From The Azzi Archives Of “Ask a Muslim Anything” (Part Two)

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In the Middle East itself, where was this “long history of economic and political control” which Azzi claims explains Islamic terrorism? Almost all of the  Arabian peninsula was off-limits to the Western powers. The only exceptions were the entrepot at Aden that the British maintained to resupply ships on the sea lane from England to India, and several small garrisons they kept in the upper Gulf, to prevent tribal warfare and to ensure that the shipping lanes remained secure. The Royal Navy also suppressed the slave trade in black Africans that the Arabs continued to engage in until the second half of the 20th century. Does any of that amount to “exploitation”?

The Western powers were only in the Middle East forvery short periods, chiefly as holders of League of Nations’ mandates. France held the mandate for Syria (which then included Lebanon) from 1923 to 1946; Britain held the mandate for Palestine and Iraq. Both mandatory powers were there not to economically exploit, nor to keep under political control, the territories assigned to them. On the contrary, their task was to  prepare these peoples as soon as possible for independence. This goal was the very  opposite of colonialism. The French were in Syria and Lebanon for 23 years. In Lebanon they established French-language schools and universities, and newspapers too, which gave the Christians, in particular, access to a wider, richer world. The French also protected the Christian Maronites from hostile Muslim neighbors.

In Iraq, the British remained for a mere decade, from 1922 to 1932, when they pulled out, having trained a cadre of local administrators capable of meeting the responsibilities of rule, and leaving  Feisal I still on the throne, though he would die in the next year. As the mandatory authority in Palestine, the British unilaterally closed to Jewish settlement  all of the mandate’s territory east of the Jordan River–78% of the original territory that was to have been assigned to the mandate — to create the Emirate of Transjordan. It was the British who spent large sums on Jordan, receiving nothing of value in return. They trained, officered, and supplied with weapons the Arab Legion of Jordan, which  in 1948 proved to be the most effective Arab fighting force against Israel.

So much for Azzi’s “long history of economic and political control” that he claims explains Muslim terrorism.  But even if we were to accept the doubtful claim that Great Britain and France had caused some lingering resentment among Muslim Arabs, what explains the 9/11 terror attacks on the United States? After all, the Amerian government had supplied weapons and money to aid the Muslim Afghans in their fight against the Infidel Russians; the Americans had relentlessly bombed the Serbian Christian in order to protect the Bosnian Muslims. Finally, they  had driven Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait, rescuing the kingdom and lifting the cloud of fear over Saudi Arabia. The Americans had been rescuing Muslims, not subjugating them.

“Some of the more policy centric questions pertained to how to effectively combat ISIS and what are the underlying factors that perpetuate this violence. Such as the dismembering of the Iraqi military following the occupation of Iraq after the onset of the second Iraq war. Azzi said when the American provisional government sent the primarily Sunni leadership home, they brought their guns home but were no longer receiving a paycheck, so they jumped at the opportunity to carry out violence regardless of the ideological slant that was imposed upon them.

“They went home with their guns, their anger and no money. (Paul) Bremer didn’t listen to any of the experts who said he needed to find a way to include them in the government,” said Azzi. “It’s not the ideology that’s sustaining them, it’s the fact we’re not asking the question: why is somebody from Minneapolis/St. Paul, why is somebody from Birmingham, England; so angry, so marginalized, so dispossessed, that they’re willing to sign a virtual death warrant to run around with these criminals in Mosul?”

A  very confusing discussion by Azzi, who first mentions Paul Bremer’s dismantling of the Iraqi Army, which was indeed an ill-thought out decision, for many of the discharged Sunnis kept their arms and fought against an Iraqi government that now favored the majority Shi’a. Azzi then switches to ISS, and asks, and answers, his own question: why does someone from Minneapolis or Birmingham, England  go off to join the Islamic State? It is, Azzi claims, they are “so angry, so marginalized, so dispossessed.” What can he possibly be thinking of? Many of those who joined the Islamic State have been well-off — lawyers, engineers, doctors, living comfortably in the West, where they were neither ‘marginalized” or “dispossessed.” Some of the girls who joined ISIS were not “angry” but interested in finding suitably fanatical Muslim mates. Many of the men and women who arrived wanted to establish an Islamically pure state, without any modern accretions. They wanted to swell the caliphate’s ranks, to secure the leadership of Al-Baghdadi. Many were enthusiastic about living in a polity ruled entirely by a true, primitive, undiluted Islam.. Even after the defeat of ISIS, women still in camps in Syria have told BBC and NPR reporters that life in the Islamic State was like ‘paradise.” Quite a few mentioned that particularly wonderful was the prohibition on all music, for they knew for a certainty that after death those who had listened to music while alive would have molten lead portaged into their ears. It’s Muslim fanaticism, not “anger” with the West, that explains the existence, and continued appeal — which will appear again, in other places — of the Islamic State.

“Members of the audience were of all ages and backgrounds but the underlying theme, which motivated them to attend the event was a desire to learn more from a first-hand source.

Comment:

Yes, what better way for uninformed Unbelievers, with their “desire to to learn more” about Islam than to listen to Robert Azzi, a past master at taqiyya and tu-quoque, who knows that “war is deceit,” and who has honed his skills at misinforming unwary Infidels  through nearly fifty of these “Ask-A-Muslim-Anything” event, that he has held throughout  New Hampshire and in neighboring states.

“Azzi said the biggest threat to America was not the Muslim world, but how the fear of all of these perceived threats would erode American democracy.”

Comment:

Wouldn’t it be unthinkable or unjust if Americans did come to “fear” those Muslims who, following many verses in the Qur’an, believe it their duty to wge jihad against Unbelievers, as Muslims have been doing for 1,400 years? Haven’t we Americans  seen, over just the last few years, an eruption of terrorist attacks in Europe, in Madrid, Barcelona, Paris (many times), Nice, Magnanville, St. Etienne-du-Rouvray, London (many times), Manchester, Brussels, Antwerp, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Berlin, Munich, Hamburg,Wurzburg, Copenhagen, Oslo, Stockholm, Malmo, Helsinki , Turku, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Beslan? And here at home, after the attacks of 9//11, haven’t we endured Muslim terror attacks in New York (many times), Boston, Washington, Chicago, Minneapolis, Seattle, Los Angeles, Fort Hood, Little Rock, Orlando, San Bernardino, Chattanooga? Or in Asia, haven’t  Muslim terrorists struck in Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi, New Delhi, Calcutta, Beijing, Colombo, Bangkok,the Moro Islands? In Melbourne, Minto, Mill Park, and Parramatta? Azzi never brings up on his own any of those attacks, in Europe or America or Asia,, nor any of the other 34,500 terror attacks by Muslims since 9/11. Instead he channels, most deceptively, FDR, by insisting that the only thing Americans have to fear is fear itself. It isn’t true; there is much to fear from Muslim terrorism, and there would have been many hundreds more such attacks in this country had not the Department of Homeland Security not caught the would-be “martyrs” in time.

“Every time something happens it’s always, ‘Oh it’s ISIL. ISIL is an existential threat to the United States,’” said Azzi. “The existential threat to the United States is our fear. The existential threat to the United States is our unwillingness to deal with the foundational problems of people who are so angry, so dispossessed and would sacrifice their families just for some perverse sense of honor.”

It is not true that “every time something happens” — that is the same “something” that Ilhan Omar had in mind when she mentioned that “some people did something” — we Americans ‘always’ say ‘it’s ISIL.” We do not rush to such conclusions.. We wait to hear what the authorities tell us. There is only one act of terror in the United States which has been connected to ISIL. That is the attack on the Pulse nightclub in Orlando by Omar Mateen, who made a video pledging his allegiance to ISIL’s leader, but even in that case, there is no evidence of any actual involvement by ISIL. Some attacks have been attributed, like 9/11 itself, to Al-Qaeda, and many others were carried out by lone-wolf Muslims, who needed no instructions from any terror group to carry out the Qur’anic commands to “fight,” to “kill,’ and to “strike terror in the hearts of the Infidels.” Think of Major Nidal Hassan at Fort Hood, of the Tsarnaev brothers at the Boston Marathon, of Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik in San Bernardino, all of whom “radicalized” themselves” by reading the Qur’an and hadith. Nothing more was needed — but don’t expect Robert Azzi to admit that.

Azzi speaks dismissively of our “fear” of Islamic terrorism, as if it were without foundation.. It’s not baseless “fear” but, rather, a perfectly rational apprehension about Jihad terrorism, given the endless series of such attacks all over the world. Azzi mocks those who, he  claims, see ISIL as “an existential threat to the United States.” An ‘existential threat”–that is, a threat to our very existence? Can Robert Azzi provide any examples of Americans describing ISIL as a “threat to our very existence”?

Azzi warns that ‘fear” of Muslim terrorists “would erode American democracy.’ He does not supply examples of any erosion in our democracy. The Gestapo is not at the door. Muslims are not being rounded up. CAIR is perfectly free to counsel Muslims not to cooperate with the FBI. A Muslim congresswoman is celebrated, despite her antisemitic remarks,  on the cover of Newsweek. No, Azzi’s silence is understandable, for there has been no “erosion in our democracy””  Decrying “fear”of Islam, Azzi tries to instill fear in his audience that our modest efforts to protect ourselves against jihadis are “eroding” our democracy. Thus it is that Robert Azzi himself has become, in his sweetly sinister novahantonian appearances, one of the chief fear-mongers in America today.

In the Middle East itself, where was this “long history of economic and political control” which Azzi claims explains Islamic terrorism? Almost all of the  Arabian peninsula was off-limits to the Western powers. The only exceptions were the entrepot at Aden that the British maintained to resupply ships on the sea lane from England to India, and several small garrisons they kept in the upper Gulf, to prevent tribal warfare and to ensure that the shipping lanes remained secure. The Royal Navy also suppressed the slave trade in black Africans that the Arabs continued to engage in until the second half of the 20th century. Does any of that amount to “exploitation”?

The Western powers were only in the Middle East forvery short periods, chiefly as holders of League of Nations’ mandates. France held the mandate for Syria (which then included Lebanon) from 1923 to 1946; Britain held the mandate for Palestine and Iraq. Both mandatory powers were there not to economically exploit, nor to keep under political control, the territories assigned to them. On the contrary, their task was to  prepare these peoples as soon as possible for independence. This goal was the very  opposite of colonialism. The French were in Syria and Lebanon for 23 years. In Lebanon they established French-language schools and universities, and newspapers too, which gave the Christians, in particular, access to a wider, richer world. The French also protected the Christian Maronites from hostile Muslim neighbors.

In Iraq, the British remained for a mere decade, from 1922 to 1932, when they pulled out, having trained a cadre of local administrators capable of meeting the responsibilities of rule, and leaving  Feisal I still on the throne, though he would die in the next year. As the mandatory authority in Palestine, the British unilaterally closed to Jewish settlement  all of the mandate’s territory east of the Jordan River–78% of the original territory that was to have been assigned to the mandate — to create the Emirate of Transjordan. It was the British who spent large sums on Jordan, receiving nothing of value in return. They trained, officered, and supplied with weapons the Arab Legion of Jordan, which  in 1948 proved to be the most effective Arab fighting force against Israel.

So much for Azzi’s “long history of economic and political control” that he claims explains Muslim terrorism.  But even if we were to accept the doubtful claim that Great Britain and France had caused some lingering resentment among Muslim Arabs, what explains the 9/11 terror attacks on the United States? After all, the Amerian government had supplied weapons and money to aid the Muslim Afghans in their fight against the Infidel Russians; the Americans had relentlessly bombed the Serbian Christian in order to protect the Bosnian Muslims. Finally, they  had driven Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait, rescuing the kingdom and lifting the cloud of fear over Saudi Arabia. The Americans had been rescuing Muslims, not subjugating them.

“Some of the more policy centric questions pertained to how to effectively combat ISIS and what are the underlying factors that perpetuate this violence. Such as the dismembering of the Iraqi military following the occupation of Iraq after the onset of the second Iraq war. Azzi said when the American provisional government sent the primarily Sunni leadership home, they brought their guns home but were no longer receiving a paycheck, so they jumped at the opportunity to carry out violence regardless of the ideological slant that was imposed upon them.

“They went home with their guns, their anger and no money. (Paul) Bremer didn’t listen to any of the experts who said he needed to find a way to include them in the government,” said Azzi. “It’s not the ideology that’s sustaining them, it’s the fact we’re not asking the question: why is somebody from Minneapolis/St. Paul, why is somebody from Birmingham, England; so angry, so marginalized, so dispossessed, that they’re willing to sign a virtual death warrant to run around with these criminals in Mosul?”

A  very confusing discussion by Azzi, who first mentions Paul Bremer’s dismantling of the Iraqi Army, which was indeed an ill-thought out decision, for many of the discharged Sunnis kept their arms and fought against an Iraqi government that now favored the majority Shi’a. Azzi then switches to ISS, and asks, and answers, his own question: why does someone from Minneapolis or Birmingham, England  go off to join the Islamic State? It is, Azzi claims, they are “so angry, so marginalized, so dispossessed.” What can he possibly be thinking of? Many of those who joined the Islamic State have been well-off — lawyers, engineers, doctors, living comfortably in the West, where they were neither ‘marginalized” or “dispossessed.” Some of the girls who joined ISIS were not “angry” but interested in finding suitably fanatical Muslim mates. Many of the men and women who arrived wanted to establish an Islamically pure state, without any modern accretions. They wanted to swell the caliphate’s ranks, to secure the leadership of Al-Baghdadi. Many were enthusiastic about living in a polity ruled entirely by a true, primitive, undiluted Islam.. Even after the defeat of ISIS, women still in camps in Syria have told BBC and NPR reporters that life in the Islamic State was like ‘paradise.” Quite a few mentioned that particularly wonderful was the prohibition on all music, for they knew for a certainty that after death those who had listened to music while alive would have molten lead portaged into their ears. It’s Muslim fanaticism, not “anger” with the West, that explains the existence, and continued appeal — which will appear again, in other places — of the Islamic State.

“Members of the audience were of all ages and backgrounds but the underlying theme, which motivated them to attend the event was a desire to learn more from a first-hand source.

Comment:

Yes, what better way for uninformed Unbelievers, with their “desire to to learn more” about Islam than to listen to Robert Azzi, a past master at taqiyya and tu-quoque, who knows that “war is deceit,” and who has honed his skills at misinforming unwary Infidels  through nearly fifty of these “Ask-A-Muslim-Anything” event, that he has held throughout  New Hampshire and in neighboring states.

“Azzi said the biggest threat to America was not the Muslim world, but how the fear of all of these perceived threats would erode American democracy.”

Comment:

Wouldn’t it be unthinkable or unjust if Americans did come to “fear” those Muslims who, following many verses in the Qur’an, believe it their duty to wge jihad against Unbelievers, as Muslims have been doing for 1,400 years? Haven’t we Americans  seen, over just the last few years, an eruption of terrorist attacks in Europe, in Madrid, Barcelona, Paris (many times), Nice, Magnanville, St. Etienne-du-Rouvray, London (many times), Manchester, Brussels, Antwerp, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Berlin, Munich, Hamburg,Wurzburg, Copenhagen, Oslo, Stockholm, Malmo, Helsinki , Turku, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Beslan? And here at home, after the attacks of 9//11, haven’t we endured Muslim terror attacks in New York (many times), Boston, Washington, Chicago, Minneapolis, Seattle, Los Angeles, Fort Hood, Little Rock, Orlando, San Bernardino, Chattanooga? Or in Asia, haven’t  Muslim terrorists struck in Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi, New Delhi, Calcutta, Beijing, Colombo, Bangkok,the Moro Islands? In Melbourne, Minto, Mill Park, and Parramatta? Azzi never brings up on his own any of those attacks, in Europe or America or Asia,, nor any of the other 34,500 terror attacks by Muslims since 9/11. Instead he channels, most deceptively, FDR, by insisting that the only thing Americans have to fear is fear itself. It isn’t true; there is much to fear from Muslim terrorism, and there would have been many hundreds more such attacks in this country had not the Department of Homeland Security not caught the would-be “martyrs” in time.

“Every time something happens it’s always, ‘Oh it’s ISIL. ISIL is an existential threat to the United States,’” said Azzi. “The existential threat to the United States is our fear. The existential threat to the United States is our unwillingness to deal with the foundational problems of people who are so angry, so dispossessed and would sacrifice their families just for some perverse sense of honor.”

It is not true that “every time something happens” — that is the same “something” that Ilhan Omar had in mind when she mentioned that “some people did something” — we Americans ‘always’ say ‘it’s ISIL.” We do not rush to such conclusions.. We wait to hear what the authorities tell us. There is only one act of terror in the United States which has been connected to ISIL. That is the attack on the Pulse nightclub in Orlando by Omar Mateen, who made a video pledging his allegiance to ISIL’s leader, but even in that case, there is no evidence of any actual involvement by ISIL. Some attacks have been attributed, like 9/11 itself, to Al-Qaeda, and many others were carried out by lone-wolf Muslims, who needed no instructions from any terror group to carry out the Qur’anic commands to “fight,” to “kill,’ and to “strike terror in the hearts of the Infidels.” Think of Major Nidal Hassan at Fort Hood, of the Tsarnaev brothers at the Boston Marathon, of Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik in San Bernardino, all of whom “radicalized” themselves” by reading the Qur’an and hadith. Nothing more was needed — but don’t expect Robert Azzi to admit that.

Azzi speaks dismissively of our “fear” of Islamic terrorism, as if it were without foundation. It’s not baseless “fear” but, rather, a perfectly rational apprehension about Jihad terrorism, given the endless series of such attacks all over the world. Azzi mocks those who, he  claims, see ISIL as “an existential threat to the United States.” An ‘existential threat”–that is, a threat to our very existence? Can Robert Azzi provide any examples of Americans describing ISIL as a “threat to our very existence”?

Azzi warns that ‘fear” of Muslim terrorists “would erode American democracy.’ He does not supply examples of any erosion in our democracy. The Gestapo is not at the door. Muslims are not being rounded up. CAIR is perfectly free to counsel Muslims not to cooperate with the FBI. A Muslim congresswoman is celebrated, despite her antisemitic remarks,  on the cover of Newsweek. No, Azzi’s silence is understandable, for there has been no “erosion in our democracy””  Decrying “fear”of Islam, Azzi tries to instill fear in his audience that our modest efforts to protect ourselves against jihadis are “eroding” our democracy. Thus it is that Robert Azzi himself has become, in his sweetly sinister novahantonian appearances, one of the chief fear-mongers in America today.