A certain Arab author by the name of Mr. Alaa Alsaegh, an immigrant to the U.S. from Iraq, was attacked on August 14, 2011, by Muslims in the streets of St. Louis, Missouri. They stabbed him and carved a Star of David onto the flesh of his back. His crime? He published an Arabic language poem titled “Tears at the Heart of the Holocaust” on the website ArabsForIsrael.com. The poem expressed his love for the Jewish people and his sorrow over their fate in the Holocaust. The Muslim community in which he lived was outraged by this thought crime. He was called an infidel and received many threats for articulating his taboo feelings for the Jewish people. Alienated from the Muslim community, he continued to write his poetry, which contained the same themes which so upset his fellow Muslims.
In broad daylight and heavy traffic on Aug. 14, Alsaegh paid the price for expressing love for the Jews. And it happened in the streets of St. Louis, right here in the heart of America. Author and courageous freedom fighter Nonie Darwish describes the horrific event:
As he was driving at 10:30 in the morning on Compton St. near Park Ave., a small white car cut him off and hit his car, while another car stopped behind him. The occupants of the cars, some of whom wore security guard-type uniforms, quickly entered Alsaegh’s car, pointing a gun at him. They pushed his upper body down against the steering wheel, stabbed him and pulled off his shirt to expose his back. Then, with a knife, they carved the Star of David on his back while laughing as they recited his pro-Jewish poem.
Alsaegh thought that the perpetrators were Somalis; he was taken to the hospital and the photo of his injury was taken there.
The FBI has concluded that this was a hate crime. Question: apart from the Nonie Darwish article, and a handful of other reports, where exactly is this horrific story of Sharia street justice in America being reported? It is nowhere in the media.
Rodney King became a household name. The inhabitants of one American city rioted over what happened to that man. President Obama quickly reacted to the arrest of Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates and, without knowing the incident’s specifics, accused the police of acting “stupidly.”
Will Alaa Alsaegh become a household name? Will the inhabitants of an American city riot over his case? Will Obama say something? Henry Louis Gates didn’t have his flesh violated by the police. Might Alsaegh prove worthy of one ounce of Obama’s moral indignation?
We know the answers to these questions.
Three more questions:
[1] What if Alaa Alsaegh was a Muslim who was attacked by Christians in St. Louis who carved a cross on his back? Do you think this story would make it into the media?
[2] What if Alaa Alsaegh was a black man who was attacked by skinheads who carved KKK or a swastika onto his back? Do you think this story would make it into the media?
[3] What if Alaa Alsaegh was a Jew who expressed love of Muslims and was attacked for that by Jews who carved a crescent moon and star, a recognized symbol of Islam, onto his back? Do you think the story would make it into the media?
We know the obvious answer to those three questions. We also know that not only would these scenarios lead to mass media coverage worldwide and spark anti-American hysteria, but that scenarios 1 and 3 would most certainly lead not just to U.S. congressional committee investigations, but also to entire UN commissions.
Why is our media silent when a Muslim infidel has a Star of David carved on his back in a hate crime perpetrated by Muslims? Why is the literary culture silent? Where is Hollywood? Why is even our own president silent?
The answer is because of a monstrosity called the Left. The Left shapes and controls the boundaries of our society’s discourse. The Left’s mantle of multiculturalism and the belief that all religions and cultures are equal (except the ones it hates) have been internalized by our society, and there are severe punishments for crossing the boundaries of permitted speech. For example, if you condemn the Muslims for inflicting violence on Alsaegh, then you would have to accept that, in terms of the ingredients of their crime, that they are clearly acting out of the mandates of their Islamic faith (i.e., the obligation to hate infidels and Jews etc. is irrefutable). But to condemn their acts and the teachings on which they are based violates the sacred cow of leftist beliefs (i.e., Islam is a Religion of Peace) and, therefore, makes one an Islamophobe, something that, thanks to the Left’s victory in our culture, most people are now terrified of being accused of.
This phenomenon explains why Ilan Halimi, a Jewish boy in France, was kidnapped by a Muslim gang several years ago in Paris, held in a secret Muslim concentration camp and barbarically tortured for 23 days until he died (with the torturers calling his mother and reciting Koranic verses to her while she heard his screams), and his name is still to be spoken in our media.
It is understandable, of course, why Halimi’s name is not spoken — or known — in our culture. If it were, then the fact would become well known that in the apartment building in which he was tied up and tortured, the myriad of dwellers in the building, all Muslims, heard Ilan’s screams. Not only did they not do anything to stop it, but many of them got in line to participate. And they took gratification and consolation from torturing their Jew, for Islamic theology dispenses numerous mandates and incentives for Muslims to hate, hurt, and kill Jews. To accept this fact annihilates the foundational structures of the leftist belief system; it takes the legs out from the progressive lies on which our culture is built. It is safer, therefore, not to acknowledge the names of Alaa Alsaegh and Ilan Halimi, let alone what happened to them and why.
The notion that his own society is unjust is the bedrock of the leftist’s vision. To recognize the evil of the people who carved the Star of David on Alaa Alsaegh’s back or who tortured Ilan Halimi, and to recognize the evil of the ideology that inspired them, is to admit the existence of pernicious adversarial faiths. Such an admission concedes that there are cultures and systems that are much more unjust than ours. This is an untenable step for leftists to take, because it means acknowledging that there is something superior about our civilization that’s worth saving and defending.
Showing compassion for Alaa Alsaegh and Ilan Halimi is, therefore, extremely dangerous for any leftist, as it would undermine his political faith. As I have documented in United in Hate, it would also expose him to potential excommunication from his social community — which is unfathomable for the majority of leftists, whose politics are, in the end, their social lives and, therefore, their sense of personal identity.
There is also a desperation in our culture and media for a “moderate Islam” (we talk about it more than Muslims do) — an Islam that many non-Muslims strenuously insist exists, but that somehow mysteriously eludes them. This moderate Islam will take all of our problems away, we are told, once the “extremists,” who are the “minority” in Islam, are consoled. Meanwhile, a real and actual “moderate Islam” is nowhere to be found; there is no school of Islamic jurisprudence that counsels Muslims to renounce the Qur’an’s teachings on Islamic supremacism and the obligation of violent jihad. And yet, to suggest the truth of this reality in our society earns one only the label of being a racist and an “Islamophobe.”
Roger Simon, CEO of Pajamas Media, wrote a piece awhile back that touched on this theme, analyzing why even various conservative thinkers have attacked Geert Wilders. In his view, these conservative individuals are rejecting Wilders because they are afraid that he might be right. Krauthammer criticized Wilders, Simon writes, not because
he thinks the Dutch politician is “extreme,” but because he is afraid the Dutch politician is right. Call it projection, but I believe this because I have the exact same fear. I think many of us do and we don’t want to face it. Who would? The resultant conclusions are too depressing.
Indeed, it is too depressing to consider the implications of Wilders being right and so a form of Stockholm Syndrome vis-à-vis Islam must enter the consciousness of our society – a Stockholm Syndrome clearly on display, in its own toxic form, in the shameless silence we are now witnessing of our media on the frightening and tragic fate of Alaa Alsaegh.
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