Free Speech on Trial in Austria … and Europe
The “hate speech” trial of the Austrian housewife and anti-Islam activist Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff resumed at a Vienna courthouse on January 18, following a two-month break in the hearings. Sabaditsch-Wolff, who has been charged with “incitement of hatred” and “denigrating religious teachings” after giving a series of seminars about the dangers of radical Islam, faces a possible three year prison sentence. Her case, which is eerily similar to the one involving the Dutch politician Geert Wilders, reflects the growing use of lawfare, the malicious use of European courts to silence politically incorrect speech about Islam.
Sabaditsch-Wolff’s legal problems began in November 2009, when she presented a three-part seminar about Islam to the Freedom Education Institute, a political academy linked to the Austrian Freedom Party. A glossy left-wing magazine called NEWS — all in capital letters — planted a journalist in the audience to secretly record the first two lectures. Lawyers for the publication then handed the transcripts over to the Viennese public prosecutor’s office as evidence of hate speech against Islam, one of the officially recognized religions under Austrian law. Formal charges against Sabaditsch-Wolff were filed in September 2010 and her bench trial, presided by one judge and no jury, began on November 23.
One the first day of the trial, however, it quickly became apparent that the case against Sabaditsch-Wolff was not as air-tight as prosecutors had made it out to be. For example, the judge pointed out that only 30 minutes of the first seminar had actually been recorded. The judge also noted that some of the statements attributed to Sabaditsch-Wolff were offhand comments made during breaks and were not a formal part of the seminar. Moreover, only a few people heard these comments, not 30 or more, the criterion under Austrian law for a statement being “public.” In any case, Sabaditsch-Wolff says her comments were not made in a public forum because the seminars were held for a select group of people who had registered beforehand.
More importantly, however, many of the statements attributed to Sabaditsch-Wolff were actually her quoting directly from the Koran and other Islamic religious texts. Fearing that the trial would end in a mistrial, the judge abruptly suspended hearings until January 18, ostensibly to give the judge time to review the tape recordings, but also to give the prosecution more time to shore up its case.
In more ways than one, the case (or show trial, as many are calling it) in Vienna against Sabaditsch-Wolff is similar to the one in Holland involving Geert Wilders.
Viewed broadly, both trials represent landmark cases that likely will establish the limits of free speech in countries where the politically correct elite routinely seek to silence public discussion about the escalating problem of Muslim immigration.
Viewed more narrowly, the accusers of both Sabaditsch-Wolff and Wilders are resorting to extra-legal shenanigans to make their charges stick.
For example, the trial against Wilders, who faces five charges of inciting racial and religious hatred for criticizing Islam, was abruptly ended in October 2010 after it emerged that one of the judges presiding over the trial tried to influence an expert witness to testify against Wilders. In that case, a hastily convened judicial panel agreed with Wilders that the judges were biased against him and ordered a retrial, sending the closely watched case back to square one before an entirely new panel of judges. Wilders, who called the trial a farce, a disgrace, and an assault on free speech, welcomed the decision, saying: “This gives me a new chance with a new fair trial.”
In the trial against Sabaditsch-Wolff, her accusers are basing their case on out-of-context quotes from an article in a socialist magazine. The main difference in the two cases is that Wilders is a professional politician while Sabaditsch-Wolff is a private citizen, a housewife who lacks the resources to defend herself against the deep pockets of the state that wants to silence her.
Of course, Sabaditsch-Wolff is not the only Austrian to run afoul of the country’s anti-free speech laws. In January 2009, Susanne Winter, an Austrian politician and member of parliament, was convicted for the “crime” of saying that “in today’s system” the Prophet Muhammad would be considered a “child molester,” referring to his marriage at the age of 56 to a six-year-old child. She was also convicted for “incitement” for warning that Austria faces an “Islamic immigration tsunami.” Winters was ordered to pay a fine of €24,000 ($31,000) and received a suspended three-month prison sentence.
Elsewhere in Europe, in Italy the late Oriana Fallaci, a journalist and author, was taken to court for writing that Islam “brings hate instead of love and slavery instead of freedom.” She died in September 2006, two months after the start of her trial. In France, novelist Michel Houellebecq was taken to court for calling Islam “the stupidest religion.” He was acquitted in October 2002. Also in France, a Paris court in June 2008 convicted animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot for “inciting racial hatred” for demanding that Muslims anaesthetize animals before slaughtering them.
In Britain, the Racial and Religious Hatred Act creates a new crime of intentionally stirring up religious hatred against people on religious grounds. The new law effectively establishes new limits on free speech in the country that in 1215 produced the Magna Carta, the famous document that is the foundation of British liberty and partly inspired the Constitution of the United States.
In Europe as a whole, the European Union recently issued a new law known as the “Framework Decision on Combating Racism and Xenophobia.” The edict requires the punishment of “certain forms and expressions of racism and xenophobia by means of criminal law.”
More specifically, the text establishes that the following conduct is punishable in all 27 member states of the European Union: “Publicly inciting to violence or hatred, even by dissemination or distribution of tracts, pictures or other material, directed against a group of persons or a member of such a group defined by reference to race, colour, religion, descent or national or ethnic origin.”
Free speech advocates worry that the vague and all-encompassing language of the new law will be used to silence critics of Islam in a Europe that lacks American-like First Amendment protections of free speech. In fact, another EU law called the “Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union” (see paragraph 52, subsection 1) actually gives non-elected bureaucrats in Brussels the right to prosecute European citizens for expressing the “wrong” opinions if it is in the interests of the European Union to do so.
Back in Vienna, Sabaditsch-Wolff says her case is not really about her or the law, but rather it is a political trial intended to silence anyone who speaks out against Islam. In a recent speech to the International Free Press Society (transcript here), she said: “Freedom of speech is under attack today all across Europe. Today, in 21st century Western Europe, our right to free speech is being shut down quietly and systematically with an effectiveness that the commissars in the old Soviet Union could only dream of.”
Sabaditsch-Wolff also says: “We’re going to reply to the charges and we will do that in full detail. It remains to be seen whether the truth is a defense. I don’t think it will be.”
Well,if these Austrian legalists think that quoting the koran is ‘hate speech’,then the implications are obvious….the koran is a hate screed that must never be quoted by anyone ever again in Austria…not even muslims…the rule of law derives from the presumption…and the presumption is that the koran is full of hate…ergo….
coming to a theater near you!
In Europe as a whole, the European Union recently issued a new law known as the “Framework Decision on Combating Racism and Xenophobia.” The edict requires the punishment of “certain forms and expressions of racism and xenophobia by means of criminal law.”
With the emphasis on CERTAIN FORMS.
This law comes hot on the heels of the IOC sponsored “anti-blasphemy law” that will be used to prevent ANY criticism of Islam in Western countries and is used in islamic countries to persecute religious minorities.
Attacks on christians are obviously not covered by the European edict.
http://apocalisselaica.net/news/uk/rape-cross-wins-dutch-award
Did anyone take this cartoonist to trial?
lam denigrates itself. Is you expose a Muslim THAT is considered defamatory. They twist everything with Taquiyah.
Learn where it all began in this historic interview on Israel National Radio where Islam (and Arabs) are shown to be direct descendants of Baal worshipers who kept their “religious” practice and cloaked it in a pseudo-monotheism. (after all, who do they REALLY worship more, God or Mohammed?)
http://www.marcrubin.com/judean-eve.ivnu
And watch the Progressives in action in this hilarious dead on satire of the “head up the butt” people who wake up and take back their country from impending catastrophe. Sarah Palin, Joy Behar, Glenn Beck, Nancy Pelosi, George soros and more are all part of this imaginative cartoon.
http://www.marcrubin.com/hairmerica.ivnu
why don’t you stick your video where it mostly counts.people are getting really sick of it.
Insanity.
What else is their to say.
Next you will have people attempting to put in Sharia compliant legislation and no one will be able to speak against it or even vote against it or you will be prosecuted for hate speech.
INSANITY.
If Hate Speech is supposed to include the denigration of other groups, then by definition the Koran is illegal, and many Imams should be prosecuted and imprisoned. As much as I do not approve of the behavior of many fundamentalist Imams and their congregations, I think it is highly improper to outlaw it.
This is a well intentioned paving stone on the road to hell. The European Union would do well to think very carefully about what free speech is all about.
I’m guessing that if you were to secretly tape an imam talking about death to the Jews and/or Christians/infidels, you’d be charged with a hate crime. Seems only people pointing out the problems with islam are guilty of going astray of the law.
The most important written text in your religion calls for the killing of non-believers just for being non-believers and this isn’t about hate? The truth is the Koran is the most hate-filled book since “Mein Kampf.”
Do the Euros really believe they are putting out a fire by prosecuting this woman? It looks more like they are fanning them.
The PC drunk Euros had better sober up fast before followers of the ‘religion of peace’ give a lot of them the Theo van Gogh treatment.
“The PC drunk Euros had better sober up fast before followers of the ‘religion of peace’ give a lot of them the Theo van Gogh treatment.”
Theo van Gogh Treatment:
http://www.rnw.nl/english/article/wikileaks-us-courted-dutch-muslims-after-theo-van-gogh-murder
“An all-expenses-paid study trip to the US: that was the offer to a number of prominent Dutch Muslims following the killing of controversial filmmaker Theo van Gogh in 2004. Now WikiLeaks documents reveal that these trips were part of a concerted effort by Washington to win the hearts and minds of Dutch Muslims. Among them was the current Mayor of Rotterdam, Ahmed Aboutaleb.
Nordin Ghoudani was one of those fortunate enough to be offered such a trip after being invited for a number of conversations at the US Embassy. Now that he is aware of being a cog in the wheel of US policy, he tells Dutch broadcaster NOS that he looks back on the trip with mixed feelings.
“The knowledge that Washington, and former president George W Bush, insisted on these trips… yes, that puts things in a different perspective.”
Poorly integrated
On 2 November 2004, the murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh at the hands of a radical Muslim sent shock waves through the Netherlands. Van Gogh had collaborated with politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali on the film Submission, a fierce indictment of the position of women in Islam. The US authorities examined the situation and came to the conclusion that the Netherlands was home to the most poorly integrated Muslim community in Europe.
The Dutch Muslims were described as strongly anti-American, an attitude that Washington was keen to change. Diplomats were ordered to seek contact with leading members of the Muslim community. They organised Ramadan dinners and offered study trips to the US for the select few. It was all done with the aim of cultivating greater understanding for the US and America’s views.” …
Europe has some pretty insane laws.
For example, if you claim that only 5,999,999 Jews died in the Holocaust (instead of the pre-approved 6 million figure), you have committed a crime in most European nations.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_denial_laws
That is simply not true. You clearly have no understanding of what the laws forbidding Holocaust denial really say and mean. It’s shocking that nonsense like your statement pass for conventional wisdom on this website.
Transparency, freedom of expression for the greater good of all is the hallmark of western life style.
Islamist have through out the years try to silence any negative facts about Islam which they are unable to defend, such a Mohammad being a pedophile or islam being a plagiarism of the Torah, or that Mohamad was a brutal & cruel founder of islam, as depited in the Cartoon.
Is Islam so weak a religion that it cannot stand strutiny & open debate.
Time for all government in the world to realise that it is through transparency, open debate & freedom of expression that our civilisation have come to this stage. We must not degenerate to the Islamist desire for backwardness to cover up their ulterior motive. This is 2011 AD and not 670 AD.
Deception through Takiyah must be exposed.
“planted a journalist in the audience”
This need more explanation. Journalists aren’t allowed to report on activist’s speeches? Or the plant isn’t a journalist, but a “journolister.”
“judge and no jury”
Jury trials are available in the EU?
“quoting directlly the Koran”
Truth has never been a defense in the EU, or its predecessor, which prosecuted the 1934 peace prize winner, Ossietzky.
My sympathies go out to any subject of the EU, as they did to the subjects of the USSR, which preceeded it.
It’s terrible news that Austria is abandoning its centuries-long tradition of free speech…, oh wait. Austria has never had free speech. Ever. Neither you nor I can make the EU into a human and decent polity, not without years of warfare and bloodshed, and the complete and utter annihilation of the EU governing class.
If you want help establishing an underground railroad to smuggle out dissidents and establishing guerillia groups overthrow the EU tyranny, let me know. Otherwise–nice article, but, you and she will go the way of the Cathars. The nature of EUrope can’t be changed by words alone.
As was mentioned in the article, many of the EU’s laws and edicts are being crafted by non-elected bureaucrats. There is no recourse for the people of Europe. They can’t vote out these unelected people. This is just as scary as the laws they are dreaming up.
Don’t be such a dumb a$$, Why do you think Obama has all the Czars to “regulate” for him.It’s a way of bypassing Congress,and you fools allow it to happen.Europe is just catching on that it’s a great way to get your point of view across without anyone being able to do a thing about it.
Austria – home of Hitler, Himmler, and most of the SS leadership. Still one of the most Israel-hating, Jew-hating countries on earth.
There are not many Jews left in Austria. Get them out, then let the Islamonazis and Aryan Nazis fight it out in the streets, until they kill each other off, like in that Star Trek TOS episode on planet Cheron.
Two groups of savages annihilating each other. A win-win.
“Austria – home of Hitler, Himmler, and most of the SS leadership. Still one of the most Israel-hating, Jew-hating countries on earth.”
Does there exist a country you don’t consider ‘one of the most Joo-hating’ nation on earth?
I sincerely think that the reason for the lack of freedom of speech in Europe is the aftermath of the Shoah. The Euros try their best to be more politically correct than America. The Muslim POSs are merely taking advantage of the situation.
The same applies to America. Due to our history, and those who took and still take advantage of it, our freedom of expression is soon limited to alphabet words.
That said, I never liked too much the Austrians or the Germans, but I doubt they’d allow Jihadi training camps on their soil.
“Does there exist a country you don’t consider ‘one of the most Joo-hating’ nation on earth?”
Apart from the USA, Australia, (the English part of Canada) and of course, Israel, no.
It’s a sick, sick world Tim, and getting sicker. I actually doubt it will ever get better.
Cut the crop, Eric! you’ve got Jewish paranoia. I’m a goy, I’ve lived in dozens of countries on 4 continents where Jews were accepted as regular citizenz by all comers including anti-Semites! How do I know? My father was a notorious anti-Semitic agitator, but he had Jewsish friends with whom the subject of Judaism never came up! It was more a pòse than anything alse. His most celebrated quote: ” I smack my lips when I hear the word ‘genocide’”. I can’t even recall him actually making any derogatory remarks about Jews. As a matter of fact, I was completely unprepared for being hustled by certain unscrupulous Jewish merchants. I had to learn how to deasl with them on my own!
So it turns out that anti-Semitism is not only evil, but useless to boot!
This is the creepiest post I’ve seen on this site, and that’s saying something.
You’ve got some real winners here, Roger.
I sympathise with your frustration; but as a former resident of Austria I must take exception to such gross generalities concerning Austrians. It is true that in Austria certain kinds of reactionary chauvinism and bureaucratism soenmtimes prevail. But Austria is a very diverse and advanced country where many cultural traditions converge. Austria started compiling its Civil Code half a century before the French started on theirs. Austria gave birth to many great thinkers, like Popper and Wittgenstein, both before Fascism and after it. It is a perfectly repectable country and should not be so zealously disparaged.
I think we all know that Muslim infiltration into evolved societies is not wanted. Segregation needs to be brought back into vogue. No one deserves to be subjected to “mohammed” and the violent acts his followers bring into the light of day. Sabaditsch-Wolff is a hero and I pray for her future.
By the way, here in the USA the muslims are lining up for the free welfare, housing, heat, food stamps, etc. It is time to deal with this issue head on.
Amazingly, the Austrian prosecutors could not make their case against the FPÖ – the Freedom Party of Austria – in the Mustafa comic-book ‘hate crime’ case.
[ http://diepresse.com/home/politik/innenpolitik/626528/MustafaComic_FPOe-hetzte-nicht-gegen-Tuerken?_vl_backlink=/home/politik/innenpolitik/index.do ]
More about the book in English here: http://www.austriantimes.at/news/General_News/2010-10-06/27303/Vienna_vote_has_its_battle_of_the_comic_books
BTW, Obama is robbing banks in Austria: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/austria/8274972/Obama-Robber-being-hunted-in-Austria.html
I am so thankful that ancestors left Europe long ago. Even the slowest learners among them left when Karl Marx was doing his writing.
“Even the slowest learners among them left when Karl Marx was doing his writing.”
Which makes the fact that most of Europe beats us in education even more amazing. At least we’re free!
i fear that this very thing is just down the pike for the USA. oklahoma is fighting this actual toxic invasion. go, oklahoma!
Maybe they’ll choose the right targets this time?
“the “Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union” (see paragraph 52, subsection 1) actually gives non-elected bureaucrats in Brussels the right to prosecute European citizens for expressing the “wrong” opinions if it is in the interests of the European Union to do so.”
Rule by bureaucratic fiat would seem to be in Europe’s future. What otherwise unimportant bureaucrat doesn’t dream of being more important that he/she really is? If someone is blocking you from the ladder rung you need to reach to get where you want to go – simply level charges of hate speech.
And can ‘hate thought’ be far off?
Austria has never confronted its Nazi legacy, certainly nothing like Germany has done. Unfortunately, this will come to haunt the nation in times like this as the watching world tries to determine where legitimate concern about extreme Islam ends and where warmed up Nazi era sentiment begins.
The funny part,if there is one,is that the left loons that recorded this crap so she could be charged ,are the ones that will suffer first under sharia law.
Notice to Europe do not come crying to the US for help, you bleeding heart do gooders asked for this muslim problem! Maybe Europe should have helped the US fight muslim terrorism but no you have to be PC. When the muslims are killing and raping your women and children. You invited them into your countries. The US can not wipe your a-s this time, we have our own problem with the muslim here. England is the only country from europe that really helped the US and it is sad because they will be the first country to fall.
The question begs… why do these Islamists prefer to live in western democratic countries? Why? They hate our western way of life, they hate freedom of speech, they hate the democratic way, and they hate us infidels… the Christians and the Jews.
So why do these Islamists despise us yet prefer to live in our democratic countries?
The answer is simple. They have a goal. To spread the way of Islam throughout the west.
The truth, however, is that these Islamists have an inferiority complex about Islam because the democratic way exposes Islam for what it is… it is restrictive, it is discriminatory, it incites hatred, it incites violence, and it is incompatible with the articles of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Democracy shows up the Islamic way for what it is… and the Islamists don’t like this! So they want us all to bow to their way.
The ultimate question is why do western societies tolerate Islamists? Why have so many western societies encouraged these sorts of people? When Islamists start trying to change the western way of life, including freedom of speech and expression, why aren’t islamists simply told to pack up their bags and head back to their countries of origin, if they don’t like it?
And the Progressives want the “Anointed One” to make us more like these pudknockers?
Gee, I wonder why our forefather’s got out of there?
Islam Sharia Law’s Threat to Free Speech
by Connie Hair 10/11/2010
An organized effort is underway worldwide orchestrated by a powerful Islamic political body to criminalize speech that “offends” Muslims. As much as that may sound like some fantastic conspiracy theory, these Muslim leaders broadcast their group’s every move on their website—yet America’s ruling elites refuse to listen.
The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is the second largest inter-governmental organization after the United Nations representing 57 member states which seek to criminalize speech that violates the archaic tenets of Sharia law.
The OIC is comprised of the kings and heads of state of all Islamic countries numbering its membership at 57 states by including the non-existent state of Palestine.
As reported last week on HUMAN EVENTS, the OIC website says it comprises “the collective voice of the Muslim world” making “policy decisions” and providing “guidance on all issues pertaining to the realization of the objectives and consider other issues of concern to the Member States and the Ummah.”
The ummah is the worldwide body of Muslim believers.
The OIC’s claim to speak for “the collective voice of the Muslim world” carries great weight considering its membership. The OIC is not an Islamic religious organization but a political entity exercising political power and territorial claims through all of its member states as well as the ummah.
On December 8, 2005, at a heads-of-state-level summit, the OIC ratified its “Ten-Year Programme of Action to Meet the Challenges Facing the Muslim Ummah in the 21st Century.”
The plan, among other things, seeks to define slander according to Islamic Sharia law—making Islamic “slander” a serious crime in every jurisdiction in the world, including the United States.
By January of 2006—just one month after ratification—the first OIC-orchestrated crisis was born.
In an attempt to buck the trend of media self-censorship on matters regarding Islam worldwide, Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten on September 30, 2005, published 12 editorial cartoon depictions of the Muslim prophet Muhammad. Under Sharia law it is illegal to publish an image of Muhammad.
Four months later, Muslim leaders circulated offensive cartoons not published by the paper, cartoons they had created themselves for the sole purpose of inciting violence. Manufactured outrage and violence ensued.
Eleven ambassadors from Muslim countries asked for a meeting with Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen to discuss what they perceived as an “on-going smearing campaign in Danish public circles and media against Islam and Muslims.”
On December 6, 2005, at a summit with heads of state in attendance, the OIC issued an official communiqué demanding that the United Nations impose international sanctions on Denmark.
On March 4, 2006, in The News from Karachi, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf “raised the offensive caricatures issue and demanded his U.S. counterpart draft [a] law to avoid such incidents in the future. President Bush, who hopes to boost the U.S.’ image among Muslims, condemned the publications of the cartoons and assured full cooperation.”
Muslim imams toured the Middle East inciting violence that caused over 100 deaths.
Much more on the coordinated OIC efforts are found in this exhaustive, footnoted timeline of events.
The following year in 2007, the process was repeated when Salman Rushdie, author of the Satanic Verses, was honored with knighthood by the British government.
As reported in the Washington Times, Pakistani cabinet member Mohammed Ijaz ul-Haq called for violent response to what he framed for the ummah as “slander” to Islam—this coming from the son of Gen. Zia-ul-Haq, Pakistan’s third military president who reinstated Sharia rule in Pakistan in 1977:
“This is an occasion for the [world's] 1.5 billion Muslims to look at the seriousness of this decision,” Mohammed Ijaz ul-Haq, religious affairs minister, said in parliament.
“The West is accusing Muslims of extremism and terrorism. If someone exploded a bomb on his body, he would be right to do so unless the British government apologizes and withdraws the ‘sir’ title,” Mr. ul-Haq said.
In 2008, the OIC continued its strategic campaign with an effort to silence Geert Wilders, a sitting member of the Dutch parliament. Because of OIC orchestrations, Wilders is currently on trial in Amsterdam for hate speech.
Wilders produced a film entitled Fitna which cites violent verses from the Koran interspersed with footage of Muslim imams spewing vitriol and violent Muslim jihadi attacks worldwide.
OIC General Secretary Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu readily admitted in a speech in June of 2008 the OIC’s targeting and orchestration, noting their success in causing the West to deter “freedom of expression.”
“In confronting the Danish cartoons and the Dutch film Fitna, we sent a clear message to the West regarding the red lines that should not be crossed. As we speak, the official West and its public opinion are all now well-aware of the sensitivities of these issues. They have also started to look serious into the question of freedom of expression from the perspective of its inherent responsibility, which should not be overlooked,” Ihsanoglu said.
Wilders’ trial began in earnest last week and is expected to run through October. Wilders was denied expert-witness testimony to assert the truth of claims he made in the film about Islam.
The Dutch court instead stipulated to the truth-of-all-the-facts-of-the-matter when the court stated, in language that aligns with Islamic notions of “slander,” that: “It is irrelevant whether Wilders’ witnesses might prove Wilders’ observations [about Islam] to be correct, what’s relevant is that his observations are illegal.”
It doesn’t matter what’s true; the court says speaking truth in regard to Islam is illegal in the Netherlands because it may incite violence. Just what the OIC ordered.
Wilders’ speech in Germany last Friday gives great insight into the OIC attacks on those who confront the “supremacy” of Sharia law and his own court battle that resumes today.
In 2009, the UN Human Rights Council passed a resolution (without a vote), submitted by the Obama Administration, which would subordinate U.S. free speech rights to UN oversight standards. These standards mirror the OIC’s Ten-Year Plan objectives.
The OIC seeks deterrent punishments for speaking against Islam to garner silence and submission to Sharia law.
In 2009 the toxic, politically correct atmosphere in the U.S. reached out and touched an American Christian group personally. The Christian Action Network (CAN) had its non-profit status revoked and was fined $4,000 by the state of Maine in 2009 for “an inflammatory anti-Muslim message.”
CAN sent information to its members exposing schooling programs that took place in Byron, Calif., that required students to dress up as Muslims, chant “Praise be to Allah” and learn the Five Pillars of Islamic faith. The letter asked parents to sign a petition to the governor of their state to prohibit such Islamic teachings and activities in their public schools.
CAN eventually prevailed in court spending thousands of dollars to fight the precedent-setting fine for “insulting” Islam.
In August and September of 2010, we were all treated to threats of Islamic violence surrounding a Gainesville, Fla., preacher’s plan to burn the Koran on the anniversary of the September 11 attacks.
The story hit the radar screen of most Americans in news reports of the Muslim threat of concerted retaliatory violence. How is it that these groups around the Muslim world were protesting this small-town rural American preacher at the same time on the same issue? Did al Jazeera open a Gainesville bureau?
Hardly.
In the Koran burning iteration of the information campaign, there was a coordinated media message including tie-ins to the Ground Zero mosque, Christian clergy condemning the pastor’s activities as “un-Christian” to satisfy Muslim sensitivities, the State Department comparing the pastor to the 9/11 terrorists (an American citizen exercising his protected free-speech rights inside America, mind you), and the U.S. Army commanding general in Afghanistan injecting himself into constitutional free-speech issues by allocating blame for future acts of Islamic-based terrorism to Americans.
A staged protest of Afghanis pressured Gen. Petraeus to comment on the planned actions of a private citizen inside the United States.
As seen in these efforts, the OIC seeks out stories to augment and broadcast to the Muslim world to orchestrate the violence or threats of violence. Once the Gainesville pastor buckled to Sharia-compliant demands, there was no outrage in the Muslim world over those who actually did burn the Koran on the nine-year anniversary of September 11.
Because the OIC picked the Gainesville pastor as its target, when they forced him to back down through intimidation, they had won. U.S. leaders including the President of the United States demanded the pastor submit to the tenets of Sharia law.
The subordination of 1st Amendment rights to Islamic law under threat of lethal jihadi attacks should be understood to be a declaration of hostility by those making the demands.
The threat that Muslims will self-radicalize and kill is at the very heart of the OIC campaign to squelch free speech regarding Islam. Issues such as the proposed Koran burning are manipulated for that purpose. Western cultural “elites” are targeted to deem the free speech inappropriate thereby facilitating a cultural dilution of our commitment to free-speech principles over time.
OIC “slander” campaigns are calibrated against issues like Koran burning or the Muhammad cartoons to dupe elites in the West into support for Islamic standards of “free speech” against their own interests. And it’s working.
Islam A Profound Warning We Must Not Ignore
This is a profound warning to America by one of the most knowledgeable and articulate Politicians in Europe. Geert Wilders is a member of the Dutch Parliament who has spoken out bravely, even though his life is under continual threat. Prayerfully, America will listen to what he says before it is too late.
[Geert Wilders is a Dutch Member of Parliament. In a generation or two, the US will ask itself: Who lost Europe? Here is the speech of Geert Wilders, Chairman, Party for Freedom, the Netherlands, at the Four Seasons, New York, introducing an Alliance of Patriots and announcing the Facing Jihad Conference in Jerusalem.]
Dear friends,
Thank you very much for inviting me.
I come to America with a mission. All is not well in the old world. There is a tremendous danger looming, and it is very difficult to be optimistic. We might be in the final stages of the Islamization of Europe. This not only is a clear and present danger to the future of Europe itself, it is a threat to America and the sheer survival of the West.
The United States is the last bastion of Western civilization, facing an Islamic Europe.
First I will describe the situation on the ground in Europe . Then, I will say a few things about Islam. To close I will tell you about a meeting in Jerusalem.
The Europe you know is changing.
You have probably seen the landmarks. But in all of these cities, sometimes a few blocks away from your tourist destination, there is another world. It is the world of the parallel society created by Muslim mass-migration.
All throughout Europe a new reality is rising: entire Muslim neighborhoods where very few indigenous people reside or are even seen. And if they are, they might regret it. This goes for the police as well. It’s the world of headscarves, where women walk around in figureless tents, with baby strollers and a group of children. Their husbands, or slaveholders if you prefer, walk three steps ahead.
There are mosques on many street corners. The shops have signs you and I cannot read. You will be hard-pressed to find any economic activity. These are Muslim ghettos controlled by religious fanatics. These are Muslim neighborhoods, and they are mushrooming in every city across Europe. These are the building-blocks for territorial control of increasingly larger portions of Europe, street by street, neighborhood by neighborhood, city by city.
There are now thousands of mosques throughout Europe. With larger congregations than there are in churches. And in every European city there are plans to build super-mosques that will dwarf every church in the region. Clearly, the signal is: we rule.
Many European cities are already one-quarter Muslim: just take Amsterdam, Marseille and Malmo in Sweden. In many cities the majority of the under-18 population is Muslim. Paris is now surrounded by a ring of Muslim neighborhoods. Mohammed is the most popular name among boys in many cities.
In some elementary schools in Amsterdam the farm can no longer be mentioned, because that would also mean mentioning the pig, and that would be an insult to Muslims.
Many state schools in Belgium and Denmark only serve halal food to all pupils.
In once-tolerant Amsterdam gays are beaten up almost exclusively by Muslims. Non-Muslim women routinely hear ‘whore, whore’. Satellite dishes are not pointed to local TV stations, but to stations in the country of origin.
In France school teachers are advised to avoid authors deemed offensive to Muslims, including Voltaire and Diderot; the same is increasingly true of Darwin. The history of the Holocaust can no longer be taught because of Muslim sensitivity.
In England sharia courts are now officially part of the British legal system. Many neighborhoods in France are no-go areas for women without headscarves. Last week a man almost died after being beaten up by Muslims in Brussels, because he was drinking during the Ramadan.
Jews are fleeing France in record numbers, on the run for the worst wave of anti-Semitism since World War II. French is now commonly spoken on the streets of Tel Aviv and Netanyahu, Israel.
I could go on forever with stories like this. Stories about Islamization.
A total of fifty-four million Muslims now live in Europe. San Diego University recently calculated that a staggering 25 percent of the population in Europe will be Muslim just 12 years from now. Bernhard Lewis has predicted a Muslim majority by the end of this century.
Now these are just numbers. And the numbers would not be threatening if the Muslim-immigrants had a strong desire to assimilate. But there are few signs of that. The Pew Research Center reported that half of French Muslims see their loyalty to Islam as greater than their loyalty to France. One-third of French Muslims do not object to suicide attacks.
The British Centre for Social Cohesion reported that one-third of British Muslim students are in favor of a worldwide caliphate. Muslims demand what they call ‘respect’. And this is how we give them respect. We have Muslim official state holidays.
The Christian-Democratic attorney general is willing to accept sharia in the Netherlands if there is a Muslim majority. We have cabinet members with passports from Morocco and Turkey.
Muslim demands are supported by unlawful behavior, ranging from petty crimes and random violence, for example against ambulance workers and bus drivers, to small-scale riots. Paris has seen its uprising in the low-income suburbs, the banlieus. I call the perpetrators ‘settlers’. Because that is what they are. They do not come to integrate into our societies; they come to integrate our society into their Dar-al-Islam. Therefore, they are settlers.
Much of this street violence I mentioned is directed exclusively against non-Muslims, forcing many native people to leave their neighborhoods, their cities, their countries. Moreover, Muslims are now a swing vote not to be ignored.
The second thing you need to know is the importance of Mohammed the prophet. His behavior is an example to all Muslims and cannot be criticized. Now, if Mohammed had been a man of peace, let us say like Ghandi and Mother Theresa wrapped in one, there would be no problem. But Mohammed was a warlord, a mass murderer, a pedophile, and had several marriages – at the same time.
Islamic tradition tells us how he fought in battles, how he had his enemies murdered and even had prisoners of war executed. Mohammed himself slaughtered the Jewish tribe of Banu Qurayza. If it is good for Islam, it is good. If it is bad for Islam, it is bad.
Let no one fool you about Islam being a religion. Sure, it has a god, and a hereafter, and 72 virgins. But in its essence Islam is a political ideology. It is a system that lays down detailed rules for society and the life of every person. Islam wants to dictate every aspect of life. Islam means ‘submission’. Islam is not compatible with freedom and democracy, because what it strives for is sharia.
If you want to compare Islam to anything, compare it to communism or national-socialism, these are all totalitarian ideologies.
Now you know why Winston Churchill called Islam ‘the most retrograde force in the world’, and why he compared Mein Kampf to the Quran.
The public has wholeheartedly accepted the Palestinian narrative, and sees Israel as the aggressor. I have lived in this country and visited it dozens of times. I support Israel. First, because it is the Jewish homeland after two thousand years of exile up to and including Auschwitz, second because it is a democracy, and third because Israel is our first line of defense.
This tiny country is situated on the fault line of jihad, frustrating Islam’s territorial advance. Israel is facing the front lines of jihad, like Kashmir, Kosovo, the Philippineconquest.
Thanks to Israeli parents who send their children to the army and lay awake at night, parents in Europe and America can sleep well and dream, unaware of the dangers looming.
Many in Europe argue in favor of abandoning Israel in order to address the grievances of our Muslim minorities. But if Israel were, God forbid, to go down, it would not bring any solace to the West. It would not mean our Muslim minorities would all of a sudden change their behavior, and accept our values. On the contrary, the end of Israel would give enormous encouragement to the forces of Islam. They would, and rightly so, see the demise of Israel as proof that the West is weak, and doomed. The end of Israel would not mean the end of our problems with Islam, but only the beginning. It would mean the start of the final battle for world domination. If they can get Israel, they can get everything.
So-called journalists volunteer to label any and all critics of Islamization as a ‘right-wing extremists’ or ‘racists’. In my country, the Netherlands, 60 percent of the population now sees the mass immigration of Muslims as the number one policy mistake since World War II. And another 60 percent sees Islam as the biggest threat.
Yet there is a greater danger than terrorist attacks, the scenario of America as the last man standing. The lights may go out in Europe faster than you can imagine.
An Islamic Europe means a Europe without freedom and democracy, an economic wasteland, an intellectual nightmare, and a loss of military might for America – as its allies will turn into enemies, enemies with atomic bombs.
With an Islamic Europe, it would be up to America alone to preserve the heritage of Rome, Athens and Jerusalem.
Dear friends, liberty is the most precious of gifts. My generation never had to fight for this freedom. People who fought for it with their lives offered it to us on a silver platter.
All throughout Europe, American cemeteries remind us of the young boys who never made it home, and whose memory we cherish. My generation does not own this freedom; we are merely its custodians. We can only hand over this hard won liberty to Europe’s children in the same state in which it was offered to us. We cannot strike a deal with mullahs and imams.
Future generations would never forgive us. We cannot squander our liberties. We simply do not have the right to do so.
We have to take the necessary action now to stop this Islamic stupidity from destroying the free world that we know.s, Southern Thailand, Darfur in Sudan, Lebanon, and Aceh in Indonesia.
Israel is simply in the way. The same way West Berlin was during the Cold War. The war against Israel is not a war against Israel. It is a war against the West. It is jihad. Israel is simply receiving the blows that are meant for all of us. If there had been no Israel, Islamic imperialism would have found other venues to release its energy.