Tim Furnish: Occidental Jihadist
Major Nidal Malik Hasan: Not An Islamic “Extremist,” But Simply A Good, Literalist Muslim
While the mainstream media outlets continue their politically-correct embrace of one another, rallying around the propaganda point that Hasan’s killing of 13 soldiers and civilians at Ft. Hood had nothing to do with his Islamic beliefs, even the more gimlet-eyed feel compelled to use terms like “extremist” to describe Hasan’s worldview. For example, Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT), in calling for possible Senate hearings into the murders, said he was doing so because “there had been strong warning signs that Hasan was an ‘Islamic extremist.’”
But was—is—he? The “Washington Post” today is reporting on the Power Point presentation Nidal gave to fellow doctors in 2007, entitled “The Koranic [sic] Worldview As It Relates to Muslims in the US Military.” The “Post” even has copies of the 50 slides he used for this lecture, a number of which detail the Qur’anic-prescribed afterlife rewards for “believers”—Muslims—and punishments for non-Muslims. The slides themselves simply provide the Qur’anic citations for these (and other) Islamic beliefs, and the “Post” story is ambiguous about whether Hasan was reporting dispassionately on these beliefs or advocating them. However, according to a story yesterday in the U.K. “Telegraph,” at that same talk Hasan “had told US military colleagues that infidels should have their throats cut,” as well as “be beheaded and have boiling oil poured down their throat.”
Are such beliefs “extremist” for a Muslim? Actually, no—at least not for a Sunni like Hasan.
In the Sunni world the only acceptable exegetical paradigm regarding the Qur’an is a literalist one, in which the ayahs (verses) of each surah (chapter) are binding, at face value, not only on Muhammad and those of his time—but also on each and every Muslim today, wherever he or she resides. And while there are Muslims who depart from this woodenly-literal reading, they are found in sects that make up perhaps 15% of the world’s Muslim population (Shi`is, of several stripes, most notably Isma’ilis; some of the Sufi orders; and borderline-heretical groups such as the Alawis of Syria and the Druze of Lebanon and Israel).
Thus, if his Qur’an briefing was any indication—and it damned well should be, Army political-correctness notwithstanding—Hasan’s murderous rampage at Ft. Hood was nothing if not a private jihad, fueled and justifed by the following Qur’anic mandates:
*Surah Muhammad [47]:3ff: “When you encounter the unbelievers on the battlefield, strike off their heads until you have totally defeated them….”
*Surah al-Anfal [8]:12ff: “I will cast dread into the hearts of the unbelievers. Strike off their heads….”
*Surah al-Dukhan [44]:43ff: “Surely the tree of Zamzam [bitterness] will provide food for the sinful. Like molten brass it will boil their insides, like the boiling of scalding water.”
Until it becomes acceptable in Sunni Islam to read such verses as metaphor—as, for example, rhetorical “decapitation” of non-Muslim arguments against Islam—and/or to limit them to the 7th century AD, the Hasans of the world will continue to find rational justification within the Islamic fold for personal jihad against “infidels”—totally apart from any connections to, or encouragement from, al-Qa`idah or any other Islamic terrorist group. Far from being an “extremist,” Hasan was, and is, simply a literalist Sunni Muslim who acted upon the teachings of his holy book, rather than merely pay it lip service. We should be thankful that, so far, the bulk of the world’s, and America’s, Muslims remain hypocrites--unlike Hasan.
News
- Breaking News
- History Buzz
- Historians in the News
- Political Highlights
- Washington DC
- Obituaries
- History on TV
Hot Topics
- Black History Month
- China Rising
- The Olympics
- Haitian Earthquake
- Did You Know?
- Health Care Reform
- HNN Polls: Rate Obama's State of the Union!
- Important State of the Union Addresses in History
- Did You Know?
- HNN Polls: Massachusetts Senate Election
Features
- Top Young Historians
- Doyens
- Books About History
- On This Day in History
- This Week in History
- Quote/Unquote
Roundup
HNN Blogs
- History Blogroll
- Cliopatria
- Liberty & Power
- Judith Apter Klinghoffer
- How Stupid?
- Mark A. LeVine
- Allan Lichtman
- Tim Furnish
- Gil Troy
Etc.
