When you go back in history to the Dark Ages – sometimes
referred to as the Middle Ages or Medieval Times – and you study what the
“edified” people of the era were saying and doing, you can only be stunned by
how superficial these people were, yet how serious the consequences of what
they decided.
You wonder: How could this have happened? You ask the
question not realizing that we are living similar moments right now, though the
issues we face are somewhat different. If you want proof, take a look at the
article which came under the title: “It's time We Faced the Facts about the
Muslim World,” written by David French and published on September 19, 2016 in
National Review Online.
David French is said to be a man of depth, a modern
equivalent to the sages that used to gather at the “round tables” in the
castles of the medieval bigwigs. They used to discuss topics as grave and
important as the number of angels that can be made to dance on the head of a
pin. David French has also chosen to play the numbers game but without citing
actual numbers or how they break down … which renders the discussion on this
topic moot. The thing, however, is that he asks the people on the Left a
question that turns out to reveal the extent of his shallowness. It is this:
“Why exclude America 's
worst terror attack [9/11] when calculating the terror threat?” The man just
made an error of logic.
The fact is that 9/11 was al-Qaeda's declaration of war on America , not
just an act of terror. It was one in the string of wars that began with the
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, followed by Reagan's recruitment of al-Qaeda to
fight the Soviets, followed by America's abandonment of its ally after the
victory, followed by America's unprovoked attack on Iraq, followed by America's
“occupation” of Saudi Arabia, followed by Al-Qaeda's 9/11 response to America's
double-crossing and its hard-to-hide war on Islam.
Without realizing what he is saying, David French goes on to
admit that this string of wars has been won by America because “of the fact
that it is now ISIS and al-Qaeda strategy to inspire lone wolves.” He just
called the two organizations junior varsity that can no longer mount a war
against America ,
the reason why they opted for a version of the Tokyo Rose style incitement from
a distance. This does not rise to the level of guerrilla skirmishes against the
American homeland, and certainly not the level of a 9/11 act of war.
Faced with that reality on the ground, but eager to paint a
picture that fits the current political narrative, David French relies on
something else to make his points. He says that the Pew Foundation has
discovered the following: “More than 100 million Muslims have expressed
sympathy for terrorists such as Osama bin Laden or for barbaric groups such as ISIS . Hundreds of millions more express support for the
most intolerant forms of Sharia law. Jihadis have been able to recruit hundreds
of thousands of fighters to deploy against Americans, Israelis, and our Muslim
allies”.
The response to that situation, he says, is to let the
internal Muslim debate take its course. A good idea. But he goes on to make a
second error in logic. It is this: “[It's] important that we double down on our
support for proven Muslim allies. The Kurds, for example, are perhaps our most
stalwart allies. The current Egyptian regime is a declared enemy of the Muslim
Brotherhood, and its president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, has called for a
'religious revolution' within Islam”.
If only the man knew what he was talking about. The truth is
that surveys taken by the likes of the Pew Foundation are good for the trash
can and nothing else. David French should have realized this much because he
had all the relevant information that says so. For example, he mentions the
situation in Egypt
where the people voted for the Muslim Brotherhood. By the time a year had
passed, they had seen where the party was taking the country. They did not like
what they were seeing, especially in the economy, and wanted an end to the Brotherhood's
administration. Refusing to wait for the end of the mandate before throwing the
rascals out, they asked the army to do the job now, and the army obliged.
This means that surveys taken of the people before the
election and a year after it, would have shown different results. A pollster
such as the Pew would have falsely interpreted the result before the election to
mean that the people were in favor of the things they actually rejected a year
later. What's important to remember also is that the people vehemently opposed
the tolerance that the Brotherhood exhibited toward the foreign interference in
Egyptian affairs. And this is a reality that escaped David French.
No, Islam does not have a serious problem; it has a
normal problem such as that which all nations experience once in a while.