Holy Week, Holy Shariah? (Part 1)

Holy Week, Holy Shariah? (Part 1)
By Chuck Norris
4/19/2011

As most Americans have done since our republic's inception, millions of us across the country this Holy Week will commemorate the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. But what concerns me in America is not only the growing disdain for Christian sentiment but also the increasing spread of Shariah.

There's no mystery that radical Islamists intend to use the freedoms in our Constitution to expand the influence of Shariah. But still, too many Americans don't know or understand how it threatens the very fabric of our republic. So I've decided to do a series on how Shariah is seeping into American society.

First, let me categorically state that I'm not an Islamophobe. I welcome the plurality of religions in America and am a firm believer in the First Amendment. But just as our religious freedom is secured in the Bill of Rights, so is our freedom of speech to share even our religious concerns.

For those who might not know, the Arabic term "Shariah" literally means "the path to be followed," denoting its nature as a guide for a blessed life. Shariah is derived from both the Quran (the Muslim holy book) and Sunna (Islamic custom, piety and practice). In short, Shariah is Islamic law, a religious code for living; it is a system of moral, religious, social and civic laws. Shariah details and decrees proper benevolence, prayers, fasting, dress, business practices, marital and relational conduct, sexual offenses, custody, contracts, inheritance, etc.

Shariah has been adopted in different ways by various countries, ranging from a narrow and strict interpretation in Saudi Arabia and northern states of Nigeria to a loose and liberal interpretation in much of Malaysia. Some Shariah offenses are criminal and require imprisonment. Others incur hudud, a class of penalties including stoning, flogging and amputation. There are five crimes that are punishable by hudud: sex outside of marriage and adultery, false accusation of unlawful sexual intercourse, wine drinking (sometimes extended to include all alcohol drinking), theft and highway robbery.

Though most Islamic states have adopted elements of Shariah into law, only some have adopted hudud, including Iran, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria and Pakistan (though the latter is lax in enforcement). Egypt, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon have not adopted hudud. And other countries, such as Turkey, have essentially abandoned Shariah in favor of new law codes based on European systems.

But the main point here is this: Where Islam and Islamic culture have spread, Shariah has shortly followed.

Of course, many Americans watching a video of a Middle Eastern woman allegedly caught in adultery be buried in the ground up to her head and stoned to death would think, "That could never happen in America." But they fail to see how Shariah already has been enabled and subtly invoked in our country and that any induction of it is by understated, lukewarm changes, like a frog boiled in a kettle by a slow simmer.

For those who don't believe in that Shariah simmer, consider that in just the past few months:

--A Florida judge ruled that a dispute between Muslim parties could proceed under Shariah. "This case," the judge wrote, "will proceed under Ecclesiastical Islamic Law."

--Alabama is joining a growing list of states that are considering outlawing the use of foreign and religious laws, specifically Shariah, in their courts.

--President Barack Obama's adviser on Muslim affairs, Dalia Mogahed, appeared on a British television show hosted by a member of an extremist group to talk about Shariah. Mogahed said that the Western view of Shariah is "oversimplified" and that the majority of women around the world associate it with "gender justice." Does she really think that Shariah is the ideological bastion of gender equality?

In the end, it seems to me we have a choice to believe that Shariah is or is not a pro-Islamic system of civic, religious, moral and social laws that is being used to run other countries and governments but that should not be invoked to run ours based upon the belief that our constitutional republic is inferior.

Many think we should just drink the Kool-Aid and adopt the "very small" changes of Shariah, as Sheik Ibrahim Mogra described them when being questioned about its influence in Great Britain: "We're looking at a very small aspect of Shariah for Muslim families when they choose to be governed with regards to their marriage, divorce, inheritance, custody of children and so forth."

Then again, maybe Mogra explained between the lines everything we need to know when he said: "It is very complex; it is not as straightforward as saying that we will have a system (in Britain). We do not wish to see a parallel system or a separate system of judiciary for Muslims. ... We've seen examples of this in Ontario in Canada and in Singapore, where systems have worked very well."
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US Shariah Infiltrations (Part 2)
By Chuck Norris
4/26/2011

While all eyes this week are on London's royal couple Prince William and Kate Middleton, my eyes are on an opening statement from the U.K.'s Daily Mail Reporter: "Women who do not wear headscarves are being threatened with violence and even death by Islamic extremists intent on imposing (Shariah) on parts of Britain."

Of course, we're told such views represent an extreme minority. Yet just a few months ago, the Los Angeles Times contested that thread, in an article titled "Majority of Muslims want Islam in politics, poll says." The poll was taken in seven countries with large Muslim populations. The Times reported: "According to the survey, majorities in Pakistan, Egypt, Jordan and Nigeria would favor changing current laws to allow stoning as a punishment for adultery, hand amputation for theft and death for those who convert from Islam to another religion. About 85 percent of Pakistani Muslims said they would support a law segregating men and women in the workplace."

But we shouldn't believe such sentiment ever could reach the shores of America, right? Or has it already penetrated our land and even our governmental seats?

I'll say what I said at the outset of last week's column: It is no mystery that radical Islamists intend to use the freedoms in our Constitution to expand the influence of Shariah, or Islamic law. And let me categorically restate that I'm neither an Islamophobe nor a fear-monger. I welcome the plurality of religions in America and am a firm believer in the First Amendment. But just as our religious freedom is secured in the Bill of Rights, so is our freedom of speech to share even our religious concerns.

Having defined what Shariah is in Part 1, here I'm going to give what I label as the top 10 evidences to date that support the fact that Shariah is seeping into society, from homes to halls of justice. As you read these, ask not only what they mean today but also how they might escalate and morph 10 years from now into more progressive forms.

10) According to Middle East Quarterly, Muzzammil Hassan informed New York police on Feb. 12, 2009, that he had beheaded his wife, being justified by Shariah. Hassan emigrated to the U.S. 30 years ago. In 2007, after Aqsa Parvez was murdered by her father in Toronto for not wearing hijab (the headscarf worn by Muslim women), Sheila Musaji wrote in The American Muslim, "Although this certainly is a case of domestic violence ... 'honor' killings are not only a Muslim problem, and there is no 'honor' involved." For those who think these heinous crimes are just random acts of domestic violence, a study published in the spring 2009 edition of Middle East Quarterly documented how 50 honor killings in the U.S. over the past 20 years prove otherwise.

9) Fox News reported that in 2010, a New Jersey family court judge refused to grant a restraining order to a woman who was sexually abused by her Moroccan husband and forced repeatedly to have sex with him, ruling that the Muslim husband did not have "criminal desire to or intent to sexually assault," because under Shariah, he had a right to rape his wife. Though the ruling was overturned by New Jersey's Appellate Court, which ruled that the husband's religious beliefs were irrelevant and that the judge in taking them into consideration "was mistaken," it still shows Shariah effects.

8) In March, a Florida judge ruled that a dispute between Muslim parties could proceed under Shariah. This was not a simple matter of arbitration, but an induction of foreign law. "This case," the judge wrote, "will proceed under Ecclesiastical Islamic Law."

7) Legislators in 15 states have put forth bills to ban international law and Shariah from being applied in their states. Are we going to label them all as paranoid? Or are they protecting our Constitution and rule of law as they should?

6) Based upon the investigative work of P. David Gaubatz and Paul Sperry in their expose, "Muslim Mafia," the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, the nation's largest Islamic advocacy group, "teamed up with a terror-tied Islamic investment bank to attack publicly traded American firms who refuse to comply with Shariah law by using shareholder resolutions, divestitures, and boycotts against them," a very successful strategy used already in Britain. In 2008, when the FBI severed its formal ties to CAIR because of its questionable ties to extremism, CAIR rallied other Shariah-supporting Muslim Brotherhood front groups to send the FBI a threatening letter, in which was a ban against providing the FBI with information about "acts of violence" and "threats" in the Muslim community. CAIR is riddled with pro-Shariah components and proponents seeking to permeate every aspect of our culture. For example, multiple U.S. congressmen are calling for the Department of Justice to investigate whether CAIR has been successful in a strategic mission to infiltrate congressional offices and plant Muslim interns there.

Next week, I will conclude with my top five U.S. Shariah infiltrations, including more in Washington itself.

Until then, let me ask those who refuse to acknowledge any evidence that Shariah is seeping into the U.S. landscape to ponder one more question: Do you find it inconsistent and even hypocritical that many warn the world about the dangers of the Christian right yet defend the Islamic right?
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US Shariah Infiltrations (Part 3 of 3)
By Chuck Norris
5/3/2011

Five years ago, Donald Van Duyn, then the deputy assistant director of the FBI's counterterrorism division, warned us: "Islamic radicalization ... (exists) nationwide. Key to the success of stopping the spread of radicalization is identifying patterns and trends in the early stages." Van Duyn was exactly right.

In Part 2, I showed five examples of Shariah infiltration in U.S. domestic violence, jurisprudence, commerce and government access and legislation. As you read these next five points of evidence in my top 10, ask yourself: Are there any "patterns and trends" emerging here, as well?

5) We should not be naive to foreign Islamic extremists' work within our country -- a vast network that the FBI has documented well. Just one example of a bubble that surfaced from that underground network occurred during the raid and seizure of secret documents at the Annandale, Va., house of one extremist leader, Ismail Selim Elbarasse. As documented in P. David Gaubatz and Paul Sperry's investigative expose, "Muslim Mafia," one letter found there was written by Mohammed Akram Adlouni, a Muslim Brotherhood boss. It described the plans for U.S. takeover and replacing the Constitution with Shariah. Under the heading "The role of the Muslim Brother in North America," it states: "The Ikhwan must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within, and 'sabotaging' its miserable house by the hands of believers, so that it is eliminated and Allah's religion is made victorious over all other religions."

4) To win that internal war, extremists recruit not only adults but also youths within the U.S. The Muslim American Society, which the Chicago Tribune linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, is an example. Seven years ago, a Tribune report documented how "over the last 40 years, small groups of devout Muslim men have gathered in homes in U.S. cities to ... (address) their ultimate goal, one so controversial that it is a key reason they have operated in secrecy: to create Muslim states overseas and, they hope, someday in America as well." It went on to say that MAS "spending often is aimed at schools, teachers and children. ... The group has conducted teacher training programs, issued curriculum guides and established youth centers. ... Part of the Chicago chapter's Web site is devoted to teens. It includes reading materials that say Muslims have a duty to help form Islamic governments worldwide and should be prepared to take up arms to do so."

3) There's no mystery that radical Islamists use the freedoms in our Constitution to expand the influence of Shariah. However, another key for the Muslim Brotherhood in North America and other extremist groups to engage in their "grand jihad ... from within" is capitalizing on the proliferation of our politically correct culture, especially the fad of condemning the Christian right while condoning Islamic fundamentalism. Political correctness is the cultural petri dish in which Shariah is accepted and developed. In "Muslim Mafia," Frank Gaffney, head of the Center for Security Policy, explains it this way: The Muslim Brotherhood's "object is to establish, initially, a separate society for Muslims within that of their host nations in which non-Muslims are the majority. This is accomplished by insinuating preferential arrangements for Muslims -- religious accommodations, their own legal code and courts (that is, Shariah), territorial 'no-go' zones, and assorted political benefits. Initially, these seem modest and unthreatening. Separate rules governing dress codes. Accommodations in public spaces for the practice of a single religion. Latitude to deny service or handling of certain products in deference to religious sensibilities. Organized labor contracts that substitute Muslim holy days for Labor Day, etcetera."

2) From our counties to the corridors of Washington, our politically correct culture has ushered in a host of politically correct politicians and judges who are legislating and advocating pro-Islamic culture and practices. Last year, The New York Times even published a multi-page report titled "White House Quietly Courts Muslims in U.S." In Part 1, I mentioned President Barack Obama's adviser on Muslim affairs, Dalia Mogahed, who advocated Shariah on a British television show. In February 2010, President Obama appointed Rashad Hussain to serve as his special envoy to the Organization of the Islamic Conference, an intergovernmental body of 56 Muslim countries. Where is the same treatment from this White House for any other religion?

1) There is no greater proponent of the partnership of America and Islam (and therefore Shariah) than President Obama himself. I'm not saying he is a Muslim, but he is a Muslim advocate and apologist. He said it himself. He declared his explicit mission in Cairo in June 2009 for the whole world to hear, vowing to establish "a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world. ... That experience guides my conviction that partnership between America and Islam must be based on what Islam is, not what it isn't. And I consider it part of my responsibility as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear." Have you ever heard a president talk about "partnership between America and Islam" and a presidential responsibility to "fight" for Islam? Or are we naive enough to believe that Obama's "fight" never will entail an advocacy for Shariah?