BusterStronghart@Gmail.com
Expert Warns of “Ideological Leap” in Muslim FundamentalismStatements of Professor of Pontifical Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies ROME, SEPT. 27, 2004 (Zenit.org).- According to a professor at the Pontifical Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, we are currently witnessing an "ideological leap" of "Muslim fundamentalism, of extremist groups and terrorists," who see the West as the enemy. Francesco Zannini explained to AsiaNews that the latest on-line decapitations of Western hostages in Iraq, is a way of bringing "the West to its knees." Although decapitation "exists in the history of Islam," the "cutting off of heads is not a punishment foreseen in Islamic rules." "It may have existed in the past, but it was not a specific punishment" and, "above all, it is not specified for use against enemies," he said. "There are texts that order the killing of enemies of Islam, but they do not order decapitations. The Koran does not mention it. Nor do the hadith (the Prophet's maxims)," Zannini continued. In his opinion, "the choice to decapitate and use the media to broadcast such killings are made precisely to attract attention and to intimidate" and "to bring the West to its knees," and affect "mass psychology." Including in cases like the slaughter of Beslan, Russia, or the recent kidnapping of two Italian volunteers, Simona Torretta and Simona Pari, the terrorists are "going against every traditional rule." Zannini clarified that the "killing of women is explicitly condemned by Islamic texts. The most accredited hadith say that women, children, clergy and even farmers cannot be killed, nor can young men of military age who are not in the military." "But these terrorists have taken an ideological leap: they have redefined the figure of the 'enemy,'" he warned. "For fundamentalism, for extremist groups and terrorists, the enemy has become the whole of the West as such," so that every Westerner, even if a child, is someone who 'attacks Islam"" and who, therefore, "must be annihilated," he explained. According to Zannini, it "is an ideological framework that justifies total Jihad," although it is true that in Iraq, those who kill might be Muslims, but "there are also atheists that hide behind Islam, or some secret service or another." In face of this situation, Muslims themselves "are aghast," he said. "They find themselves faced with something new and unprecedented," and although they "have not forgotten past struggles," they are "left stunned by what is happening today." "A Muslim friend of mine from Bangladesh, an intellectual, confessed to me his concern: he feels that there is an urgent need to strengthen education in ideals among the young who are otherwise headed for a future of darkness," the professor added. "Even some members of the Muslim Brothers in Egypt have admitted their astonishment. The Muslim Brothers see that the Iraqi terrorists go partly by their ideology, but they themselves feel that ... 'they are giving Islam bad publicity,'" Zannini added. ZE04092706
posted by Ed at 9/28/2004 11:36:24 PM 0 comments
Wednesday, September 29, 2004
Tuesday, September 28, 2004
BusterStronghart@Gmail.com
Found on the net
Getting married to a Japanese Girl
Today lunch, I involved in a debate with a Japanese lady. She has a degree in literature, so well knowledge and she is capable to escape for every traps I told her. The topic is about getting married to Japanese girl. She began the conversation, are you single? "Yes, I'm single", I replied. "Why you didnt marry a Japanese lady?", she attacked. I explain to her, that my intention to married is not because of sex. I didn't think that I can be a good lover in the bed. I just need a friend to share, to talk and to learn. My wife should be someone who I can discuss, debate and fights in words. Someone who has strong minded. Someone who questioning many thing in life. I attacked back, "Is there any Japanese girl fall in that category?"She replied shortly, "It is many." I have never seen even one, excepts you. I didn't mean flattering her, but she is really smart. I didn't know how old she is, I guess it should be more than 40 or 50. She asked me to tell her about my self. I wanted a short answer, but it should be something that she familiar. About my self, "I like Kenzaburo writing." She surprised, but understand what I mean. "You have a pretty old mind set", she said. Our conversation goes far away. We discussed many things. One thing that so impressed me is that her thinking capability is really agile. Fergi
Found on the net
Getting married to a Japanese Girl
Today lunch, I involved in a debate with a Japanese lady. She has a degree in literature, so well knowledge and she is capable to escape for every traps I told her. The topic is about getting married to Japanese girl. She began the conversation, are you single? "Yes, I'm single", I replied. "Why you didnt marry a Japanese lady?", she attacked. I explain to her, that my intention to married is not because of sex. I didn't think that I can be a good lover in the bed. I just need a friend to share, to talk and to learn. My wife should be someone who I can discuss, debate and fights in words. Someone who has strong minded. Someone who questioning many thing in life. I attacked back, "Is there any Japanese girl fall in that category?"She replied shortly, "It is many." I have never seen even one, excepts you. I didn't mean flattering her, but she is really smart. I didn't know how old she is, I guess it should be more than 40 or 50. She asked me to tell her about my self. I wanted a short answer, but it should be something that she familiar. About my self, "I like Kenzaburo writing." She surprised, but understand what I mean. "You have a pretty old mind set", she said. Our conversation goes far away. We discussed many things. One thing that so impressed me is that her thinking capability is really agile. Fergi
Wednesday, September 08, 2004
BusterStronghart@Gmail.com
Hurricane Frances
Thanks! for asking, Marcy--here's the story. Decision to leave or stay really had to be made on Thursday night in light of hotel reservation problems. Another alternative was to leave Thursday night or Friday morning and head north, probably to Virginia or further.
On Thursday there was already doubt as to the actual heading of the storm. We might have headed out to a place and had the hurricane overtake us. I decided to stay in the apartment, with the knowledge that we had windows that were hurricane proof--supposedly. Well, they were marked "safety glass" anyway, so if they would break, like the windshield in your car, they would break into small gravel like pieces and wouldn't kill us. That sounded okay to me. There are two buildings in our complex and during the summer they are about 40% full. That meant that there were 160 apartments occupied before the storm. The rest are owned by snow-birds or travelers.
Thursday afternoon, we were told that it would be a "mandatory evacuation." That means that the authorities will not assist you if you stay. People will not be forced out. But they are on their own.
The people in about 100 apartments decided to leave. That left about 60 apartments occupied, mostly by older couples. This was one time that youth was more prudent than age.
At four PM on Thursday we took a census at a meeting of the "dead enders." Everyone on the Board of Directors had chosen to stay, and several of the maintenance people had also decided to remain. The rest of us, were just the "little people," in Leona Helmsley's delightful phrase.
The wind came up on Friday, but we already knew that it was doubtful that we would be hit by the main force of the storm. The wind was strong enough to bend the trees and send palm fronds flying, but we lost only a few trees over the whole weekend.
There is a reef about five hundred yards out. Normally it is invisible, the lighter waves just pass over it. But now, white caps delineated it all along the shore. Later there was a strong wind from the west which pushed the spray from the reef-breakers about thirty or forty feet feet up into the air. Much of the night there was a moon, and there was light on the waves far out off shore breaking over the reef, the spray looked almost like white sparks, and then like showers of steam coming off the ocean.
To some extent, I think that the reef protects Ft. Lauderdale's beach. But we still lost sand.
As you must have heard, the storm remained over southern Florida from Friday night through early Sunday morning. During that time the ocean blew up, and the waves were larger than usual but still not really scary. I walked along the beach, my body bent into the wind and sand blasted at me, which sometimes felt like thousands of needles against my face and legs. There were hundreds of small holes where baby turtles had emerged from their eggs and dug themselves out of the sand covering the nests laid by females months previous.
Nearby I found some large pieces of coral that had been ripped from a reef about five hundred yards out. Later I brought a few upstairs and was instructed by the misses to bring them back. But as they were my found-treasure they remain in my shower.
On Saturday afternoon I looked down at the roiling ocean from my terrace and saw that the surf had attracted some teenaged surfers even though it was raining. I put on my suit and went down and I talked one of them into letting me try to push out into the sea on his board while he was trying to catch his breath on the beach.
It was almost impossible to get out past the surf line put after some effort and a little help I found myself just past the breakers and waited for a roller to take me in. As I looked around I noticed that the teenagers had circled my board, as though they were a pod of dolphins trying to protect the "old man." Embarrassed, I took the first roller in and returned the board to its eager owner. It was an express train.
Some of the private houses nearby on the beach lost sea walls, and huge buoy floated onto the beach, its light still darkened. I wondered where the power for the buoy lights comes from. batteries? A wire under the sea? A passel of 12 x 12's from some dock or pier came by, but the sea was moving north to south so fast that I saw them only for a short time.
The nights were great--lightning and thunder right over head, but we never really got any heavy driving rain. Maybe that's being saved for next time. One of the nights I almost lost the door to my terrace as I opened it into the wind. But, make no mistake, we only got the edge of the storm, and we never understood its full force.
When I went out to the street, A1A was deserted, the stores had all boarded up, the traffic lights had been re-set to flash only red. The red reflections on the wet highway went as far as I could see. Several signs had been knocked apart and pieces of sign material blew along the highway.
Ironically, many of our neighbors went to places out west where they lost electric and had to stay for two or three without a/c and in the dark. I am fine with darkling nights; but to have a series of hot nights--well. ... Of course, the air on the beach is always cooler so it might not have been so bad....
Now, the next question is Ivan....
Hurricane Frances
Thanks! for asking, Marcy--here's the story. Decision to leave or stay really had to be made on Thursday night in light of hotel reservation problems. Another alternative was to leave Thursday night or Friday morning and head north, probably to Virginia or further.
On Thursday there was already doubt as to the actual heading of the storm. We might have headed out to a place and had the hurricane overtake us. I decided to stay in the apartment, with the knowledge that we had windows that were hurricane proof--supposedly. Well, they were marked "safety glass" anyway, so if they would break, like the windshield in your car, they would break into small gravel like pieces and wouldn't kill us. That sounded okay to me. There are two buildings in our complex and during the summer they are about 40% full. That meant that there were 160 apartments occupied before the storm. The rest are owned by snow-birds or travelers.
Thursday afternoon, we were told that it would be a "mandatory evacuation." That means that the authorities will not assist you if you stay. People will not be forced out. But they are on their own.
The people in about 100 apartments decided to leave. That left about 60 apartments occupied, mostly by older couples. This was one time that youth was more prudent than age.
At four PM on Thursday we took a census at a meeting of the "dead enders." Everyone on the Board of Directors had chosen to stay, and several of the maintenance people had also decided to remain. The rest of us, were just the "little people," in Leona Helmsley's delightful phrase.
The wind came up on Friday, but we already knew that it was doubtful that we would be hit by the main force of the storm. The wind was strong enough to bend the trees and send palm fronds flying, but we lost only a few trees over the whole weekend.
There is a reef about five hundred yards out. Normally it is invisible, the lighter waves just pass over it. But now, white caps delineated it all along the shore. Later there was a strong wind from the west which pushed the spray from the reef-breakers about thirty or forty feet feet up into the air. Much of the night there was a moon, and there was light on the waves far out off shore breaking over the reef, the spray looked almost like white sparks, and then like showers of steam coming off the ocean.
To some extent, I think that the reef protects Ft. Lauderdale's beach. But we still lost sand.
As you must have heard, the storm remained over southern Florida from Friday night through early Sunday morning. During that time the ocean blew up, and the waves were larger than usual but still not really scary. I walked along the beach, my body bent into the wind and sand blasted at me, which sometimes felt like thousands of needles against my face and legs. There were hundreds of small holes where baby turtles had emerged from their eggs and dug themselves out of the sand covering the nests laid by females months previous.
Nearby I found some large pieces of coral that had been ripped from a reef about five hundred yards out. Later I brought a few upstairs and was instructed by the misses to bring them back. But as they were my found-treasure they remain in my shower.
On Saturday afternoon I looked down at the roiling ocean from my terrace and saw that the surf had attracted some teenaged surfers even though it was raining. I put on my suit and went down and I talked one of them into letting me try to push out into the sea on his board while he was trying to catch his breath on the beach.
It was almost impossible to get out past the surf line put after some effort and a little help I found myself just past the breakers and waited for a roller to take me in. As I looked around I noticed that the teenagers had circled my board, as though they were a pod of dolphins trying to protect the "old man." Embarrassed, I took the first roller in and returned the board to its eager owner. It was an express train.
Some of the private houses nearby on the beach lost sea walls, and huge buoy floated onto the beach, its light still darkened. I wondered where the power for the buoy lights comes from. batteries? A wire under the sea? A passel of 12 x 12's from some dock or pier came by, but the sea was moving north to south so fast that I saw them only for a short time.
The nights were great--lightning and thunder right over head, but we never really got any heavy driving rain. Maybe that's being saved for next time. One of the nights I almost lost the door to my terrace as I opened it into the wind. But, make no mistake, we only got the edge of the storm, and we never understood its full force.
When I went out to the street, A1A was deserted, the stores had all boarded up, the traffic lights had been re-set to flash only red. The red reflections on the wet highway went as far as I could see. Several signs had been knocked apart and pieces of sign material blew along the highway.
Ironically, many of our neighbors went to places out west where they lost electric and had to stay for two or three without a/c and in the dark. I am fine with darkling nights; but to have a series of hot nights--well. ... Of course, the air on the beach is always cooler so it might not have been so bad....
Now, the next question is Ivan....
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