Someone recently got upset with me for pointing out that Gazans painting the Israeli flag on an innocent animal (not for the first time) in order to stone it to death as a four-legged proxy for the “Zionist state”—if true—would certainly amount to a savage act.

Her hang-wringing objection is that she knows a few Muslims, and they're quite lovely people (which I don't doubt); and furthermore that it hurts her feelings for anyone to call acts of savagery—well, you know, “savage”—and that I should take more care not to “give offense,” and try not to be such a “bigot.”

Note that that I didn’t mention Islam or Muslims, only savagery in Gaza. Wherever did she conjure the connection between Islam and savagery?

In order to further enlighten me, she was kind enough to send me a link to a page on the CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) web site.

Given that CAIR is the US-based political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, an “unindicted co-conspirator” in the Holyland Terrorism case, and that members and former directors of CAIR have received 65 year prison sentences for funneling money to help facilitate terrorism, I thought she ought to be able to find a more reputable source.

Nevertheless, I read the page. Aside from at least three lies per column inch regarding CAIR’s motives, actions, “vision,” etc., there is this:

(Qur’an, 5:32) “Whoever kills a person [unjustly] … it is as though he has killed all mankind. And whoever saves a life, it is as though he had saved all mankind.”

That’s a lovely sentiment, it really is—a real chestnut. I’ve seen and heard it quoted many times. It sounds sweet and rings pleasantly in the mind’s ear—like blowing a big, wet kiss to humanity.

Unfortunately its warm and cuddly aspect is spoiled just a bit by the VERY NEXT verse (which is never quoted):

(Qur’an 5:33) “The punishments of those who wage war against Allah and His Prophet and strive to spread disorder in the land are TO EXECUTE THEM IN AN EXEMPLARY WAY OR TO CRUCIFY THEM OR TO AMPUTATE THEIR HANDS AND FEET FROM OPPOSITE SIDES OR TO BANISH THEM FROM THE LAND. SUCH IS THEIR DISGRACE IN THIS WORLD, AND IN THE HEREAFTER THEIRS WILL BE AN AWFUL DOOM SAVE THOSE WHO REPENT BEFORE YOU OVERPOWER THEM; you should know that Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Ever Merciful.”

Perhaps the cuddle-bunnies at CAIR just couldn’t fit that particular verse in among the daisies on their page, web space being what it is. The verse doesn’t appear on any of their other pages, either, apparently; surely they’ll include it somewhere by and by—for balance, you know. At least they could utilize an ellipsis and cite that bit about how “…Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Ever Merciful.” That sounds nice.

In the Qur’an in Arabic the original word for the crime of “wag[ing] war against Allah and His Prophet and striv[ing] to spread disorder in the land” is “fitna”. Now that’s a word even the crowd at CAIR must be familiar with.

What’s a fitna? Some infidels start grousing about fundamentalist Muslims occupying their land, or making off with their stuff, or selling their women and children into slavery? It´s a fitna! The conquered don’t want to pay jizyah (the tax on non-Muslims for, you know, not being Muslim)? It´s a fitna! Any form of protest or resistance against Muslim domination—armed or unarmed—it’s a fitna!

You pull a fitna, they pitch a fit—in an “exemplary way,” of course. So say the holy scriptures of the Religion of Peace™.