Nadine:

Dont forget it was a muslim mob which set the railway coach on fire at Godhra Station in Feb 2002 which killed 59 returning hindu pilgrims and which led to the subsequent hindu muslim riots in which 900 muslims and 250 hindus were killed.

Also do tell us what happened to Taslmina Nasreen in India (in Hyderabad and Kolkata) ?

SUCH NEWS ITEMS NEVER APPEAR IN THE WESTERN PRESS:

New Delhi, April 04, 2009

India's Muslims denounce Taliban whipping of girl

After video clips of a 17-year-old girl being flogged in public by Taliban fighters in Pakistan's Swat valley were shown on TV, India's Islamic scholars denounced it as "un-Islamic" and "satanic" and condemned it as "gross violation" of Quranic codes.Renowned Islamic scholar Maulana Wahiduddin Khan spoke out strongly against the incident and added that if anything, the act was absolutely "un-Islamic - even satanic"."This kind of treatment is neither Islamic nor human. In fact, not only is it un-Islamic and inhuman, but also satanic," Khan, who has authored over 200 books on Islam, told IANS."The first thing that should be done is to educate people, develop ethical values, sensitivity towards women and treat them equally. Society can be reformed through education - punishment (of the perpetrators) can never be the starting point for any kind of reform or change," he added.

Similarly, Mushirul Hasan, vice chancellor of the Jamia Millia Islamia university, condemned the incident saying that it was a wrong portrayal of Islam, which preaches exactly opposite of what the Taliban were seen doing to the hapless young girl."I am horrified. This (incident) is a gross violation of Islamic and Quranic injunctions which teaches humanity, love, peace and magnanimity," Hasan told IANS.The dangers of imposing Sharia laws in Pakistan's restive Swat Valley were brought into sharp focus Friday with the airing of a two-minute video showing a 17-year-old screaming, burqa-clad girl being whipped by Taliban fighters for coming "out of her house with another man who was not her husband".The grainy video, shot on a mobile phone, showed the girl face down on the ground. Two men held her arms and feet while a third, a black-turbaned man with a flowing beard, whipped her repeatedly.

READ FULL STORY:
http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/Print.aspx?Id=b6aaacd5-54ba-4e95-b097-d1be921dfaf5

GoofyPlatypus:

You forgot Viet NAm (3 million deaths) korea, the annihilation of the Native Americans, the decimation of Australian aborigines, the destruction of the Maya, Inca, and Aztec civilizations, and 300,000 dead in Iraq.

What amazes me is how many innocent Muslims are murdered by bloodthirsty Muslims of another sect each week and how many innocent Jews, Christians and Westerners are murdered by Islamic terrorists, but people like Eboo and his apologists can only condemn so-called "intolerance" in Americans and Christians.

Get a clue! Or at least make an attempt at credibility. Westerners and non-Muslims are not perfect, but we're not responsible for Darfur, for Ethiopia, for Sudan, for Afghanistan, for Kashmir ...

Seriously. Criticize us all you want, Eboo, but at least try to be more inclusive in your comprehension of the realities of this world.

Counterww,

Reiteration is one of the prime education tools. Read it again and learn!! Btw, the previous commentary was more about the violence of basic Islam not its theology. Apparenty you need to read it again!!!

CCNL:

Do you EVER get bored of this copy and paste routine?

You posts repeat over and over.... Assume opinions from liberal theologians to be facts, and you don't debate, you just state.

You need to pick up a few books from conservative Christian theologians and get some balance, dude.

What exactly is your purpose on here?

Nadinebatr,

The Reality of Contemporary Islam:

Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the massacre in Mumbai, the assassinations of Bhutto and Theo Van Gogh, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And who funds this muck and stench of terror? The warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

Current crises:

The Sunni-Shiite blood feud and the warmongering, womanizing (11 wives), hallucinating founder.

And some body counts:

1a) 179 killed in Mumbai/Bombay, 290 injured

1b) Assassination of Benazir Bhutto and Theo Van Gogh

2) 9/11, 3000 mostly US citizens, 1000’s injured

3) The 24/7 Sunni-Shiite centuries-old blood feud currently being carried out in Iraq, US Troops, 3,425 from combat, 839 non-hostile) and 91,356 – 99,743 Iraqi civilians killed, http://www.iraqbodycount.org/ and
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/casualty.pdf

4) Kenya- In Nairobi, about 212 people were killed and an estimated 4000 injured; in Dar es Salaam, the attack killed at least 11 and wounded 85.[2]

5) Bali-in 2002-killing 202 people, 164 of whom were foreign nationals, and 38 Indonesian citizens. A further 209 people were injured.

6) Bali in 2005- Twenty people were killed, and 129 people were injured by three bombers who killed themselves in the attacks.

7) Spain in 2004- killing 191 people and wounding 2,050.

8) UK in 2005- The bombings killed 52 commuters and the four radical Islamic suicide bombers, injured 700.

"Care to produce a single statement in the entire history of the Troubles of Ireland where either a Catholic or a Protestant stood up and said that their God or their Prophet Jesus had ordered the other side to be completely eliminated? Go ahead and give it a try. Why?..."
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

You are using semantics and the terrorism of Catholics and Protestants of only academic interest.

This sectarian violence was perpetrated for more than four centuries because the two sects hated each other. Why does the explanation have to be only derived from statements of leaders or "waving of the Bible"?

Why was such a hatred generated? Don't tell us that it was non-ideological.

True, the Army of God people were punished. The Pakistanis are also trying to punish the crimnals there. Don't you read about "drone attacks"?

Yes, there are extremist elements in Pakistan, just as there are extremist elements in India (like RSS, Shiva Sena, Bajrang Dal and BJP).

There have been hundreds of bombings and terrorism acts in Northeastern India during the last three or more decades. They are simply not publicized here.

No, world's 1.3 billion Muslims are not beheading their wives every day. Most people are busy making a living, putting food on the table or providing shelter to their families.

You like us to believe that they are busy plotting against the West.

@nadinebatra,

There is a cure for ignorance but it does require a willingness to learn and examine.

Care to produce a single statement in the entire history of the Troubles of Ireland where either a Catholic or a Protestant stood up and said that their God or their Prophet Jesus had ordered the other side to be completely eliminated? Go ahead and give it a try. Why? Thinking does require that you unwind yourself and pull your head out of either your own or Muhammad's anal cavity for a bit. Try it.
Can the christians, or the hindus or the jews or the buddhists revert back to the violent and killing past of their religions. Given a chance they might, but highly unlikely because the overwhelming majority of the followers of these religions have stepped into the modern world and have no desire to "re-fang" their theocrats. Can you say that about Islam and its followers at the moment? The centuries long religious sectarian warfare that raged in Europe was mostly with crude weapons. Pakistan has about 100 nuclear bombs and the Jihadis just killed 20 yesterday!

By the self-haters who are unable to see no should ask what motivates the Jihadis, what motivates the suicide bombers? You do not like the answer that they give. How many in the Islamic world support the ideology of the bombers? Again you do not want to know the answer. Eboo does not even want the people to think about why the killers wave the Qurans, say the verses of the Quran, and why hundreds of millions of the followers of Muhammad support these killers.

So you think bringing in the miniscule dregs and nut cases like the Army of God justifies ignoring the massive support of the jihadis from the OIC countries? The bombers of Army of God were hunted, caught and persecuted like criminals by who? Have you seen how many pakistanis support the Taliban warriors? Have you seen how many British Muslims want Sharia Imposed upon their fellow citizens and reduce the kaafirs to dhimmis? In USA we have one of the founders of CAIR talking about imposition of Sharia and the effective overthrowing of the US constitution. Where does all this supremacist ideology finds its drive among the muslims?

But then you are too busy blowing off to really want to find out.

Well, as MANY "Christians" are behind and paying for Zionists to kill ALL Arabs/Muslims, I have to say that they ARE behind a "Holy War", at least in Israel. For whatever reason (the "rapture" and Jews' connection to it), many churches in the US are happy to send MONEY to the Zionists, whom I see as Jews-- IN NAME ONLY.
Anyone who believes that Muslims (who have worked beside Jews IN Palestine for decades) are merely set to "obliterate all Jews" is not paying attention. It's obvious to ANYONE who gets their news out of the U.S., that the exact OPPOSITE is the truth... and because of this (lack of media attention within this country) that Palestinian Muslims and Chrisians are being slaughtered and displaced on a daily basis.
Good job, USA...
(it's called sarchasm)

"When was the last time a Christian killed in the name of Jesus or even Christianity.”
**********************************************************************

Hey AKafir:

That is the quote from your post. You got the answer for what you asked.

The Army of God fanatics bombed numerous abortion clinics in America. For what? They wanted to kill adults to save unborn babies in the name of Jesus. Why is it so difficult for you to understand?

In Northern Ireland, why were Catholics and Protestants terrorizing each others' communities for more than four centuries? Aren't Catholics and Protestants two sects of Christianity?
Oh, I forgot some bigots don't want to consider Catholics and mormons as Christians.

That was not exactly a war between the labor and the management of a factory.

I have read many bigoted statements before, but your beats them all.

When Americans see Muslims hijack planes, chant praised to Allah and massacre thousands of civilians, they are more likely to get more religious to save themselves from violent jihad of Islam.

Same with Israel. Most Muslims see it as their religious duty to wipe out Israel, so why is Eboo surprised when Jews get more religious?

@nadinebatra

Muhammad was more like Jim Jones but homicidal and far more successful than the suicidal Jones. Labeling Jones as a follower of the bible is truly ignorant. Read up on Jones and remove a bit of your ignorance.

The thing that self flagellators in the west do not seem to grasp that there are criminal and murderers in All groups religious or otherwise, and many of these do use religious "jargon" to fool the gullible, and that Muhammad the prophet of Islam was one such criminal and murderer who was widely successful.

In all the example you give, go back and find the words of the killers and see whether they are quoting the words of their scriptures to not only justify their actions but also using them as the reason of their killings. Read what I asked before carefully and do not confuse the reason they give for their crimes with the religion of the group they belong to.

See the reason that the Jihadis are providing for their killings. Violence and killing (JIHAD) of the Kaafirs is a RELIGIOUS obligation a 'fard' in Islam. Jihads not only wave the Quran as they behead the kaafirs but they are following the dictates of their Allah and Muhammad.

Confusing the REQUIRED and obligatory murder under jihad in Islam and the violence that you quote is the ignorance that plagues many in the world, but not those who have suffered as Kaafirs under the Islamic rule.

So be a little less self righteous and go actually learn about Islam and its murder manual given by Muhammad.

Intolerance, hate, violence, and murder are words we throw around without much meaning until they become unending realities for some people. The Israeli daily Haaretz recounts some of the nastiest of human nature in display in the occupied Palestinian lands: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1072466.html

[Dead babies, mothers weeping on their children's graves, a gun aimed at a child and bombed-out mosques - these are a few examples of the images Israel Defense Forces soldiers design these days to print on shirts they order to mark the end of training, or of field duty.

The slogans accompanying the drawings are not exactly anemic either: A T-shirt for infantry snipers bears the inscription "Better use Durex," next to a picture of a dead Palestinian baby, with his weeping mother and a teddy bear beside him.

A sharpshooter's T-shirt from the Givati Brigade's Shaked battalion shows a pregnant Palestinian woman with a bull's-eye superimposed on her belly, with the slogan, in English, "1 shot, 2 kills.

" A "graduation" shirt for those who have completed another snipers course depicts a Palestinian baby, who grows into a combative boy and then an armed adult, with the inscription, "No matter how it begins, we'll put an end to it."

There are also plenty of shirts with blatant sexual messages. For example, the Lavi battalion produced a shirt featuring a drawing of a soldier next to a young woman with bruises, and the slogan, "Bet you got raped!"

Drawings or slogans previously banned in certain units have been approved for distribution elsewhere. For example, shirts declaring, "We won't chill 'til we confirm the kill" were banned in the past (the IDF claims that the practice doesn't exist), yet the Haruv battalion printed some last year.

The slogan "Let every Arab mother know that her son's fate is in my hands!" had previously been banned for use on another infantry unit's shirt. A Givati soldier said this week, however, that at the end of last year, his platoon printed up dozens of shirts, fleece jackets and pants bearing this slogan.]

In another comment: [The Israeli army, meanwhile, denies the existence of such slogans and drawings, claiming certain pictures had been banned.

According to the report, a shirt for the Lavi battalion's soldiers bear the sentence "We came, we saw, we destroyed!" - "alongside images of weapons, an angry soldier and a Palestinian village with a ruined mosque in the center."

"There is a perception that the Palestinian is not a person, a human being entitled to basic rights, and therefore anything may be done to him," said Sociologist Dr. Orna Sasson-Levy, of Bar-Ilan University.

He believes that the phenomenon reflects a process of radicalization inside the Israeli society and soldiers are on the frontline of the process.]

Dr. Saaon-Levy maybe is onto something here. Making our moral circle bigger than what it is could be the answer to our unending cruelty toward our fellow human beings.

Hello vikram3,

"It would take non-Muslims perhaps thousand more years to get to Muslim level of intolerance."

How soon we forget, it seems. It was not but a couple of centuries ago that this "Christian nation" was purging it's lands of the native inhabitants. Do you not know that christian soldiers had as relatively recent history training in how to torture Inquisition style? Do you not know that it was Christians that started the ritual of scalping indians, not the other way around. They would collect bounties on each scalp. Used to go in and just kill all the Indians they could find. Would hunt them. More scalps, more dollars.

Christians do not have a sparkling track record on tolerance. Strange, no?, in that the Master was supposed to have been all about it. Love, forgiveness, compassion for enemy as well as friend... Christians have a bloody, violent and ugly history. Christians came up with some of the most brutal forms of torture.

America is a great country, and there is currently a surprising degree of freedom and allowance here. But we should be careful sounding too prideful of our tolerance. Least we start a pre-emptive war on one of your 57 Islamic nations. There is no problem coming up with a justification.

What "Christian" recruits need to read and agree to before they are allowed to enlist in any military establishment:

Jesus was an illiterate Jewish peasant/carpenter/simple preacher man who suffered from hallucinations and who has been characterized anywhere from the Messiah from Nazareth to a mythical character from mythical Nazareth to a mamzer from Nazareth (Professor Bruce Chilton, in his book Rabbi Jesus). Analyses of Jesus’ life by many contemporary NT scholars (e.g. Professors Crossan, Borg and Fredriksen, On Faith panelists) via the NT and related documents have concluded that only about 30% of Jesus' sayings and ways noted in the NT were authentic. The rest being embellishments (e.g. miracles)/hallucinations made/had by the NT authors to impress various Christian, Jewish and Pagan sects.

The 30% of the NT that is "authentic Jesus" like everything in life was borrowed/plagiarized and/or improved from those who came before. In Jesus' case, it was the ways and sayings of the Babylonians, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Hittites, Canaanites, OT, John the Baptizer and possibly the ways and sayings of traveling Greek Cynics.

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html

For added "pizzazz", Catholic/Christian theologians divided god the singularity into three persons and invented atonement as an added guilt trip for the "pew people" to go along with this trinity of overseers. By doing so, they made god the padre into god the "filicider".

Current crises:

Pedophiliac priests, atonement theology and original sin!!!!

Luther, Calvin, Smith, Henry VIII, Wesley, Roger Williams et al, founders of Christian-based religions, also suffered from the belief in/hallucinations of "pretty wingie thingie" visits and "prophecies" for profits analogous to the myths of Catholicism (resurrections, apparitions, ascensions and immaculate conceptions).

Current crises:

Adulterous preachers, "propheteering/ profiteering" evangelicals and atonement theology.

It would take non-Muslims perhaps thousand more years to get to Muslim level of intolerance. How do 57 exclusive nations based on Islam sound to you? Perhaps, very insulting if you happen to be a non-Muslim living there.

The fact that you and your co-religionist Fareed Zakaria and many other Muslims come here and achieve success (despite spewing Islamic venom and talking trash) in a majority Xtian nation says a lot about this country.

AKafir wrote:
"When was the last time a Christian killed in the name of Jesus or even Christianity.”
Someone as a reply to the above question mentioned unabashedly the names of Eric Rudolph, Jim Jones as well as the Irish and Angolan civil wars as conflicts waged in the name of Jesus. Just like that ! and some still wonder why the world is in this sorry state of affairs.

AKafir wrote:

"When was the last time a christian killed in the name of Jesus or even Christianity? "

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Ignorance is bliss ! Do you think people have short memories that they would not remember Eric Rudolph of ARMY OF GOD?

Do you think we don't remember Reverend Jim Jones of Jonestown, Guiana, who killed one of our congressmen and then led his followers to a mass suicide?

Do you think we don't remember Rajnishi Hindus who tried to control the town of Antelope, Oregon in 1984, where they tried to commit bioterrorism by sprinkling salmonella in restaurants where more than 600 people bcame seriously ill?

Do you think our memories are so short that we do not remember that Catholics and Protestants terrorising each other for more than four centuries?

Do you think we don't remember that Hindus went on a rampage and killing spree against Sikhs after the assasination of Indira Gandhi?

Do you think we can not remember Hindus of Gujarat commiting genocide of Muslims of Gujarat.

Do you think we forgot Rwanda where even Catholic nuns participated in the ethnic cleasing and genocide of nearly 900,000 Tutsis?

What a piece of bigotry you wrote!

In the name of Islam followers of Muhammed have killed millions (just 3 million Bangladeshis by the warriors of Pakistan who called the Bangalis half-hindus ), and every day there are reports of young men in Islam blowing themselves up and killing kafirs around them.

When was the last time a christian killed in the name of Jesus or even Christianity? When was the last time a jew killed in the name of Moses or David or Judaism? When was the last time a Sikh killed in the name of sikhism or Guru Nanak? When was the last time a buddhist killed in the name of Buddha or buddhism?

Eboo wants to equate the very real and very bloody civil war that is raging among the followers of Muhammad across the globe, and the casual beheadings, and casual suicide bombings that are taking place daily across the world to the articles and words of individuals expresssing dismay at the mere prospect of a fellow human considering 'fundamentalism'?

Those who like to pile on Bush and Cheney: when did the neocons used Christianity to justify anything? Bush bent over backwards and repeated that "Islam is a peaceful religion" adnauseam. The simple fact is that Islam is a very violent imperialistic ideology and not a religion at all. "We" need to recognize this simple fact to deal with the civil war within Islam that we have been dragged into willy nilly.

You forgot to mention Cheney's private "Christian" mercenaries Blackwater.

Can you imaging the outrage if the "freedom packages" contained the Koran or the Tipitaka. Americans voted out the intolerant neochristian theocracy last November. It's high time the military caught up with the rest of the country.

Distributing New Testament stories in tracts is now deemed by some on this thread as inciting violence. This is not just an individual opinion but that of a whole culture who sees in one eye. In yesterday’s news five men were jailed in Morocco for handing out copies of the New Testament. The charge was” incitement for violence”. Where does it say in that book to kill those who are non-Christians? Every mosque in this country has a library of tracts that they spread on tables near the door that do proselytize by making nonsense claims as it being religion of peace etc., and do actually incite for violence when they hand out copies of the Quran. We do not shut those places down because we believe in the freedom for ideas to compete in the open marketplace of ideas. We should be reciprocated !

The solution:

The following should be read by all potential recruits and agreed to before they sign up for military duty:

Abraham founder/father of three major religions was either the embellishment of the lives of three different men or a
mythical character as was mythical Moses, the "Tablet-Man" who talked to burning bushes and made much magic in Egypt.

Abraham has been relegated to the myth pile along with most if not all the OT.

Mohammed was an illiterate, womanizing, lust and greed-driven, warmongering, hallucinating Arab, who also had embellishing/hallucinating/plagiarizing scribal biographers who not only added "angels" and flying chariots to the koran but also a militaristic agenda to support the plundering and looting of the lands of non-believers.

This agenda continues as shown by the massacre in Mumbai, the assassinations of Bhutto and Theo Van Gogh, the conduct of the seven Muslim doctors in the UK, the 9/11 terrorists, the 24/7 Sunni suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the 24/7 Shiite suicide/roadside/market/mosque bombers, the Islamic bombers of the trains in the UK and Spain, the Bali crazies, the Kenya crazies, the Pakistani “koranics”, the Palestine suicide bombers/rocketeers, the Lebanese nutcases, the Taliban nut jobs, and the Filipino “koranics”.

And this muck and stench of terror is sponsored by the warmongering, Islamic, Shiite terror and torture theocracy of Iran aka the Third Axis of Evil and also the Sunni "Wannabees" of Saudi Arabia.

Current crises:

The Sunni-Shiite blood feud all over the Muslim world and the warmongering, womanizing (11 wives), hallucinating founder.

How else are you going to get young men to dive on a hand grenade or blow themselves up in a cafe? You have to put some god or two in the mix.
The older men who sent those young men to die also need a god-fix, you know, it helps them feel guiltless about killing the accidental innocents along with the satan-worhshipping enemy.

Sure, what osama and the other self-styled muslim leadership are doing is true evil. Why has it taken so long to kill this guy? What are you christian soldiers doing about killing this despot?

I suppose those same young men willing to die for our country would LOVE the chance to personally kill osama, sh!t I'd be willing to do it. So why is he still alive?

The Bible might be for their own personal study. However, the proselityzing material in Arabic, not to mention the "Left Behind" game where one can kill the Unbelievers" is most certainly an incitement to violence! It has no place in a military where Jews, Muslims, Christians, Pagans, etc. serve honorably. I have heard numerous stories of non-Christian soldiers being discriminated against by their Fundamentalist Christian counterparts. How are we supposed to show the Sunnis and Shias how to be in a pluralistic society, when we can't even have one in our own military?

It has been my hope that as we move into the 21st century religious nationalism would fade along with religious fundamentalism. Perhaps that is occurring, and this is some kind of last stand. Often as long held traditions die they put up a fight at the end, struggling for viability.

Humans have not lived long without warfare. Brutality is less than it was a few hundred years ago, and the value of a life is held as greater. Is it just dreamyness to imagine a better world?

Fundamentalism is an obstacle in the way of world peace. Fundamentalism appears to be an obstacle to love, even as it may say that is it's purpose. But then most of us are deluded in one way or another.

Fundamentalism does not seem to be struggling for membership in the world, currently and unfortunately. But it remains my hope that nations and religions continue to evolve toward what serves all of us best. Peace for all begets prosperity, happiness, fulfillment, and a brighter future.

Eboo pontificates thus:
“What were the packages to contain? Not body armor or home-baked cookies. Rather, they held Bibles, proselytizing material in English and Arabic.”

Do you consider a bible whether given to the soldier or by the soldier an encouragement of or incitement to violence? Something like the Pakistani security giving confidential security information to our enemies so as to ambush our soldiers?