Juan Cole on another Invasion of the Middle East: Napoleon in Egypt (1798)

Readers of this Blog often see my Informed Comment-faves on Iraq and the Middle East in general. Their author, history professor Juan Cole, gets a biographical note below. I borrow the following text from a recent post in the FireDogLake Blog by Swopa.

You should go there and read the interesting discussion of the book between Cole and some readers.

Juan Cole was one of the first and most valuable voices to vault into public attention from the political blogosphere. As America blindly stumbled into Iraq in 2003, Cole's analyses and daily summaries of Arabic-language news at Informed Comment became an essential counterweight to government-dictated propaganda in the U.S. media for tens of thousands of regular readers.

But as an outstanding and experienced historian, Dr. Cole's knowledge ranges far beyond Iraq. In Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East, Cole provides the same perspective and keen insight regarding a military incursion that occurred two centuries ago -- the French effort, led by then-general Napoleon Bonaparte, to invade and occupy Egypt.

Cole’s fluency in both French and Arabic enabled him to scour and compare contemporaneous sources in each language, and the resulting account gives equal weight to each side of the awkward collision of cultures (including attempts to discern the truth when different retellings conflict). And the tone, although well-informed, is scarcely academic -- because Cole's sources include numerous eyewitness journals, letters, and other firsthand reports, he is able to weave a rich, complex narrative that is as involving as any novel on the subject could be.

Although he almost never makes a direct connection, Cole doesn't have to mention Iraq for several elements of his story to resonate with modern-day news junkies. It's hard not to hear the echoes of neocon self-absorption in Napoleon's efforts to blend Enlightenment philosophy with brutal military conquest, or Iraq quasi-viceroy L. Paul Bremer's clueless egotism in Bonaparte's hamfisted communications with the people of Cairo, or especially the similarly dogged, draining insurgencies that result from a distant nation's attempt to impose its will on millions of people.

The details Cole gleans from his research (some of which he continues to post at a blog devoted to the book), though, make Napoleon's Egypt a unique and personal tale worth reading in its own right. With that, I am delighted to be able to introduce Juan Cole, who is joining us to answer questions about the book.

My appreciation: Juan Cole succeeds in doing two things that, on top of one another, normally are above the forces of a normal human being.

• 1. He publishes one or more daily inside-informations about what is going on in Iraq, summarily put into the context of his vast knowledge of the Middlke East political, social, economic and historical landscape. Informed, quick and oblective.
• 2. He continues his in-depth studies, like this one, and plays a role in defending academic freedom against conservative, biased intrusions by the actual US Government, its services and satellite watchdogs, like the AEI & c.

Asked last year, during a brief visit to Holland, how he manages doing so many things in one day, his reply was, that he types very, very quickly on the keyboard... :-)

The Book
The Napoleon book (click on the image to see its Amazon.com page) is reviewed on Amazon by Reed Elsevier as follows:

In July 1798, Napoleon landed an expeditionary force at Alexandria in Egypt, the opening move in a scheme to acquire a new colony for France, administer a sharp rebuff to England and export the values of French republicanism to a remade Middle East.
Cole, a historian of the Middle East at the University of Michigan, traces the first seven months of Napoleon's adventure in Egypt. Relying extensively on firsthand sources for this account of the invasion's early months, Cole focuses on the ideas and belief systems of the French invaders and the Muslims of Egypt.
Cole portrays the French as deeply ignorant of cultural and religious Islam. Claiming an intent to transplant liberty to Egypt, the French rapidly descended to the same barbarism and repression of the Ottomans they sought to replace. I
slamic Egypt, divided by class and ethnic rivalries, offered little resistance to the initial French incursion.
Over time, however, the Egyptians produced an insurgency that, while it couldn't hope to win pitched battles, did erode French domination and French morale. Perplexingly, Cole ends his account in early February 1799, with Napoleon still in control of Egypt but facing increasingly effective opposition. Napoleon's attack on Syria is only mentioned, not detailed, and his return to Cairo and eventual flight to France are omitted altogether.
In a brief epilogue, Cole makes an explicit comparison between Napoleon's adventure in Egypt and the current American occupation of Iraq. Though at times episodic and disorganized, this doesn't detract from the value of Cole's well-researched contribution to Middle Eastern history. Illus. (Aug.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Georg W. Bush is everything opposite to the 1798 Napoleon. He has no enlightenment objectives. Compare the fate of the invaluable objects robbed from the Iraq National Museum in April 2003 under the eyes of the American invaders with the way Napoleon's expedition opened the way, (through the 3-lingual Rosette Pyramid) to understand ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphs.
I stick to my Caligula comparison. Which is sad enough.
But interesting parallels can be found in the disastrous military history of the temporary occupation. It is there, that Cole applies his "micro"-approach (known from his Informed Comments" on Iraq), citing an abundance of letters home from French participants in the expedition.
The book doesn't describe the end of Napoleon's expedition. However, the way Napoleon and the top generals abandoned the thousands of lesser soldiers they brought to the country, when their defeat became apparent, may forebode the way, in which Bush will end his Iraq adventure.

Buy and read the book.
European readers: On Amazon, switch to Amazon.uk, Amazon.de or to Amazon.fr, to get delivery for a more reasonable charge. Belgian and Dutch readers may prefer to try Proxis, that has an excellent English language books store. French translation of this Post to be published on HUIBSLOG and L'Europe Chez Soi.

After some traveling: Back to Business!

In October and November, I visited Istanbul and the Balkans by car; went to the opposite side of the European area to the Canary Islands and Morocco by plane. It has been some weeks without direct reporting or commenting in English on European affairs.
But in December, we'll see some fruits of those explorations.
Istanbul was the location of a conference on city regeneration in Europe, organised jointly by the world architects and urbanists organisation INTA, a transborder, Italian-led, cities network, and the Anadolu High School, who was host. Multimillion Istanbul agglomeration played no real role in this event. I tried to discover it on my own. My hopes for Turkish integration into the EU were not disappointed. Istanbul is a modern, western city with all the problems and opportunities that go with such a status.
I stopped by in central Bulgaria, where I discovered the ancient city of Plovdiv (Philippople - Philippopolis, ancient Macedonian capital). Presence of an EU agency, charged with seeking solutions for discrepancies with the EU acquis. Problems with Turkish and islamo-slavic minorities as well as with gypsies. And a rich series of unused opportunities: economic, social and cultural.
Driving back home, I revisited the Serbian countryside, where, as long ago as 1962, we helped to build a motorway ("autoput") between Belgrade and Nish. The Velika Plana people occupy still a warm spot in my memory. However, their actions in Bosnian Srebrenica, just over the Drina border, in 1995, when they started to kill over 8.000 Muslim inhabitants under the eyes of a Dutch UN force, were still visible on the Potocari location. Most shocking were the graffitti the Dutch soldiers left behind after their shameful retreat.
Croatia and Slovenia showed much progress in Europeanisation. Slovenia is already a member of the EU and it is using the Euro as currency. A small, industrious and Austria-dominated region, good at delivering services and receiving tourists. Croatia could become a second, and smaller Poland, in the EU. Very catholic, very pro-US, and, if I may believe Ulfkotte on that point , completely subdued by western secret services and their hired companies. Infrastructure very modern and very privatised.
The Canaries are a subtropical outpost of Spain. No effort has been neglected, to make this African archipelago look like a normal Spanish province. Some 100 KMs from the Moroccan Saharian coast, Europe's Florida is thriving. Two million inhabitants. Equipped with everything you would expect in an 21st century western country.
100 KMs away, lies Morocco, or, to be exact, the former Spanish Sahara, that has been claimed and occupied by Morocco. I was there in 1979. A guerilla was then, and still now, being fought by the saharian nomadic people, bleeding the Moroccan army and resources as well as theirs. No solution on the horizon.
In Morocco itself (Casablanca, Meknès, Rabat, Tangier, Marrakesh), I studied the work of urban regeneration colleagues, working in deprived bidonvilles, where islamist groupings steal the show by providing material and medical help. Conditions for a more secularist and emancipation-oriented policy are weak. No money, no urgency on government level. What could the EU do? Most investments under association contracts go to big infrastructural undertakings. My contribution to another policy could be a research into the conditions under which, some decades ago, the European middle classes decided to forge the welfare state. Such conditions, evidently do not exist in 2007 Morocco. Modernisation, as applied by the new king, in matters like more freedom for women, mostly help middle class and upper class people, who have no interest in sharing their wealth with the poor masses.
Moroccan civilization, its rich cultural and intellectual heritage, preserved by the French during their rule from the twenties to the fifties, offer many opportunities for an independent take-off. But it is not happening. It was sad to see, how a potentially rich and thriving society is condemned to serve, again and again as an economic backyard to the North.

Mr. Entenmann threatens Bigberta with murder. A setback for Ulfkotte?

The German Islamophobes are putting on a higher gear.
In their hate-blogs, writes Jochen Hoff from Berlin, they are threatening publicly to murder another blogger. An example from the Kewil-Blog :

Wilhelm Entenmann / Website (13.10.07 18:34)

"Schickt n'en Fresskorb nach Sonthofen, packt 'ne Schweinhaxe hinzu,
tut auch Methylphenidat kaufen, dann ist vielleicht bald Ruh'."
Translation: "Send a food-basket to Sonthofen, join a pig-ax to it, buy also Methylpenidate, then, maybe, everything will be quiet."

The object of this call or invitation to murder, is Bigberta, who is living in Sonthofen (Southern Bavaria) and who is an active blogger against xenophobia at "Watchblog Islamophobie". Methylphenidate is a drug that is administered to (young) people who suffer from ADHD.

A certain Mr. Wilhelm Entenmann from Mannheim is the author of this prose.
Bigberta tried at first to engage in a debate with this person in the Watchblog.
But when commenters on her blog and on the Kewil Blog started to attack her even more hatefully, she closed the discussion and announced to Mr. Entenmann, that he will be held responsible in Court for his ramblings.

This creates an awful situation for Dr. Udo Ulfkotte. Although there is no direct link between him and Entenmann, as far as we can see, there is certainly one between Entenmann and "Politically Incorrect", the German anti-Islam Blog that was recently removed from the "Google News list'. "PI" is Mr. Ulfkotte's favourite source for his Islam-bashing postings. Entenmann is also a great fan of "PI", as we see on his blog.

Unconscously, Wilhelm Entenmann from Mannheim delivers proof of what Bigberta and the other bloggers who are attacked by Ulfkotte, have always said: Ulfkotte is sowing hate, racist hate, in society. Therefore, he can be called a "racist". And his ways of Islam-bashing provoke poor people like Van Themse in Antwerp and Entenmann in Mannheim, to menace people with murder. And beyond menace: they execute, what the Ulfkottes only dare to suggest...

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Will Ulfkotte succeed in strangling freedom of expression on the Web?

I read a nearly desperate call of one of the bloggers who are persecuted in Germany by Udo Ulfkotte.

The self-appointed Saviour of Europe (from Islam) wastes his time and money on legal quibbling against at least three German bloggers we know of, demanding huge amounts of money as compensation for alleged calumny.

As always, he uses "Pax Europa" as his vehicle to bear the brunt of his expenditure on legal fees and lawyers, as well as the risk of his finally going out empty-handed. (Like in his legal actions against Belgian authorities who forbade the Brussels 9/11 demonstration).

Ulfkotte's legal tactics have for consequence that individual antiracist bloggers are now in danger of being blooded to a financial death by legal invoices (from lawyers as well as from Ulfkotte and his Pax Europa Organization).

It is a cause of principle: Freedom of opinion, freedom of linking to other people's opinions. The Internet is something different from traditional media. It is interactive. People who feel the need to contradict something, can react, either on the site of their "detractor", or on their own site, and link it to the original post.

On the Net, it is no more like in the traditional printed-paper world. Legal provisions to protect individuals and institutions from slandering in the press, have historically been instituted to limit the abuse by mass media of their near-monopoly of the public sphere. This was done to correct a situation of unequal power, unequal access to the public tribune.

The Net, however, is much more democratic: Anybody can publish, react, link, with about equal opportunity to reach the public and the public opinion. Therefore, everybody can, within the limits of the law, more freely vent his or her opinions and participate in the many dialogues that ensue. This is a fundamentally different situation from the one, the old press laws have been made in.

Does this open the way to a so-called "liberty to offend", as claimed by many ideological allies of Dr. Ulfkotte? (Viz. the danish Cartoons debate!). We do not think so. Bloggers should take up their responsibility for consequences that their words and drawings may provoke.

But nobody can upheld, that opening a discussion about racism, or hidden racism, in Dr. Ulfkotte's recent statements and actions, is irresponsible or provocative in the way, the Danish cartoons and similar systematic slandering of other people's deepest convictions are.

But Ulfkotte, undermining the opinions of his allies, also in this matter, goes for exactly the contrary of "freedom to offend". He goes for Internet Censure by the Courts.

The German Courts work with existing laws. Laws that date essentially from the printed-paper area. Laws that in the matter of press rules, have been sharpened after 1945, in order to avoid the kind of abuse, the Nazis made of the media. These laws need urgently an update for the 21st century. The actual legal situation allows anybody who has the financial means for it, to legally strangle other, less wealthy, bloggers, and to bleed them financially white with court fees and amends.

Ulfkotte has started to exploit this loophole in German jurisdiction. He sues other bloggers for "Verleumdung" (defamation), when they call him a "racist". Even if they only link to an article where such things are written!

Even if Udo Ulfkotte does not agree, and invokes "demographic" reasons for his islam-bashing, the opinion, that Ulfkotte's ramblings are of a racist nature, can be perfectly sustained:

In other countries, where legislation is not narrowed by post-1945 fears of nazist revival, an authority on Islam-Western relations like Olivier Roy, has been able to freely characterise as "racist" a maverick French philosopher (Robert Redeker), who wrote a perfectly "ulfkottean" article in the Paris daily 'Le Figaro'. (Olivier Roy in 'Esprit', November 2006 [FR]). That is why Germany urgently should modernize its legislation on the protection of personal integrity in the media, especially ont the internet. And that is why, if the German Courts would follow Ulfkotte's injunctions, an appeal to the European Court of Justice could well turn into a final victory for the attacked bloggers.

That Ulfkotte abuses of these provisions that were originally intended to guard against new Nazism, in order to silence his critics from the antiracist left, is is proven by the fact, that he doesn't undertake anything against those who defame him from the right. (Examples in At Home in Europe, october 3, 2007). Such a behaviour has never been the intention of the legislators! German parliament and Courts should urgently undertake steps to correct the old provisions in order to make them applicable to the internet-epoch.

Those, who stand up so vehemently for "the freedom to offend" (vide Danish Mohammed Cartoons debate, as well as Ajaan Hirsi Ali's statements to that effect), should also take action here against Ulfkotte and his organization. Freedom is indivisible. If Ulfkotte's anti-Islamist allies let him have his way against anti-racist bloggers, their turn will come next.
Ulfkotte's former "SIOE"-allies from Denmark and Britain are already aware of the possibility that Ulfkotte may do his disorganizing and destabilizing work at the service of unknown secret services! (At Home in Europe, September 13)

So, the only thing that is left to do next, is to organise a public action of bloggers (from left and right) to make Ulfkotte and Pax Europa stop their legal advocacy against freedom of expression on the Net. On the 15th of November, in Frankfurt, a provisional hearing by the Court will decide about the procedure to follow.

Time is short. An appeal to the European Court should be envisaged, if German judges choose to follow Dr. Ulfkotte and his Pax Europa Verein.

It is important, that German judges and legislators be aware of what is at stake, before the Frankfurt Court holds its preliminary hearings on November 15 in the first two cases of Ulfkotte advocacy against freedom of expression on the Web!

Imperfections of EU roaming charges victory

My small contributions (see under 'roaming charges' in my Euroblogs, [EN], [FR], [DE] and [NL]) to the reform of European "roaming charges" (costs for appeals from and to mobile telephones in Europe from and to different countries/providers) have some reason to be celebrated: Finally, on September 30, all providers are obliged to apply the European maximum tariffs of 49 cts p/Minute for calling abroad, and 24 cts p/Minute for receiving an international call (Plus national VAT).

This means a 60% reduction of consumer costs, coming too late for holiday roamings, but nevertheless welcome. The more so, while costs will continue to be capped at lower levels during the coming years.

Imperfections
SMS- and GPRS (internet) roaming have still to be tackled. If providers do not limit themselves, measures have been announced this week in Brussels, to discipline them.
The application of the caps comes also 3 months too late. It could have been applied on July 1st. That was the intention of the Commission and the European Parliament. Somehow, the providers managed to delay it during the three summer months, thus profiting from the consumers needs to call home during holidays.

I myself, being a customer of the Belgian Proximus provider (an affiliate of the giant British Vodafone networks), received today an August bill of € 88.89 (21% Belgian VAT included). International and roaming calls are billed in it for about 0.75 € p/Minute (VAT not included). This in spite of the fact, that I am a member of Vodafone Passport, that allows lower tariffs if I call to or from Vodafone-affiliated networks in Europe. Otherwise, I would have had to pay still more.

During our holidays (the August part), I called from Belgium to France, Spain and the UK; from France to Belgium and the UK; from Spain to Belgium, and the UK. And I received several calls from Holland, Belgium, the UK and Spain in different countries. Always via Vodafone Networks, where the Vodafone Passport is applicable.

Total minutes outgoing European intl calls: 73.43 Minutes
Total Proximus/Vodafone price (without VAT): € 43,1682
Also a middle price p/Minute of: 0,5878, which is 9,878 cts more per minute than it should have been.
Calls received abroad: 2,04 Minutes at 0,8182 € = 0,4011 €.
That is 16,01 cts more p/Minute than should have been billed.

All in all, Proximus/Vodafone stole from me in a petty way (for they could easily have applied the new tariffs by July), in one month:
73.43 x 9.878 + 2.04 x 9.878 = 725,34154 + 20,15112 cts = 745,49266 cts, or 7.45 €, which means: € 9.02 VAT included, or: somewhat more than 10% of my entire bill! Multiply by three months.

This petty manoeuver, during three months, and multiplied by all other consumers' bills (except for corporations, who enjoy preferential tariffs since long), may have paid for the consultants and lobbyists Vodafone hired in 2005-2007, to counter the EU Commission's proposals with literally every possible counter-argumentation. The venerable Financial Times duly reported their ramblings, and was echoed by other media.

We need the EU to protect consumers
All this shows, how necessary (and not at all impossible) it is, to regulate the "free" market with overall European regulations, as long as oligopolists try to profit from the remainders of compartimentalisation by country. (In this case: the fact that licences are being issued by national governments, who receive also the fees).

I celebrate above all this proof of the capability of EU-cooperation, to get provider-consumer relations right on this issue. For the odds were not small: A formal, well financed campaign of big and smaller providers like Vodafone (GB) and France Telecom has been raging. But they did not prevail against Swedish Eurocommissioner Viviane Reding (EUobserver.com, October 2).

This case is a weapon against Euroscepticism. It should be used.

(Parts of this post were originally published at huibslog)

Europe's right-wing extremists show us, how to discuss differences of opinion

Europe's right-wing extremists show us, how to discuss differences of opinion in a way, compatible with European judeo-christian values. The invectives cited below, are undoubtedly part of the European Christian heritage, particularly that of the years 1922-1945.


No, no: It has not been the popular hate-manifestation that Europe's baldheads hoped for. A mere 200 people gathered on September 11 at the Luxemburg Train Station and the Schuman Square. Most of them were Vlaams Belang activists, who saw the event from their own Flemish perspective: To them, not the "Eurabisation of Europe" was the issue, but the fact, that a socialist, francophone, politician initiated the interdiction. Thus: Yellow lion flags all over! (Photo)
The Anglodanish organisers were not amused at all. But who can forbid freedom of expression on foreign soil? Brethren: You'll have to live with national and regional particularities and sensibilities, if you want to create an Europe of your design...
SIOE not only blames the German maverick politician Udo Ulfkotte for it, bur now also the Flemish extremist party Vlaams Belang.

SIOE website (England), 14.9.07:

SIOE considers that Vlaams Belang played right into Thielemans’s hands, which he must now be rubbing together with glee with an “I told you so” look on his fat face.

Some female Vlaams Belang supporters jokingly wore niqabs in Schumann Square.

Well, if Vlaams Belang doesn’t get its finger out of its political ass pretty damned quick, such women may find themselves compelled to wear niqabs when outdoors, if they are allowed out of the house.

The only way Islamism will be defeated is by fighting it single-mindedly, but you have to have a brain to have a mind, and it’s pretty obvious some leaders of some political parties are brainless.

SIOE-England is good in inventing invectives.
"Single-mindedness" is its trademark.
And, when SIOE burst out into the above philippica, it still had to undergo the treason by Udo Ulfkotte, who retired to Cologne at the last moment.

No wonder, that SIOE-England and -Denmark replied to Ulfkotte's demand to share his costs for juridical action in Brussels, with an email, that Ulfkotte says (on the Pax Europa website), he "regrets not to be able to publish it, because of German laws for protecting identities".

But, maybe, that mail did not only reveal some juicy details about the Pax-Europa/SIOE collaboration, but it may be possible, that it also mentioned Ulfkotte's "ass" as the location where he could stick up his bills...

We demand freedom of speech on the internet! We issue an appeal to SIOE, to publish its mail to Ulfkotte. No backroom dealings between self-appointed leaders! Out in the Open, with it!

We want more of this...

(Updated Oct. 1st, 2007)

Will Ulfkotte sue now his new detractors?

[Ulfkotte-Images published by SIOE-England on Sept. 7, 2007]

Udo Ulfkotte, during the summer of 2007, sued a number of German Bloggers for qualificating him as a coward, a racist and an opportunist. Conjointly with his organisation "Pax Europa" and its treasurer who is also his spouse, he demands from four or five bloggers more than 200.000 Euros as indemnification. The German Courts have, at first instance, accepted his complaints and have ordered provisional interdictions to the incriminated bloggers.

All those bloggers are from the "left", or, at least, anti racist thinkers and activists.

Now, after his desertion from the Brussels' Sept. 11 demonstration and after his denunciation of the former allies from the Vlaams Blok and from SIOE as "racists" and "extreme right-wing", he is being attacked personally and vehemently by the "right".

Here are some examples of those incriminations from SIOE (England):

Is Udo Ulfkotte exercising dhimmi-status?

(Statement from Anders Gravers and Stephen Gash regarding Udo Ulfkotte’s behaviour.)

"Dhimmi" is a very heavy qualification in Ulfkotte's and SIOE's world. Dhimmis are non-Muslims who, passively or actively, compose with the enemy. Traitors, for short.

Ulfkotte is also accused of foul play:

This [remaining in contact with SIOE-chiefs, HR] was never the case with Udo Ulfkotte. Although he corresponded with Anders fairly regularly he was never fully forthcoming with any news regarding contacts, for example, or interest shown by the media.
[..]
Ulfkotte is not a team player in our opinion and this has been shown to its extreme over the last few days with him appearing on media outlets, especially in Belgium, saying HE cancelled the demonstration.
[..]
He could not have done a better job of trying to make the court case fail to reach a verdict in our favour and undermine SIOE’s lawyer’s attempts to reinstate the march.

We regard his behaviour as despicable and we both regard Ulfkotte as a Judas to the cause of anti-Islamism.

We regard his conduct to be calculated in making the demonstration fail.

(Some emphasis is mine, HR). Here, Ulfkotte is indicted for treachery, misleading people who were dependent on his informations, and, worst of all, intentionally sabotaging efforts to legalise the demonstration. He is regarded as a "Judas to the cause of anti-Islamism".

Could anything worse be said about our staunch defender of 'judeo-christian European values"?

Yes, it can be. SIOE investigators are currently engaged in researches into Ulfkotte's connections with secret services, who could possibly have directed his actions. Ulfkotte is considered as a stooge of manipulations by "Intelligence Agencies" or as a mere opportunist politician. SIOE says:

Why this is so, we are still investigating. He may be employed by the European Intelligence Agencies, he supposedly acts as a consultant to, or it may be solely due to him selfishly pursuing his own political career.
There may be a more sinister reason, but we don’t actually know because he hasn’t had the guts to tell us.

And then follows a typical SIOE-personal bashing:

Udo Ulfkotte has declared he intends to start and lead a political party to combat Islamism.

We believe he couldn’t lead a starving donkey to grass. He is a director of Pax Europa. Well, we believe he couldn’t direct a drinking straw into a bottle.

A denunciation of the political and personal impotence of Ulfkotte, that should merit another alert of the prosecution by Pax Europa!
And look here, how the old antigermanism resurfaces, because of Ulfkotte. Pax Europa should take its responsibilities and pursue the following contempt of democratic Germany by SIOE:

Once again we say, “If Udo Ulfkotte is the best Germany has, to combat the Islamisation of Germany, then God help Germany!”

[..]
Finally, Ulfkotte is qualified as a "saboteur" and a traitor to the German people. Objectively, he is helping to impose "the sharia" on the Germans. And on all Europeans, too:

He is nothing more than a saboteur who is doing no favours for the people of Germany, let alone Europe.

In our opinion he is a pathetic coward and German people would be best advised to avoid him and his future political party, unless they wish to endure an existence under Sharia law.

Well, Ulfkotte sued people for less. For instance, he wants to fine Watchblog Islamophobie-author "bigberta" with more than 60.000 Euros, merely for linking to a blog, where Ulfkotte was qualified as a "racist".
If Mr. Ulfkotte and his Pax Europa Organisation are interested in giving proof of the fact that their juridical actions are not exclusively oriented at people whom they consider as their political enemies, but that they are seriously engaged in upholding European civilized values on the Internet, they know now what they have to do.
They know, that, if they let pass SIOE's incriminations without reaction, their chances in court against the German bloggers who warned against Ulfkotte, become very tiny.

Trouble in Eurabia House: SIOE against the Vlaams belang.

No, no: It has not been the popular hate-manifestation that Europe's baldheads hoped for. A mere 200 people gathered on September 11 at the Luxemburg Train Station and the Schuman Square. Most of them were Vlaams Belang activists, who saw the event from their own Flemish perspective: To them, not the "Eurabisation of Europe" was the issue, but the fact, that a socialist, francophone, politician initiated the interdiction. Thus: Yellow lion flags all over! (Photo)
The Anglodanish organisers were not amused at all. But who can forbid freedom of expression on foreign soil? Brethren: You'll have to live with national and regional particularities and sensibilities, if you want to create an Europe of your design...
SIOE not only blames the German maverick politician Udo Ulfkotte for it, bur now also the Flemish extremist party Vlaams Belang.

SIOE website (England), 14.9.07:

SIOE considers that Vlaams Belang played right into Thielemans’s hands, which he must now be rubbing together with glee with an “I told you so” look on his fat face.

Some female Vlaams Belang supporters jokingly wore niqabs in Schumann Square.

Well, if Vlaams Belang doesn’t get its finger out of its political ass pretty damned quick, such women may find themselves compelled to wear niqabs when outdoors, if they are allowed out of the house.

The only way Islamism will be defeated is by fighting it single-mindedly, but you have to have a brain to have a mind, and it’s pretty obvious some leaders of some political parties are brainless.

Oh my! European politics are about national and regional feelings. Some UK activists have to educate themselves somewhat more...

Ulfkotte admits errors and returns to "naive professor" acting

Interview with Dr. Udo Ulfkotte, four days ago:
Which other errors did he admit during the break near to the end of the movie?
Maybe, he mentioned his expensive and futile lawsuits against German bloggers, who warned the public against him and his "errors"? We will never know.

We found the YouTube film on the excellent "Yelloman" blog ("Extreme Right in Flanders - weblog against hate and racism"). [In Dutch/Flemish]. Yellow is the favourite nationalist Flemish colour. And "yell" indicates the way in which the Vlaams Belang usually prefers to communicate.

Today, the same Blog was extremely quick in posting images of the Vlaams-Belang dominated former Ulfkotte manifestation in Brussels. The announced 20.000, plus 10.000 people from North America and Asia that Ulfkotte announced repeatedly, were shrunken to a mere 200, fifty of whom were arrested. Vlaams Belang leaders Dewinter en vanhecke were among those.

I publish that movie (in Dutch) today in In Europa Thuis.

Ulfkotte defines himself as "Gang" Leader

"Brussels 9/11 Gang Shop"

Is this a bad joke? Have another "gang" come up to disturb the German Dr. Ulfkotte's peaceful and civilised plans for September 11 in Brussels? Or Cologne? Or both?
Fact is, that Ulfkottes Pax Europa Website links to a Leipzig store, where, under the exclusive responsibility of himself, anti-islamist "gang"-distinctives are being sold for exorbitant prices.

The Web is a jungle. Some hackers could have done, what Ulfkotte's allies like "Pro Köln" and "Vlaams Belang" did, in organising their own parallel demonstrations op 9/11 in Brussels and in Cologne.
Or is it maybe the MOSSAD? In 2001, Ulfkotte published an anti-Mossad book ("Gen-factor 'J'"), where he invents a biologic extermination plot by this Israeli secret service against Europe and the European Union. Since then, Ulfkotte turned tables, and defends "judeo-christian values" against the Islam. But the Mossad doesn't forget, who their enemies are...
Whatever - if it is a joke, it is a good one!

Go with me on some windowshopping in Ulfkotte's 98 pieces devotionalia collection:

Show everyone, that your gang thinks that peaceful Brussels Turks are plotting to impose a sharia that doesn't exist since a long time in their home country:

Messenger Bag

strapazierfähige Tasche aus 100% Polyester

Details

Größe Unisize

Anzahl

Versandfertig: innerhalb 1-2 Werktagen

Article No. 5494094

inkl. MwSt. EU
zzgl. Versand

Preis 19,60 €

You think this is not value for money? Yes, the baggy is expensive. And delivery costs have to be added. But you have to remember, that Pax Europa needs money badly. Their lawyers ask every time for more. For instance, in procedure against a blogger who only linked to a site where Ulfkotte was characterised as a "racist".

The owners of the "Spreadshirt" Firm's website were aware of Dr. Ulfkotte's idea of responsibilities. That is why, on their "Impressum" page, reject any responsibility for the childish provocations of Dr. Ulfkotte. Here is their text:

Für diesen Online-Shop verantwortlich im Sinne des Presserechts ist:

Udo Ulfkotte

Postfach 2249
35532 Wetzlar
Deutschland

harleybike at web.de

Die Verantwortung des oben genannten Shop-Betreibers gilt insbesondere für sämtliche in diesem Shop veröffentlichte Druck-Motive sowie für die optische Gestaltung des Shops.

[Ulfkotte's picture was added by us]

Technische Realisierung:

Dieser Onlineshop wird auf einer von Spreadshirt zur Verfügung gestellten Plattform betrieben. Spreadshirt ist verantwortlich für den technischen Shopbetrieb sowie die Bestellabwicklung, nicht aber für die Inhalte des Shops.

Mit einer Bestellung in diesem Online-Shop geht der Besteller ausschließlich einen Vertrag mit der sprd.net AG [Wer sind das? HR] ein, nicht jedoch mit dem oben stehenden Shop-Betreiber. Für die Bestellung gelten ausschließlich die AGB der sprd.net AG.

End of quote.
Resume:
"In ordering something at this online-shop, the orderer enters only into an agreement with the sprd.net Ltd, and not with the managers and owners of this on-line shop."

We continue our window shopping tour at Dr. Ulfkotte's souvenir shop.

Do you like pins? - Here is one! No, it doesn't show President Bush adoring an oil barrel, stupid!
Dr. Ulfkotte presumably meant a Muslim, praying at a gas dispenser.
But, more subtly, one could subsume a link to Dr. Ulfkotte himself. As an Africa-correspondent for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung during the nineties, he was accused of accepting bribes from oil-company SHELL. However, this accusation was invalidated, when the FAZ won in court against the accusers.


Ffünf Stück für nur 5.80 €, zzgl Versand!
Die feine Humor des Dr. Ulfkottes (Verantwortlicher für die Gestaltung) ist unwiderstehlich!









The "Gangs" of boys and girls who were to march through the Brussels streets, would have been dressed up by Dr. Ulfkotte and his wife who is treasurer of the Pax Europa Organisation like this:
Kostet 61,40 €!!

And don't forget your umbrella, "bad boys": 13,40 €!








For the girls, no not a headscarf, but this woollen cap: € 13,40!



Oder eine kleine Börse? - Nur € 20,10 (zzgl Versand)?





The same handbag, but now with an inscription against "Freddy" (Thielemans), the Brussels mayor? - Only 20.10 Euros, delivering costs to be added!

Dr. Ulfkotte did not forget about you, beer and wine drinkers! Only 15.90 € apiece!!

























Ulfkotte says so himself: I am a "gang"-leader...

"Do I resemble a hooligan?", Udo Ulfkotte asked the journalists, when, on August 17, he was found in Vlaams-Belang-leader Philip Dewinter's parliamentary offices, talking with that extremist in person.
Indeed, the gang leader had dressed as a "Hochschullehrer" (professor) for that occasion.

Brussels: Landmark encounter of Belgian and German extremists Dewinter and Ulfkotte

Leading Belgian Flemish (Dutch language) daily "De Morgen" had an interesting scoop on Monday August 18, 2007. In the Flemish parliament offices of the Vlaams Belang Party in Brussels, it met it's historical leader Philip Dewinter (on the right in the picture), hosting the German maverick right-wing politician Dr. Udo Ulfkotte (to the left).

("De Morgen" daily, p. 6, 18.8.07)

The meeting was about an appeal to the highest Belgian administrative Court, Ulfkotte intends to make against the refusal of Brussels Mayor Thielemans to allow an Europe-wide "Anti-Eurabia" manifestation, that Ulfkotte had planned for September 11 at the European Parliament buildings. This manifestation was intended to underline Mr. U.'s ambitions for the European Parliament elections, due in 2008. A critical portrait of Dr. Udo Ulfkotte has been published by Dialog International, a German-American blog, on July 31, 2007. That text is also incorporated in Uncontrolled Fallout from the Pepperdine Conference: Udo Ulfkotte, that I published today in Legal Alien @ New York.

A welcome change of battlefield: from streetwise hooligans to the courtroom
As positive response to Mr. Ulfkotte's Brussels manifestation proposal had remained restricted to the usual rightwing mini-formations in different countries, the Brussels interdiction may have been a welcome development to him. His recent identification with "European Judeo-Christian values", to be anchored in a new "Christian-ecological" party that he intends to create, doesn't marry well with the image of some thousand neonazis, baldheads and hooligans, marching through the Brussels streets, provoking indignation with the population and laughter with the counter-demonstrators.

Awkward and embarrassing allies
A public battle in a courtroom, where he might position himself as a protagonist of "free expression" and a staunch defender of Europe against "the Islamic tsunami", suits him better. That is why he accepted the offer of the separatist and racist (condemnation in 2004) Vlaams Belang Party ("quarantained" by all other Belgian parties) to help him out with a very special lawyer: Mr. Hugo Coveliers (his foot is visible in the picture).

Coveliers used to be an Antwerp city council member for the liberal VLD party. At the last communal elections (2007), he created a new rightwing formation (VLOTT) that leaned heavily to- (and upon) the Vlaams Belang. Together with the VB, he lost those elections in Antwerp. At the federal parliamentary Belgian elections in June, he associated completely with the VB, getting a third position on the VB list for the Belgian Senate. Those elections were also unsuccessful for the extremist formations, but Coveliers got his seat. The man is also a lawyer. In the eyes of Dewinter, he must be an ideal person for the job.

Ulfkotte, caught red-handed, pleads naivety and features his nonpoliticalness
But for Ulfkotte? - Dr. Udo was apparently taken by surprise, when the journalists came in. (Did Dewinter play him that nasty trick?) He denied any political cooperation with Dewinter and his party. VB-members were allowed to march with "Pax Europa" in the manifestation, but he had turned away an offer of the VB "Ordedienst" to put up a security and order service for the manifestation. All political symbols and party-flags were to be outlawed in his manifestation.

Ulfkotte positioned himself during that interview as an "unpolitical" person, unbeknown with the Belgian juridical system, just looking for help. "Indeed," said Dewinter ("looking amused", dixit De Morgen), "he is a kind of Pim Fortuyn or Geert Wilders. See for yourself: his statements are totally unpolitical!"

Dewinter lets Ulfkotte ramble and puts forward a murderous comparison
Here we must allow for some appreciation for Dewinter's ironical capacities and for the cunning ways in which he succeeds in enrolling the German Doctor in his ailing movement. For both names of Dutch anti-Islamic activists he mentions, are the names of ... politicians! Fortuyn participated in the 2002 Dutch parliamentary elections with his LPF (Lijst Pim Fortuyn) list and won, days after he was murdered by an extremist animal-protector, more than 20 seats in the 150 strong Dutch parliament. Geert Wilders is leader of a (PVV) party, with an anti-Islamic mission, who won 12 seats in November 2006. Both politicians consider(ed) themselves as "anti-politicians", ready to abuse of the parliamentary system for populist agitation and fear mongering. For some years, Dewinter has been unsuccessfully proposing collaboration to the latter (Wilders). By putting Ulfkotte and Wilders in one sack, he catches two flies in one move: Putting himself in the position of an acceptable ally of non-quarantained movements abroad, and, subtly, defining Ulfkotte as the populist extremist politician he denies being.

Is Dr. Udo Ulfkotte as naive as he pretends?
"We do not collaborate with this [VB] party", says Ulfkotte, drinking his cup of tea or coffee at Dewinter's conference table. "I am completely upset because of that interdiction," he declares. "Do I look like a hooligan? Of course, I accepted readily Dewinter's proposal to arrange a lawyer for our organisation. I don't know anybody here in Brussels, I am completely jammed. How could I find my way in the Belgian juridical system on my own?"
Poor Udo! Somebody (a Moroccan, a Turk?) must have stolen his telephone directory at home. Otherwise, he would have engaged a, preferably francophone, non-socialist Brussels lawyer (Below, we will tell you, why...), without links to politics!

We cannot get rid of the impression, that Dr. Udo, caught red-handed, is desperately excusing himself for the awkward company he keeps. But, if we believe, for a moment, that he is really as naive as he pretends, he would make a poor politician, if ever elected. To let yourself be embarrassed in this way by a second-rank regional extremist, is unforgivable for a man with such far-reaching pretensions as he is.

The manipulator manipulated
In the end, we do not believe, however, that Ulfkotte will succeed in denying his association with a party that has been condemned for racism and forced to change its name and program. As a former foreign editor of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (1986-2003) and self-appointed "international security expert", boasting about his links with the German Bundesnachrichtendienst, the Israeli Mossad and the British MI6, as well as international oil companies, he cannot but have known, what company he was going to keep. Maybe, he thinks, that in associating with his Flemish ally, exclusively for the sake of a juridical procedure, he can win its sympathy, without having to subscribe to its racist ideology.

Indeed. He needs badly allies who may provide some simulacrum of a mass following. The only "masses" he can summon in Germany, are the "Bürger in Wut" (Outraged Citizens) party in Bremerhaven, a xenophobic and "security"- obsessed local movement, that managed to get some representatives elected in the local council earlier this year. His effort, to make the Flemish separatists and xenophobes abandon their beloved yellow lion-flags and march orderly and exclusively for the election of Dr. Ulfkotte into the EP, seems to have lead to a mini-disaster.

Ulfkotte's collaboration with racists cannot be denied any more
Why? - In July this year, Ulfkotte started a defamation procedure in Germany against a blogger (Jochen Hoff, Berlin), who had qualified him as a "racist". Another blogger, who had merely linked to that blog, was also summoned (bigberta, Watchblog Islamophobie). Betraying his own "freedom of expression" principles, he, together with his organisation "Pax Europa", claims more than 100.000 Euros from the two bloggers. German judges ordered a provisional suppression of the incriminated texts.

Consequences for Ulfkotte's chances in his complaint against German bloggers
But how can Ulfkotte, now that his links with a movement that has been condemned for "racism", have been revealed, maintain that Hoff's qualification was outrageous? Will a German judge disregard a definitive judgment by the highest Belgian court? Not very likely.

Mr. Ulfkotte, who spent already much money on expensive lawyers in that German case, will have to explain to the contributors to the Pax Europe organisation, who thought they were helping the promotion of "European Judeo-Christian Values", how and why he wasted their Euros. Will he have enough money left, to pay for Coveliers in Belgium? Or will he, "jammed" again, resort to financial help or a gift "in natura" (if Coveliers offers free services) from his Flemish friends, with whom he "does not collaborate"?

Ulfkotte's courtroom activities in a wider perspective
As we wrote today in "Legal Alien @ New York" (Uncontrolled Fallout from the Pepperdine Conference: Udo Ulfkotte), the American and European protagonists of the anti-"Eurabia" Pepperdine Conference in Malibu, California, of June 11, 2007, will not be very happy with Mr. Ulfkotte's handling of one of it's main instructions to counter Islam in Europe. That strategy is called "advocacy", and is meant to abuse the juridical system in order to harass Muslims and their property (and anti-racists) by legal and administrative means. Ulfkotte, however, spoils his capital in efforts to take personal revenge on relatively unimportant bloggers and tries to kill freedom of speech.

Stuck in the Belgian communitarian swamp
Now, on top of that, he hands the advocacy issue in Belgium over to classical ("traditional extreme right") and separatist actors, whom they cannot associate with. A good opportunity to nail the social-democrats once again to their supposed "dhimminess" (Brussels Mayor Thielemans is affiliated to the Belgian (French) Socialist Party - Parti Socialiste, PS) is foregone. With VB-man Coveliers as a lawyer, the issue will for sure become part of the eternal Belgian language-community feud, where all French-speaking people will automatically solidarise with the attacked PS, who, as the biggest Walloon party, embody Frenchness in the country.

How Ulfkotte selects his fear-mongering issues
Once again, Mr. Ulfkotte appears as an embarrassing ally to a cause, he chooses to adopt as his own. In an upcoming article, we will study his previous (pre-2001) obsession with the Israeli Mossad as a danger to European security. An obsession, he apparently traded in after September 11, for his actual themas, that contrast remarkably with the former one.

Legal Alien: Pepperdine 2 and 3 Reports: European stooges enter the scene. Pipes underhandedly calls for a pogrom on Mosques.

Leon de Winter, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Henryk Broder, Andy Bostom, Daniel Pipes and Greg Davis (This photo is merged from two smaller photos. [By Vik Rubenfeld, on whose reporting I draw, HR])

In A Legal Alien in New York I published two new reports about the Pepperdine Conference against 'Eurabia' and Islam.

1. Pepperdine 2: "Ibn Warraq" tells his tale. (July 7)
2. Pepperdine 3: European Stooges enter the Scene (July 10).

1: "Ibn Warraq", a Pipes pet and anti-muslim hetzer working under pseudonym in the US, takes a Muslim mother's warning to her children not indulge in stupid commercial "sport" hooliganism, as proof, that Muslims never will integrate into Western society. However, that mother did nothing else than a Christian mother could have done: she referred to religion as a basis of discernment.
Nevertheless, the Pepperdine audience seems convinced, that this is proof of the Islam danger and the dhimmi treason.

2: Ayaan Hirsi Ali introduces a new concept. Suppression of Muslims is no more a Government task, in her eyes. She has 'learned' in the US, that a "popular upsurge" will be a better way. Dutch writer Leon de Winter delivers a vague statement about the Amsterdam situation and confirms that even Calvinists are ready to come into action, as they have "enough" of the Islam intrusion. (If the reporter understood him well, and if I understood the reporter correctly). German prize-winning anti-islamic writer Henryk Broder communicates some German and British anecdotes that should deliver more proof of Islam's evilness and the treacherously weak ('appeasement') reactions of mainstream European politicians.
Finally, the conference initiator, Pepperdine visiting Professor Daniel Pipes, delivers an outrageous statement, calling, underhandedly, for a pogrom-like popular movement against Mosques.

The reporting will be continued in the next days.

London Financial Times Commenter is as disgusted as I am about Pepperdine...

Ah, I'm not alone in my disgust about the Pepperdine Conference.
Listen to Gideon Rachman of the London Financial Times, who chastizes Mark Steyn and Ajaan Hirsi Ali even more than I did:

The collapse of Europe

If you happen to be passing though Malibu next month, why not pop into an intriguing-sounding conference at Pepperdine University on "The Collapse of Europe". One of the early sessions is entitled - "Eurabia: Is Muslim domination of Europe inevitable?"

My answer to this is "No" it's not inevitable. In fact, given that the Muslim population of Europe is just 4% at the moment, I would say it's highly unlikely. But don't trying telling that to an audience of American conservatives. The idea that Europe is about to be submerged by the Muslim hordes seems to be almost recieved wisdom over there. It is certainly a notion that has launched a great many books. There is “Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis” by Bat Ye’or; “While Europe Slept – How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within” by Bruce Bawer; “The Death of the West” by Pat Buchanan; and “The Cube and the Cathedral” by George Weigel.

I was depressed to see that Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali-born Dutch politician is taking part in the Pepperdine conference. She is a highly intelligent and courageous woman, so it's a shame to see that she is mixing with buffoons like Mark Steyn, who is giving the keynote address at the conference.

Steyn is the author of the most successful recent book about the alleged Muslim takeover of Europe. “America Alone” earned its author a place in the New York Times best-seller list and praise from President Bush.

Mr Steyn argues that – “Europe has all but succumbed to the dull opiate of multiculturalism.” Indeed “a fearless Muslim advance has penetrated far deeper into Europe than Abd al-Rahman” – a Muslim general who made it to the outskirts of Paris in 732. With apparent relish Mr Steyn predicts a “Eurabian civil war”. The weak-kneed elites will succumb to militant Islam. But an “unreconstructed minority” will turn to “neo-nationalist strongmen”. The poor old Europeans can’t win. It’s either appeasement or fascism.

It is alarming stuff. So it is comforting to recall that Mr Steyn has been disastrously wrong about many things in the past. I've just looked up a piece that he filed from Iraq in June 2003, in which he confidently informed his readers that everything was fine - "a vast number of bureaucrats are running around Iraq with unlimted budgets in search of a human catastrophe that doesn't exist." This is vintage Steyn - jeering, complacent and utterly stupid.

Steyn's Iraq epic ended with him sitting in an Iraqi cafe, watching a BBC television report suggesting that there was a crisis in Baghdad's hospitals. Once again, Steyn knew better. He sneered at:

"the blazing lights of round-the-clock CNN and BBC camera crews filming their reporter yakking away in front of a telegenic moppet whose acute tonsillitis is somehow all Rumsfeld's fault. These days, I always laugh my head off at BBC World reports. And, in that Ramadi cafe, I was touched to find that, even though most of them hadn't a clue what he was going on about, within half a minute, the rest of the crowd was roaring along with me."

Ah Iraq - if only the rest of the world could see the funny side. In fact, I have a suggestion for Mr Steyn. When he has finished lecturing the inmates at Pepperdine, perhaps he could repeat his trip to Iraq and see if it's still as hilarious as the last time.

Nothing to add. My analysis is upcoming...

EU Commission's Response to Mark Steyn: 18 couples coming, together!

Reproductive Activities...

In A Legal Alien in New York, we quoted Mr. Mark Steyn (11.6.07), a keynote speaker at the "Collapse Of Europe" Conference at Pepperdine University in Malibu last month. In a Wall Street Journal article of January 2006 Steyn resumes his New York Times bestseller "America Alone: The End Of the World as We Know It":

It's the Demography, Stupid
The real reason the West is in danger of extinction.

BY MARK STEYN
Wednesday, January 4, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

[..]

The challenge for those who reckon Western civilization is on balance better than the alternatives is to figure out a way to save at least some parts of the West.

One obstacle to doing that is that, in the typical election campaign in your advanced industrial democracy, the political platforms of at least one party in the United States and pretty much all parties in the rest of the West are largely about what one would call the secondary impulses of society--

• government health care,
  
• government day care (which Canada's thinking of introducing),
• government paternity leave (which Britain's just introduced).
  

We've prioritized the secondary impulse over the primary ones:

• national defense,
  
• family,
  
• faith and,
  
• most basic of all, reproductive activity--"Go forth and multiply," because if you don't you won't be able to afford all those secondary-impulse issues, like cradle-to-grave welfare.

Americans sometimes don't understand how far gone most of the rest of the developed world is down this path... [..]

Who could have guessed, that, of all people, the "European Bureaucrats" (as the EU was labeled in all documents of that "scientific" seminar) would come up with such a convincing refutation of Steyn's, Pipes', Hirsi Ali's, Claire Berlinski's, Arnaud Dotézac's accusations, that they are committing high treason to Western values, participating in a conspiracy to keep down the production of white, Christian babies, born in faithful and docile families, as they are promoting abortion, homosexual couples, kindergarten, women's liberation and other horrors.

The movie shows, exclusively white, European couples, engaged in state-sponsored, (the movie features 18 quotes of EU-subsidized movies), reproductive activities by consenting adult heterosexual couples.

It opens up original suggestions about who, where and and how Europeans should f**k against the Turk: Old and young, in toilets and on tables, in varying positions!

Watch this EuTube movie, quoted from the official EU Commission Website!

By July 4th, it had scored (since June 15): Views: 1,872,501 Comments: 530 Favorited: 2133 times. Rating: Four stars out of five by 2217 viewers...

If these are not Steyn's "reproductive activities", what else is?

The EU shows, that it is fully committed to "primary impulsions".

A loud "Hallelujah!" was heard at Pepperdine Churches of Christ University at Malibu, when the students discovered this divinely inspired result of their prayers against 'Eurabia" on the Internet...

Anti-Europe Smear Campaign at Malibu: A Report (1)

Pepperdine: Mark Steyn, Hirsi Ali and Greg Davis
label European advocates of women's choice, freedom of religion and free choice of childbearing,
as criminal sponsors of a supposed Muslim conspiracy against the West!

From 'Legal Alien in New York' (29.6.07):

Oh my!
The Pepperdine 'Collapse Of Europe' Conference has been even more villain than I imagined! When I got to sleep, on the morning of June 12 (see: "Daniel Pipes rallies..." on this Blog), I couldn't know which depths of political depravity, hate and un-christian (and un-jewish) sadism I was going to discover during the next weeks. I set myself (interrupted by illness, which I will not impute to the virtual company I got into) to a systematical collection of data on the key-participants of the Conference, those from the US as well as from Europe.

Participants: A sickening collection of false prophets
Some of them I knew already from my home country, Holland (Ayaan, De Winter, Ellian). Others from Europe had already been dealt with by some friends in other European countries (Henryk Broder, Claire Berlinsky). But the personalities from North America I got to know here (Pipes, Steyn, Avi Davis, Horowitz [who was one of my favored historians, back in the sixties...], Greg Davis and rabbi David Baron, etq.....) - a sickening bunch of would-be prophets, ready to play into any McCarthyist campaign that promises some minutes of fame on Fox News!

A plot against European humanistic policies with American taxpayers' money
On top of that, I was able to find some reporting from the informal 11 June Conference. If I had any doubt in guessing, that this meeting was about financing hate- and smear-campaigns against Islam in Europe and in America and against the humanistic core of mainstream European Union policies, - well, I am free of any doubt about that now: The official, government-funded, 'American Freedom Alliance' of Avi Davis is going to support a policy of "advocacy" against muslims and Islam, in the US as well as in Europe.

Muslims and Muslim goods should carry a 'warning sticker'...
Amongst other things, it is going to promote a "precautionary principle" strategy in Europe, which means, as the Swiss lawyer Arnaud Dotézac (Lausanne, another participant in the meeting) proudly explains:
"Treat Islam and Muslims as if they were a dangerous product for consumers and put a legally obligatory warning sticker on any Mosque and Qur'an, saying that Islam contains illegal exhortation to Jihad." The reasoning behind this Nazi idea (they did the same to Jews after 1933) is, that the leftists and the greens used the same policy against tobacco products, which might put them into an awkward situation, when it will be proposed in Europe.

Hirsi Ali (together with the American Christian Right) against European abortion-, homosexuality- and protection of women policies!
Naive as I am, I originally thought, that Hirsi Ali would oppose the Steyn "reproductive activity" policies, i.e.: forcing women (women!) to give birth tho rosy-white christian babies to counter the Turk. (Ref: My earlier post on the Pepperdine Conference). But a post on an Israelian Indy Blog by one Dickerson, who assisted at the Monday June 11 meeting, confirms, that everybody there was outraged by the 1,2 birthrate per couple in Europe. This was, of course, another treason by the Left, who struggle to keep down the Arian birthrate by promoting homosexual marriages, abortion and other sexual depravities.
You can count on me, to come back to you with the full texts and sources for this extraordinary Pepperdine Conspiracy against Europe and against religious freedom!

Here is reproduced, fyI, Vik Rubenfeld's report from the Pepperdine (Malibu) Conference in his Blog "The Big Picture" (15.6.07, part I). Our comments and explanations are in red.

Conference on the Collapse of Europe: How Supremacy of Islam is Taught to Muslim Children

Last weekend I attended the international conference on the Collapse of Europe, organized by Avi Davis of the American Freedom Alliance, and the Council for Democracy and Tolerance, at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California.

Avi Davis opens the Conference on the Collapse of Europe to a standing-room only crowd.

It was a remarkable event, with many of the leading authorities on the subject gathered together. It often seemed as though every sentence from each speaker was worthy of discussion in its own right. It can't possibly all be covered in a single blog post. This is the first in a series of articles (probably three or so in total) on the conference. All quotes are transcribed from audio recordings.

Following the keynote speech by Mark Steyn, Avi presented a panel featuring Greg Davis, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Ibn Warraq, and Philippe Karsenty, moderated by Mark Steyn. (Bios).

For the preacher Greg Davis, the Canadian humorist Mark Steyn ('reproductive activity') and Hirsi Ali, see my article dated June 12. Ajaan Hirsi Ali is featured in many other posts in my blogs (see sidebar). Ibn Warraq is a creation of Daniel Pipes. The man is no Arab and his name is not Ibn Warraq. We'll come back on him, as well as on Philippe Karsenty, who is a pro-Israelian extremist in France and only taken seriously in the rightist American media. Curiously, he is opposed to anti-Islam policies, but that may have changed during the conference.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Islam is a political project. It is a supremacist movement. It has a three-tiered stage, and has always had that. And those stages - the first one is dawa, or missionary work, persuading individuals to agree with the basic tenets and principals of that political project. The second is hejira, or emigration - spreading the faith, by planting people who have been converted to the faith, in other areas. And finally there's the stage of jihad. And that, I don't have to tell you.

Ayaan is describing the phenomenon we are all beginning to become aware of. Islamists emigrate into an area, and once there in sufficient numbers, they begin threatening the public with riots and violence. They do this not by specific direction; that is, they don't, as the Mafia did, have leaders who identify specific targets for attack. Instead, they do this by general direction, as per the Koran, to be at war with non-Muslims in general. This effectively results in enough acts of violence because the Islamist culture is intentionally filled with hate for non-Muslims, so that there are always more than enough Islamists itching to do violence. The non-Islamic host culture is unused to such an attack. Arresting the specific perpetrators of violence doesn't solve the situation, since the Islamist culture always produces more violence-prone Islamists. The non-Islamic host culture typically has no systems in place to root out the Islamist culture that is attacking it. Blindsided, without thinking about the long-term implications, the non-Islamic host culture usually attempts to appease the Islamists by giving them more and more of whatever they demand, hoping that they will then abandon violence. But Islam doesn't seek co-existence; as Ayaan says, Islam is a political project. It seeks political domination and supremacy. In many cases the result is that the non-Islamic host culture is destroyed, in a manner comparable to a body attacked by cancer.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, at an afternoon panel.

This is a strategy that is brilliantly crafted to attack non-Islamic cultures. It has been developed and honed literally over centuries.

Imagine: An academic gathering of people who have read certainly hundreds of the thousands of books that have been written on the complex concept of 'culture', listening to this nonsense about a "political attack on non-islamic cultures". How can a culture be "attacked"? How many, very different, cultures, Islam has adapted to in its history? Confusion between culture, civilization, religion, traditions, philosophy and ideology! I guess, that the Pepperdine heroes soon will find an Islamic version of the "Protocols of the Wise of Zion", to underpin their racist fear- and hate-mongering!

And it's extremely effective, as seen in this example discussed by Mark Steyn (more examples follow below):

Mark Steyn: The marriage practices of one province in Pakistan, have become routine in northern English towns. People are sometimes bringing brides over who do not meet the legal age of consent in some of these countries and still marrying them, and living with them, and nobody does anything about it because of multi-cultural sensitivities.

Stop! Not the first lie by Steyn at this Conference. But here we are dealing with a fact. It is about Bradford in North-West England. The local authorities immediately acted and forced the family to abide by the law. We'll force this ridiculous humorist to retract.

Greg Davis noted the importance of awareness of the nature of Islam as a political project.

Greg Davis: Islam has never understood a distinction between the secular and the religious. It is really only in the West, only in Christian and post-Christian countries, where the separation between the political and the temporal - and the religious - became enshrined in a serious way, in civilization, and freedom of conscience and such things developed. This has never occurred in Islam. From the times of the prophet Mohammed, Islam was a political program - an imperialistic project. It was really, I think you could say, the first totalitarian global movement in history, far predating national Socialism, far predating Communism. It was an attempt - is an attempt - to reconstruct the world along what is imagined to be ideal lines, specific guidelines, statutes, given by Allah, by god himself, from his last, final, complete thought [expressed to] Mohammed. This is what we must understand first and foremost about Islam. It is more appropriate to think of Islam as akin to Communism, I would say, or national Socialism, than any religion that we are likely to be familiar with. If we do not understand this basic fact - if we cannot speak frankly about the danger, and identify it, and call it what it is, I think we don't have a very good chance of surviving.

The happily smiling preacher couple Greg and Amy Davis of the Churches of Christ Protestant congregation, the church of Pepperdine at its foundation in 1937.

Here, I will reveal a great Secret to the Minister and his wife: All "cultures", religions and states, even cities, were 'totalitarian' in all history and still are, but for a limited number of countries in West and East, where pluralism has been developed, starting in the later eighteenth century. Even now, in the United States of America, there are Protestant sects (I am not talking about the arch-totalitarian Roman Catholic Church) that are totalitarian. That is why the defense of pluralism, including the right to dissent and to believe privately anything you like, is so important in the struggle against totalitarianism. 'Multiculturalism' is not a weakness of treacherous European intellectuals, but a necessary concept, a proud concept, that is written into the great American Constitution. He who, as is being done at this conference, tries to suppress by way of Government (state) lawful and honest creeds and beliefs of his neighbors, is giving way to the most abject form of totalitarianism, that of a privately owned (by white Christians) state.

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Well. Tomorrow we will listen to 'Ibn Warraq' and his ice-hockey parable. And meet other new friends. Our Warraq prophetizes Europe's collapse in 10 years, so we may still have some time to ponder his wisdom.