They have now started to wake up to the fear that al-Qaeda-linked rebels from the frontier could take over their nation.

The killings happened in Hangu district, in North West Frontier Province, about two hours drive from the regional capital Peshawar. The punishment was administered by a local group of the Pakistani Taliban, the Islamic militia which has swept across the NWFP towards the capital Islamabad.

Last week, the Taliban had reached within 60 miles of Islamabad, in Buner district. Their takeover sparked panic in the West, which was already appalled by a peace deal that the government had signed this month with Taliban in adjacent the Swat valley.

In an extraordinary move, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, called on the people of Pakistan to defy their government, saying they "need to speak out forcefully against a policy that is ceding more and more territory to the insurgents".

The Taliban had agreed a withdrawal, in the last couple of days, to their stronghold of Swat. That will scarcely make the government and elite in the capital Islamabad feel much safer, as Swat is only 100 miles from them.

"The Taliban are steady and confident, the government is weak and faltering," said Pervez Hoodbhoy, a professor at Islamabad's Quaid-e-Azam University and one of Pakistan's leading intellectuals.

"A Taliban victory will enslave our women, destroy Pakistan's rich historical and cultural heritage, make education and science impossible, and make the lives of its citizens impossibly difficult. Some are already contemplating an exodus."

Pakistan today stands on a knife-edge, threatened with anarchy. The desperate deal signed with the Taliban in Swat looks set to fall apart. The result will almost certainly be violence. An army convoy heading into Swat on Saturday morning was stopped by the Taliban and forced to turn back, in a naked display of their power.

They seem to have been only emboldened by the peace agreement. Many believe that a bloody military operation now looks inevitable,

For those in areas falling under Taliban control, their harsh rule is terrifying.

An SOS text message sent out on Friday by a terrified local resident, in an area of Swat called Bahrain, says that the Taliban have established total control. Asking not be named for fear of reprisal, he said that they have set up check posts at the entrance to Bahrain, from where they kidnap those they want, including young women.

"They've even warned the local schools to close the girl classes or face dire consequences. Yet the government says its writ is in Swat."

Another Swat resident said: "Every day I see armed Taliban move around freely. At the time of prayer, if they see anyone in his shop or walking about, they whip him with a stick."

The Pakistani Taliban, a copy of the Afghan extremist movement, have long controlled the tribal area along the Afghan border, which is a sanctuary for militants, including al-Qaeda. But it is their march into the heart of the country that has horrified ordinary Pakistanis, and the wider world. And the threat comes not just from the Taliban to the west. Islamic extremists, who are not part of the Taliban, are already entrenched in Islamabad and across the Punjab, the most populous province, seemingly ready to surface when their moment comes.

Islamabad's defences are being hurriedly fortified, with paramilitary troops stationed on the Margalla Hills, which overlook the city from the West. In the capital, there are thousands of followers of the radical Red Mosque, where there are now open calls for Islamic revolution at the weekly Friday prayers.

"The Taliban will not stop at Swat. They will come towards Islamabad," said Hasan Askari Rizvi, a military analyst based in Lahore. "If the army is to take action against them, it is going to be a really bloody battle. And then civil government will be knocked out."

"Extremist groups based in Islamabad will move from within and they (Taliban) will build pressure from outside."

The footage Pakistanis have been watching shows them what they could expect.

A local journalist was invited to witness the execution, who filmed it with his mobile phone for a Pakistani channel, Dawn News. The Sunday Telegraph is showing the footage in the West for the first time.

There were no names for the two victims.

"Using the media is part of their (the Taliban's) psychological warfare," said Imtiaz Gul, chairman of Centre for Research and Security Studies, an independent think tank in Islamabad. "This way, they inject fear into the minds of people who might oppose them, keeping the majority silent."

After the couple were shot, the family were told to take their bodies away for burial. The punishment was administered by a local group of the Pakistani Taliban linked to warlord Baitullah Mehsud. Telegraph

Ragavan: Another major reason for the LTTE’s demise is its bid for sole representation and, to that end, the banning of all Tamil political parties and killing of all other likeminded political leaders and cadres, thereby estranging large sections of the population.

Ragavan: The LTTE does not encourage political discussion, and is intolerant of criticism internally and externally. A case in point is when, in 2004, the LTTE was unable to amicably resolve disagreements between Velupillai Prabhakaran and ‘Karuna’, the top Eastern commander. This led to Karuna’s defection, and consequently brought the whole Eastern Province under government control.

Nirmala: To add further, army reports have surfaced revealing that some of the military’s most effective informants were former members of the LTTE who faced internal repression and left the organization. One could not easily escape and survive the LTTE’s hunting-down, and so the defectors would surrender to the army for protection.

The army gained considerable advantage in 1993 when the military leader ‘Mahattaya’, along with 600-800 of his cadres, was murdered following a rift between Prabhakaran and Mahattaya. Because of internal developments, and the internecine warfare between Tamil militant groups, and because of the way the LTTE clamped down on Tamil society and took total control of the Tamils, many people began to have doubts. The struggle has completely sapped the energy of the Tamil people. They have even forgotten why they started this struggle. They have had enough. To go back to the LTTE’s rapid collapse, what are the external factors, and how do we weigh them against the internal factors?

Nirmala: Post-11 September 2001, the LTTE was proscribed by many of the Western countries. But despite the ban, the 2002 peace talks gave them legitimacy, and meanwhile no significant reduction in their activities was observed. The LTTE just set up front organizations and continued with its regular course of action. But eventually, the increased surveillance weighed down on the Tigers, especially given their heavy reliance on the economic power base of the Diaspora in the West. And in the US, Britain, France and other countries, there were coordinated arrests of LTTE officers. This disabled them logistically, to a certain extent.

On the other hand, the Sri Lankan State has really benefited from the ‘war on terror’ rhetoric, using it as a convenient cover for its campaign against the LTTE. Aside from some noise about civilian suffering and casualties, this has been executed with the tacit support of the international community.

Nirmala Rajasingam: A number of militant groups came into being in the 1970s, during the period preceding the promulgation of the Prevention of Terrorism Act. What factors led their rise?

Nirmala: Sri Lanka has been wracked by its colonial legacy of ethnic conflict. Indeed, the seeds of division and ethnic antipathies and animosity were germinated during the colonial period itself. Despite claims of long histories of intractable ethnic conflict, this is very much a conflict of modern origin. Right at the moment of Independence, the Sri Lankan state became a majoritarian state, with a government of elite leadership.

Soon after that, we see a coming-together of a new array of forces, of lower-middle class and middle-class teachers, clerks, traders and Buddhist monks in the south questioning the elite leadership and deciding that this is the time to overthrow the colonial legacy and come into their own. The movement culminated in the 1956 general election. What followed from the 1950s onwards was the burgeoning of a virulent form of Sinhala Buddhist nationalism, and the passing of a series of discriminatory legislation against minorities and Tamils in particular.

The Sinhala Only Act was passed in 1956; the Republican Constitution was adopted in 1972, giving Buddhism a place of privilege in the constitution while removing the protection that was afforded minorities in the previous constitution; and immediately afterwards, the infamous policy of standardization of marks for university admissions was also implemented in 1972, which Tamils found to be discriminatory. This came alongside colonization attempts that had begun in the 1950s in the Eastern Province, where a lot of Tamils lived, radically altering the local demography and reducing Tamil and Muslim representation in Parliament. Non-violent protests by Tamil parliamentarians and their supporters were responded to with periodic violence by the state, throughout this period.

In my opinion, the minority leadership did not quite understand the forces driving this Sinhala nationalism. Therefore, rather than build a strong grass roots democratic movement, the minority leaders felt that their problems could be fixed by going into deals with the political leadership at the Centre, thereby securing concessions for their communities. The standard official narrative of Tamil nationalism will always tell us that the Tamil leadership waged a decades-long democratic struggle against the Sri Lankan state before giving way to the militant movement. I believe this to be incorrect. The militarisation of the movement started not as a result of exhausting methods of protracted democratic struggle, but as a response to the 1972 standardisation of marks referred to earlier.

This affected a miniscule percentage (about 0.01 percent) of the Sri Lankan population - the Jaffna and Colombo Tamil middle-class and upper-class youth. Years of poor economic conditions during the 1960s and 1970s prompted the first JVP (Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna) insurrection of mostly poor and rural Sinhala youth. Following its merciless putdown by the then government, the policy of standardization was set forth to placate anti-government sentiment in the south.

This policy required Tamils to have higher marks for acceptance into university, which marginalized Tamil youths who looked to university education as a means to secure employment in the state sector. The perceived discrimination catalyzed the taking-up of arms by select middle- and lower-middle-class Tamil youth of Jaffna, initially. Recruitment of people from the poorer sections of the Tamil community into the militant movement happened afterwards.

Because of the narrow class composition of the movement’s leadership, many marginalized groups - Muslims, Up-country Tamils, Dalits, Tamils who hailed from the Eastern Province and the Vanni - were alienated and excluded from the so-called ‘Tamil nation’. While the ‘bourgeois’ struggle waged on, Sinhala Buddhist nationalism responded with violence, through periodic government-instigated pogroms against the Tamils. It was after the Black July killings of 1983 that Tamil militancy mushroomed.

Is there a legitimacy for Tamil nationalism devoid of the LTTE? If not, can we think of a political solution outside the nationalist framework?

Ragavan: We need to look at it differently, because this nationalistic framework will only alienate people further. Tamils constitute 12 percent of Sri Lanka’s population, and they have to join hands with the other minorities. Tamil nationalism that does not take into account the regional religious and economic differences will not be able to reconcile itself with these broad alliances. Without the support of the Sinhala progressives and other non-Sri Lankan Tamil minority groups, Tamils cannot take their struggle forward anymore.

Nirmala:I am rather keen to turn my back on Tamil nationalism. It is counter-productive and destructive to respond to Sinhala Buddhist nationalism using the latter’s own logic. We must eject ourselves out of the deadly relationship between these two inimical nationalisms. While the Tamil people’s struggle for their just rights and against the majoritarian state cannot stop, they have to stop thinking Tamil, Tamil, Tamil all the time. They have to be thinking in terms of their rights within the larger framework of minority rights.

Also, devolution is about giving power to the local people; it is not just about the Tamil people. We have to wipe the slate clean and start all over again. This must be done actively, as I do not think that Tamil nationalism with secessionist aspirations, particularly in the Diaspora, will die a natural death with the demise of the LTTE. Even if the LTTE is destroyed as a conventional armed force, it is possible that a new guerrilla war could emerge in a few years’ time. For this very reason, it is our duty to see that a democratic leadership evolves, and an alternative, truly democratic voice for the Tamils emerges. Himal Southasian, April 2009

In response to Ahmadinejad's speech, a parade of delegates, including those of France, Britain and the Czech Republic, got up and walked out. The foreign minister of Norway, Jonas Gahr Store, stuck around, but denounced Ahmadinejad's remarks, saying "The president of Iran chose to place Iran as the odd man out." Ban Ki-Moon and the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay--both of whom had earlier deplored and regretted the U.S. decision to boycott the conference--weighed in to deplore and regret Ahmadinejad's remarks.

Still not done, Ahmadinejad later on Monday afternoon held a press conference at the U.N. He then decamped to his plush hotel, just up the road, to attend a dinner for some 500 guests, including his entourage (for whom the Swiss government requisitioned some 40 hotel rooms) and members of the local Iranian community.

By Monday evening, Ahmadinejad's speech, and the walkout, were all over the news. On Tuesday, Ahmadinejad having departed the scene, the U.N. turned its attention full bore to damage control. According to the original schedule, the grand finale of the conference wasn't supposed to come until Friday, when--after a lot more talk at least masquerading as debate--the conference assembly was scheduled to stamp its collective approval on a final "outcome document."

But it seems that after the adventures of Ahmadinejad on Monday, the U.N. wanted to put an end to any further publicity emanating from this conference.

So, despite a long list of speakers still waiting for the podium, plus more than 200 U.N.-accredited nongovernmental organizations on hand hoping for "dialogue," a U.N. body known as the conference's "Main Committee" abruptly moved up production of the outcome document--which embodies the official results of the conference. By late afternoon on Tuesday, the second day of the five day gathering, High Commissioner Pillay stepped forth to announce that the outcome document had been approved.

Indeed, according to U.N. spokespersons, the outcome document was approved by a "consensus" of member states. That's an intriguing interpretation of a decision in which some members of the U.N.--the U.S. for instance-- were, with good reason, dissenting so strongly as to boycott the entire gathering.

Officially, at that point, Durban II still had three days left to go. Unofficially, it was over. Clutching copies of the outcome document, some members of the press headed for the bar--perhaps to fortify themselves before plowing through all 16 pages and 143 articles of this Durban Review premature final product.

Country delegates and U.N. staff sauntered into the afternoon sunlight, some making for the shiny ranks of BMWs and Mercedes in the parking lot, some strolling past the meticulously tended flowerbeds, lush lawns and fluttering flags, toward the main pedestrian exit of this vast complex that once housed the failed League of Nations.

It was clear the U.N. wished to make no more headlines with this particular conference. And yet, inside the building, the machinery--with its full complement of blue-uniformed security guards, secretaries, aides and speeches--ground on, spewing forth stacks of schedules and statements into an almost deserted press room. On the fringes of a conference that no longer had a core, scores of NGO staffers lingered for activities such as watching a mid-day performance by South Africa's Surialanga Dance Company.

So, after all the controversy and drama, what was the Durban Review Conference really about?

The debacle this week was, above all, a natural product of the U.N. system. The real basis for fighting racism is neatly summed up in five words from the U.S. Declaration of Independence: "All men are created equal." But in the U.N. calculus, it is not the equality of individual men or women that matters most. Instead, the U.N. tends to exalt the "equality" of sovereign states--as if there were no difference, say, between North and South Korea; Iran and the U.S.

That's why the president of terrorist-sponsoring, nuclear weapons-proliferating, U.N.-sanctioned Iran can jet into a U.N. conference on racism and be handed a turn at the podium. Beyond that, in the manner of central planners of the past century, the U.N. tends to seek equality not of basic rights, but of results. This entails not a defense of individual freedom, but a vast and elaborate lattice of machinery for social engineering, wealth transfers, government training programs and other projects in which politicians and bureaucrats decide who needs what.

In such a system, geared to defend first and foremost the interests not of individual human beings, but of governments, it's no surprise that some of the world's worst tyrannies end up hijacking such worthy causes as combating racism. And they've been at it for awhile: This week's train wreck of Durban II was a long time in the making. It was styled as a re-hash of the U.N.'s 2001 conference in Durban, South Africa. That jamboree was supposed to focus on racism, but instead turned into such a frenzy of Israel-bashing and U.S.-trashing that the U.S. delegation walked out.

The U.N. preparatory committee for this week's conference on "Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance" was chaired by Iran's fellow tyranny, Libya, and included among its liveliest members Russia, Cuba and Pakistan (speaking on behalf of the 57-member, despot-dominated Organization of the Islamic Conference), as well as Iran itself. Ahmadinejad's appearance on the U.N. stage this week--complete with his predictable tirade there--should have come as no surprise.

The U.N. currently hosts Iran on the governing boards of some of its lead agencies and has welcomed Ahmadinejad repeatedly to the U.N. General Assembly stage in New York. Not least, in one of the main hallways of the U.N.'s Geneva complex, near the Durban II assembly chamber, hangs a big silk maroon-tinted carpet of intricate design. It is framed in gold, and below it appears the inscription: "Presented by the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran on the Occasion of its 30th Anniversary." It is dated just two months ago: "February 2009." With the U.N.'s warm relations with the Islamic Republic so showcased, Ahmadinejad had reason to expect a red carpet rolled out for him in Geneva.

As far as there was a redeeming aspect to this conference, it came not from the U.N., but from the protests made against it. For almost two years, a handful of watchdog outfits, such as Anne Bayefsky's New York-based EyeOnTheUN.org and Hillel Neuer's Geneva-based UN Watch have called attention to the hypocrisies, travesties and raw anti-Semitism that were being worked by the likes of Libya and Iran into plans for Durban II.

Surrounding the conference itself, there have been a number of "side events" at which genuine champions of human rights have spoken up. On Tuesday, for instance, despite heckling, there was a terrific presentation from an NGO lineup that included holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky, Harvard lawyer Alan Dershowitz, actor Jon Voight and the Hoover Institution's Shelby Steele--who warned that the U.N.'s perverse version of fighting "racism" was a damaging distraction from the real fight for the basic human right to liberty.

When the best you can say about a U.N. world conference is that it deserved boycotting, inspired some well-deserved condemnation and tried to hide its own disgrace by effectively folding early, it's high time to consider that the U.N. ought to take a long break from such themes as engineering a global solution to "racism," and focus instead on dreaming up some way to clean up its own act. Forbes

Claudia Rosett, a journalist-in-residence with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, writes a weekly column on foreign affairs for Forbes.com.

The U.N. resolution, which has been introduced for the past couple of years, is backed by countries such as Saudi Arabia, one of the most repressive nations when it comes to the free exercise of religion. Blasphemers there are frequently executed. Most recently, the government arrested author Hamoud Bin Saleh simply for writing about his conversion to Christianity.

While it hasn't gone so far as to support the U.N. resolution, the West is prosecuting "religious hatred" cases under anti-discrimination and hate-crime laws. British citizens can be arrested and prosecuted under the 2006 Racial and Religious Hatred Act, which makes it a crime to "abuse" religion. In 2008, a 15-year-old boy was arrested for holding up a sign reading "Scientology is not a religion, it is a dangerous cult" outside the organization's London headquarters. Earlier this year, the British police issued a public warning that insulting Scientology would now be treated as a crime.

No question, the subjects of such prosecutions are often anti-religious -- especially anti-Muslim -- and intolerant. Consider far-right Austrian legislator Susanne Winter. She recently denounced Mohammad as a pedophile for his marriage to 6-year-old Aisha, which was consummated when she was 9. Winter also suggested that Muslim men should commit bestiality rather than have sex with children. Under an Austrian law criminalizing "degradation of religious doctrines," the 51-year-old politician was sentenced in January to a fine of 24,000 euros ($31,000) and a three-month suspended prison term.

But it is the speech, not the speaker, that's at issue. As insulting and misinformed as views like Winter's may be, free speech is not limited to non-offensive subjects. The purpose of free speech is to be able to challenge widely held views.

Yet there is a stream of cases similar to Winter's coming out of various countries:

In May 2008, Dutch prosecutors arrested cartoonist Gregorius Nekschot for insulting Christians and Muslims with a cartoon that caricatured a Christian fundamentalist and a Muslim fundamentalist as zombies who meet at an anti-gay rally and want to marry.

Last September, Italian prosecutors launched an investigation of comedian Sabina Guzzanti for joking about Pope Benedict VXI. "In 20 years, [he] will be dead and will end up in hell, tormented by queer demons, and very active ones," she said at a rally.

In February, Rowan Laxton, an aide to British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, was arrested for "inciting religious hatred" when, watching news reports of Israel's bombardment of Gaza while exercising at his gym, he allegedly shouted obscenities about Israelis and Jews at the television.

Also in February, Britain barred controversial Dutch politician Geert Wilders from entry because of his film "Fitna," which describes the Koran as a "fascist" book and Islam as a violent religion. Wilders was declared a "threat to public policy, public security or public health."

And in India, authorities arrested the editor and publisher of the newspaper the Statesman for running an article by British journalist Johann Hari in which he wrote, "I don't respect the idea that we should follow a 'Prophet' who at the age of 53 had sex with a 9-year-old girl, and ordered the murder of whole villages of Jews because they wouldn't follow him." In India, it is a crime to "outrage religious feelings."

History has shown that once governments begin to police speech, they find ever more of it to combat. Countries such as Canada, England and France have prosecuted speakers and journalists for criticizing homosexuals and other groups. It's the ultimate irony: free speech curtailed for the sake of a pluralistic society.

Even countries that the United States has helped liberate have joined the assault on free speech, rejecting the core values of our First Amendment. Afghan journalist Sayed Perwiz Kambakhsh was sentenced to death under Sharia law last year just for downloading Internet material on the role of women in Islamic societies that authorities judged to be blasphemous. The provincial deputy attorney general, Hafizullah Khaliqyar, has been quoted as saying: "Journalists are supporting Kambakhsh. I will arrest any journalist trying to support him after this."

Not only does this trend threaten free speech, freedom of association and a free press, it even undermines free exercise of religion. Challenging the beliefs of other faiths can be part of that exercise. Countries such as Saudi Arabia don't prosecute blasphemers to protect the exercise of all religions but to protect one religion.

Religious orthodoxy has always lived in tension with free speech. Yet Western ideals are based on the premise that free speech contains its own protection: Good speech ultimately prevails over bad. There's no blasphemy among free nations, only orthodoxy and those who seek to challenge it.

After years of international scorn, the United States can claim the high ground by supporting the right of all to speak openly about religion. Otherwise, free speech in the West could die with hope of little more than a requiem Mass. Washington Post

jturley@law.gwu.edu
Jonathan Turley is a law professor at George Washington University.

He never had to struggle for his start in politics. When his father, prime minister Abdul Razak, died in 1976, Najib took his father's parliamentary seat aged 22, and within a few years was rising in cabinet and the ruling United Malays National Organisation.

He put a distinctive stamp on the defence portfolio, which he held for 14 years until last year. Malaysia's armed services became notable for their multiple sources of equipment - a policy, many analysts think, with the main rationale of increasing the number of big arms contracts and consequent opportunities for lucrative commissions. The Malaysian air force, for example, flies both Russian and American fighters, the MiG-29 and Sukhoi 30s alongside the Boeing F/A-18s.

It was one of these defence deals that has led to the biggest stink around Najib. In 2002 his ministry entered a €1 billion deal with a French-Spanish shipyard, Armaris, for delivery of two new Scorpene and one refurbished Agosta conventional submarines to the Malaysian navy.

The Malaysian intermediary in the noncompetitive tender was a company called Perimekar, which was then owned by another Malaysian company, Ombak Laut, wholly owned by Abdul Razak Baginda, head of a government-backed strategic studies think tank who was a close friend and adviser to Najib. The deal earned Perimekar a commission of €114 million.

Baginda had a glamorous assistant and lover, Altantuya Shaaribuu, 28, who came down to Kuala Lumpur and claimed $US500,000 of the commission when it was paid in October 2006. When Baginda refused, she took to turning up outside his house and making a scene.

In a sworn statement that has just surfaced, Special Branch policeman Sirul Azhar Umar confessed that he was asked by a superior officer, Azilah Hadri, to deal with a woman disturbing Baginda, for a large reward. On the evening of October 19, 2006, he and Azilah bundled her away from Baginda's gate, drove her to a state forest, shot her dead, and blew up the body with military explosives.

However, the abduction had been witnessed by a taxi driver. Azilah and Sirul were soon charged with murder. Baginda was also charged as an accomplice despite an SMS message from Najib: "I will see the Inspector General of Police at 11am today … The problem will be solved. Be cool."

In the event, it has been cool: a judge ruled last October that Baginda had no case to answer. Now he is reported to be studying for a PhD at Oxford. Azilah and Sirul, whose embarrassingly detailed statement was ruled inadmissible, face judgment next Thursday and a possible death sentence.

On February 3, Sirul made a tearful plea against a death sentence. He said he was "a black sheep that has to be sacrificed" to protect unnamed people who had not been before the court or questioned. "I have no reason to cause hurt, what's more to take the life of the victim in such a cruel manner," Sirul said. "I appeal to the court, which has the powers to determine if I live or die, not to sentence me so as to fulfil others' plans for me." The judgment will come, conveniently, a day after Najib faces his first electoral test, in the first of three byelections. In recent weeks the government machinery has tear-gassed an opposition rally, bribed rival MPs to defect, closed the two main opposition newspapers for three months, barred an opposition MP who tried to ask Najib questions about the murder, and charged the veteran lawyer-MP Karpal Singh with sedition.

Anwar Ibrahim says he has not had "one minute" on the state-run broadcast media since he returned to parliament and became opposition leader last August. Ousted as deputy prime minister by Mahathir in 1998 and convicted over manufactured sodomy and corruption crimes, Anwar faces a new trial for sodomy in July, based on evidence given by a young man whom Najib has admitted meeting before the alleged offence. South-East Asia seems to be getting a new Marcos.

Source: The Sydney Morning Herald

Brisbane Times

As the saying goes, you point one finger and four more point back at you.

Over the past month, the (SelCAT) inquiry revealed how a few in power, including Mohd Khir, had gallivanted around the world using people’s money.

Many of these excesses were touched on by Citizen Nades last week, and a lot more such as the RM160,000 watch gift to Mohd Khir by a state subsidiary were exposed by this paper since March last year.

Yesterday, we read how Mohd Khir had spent RM1.7 million on overseas trips including two to Disneyland.

What makes one’s stomach churn is that Mohd Khir and his minions did not even bother to disguise the trip as a lawatan sambil belajar. The least they could have done was to slot in a few meetings with the theme park management or the guy in the Mickey Mouse suit (although I think Goofy would have been more up their alley).

But no. With kids and maid in tow, it was a blatant lawatan sambil berjoli, paid by the people of Selangor. Such was their arrogance and superiority complex that they thought no one could question them.

But no, like all Disney fairytales, the wicked stepmother may have had the upper hand in the beginning but they all end with her getting her just desserts.

In real life, however, one wonders if those who had abused the public trust will be brought to book. This is because as recent experiences have shown us, the system seems to work for some but not others.

Mohd Khir and his wife Datin Seri Zahrah Kechik refused to attend the inquiry which wound up on Wednesday, choosing instead to hide behind their lawyer’s letter.

But they cannot run away forever. It is the way of the world, karma if you please.

Even if they don’t end up in jail for corruption, CBT or abuse of power, there are other ways that they will have to face the music.

Losing the state in the general election is one. Failing to win the Umno Youth chief’s post was another. With all these hanging over his head, the loss of trust among the rakyat and popularity in his party, Mohd Khir’s political future is as good as finished.

The incoming prime minister, it is understood, wants a clean slate and hopes to purge his administration and party of those with tainted hands.

Mohd Khir will go down in history as the first Umno mentri besar to lose Selangor to the opposition. If he wants a scapegoat, he needs to only look in the mirror.

Just before the general election, Mohd Khir told theSun’s editors that some of the stories and commentaries carried by this paper were damaging to him, as well as his party’s chances in the general election. Although he gave excuses for the shortfalls, and tried to sidetrack the argument by throwing the race card, he could not counter our arguments.

All I can say is there was no hidden agenda or political motivation in our writings. And if this paper’s exposes helped rid the system of leaders who treated public funds as their own, consider it our national service. Sun2 Surf

One of Terence’s favourite tunes is Sting’s "History Will Teach Us Nothing", thus he feels past lessons need to be repeated so we don’t make the same mistakes. He is deputy editor, (special reports & investigations). To reach him, email: terence@thesundaily.com

Visits to the Disneyland theme parks in the US and France were supposed to be work trips but he treated them as holidays and took his wife, children and maid. He blew RM1.7 million on his supposed work trips between 2004 and 2007.

Because they had previously lived in poverty and now had access to millions, his wife and her friends even went on a “repentance” trip to “see and feel” how the poor in an Asean country lived. But then it was just to “experience” the feeling of being poor for a fleeting moment after which they were soaking themselves in the comfort of their luxury rooms in a five-star hotel. For this, a fairy godmother paid RM82,227, including RM19,000 for library books, RM25,000 for accommodation and transportation for four people, inclusive of RM3,000 allowance for reporters and RM10,000 for the production of a video clip.

The exchange between the Godmother and Joe Public went something like this:
Joe Public: What was this trip for?

Godmother: This was a programme designed to make people repent.
Joe Public: Who repented?

Godmother: Both sides repented. Because when those who visited the country saw how much suffering there was, they repented.

Joe Public: So, those who were suffering saw that we were rich, and so they too repented? Did you notice a change or a tinge of repentance in those who went for the trip?

Godmother: That is subjective.

Repentance did not work or had to work. On Christmas Eve two years ago, the man, his wife and an entourage were off again to Disney World in Orlando and Miami Beach. After that, they flew to Honolulu on a sight-seeing trip. They also visited the Kennedy Space Center. We were told that it was to see how the concept could be replicated locally, but when we have only one Malaysian space tourist, what is there to be replicated? But the eight-day trip cost a whopping RM646,840.

But wait. The cost of housing the ice cream boy and his family in suites at the Hilton Waikiki Hotel and the Walt Disney Dolphin Hotel cost RM110,000. (One quarter of this sum would give the caddy a low-cost apartment) But then Disneyland had yet to be taken in. Instead of flying in to Charles de Gaulle airport and be driven to the Chessy, he had other plans such as rewarding his minions by offering them an all-expenses paid trip in the guise of a recce trip. That cost RM366,000. When he flew, he and the family decided a sojourn in Dubai and that cost money too. The cost of both trips amounted to RM900,000.

So, all in all, it must have cost several millions for him, his wife and their family and friends on trips to Disneyland theme parks around the world. But the inevitable question is: Where did all the money come from? His forefathers did not exactly leave a family fortune and he did not own a thriving business organisation. Working as a tukang gigi for a few years wouldn’t have brought such a windfall.

While Joe Public was scratching his head and looking for answers, Godmother appeared on the scene. “I was directed to fund these projects,” she said.

“By whom?”

“By someone upstairs.”

The questioners were silent. Didn’t she have to account for the expenditure?

“Yes, but those upstairs screamed at me in unison.’

“What did they say?”

“Semuanya OK!”

And the echo from the basement car park was: “I did nothing wrong.” Sun2Surf

R. Nadeswaran is editor (special and investigative reporting) at theSun. He can be reached at citizen-nades@thesundaily.com

Violence in Jewish and Christian History

Along with Armstrong, any number of prominent writers, historians, and theologians have championed this "relativist" view. For instance, John Esposito, director of the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University, wonders,

How come we keep on asking the same question, [about violence in Islam,] and don't ask the same question about Christianity and Judaism? Jews and Christians have engaged in acts of violence. All of us have the transcendent and the dark side. … We have our own theology of hate. In mainstream Christianity and Judaism, we tend to be intolerant; we adhere to an exclusivist theology, of us versus them.[2]

An article by Pennsylvania State University humanities professor Philip Jenkins, "Dark Passages," delineates this position most fully. It aspires to show that the Bible is more violent than the Qur'an:

[I]n terms of ordering violence and bloodshed, any simplistic claim about the superiority of the Bible to the Koran would be wildly wrong. In fact, the Bible overflows with "texts of terror," to borrow a phrase coined by the American theologian Phyllis Trible. The Bible contains far more verses praising or urging bloodshed than does the Koran, and biblical violence is often far more extreme, and marked by more indiscriminate savagery. … If the founding text shapes the whole religion, then Judaism and Christianity deserve the utmost condemnation as religions of savagery.[3]

Several anecdotes from the Bible as well as from Judeo-Christian history illustrate Jenkins' point, but two in particular—one supposedly representative of Judaism, the other of Christianity—are regularly mentioned and therefore deserve closer examination.

The military conquest of the land of Canaan by the Hebrews in about 1200 B.C.E. is often characterized as "genocide" and has all but become emblematic of biblical violence and intolerance. God told Moses:

But of the cities of these peoples which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance, you shall let nothing that breathes remain alive, but you shall utterly destroy them—the Hittite, Amorite, Canaanite, Perizzite, Hivite, and Jebusite—just as the Lord your God has commanded you, lest they teach you to do according to all their abominations which they have done for their gods, and you sin against the Lord your God.[4]

So Joshua [Moses' successor] conquered all the land: the mountain country and the South and the lowland and the wilderness slopes, and all their kings; he left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the Lord, God of Israel had commanded.[5]

As for Christianity, since it is impossible to find New Testament verses inciting violence, those who espouse the view that Christianity is as violent as Islam rely on historical events such as the Crusader wars waged by European Christians between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries. The Crusades were in fact violent and led to atrocities by the modern world's standards under the banner of the cross and in the name of Christianity. After breaching the walls of Jerusalem in 1099, for example, the Crusaders reportedly slaughtered almost every inhabitant of the Holy City. According to the medieval chronicle, the Gesta Danorum, "the slaughter was so great that our men waded in blood up to their ankles."[6]

In light of the above, as Armstrong, Esposito, Jenkins, and others argue, why should Jews and Christians point to the Qur'an as evidence of Islam's violence while ignoring their own scriptures and history?

Bible versus Qur'an
The answer lies in the fact that such observations confuse history and theology by conflating the temporal actions of men with what are understood to be the immutable words of God. The fundamental error is that Judeo-Christian history—which is violent—is being conflated with Islamic theology—which commands violence. Of course, the three major monotheistic religions have all had their share of violence and intolerance towards the "other." Whether this violence is ordained by God or whether warlike men merely wished it thus is the key question.

Old Testament violence is an interesting case in point. God clearly ordered the Hebrews to annihilate the Canaanites and surrounding peoples. Such violence is therefore an expression of God's will, for good or ill. Regardless, all the historic violence committed by the Hebrews and recorded in the Old Testament is just that—history. It happened; God commanded it. But it revolved around a specific time and place and was directed against a specific people. At no time did such violence go on to become standardized or codified into Jewish law. In short, biblical accounts of violence are descriptive, not prescriptive.

This is where Islamic violence is unique. Though similar to the violence of the Old Testament—commanded by God and manifested in history—certain aspects of Islamic violence and intolerance have become standardized in Islamic law and apply at all times. Thus, while the violence found in the Qur'an has a historical context, its ultimate significance is theological. Consider the following Qur'anic verses, better known as the "sword-verses":

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.[7]

Fight those who believe not in God and the Last Day, and do not forbid what God and His Messenger have forbidden – such men as practise not the religion of truth, being of those who have been given the Book – until they pay the tribute out of hand and have been humbled.[8]

As with Old Testament verses where God commanded the Hebrews to attack and slay their neighbors, the sword-verses also have a historical context. God first issued these commandments after the Muslims under Muhammad's leadership had grown sufficiently strong to invade their Christian and pagan neighbors. But unlike the bellicose verses and anecdotes of the Old Testament, the sword-verses became fundamental to Islam's subsequent relationship to both the "people of the book" (i.e., Jews and Christians) and the "idolaters" (i.e., Hindus, Buddhists, animists, etc.) and, in fact, set off the Islamic conquests, which changed the face of the world forever. Based on Qur'an 9:5, for instance, Islamic law mandates that idolaters and polytheists must either convert to Islam or be killed; simultaneously, Qur'an 9:29 is the primary source of Islam's well-known discriminatory practices against conquered Christians and Jews living under Islamic suzerainty.

In fact, based on the sword-verses as well as countless other Qur'anic verses and oral traditions attributed to Muhammad, Islam's learned officials, sheikhs, muftis, and imams throughout the ages have all reached consensus—binding on the entire Muslim community—that Islam is to be at perpetual war with the non-Muslim world until the former subsumes the latter. Indeed, it is widely held by Muslim scholars that since the sword-verses are among the final revelations on the topic of Islam's relationship to non-Muslims, that they alone have abrogated some 200 of the Qur'an's earlier and more tolerant verses, such as "no compulsion is there in religion."[9] Famous Muslim scholar Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) admired in the West for his "progressive" insights, also puts to rest the notion that jihad is defensive warfare:

In the Muslim community, the holy war [jihad] is a religious duty, because of the universalism of the Muslim mission and the obligation to convert everybody to Islam either by persuasion or by force ... The other religious groups did not have a universal mission, and the holy war was not a religious duty for them, save only for purposes of defense ... They are merely required to establish their religion among their own people. That is why the Israelites after Moses and Joshua remained unconcerned with royal authority [e.g., a caliphate]. Their only concern was to establish their religion [not spread it to the nations] … But Islam is under obligation to gain power over other nations.[10]

Modern authorities agree. The Encyclopaedia of Islam's entry for "jihad" by Emile Tyan states that the "spread of Islam by arms is a religious duty upon Muslims in general … Jihad must continue to be done until the whole world is under the rule of Islam … Islam must completely be made over before the doctrine of jihad [warfare to spread Islam] can be eliminated." Iraqi jurist Majid Khaduri (1909-2007), after defining jihad as warfare, writes that "jihad … is regarded by all jurists, with almost no exception, as a collective obligation of the whole Muslim community."[11] And, of course, Muslim legal manuals written in Arabic are even more explicit.[12]

Qur'anic Language
When the Qur'an's violent verses are juxtaposed with their Old Testament counterparts, they are especially distinct for using language that transcends time and space, inciting believers to attack and slay nonbelievers today no less than yesterday. God commanded the Hebrews to kill Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites—all specific peoples rooted to a specific time and place. At no time did God give an open-ended command for the Hebrews, and by extension their Jewish descendants, to fight and kill gentiles. On the other hand, though Islam's original enemies were, like Judaism's, historical (e.g., Christian Byzantines and Zoroastrian Persians), the Qur'an rarely singles them out by their proper names. Instead, Muslims were (and are) commanded to fight the people of the book—"until they pay the tribute out of hand and have been humbled"[13] and to "slay the idolaters wherever you find them."[14]

The two Arabic conjunctions "until" (hata) and "wherever" (haythu) demonstrate the perpetual and ubiquitous nature of these commandments: There are still "people of the book" who have yet to be "utterly humbled" (especially in the Americas, Europe, and Israel) and "idolaters" to be slain "wherever" one looks (especially Asia and sub-Saharan Africa). In fact, the salient feature of almost all of the violent commandments in Islamic scriptures is their open-ended and generic nature: "Fight them [non-Muslims] until there is no persecution and the religion is God's entirely. [Emphasis added.]"[15] Also, in a well-attested tradition that appears in the hadith collections, Muhammad proclaims:

I have been commanded to wage war against mankind until they testify that there is no god but God and that Muhammad is the Messenger of God; and that they establish prostration prayer, and pay the alms-tax [i.e., convert to Islam]. If they do so, their blood and property are protected. [Emphasis added.][16]

This linguistic aspect is crucial to understanding scriptural exegeses regarding violence. Again, it bears repeating that neither Jewish nor Christian scriptures—the Old and New Testaments, respectively—employ such perpetual, open-ended commandments. Despite all this, Jenkins laments thatCommands to kill, to commit ethnic cleansing, to institutionalize segregation, to hate and fear other races and religions … all are in the Bible, and occur with a far greater frequency than in the Qur'an. At every stage, we can argue what the passages in question mean, and certainly whether they should have any relevance for later ages. But the fact remains that the words are there, and their inclusion in the scripture means that they are, literally, canonized, no less than in the Muslim scripture.[17]

One wonders what Jenkins has in mind by the word "canonized." If by canonized he means that such verses are considered part of the canon of Judeo-Christian scripture, he is absolutely correct; conversely, if by canonized he means or is trying to connote that these verses have been implemented in the Judeo-Christian Weltanschauung, he is absolutely wrong.

Yet one need not rely on purely exegetical and philological arguments; both history and current events give the lie to Jenkins's relativism. Whereas first-century Christianity spread via the blood of martyrs, first-century Islam spread through violent conquest and bloodshed. Indeed, from day one to the present—whenever it could—Islam spread through conquest, as evinced by the fact that the majority of what is now known as the Islamic world, or dar al-Islam, was conquered by the sword of Islam. This is a historic fact, attested to by the most authoritative Islamic historians. Even the Arabian peninsula, the "home" of Islam, was subdued by great force and bloodshed, as evidenced by the Ridda wars following Muhammad's death when tens of thousands of Arabs were put to the sword by the first caliph Abu Bakr for abandoning Islam.

Muhammad's Role

Moreover, concerning the current default position which purports to explain away Islamic violence—that the latter is a product of Muslim frustration vis-à-vis political or economic oppression—one must ask: What about all the oppressed Christians and Jews, not to mention Hindus and Buddhists, of the world today? Where is their religiously-garbed violence? The fact remains: Even though the Islamic world has the lion's share of dramatic headlines—of violence, terrorism, suicide-attacks, decapitations—it is certainly not the only region in the world suffering under both internal and external pressures.

For instance, even though practically all of sub-Saharan Africa is currently riddled with political corruption, oppression and poverty, when it comes to violence, terrorism, and sheer chaos, Somalia—which also happens to be the only sub-Saharan country that is entirely Muslim—leads the pack. Moreover, those most responsible for Somali violence and the enforcement of intolerant, draconian, legal measures—the members of the jihadi group Al-Shabab (the youth)—articulate and justify all their actions through an Islamist paradigm.

In Sudan, too, a jihadi-genocide against the Christian and polytheistic peoples is currently being waged by Khartoum's Islamist government and has left nearly a million "infidels" and "apostates" dead. That the Organization of Islamic Conference has come to the defense of Sudanese president Hassan Ahmad al-Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court, is further telling of the Islamic body's approval of violence toward both non-Muslims and those deemed not Muslim enough.

Latin American and non-Muslim Asian countries also have their fair share of oppressive, authoritarian regimes, poverty, and all the rest that the Muslim world suffers. Yet, unlike the near daily headlines emanating from the Islamic world, there are no records of practicing Christians, Buddhists, or Hindus crashing explosives-laden vehicles into the buildings of oppressive (e.g., Cuban or Chinese communist) regimes, all the while waving their scriptures in hand and screaming, "Jesus [or Buddha or Vishnu] is great!" Why?

There is one final aspect that is often overlooked—either from ignorance or disingenuousness—by those who insist that violence and intolerance is equivalent across the board for all religions. Aside from the divine words of the Qur'an, Muhammad's pattern of behavior—his sunna or "example"—is an extremely important source of legislation in Islam. Muslims are exhorted to emulate Muhammad in all walks of life: "You have had a good example in God's Messenger."[18] And Muhammad's pattern of conduct toward non-Muslims is quite explicit.

Sarcastically arguing against the concept of moderate Islam, for example, terrorist Osama bin Laden, who enjoys half the Arab-Islamic world's support per an Al-Jazeera poll,[19] portrays the Prophet's sunna thusly:

"Moderation" is demonstrated by our prophet who did not remain more than three months in Medina without raiding or sending a raiding party into the lands of the infidels to beat down their strongholds and seize their possessions, their lives, and their women.[20]

In fact, based on both the Qur'an and Muhammad's sunna, pillaging and plundering infidels, enslaving their children, and placing their women in concubinage is well founded.[21] And the concept of sunna—which is what 90 percent of the billion-plus Muslims, the Sunnis, are named after—essentially asserts that anything performed or approved by Muhammad, humanity's most perfect example, is applicable for Muslims today no less than yesterday. This, of course, does not mean that Muslims in mass live only to plunder and rape.

But it does mean that persons naturally inclined to such activities, and who also happen to be Muslim, can—and do—quite easily justify their actions by referring to the "Sunna of the Prophet"—the way Al-Qaeda, for example, justified its attacks on 9/11 where innocents including women and children were killed: Muhammad authorized his followers to use catapults during their siege of the town of Ta'if in 630 C.E.—townspeople had refused to submit—though he was aware that women and children were sheltered there. Also, when asked if it was permissible to launch night raids or set fire to the fortifications of the infidels if women and children were among them, the Prophet is said to have responded, "They [women and children] are from among them [infidels]."[22]

Jewish and Christian Ways

Though law-centric and possibly legalistic, Judaism has no such equivalent to the Sunna; the words and deeds of the patriarchs, though described in the Old Testament, never went on to prescribe Jewish law. Neither Abraham's "white-lies," nor Jacob's perfidy, nor Moses' short-fuse, nor David's adultery, nor Solomon's philandering ever went on to instruct Jews or Christians. They were understood as historical acts perpetrated by fallible men who were more often than not punished by God for their less than ideal behavior.

As for Christianity, much of the Old Testament law was abrogated or fulfilled—depending on one's perspective—by Jesus. "Eye for an eye" gave way to "turn the other cheek." Totally loving God and one's neighbor became supreme law.[23] Furthermore, Jesus' sunna—as in "What would Jesus do?"—is characterized by passivity and altruism. The New Testament contains absolutely no exhortations to violence.

Still, there are those who attempt to portray Jesus as having a similarly militant ethos as Muhammad by quoting the verse where the former—who "spoke to the multitudes in parables and without a parable spoke not"[24]—said, "I come not to bring peace but a sword."[25] But based on the context of this statement, it is clear that Jesus was not commanding violence against non-Christians but rather predicting that strife will exist between Christians and their environment—a prediction that was only too true as early Christians, far from taking up the sword, passively perished by the sword in martyrdom as too often they still do in the Muslim world. [26]

Others point to the violence predicted in the Book of Revelation while, again, failing to discern that the entire account is descriptive—not to mention clearly symbolic—and thus hardly prescriptive for Christians. At any rate, how can one conscionably compare this handful of New Testament verses that metaphorically mention the word "sword" to the literally hundreds of Qur'anic injunctions and statements by Muhammad that clearly command Muslims to take up a very real sword against non-Muslims?

Undeterred, Jenkins bemoans the fact that, in the New Testament, Jews "plan to stone Jesus, they plot to kill him; in turn, Jesus calls them liars, children of the Devil."[27] It still remains to be seen if being called "children of the Devil" is more offensive than being referred to as the descendents of apes and pigs—the Qur'an's appellation for Jews.[28] Name calling aside, however, what matters here is that, whereas the New Testament does not command Christians to treat Jews as "children of the Devil," based on the Qur'an, primarily 9:29, Islamic law obligates Muslims to subjugate Jews, indeed, all non-Muslims.

Does this mean that no self-professed Christian can be anti-Semitic? Of course not. But it does mean that Christian anti-Semites are living oxymorons—for the simple reason that textually and theologically, Christianity, far from teaching hatred or animosity, unambiguously stresses love and forgiveness. Whether or not all Christians follow such mandates is hardly the point; just as whether or not all Muslims uphold the obligation of jihad is hardly the point. The only question is, what do the religions command?

John Esposito is therefore right to assert that "Jews and Christians have engaged in acts of violence." He is wrong, however, to add, "We [Christians] have our own theology of hate." Nothing in the New Testament teaches hate—certainly nothing to compare with Qur'anic injunctions such as: "We [Muslims] disbelieve in you [non-Muslims], and between us and you enmity has shown itself, and hatred for ever until you believe in God alone."[29]

Reassessing the Crusades

And it is from here that one can best appreciate the historic Crusades—events that have been thoroughly distorted by Islam's many influential apologists. Karen Armstrong, for instance, has practically made a career for herself by misrepresenting the Crusades, writing, for example, that "the idea that Islam imposed itself by the sword is a Western fiction, fabricated during the time of the Crusades when, in fact, it was Western Christians who were fighting brutal holy wars against Islam."[30] That a former nun rabidly condemns the Crusades vis-à-vis anything Islam has done makes her critique all the more marketable.

Statements such as this ignore the fact that from the beginnings of Islam, more than 400 years before the Crusades, Christians have noted that Islam was spread by the sword.[31] Indeed, authoritative Muslim historians writing centuries before the Crusades, such as Ahmad Ibn Yahya al-Baladhuri (d. 892) and Muhammad ibn Jarir at-Tabari (838-923), make it clear that Islam was spread by the sword.

The fact remains: The Crusades were a counterattack on Islam—not an unprovoked assault as Armstrong and other revisionist historians portray. Eminent historian Bernard Lewis puts it well, Even the Christian crusade, often compared with the Muslim jihad, was itself a delayed and limited response to the jihad and in part also an imitation. But unlike the jihad, it was concerned primarily with the defense or reconquest of threatened or lost Christian territory. It was, with few exceptions, limited to the successful wars for the recovery of southwest Europe, and the unsuccessful wars to recover the Holy Land and to halt the Ottoman advance in the Balkans. The Muslim jihad, in contrast, was perceived as unlimited, as a religious obligation that would continue until all the world had either adopted the Muslim faith or submitted to Muslim rule. … The object of jihad is to bring the whole world under Islamic law.[32]

Moreover, Muslim invasions and atrocities against Christians were on the rise in the decades before the launch of the Crusades in 1096. The Fatimid caliph Abu 'Ali Mansur Tariqu'l-Hakim (r. 996-1021) desecrated and destroyed a number of important churches—such as the Church of St. Mark in Egypt and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem—and decreed even more oppressive than usual decrees against Christians and Jews. Then, in 1071, the Seljuk Turks crushed the Byzantines in the pivotal battle of Manzikert and, in effect, conquered a major chunk of Byzantine Anatolia presaging the way for the eventual capture of Constantinople centuries later.

It was against this backdrop that Pope Urban II (r. 1088-1099) called for the Crusades:
From the confines of Jerusalem and the city of Constantinople a horrible tale has gone forth and very frequently has been brought to our ears, namely, that a race from the kingdom of the Persians [i.e., Muslim Turks] … has invaded the lands of those Christians and has depopulated them by the sword, pillage and fire; it has led away a part of the captives into its own country, and a part it has destroyed by cruel tortures; it has either entirely destroyed the churches of God or appropriated them for the rites of its own religion.[33]

Even though Urban II's description is historically accurate, the fact remains: However one interprets these wars—as offensive or defensive, just or unjust—it is evident that they were not based on the example of Jesus, who exhorted his followers to "love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you."[34] Indeed, it took centuries of theological debate, from Augustine to Aquinas, to rationalize defensive war—articulated as "just war." Thus, it would seem that if anyone, it is the Crusaders—not the jihadists—who have been less than faithful to their scriptures (from a literal standpoint); or put conversely, it is the jihadists—not the Crusaders—who have faithfully fulfilled their scriptures (also from a literal stand point). Moreover, like the violent accounts of the Old Testament, the Crusades are historic in nature and not manifestations of any deeper scriptural truths.

In fact, far from suggesting anything intrinsic to Christianity, the Crusades ironically better help explain Islam. For what the Crusades demonstrated once and for all is that irrespective of religious teachings—indeed, in the case of these so-called Christian Crusades, despite them—man is often predisposed to violence. But this begs the question: If this is how Christians behaved—who are commanded to love, bless, and do good to their enemies who hate, curse, and persecute them—how much more can be expected of Muslims who, while sharing the same violent tendencies, are further commanded by the Deity to attack, kill, and plunder nonbelievers?
Raymond Ibrahim is associate director of the Middle East Forum and author of The Al Qaeda Reader (New York: Doubleday, 2007).

[1] Andrea Bistrich, "Discovering the common grounds of world religions," interview with Karen Armstrong, Share International, Sept. 2007, pp. 19-22.
[2] C-SPAN2, June 5, 2004.
[3] Philip Jenkins, "Dark Passages," The Boston Globe, Mar. 8, 2009.
[4] Deut. 20:16-18.
[5] Josh. 10:40.
[6] "The Fall of Jerusalem," Gesta Danorum, accessed Apr. 2, 2009.
[7] Qur. 9:5. All translations of Qur'anic verses are drawn from A.J. Arberry, ed. The Koran Interpreted: A Translation (New York: Touchstone, 1996).
[8] Qur. 9:29.
[9] Qur. 2:256.
[10] Ibn Khaldun, The Muqudimmah: An Introduction to History, Franz Rosenthal, trans. (New York: Pantheon, 1958,) vol. 1, p. 473.
[11] Majid Khadduri, War and Peace in the Law of Islam (London: Oxford University Press, 1955), p. 60.
[12] See, for instance, Ahmed Mahmud Karima, Al-Jihad fi'l-Islam: Dirasa Fiqhiya Muqarina (Cairo: Al-Azhar University, 2003).
[13] Qur. 9:29.
[14] Qur. 9:5.
[15] Qur. 8:39.
[16] Ibn al-Hajjaj Muslim, Sahih Muslim, C9B1N31; Muhammad Ibn Isma'il al-Bukhari, Sahih al-Bukhari (Lahore: Kazi, 1979), B2N24.
[17] Jenkins, "Dark_Passages."
[18] Qur. 33:21.
[19] "Al-Jazeera-Poll: 49% of Muslims Support Osama bin Laden," Sept. 7-10, 2006, accessed Apr. 2, 2009.
[20] 'Abd al-Rahim 'Ali, Hilf al Irhab (Cairo: Markaz al-Mahrusa li 'n-Nashr wa 'l-Khidamat as-Sahafiya wa 'l-Ma'lumat, 2004).
[21] For example, Qur. 4:24, 4:92, 8:69, 24:33, 33:50.
[22] Sahih Muslim, B19N4321; for English translation, see Raymond Ibrahim, The Al Qaeda Reader (New York: Doubleday, 2007), p. 140.
[23] Matt. 22:38-40.
[24] Matt. 13:34.
[25] Matt. 10:34.
[26] See, for instance, "Christian Persecution Info," Christian Persecution Magazine, accessed Apr. 2, 2009.
[27] Jenkins, "Dark_Passages."
[28] Qur. 2:62-65, 5:59-60, 7:166.
[29] Qur. 60:4.
[30] Bistrich, "Discovering the common grounds of world religions," pp. 19-22; For a critique of Karen Armstrong's work, see "Karen Armstrong," in Andrew Holt, ed. Crusades-Encyclopedia, Apr. 2005, accessed Apr. 6, 2009.
[31] See, for example, the writings of Sophrinius, Jerusalem's patriarch during the Muslim conquest of the Holy City, just years after the death of Muhammad, or the chronicles of Theophane the Confessor.
[32] Bernard Lewis, The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2000 Years (New York: Scribner, 1995), p. 233-4.
[33] "Speech of Urban—Robert of Rheims," in Edward Peters, ed., The First Crusade: The Chronicle of Fulcher of Chartres and Other Source Materials (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998), p. 27.
[34] Matt. 5:44.
Middle East Forum

One of the staunchest supporters of Onn was the then mentri besar of Perak, the Datuk Panglima Bukit Gantang Abdul Wahab Toh Muda Abdul Aziz. Perhaps the spirit of Bukit Gantang will remind certain people that history should never be re-written. Hussein re-entered politics in 1968 at the invitation of his brother-in-law Tun Abdul Razak Hussein. He contested the 1969 election and won, subsequently being appointed the minister of education.

In August 1973, Hussein filled the post of deputy prime minister upon the demise of Tun Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman. He was minister of finance between 1974 and 1976, tearfully sworn in as prime minister when Razak died in office in January 1976. The crux of the problem with the learning of history in this country is partisanship. Hishammuddin’s latest view is just another sad addition to the problem, at the expense of a genuine understanding of the contribution of his father and grandfather to the nation, outside of Umno.

A case in point is the Tun Hussein Onn Memorial. Opened in February 2006 after a RM30 million makeover of the old Prime Minister’s Department building in Kuala Lumpur, the memorial failed to deal with the period of Hussein’s life when he fought against Umno.

There was no mention of Hussein’s departure from Umno in 1951 or Hussein’s role in helping the opposition, especially Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah’s Semangat 46, against Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s Umno Baru in the late 1980s in the aftermath of Umno’s deregistration.

When Hussein died in May 1990, he was not a member of Umno. Significantly, all Umno presidents — Tunku Abdul Rahman, Hussein and Dr Mahathir — quit the party in retirement; although the latter is expected to rejoin the party. For Hishammuddin and his supporters, they should remember that a nation is only mature when history is studied in a less partisan way. By Liew Chin Tong in The Malaysian Insider