Countdown to Conflict

Brig. Gen. (res.) Dr. Shimon Shapira

Jerusalem Issue Brief

In May 2000, Israel completed a full withdrawal from Lebanon in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 425 from 1978. Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah, however, the “liberator of the South,” did not recognize the new border. His patrons in Iran ordered continued jihad against Israel.
The Israeli withdrawal in 2000 did not lead Hizballah to become just another political party, and the belief that this would occur was an illusion. The movement’s charter, published in 1985, was not changed. Its leadership remained religiously and politically loyal to the leader of the Islamic revolution in Iran, Ali Khameini.
All the nonsense about Hizballah’s Lebanese nationalism was exposed by the strategy that Iran crafted in Lebanon, which rested on three main components: turning Lebanon into an Iranian front against Israel, building an Islamic society in Lebanon in the image of Iran, and active involvement in the jihad that the Palestinians are waging against Israel.
Nasrallah was surprised by the Israeli response to the kidnapping of its soldiers and so were his Iranian patrons. From Iran’s standpoint, the region had been ignited too early, before its nuclear program was ready. Hence, it lost an important factor of deterrence it had built in Lebanon against Israel. The large-scale use of rockets and missiles against the Israeli home front has impaired the power of the threat.
Any end to the war that does not involve Hizballah’s disarmament will enable the jihadist movement to rise again like a phoenix, rehabilitate itself, and continue its jihad against Israel. Hizballah has stated that it refuses to disarm, a situation that elevates the importance of an embargo on supplying Hizballah with weapons, as called for in the UN resolution.
Right now, Resolution 1701 just calls on Lebanon to secure its borders; UNIFIL may assist the Lebanese government if requested. The resolution also only calls on states to refrain from selling weaponry to Hizballah, but does not authorize any state to enforce an arms embargo. There has been no decision to deploy a special force that would supervise the embargo on the Syrian-Lebanese border and in the Lebanese seaports and airports.
Hizballah After Israel’s May 2000 Withdrawal from Lebanon
In May 2000, Israel completed a full withdrawal from Lebanon in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 425 from 1978. The Lebanese government was full of praise for the move and Israelis were relieved. The UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1310 to confirm that Israel indeed fulfilled its obligation to leave Lebanese territory. Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah, however, the “liberator of the South,” did not recognize the new border. His patrons in Iran ordered continued jihad against Israel. As a pretext for his military buildup and provocations against Israel, Nasrallah argued that Israel had not pulled out from the Shebaa Farms which were on the Golan Heights and disputed between Israel and Syria. Syria agreed to play along with the Lebanese claims to the Shebaa Farms, without formally acknowledging their being under Lebanese sovereignty, in order to enable the ongoing armed struggle against Israel to continue.
In October 2000, Hizballah kidnapped three IDF soldiers after attacking an Israeli patrol along the main border road near the Shebaa Farms. Nasrallah awaited the Israeli response, which was not long in coming, and he was astonished by its feebleness. To him, the Israeli response bore no relation to the boastful threats and warnings that Israel’s leaders had voiced before and after the May 2000 withdrawal. This reinforced Nasrallah’s belief that Israeli society was made of “spider webs” and that its leaders were so traumatized by Lebanon that they were loath to use their armed forces for fear of sinking into the Lebanese mud. Nasrallah listened in amazement to voices in Israel stating that “Restraint is strength”; he rubbed his eyes in wonder at the sight of Israeli soldiers taking cover in special protective cages when stones were thrown at them from across the fence.
A short time later, Hizballah began building military outposts along the border to enable its troops to freely observe what was happening on the Israeli side. From the line of outposts northward to the suburbs of Beirut, Hizballah built the state of Hizballahstan with Iranian assistance. It also established an extensive network of welfare, cultural, educational, and religious institutions, along with the militia Al-Muqawama Al-Islamia – the Islamic Resistance. This force was equipped by Iran and Syria with everything from shoelaces to long-range missiles, and was entrenched in dense defensive networks brimming with advanced weapons systems that were intended to strike at Israel.
Hizballah has never deviated from its jihadist path. The Israeli withdrawal in 2000 did not lead Hizballah to become just another political party, and the belief that this would occur was an illusion, cultivated by shortsighted people in academia and by politicians guided by the whims of their hearts. Jihad continued to be Hizballah’s life-force and raison d’être. The armed struggle against Israel was fuel for the Islamic revolution that remained Hizballah’s objective.
Hizballah’s First Loyalty is to Iran
Hizballah’s “Lebanonization” process continued to expand without contradicting its jihadist aspirations. Hizballah exploited the rules of the Lebanese political game to increase its power in parliament and also, after Syria withdrew from Lebanon, sent two ministers to the Lebanese government to ensure that its military force would remain intact. Meanwhile, Hizballah stayed faithful to its Khomeinist revolutionary ideology. The movement’s charter, published in 1985, was not changed, and its leadership remained religiously and politically loyal to the leader of the Islamic revolution in Iran, Ali Khameini.
Nasrallah’s declarations that “Hizballah is a Lebanese party that makes its decisions independently and the Iranian ambassador in Beirut reads about them in the paper,” did not stand the test of reality. Lebanese President Emile Lahoud told FOX News: “Hizballah is Lebanese and its demands are [made] in the service of Lebanese sovereignty….Its fights are Lebanese, not Syrian or Iranian,”1 but the reality is very different. Nasrallah was appointed the representative in Lebanon of the Marja Taklid (supreme Shiite religious authority), and the source of authority, Ali Khameini, ensured that he worked under Iran’s orders. Indeed, Hizballah’s representative in Iran was quoted in the Iranian press on August 7, 2006, as saying: “Everything we have, we [obtained] thanks to the Islamic Revolution [in Iran].”2 All the nonsense about Hizballah’s Lebanese nationalism was exposed by the strategy that Iran crafted in Lebanon, which rested on three main comp onents:
Turning Lebanon into an Iranian front against Israel, which involved deployment of an array of short- and long-range missiles, so as to create a balance of deterrence with Israel that would prevent it from attacking the Iranian nuclear program. Iran explicitly threatened that any strike on its nuclear facilities by the United States and/or Israel would result in immediate missile fire on Israel. Accordingly, Iran also stationed long-range, Zelzal-2 missiles in Lebanon, capable of reaching deep into Israel’s interior with their 250-kilometer (155 mile) range. These were supplied in late 2003 when Syrian transport aircraft flew to Iran with humanitarian aid for earthquake victims and returned with military cargo including the Zelzal missiles. Ali Akbar Mohtashamipour, who heads Iran’s Headquarters for Intifada Support, revealed in an Iranian newspaper that Iran had delivered Zelzal rockets to Hizballah.3 Parts from Fajr missiles fired by Hizballah at Israe l bear the symbol of Iranian military manufacture.4
Iran’s involvement in Lebanon included training Hizballah operatives in the use of advanced weaponry and military tactics: During the recent fighting, Israel captured a 22-year-old Shiite from Hizballah named Hussein Ali Suleiman, who admitted that he had undergone extensive training in Iran along with 40-50 other Hizballah operatives.5 Hizballah operatives in Israeli custody have also disclosed that the Iranian Revolutionary Guards visited their forward positions along Israel’s northern border.
Building an Islamic society in Lebanon in the image of Iran, one loyal to the Imam Khameini. Iran, like Hizballah, recognized the limits of its ability to set up an Islamic republic in Lebanon under the existing political conditions. Hence it looks to the future, prepares the ground socially, and puts its trust in the demographic strength of the Shiites as the basis for establishing an Islamic republic in Lebanon when political conditions change.
Active involvement in the jihad that the Palestinians are waging against Israel. Iran has become the main source of military assistance to the Palestinian armed struggle. Through Hizballah, Iran provides funds and weapons and keeps the flames of jihad burning.
Nasrallah, dizzy from his adulation in the Arab world as the modern Saladin and as the first leader who defeated Israel and caused an Israeli withdrawal from Arab land, sent fighters again and again to try and kidnap Israeli soldiers. While the ostensible goal was to free Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners, the real one was to demonstrate openly that even after Syria’s pullback from Lebanon, Hizballah was continuing the jihad against Israel.
The Beginning of the War
On July 12, 2006, Hizballah succeeded in kidnapping two wounded Israeli soldiers after a cross-border ambush. Although Nasrallah expected an Israeli response similar to the one in October 2000, this time Israel reacted with great force. It destroyed Hizballah’s headquarters in Dahiya, its social institutions, and also the home and offices of senior Lebanese Ayatollah Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, who, despite his past rivalry with Nasrallah, nonetheless supported him. Nasrallah shifted in a moment from being a public orator, to becoming a supplier of pre-recorded tapes. He was surprised by the Israeli response and so were his Iranian patrons.
Iran, which had replaced Syria as the primary actor in the Lebanese arena, was not pleased with the timing of Nasrallah’s move, but nonetheless supported it. From Iran’s standpoint, the region had been ignited too early, before its nuclear program was ready. Hence, it lost an important factor of deterrence it had built in Lebanon against Israel. The large-scale use of rockets and missiles against the Israeli home front has impaired the power of the threat.
Israel’s aim in the war was to break Hizballah’s military power. At the same time, however, the Palestinians, Syria, and Iran are watching Israel and gauging its resolve to use force. Each side will draw its lessons in the future. From Hizballah’s standpoint, any settlement that ends the war without involving its disarmament will enable the jihadist movement to rise again like a phoenix, rehabilitate itself, and continue its jihad against Israel.
A Weapons Embargo?
It is, therefore, vitally important to implement the relevant articles of UN Security Council Resolution 1701 regarding the disarmament of Hizballah. Unfortunately, this obligation, also contained in Resolution 1559 from 2004, is the subject of a plan which, according to Resolution 1701, is to be developed in the next month by the UN secretary-general and implemented at a later date. In the meantime, Hizballah has stated that it refuses to disarm. This situation elevates the importance of an embargo on supplying Hizballah with weapons, as called for in the UN resolution. However, there has been no decision to deploy a special force that would supervise the embargo on the Syrian-Lebanese border and in the Lebanese seaports and airports.
Right now, Resolution 1701 just calls on Lebanon to secure its borders; UNIFIL may assist the Lebanese government if requested. The resolution also only calls on states to refrain from selling weaponry to Hizballah, but does not authorize any state to enforce an arms embargo. What is necessary is the establishment of special forces that will carry out this mission of monitoring the entry-points into Lebanon.
Given the huge amounts of Iranian weaponry that were delivered to Hizballah in the past six years, this is a glaring inadequacy in the resolution. This point was also made by Lebanese Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, who stated: “As long as Syria can send weapons to Hizballah, there will be no change in the situation. Not with this regime in Damascus. We need a force that can cover all of Lebanon, like in Kosovo. Monitor the Syrian border, then talk.”6 Failure to enforce a real arms embargo against Hizballah will empty the entire UN resolution of its content and increase the risk of a violent clash erupting between Hizballah and the international force, and of continued military conflict between Hizballah and Israel.
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Notes
1. “Arab Media Accuses Iran and Syrian of Direct Involvement in Lebanon War,” MEMRI Special Dispatch Series – No. 1249, August 15, 2006; http://memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=archives&Area=sd&ID=SP124906
2. “Iranian and Syrian Media Stepping Up Statements on the War,” MEMRI Special Dispatch Series – No. 1239, August 9, 2006; http://memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=archives&Area=sd&ID=SP123906
3. “An Iranian Figure Who Had a Key Role in Founding Hezbollah Publicly Announced that Long-Range Iranian Zelzal-2 Rockets were Delivered to the Organization,” Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies, August 8, 2006; http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/ali_akbar_e.htm
4. “Display of Hezbollah Weaponry,” Israel Defense Forces Website; http://www1.idf.il/DOVER/site/mainpage.asp?sl=EN&id=7&docid=56786.EN
5. Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special Studies; http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/ali_suleiman.htm
6. Michael Young, “Mountain Main: The Leader of Lebanon’s Druze Talks about the Syrian Threat,” Wall Street Journal, July 29, 2006; http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110008721

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Tim Doctor Daily Wisdom

Tim Doctor-Daily Blog(ok, sort of daily, I’m going to try harder to make the time)

August 16, 2006

After viewing the start of the israeli Hezbollah conflict as the perfect and overdue oppurtunity to wipe out a terrorist organization, I now consider it a blown opportunity and much worse.
It doesn’t matter what Israel says at this point, even to highlight the serious damage it inflicted upon Hezbollah. The simple facts of the matter are that radical Islam has grown stronger in their own minds through this conflict.
1. An Islamic fascist terrorist group living next to one of the worlds most successful democracies attacked and lived to tell about it.
2. Radical Islam will be greatly encouraged and emboldened by Hezbollah’s ability to not only survive but inflict heavy casualties on the Jews. This will reinforce their religious perspective of divine blessing. It will also help with recruiting. People love to be on a winning team.
3. The Israeli refusal to go all the way and fight to win, will be viewed the same way Bin Laden viewed our withdrawal from Somalia; weakness. This was a soften-up and measuring of Israel. They have been found wanting. This will encourage the next conflict that much sooner.
4. Stopping the destruction of Hezbollah will be looked back on(it already is) as the greatest strategic blunder Israel has ever made.
5. When this war is fought again for the third time, it will far more costlier in terms of lives. Iran might not feel it needs to hide behind its proxy.
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I feel a sense of impending doom, that a contract for a new world war was just inked.
It seems like we are again being driven towards global war, just as in the days preceding WWII. Iran is set on an apocalyptic path and continues to goad the free world. There is no one in the West with the willingness to force their hand early, but even if there was, it may be exactly what Tehran wishes.
If Israel had wiped out Hezbollah, the show of strength would have kept the wolves at bay. But its failure will only draw them in sooner.
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The problem confronting the West with regards to radical Islam is this; there is no middle war, no low grade level of conflict which will cure us of militantism. We are learning this in Iraq. The odds seem to be against us reigning in the chaos. I hope, very much so, that I am proved wrong. The rewards of a stable Democratic Iraq would do much in the way of aiding the conflict of values between East and West. It’s not out of the question. However, the forces of Islamic fundamentalism are proving very determined. They would rather see tens of thousands of their own dead at their own hands, including women and children, than lose the war in Iraq to the West, which is exactly why they need to be crippled, but I digress.
I give Iraq 2 more years to get their forces trained up, then we pull out, barring serious attacks on the West.
Looking ahead, after my 2 years, and still faced with an enemy determined to conquer and kill infidels for the sake of Allah, until Islam dominates the globe; the West will have two choices with regards to the War on Islamic Fascism:
1) Get Roman. Gather the necessary will and annihilate any and all things resembling militant Islam, especially the Madrashes, the religious schools where future terrorists are imprinted. This would require the West to adopt the same ruthless mentality from WWII. This will not happen until Western populaces have their survival instincts fully aroused, and this will not happen until the Big One.
2) Leave the Middle East, and wait and see if the Big One comes, an attack with WMD. When it comes refer to option #1 and start buying war bonds.

Tim DoctorThe Tim Doctor ShowWTKG Am 1230 Sundays, 8-10pmhttp://www.timdoctor.com/http://www.wtkg.com/ -stream

The Iranian Mullah’s Aim

The Iranian Mullah’s Aim

By Amil Imani

The American Thinker

The world is presently at its most wicked. It is beyond human help. It requires only a nudge to implode and prepare for the divine ruler, the Saheb-ul-Zaman (the Mahdi, the Lord of the Age) to come and set it aright. It is the sacred duty and privilege of every Muslim to do all he can to hasten the death of the old world and the birth of the global Islamic Ummah. Thus goes the thinking of Iran’s ruling mullahs and their hand-picked president Mahmood Ahmadinejad.
It seems like the old millennialism thinking, a belief held, in one version or another by several major religions. Indeed it is, with one terribly alarming difference. This time around, a group of believers with tremendous resources is intent upon forcing the issue, making the conditions so dire that the reluctant Saheb-ul-Zaman is left no choice but to appear and assume his universal reign.
The belief in supernatural intervention to set the world aright is scriptural to major religions, including Islam. The Jews have been earnestly supplicating the Lord for the Messiah to come; the Christians are impatiently awaiting the second coming of Christ; and, the Zoroastrians are convinced that Saoshayant is the one who shall come, defeat the trouble-making Ahriman-Satan-and make the creatures again pure.
Up to this point millennialism was a belief and a hope. No one ever aspired to or had the means of making the anticipated events come about. The matter was in the hands of God. The Muslims’ perennial prayer recited every day, posted in mosques and even on bumpers of vehicles has been, “O, Saheb-ul-Zaman, hasten your coming.” The prayer for the advent, thus far, has been limited to passive supplications of the faithful.
It is a well-established fact that beliefs are a potent impetus to action. If you believe your home is about to be burglarized, you secure the house and take other precautions. If you, under the influence of drugs, believe that a bug is burrowing into your skin, you may take a knife to your own body and try to dig the imaginary bug out.
Hence, it is shortsighted to dismiss the mullahs as a bunch of lunatics who are out of touch with reality and that they have no intention of doing catastrophic mischief to compel the Mahdi’s coming. Maybe some arming of the Iraqi Shiites, a little support for Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Palestine-but no, no major idiocy. After all, they are rational people and in touch with reality. Any large scale troublemaking spells their doom as well. Thus goes the rationalization-the greatest risky tranquilizer of the mind.
Rationalization, compounded by complacency and denial, can be deadly, particularly when the adversaries have different realities. To the fanatic mullahs ruling Iran Sahaeb-ul-Zaman is an absolute reality and his promised advent is irrevocably ordained. This is their reality and their belief and they have every intention of leading their life according to them.
It is foolish for the non-Muslims to dismiss the mullahs and the Bin Ladens as a bunch of fringe lunatics who are going to go away simply by wishing it. The Islamist reality is that the non-Muslims are the ones who deserve to be done away with; they are the ones who have refused to submit to the summons of Allah for much too long; and, it is time for the faithful to get rid of them. This makes for a lopsided contest. The non-Muslims are passively wishing that the nightmarish surge of Islamism is only a temporary fringe phenomenon doomed to die on its own, while the other side is marshalling its huge destructive power to accomplish its aim by eradicating the non-Muslims.
The cabal of fanatical mullahs ruling Iran has lost its patience, not only with the unbelievers, but also with the Mahdi as well. They aim to force his arrival. The mullahs believe they have the means to make it impossible for the Mahdi to tarry any longer by causing unprecedented death and destruction-conditions deemed essential for his coming. The world must hit the very bottom, before the Savior of the world comes to the rescue, so they firmly believe.
The question is: What does prudence demand? Clearly wishing the problem to go away is not a very effective solution in the same way that wishing for the Saheb-ul-Zaman to come has not been. Reasoning and negotiating with the mullahs and their ilk hold very little, if any, lasting promise. There are always the easy ways of denial and appeasement. We are very good at both practices. No, the Muslims have been around for ages. They make some troubles from time to time. But they really are not all that bad and dangerous. We’ll get along. If we have too, we’ll even let them live by the Sharia-their stone-age laws- in our midst. We’ll be reasonable and they will come around. We’ll just have to get along. So goes the line.
One problem: The other side doesn’t think this way. The Islamofascists don’t believe in the notion of “Live and let live.” They believe that the earth is Allah’s and it has been sullied by the heathens, the unbelievers and the kafir for far too long. Now that they have the means, they aim to make the world to their design and bring about the final solution-a nasty reminder of not too long ago Nazism.
Is this alarmist, or even hatemongering? You don’t believe Muslims can be that intolerant and hostile toward non-Muslims and that they’ll never go to the extremes? You know Muslims personally in your neighborhood or your work place and they are nice people? The nice Muslims you personally know are presently small minorities in alien lands. They have to be nice, and they may indeed be nice. Yet, when the main force of Islamofascism surges forward, these nice folks will either have to join it or be swept aside like the rest of the resisters.
The concern is not with individual Muslims who live as solid citizens in democratic societies. They may have developed a taste for the freedom democracy bestows or have simply learned to tolerate it. Our concern is with the gathering Islamofascist storm from the heart of Islamdom. To truly appreciate Islam, you must experience firsthand Islam in power. Take a quick trip to the lands of the Muslims and find out for yourself how horribly they treat the non-Muslims, even the, “People of the book,” Jews and Christians. Try to have a Bible study group or build a church in Saudi Arabia and discover the benevolence of Islamic rule.
The world is a laboratory where the experiment with Islam shows irrefutable results. The Islamic Republic of Iran represents the cutting edge for the newly petrodollar-invigorated Islam. It is determined to complete its task of ending the world of “Dar-ul-Harb”-the non-Muslim world to be warred upon-and establishing the “Dar-ul-Solh,” or “Dar-ul-Salam”-the Muslim world of the Ummah under the rule of the Mahdi. If achieving this aim hinges on the conflagration of the Third World War, the mullahs are happy to make it happen.

Amil Imani is an Iranian born American citizen and pro-democracy activist who resides in the United States of America. He maintains a website.

Dear Muslims: What is It that You Don’t Understand?

Sunday, 23 July 2006
We, the non-Muslims—the infidels, heathens, unbelievers, apostates, enemies of Allah, najis (soiled), as you prefer to call us—would like to know what is it that you don’t understand and what it is that makes you behave so badly toward us? You blame us for your problems and believe if we embrace Islam and help establish the Islamic Ummeh the earth would be cleansed of us, transformed to paradise, and all your problems disappear.

Respectfully, we disagree. We believe that you and your system of belief are at the core of your problems; that you need to critically examine the facts rather than conveniently blame others for your ills. Keep in mind that beliefs and ideas make people human, that beliefs are roadmaps of life. To the extent that the roadmap is rational and enlightened, the path of life is illumined, pitfalls are avoided and obstacles are removed. The terrain of life has greatly changed since the roadmap of Islam was given to the wondering primitives of the Arabian Peninsula.

The twenty first century presents great challenges and opportunities that demand new ways of thinking and behaving. The doctrine of Islam may have been appropriate for the desert dwellers of some 1400 years ago, the people you yourselves stigmatize as “The Ignorant.” It is dysfunctional today to say the least. As a matter of fact, Islam went astray from the very beginning and inflicted a great deal of suffering on both its followers as well as those who resisted its advance.Early on, the Prophet Muhammad explicitly said, “There is no compulsion in religion.” He further confirmed that admonition, “For you, your religion; and for me, my religion.” Why is it that as soon as you gathered enough power, you violated those exhortations and set out to force your belief and way of life on others at the point of the sword? Further, you conveniently ignored your own teaching by unsheathing your sword at “the people of the book”—Jews and Christians. You spared them death only if they converted or consented to pay you backbreaking religious taxes of Jazyyeh.Your cruel successful subjugation of the people of the Arabian Peninsula whetted your appetite for further conquests. You ventured into the civilized world—to Persia, the Levant, Spain, and eventually to the gates of Vienna. Cruelty and terror were your instruments of policy—weapons you liberally use today whenever and wherever you are able.Contempt and hostility toward non-Muslims living under your rule as well as those outside of your domain have characterized your attitude and behavior throughout history. Isn’t time to say enough is enough? Is it not now time to stand back and take a good look at what is the root cause of this pathological state of affairs?Life is precious. It is to be protected, nurtured and celebrated. Mankind is moving, perhaps at a glacier pace, toward reconciliation, ever-expanding inclusiveness without any group or ideology imposing itself on others. Any attempt against this trend of unity in diversity is doomed to failure, as exemplified by the demise of fascism and communism. Your charter, the Quran, for most parts, preaches discrimination, death and imposition of its dogma on everyone. Islam, just like fascism and communism, is a dysfunctional ideology that needs to be abandoned. Humanity has matured considerably since the time of Muhammad. In order to continue its forward march, mankind must follow a roadmap appropriate for its age and state of development. It is foolish to insist that a book written over 1400 years ago must serve as the one and only guide for humanity. Progress thrives in a marketplace of free ideas, where beliefs and viewpoints, not people, clash. It is through the unimpeded clash of ideas that the best decisions and actions are reached. Islam is anathema to this invaluable principle. By forcing itself on any and all people it could, Islam violated this vital principle and it aims to continue to do so to this day. Islam’s inflexible and intolerant dogmatism is at the heart of Islamic world’s stagnation and backwardness. It is evident that staying put, so to speak, does not allow going forward. It is not the non-Muslim world, the convenient scapegoat, but Islam itself which is the culprit for your chronic ills. The non-Muslims of the twenty first century treasure freedom in all its forms and are not going to lend their necks passively to the yoke of blind obedience and imitation.Is the present argument too difficult to understand? Is it too threatening to the security of your mindset to concede its validity? Please have the courage and take that fateful step. Leave Islam, as many of us “apostates” have done, and inhale the life-nurturing fragrance of freedom. Islam is a slaveholder. It feels that it owns you; it condemns you as apostate to be beheaded if you dare to leave its chains. The non-Muslims, by contrast, respect you as a free human and support your inalienable right to believe whatever you want to believe—even if it is a non-belief. If you still wish to wrap yourself in your suffocating security blanket—Islam—please keep it to yourself and refrain from forcing it on others.