The MYTH of Sectarian Violence in Iraq
The Myth of Sectarian Violence in Iraq
By Dahr Jamail
International Socialist ReviewJanuary 8, 2008
If the U.S. leaves Iraq, the violent sectarianism between the Sunni and Shia will worsen. This is what Republicans and Democrats alike will have us believe. This key piece of rhetoric is used to justify the continuance of the occupation of Iraq. This propaganda, like others of its ilk, gains ground, substance, and reality due largely to the ignorance of those ingesting it. The snow job by the corporate media on the issue of sectarianism in Iraq has ensured that the public buys into the line that the Sunni and Shia will dice one another up into little pieces if the occupation ends.
It may be worthwhile to consider that prior to the Anglo-American invasion and occupation of Iraq there had never been open warfare between the two groups and certainly not a civil war. In terms of organization and convention, Iraqis are a tribal society and some of the largest tribes in the country comprise Sunni and Shia. Intermarriages between the two sects are not uncommon either.
Soon after arriving in Iraq in November 2003, I learned that it was considered rude and socially graceless to enquire after an individual's sect. If in ignorance or under compulsion I did pose the question the most common answer I would receive was, "I am Muslim, and I am Iraqi." On occasion there were more telling responses like the one I received from an older woman, "My mother is a Shia and my father a Sunni, so can you tell which half of me is which?" The accompanying smile said it all.
Large mixed neighborhoods were the norm in Baghdad. Sunni and Shia prayed in one another's mosques. Secular Iraqis could form lifelong associations with others without overt concern about their chosen sect. How did such a well-integrated society erupt into vicious fighting, violent sectarianism, and segregated neighborhoods? How is one to explain the millions in Iraq displaced from their homes simply because they were the wrong sect in the wrong place at the wrong time?
Back in December 2003 Sheikh Adnan, a Friday speaker at his mosque, had recounted a recent experience to me. During the first weeks of the occupation, a U.S. military commander had showed up in Baquba, the capital of Diyala province located roughly twenty-five miles northeast of Baghdad with a mixed Sunni-Shia population. He had asked to meet with all the tribal and religious leaders.
On the appointed day the assembled leaders were perplexed when the commander instructed them to divide themselves, "Shia on one side of the room, Sunni on the other"It would not be amiss, perhaps, to read in this account an implanting of a deliberate policy of "divide and rule" by the Anglo-American invaders from the early days of the occupation.
There have been no statistical surveys in recent years to determine the sectarian composition of Iraq. However, when the Coalition Provisional Authority, led by Paul Bremer, formed the first puppet Iraqi government, a precedent was set. The twenty-five seats in the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC), were assigned strictly along sectarian lines based on the assumption that 60 percent of the population is Shia, 20 percent Sunni, and 20 percent Kurds, who are mostly Sunni. For good measure, a couple of Turkoman and a Christian were thrown in. It is evident that this puppet troupe deployed at the onset of "democracy" in Iraq was mandated to establish to the population that it was in the larger interest to begin thinking, at least politically, along sectarian and ethnic lines. Inevitably, political power struggles ensued and were cemented and exacerbated with the January 30, 2005, elections.
Mild surface scratching reveals a darker, largely unreported aspect of the divisive U.S. plan. A UN report released in September 2005 held Iraqi interior ministry forces responsible for an organized campaign of detention, torture, and killing of fellow Iraqis. These special police commando units were recruited from the Shia Badr Organization and Mehdi Army militias.
In Baghdad during November and December 2004, I heard widespread accounts of death squads assassinating Sunni resistance leaders and their key sympathizers. It was after the failure of Operation Phantom Fury, as the U.S. siege of Fallujah that November was named, that the Iraqi resistance spread across Iraq like wildfire. Death squads were set up to quell this fire by eliminating the leadership of this growing resistance.
The firefighting team had at its helm the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte, ably assisted by retired Colonel James Steele, adviser to Iraqi security forces. In 1984-86 Steele had been commander of the U.S. military advisory group in El Salvador. Between 1981 and 1985 Negroponte was U.S. ambassador to neighboring Honduras.
In 1994 the Honduras Commission on Human Rights charged him with extensive human rights violations, reporting the torture and disappearance of at least 184 political workers. A CIA working group set up in 1996 to look into the U.S. role in Honduras has placed on record documents admitting that the operations Negroponte oversaw in Honduras were carried out by "special intelligence units," better known as "death squads," of CIA-trained Honduran armed units which kidnapped, tortured, and killed thousands of people suspected of supporting leftist guerrillas.
Negroponte was ambassador to Iraq for close to a year from June 2004. The only public mention of any of this I have seen was in Newsweek magazine on January 8, 2005. It quotes Donald Rumsfeld, U.S. secretary of defense at the time, who discussed the use of the "Salvador Option" in Iraq.
It compared the strategy being planned for Iraq to the one used in Central America during the Reagan administration: "Then, faced with a losing war against Salvadoran rebels, the U.S. government funded or supported "nationalist" forces that allegedly included so-called death squads directed to hunt down and kill rebel leaders and sympathizers. Eventually the insurgency was quelled, and many U.S. conservatives consider the policy to have been a success--despite the deaths of innocent civilians and the subsequent Iran-Contra arms-for-hostages scandal."
U.S.-backed sectarian death squads have become the foremost generator of death in Iraq, even surpassing the U.S. military machine, infamous for its capacity for industrial-scale slaughter. It is no secret in Baghdad that the U.S. military would regularly cordon off pro-resistance areas like the al-Adhamiyah neighborhood of Baghdad and allow "Iraqi police" and "Iraqi army" personnel, masked in black balaclavas, through their checkpoints to carry out abductions and assassinations in the neighborhood. Consequently, almost all of Baghdad and much of Iraq is now segregated.
The flipside is that violence in the capital city has subsided somewhat of late now that the endgame of forming the death squads, that of fragmenting the population, has been mostly accomplished. Baghdad resident, retired General Waleed al-Ubaidy told my Iraqi colleague recently, "I would like to agree with the idea that violence in Iraq has decreased and that everything is fine, but the truth is far more bitter. All that has happened is a dramatic change in the demographic map of Iraq." Baghdad today is a divided city.
Ahmad Ali, chief engineer from one of Baghdad's municipalities told my colleague, Ali al-Fadhily, "Baghdad has been torn into two cities and many towns and neighborhoods. There is now the Shia Baghdad and the Sunni Baghdad to start with. Each is divided into little town-like pieces of the hundreds of thousands who had to leave their homes."
Al-Adhamiyah, on the Russafa side of Tigris River, is now entirely Sunni, the other areas are all Shia. The al-Karkh side of the river is purely Sunni except for Shula, Hurriya, and small strips of Aamil which are dominated by Shia militias.
Not being privy to the U.S. machinations, Iraqis in Baghdad blame the Iraqi police and Iraqi army for the sectarian assassinations and wonder why the U.S. military does little or nothing to stop them.
"The Americans ask [Prime Minister Nouri al] Maliki to stop the sectarian assassinations knowing full well that his ministers are ordering the sectarian cleansing," says Mahmood Farhan of the Muslim Scholars Association, a leading Sunni group.
A more recent manifestation of the divisive U.S. policy has been the "purchase" of members of the largely Sunni resistance in Baghdad and in al-Anbar province that constitutes one-third of the geographic area of Iraq. Payments made by the U.S. military to collaborating tribal sheikhs already amount to $17 million. The money passes directly into the hands of fighters who in many cases were engaged in launching attacks against the occupiers less than two weeks ago.
Tribal fighters are being paid $300 per month to patrol their areas, particularly against foreign mercenaries. Today the military refers to these men as "concerned local citizens," "awakening force," or simply "volunteers"
Arguably, violence in the area has temporarily declined. "Those Americans thought they would decrease the resistance attacks by separating the people of Iraq into sects and tribes," announced a thirty-two-year-old man from Ramadi, who spoke with al-Fadhily on terms of anonymity, "They know they are sinking deeper into the shifting sand, but the collaborators are fooling the Americans right now, and will in the end use this strategy against them." By the end of November 2007, the U.S. military had enlisted 77,000 of these fighters, and hopes to add another 10,000. Eighty-two percent of the fighters are Sunni.
Politically, the U.S. administration maintains its support of the Shia-dominated government in Baghdad. The fallout has been blatantly clear. On the first of December, Adnan al-Dulaimi, head of the Accordance Front, which is the Sunni political bloc in the Iraqi Parliament, was placed under house arrest by Iraqi and U.S. security forces in the Adil neighborhood, west of Baghdad. Iraqi security forces also detained his son Makki and forty-five of his guards. They were accused of manufacturing car bombs and killing Sunni militia members in the neighborhood who have been working with the U.S. military. Members of the Accordance Front, which holds 44 of the 275 seats in the Iraqi Parliament, promptly walked out. Maliki has, several times in the last several weeks, hurled public accusations and criticisms at al-Dulaimi, sending political and sectarian shock waves, further crippling the crumbling political process.
It is important to mention that Maliki, a U.S. puppet par excellence, acts only as told. After the January 2005 elections, the government that came into power had chosen Ibrahim al-Jaafari as its prime minister. When Jaafari refused to toe the U.S./UK line, Condoleezza Rice and her UK counterpart Jack Straw flew to Baghdad, and before their short trip ended Jaafari was out and Maliki was in as prime minister.
In the context of these facts let us now return to the big question: Will Iraq descend further into a sectarian nightmare if the occupation ends?
An indicator of how things will likely resolve themselves upon the departure of foreign troops may be drawn from the southern city of Basra. In early September, 500 British troops left one of Saddam Hussein's palaces in the heart of the city and ceased to conduct regular foot patrols. According to the British military, the overall level of violence in the city has decreased 90 percent since then.
This may or may not be a guarantee of a drop in sectarianism upon the departure of the invading armies, but it does prove that when the primary cause of the violence, sectarian strife, instability, and chaos is removed from the equation of Iraq, things are bound to improve rapidly.
Are we still going to believe that the occupation is holding Iraq together?
The article above by Dahr Jamail answers perfectly to the nonsense of one fahim knight. Therefore, the article renders the so-called "insights" of this fahim knight USELESS, distracting, and highly misinformed, as he is bent on misinforming others.
according to fk from his previous post:
"For example, in the Middle East (Iraq
I will put no more comments on your junk-filled post, fahim. Your posts, especially your comments are extremely general, way too ambiguous and many times FALSE.
Your comment above is just a tiny slice of an example.
I see how you throw us a bone by putting in "instigated by the zionist" like it's a casual afterthought - - - or for all that is going on in Iraq, the zionist/american machinations are secondary. Quietly sandwiched in, I would say.
And I say NO THANKS to your assinine crap!
This website really does not need the likes of YOU to tell tales of the kind of Muslim Malcom X was, or what you perceive Jihad to be, or what Islam is, or your murky, twisted ideas of what you consider to be a cult.
Shia & Sunni can not live side by side peacefully according to FHK? Oh please ... gimme a break!! Mr. Septic "think" tank has never set foot outside his door; let's not forget his fancy trip to Ghana!
I was born in the Indian sub-continent & lucky enough to have friends & relatives & show respect for each others beliefs. My mom used to observe Day of Ashura when she was alive (It is commemorated by the Shi‘a as a day of mourning for the martyrdom of Husayn ibn Ali, the grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad at the Battle of Karbala on 10 Muharram in the year 61 AH) & she wasn't Shia! She did it to show respect & that's what most people do over there.
If all can live peacefully in the South Asian region, it is very much possible in other Muslim countries. large mixed neighborhoods were the norm in Baghdad. Sunni and Shia prayed in one another's mosques doesn't sound like a myth to me, I believe it 100%.
I don't need to see any Zionist zoo bastard written documents with distorted stories cause I don't believe 'em a bit! Since that's what they want, that's what they all care for - conflict among groups, people, religion etc.
Mr. Septic tank is the most egotistical, racist, and xenophobic bigot wrapped up in tin foil, emitting his nefarious odor here!
That is very interesting, a bit of your background that you shared. Even where I live there is a great mix of Shia and Sunni Muslims with no conscious thought to the concern of sunni/shia. Simply, it is not a big deal. And there have been plenty intermarriages, including in my family.
I notice how some people enjoy the works of this fahim knight. Which is hilarious. None of his work makes any sense, nor have they really read through his post to see its contradictions and false tones.
Most importantly! fahim knight regards religion a cult. TOO BROAD and GENERAL is he to say this. Especially when he embraces a very big CULTIST, this Elijah Muhammad, whose CULT "relgion" has turned many people away from him, especially Malcom X.
It just doesn't make sense. You can't defy and bring down cults when you belong to a cult yourself, especially a big one like the NOI.
You cannot speak highly of, and claim to know Malcom X when Malcom X says very truthfully in a speech: "elijah muhammad does not love the black man."
Not when you belong to the cult of or embrace the works of cult leader elijah muhammad.
That is quite a contradiction.
Kafim masquerades as a professor of Islam, whilst denouncing God; he would have us believe that all the world's ills are caused by religion and faith, and when you disagree with his narrow point of view, he calls you a blue-eyed khazar devil, cave-man kafir zealot from the caucasus mountains.
He then contradicts himself, by saying that religion is only part of the problem.
Are we to believe that sexism, racism, militarism, classism, racial supremacy, greed and war are all the tenets of religions and that all religion was created by zionists?
Shall we then think that secular groups are incapable of wrong, and would never exploit or create divisions, in order to conquer?
To blame all religions for what the so-called zionist jews are up to, is being quite disingenuous.
You still have no defense for religion. Now! you all over here crying and preaching more MAGIC. I deconstructed all those weak and emotional arguments on my Blog. You thought you could defeat me on Black Muslim History---I have written four books on the subject and no foreigner can tell us nothing about Elijah Muhammad, Farrakhan, Imam Mohammed, Malcolm X., etc., somebody just shot me a private email and informed me that you all had taken the conversation over here. Interesting nonsense. Let that ignorant Kafir know that all his foolish arguments were exhausted yesterday. I tore his behind up yesterday on my blog. He still continues to call me other than by my name and he is still insulting me even on this blog. I will show this Kafir no pity.
Stay Awake Until We Meet Again,
Fahim A. Knight-EL
Typical Zionist Zoo bastards are always telling you "religion is a joke and that its practitioners are delusional", ever wonder why?
The title melds the words "religious" and "ridiculous" and the film, the brainchild of humorist Bill Maher and Larry Charles "Borat" director (Larry Charles is a Jewish-American Emmy Award-winning writer) , pulls no punches in its attack on organized religions and their cultural impact.
"Just to question why is faith good, I think is a question never contemplated by most people" in the United States, Maher told Reuters at the Toronto International Film Festival, where the documentary debuted this week.
Source
Maher begins with a family revelation: He grew up Catholic, but his mother never went to church. Turns out she is Jewish. Of course, the family left Catholicism long ago -- something to do with birth control, she thinks -- so this now leaves Maher in the strong position to attack the entire Judeo-Christian ethos without any implication of bigotry.
Source
Charles grew up Jewish and once considered becoming a rabbi but was discouraged by his parents, who told him to "get bar-mitzvahed, get the checks and then get the hell out," he said. He said he now shares Maher's position: Heavy on doubt about the existence of a supreme being, even heavier on certainty that organized religion is hazardous to humanity's health.
"If I believe that Jesus is God and you believe Mohammed is God, then no matter how tolerant we are, we are never going to meet," Charles said. "All you have to do is push that one more step, then somebody's like, `You're in the way of people believing in Jesus,' and `You're in the way of people believing in Mohammed,' and the only answer is to kill you.
Source
Many thanks Rhiannon & Grim too! :)
Perhaps you should ask Jesus to save you by asking for forgiveness for your contemptible behavior on this blog.
You live in durham n.c. Interesting. A high population of zionists in that state. Who do you work for?
Here's more of your GARBAGE from the typical circus of your posts:
fahim knight - "You paint this false picture that Islam is a universal religion (free of racism and prejudice) perhaps in theory, but in practice Islam is a race, gender, and class divided religion.
I have seen light skinned Arab Muslims treat dark skinned Muslims (as Abu--servant and slave) and we do not have look too far. Right now in Darfur, Sudan, the Arab lineage Muslims is oppressing the dark skinned Muslims in southern Sudan, Africa."
BULLSHIT my ignorant, arrogant circus clown.
Total zionist garbage you spew out straight from CNN and frontpage.
He's a septic tank, don't forget! :)
“I do not care anything for your corrupt Arab Islam coming out of Mecca. Your posted sentiments are atypical of the type spirits you religious Zealots use to commit murder against innocent people all in the name of God and Religion.”
This is the exact type of religious intolerance and fanaticism that religion creates; in particular when someone disagrees with their God and their belief system. Now! You wish you could impose the Sharia (Islamic Law), on me, don’t you? You fools are drunk off this man made garbage you call religion that continues to be the root cause of human suffering and strife. What are you going to tell me next fool; that you had a divine talk with some damn Angel named Jabril (Gabriel) all this mess, is made up superstitious magic and sorcery designed to keep humanity divided and under control. I am a Free Thinker who refuses to allow the dictates of these Magic Workers called clergy to impose these foolish views on me. Thus, because I disagree with your Wahabbism concepts and the religious witchcraft that is being practice by that Zionist Arab Ruling Class, calling themselves the Royal Family that makes me a hypocrite. Those are your true hypocrites’ right there inMecca Holy Land , which is being led by Zionist Arab entities (Remember the Jew and the Arab claim Semitic brotherhood lineage). I do not care anything for your corrupt Arab Islam coming out of Mecca New York
STAY AWAKE UNTIL WE MEET AGAIN,
Fahim A. Knight-EL
Fahim,
You are so quick to criticise religions, but yet you subscribe to that religion of rolled-up trouser-legs, funny handshakes, wearing funky aprons, thirty-three degrees and blood-curdling oaths. Quite where you get that false sense of superiority from, I will never know.
As for Darfur, it has been explained to you many times that the conflict is primarily a conflict over resources, not a religious conflict, although it may suit the purposes of the media to represent it as the latter. That you are so willing to repeat the lies of the media is simply a testament to your level of gullibility.
Eh...?
Why should anyone believe your zionist / neocon spew? You...who knows so much about Malcom X, but you keep failing to show everyone how Malcom X evolved, his thinking transformed, he embraced true Islam, he broke away from the NOI because of its unIslamic prejudices, the hypocrisy of elijah muhammad, etc...
And now you scream about Darfur...some "revelations" you make, dear little ignorant, narrow-minded fahim knight, as I see daniel pipes, CNN, CAMERA, and frontpage have shaped your "intelligence" on Sudan.
Tell us more lies about Sudan, mr. charlie jacobs/fahim knight.
I see that you are doing the coward thing by copying your comment from the comments of your post and and pasting them here.
But why won't address your Neo-con/ zionist LIE about Sudan???
And what about the ambiguous and misleading comment you made about "sectarian violence" in Iraq? Why won't you answer the article above? What do you have to say about John Negroponte?
You keep stoning us with your over-the-top dramatics, and the same hysterical expressions. Now you are pasting the exact same comment from your post. Thanks...you keep proving my point about you.
The only brunt of injustice to be suffered is your ongoing temper tantrums about religion.
Malcom X would have great pity for you.
Rhiannon you are an angry Islamic fanatic. That is in denial about the atrocities of religion. Humanity is suffering the world over due mainly to religion. Those damn crooks you follow inMecca Mecca Ireland Palestine
Stay Awake Until We Meet Again.,
Fahim A. Knight-EL
Sullivan words From The Great Revealer Blog
"..has always seemed to me to be a religion that presents itself to the rest of the world as loving, fluffy, caring and tolerant, when in reality it is racist, dogmatic, intolerant and full of hate".
"These attributes could be assigned to almost any religion when the practitioners are ultra-zealots, but I can't help but think that such extreme views are far more entrenched in Hinduism than in other religions, such as Islam or Christianity. Indeed, I know of only one other religion that exhibits such a level of unabashed bigotry and prejudice - Judaism."
fahim knight - "You paint this false picture that Islam is a universal religion (free of racism and prejudice) perhaps in theory, but in practice Islam is a race, gender, and class divided religion.
I have seen light skinned Arab Muslims treat dark skinned Muslims (as Abu--servant and slave) and we do not have look too far. Right now in Darfur, Sudan, the Arab lineage Muslims is oppressing the dark skinned Muslims in southern Sudan, Africa."
I paint a false picture? You have no such evidence, no proof of me painting false pictures of Islam. There is not one person that can accuse me of doing so. So you lie, you tell tales again. Your generalizations of religion are too weak, tepid, and as dangerous and irresponsible as the world "anti-semitism"
You are way too lazy to explain yourself with any focus or diligence. You paint all Muslims with one broad stroke. Your research is pathetic, way too stunted. You paint Christians with one broad stroke.
Too weak!
I'm angry? YOU are hysterical. You are obnoxious and rude. And most definitely, you are ignorant and arrogant. No one can learn from such a person. People do not take well to such radical condescending behavior as yours.
fahim knight - "You paint this false picture that Islam is a universal religion (free of racism and prejudice) perhaps in theory, but in practice Islam is a race, gender, and class divided religion.
I have seen light skinned Arab Muslims treat dark skinned Muslims (as Abu--servant and slave) and we do not have look too far. Right now in Darfur, Sudan, the Arab lineage Muslims is oppressing the dark skinned Muslims in southern Sudan, Africa."
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Let me begin by reminding you that YOU claim to be a student of Malcom X. You worship Malcom X! In that case what you say about Islam being racist, divided, and class oriented...then YOU might as well give up the books on your idol Malcom X!
BECAUSE....as I understand....Malcom X was a Muslim! He followed Islam. Contradictions get you nowhere!
NOW! I suggest that you explain to everyone what you mean by DARFUR! The claim you make about DARFUR is the same claim straight out of the mouth of Charlie Jacobs and CAMERA.
Well?
Malcolm X stated: Just as the slave master of that day used Tom, the house Negro, to keep the field Negroes in check, the same old slave master today has Negroes who are nothing but modern Uncle Toms, 20th century Uncle Toms, to keep you and me in check, keep us under control, keep us passive and peaceful and nonviolent. That's Tom making you nonviolent. It's like when you go to the dentist, and the man's going to take your tooth. You're going to fight him when he starts pulling. So he squirts some stuff in your jaw called Novocain, to make you think they're not doing anything to you. So you sit there and 'cause you've got all of that Novocain in your jaw, you suffer peacefully. Blood running all down your jaw and you don't know what's happening. 'Cause someone has taught you to suffer – peacefully. (Reference: Malcolm X Speech titled, “Message To The Grass Roots—Detroit; November 10, 1963).
How did you like old Sullivan words? I found his words on religion to be truthful and refreshing, in fact let him know his discription of religion was accurate and for the first time I have found something that I agree with relative to a position he has taken. I must admit I was initially shocked that he was saying the exact same thing in my article titled, "Religion Versus Cult: And Our Quest For Truth”
I AM IMPRESSED BY SULLI'S OBJECTIVITY.
Stay Awake Until We Meet Again,
Fahim A. Knight-EL
Yes. What Sullivan says is correct and I agree with him wholeheartedly. But Sullivan does not generalize like you have so many times. That is the difference. Do not come on here to say YOU speak like Sullivan , you do not. Nor do you have the insight of Sullivan.
In each faith there are man-made parts which are fabrications and hearsay. I will say that most of the hadiths are hearsay. No doubt you have your head wrapped around the hadiths. Nonie Darwish and Walid Shoebat also has their heads wrapped around the hadiths. And the zionist press LOVES that. Because they can take the stupidity and falseness and paint ISLAM in that one color only.
Therefore it is easy to gossip and murder Muslims.
What you keep failing to recognize is that HUMANS taint the scripture...[I have told you this several times before, but you don't care to listen]. HUMANS use religion to control other people who may be weak or suffering and desperate.
Religion needs no defense. Islam needs no defense.
Humans, such as yourself, are the problem, not so much religion.
You are perpetually, rabidly bashing Islam by marrying it to a bunch of billionaire sheiks in Saudi Arabia who are just a very teeny tiny percent of the population of Muslims worldwide, as if they are one entity. This is absurd, to say the least.
Yet, I don't paint Christianity under the same stroke as the feeble-minded, murderous christian zionists. I would never say that Christianity is deceitful and filled with hatred as you say about Islam.
Your CNN behavior precedes your mental process.
And you have nothing to say about your over-generalized, neo-con remarks about the "sectarian violence" in Iraq.
And you do not answer about your Charlie Jacobs remark about Darfur.
And if I came to power today? No, I would not impose Islam on others and outlaw other Faiths. I do not impose as YOU impose with your assinine assumptions and backstabbing gossip.
But I would have qrs ban you from this site. If I came to power today.
Rhiannon is correct here. Most extreme edicts from religious zealots do not originate from the tenets of the religion, but are a cultural imposition.
Your attempt to portray followers of Islam as a homogeneous group of people and thus paint them with the same brush is utterly ludicrous. Ditto your attempt to take my words and twist them to your own agenda.
Just because you are incapable of writing a clear and cogent argument does not give you the right to appropriate mine.
hafim: are these men part of the problem; and explain.
hafim: are these men part of the problem; and explain.