The Symbol of Intolerance : Sanctimony and Islam

"The Justice Department, Homeland Security, the FBI, and the White House, alongside congress and local officials, must speak out -- and speak out forcefully -- against this scourge of anti-Semitism impacting communities across the country."
"Members of our community must see swift and concerted action from federal officials to identify and capture the perpetrator or perpetrators who are trying to instill anxiety and fear in our communities."
David Posner, spokesperson, JCC Association of North America

Melanie Steinhardt comforts Becca Richman at the Jewish Mount Carmel Cemetery in Philadelphia    Credit: AFP

"[The vandalism and bomb threats represent serious, unacceptable behaviour which the Department of the Attorney-General will] do what it can to assist in pushing back ... and prosecuting anybody that we can prove to be a part of it."
"We are a nation that is a diverse constituency, and we don't need these kind[s] of activities."
U.S. Attorney-General Jeff Sessions

The rising tide of viral anti-Semitism appears to be nowhere near abating. Democrats insist that the election of Donald J. Trump to the presidency of the United States and his catering to the dark forces of the right wing has emboldened society's anti-Semites to come out of the sewers where they usually slither, undetected but for occasional poisonous attacks. Certainly, some of the followers of Donald Trump during the election campaign, even more unsavoury that himself, give a bit of credence to that theory.

On the other hand, because of his personal animus and distrust of Muslims -- where the Obama administration went out of its way to consult with the Muslim Brotherhood and CAIR, where the President of the United States would avoid speaking of attacks on Jews by Muslims at home and abroad as nothing but 'random attacks on folks', seemed to keep blatant anti-Semitic attacks to a minimum -- perhaps President Trump's statements and actions have created a backlash from within that community.

It is, after all, a community whose growing presence throughout Europe has been almost entirely responsible for the rising persecution and violence against Jews in France, Belgium, Norway, the Netherlands and Sweden and virtually across the continent where Jews have lived for centuries and Arabs more recently, leading to mass 'protests' by Arabs and Muslims slandering Israel and pillorying any Jews that support Israel as hated Zionists.

There have always been, from time to time, random episodes of anti-Semitism wherever Jews have settled in the diaspora. Where Jewish community centres, parochial schools and synagogues have been defaced, sometimes fire-bombed, and cemetery monuments upturned. These latest threats against Jewish community centres have taken on a deeper, even more malevolent tone of terrorism. Jewish cemeteries where hundreds of gravestones have been upturned and smashed have a pattern, appearing in various states across the country.

Where, a Jewish cemetery dating to the 1800s was the scene of another several hundred headstones overturned and damaged in Philadelphia, hard on a suburban St.Louis cemetery reeling from a similar desecration. The much-publicized involvement of someone like Linda Sarsour whose Hamas associations identify her sentiments and others of her ilk from the Muslim community taking to social fundraising sites profiling themselves as sympathetic to the Jewish community reeling from these attacks belie their otherwise Israel-bashing normalcy.

The "abominable crime" of desecrating graves for the purpose of demonstrating contempt for Jews is an old story brought to life in an excess of hatred reflective of an acceleration of an old brand. The safety and security of Jews in North America has not yet reached the critical levels of fear and potential danger now being seen in Europe which has become drenched in the weight of a growing population of Muslims among whom Islamists thrive.

Muslim authorities tend to ignore the rare moderates among them who plead for a cessation of the Friday sermons condemning Infidels, Christians and Jews to the fires of hell, to no avail. A religion that considers itself god's final and complete salvation for the human race, one which holds that only where Islam prevails is there peace, while elsewhere war prevails, and it is Islam's duty to bring peace to non-Muslim nations by waging the war of jihad cannot be anything but what it is: an intolerant, bigoted, hate-mongering fascist ideology.

Accessories to Genocide

"I've never encountered a single case of a Nazi war criminal who ever expressed any regrets or remorse. These are the last people on earth who deserve any sympathy because they had absolutely no sympathy for their victims."
"[Still a few more names on the] most wanted [list]."
"This is the nitty gritty of Nazi hunting. Any person we can get into court, we're happy."
"There are a couple more years left, not more [to see justice done]."
Efraim Zuroff, American-born Israeli Nazi-hunter

Most Jewish children were killed on arrival at the camp after the healthy adults were selected for a slower process of being worked to death.

The last of the Third Reich's gas chambers were put out of business 70 years ago. During the time that they were in operation, a frenzy of mass murder took place in the interests of destroying world Jewry. The fascist enterprise succeeded to an amazing degree, because it was staffed with people dedicated to carrying out the Final Solution that Adolf Hitler was so committed to. The mass psychosis of anti-Semitism brought to its pinnacle of achievement.

Taking place in a fertile environment for hatred to manifest itself to the degree that it was not the least bit difficult to find not only Germans willing and eager to give assistance to this great and noble undertaking, but locals in European countries where concentration camps, death camps, work camps were set up to work Jewish slaves to death, and those incapable of work to prolong their miserable lives, summarily slaughtered; gassed with Zyklon B, suitable for eradicating vermin.

The particulate matter that arose with the stench of burning human flesh in the chimneys that never rested, fertilized European agricultural fields to produce bumper crops for many years; there was no waste in that vast, far-reaching enterprise; human skin binding books and producing lampshades, gold pried from the teeth of corpses, human hair used to stuff pillows, human fat used to produce soap, the shoes and clothing of Jews destined for death to be usefully recycled....

Germany, the source of Nazi war crimes, enacted a law permitting prosecutors to charge all those who worked in death camps or within an SS mobile killing unit as an accessory to murder, irrespective of whether they had themselves killed anyone. Their work was deemed critical to the success of the entire operation, like a well-oiled machine whose many working parts reflected efficiency and collaborative success in a defined mission.

Mr. Zuroff years ago was busy in the microfilm archives of Yad Vashem -- the national Holocaust memorial in Israel in 1986 -- when he experience an epiphany. It occurred to him that among the names appearing on the 15 million index cards which reflected the identities of Jewish concentration camp survivors compiled by the Red Cross, other names might also be present; those of their tormentors and killers.

He studiously applied himself to perusing them all, comparing the Red Cross files in a cross-reference to a list of 49 wanted Nazi war criminals. A few minutes of scrutiny rendered 16 of those sought-after criminal names , inclusive of data such as where they had moved on to, at the conclusion of the war. "That was it. That was the moment I went from researcher to Nazi hunter", the now-68-year-old recalls.
A ditch with remains of Majdanek death camp prisoners

And for over thirty years Mr. Zuroff immersed himself in the unrelenting pursuit of those who helped make the genocide of European Jewry the success it achieved. Hunting globally for the men and women acknowledged to be responsible for carrying out orders to destroy helpless people, men, women, children of all ages and vulnerabilities. He became, eventually, the lead investigator for the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, dedicated to confronting anti-Semitism.

He immersed himself in tracing the routes used by Nazis to remove themselves from their crime scenes. Directly resulting from his investigations, some 40 Nazi war criminals have been tried or investigated, people ranging from a commander of a Croatian concentration camp, to a Hungarian accused of murdering a Jewish teenager for failing to wear the yellow star all Jews were forced to wear to assign themselves to the category of target.

A female radio operator at Auschwitz, accused of involvement in 260,00 murders, Helma Kissner is now 92 years old. There are those who feel a woman of that age should be spared; after all the crimes for which she is held responsible took place a long time ago. In the unspeakable past of degrading and punishing Jews for being Jews; that dedication to cleansing the world of their presence, a deep wound was created that time will not, cannot heal.

WWII Letters -- Photos of WWII German Concentration Camps

Rejecting Hatred Bred By Islamist Bigotry

"We spent significant resources on this outreach over a period of ten months. We reached out through snail mail, e-mail, and telephone to over 3,000 mosques and over 500 known public American Muslims. We received only 40-plus rather dismissive responses from our outreach, and sadly less than ten of them were positive. In fact, one mosque in South Carolina left us a vicious voice mail threatening our staff if we contacted them again."
Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, co-founder, Muslim Reform Movement, United States

O Allah! We ask you… [to give us] victory over the enemies. O Allah! Raise the standing of Islam and the Muslims. O Allah! Give victory (help) to your oppressed slaves all over the world, east to west. O Allah! Give victory (help) to your slaves who believe in the oneness of Allah, O the Lord of the Worlds! O Allah! Destroy the criminals. O Allah! Destroy anyone who inflicts injustice on your slaves, O the Lord of the Worlds! O Allah! Count their number; slay them one by one and spare not one of them. O Allah! Do not defer [it] on them.O Allah! Seize them with the seizure of One Mighty, Omnipotent [referring to a Quranic verse that deals with the punishment Allah inflicted on Pharaoh and his people].                                                                                               [O Allah!] Give us victory over the disbelieving people… O Allah! Give victory to Islam and raise the standing the Muslims. And humiliate the polytheism and polytheists. O Allah! Give victory (help) to your slaves who believe in the oneness of Allah, O the Lord of the Worlds!O Allah! Give them victory over the criminal people. O Allah! Destroy anyone who killed Muslims. O Allah! Destroy anyone who displaced the sons of the Muslims. O Allah! Count their number; slay them one by one and spare not one of them. O Allah! Purify Al-Aqsa Mosque from the filth of the Jews! O Allah! Purify Al-Aqsa Mosque from the filth of the Jews!                                                                     O Allah! Raise the standing of Islam and the Muslims.And humiliate the polytheism, the polytheists, the infidels and the atheists. And Give victory (help) to your slaves who believe in the oneness of Allah.O Allah! Give victory to our oppressed and deprived Muslim brothers and the mujahideen (those who engage in jihad) everywhere.O Allah! Pour on them patience and steadfast their feet. And give them victory over the disbelieving people. And give them victory over the evildoersAnd give them victory over the criminals.                                                                                                                                                    Recited by Aymen Elkasrawy and Shaykh Abdool Hamid at Masjid Toronto mosque

Elected as a Member of Parliament during 2015's October general election, Liberal MP Iqra Khalid through Motion 103 spoke of "more than one million Canadians who suffer because of Islamophobia, who are victimized on a daily basis", through what she described as s poisonous climate of "Islamophobia" current in Canada, and which the Government of Canada had an obligation to formally and institutionally reject (which it has done on a previous occasion) and that a commission to study the issue should be struck.

This followed on an earlier petition e-411 advanced by Samer Majzoub, president of the Canadian Muslim Forum, which addressed Islam as having had an advancing effect leading "to the positive development of human civilization", negating Islamist terrorism as emanating from an "infinitesimally small" source, unrepresentative of the global Muslim population and that as a result, all Canadians give recognition to that fact, and condemn Islamophobia.

Islamophobia, it has been made abundantly clear, is any expression of doubt that Islam is a religion of peace. It can also be seen in criticism of the Prophet Muhammad upon whose prior instructive actions in promoting his newly-introduced religion to the world in the 7th Century to those unwilling to adopt it, were slaughtered as a warning to others that they would do well to submit. Indoctrination by the sword swept the Middle East, North Africa, Western Asia and parts of Europe in a bloodbath of proselytizing.

Muslims view the Prophet Muhammad as the perfect man whose virtues should be emulated, beginning with jihad, incumbent on the faithful, and multiple wives, along with child brides, all finding enthusiastic approval within a fundamentalist movement to return to the original values of Islam. Those original values include the denunciation of the founding monotheistic religion of Judaism and Christianity, both out of which Muhammad fashioned his 'completed' version of monotheism, rejecting its precursors as 'incomplete' and rejected by god.

In mosques across Canada, as elsewhere in the world, Friday prayers are not complete without cursing the infidels, the kuffars, the Christians and the Jews. At the Masjid Mosque in Toronto its imam was recorded as preaching of "the filth of the Jews", calling upon Allah to "kill them, one by one". Presumably, if Allah was busy elsewhere, directing his own to butcher his own, it would have to be left to the faithful to enter the scene and do his bidding, ridding the world of extraneous Jews.

At the Andalous Islamic Center in Montreal similar peace-loving attestations of the faith were given, and when those preaching hatred and violence there were brought up short they spoke of "context" to explain just how unfair it is that they have been misunderstood. The Syriacs and the Copts in the Middle East have been persecuted and violence brought upon them, yet at no time do Muslim clerics rear up to protest on behalf of those that Islam discriminates against and victimizes.

In the United States a small group of Muslim moderates attempted to gather support for reforming and modernizing Islam. They declared themselves the Muslim Reform Movement (MRM). They issued a Declaration for Muslim Reform, and sent out missives to more than 3,500 Muslim community contacts. There were 40 responses all told with less than ten of them positive in nature. A minuscule number of Muslim organizations and influential individuals contacted by the MRM evinced any interest whatever in discussing the issue. There were,  however, a number of vicious responses.

Masjid Toronto mosque. Photo: CIJnews

Another imam who serves at the Masjid Toronto mosque, known to be affiliated with the Muslim Association of Canada, prayed at a Ramadan service at the mosque, that Allah give them victory over the infidels, to kill the enemies of Islam "one by one and spare not one of them", and to "purify Al-Aqsa Mosque from the filth of the Jews". He is also a teaching assistant at Ryerson University in Toronto.

The Muslim community with few exceptions -- but thank goodness for those exceptions -- makes no effort to condemn discrimination against others emanating from within its own community, much less its mosques. What is said and done in the mosques, after all, is merely in the tradition of the Koran. When non-Muslims continually read of the degrading and atrocious actions of Islamists threatening and imposing barbaric violence on minority ethnic and religious groups little wonder they cultivate an abhorrence of this kind of Medieval anti-humanitarianism.

If it is expressed through what Muslims decry as "Islamophobia", it is a natural enough reaction to a obviously failed religion, tradition, social culture and system of justice. One Muslims should either learn to live with or expend some needed energy transforming to reflect the pacific and all-embracing values of a religion of peace. The visceral dislike that Muslims decry as Islamophobia has been well earned. Even so, it does not, other than with rare exceptions, translate into violence against those who commit constant outrages against the rest of humanity.

So Canadians across the nations have an obligation to denounce "Islamophobia", and Muslims across the land have no obligation to respect the human rights of others worshipping other religions or none at all, because Islam is exceptional and obviously without mortal stains of any kind, simply expressing what Mohammad has taught them is of great importance to Allah.

Returning from Implausibility to Recognizing Reality

"Positions are shifting, because the sands in this region are shifting. More like a sandstorm than a shift. Doubts about establishing a Palestinian state are arising now precisely because it is hard to envisage what an Arab state on the West Bank would look like."
"There are many who make the persuasive argument that the alternative to two states -- to separation from the Palestinian majority in the West Bank -- is an Israel that is no longer Jewish and democratic. That argument's power is now weakened by the prospect that a putative Palestine state might not be a benign Jordan or a peaceful Egypt, but a cauldron of expansionist violence."
Father Raymond de Sousa, National Post

It doesn't take too much of a stretch of the imagination, in fact, to arrive at the conclusion that the yearning of the Palestinians for a return to the time when they lived in a geography absent the Jewish State, with Jews living traditionally in the land of their Biblical-era heritage among Arabs represented a time of Paradisaical ease and contentment. A time when peace prevailed among the various tribes and sects, among Jew and Arab, Kurd and Druze, Bedouin and urbanites.

Such a time never existed. Jews in the Middle Eastern disapora living in Algeria, Tunisia, Iraq, Syria, Egypt and elsewhere where Islam prevailed, lived precarious lives of semi-tolerance for their presence. But then, diaspora Jews in Russia, Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Ukraine, France, Norway and elsewhere in Europe also led lives riven by bigotry against their presence. Nazi Germany would not have realized the success it did without regional compliance.

The isolation and discrimination that Jews suffered under laws imposed to ensure they knew their place created the right climate for endless pogroms and restrictions against their advancement in the societies that refused to accept them and proffer to them equal rights to other citizens. In the area now called Palestine, restive Arabs conducted raids and pogroms against Jews, holding their presence to be an assault against Islam.

When the United Nations finally took the step leading to the potential of creating two states, one for Jews the other for Arabs, through Partition, Jews finally had permission to reconstruct their original Judean homeland, while Arabs preferred to assault the nascent state, to destroy its presence, to return to the status quo. From that time forward no stone went unturned to attempt destruction of Israel by those bemoaning the loss of 'their' geography.

Bitter, ancient enmities rankle and fester in tribal and sect-ridden Arab culture. There has never been reconciliation between the two major sects in Islam, Sunni and Shiite; the only issue that unites them is their shared detestation of a Jewish State in their midst. While they engage in slaughtering one another, unmercifully uprooting one another from traditional areas, they also assault the minority populations of Christians, Kurds, Yazidis viewed by Islam as expendable unbelievers.



Imagining that an Arab agglomeration calling itself 'Palestinians' which feverishly engaged in PFLP (PLO offshoot Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine) attacks like air  hijacking, ship highjacking, organized slaughter of Israeli Olympians, bombings abroad of Jewish institutions, suicide bombings of civilian enclaves in Israel, would be amenable to dropping their 'resistance' against the 'occupiers' of Arab land, when they persist in teaching their children to hate Jews, is to remain stubbornly optimistic where optimism has no place in the face of reality.

After the 'Arab Spring' turned into an Arab Winter of Discontent and Pillage, Rapine, and Slaughter, the world witnessed the collapse of one Arab state after another. Viewing the Baathist Syrian president outdistancing the atrocities that a pre-Arab Spring Baathist Iraqi president visited on his own citizens and his neighbours. So much for the capacity of Arab nations to live among one another in peace and fellowship.

Jordan and Lebanon and Egypt represent tenuous states where Islamism can at any time overwhelm their stability.

A Palestinian State developed in the West Bank, as the European Union and the United States declare feasible and necessarily desirable will, particularly in the current climate of Frankenstein Islam, result in massive instability, with terror leaking over their borders consistently into Israel, Jordan and Egypt. Egypt already lives in fear of what the Sinai, a peaceful enclave under Israeli control, has become since being restored to Egypt, where Hamas, Salafist Bedouin, al-Qaeda and Islamic State have all gained a malevolent foothold.

Militarizing Children's Amusement Parks in Russia

"We're building a Reichstag in Patriot Park."
"Not to full size, but so our 'youth army soldiers' can storm not just any building, but a concrete place."
Sergei Shoigu, Russian Defence Minister, Moscow

Photo: Yevgeni  Khaldei

Now, Russian children have a thrilling new amusement park to enable them to explore every facet of their nation's renewed military capabilities through the $343-billion modernization of the Russian military. Nationalistic pride has been given an immense boost by this revitalization of the military in a Russia beset with economic problems but which has dispatched its troops to Ukraine and to Syria.

To the former clandestinely, to recapture part of the glory of the Soviet Union's satellite attachments; to the latter with the full fanfare of Russia re-launching itself front-and-centre as a guiding force in the Middle East.

Vladimir V. Putin is of the school that feels if you've got it, flaunt it, and this is what he is doing, not merely through the Russia-conventional showcasing of newly acquired weapons of war featuring technological advances, through its annual presentations of its Victory Day parades, but by fully introducing Russian children to the features of their nation's military, standing tall and proud on behalf of Mother Russia, brooking no interference or threats from any source.

The International Military Games where tank biathlons, aviadarts [aerial bombardment accuracy] and "Masters of Artillery Fire" events bring the admiring public out to be wonderfully amazed and proud of their military, represent yet another venue, but Patriot Park is a new public relations instrument to instill awe and patriotism in the hearts of Russian teens, preparatory to their being called up in the looming years through the universal draft to make 'men of boys'.

At Patriot Park exists this spectacular military amusement park where a model of a front line with trenches and bunkers will be built by the army so the teens can become fully immersed in the aura of life at war. A "Partisan village" is planned, where the teens will take sabotage classes or have fun at the "partisan banya" (bathhouse). They will even be introduced to a simulated "day in the life" aboard a submarine, and learn to confront claustrophobia over the greater interests of serving with pride in confined spaces.

© Sputnik/ Alexander Vilf

The "youth army" being served by this "military Disneyland" located near Moscow, represents a network of youth groups meant to instill patriotism while teaching Russian children military skills. Members of the military are assigned to teach those children how to assemble and disassemble automatic rifles. Teaching these same children how to storm a copy of the German Reichstag relives a never-forgotten episode of World War II when that seat of German government fell during the 1945 Battle of Berlin.


The Victory Day celebrations with its massive military parades, along with a new march labelled the Immortal Regiment with Russians carrying posters bearing photographs of relatives who fought and died in that war is one manifestation of Russia's remembrance of the massive sacrifices it made to stop the Nazis from complete invasion and conquest. The photograph showing the German flag being raised over the Reichstag represents Russia's iconic testament to sacrificial fortitude.

But the militarization of children's social recreational opportunities in their formative years is a little hard to accept. After all, time enough when they come of age to become fully indoctrinated into the byways of conflict and military hardware, through the inevitable conscription. Taking such proud steps to enthuse children and create a facility with the handling of arms and the exposure of what they are used for, is fairly similar to a certain type of masochistic child abuse.

It's what takes place in Africa, with the indoctrination and on-the-job training of children to fight those bloody never-ending tribal wars. It's what terrorist groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic State introduce their young to, costuming them, and outfitting them with weaponry, and exposing them to the kind of training meant to make jihadis out of them, and succeeding. How different, then is Moscow's pride in its "military Disneyland"?

Israel, Palestinians, Solutions Elude

"Trump and Netanyahu will adopt the plan of Egypt's Sisi. A Palestinian state in Gaza and Sinai. Instead of Judea and Samaria [the historical nomenclature for the disputed West Bank territory]."
"This is how we will pave a path to peace, including with the Sunni coalition."
Ayoub Kara, 61, Druze Knesset minister, Government of Israel

The-then Deputy Minister for Regional Cooperation Ayoub Kara arrives for the weekly government conference at the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, December 4, 2016. (Marc Israel Sellem)

"Due to the destruction and displacement that has affected the Middle East in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, the Palestinian cause is no longer central [to Arab interests and pressure on Israel]."
Saudi weekly Asharq al-Awsat

The Arab world is not fond of Palestinians. They are viewed as troublemakers and their presence is barely tolerated where they have settled throughout the Middle East. And wherever they have settled they have not been welcomed with open arms. They have not been offered citizenship and they are viewed as interlopers, a temporary presence until they can be shuttled back whence they came. In fact, they originally came from the Arab countries which will now not recognize them. When the State of Israel was created those same Arab countries summarily exiled the Arab Jews who had lived among them for millennia, confiscating their properties and ridding themselves of an ancient Jewish presence.

Yet they were not prepared to absorb the Palestinians who fled the area now called the State of Israel. Granted, the reasons were more complicated than just not wanting to absorb them; originally it was to keep them a festering sore of refugees, a blunt tool with which to bludgeon both Israel and the international community with the 'plight' of Palestinian refugees. Had the refugees been absorbed they would no longer be refugees.  And the purpose of keeping them refugees was to blame Israel for their flight and their plight. And those refugees, to the present day represent the most permanent group calling themselves refugees entirely supported, financially and administratively by the international community.

They choose to remain 'refugees',  anguishing for their return from land they fled, while the 800,000 Jews expelled from Arab countries were absorbed by Israel. The original 700,000 Palestinian refugees now claim the right of return to Israel for their descendants, numbering in the millions, an estimated 6.5-million. Israel has offered to compensate them for their property losses, but not to absorb them, as their presence would overwhelm the Jewish State. Palestinians do have citizenship in Jordan, the sole Arab state that has given them recognition.

Despite which in 1970, under Yasser Arafat's militias of the Palestine Liberation Organization and its offshoots, the Palestinians attempted to overthrow the Jordanian Hashemites and to remove their monarch, King Abdullah. The civil war that ensued saw Yasser Arafat and his militias battered and they removed themselves to Lebanon, where cross-border assaults into Israel led Israel to enter Lebanon with its military to confront and to remove the Palestinian militias from Lebanon. The current Jordanian monarch's consort is a Palestinian, reflecting the fact that 70 percent of Jordanians are of Palestinian origin, not Bedouin.

The entire area that is now Jordan was originally meant to be included for a restoration of the Jewish homeland. Then it was divided, and meant to be partitioned between Jews and Palestinians. And finally, the British agreed to give TransJordan to the Hashemites who were driven out of Arabia when the Saudis took control. Now, all that is left to Israel is a tiny sliver. But the historical areas of Judea and Samaria which the Palestinians claim for their own, along with the ancient city of Jerusalem represents claims supported by the international community. For what other nation on Earth are the boundaries declared by outsiders rather than the sovereign nation involved?

Particularly a sovereign nation that has been repeatedly, since 1948, attacked by its neighbours, each time defending itself successfully, and beating back the onslaughts meant to destroy it. Under such circumstances, land defended and land conquered has always remained with the victor in such conflicts. The intervention of the international community, with its entitlements to dictate to the Jewish State what it may and may not do, ensures that the Jewish State, occupying a sliver of territory remains hostage to an agglomeration of Arabs claiming the Palestinian designation and land for themselves, co-opted from historical Judea.

An Israeli flag (L) flutters next to an Egyptian one at the Nitzana crossing, along Israel's border with Egypt's Sinai desert. (photo credit:REUTERS)

More latterly, Egypt's President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi is said to have proposed a regional peace plan to involve most Sunni Arab nations in the Middle East, where part of the Sinai Peninsula, adjacent to Gaza, would comprise a Palestinian state, vacating the West Bank area of historical heritage Judea and Samaria for an expanded Jewish presence, taking in the settlements, and leaving ancient Jerusalem to the Jewish State, for its acknowledged capital.

The Palestinians may claim Jerusalem but the fact is that Arabs' only link to that city has been as neglectful overseers over the millennia leading from the Islamic conquest. Muslims speak of Jerusalem as their holy city, but the Koran fails to mention it even once. It has always been a Jewish city in antiquity, and it is a Jewish heritage to this present day. If any city has a claim to have been usurped post-Biblical times, it is ancient Medina, where many Jewish trading tribes lived and prospered among pre-Islamic Arab tribes. When Muhammad went to Medina to proselytize, expecting the Jewish tribes to leave Judaism and embrace Islam, he was incensed when the Jews refused.

What transpired then was a bloody conquest, with Jews fighting to protect themselves from the invading and marauding Arab Muslims, and being vanquished by Muhammad's nascent Muslim umma plying their trade of jihad. The slaughter of the Jewish tribes then took place; the Banu Aws, Banu Harith, Banu Jusham, Banu Majjar, Banu Ghifar, Banu Qaynuqa, Banu Sa'ida, Banu Shutayba were massacred and those that were not were exiled from Medina, the women taken into slavery. How would Muslims feel about Israel declaring its ancient heritage in Mecca (Yathrib) entitling it to a return?

The plan forwarded by President el-Sisi to turn over part of the Sinai which links Egypt and Gaza has theoretical credibility. But just as the Palestinians refused one offer after another of peace and land agreements with Israel over the years, so too has Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas purportedly rejected this offer as well, one that was described by a leading Palestinian news agency several years ago. Finally, because of their alarm over non-Arab, Aryan Iran's plans for its Shiite crescent to dominate the larger, more populous Arab Sunni population, Israel's presence appears to have been accepted by Sunni Arab states.

They see common cause with Israel over Iran's malevolence toward all other states in the region with the exception of (Shiite) Iraq, Lebanon (where its {Shiite} Hezbollah terrorist proxies operate out of) and the Houthi Yemenites, along with the Sultanate of Oman. Although the wealthy Arab states have spent untold billions on modern military equipment, none has focused as Iran has done on nuclear arms and intercontinental ballistic missiles, an agenda that has created huge consternation among its neighbours.

That 'proposal' by the Egyptian President, unfortunately, doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Egypt has had nothing but problems with Hamas in the Sinai. The Sinai, as well, is full of Salafist Bedouin, with groups affiliated with al-Qaeda, and it has been infiltrated as well by Islamic State, just as Gaza has been. All of these jihadi groups have attacked Egyptian military and police outposts. Egypt has no need to burden itself with the close presence of millions of Palestinians who are particularly given to violence. And official Egypt has denied that it had any intention of surrendering any part of Sinai, a geography that Israel returned to Egypt on the signing of their peace treaty.

In Response to a Desperate Need, Yazidis to Find Refuge in Canada

"The reality is that if the international community doesn't wake up to the plight of these people, they will be wiped off the face of the Earth."
"And that's why it's so important to look at resettlement of these people as only one very small piece of the broader puzzle."
Michelle Rempel, Conservative Member of Parliament, Ottawa

Displaced people from the minority Yazidi sect walk toward the Syrian border on Aug. 11, 2014.
(STRINGER/IRAQ/REUTERS)

"[Canada has long given haven to refugees noting their "vulnerability, not religion or ethnicity [and turns its focus on] highly vulnerable [survivors of Islamic State predations. A] significant majority [of the 1,200 slated to be brought to Canada will be Yazidi resulting from the] high level of violence [they have suffered. The Yazidi people represent] an integral part [of Iraq's society that should be preserved which explains why the Government of Canada focuses on] a small number of people for whom resettlement is the best option."
"As many have experienced unimaginable trauma, both physical and emotional, many will have unique psychological and social needs such as trauma counselling,"
Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen, Government of Canada

"Some of these women haven't even told their own families about what they experienced [as victims of Islamic State violent atrocities]."
Dawn Edlund, associate deputy immigration minister

The Government of Canada lauds itself for ensuring that 40,000 Syrian refugee families fleeing conflict in their own country were expedited entry into Canada to begin a new life, with assistance in housing, settling in, and financial aid through government tax-funded coffers. Canadians felt, by and large, fairly satisfied with the effort, though some might have felt it would have been useful to focus on the plight of women and children, with a special emphasis to begin with, on Christian Syrians and Yazidis, both of whom as minorities, were singled out for violent predation.

Yazidi women and children in particular have faced the horrific reality that the maltreatment they were singled out for destroyed families when Islamic State targeted Yazidi men for annihilation, piling them into mass graves, and taking the women and children into perpetual bondage status, as slaves to be bartered for, maltreated and violated. The 40,000 Syrians absorbed into Canada were victims of their own government, when the Shiite Alawite President of Syria took vicious exception to his Sunni Syrian population protesting their inferior place in Syria.

Few championed the plight of the thousands of Yazidi women who were sold in the marketplace as sex slaves. Those who were able to escape, were sheltered and protected by the Kurds, but the world at large seemed to take little notice of their misery and the plight they faced, destined to be slaughtered or their freedom taken from them, in an abysmal reality where they were considered less than human, and free for the taking. Michelle Rempel had a better understanding than most in government, having interviewed some Yazidi women.

That this current government has finally turned its attention to alleviating the plight of a relative handful of these vulnerable people is a welcome change. Erring on the side of caution reflecting their fears, the move to absorb 1,200 refugees comprised partially of entire families as well as individuals owes to the fact that many among them fear repercussions against other members of their families should much information be made available identifying them and their imminent move to Canada, and the government is respecting that cautionary need.

Immigration Minister Hussen spoke of close to 400 Yazidi refugees who have been accepted in the last four months, quietly and without fanfare, in contrast to the intense public exposure the intake of the Syrian refugees had been given. And, it seems that the absorption of 1,200 Yazidi refugees through government initiative won't be the end of the effort. The government is prepared to become involved in authorizing private sponsorships of Yazidi refugees, where groups associated with churches, for example, pool resources to sponsor refugees.

Four months ago the House of Commons was unanimous in its support of a motion brought by Conservative Members of Parliament, calling on the government to provide asylum opportunities to Yazidi women and girls, in recognition of their conditions of fraught existence in a geography where a ferociously inhumane Islamist jihadi group threatens their very survival to the point where the atrocities conducted upon the Yazidis have been named as genocidal in intention.

"Helping to resettle all child survivors is vital to this work", stated Immigration Minister Hussen, in acknowledgement of Islamic State's focus on targeting young boys as well as girls and women. The hope is that this government will continue to focus on the rescue of Yazidis, well deserving of Canadian efforts to offer them another opportunity to live life to its fullest potential, distanced from the horrors of their homeland where a Medieval fascism attempted to deprive them of their very existence.

Yazidis refugees carry their belongings on January 3 in Diyarbakir, southeastern Turkey as they change their refugee camp and move to Midyat, further south. The Trudeau government is poised to announce today that Canada will give asylum to 1,200 primarily Yazidi refugees by year end. While the majority of the refugees will come from Iraq, the government says some will also be accepted from Lebanon and Turkey.   (ILYAS AKENGIN / AFP/GETTY IMAGES)

The Mission to Destroy Islamic State

"We are always honoured to have them [Canadian special forces personnel] at our positions."
"It was my wildest dream to work with the Canadians. Having them show up and help us, we would die for them."
Capt. Dhyab Mohammed Omar, commander, Peshmerga, Kurdistan

THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz A Canadian Forces door gunner keeps watch as his Griffon helicopter goes on a mission, Feb. 20, 2017 in northern Iraq.

"The predominance of [battlefield wounded] cases we’re getting are emergency \- department-type casualties or patients that you would get when you get over 5,000 military troops all in one place."
"We actually understand even in conflict, there are rules that you need to follow that respects the dignity of life [so that wounded ISIL fighters are also given treatment when detained by coalition forces, reflecting laws governing war]. That’s what makes us different."
Lt.-Col. Richard Morin, Canadian military camp in Erbil, Camp Erable

"The challenge here [for the helicopters] is the more [power] wires and the weather during winter."
"We had some fog. But generally, the weather is good."
Maj. Mathieu Bertrand, commander, helicopter squadron, Camp Erable

Canadian military personnel were first dispatched to Iraq in September of 2014 with a mission to aid in the training of the Peshmerga in their dedicated conflict against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Their training mission did not make them immune from coming under fire from Islamic State, and on those occasions, Canadian soldiers fought back, in unison with the Peshmerga. That active combat role has been scaled back, however. Leaving the conflict interaction to the Iraqi military.

At the present time, approximately 150 Canadian troops are stationed in Erbil, the Kurdish capital in Iraqi Kurdistan. There is a helicopter squadron with logistical staff, and skilled medical personnel, all supporting  the special forces mission, extending to the wider coalition fight against ISIL. This is post kick-off followed by withdrawal of the final attack against Mosul to free it from Islamic State which began in October. At this juncture, it has been left to the Iraqi military to complete the combat mission.

The Canadian mission has been altered to once again going to the skies to identify and monitor Islamic State targets in the area, maintaining tabs on their movements through optical sights and whatever alternate means are required, on "key enemy movement corridors" between Syria and Iraq, including those areas within and immediately outside of Kurdish territory. Identifying Islamic State positions and conveying that data to the allied forces, guiding them to the attacks on ISIL.

The Peshmerga had built extensive earthworks as barricades to produce defensive positions, around Erbil toward the Mosul Dam, successfully stopping ISIL from streaming into northern Iraq. Now, four Canadian Griffin helicopters from Canadian Forces Base Valcartier in Quebec are dispatched daily to carry troops and equipment from Camp Erable to special forces troops in the field, flying low over fields and isolated communities, avoiding attracting enemy fire.

Pakistan's Own Islamist Frankenstein

"These [militant Islamist] groups come in various colors and varieties, but they share a common purpose. Ultimately they are joined at the hip."
"[The recent bombings constitute] the rejuvenation of a dangerous version of Islam. The message of these terrorists to the government is, ‘We are alive and kicking, and we can strike wherever we want'."
Rifaat Hussain, professor of government and public policy, National University of Sciences and Technology, Pakistan

"This remains the last defense against radicalization. We preach unity and bring together the deprived. Prayers are answered here, regardless of faction."
"[The shrines need increased protection, but] killing militants is not the solution. The government needs to change what they believe in. These terrorists are brainwashed for years, and they despise us for spreading love. But we are open today, and rituals are being offered. This is a clear message that they have failed."
Syed Mehdi Sabzwari, custodian, 13th century Lal Shahzad Qalandar shrine, Sehwan, Sindh, Pakistan

A Pakistani security officer stands guard outside a Sufi shrine in Karachi during Friday prayer. The country’s authorities have launched a sweeping offensive against Islamist militants in the days following a half-dozen Islamic State attacks last week that killed more than 125. (Shahzaib Akber/European Pressphoto Agency

"The Islamic State [group] might not have a strong organizational structure in Pakistan but we have thousands of members of banned groups sympathetic to [their] ideology."
"They subscribe to the Islamic State [group] world view."
Zahid Hussain, expert, regional militants, Pakistan

"We are so self-congratulatory that we declared success in the middle of a fight. But what have we done to address the ideological basis of terror? Has the supply chain of hate-filled violent ideology been shut down?"
"Bravado is useful to bolster public confidence when under attack but it is no substitute for sensible policy."
Babar Sattar, lawyer, rights activist, News International newspaper 

"May God have mercy on us and our country. We thought all the blasts and explosions were over, but now it is the same havoc as before. These terrorists don’t spare even mosques or schools."
"The sad thing is that our government seems to be helpless in crushing them. Look at these police, they are standing here but they cannot protect anyone. I say it would be better if this government resigns and the army takes over."
Arif Ali, 50, Civil Engineer, Bari Imam shrine, Islamabad

The Sehwan shrine came under attack during a ritual ceremony [Wali Muhammed/Al Jazeera]
 
The Pakistani military, in fact, is the culprit, and not the current government of Pakistan. Although it cannot be ignored that the current government of Pakistan has a short memory, managing to 'forget' that it was their own military and their secret service that gave haven to the Afghan Taliban and also hosted al-Qaeda. Not merely al-Qaeda, but its very leader, Osama bin Laden, whose compound was located in spitting distance of a military academy, in Abbottabad.

The Pakistan military was tasked by the-then government of Pervez Musharraf to train, arm and support the Taliban, at the very time when Pakistan designated itself an ally of the United States in the fight against terrorism from 2001 forward. Pakistan's goal was to destabilize Afghanistan, and to gain influence through the Taliban, in Afghanistan, focusing as well on creating a schism between Afghanistan and India which was also attempting to gain influence in Afghanistan, even while it was under NATO occupation.

The United States transferred $2.5-billion to support Pakistan's military in 15 years.

And all the while Pakistan was playing the game of surreptitiously allying itself with the Taliban while declaring it was fighting terrorism. Long since, Pakistan's own Taliban arose, giving Pakistan a taste of what it is like to have to continually battle a growing Islamist insurgency. Now, Pakistanis worshipping a cerebral type of Islam, are being attacked by Islamist groups allying themselves with Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, which has spread its tentacles everywhere in the world of Islam and beyond.

Compelling the Pakistani military to respond by conducting raids, sweeping across the countryside, boasting of killing over a hundred suspected "terrorists". So much for the rule of law in Pakistan where minority sectarian groups have little protection and much animus is directed toward them under the country's system of justice, and a doctor whose residence was close to the bin Laden compound and who had coooperated with U.S. Intelligence has been imprisoned for aiding the U.S. to identify the al-Qaeda leader.

Now, the current government of Pakistan, in the wake of deadly terrorist attacks killing hundreds of Pakistan's civilian population -- targeted for the brand of Islam that they subscribe to -- has taken to blaming Afghanistan for the vicious turmoil of bombings. Insisting that it is Afghanistan that is giving shelter to militants, in a turn-about from what Pakistan had inflicted on its neighbour Afghanistan.

Where Kabul once begged Istanbul to stop giving haven and support to the Taliban, Istanbul now demands that Kabul surrender Pakistani terrorists to Pakistan. Afghanistan is desperately battling the Afghan Taliban, al-Qaeda, and Islamic State presence within its own borders, along with its own endemic corruption. Much of which stemmed from Pakistan's malign interference in their neighbour's sovereign business; responsible for years of Taliban rule in the country. Now, Pakistan is reaping the rewards of its wretched intentions to do harm to Afghanistan.

The Emerging Global Flood

"We have virtually no resources at the border. The way [the Mounties] respond is when the Americans tip them off."
"Once someone reaches the border it's too late [to stop them from declaring themselves asylum seekers]."
"The worst thing that the government can do is revoke the Safe Third Country Agreement. Then you'll have a flood of people showing up at the border."
Christian Leuprecht, political science professor, Royal Military College/Queen's University

"There are many Latin Americans in the United States who fear return to their home country. I think it is quite likely that we'll be seeing more of those as the crackdown of deportations heats up."
"The Safe Third Country is encouraging people to enter Canada dangerously and surreptitiously, and I don't see how that can possibly be in our interests."
"[Immigration lawyers] have been absolutely slammed [since Trump's election]. There's no doubt that people who have options are considering leaving."
Laura Best, immigration lawyer, Vancouver

"Nearly two-thirds [of undocumented immigrants] have been in the United States for at least a decade and a fifth have been present for 20-plus years."
"A large fraction of these people have U.S.-born citizen children. I expect most . . . will try to remain in place and avoid deportation."
Douglas Massey, co-director, Mexican Migration Project, Princeton University

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And so it is that the 'world's longest undefended border' separating Canada from the United States has begun to leak refugee claimants who fear the accelerated crackdown on undocumented migrants taking place in the United States threatens their future. There is a reputed 11-million undocumented workers from Mexico and Central America living and working in the United States. These are economic migrants whose climate of fear of being detected and deported has suddenly undergone a transition from caution to outright panic.

They are not the only ones who are panicking. The farmers who depend on these workers to bring in  their crops because this is back-breaking, low-income work that most Americans avoid, now fear for their own livelihoods. The small businesses in urban centres that rely on the low-paid work of undocumented migrants are also being hit hard. The irony in all of this, of course, is that these are the very people who voted Donald Trump into the White House. And the panic that has ensued reflects a forgetfulness that his predecessor succeeded in deporting far more migrants than his predecessors ever did.

The tactics appear to have changed, however, with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement having been given new orders. They are not only rounding up non-violent criminals to rid the United States of those with a criminal record, but as well those who have committed the felony of possessing a fake ID. And those who had declared themselves previously and are on record, reporting to the ICE are now being detained and deported. So it appears that the Trump administration is determined to best President Obama's record 2.5 deportations.

Some of those hoping to stake a claim for refuge are taking the initiative to move on, further north, to cross the border into Canada. That movement has not yet become a flood, but it could, conceivably, and Canada is ill equipped to deal with a very large influx. Yes, it is illegal to cross the border into Canada bypassing the normal process of authorization, but once having achieved that goal and declaring need of refuge, Canadian authorities begin the process of assessing the refuge application.

Refugee advocates are agitating for the suspension of the Safe Third Country Agreement, a 12-year-old agreement between Canada and the United States prohibiting people arriving at a Canadian land border crossing entering from the U.S. from claiming themselves refugees since the U.S. represents the place where the initial claim for asylum would have taken place. The like premise holds that anyone entering Canada first is not entitled to claim asylum in the United States. The country of first arrival is the country where the claim is to be made.

In the wake of the 9/11 attacks many Muslim Americans evidently feared for their future in the United States, and a surge of claimants ensued. The Liberal Chretien government struck the Safe Third Country Agreement with Washington. While in opposition the current Liberal government spoke of the Conservative Harper immigration refugee policy with contempt, claiming it to be cruel and clumsy, opposing an expedited process for citizens of "designated countries of origin".

Now that the Liberals have regained power in Ottawa, they are faced with the same old problems that have traditionally bedevilled governments in power. The current Liberal Trudeau government struck down the previous government's visa provision for Mexicans. And as they did, claims began swelling once again, which led to the visas being imposed in the first place. Canadians in general are fairly open to immigration; the country 'grows' by almost a quarter-million yearly through generous immigration numbers.

A man leaps across the border with passport in-hand under watch by a U.S. Border Patrol agent at the U.S.-Canada border near Hemmingford, Que., on Friday, February 17, 2017. (Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press)

But Canadians are not the least bit enthralled at the prospect of having to host large numbers of economic migrants and refugees arriving in the country without the institutionalized immigration process being in play. The Canada Border Services Agency reported over 400 people had crossed from North Dakota into Manitoba this past year. The RCMP reported 452 asylum claims at the border in Quebec for January alone. This, when refugees have to cross on foot over long distances in the winter months, auguring a much larger influx when the weather becomes moderate.

And this will task Canada's limited resources beyond what both government and its citizens are prepared to accept.

Creeping Islamization of Western Democracies

The Canadian parliament voted February 15 to approve a motion by Liberal MP Iqra Khalid (center left) calling on the federal government to condemn and battle "Islamophobia".

"Many in the mosque establishment and right-wing Islamic groups in Canada are celebrating this as a victory."
"But Muslim critics of the so-called "Motion 103," which mentions only Islamophobia by name and not any other form of religious persecution, are in disbelief that so few members of parliament have objected to this giant step backward and the watering down of our freedom of expression."
Tarek Fatah, Pakistani-Canadian journalist

"[Motion 103] echoes the agenda of Islamists and Islamic extremists in North America who are shamelessly taking advantage of the Quebec City tragedy [when 6 Muslim men at prayer in a mosque were shot to death] to advance the international Muslim Brotherhood agenda to silence any critique of Islamism."

TV host Asif Javaid argues that Khalid's motion "echoes the agenda of Islamists."

 "(E)xtremist Muslims who came here as refugees are making preparations to turn Canada into a ... nightmare."

Asif Javaid, Television Host


 

"What are they [Conservative Parliamentarians] scared of? They're scared of denouncing Islamophobia and, by not denouncing Islamophobia, they are actually contributing to the problem."
Heritage Minister Melanie Joly, Parliament, Ottawa

"[The Conservatives chose to have the House] condemn all forms of systemic racism, religious intolerance, and discrimination of Muslims, Jews, Christians, Sikhs, Hindus, and other religious communities."
"What stands out here is the inclusiveness of this [Conservative] motion. It lists the half dozen largest faith groups in Canada, but obviously includes all religious communities in Canada. There is no sense in excluding any of them."
Member of Parliament David Anderson, (Saskatchewan)

Newly-elected Liberal MP Iqra Khalid, a Pakistani-Canadian, introduced Motion-103 to the House of Commons, which calls on Parliament to "condemn Islamophobia and all forms of systemic racism and religious discrimination", and she has the full support of the governing Liberals as well as MPs representing the New Democratic Party. The formerly-governing Conservatives with rare exception, have critiqued the motion for its singling out of Islam for protection from perceived criticism.

Having done so, the Conservatives have been heaped with scorn, charged with Islamophobia for the very reason that they refuse to support the motion clearly favouring Islam, even in the choice of the word "Islamophobia" which has served the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation in their campaign to charge that any criticism of Islam represents hatred and must be recognized as a criminal act, legally. In this way challenging the very touchstone of free speech.

This actual creeping Islamization of the West has been recognized for the threat that it represents by Islamic groups and Muslim individuals who have the greater interests of equality, democracy and freedom uppermost in mind, as opposed to the Islamists with their incendiary but surreptitious goal of suborning democracy, its justice system, and values and customs with Islamic Sharia law to be recognized universally.

This, from adherents of a religion that has roiled the world with the deadly onset of terrorism launched by Islamists who have responded to the many and various calls emanating from Koranic sacred scripts for the faithful to observe their obligation to engage in jihad.

O Allah, give victory to our brothers who engage in Jihad
O Allah, give them victory over their enemy
O Allah, destroy the accursed Jews
O Allah, make their children orphans and their women widows.

There are those, however, within the Canadian Muslim community who are outraged at this turn of events. These are the Muslim minority who speak for the majority which does not believe in the efficacy of Islamist violence either by physical force in lethal terrorism, or by stealth, by the gradual infiltration of Western institutions by the Muslim Brotherhood and its agencies and agents.

Former Conservative immigration minister Chris Alexander, hit the issue squarely on the head when he characterized M-103 as a "senseless, ill-worded motion" distracting from issues like national security and terrorism.

Pakistani Values of Religious Persecution

"Luckily I escaped. [Evading arrest in Pakistan, charged with terrorism] That's how I am safe here, thank God. It's all work of God, I believe, because had I been caught it would have been not good for my health at all."
"They [Ahmadiyya Muslims] have claimed that we attacked. It was not an attack. It was an agitation. They attacked us. The rest of what happened was a natural reaction."
"[Questioned by authorities at Pearson airport in Toronto] and they were satisfied and said that I can go. And then CSIS [the Canadian Security Intelligence Service] came and asked me questions and they said, 'Okay, no problem'."
"There was some frustration at the time [when demands were made to authorities to divest the Ahmidiyya of their mosque] and also quite a few people from close-by communities started coming because they learned about the incident."
"I mean what do you expect from a large crowd? They will sit tight and get shot at and stones throwed at them and wrong type of words used against them? There are elements, they will do something and they did it. Some of them who are youngsters tried to climb the [mosque retaining] wall. But none of the Ahmadis got hurt at all, not even a scratch."
"This is an incident where the government is trying to protect the minorities and working against the majority That's why we all are punished."
Rashid Ahmed, Mississauga, Ontario

"Rest assured, we have rule of law in Pakistan and all those individuals who are responsible for the incident [December 12 mosque attack] will be taken to task with the due process of law."
Nadeem Kiani, press secretary, Pakistan High Commission, in Canada

Army, police disperse protesters, take control of worship place. PHOTO SOURCE: TWITTER @RAZA AHMAD RUMI

This fine, upstanding Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin has lived in Canada for the last 40 years. Through immigration, Canada has a sizeable Pakistan-Canadian population. There is also a good-sized population of Ahmidiyya Muslims living in Canada, where they migrated to avoid the kind of persecution they have lived under in Pakistan. In Pakistan, Ahmidiyya are looked upon as
apostates, they are forbidden to call themselves Muslims, and they must not, by law, pray in mosques.

"They should not have anything to do with mosques and they cannot be called Muslims", said Mr. Ahmed upon enquiry in Canada why he had organized a 'protest' against the Ahmidiyya while on a visit to Pakistan. "Why are they occupying a mosque which is built for Muslims by Muslims? This is aggression", he averred. He informed an enquiring journalist that the procession he organized was meant to pass alongside the Ahmidiyya mosque, when it turned into a protest.

In Canada, Pakistani-Canadians insist on their rights under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms for Canadians, given full equality under the law. A Pakistani-Canadian woman insisted on her right to wear a niqab, leaving only her eyes visible, during a citizenship ceremony. A Pakistani-Canadian newly-elected Member of Parliament feels entitled to produce a motion to Parliament for the condemnation of "Islamophobia". The very people who wrap themselves in the protection that Canada affords all its citizens practise bigotry against others while demanding recognition of their exceptionalism.

Mr. Ahmed had previously arranged for a petition which 580 villagers from Dulmial, roughly 150 kilometres south of Islamabad had signed, to be addressed to local authorities.  The petition spoke of "extreme measures" should police fail to take action to clear the mosque of Ahmidiyyas. The first name signed on the petition was that of Mr. Ahmed, the visitor from Canada. This is a mosque said to have been built in the 1800s, and which had been "occupied" since 1996 by the Muslim Ahmidiyya sect. An unresolved court dispute over ownership of the mosque rankles villagers.

Safwan Choudhry, speaking for Ontario's Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama'at, view Mr. Ahmed and his escape from justice in Pakistan where he was busy persecuting members of his sect, with fear and trepidation, appalled that the man could travel abroad, incite to violence, then return unpunished to Canada. Mr. Choudhry is urging Canadian authorities to undertake an investigation into the fact that a mob of a thousand launched a violent attack upon the minority Ahmidiyya community in Dulmial.

The Canadian High Commission in Islamabad had posted a comment on Twitter, commending the Punhab government "for undertaking to hold mob leaders in Chakwal to account". But that it was a Pakistani-Canadian who felt free to organize and incite the mob does not appear to have entered the equation of justice and the rule of law. A rather peculiar situation in Pakistan where minority religions are given little protection under the law, leading religious bigots to feel free to persecute and demean Christian, Shiites and Ahmadiyya communities.

At the point where the 'procession' of a thousand villagers came abreast of the mosque they demanded of the police that the building be sealed and the Ahmidiyyas be ousted. The police made no move to accommodate the mob's demands. At this juncture, claims Ahmed, the Ahmidiyyas taunted the protesters, inciting them to begin scaling the mosque walls. An Ahmidiyya man suffered a fatal heart attack within the mosque as the protesters forced their way into the building.

Ahmed describes fires set by the Ahmidiyyas, torching their documents and furniture before exiting. Video footage, on the other hand, shows protesters looting the mosque and throwing items into piles, then setting them aflame. The Dawn newspaper in Pakistan reported Ahmed to be the "main suspect" in the incident where a charge sheet was made against 61 suspects by a Joint Investigation Team. The Senate Committee on Human Rights, reported Dawn, had recommended the Government of Pakistan seek Ahmed's extradition from Canada.

On the website of a group allied with a Mississauga mosque attended by Ahmed, there are descriptions of those of the Ahmidiyya faith as "evil", representing an effort "by anti-Islam forces to disunite Muslims". Mr. Choudhry looks to Canadian authorities to mount a "measured response", inclusive of taking action against people who "bring values that are both un-Canadian and dangerous to those living in Canada."

Haji Malik Rashid Ahmed  "The Qadianis (Ahmadis) are using the Mosque as their worship place which is illegal under the law, We request that you free the Mosque from the Infidels and save Muslim interests by saving the Mosque from these Infidels, If these steps are not taken we will be forced to take extreme measures in order to liberate this Mosque."

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