[Order Robert Spencer’s new book, ‘Intifada on the Hudson: The Selling of Zohran Mamdani’: CLICK HERE.]
It’s a principle as old as warfare itself: know your enemy. An enemy that you don’t understand, and even worse, an enemy that you fear to call by its right name, is an enemy that is assured of victory over you.
All this is as axiomatic as it is ignored. Ever since 9/11, and before that as well, the United States, and the West in general, has been attempting to confront and defeat Islamic jihad while not ever getting around to saying exactly what it is. Nor is this a matter of knowing exactly who the enemy is, but opting not to say his name for tactical reasons. American and European officials have made it abundantly clear that they have no idea who the enemy is, or simply don’t care, as they have opened their doors to millions of migrants from Muslim countries while making no serious effort whatsoever to try to determine if any of them are Islamic jihadis, or, given the right circumstances, could become Islamic jihadis.
The core assumption of American and European officials is that Islam rejects violence, and Muslims reject violence, and so can be safely brought into Western countries in massive numbers without any more concern over the importation of terrorists than one would have if bringing in large numbers of Amish.
We saw this yet again recently, when outgoing New York Mayor Eric Adams endorsed the old corruptocrat Andrew Cuomo to be his successor, in an attempt to stop the Muslim socialist juggernaut of Zohran Mamdani. In explaining why he was opting to back Cuomo instead of joining Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Kathy Hochul, Letitia James, and numerous other prominent leftists in backing Mamdani, Adams mentioned the havoc that Islamic jihadis are wreaking in Nigeria and Europe. The implication was that if Mamdani becomes mayor of New York, he could very well turn a blind eye to jihad activity, or ignore it altogether, allowing for a massive amount of damage to New York City or to somewhere else in the United States.
He did not, of course, call them “Islamic jihadis.” Adams said: “New York can’t become Europe, folks. I don’t know what’s wrong with people. You see what’s playing out in other countries because of Islamic extremism. Not Muslims, let’s not mix this up, but Islamic extremists that are burning churches in Nigeria, that are destroying communities in Germany, that have taken over logical thinking. That’s why I’m here today to endorse Andrew Cuomo, to be part of this fight.”
It would have been interesting if there had been a real journalist present, someone who would have asked Adams what exact religion the “Islamic extremists” follow, if not Islam, and what they are if they’re not Muslims. Adams also should have been asked what exactly makes these extremists non-Muslims; what specific tenets of Islam are they violating?
If any journalist is ever found in New York and gets a chance to ask Adams such questions, it is certain beyond any doubt that Adams would have no clear or coherent answer. The current thinking, or what passes for thought, among non-Muslim politicians across the politicians is that a Muslim is someone who professes the Islamic faith. Then that person remains a Muslim until he commits an act of Islamic jihad. That act in itself takes him outside the fold of Islam, and renders him an “Islamic extremist” who cannot be described as a Muslim at all.
This is, of course, absurd. There are no “extremist” mosques and “moderate” mosques the way there are Baptist and Methodist churches. A Muslim who kills Nigerian Christians, or burns churches in Germany, is doing so not because he has left Islam and embraced “extremism,” but because he takes very, very seriously Islam’s mandate to wage war against unbelievers and subjugate them under the hegemony of Islamic law.
The “Islamic extremists” are, in other words, living out the Islamic faith that Adams, and so very many other politicians and public officials, assumes that they have discarded, and are doing so by committing the very acts that Adams thinks remove them from the fold of Islam.
Adams is believing a fiction. This is easily verifiable by means of study of the texts and teachings of Islam. But who has time for such a trivial thing as that?
