As
someone specializing in Islamic jihadism, one would expect I’d have much to say
immediately after jihadi attacks of the sort that recently occurred in Brussels
(35 killed), or San Bernardino (14 killed), or Paris (130). Ironically, I
don’t: such attacks are ultimately symptoms of what I do deem worthy of
discussion, namely, root causes. (What can one add when a symptom of the
root cause he has long warned against occurs other than “told
you so”?)
So what is the root cause of jihadi
attacks?
Many think that the ultimate source of the ongoing
terrorization of the West is Islam. Yet this notion has one problem: the Muslim world is
immensely weak and intrinsically incapable of being a threat. That every
Islamic assault on the West is a terrorist attack -- and terrorism, as is
known, is the weapon of the weak -- speaks for itself.
This
was not always the case. For approximately one thousand years, the
Islamic world was the
scourge of the West. Today’s history books may refer to those who
terrorized Christian Europe as Arabs, Saracens, Moors, Ottomans, Turks,
Mongols, or Tatars -- but all were operating under the same banner of jihad
that the Islamic State is operating under.
No -- today, the ultimate enemy is
within. The root cause behind nonstop Muslim terrorization of the West is found
in those who stifle or whitewash all talk and examination of Muslim doctrine
and history; who welcome hundreds of thousands of Muslim migrants while knowing
that some are jihadi operatives and many
are simply “radical”; who work to overthrow secular Arab dictators in the
name of “democracy” and “freedom,” only to uncork the jihad suppressed by the
autocrats (the Islamic State’s territory consists of lands that were
“liberated” in Iraq, Libya, and Syria by the U.S. and its allies).
So
are Western leaders and politicians the root cause behind Islamic terrorization
of the West?
Close
-- but still not there yet.
Far
from being limited to a number of elitist leaders and institutions, the Western
empowerment of the jihad is the natural outcome of postmodern thinking -- the
real reason an innately weak Islam can be a source of repeated woes for a
militarily and economically superior West.
Remember,
the reason people like French President Francois Hollande, U.S. President
Barack Hussein Obama, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are in power --
three prominent Western leaders who insist that Islam is innocent of violence
and who push for Muslim immigration -- is because they embody a worldview that
is normative in the West.
In
this context, the facilitation of jihadi terror is less a top down imposition
and more a grass root product of decades of erroneous, but unquestioned,
thinking. (Those who believe America’s problems begin and end with Obama would
do well to remember that he did not come to power through a coup but that he
was voted in -- twice. This indicates that Obama and the majority of voting
Americans have a shared, and erroneous, worldview. He
may be cynically exploiting this worldview, but that doesn’t change the fact that
it’s because this warped worldview is mainstream that he can exploit it in the
first place.)
Western empowerment of the jihad is
rooted in a number of philosophies that have metastasized into every corner of
social life, becoming cornerstones of postmodern epistemology. These include
the doctrines of relativism and multiculturalism on the one hand, and
anti-Western, anti-Christian sentiment on the other.
Taken
together, these cornerstones of postmodern, post-Christian thinking hold that
there are no absolute truths and thus all cultures are fundamentally equal and
deserving of respect. If any Western person wants to criticize a civilization
or religion, then let them look “inwardly” and acknowledge their European
Christian heritage as the epitome of intolerance and imperialism.
Add
to these a number of sappy and silly ideals -- truth can never be uttered
because it might “hurt the feelings” of some (excluding white Christians, who
are fair game), and, far from suspecting them, the West should go out of
its way to appease Muslims until they “like us” -- and you have a sure recipe
for disaster, that is, the current state of affairs.
Western people are bombarded with these
aforementioned “truths” from the cradle to the grave -- from kindergarten to
university, from Hollywood to the news rooms, and now even in churches -- so
that they are unable to accept and act on a simple truism that their ancestors
well knew: Islam is an inherently violent and intolerant creed that cannot
coexist with non-Islam (except insincerely,
in times of weakness).
The
essence of all this came out clearly when Obama, in order to rationalize away
the inhuman atrocities of the Islamic State, counseled Americans to get off
their “high
horse” and remember that their Christian ancestors have been guilty of
similar if not worse atrocities. That he had to go back almost a thousand years
for examples by referencing the crusades and the
Inquisition -- both
of which have been completely distorted by the warped postmodern worldview,
including the portrayal of imperialist Muslims as victims -- did not
matter to America’s leader.
Worse,
it did not matter to most Americans. The greater lesson was not that Obama
whitewashed modern Islamic atrocities by misrepresenting and demonizing
Christian history, but that he was merely reaffirming the mainstream narrative
that Americans have been indoctrinated into believing. And thus,
apart from the usual ephemeral and meaningless grumblings, his words -- as
with many of his pro-Islamic,
anti-Christian comments and policies -- passed along without
consequence.
Once upon a time, the Islamic world was
a superpower and its jihad an irresistible force to be reckoned with. Over
two centuries ago, however, a rising Europe -- which had experienced over one
millennium of jihadi conquests and atrocities -- defeated and defanged
Islam.
As
Islam retreated into obscurity, the post-Christian West slowly came into being.
Islam didn’t change, but the West did: Muslims still venerate their heritage
and religion -- which impels them to jihad against the Western “infidel” --
whereas the West learned to despise its heritage and religion, causing it to
become an unwitting ally of the jihad.
Hence the current situation: the jihad
is back in full vigor, while the West -- not just its leaders, but much of the
populace -- facilitates it in varying degrees. Nor is this situation easily
remedied. For to accept that Islam is inherently violent and intolerant is to
reject a number of cornerstones of postmodern Western thinking that far
transcend the question of Islam. In this context, nothing short of an
intellectual/cultural revolution -- where rational thinking becomes mainstream
-- will allow the West to confront Islam head on.
But
there is some good news. With every Islamic attack, the eyes of more
and more Western people are opened to the true nature of
Muhammad’s religion. That this is happening despite generations of
pro-Islamic indoctrination in the West is a testimony to the
growing brazenness of the jihad.
Yet it still remains unclear whether
objective thinking will eventually overthrow the current narrative of
relativism, anti-Christianism, and asinine emotionalism.
Simply put, both celebrating multiculturalism
and defeating the jihad is impossible.
However, if such a revolution takes place
(sooner rather than later), the Islamic jihad will be easily swept back into
the dustbin of history. For the fact remains: Islam is terrorizing the world,
not because it can, but because the West allows it
to.
