (all Lebanese premiers are) and also the richest man in the country, was interviewed by Nicholas Blanford.
TIME: Standing for the Lebanese premiership would appear to be a thankless task given the political divisions within the country and the poor state of the economy, so what motivated you to seek the premiership?
Mikati:The real motivation is to rescue the nation. It wasn't my intention to submit my candidacy but when I saw what was happening in the country, where we are going, the deadlock, I said it's time to stand. Do I have any personal agenda for myself? Do I want anything for myself? What I'm trying to do is save and rescue the country if I can and I'm doing my best to do it.
You were able to win the nomination as prime minister after you secured the backing of the powerful Hizballah. Did Hizballah place any demands upon you before agreeing to nominate you?
There were no preconditions to my nomination. I am looking at the interest of Lebanon on the level of the international community and [on] the domestic [level] and [for] the safety and unity of Lebanon.
Did you have any misgivings about standing especially as many Sunnis believed that Saad Hariri, as the paramount Sunni leader, was the rightful premier? [In Lebanon, tradition decrees that prime ministers are drawn from the Sunni sect.]
It was not a matter of concern [for me], but I put in [my] mind what the Sunni community wants. They want stability in the country and no impunity for the killers of the late Rafik Hariri and ? others. I know what the Sunni community wants. I am saying "wait, don't prejudge [me], see [my] actions?
Hariri's coalition government was toppled when the Hizballah-led opposition ministers resigned en masse. That has left some Sunnis unhappy that the Shi'ites of Hizballah brought down a Sunni prime minister and risks aggravating sectarian tensions.
It's true [that Hizballah brought down the Hariri government] but it was purely constitutional. If one third of the ministers resign, the government resigns and that's what happened. We cannot blame anybody. It's a game and it applies to everybody.
(See why Sunnis swear their allegiance to Mikati.)
Your critics say that you are Hizballah's puppet.
Najib Mikati is an independent politician. They know my history. I believe in the stability of my country. I believe in unity. We have to look to the well-being of the Lebanese citizens and create prosperity in the country and you can't create prosperity without stability.
Will you seek to improve Lebanon's relations with Syria once your government has been formed?
Definitely? One of my first intentions is to improve relations with Syria. Not just to improve but to maintain good relations with all countries.
With Iran too?
Definitely, we will have very good relations with Iran too. Why not? As I'm looking to have very good relations with the United States. That's Lebanon — we cannot afford not to have good friends all over the world.
There is some skepticism internationally that you will be allowed to run the country independently of the influence of Syria and Iran. How can you reassure the international community that Lebanon will not become a satellite of Syria and Iran?
My agenda is not to reassure anybody outside Lebanon. My agenda is to reassure the Lebanese that we are serious [about] going into teamwork for the good of Lebanon.
The Hariri government implicitly enshrined Hizballah's right to bear arms by stating that Lebanon has the right to recover occupied land through any means, including resistance. What stance will your government take on Hizballah's arms?
Exactly the same as the previous government. The same formulation.
You have said that you will honor all United Nations resolutions, including U.N. Security Council Resolution 1757 which established the Special Tribunal for Lebanon. Does that mean that you will not seek to cancel the protocol between Lebanon and the U.N. Security Council thereby terminating Lebanon's cooperation with the tribunal?
We cannot cancel any tribunal. Whatever exists exists.
You cannot cancel the tribunal, but you could possibly annul the protocol defining Lebanon's cooperation with the tribunal. Will you do so?
If I want to change anything about the process of the tribunal related to Lebanon, it has to be done in dialogue and with the consensus of all Lebanese.
All Lebanese.
It is said that you are obliged to end Lebanon's cooperation with the tribunal as payment for the endorsement of your nomination as prime minister by Hizballah and its allies.
They say that because the other parties always want to prejudge me. I don't want to go into [this] unfruitful "you say," "I say," "you say," "I say." Judge my actions.
But if you do not end cooperation with the tribunal, perhaps you will suffer the same fate as your predecessor, Saad Hariri, and face the collapse of your government.
If I see that I'm not saving the country to the best of my ability, I will step down.
What is your assessment of the upheavals we are witnessing around the region?
So far it's not so clear. Is it the changing of a regime or something else [bigger] coming in the future? We need time to see how these countries are going to face — real democracy. Are they capable of making a real democracy? Or will whoever is chosen create this republican monarchy again [e.g., a president passing on the title to a son]?
What impact do you think the revolts in the Arab world will have on Lebanon?
Lebanon is the only place where you have an ex-president, an ex-prime minister, an ex-[parliamentary] speaker — so the process of democracy is well maintained and I don't see any problems for Lebanon at this stage.