Lying in State

I see The Daily Mail has picked up on the US Government's appalling Tweet of Defeat, in which an official State Department Twitter account approvingly reTweeted an Islamic supremacist picture with a slippery and dishonest caption. As I wrote last week:

Why is the State Department promoting Sharia for the United Kingdom?

And, given that that the "man-made law" in question is English Common Law, which is the basis of American law, why by implication is the State Department promoting Sharia for the United States? Aren't they supposed to uphold the Constitution of the United States?

Sharia is incompatible with that constitution, as it is with the entire legal inheritance of western civilization.

The Mail piece quotes that passage from me, albeit somewhat imperfectly, as is their wont. But they add some interesting detail about the State Department's new friends:

The Mail on Sunday can reveal he is Moshiur Rahman, a 33-year-old from Luton, who last year was one of 12 Islamists given Asbos banning them from taking part in demonstrations over a violent protest rally on Oxford Street. At least two of the gang are believed to be fighting for IS in Syria...

The photo appropriated by the US State Department was first placed on Twitter last week by a woman calling herself Umm Usmaan, who is a leading figure in the anti-democracy campaign...

Yesterday she posted a picture of another sign with the message: 'The right of legislation belongs to none but Allah!'

I have said for over a decade now that we can't win this war unless we fight it ideologically. That's supposed to be what the State Department's lavishly funded but characteristically ineffectual "Think Again, Turn Away" campaign is supposed to be about. Instead, the Obama pajama boys put out a Tweet is objectively in support of our enemies. It's the equivalent of promoting the German American Bund in 1939.

Last night, terror expert Douglas Murray, associate director of the Henry Jackson Society think-tank, said: 'It's an incredibly weak "fail",' he said. 'They should be putting a bit more thought into their sourcing. With all of our resources, it's not even as accomplished as the crudest IS propaganda.'

He's right. If you want to see what accomplished propaganda looks like, read this opening paragraph in today's Toronto Star, written by a woman who's been told she can't become a Canadian citizen unless she removes her niqab for the oath of allegiance:

I am Zunera Ishaq. I am a mother. I am university educated. I believe that the environment needs saving and I try to do my part by joining campaigns to plant trees. Chasing my boys in the snow is one of the things I love most about winter. I believe we should strive to give back to others, and for me that means volunteering: at women's shelters, for political candidates or at schools.

I also wear a niqab.

That's brilliant. Does she also sing Stompin' Tom and enjoy a couple of Molsons after the game?

In order to defend the Islamic body bag, Justin Trudeau has signed on to the most audacious propagandist claim of all - that Muslims are "the new Jews". David Frum responds:

Trudeau's analogy turned history upside-down. The European Jews who sought refuge in Canada in the 1930s and 1940s were fleeing an ideology that defined them as inferior and demanded they wear special identifying badges of inferiority. Trudeau now urges Canada to enable and assist those who define women as inferior — and who require women to wear special identifying badges of their inferiority...

We hear a lot these days about "the new Jews": people who supposedly have replaced the Jews as the victims of persecution. But when you review the data on which religious groups are targeted for hate crimes, it turns out — to borrow a line from an old rock anthem — that when you meet the new Jews, they're the same as the old Jews. And when you listen to the debate about Charlie Hebdo, about the massacre at the Parisian kosher market, about the attempted massacre at a free-speech gathering in Copenhagen, and the actual murder at the synagogue there — you realize that some of the people most eager to pose as victims are in reality the most merciless victimizers.

~But no matter how obvious the provocations nothing changes. In America Alone, I wrote:

While it's not true that every immigrant on welfare is an Islamic terrorist, the vast majority of Islamic terrorists in Europe are on welfare, living in radicalized ghetto cultures with nothing to do but sit around the flat plotting the jihad all day at taxpayers' expense. Muhammed Metin Kaplan used his time on welfare in Germany to set up his Islamist group, Caliphate State; the so-called "caliph of Cologne" was subsequently extradited to Turkey for planning to fly a plane into the mausoleum of Kemal Ataturk. Ahmed Ressam, arrested in Washington State en route to blow up Los Angeles International Airport, hatched his plot while on welfare in Montreal. Abdul Nacer Benbrika, leader of a group of Australian Islamists, lived in Melbourne for ten years and never did a day's work; now he's been jailed for terrorism-related activities, and taxpayers are ponying up $50,000 a year in benefits to his wife. Abu Hamza became Britain's most famous fire-breathing imam while on welfare in London and, after being charged with incitement to murder and sent to jail, sued the government for extra benefits on top of the £1,000 a week his family already received. Abu Qatada, a leading al-Qaeda recruiter, became an Islamist bigshot while on welfare in Britain, and only when he was discovered to have £150,000 in his bank account did the Department for Work and Pensions turn off the spigot. Oh, and here's an item from The Times of London:

'Police are investigating allegations that the four suspected July 21 bombers collected more than £500,000 in benefits payments in Britain.'

That's America Alone, page 83. All these years later, nothing has changed. "Jihadi John" is the ISIS executioner who gets to behead all the high-value American and British hostages on the new Caliphate's mega-viral snuff videos. If you're wondering who pays for him to go a-head-choppin' his way across Syria, well, British taxpayers do - and very generously:

Consider the case of so called Jihadi John and his family. This Kuwaiti family were granted refugee status in the UK in 1996 and, according to a report in the Daily Mail, have been living on the hard-pressed taxpayer ever since.

The vast majority of ordinary people have always been sceptical, to say the least, about those who come seeking asylum, and the Jihadi John family proves they have a point.

As soon as they were granted British citizenship, they started travelling to and from Kuwait, the very country from which they fled claiming persecution. Of course their up-market apartment rent in London's Maida Vale continued to be paid by the taxpayer, and was still being paid at the last count.

Predictably, our leaders expressed outrage at such asylum abuse, but it was Westminster immigration policies that settled Jihadi John and his family in up-market Maida Vale in the first place.

The Tsarnaevs, who blew up the Boston Marathon, were likewise "seeking asylum" and making repeat visits back to the country "they fled claiming persecution".

But where do you go to seek asylum from all the asylum seekers they're letting into your country?

~One more, from Monday's Dulles-to-Denver flight:

A United Airlines flight had to make a U-turn in the sky after an unruly passenger ran toward the cockpit screaming "jihad, jihad," according to a government official with direct knowledge of the incident...

The Boeing 737 plane, which was carrying 33 passengers and six crew members, turned around because the passenger "failed to comply with crew instructions," United Airlines spokesman Luke Punzenberger said.

The pilots told air traffic controllers that the passenger started acting violently but was later subdued by other passengers, according to LiveATC.net, which provides audio of air traffic control transmissions.

"He ran forward towards the cockpit, and he is being restrained by passengers," one of the pilots said. "Cockpit is secure, and we would like to return to the airport and have the authorities meet him."

A cell phone video shows the man, bruised on his face, held down by other passengers.

"Don't move," one passenger says. "You're OK. We're going to get you off this plane, buddy."

Oh, my! Don't they know "jihad" is a time-honored and perfectly harmless Islamic expression for a personal growth experience? What a shame Justin Trudeau wasn't aboard to explain to all these hair-trigger commuters that once they get over their paranoia and bigotry they'll soon be able to enjoy the complimentary falafel at mosque photo-ops just like him.

Comment by clicking here.

Mark Steyn is an international bestselling author, a Top 41 recording artist, and a leading Canadian human rights activist. His latest book is "The Undocumented Mark Steyn: Don't Say You Weren't Warned". (Buy it at a 32% discount by clicking here or order in KINDLE edition at a 50% discount by clicking here. Sales help fund JWR)