THE CHURCH MILITANT
Ephesians 5:11-"And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them". This Christian News Blog maintains a one stop resource of current news and reports of its own related to church, moral, spiritual, and related political issues, plus articles, and postings from other online discernment ministries, and media which share the aims to obey the biblical commands to shed light on and refute error, heresy, apostasy, cults, and spiritual abuse.
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research purposes:
The world has no doubt been rocked by the horrific news of the mass shooting by a White supremacist that killed dozens of Muslims who were worshiping in 2 mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. The racist attack shocked the normally quiet country and has sent the world reeling into mourning and much discussion of violence, gun control and politics. However, in all the anger, emotion and discussion about what motivated the killer to commit such an atrocity the spiritual clues and satanic influence behind this crime should not be ignored.
ONE OF THE WORST MASS SHOOTINGS IN HISTORY
Locals in Christchurch are still reeling from the worst tragedy in the nation’s history.
According to reports:
“One suspect has been charged with murder after at least 49 people were killed and more than 40 others were injured in mass shootings at two mosques in New Zealand on Friday.
The attacks occurred while worshippers attended Friday prayers. The main attack happened at Masjid Al Noor in central Christchurch, the largest city on the country’s southern island, where 41 people were killed, police said. A second shooting took place at Linwood Masjid, in an eastern suburb of Christchurch, where seven people were killed. Another person died after being transported to a hospital.
A number of explosive devices attached to vehicles were reportedly defused after the attack.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern called the incident a “terrorist attack.”
A 28-year-old man, who authorities identified as Brenton Tarrant, charged with murder, appeared in Christchurch District Court briefly on Saturday. Two other people remained in police custody Saturday, after a total of four people — three men and one woman — were initially detained as suspects.” (source).
Tarrant, who livestreamed the murders on Facebook, twitter and Instagram (while also posting on YouTube) is a self-described white supremacist, racist and fascist who carried out the attacks in response to immigration by non-whites and revenge for Muslim terror attacks in Europe. His “manifesto” was a likely intentionally confusing rant on politics and society. The alleged murderer referenced Norwegian white supremacist and mass murderer Anders Breivik who in 2011 killed 77 people at a youth camp in Norway and after posting a 1,500-page manifesto online. Tarrant also referred to himself as a “Knights Templar: invoking the name of the Crusaders as Breivik did in his own manifesto.
MURDER – THE ULTIMATE RESULT OF THE SIN NATURE
“But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul: all they that hate me love death.” – Proverbs 8:36
The Bible is very clear that it is because of our fallen, sin nature, that humans can commit murder. It is also a downward spiral as one’s heart moves continually way from God and towards one’s own desire for evil and satanic influence. The Cain, the first son born in human history, was also tragically the first murderer – killing his own brother Abel. After God’s accepted the offering of Abel and rejected Cain’s, the wicked son plotted to murder his own family. The Bible details the spirit operating within him:
“For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother’s righteous.” – 1 John 3:11-12
One of the numerous wounded victims who suffered at the hands of anti-Muslim bigotry.
Cain was “of that wicked one” – meaning Satan. Once a person gets so deep into sinful rebellion against God, the limited influence of God all people have – the conscience, gets “seared” and all manner of evil becomes acceptable. This is Satan’s goal for all people – to abandon any thought or fear of God in their hearts. Tarrant built his life around hatred for other people. Hatred for people of non-White races. Hatred for Muslims. Hatred for immigrants. This sinful lust in his heart soon grew into a desire to kill. The Bible speaks of this very descent:
“But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.” – James 1:14-15
Note once again that it is a process. Judas, the disciple who betrayed Jesus, helping to frame The Lord and arrange His execution by Roman authorities, started off as a thief. But that sin soon led to helping to being complicit in murder. And to no surprise at the moment Judas prepared for the ultimate betrayal, Satan was involved:
“And the chief priests and scribes sought how they might kill [Jesus]; for they feared the people. Then entered Satan into Judas surnamed Iscariot, being of the number of the twelve. And he went his way, and communed with the chief priests and captains, how he might betray him unto them.” – Luke 22:2-4
Jesus Christ said of the Devil: “…He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.” (John 8:44)
Therefore, putting your faith and trust in God, reading and understanding the Bible, praying to God and keeping love for Him in your heart, is so critical. Not only will it save your soul from eternal damnation, it gives the power to overcome sin and a desire to live for God, not rebel.
THE NEW ZEALAND SHOOTER’S SATANIC CONNECTION
The Crazy World of Arthur Brown – the heavy metal band whose music Brenton Tarrant was listening to as he carried out his murders.
After he returned in his car to head to the second mosque to find more victims, Tarrant played the song “Fire” by British rock band The Crazy World of Arthur Brown. The killer could be heard yelling the opening line of the song on his livestream:
“I am the god of hell fire, and I bring you!
Fire, I’ll take you to burn.
Fire, I’ll take you to learn.
I’ll see you burn!” (source)
Arthur Brown, the lead singer is often credit as being the father of heavy metal music. He was renowned for his obsession with occult imagery and performed with a colander with a flame ignited on it. This was done in the same fashion of the Baphomet:
Left: Heavy Metal “forefather” Arthur Brown with flaming collander on his head. Right: The Baphomet, a symbol for Satan, with a flame on his head.
Here is another picture of Arthur Brown’s group mimicking the shape of the Baphomet sigil:
The Baphomet Sigil
The Baphomet, a term originally coined by the Knights Templars, when they were on trial for heresy and confessed to worshiping an idol of that name. In describing the flame atop the head of the Baphomet, a researcher stated:
“Baphomet signifies Βαφη Μητεος, baptism of Metis, baptism of fire,[44] or the Gnostic baptism, an enlightening of the mind, which, however, was interpreted by the Ophites, in an obscene sense, as fleshly union .” (source).
And of course, as time progressed the Baphomet became synonymous with the Devil. In fact, the Church of Satan official adopted the Baphomet sigil symbol as their logo. Arthur Brown, who also had a song called “In The Devil’s Grip” was also renowned for using his rock concerts and music as a means to initiate an occult ritual. In an inteview, Peter Bebergal, author of Season of The Witch: How The Occult Saved Rock n’ Roll, he describes Arthur Brown’s beliefs:
“But for some, while they saw their music has having potential to work magic, they still saw themselves first and foremost as musicians. Arthur Brown, best known for his song “Fire” believed a rock concert could function as a shamanic rite. He used every element of the performance, from his makeup to the staging to the way he moved, as an attempt to channel and then release what he believed was magical energy. ” (source).
Brown, in a freemasonic pose popularized by luciferian Aleister Crowley.
What spirit was moving in the New Zealand killer to play this particular song as he committed such horrific acts? The same spirit that was working in Cain when he slew Abel, in Pharaoh wanting to kill the male babies in the days of Moses and Judas when he betrayed Christ. Do not be deceived.
PRAY FOR NEW ZEALAND
The nation of New Zealand desperately needs prayer right now.
“But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.” – 2 Corinthians 4:1-4
If you are a Christian, pray for New Zealand to heal in the wake of this unprecedented violence in their nation. Pray for the families of the Muslim victims to be comforted in this terrible time. Pray for the shooter, whose mind and heart were so twisted with sin and rejection of God that he could do this. And pray for the churches in Christchurch to live up to their city’s namesake and boldly and lovingly preach the Gospel to the many hurting people there.
Pray for the Gospel to shine in the hearts of the people in that nation. Christianity identifies the real problem in the world: sin. It is in the hearts of all people and there is nothing we can do on our own to stop it. But through faith in Jesus Christ, sin can be conquered. God wants to give all people a new spirit and heart that will seek to serve Him and do good, not evil:
“A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.” – Ezekiel 36:26-27
Racial and political strife feel like they are at an all-time high in society. Hatred is brewing all over social media. Families are divided. Workplaces are split in hostile anger. Brenton Tarrant’s agenda was right in light with the Devil’s: to sow discord, anger and more violence in society – all to drag as many people into true hellfire as possible.
This is not God’s way. This will not bring peace. True peace comes with being forgiven for your sins and reconciled with God. This is what Jesus died for. This is why Jesus rose from the grave after taking your punishment on the cross. If you are not a Christian, do not wait. This tragedy is yet another stark reminder that we do not know how long we have left on this Earth. Life like a vapor, can disappear in a moment. Believe the Gospel of free forgiveness of sins through faith in Jesus Christ and let your heart be filled with God’s love. The world could use a lot more of it right now.
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research purposes:
Predictions were that the New Zealand shooting would be used as a pretext to further stifle critics of Islam. So perhaps it’s no coincidence that Judge Jeanine Pirro, under fire recently for criticizing Muslim congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), just had the Saturday edition of her show unceremoniously pulled off the air by Fox News.
While Fox hasn’t explained the move, the timing is uncanny. It was Saturday, 3/9 that Pirro made her remark, “Think about it — Omar wears a hijab. Is her adherence to this Islamic doctrine indicative of her adherence to Sharia law, which in itself is antithetical to the United States Constitution?” Yet it wasn’t till this past Saturday, 3/16 — the very day her show was set to air again — that we heard about the cancellation.
This also happened to be just two days after China-loving, anti-capitalist, self-described “eco-fascist” Brenton Tarrant perpetrated the horrible Christchurch, New Zealand, massacres, killing 50.
But this was predictable — and predicted. Chronicles magazine wrote Friday that Muslim activists and their Thought Police enablers would use the shooting as a pretext to stifle “‘Islamophobia,’ effectively defined as any form of meaningful debate of Islam, its scriptural message, historical practice, and current ambitions.”
And, sure enough, writesAmerican Thinker’s Thomas Lifson, “New Zealand has changed the momentum of American politics, putting concerns about Jew-hatred in the back seat (or maybe the trunk), while ‘Islamophobia’ activists sit in the driver’s seat, turning us left.”
It doesn’t matter that, as I wrote Saturday, Muslim-on-Christian massacres are the norm in places such as Nigeria, that many thousands of Christians were thus killed in just the past year, and that a Christian is 143 times as likely to be killed for being Christian in a Muslim country as a Muslim is to be killed for being Muslim in a Western one. Perception isn’t reality, but it shapes policy — and isshaped by the media.
The mainstream media’s selective reporting means people don’t hear about massacred Christians, but it also gives us other double standards. For example, while it’s verboten for even a pundit to question Omar’s faith, senators Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), and Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) have in recent times suggested that certain judges may be too Catholic to sit on the bench, coming “close to imposing an unconstitutional ‘religious test’ upon [them],” as the Washington Examinerwrote last year. The Thought Police didn’t seem to mind, either.
Then there’s the headwear hustle. Pirro is a zero, supposedly, for questioning Omar’s hijab. But consider that Americans wearing MAGA hats have been attacked, and refused service in restaurants and elsewhere; also note that the poor Covington Catholic High School boys were targeted by activists and media for scorn, ostracism, and character assassination for wearing the caps.
Critics may say that MAGA hats represent something: ideas. But so does the hijab. These are symbols, which by definition are symbolic of something.
So the question is: What is it in the hijab’s case — and what, in particular, in Omar’s case?
American Thinker’s E. Jeffrey Ludwig weighed in on this yesterday, writing that Omar “poses an interesting case study in American cultural or civilizational consciousness. She is the first congressional representative to wear a scarf around her head, and that scarf is for some a symbol of the breadth and depth of our acceptance of others. For others, it is a symbol of alienation and rejection of the America she claims — simply by holding office — to represent. To those who see her this way, the hijab or head covering is seen as a hostile schmata (rag) whereby she is not merely carrying on one of her subculture’s customs, but, in essence, giving the finger to the country she now would participate in governing.”
If this seems a stretch, consider: The New York Timesreported last year that Omar “became a citizen in 2000, when she was 17. After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, she decided to wear the hijab, as an open declaration of her identity.”
Striking. So Omar “put on the hijab after 9/11?” asksAmerican Thinker editor Monica Showalter incredulously. “Back [when] most Americans were draping themselves in the American flag, flags flying like crazy, flag pins, flag boxes, flag everything, and back when Palestinians were dancing in the streets about it? Yes, that happened, there were horrible people in hijabs dancing with glee when that terrible event happened. How strange she chose that moment to put on the hijab. For her, it wasn’t even a religious motivation, it was, as she said, all about her identity, who[m] she identified with.”
“It goes against the response normally seen at such times,” Showalter continues. “Normally, people tend to want to assimilate with the injured party or with the nation itself when it's had war declared upon it.”
A case in point, Showalter points out, is when “Japanese-descent Americans responded to their nationality under fire after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor by volunteering in vast numbers to join the U.S. military to fight the Axis.” But that was a different time — and Omar is a different kind of immigrant.
It’s not just that, according to some sources, she has been implicated in multiple felonies, including fraud relating to immigration, healthcare, taxes, and the Free Application for Federal Student Aid program. It’s that she exudes bigotry and ingratitude.
Omar has accused the United States of being complicit in “genocide” in “Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua.” Moreover, reports the New York Times, from “‘the first day we arrived in America,’” Omar said, “she concluded that it was not the golden land that she had heard about.” (We really need to stop holding that gun to her head and keeping her here.)
Omar also tweeted in 2012 that “Israel has hypnotized the world, [sic] may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel.” In a 2018 tweet she called Israel an “apartheid regime,” and she has demanded an end to the “occupation” of East Jerusalem. These are typical jihadist passions.
To the point of Pirro’s statement, however, the “hijab is in many cases, if not most, indicative of adherence to Sharia,” explainsJihad Watch proprietor Robert Spencer, one of America’s foremost authorities on Islam. “Sharia does contradict Constitutional principles in numerous ways, including the denial of the freedom of speech and the denial of the equality of rights of women,” he continues.
Note, too, that “the Center for Security Policy released a 2015 poll of Muslims in the US showing that ‘a majority (51 percent) agreed that “Muslims in America should have the choice of being governed according to Shariah,”’” as I reported in 2017 (related video below concerning the part of Omar’s district dubbed “Little Mogadishu”). Given these facts, was Pirro’s question unjustified — or logical and necessary?
The deeper issue is that we always should — and should be able to — question our leaders’ motivations. If someone is a Marxist, is it wrong to wonder if his worldview contradicts his constitutional duties? If you think this isn’t analogous, consider that what differentiates ideologies from each other is that they involve different values.
Yet so do different religions.
Thus, not all religions can be morally equal unless all values are. This value-equivalency error, known as “moral relativism,” not only has as a corollary that all faiths are morally equal, but that all ideologies (and everything else) are, too. Do we really believe that Marxism, Nazism, conservatism, liberalism, and every other ism are equivalent?
Since our Constitution also expresses specific values, it follows that the values of certain other “belief systems” — whether called “religion,” “ideology,” “philosophy,” or something else — may conflict with it. It therefore is not just wise to wonder if a leader’s beliefs are compatible with the Constitution. It’s also an imperative of good citizenship.
While I won’t hold my breath waiting, I’d like to see a reporter ask Representative Omar, “Do you believe that Muslims in the United States should be allowed to govern themselves with Sharia rather than civil law?” and, “Do you believe Sharia law should be subordinated to our Constitution?”
Perhaps only Catholic judges can be thus grilled, but it would be interesting to see if Omar could give a straight answer.
Outrage is mounting in the wake of Judge Jeanine Pirro's suspension from Fox News. The Center for Security Policy is now voicing its anger with the news outlet. One America's Neil W. McCabe sat down with the group's president and has this from Washington.
3000 Yazidi sex slaves are lost and feared dead. This story should be in headlines everywhere. Is it? Are the lives of Yazidi girls and women so valueless in the eyes of the Western media? Add to that the fact that thousands of other Yazidi sex slaves who were tortured and murdered. Where also are the human rights activists? Why do they ignore these victims of jihad terror and abuse?
“LOST FOREVER ISIS’ 3,000 Yazidi sex slaves feared dead as hopes of finding any of them alive fade with collapse of evil ‘caliphate,’” by Tariq Tahir, Sun, March 12, 2019:
FEARS are mounting for thousands of Yazidi women who were captured and used as sex slaves by ISIS fighters.
Figures suggest almost 10,000 Yazidis have either been killed or kidnapped by ISIS and there are horrifying accounts of mass rape.
Many Yazidis have been able to flee the clutches of the terror group as it defends its final remaining stronghold in Baghouz, eastern Syria, from the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.
One Yazidi woman held as a sex slave by ISIS burnt her veil after being freed from the town this week.
But families of around 3,000 others still missing fear they may never see their loved ones again.
“We have had the same number of missing for years now. The problem is, not many are coming back,” Ahmed Burjus, deputy executive director of Yazda, a Yazidi advocacy group told The Independent.
“We were hoping that many people would be liberated from Baghouz, but only 50-60 [Yazidis] have escaped.”
The Yazidis are a religious sect whose beliefs combine elements of several ancient Middle Eastern religions.
But ISIS considers them devil worshippers and its attacks on the group were condemned as a “genocide” by the United Nations.
Salwa Sayed al-Omar spent years as a prisoner of ISIS but she escaped its clutches this week.
She fled its last populated enclave in east Syria along with two Iraqi boys pretending to be her brothers.
RAPED BY JIHADIS She said: “A woman was shifted from one man to another unless it was to one who had a bit of mercy… if she was in good condition, she would carry on.
“If not, she would get married to avoid being abused.”
Omar was eventually married to a Tajik jihadist but she escaped along with two Iraqi children, Mustafa and Dia, who had been her neighbours.
Dr Paul Stott, from the Henry Jackson Society think-tank, told The Sun Online: “At least 3,000 Yazidis are missing from this period. Many will be dead…..
Apparently, terrorism that is condoned by religions is fine with him, as in “strike terror in the enemies of Allah” (Qur’an 8:60).
And by “hate speech” he likely means honest discussion of how Islamic jihadis use the texts and teachings of Islam to justify violence.
“King Salman in tweet calls for combating hate speech, terrorism,” Al Arabiya, March 15, 2019:
Saudi Arabia’s King Salman reacting to the attacks on two mosques in New Zealand tweeted that it was a terrorist attack and called on the international community to combat hate speech and terrorism.
The tweet read: “The heinous massacre that targeted worshippers in the mosque in New Zealand is a terrorist act, and it reaffirms the responsibility of the international community in combating hate speech and terrorism that is not condoned by religions or the values of tolerance.”…
“Despite 9/11, the US still is still unable to tackle the Islamic threat in the country, an investigative journalist and expert on Arab affairs warns. Exactly what happened in the mosques in France 15 years ago is happening today in the U.S.”
“Incitement to genocide of Jews widespread inside US mosques,” but to call it out makes one “Islamophobic.” The Muslim community must end this hatred, intolerance, and bigotry.
“WATCH: Incitement to Genocide of Jews Widespread Inside US Mosques,” United With Israel,March 11, 2019:
Despite 9/11, the US still is still unable to tackle the Islamic threat in the country, an investigative journalist and expert on Arab affairs warns.
Exactly what happened in the mosques in France 15 years ago is happening today in the U.S., says Israeli investigative journalist and Arab Affairs expert Zvi Yehezkeli.
In this video, Yehezkeli, who went undercover in the U.S. last year, says anti-Semitism and incitement to genocide of Jews have become prevalent in mosques across the country, while the American government remains unaware.
The Jewish community has not responded either, he adds.
Despite 9/11, the US is still unable to tackle the situation, and the writing is on the wall, Yehezkeli warns….
Qanta Ahmed is a poised and eloquent defender of “moderate” Islam. A British-American pulmonologist now serving as an Associate Professor of Medicine at the State University of New York, she also describes herself as a specialist in the study of Islamism as contrasted with Islam.
In my opinion, Ahmed diagnoses the problem correctly, but she gets the etiology wrong. That is, she rightly condemns the anti-Semitic hatred of Ilhan Omar’s statements, but she wrongly attributes that antipathy to a modern fiction known as “Islamism” rather than to orthodox Islam itself. Since Ahmed clings to a belief in Islam as “moderate”, she cannot allow herself to see that the problem of Omar’s anti-Semitism finds its roots in the Qur’an and Sunna of Muhammad.
Ahmed declares, in purported contrast to Omar, “I don’t hate Jews and I don’t hate the Jewish state of Israel.” In fact, she goes on to say,
I have studied the Koran and know it says Jerusalem belongs the Jews. The Koran devotes an entire chapter to the Children of Israel – and considers the Israelites to be a nation bestowed with special Divine favor.
This is a highly misleading statement. As a matter of fact, Jerusalem is never mentioned by name in the Qur’an. Everything Ahmed declares positively about the Jews and Israel rests upon only one passage in Islam’s holy book, 5:20-21, which reads:
Remember Moses said to his people: “O my people! Call in remembrance the favour of Allah unto you, when He produced prophets among you, made you kings, and gave you what He had not given to any other among the peoples. O my people! Enter the holy land which Allah hath assigned unto you, and turn not back ignominiously, for then will ye be overthrown, to your own ruin.” (Yusuf ‘Ali translation)
Ahmed’s reasons that since according to the Qur’an’s Moses Allah has assigned the holy land to the Jews, and since Jerusalem was/is within that holy land, Jerusalem must still belong to the Jews today, for Allah’s decrees cannot be reversed. So, not only do the Jews have the right to Jerusalem as their capital, they also are the rightful owners of all the land of Israel, because they are a specially favored people before Allah. Wow!
This raises the question, “How have the vast majority of Muslims (non-Arab as well as Arab) gotten this so wrong, not only in modern times but throughout Islam’s history?” Why has anti-Jewish vitriol spewed from the mouths and pens of Muslim leaders, scholars and commoners since the time of the sahaba (Muhammad’s early companions)? Why has this Qur’anic text not convinced the worldwide Muslim community that Qanta Ahmed is right and they are wrong?
The answer is fairly simple. Ahmed has failed to read this passage in the light of the rest of the Qur’an.
First of all, v. 21 declares that Allah has decreed this land for the Jews as long as they “turn not back ignominiously [from jihad against the contemporaneous inhabitants], for then will ye be overthrown, to your own ruin.” This is a reference, of course, to the original conquest of the land after the Jews had been miraculously liberated from their slavery in Egypt. As subsequent verses in Sura 5 show, the bulk of the Jews, out of fear, disobeyed this divine command delivered by Moses, and so were punished with wandering in the wilderness for 40 years until that disobedient generation died off. Why does Allah remind Jewish listeners of this history? Because immediately preceding this story, Allah warns the Jews and Christians that “Now has come to you our messenger….” The sober implication is clear — if you do not obey Muhammad and become his followers, you will lose your favor with Allah and be treated as the disobedient Jews in the time of Moses.
The original decree of the holy land was dependent on the Jews’ obedience to Allah’s will. In refusing to carry out his commands, they lost their right to possess the land. Even though the next generation of Jews did conquer the land, the Jewish nation as a whole continued throughout its history to disobey God, and according to Islamic doctrine have become cursed and hated by Allah, eternal enemies to the Muslims and their god.
According to a statistical linguistic analysis of the Qur’an found on Dr. Bill Warner’s website www.politicalislam.com, though there are a few positive statements about Jews in the early Meccan revelations of Muhammad (while he was trying to curry their favor in support of his claim to be a true prophet of the one God), the Qur’an as a whole is virulently anti-Jewish. Overall, 18% of the content of the Qur’an is negative toward Jews. When you consider that Hitler’s Mein Kampf, which fueled the Nazi execration of Jews, devotes only 7% of its contents to anti-Semitism and yet stirred the Nazi party to such racist and anti-religious evil against Jews, why should we be surprised that Muslims by and large are today characterized by Qur’anically-induced loathing for Jews, and have been throughout their history, with limited exceptions? Ilhan Omar’s recent statements produce no surprise or condemnation among most Muslims around the world because they fit the mindset of Muhammad’s Islam as found in the Qur’an and Sunna.
For example, Jews are classified as infidels to be killed or subjugated (2.62; 5:69), unless they accept Islam, thereby becoming Muslims. Allah declares that only a tiny minority of Jews will convert (3.110, 199), leaving the vast majority as sinners destined for eternal fire (4;46, 162).
They have been inveterate persecutors and murderers of their prophets (3.181-3; 2:61, 87, 91; 4.155; 5.70). Their arrogance as the “chosen people” knows no bounds (2.111; 5.18; 62.6; 2.79-80), yet they are rightly characterized by disbelief and insubordination as seen in their breaking of the Mosaic Law (62.5; 5.44; 2.85). Indeed, because of their flagrant violation of the Sabbath, Allah turned some of them into apes and pigs (5.60; 2.65; 7.166). This is why today from the pulpits of mosques Jews are popularly referred to as “descendants/brothers of apes and pigs.”
Because of their “obstinate rebellion and disbelief” (5.64), Allah has put mutual “enmity and hatred among them” until the Day of Judgment. As a result of their bitter hearts, “they ever strive to make mischief on the earth” (for which the appropriate punishment, according to 5.33, is:
“…that they be killed or crucified or that their hands and feet be cut off from opposite sides or that they be exiled from the land. That is for them a disgrace in this world; and for them in the Hereafter is a great punishment.”
Cursed repeatedly by Allah (2.89; 105), the disbelieving (i.e., non-Muslim) Jews “…have drawn on themselves wrath upon wrath” (2.90). They have distorted their sacred texts in order to deceive Muhammad and his followers (4.46; 5.13, 41-3; 2.75, 79, 104; 3.78), they have concealed truths in order to undermine Muhammad’s standing as a true prophet (2.76, 146; 3.71), they have rejected, out of jealousy, the authenticity of the Qur’an as the Word of God (2.89-90, 105; 4.153). They “bite their nails in rage against the believers [i.e., Muslims]” (3.119) and conspire to turn such believers into infidels (2.109; 3.69, 99-100; 4.54; 5.59).
According to 9.30-31, the Jews are not merely infidels but idolaters — those guilty of shirk, the worst sin against Allah, which the Qur’an declares unforgivable (4.48). Together with all other idolaters, they are “the strongest in enmity to the believers” (5.82; 3.186). They have “thrown away” the covenant which Allah originally made with them in favor of “some miserable [worldly] gain” (3.187) but their end will be a “painful torment.”
Because their hearts are filled always with “evil inclinations” (2.120, 135, 140), Muslims are not to take them (or Christians) as friends/supporters (5.51, 57; 42.15). Instead, when able, the Muslim umma (nation) is to serve as the punishing rod of Allah against them (29.46; 3.20; 2.85, 109; 5.64;9.29; 33.26-7).
This conviction played itself out in Medina during the lifetime of Muhammad. When he arrived there from Mecca in 622, there were 3 prosperous and powerful Jewish tribes: the Qaynuqa, the Nadir and the Qurayza. In five years time, two of the tribes had been expelled (with the Muslims confiscating their lands, homes and possessions), and the third tribe lost their 700-900 adult males to beheading, while the women and children were farmed out as slaves.
One might argue that such Jew-hatred was limited to the time of Muhammad and that such horrible passages in the Qur’an no longer apply to Muslims in their relations to the Jews today. However, Islam claims that the Qur’an is the eternal and unchanging Word of Allah, written on an eternal book in heaven before history began. Its dictates are timeless and universal, unless Allah abrogates them with new revelation. There is no abrogation of such anti-Semitism in the Qur’an, and unfortunately, there can be none in the future since Allah declares in 5.3, “This day I have perfected for you your religion and completed My favor upon you and have approved for you Islam as religion.”
To prove that Islamic hatred for the Jews is cemented in the Muslim psyche for all time we may turn to one of the most popular hadith traditions cited among Muslims both Sunni and Shi’ite. Found in both the collections of Bukhari and al-Muslim (the two most authoritative Ahadith works), the prophecy attributed to Muhammad reads thus:
Allah’s Apostle said, “The Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say. “O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him.” (Bukhari, 4.52.177)
or:
Abu Huraira reported Allah’s Messenger as saying: “The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him; but the tree Gharqad would not say, for it is the tree of the Jews.” (Muslim, 7.41.6985)
In the final analysis, Qanta Ahmed is right in calling out Ilhan Omar’s hatred of Jews and Israel. However, she is wrong in attributing such a mindset to “Islamism” as something distinct from Islam. As the Qur’an, the Hadith and the early biographies of Muhammad’s life all confirm, anti-Semitism is baked into the revelation and practice of Islam from at least 622 on, when Muhammad moved to Medina and began his campaign to destroy all those opposing him, most notably the Jews.
Qanta Ahmed no doubt means well, but in deluding herself about the truth of Islam she is also deluding others. Her Islam is a chimera, for it flies in the face of the religion’s core teachings, but the rest of the Islamic world knows this and consequently ignores her words.
Four years ago, I wrote about my decision to live as a woman in The New York Times, writing that I had wanted to live “authentically as the woman that I have always been,” and had “effectively traded my white male privilege to become one of America’s most hated minorities.”
Three years ago, I decided that I was neither male nor female, but nonbinary—and made headlines after an Oregon judge agreed to let me identify as a third sex, not male or female.
Now, I want to live again as the man that I am.
I’m one of the lucky ones. Despite participating in medical transgenderism for six years, my body is still intact. Most people who desist from transgender identities after gender changes can’t say the same.
But that’s not to say I got off scot-free. My psyche is eternally scarred, and I’ve got a host of health issues from the grand medical experiment.
Here’s how things began.
After convincing myself that I was a woman during a severe mental health crisis, I visited a licensed nurse practitioner in early 2013 and asked for a hormone prescription. “If you don’t give me the drugs, I’ll buy them off the internet,” I threatened.
Although she’d never met me before, the nurse phoned in a prescription for 2 mg of oral estrogen and 200 mg of Spironolactone that very same day.
The nurse practitioner ignored that I have chronic post-traumatic stress disorder, having previously served in the military for almost 18 years. All of my doctors agree on that. Others believe that I have bipolar disorder and possibly borderline personality disorder.
I should have been stopped, but out-of-control, transgender activism had made the nurse practitioner too scared to say no.
I’d learned how to become a female from online medical documents at a Department of Veterans Affairs hospital website.
After I began consuming the cross-sex hormones, I started therapy at a gender clinic in Pittsburgh so that I could get people to sign off on the transgender surgeries I planned to have.
All I needed to do was switch over my hormone operating fuel and get my p—– turned into a v—–. Then I’d be the same as any other woman. That’s the fantasy the transgender community sold me. It’s the lie I bought into and believed.
Only one therapist tried to stop me from crawling into this smoking rabbit hole. When she did, I not only fired her, I filed a formal complaint against her. “She’s a gatekeeper,” the trans community said.
I should have been stopped, but out-of-control, transgender activism had made the nurse practitioner too scared to say no.
Professional stigmatisms against “conversion therapy” had made it impossible for the therapist to question my motives for wanting to change my sex.
The “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders” (Fifth Edition) says one of the traits of gender dysphoria is believing that you possess the stereotypical feelings of the opposite sex. I felt that about myself, but yet no therapist discussed it with me.
Two weeks hadn’t passed before I found a replacement therapist. The new one quickly affirmed my identity as a woman. I was back on the road to getting vaginoplasty.
There’s abundant online literature informing transgender people that their sex change isn’t real. But when a licensed medical doctor writes you a letter essentially stating that you were born in the wrong body and a government agency or court of law validates that delusion, you become damaged and confused. I certainly did.
Painful Roots
My trauma history resembles a ride down the Highway of Death during the first Gulf War.
As a child, I was sexually abused by a male relative. My parents severely beat me. At this point, I’ve been exposed to so much violence and had so many close calls that I don’t know how to explain why I’m still alive. Nor do I know how to mentally process some of the things I’ve seen and experienced.
Dr. Ray Blanchard has an unpopular theory that explains why someone like me may have been drawn to transgenderism. He claims there are two types of transgender women: homosexuals that are attracted to men, and men who are attracted to the thought or image of themselves as females.
It’s a tough thing to admit, but I belong to the latter group. We are classified as having autogynephilia.
After having watched pornography for years while in the Army and being married to a woman who resisted my demands to become the ideal female, I became that female instead. At least in my head.
While autogynephilia was my motivation to become a woman, gender stereotypes were my means of implementation. I believed wearing a long wig, dresses, heels, and makeup would make me a woman.
Feminists begged to differ on that. They rejected me for conforming to female stereotypes. But as a new member of the transgender community, I beat up on them too. The women who become men don’t fight the transgender community’s wars. The men in dresses do.
Medical Malpractice
The best thing that could have happened would have been for someone to order intensive therapy. That would have protected me from my inclination to cross-dress and my risky sexual transgressions, of which there were many.
Instead, quacks in the medical community hid me in the women’s bathroom with people’s wives and daughters. “Your gender identity is female,” these alleged professionals said.
Trans men are winning in medicine, and they’ve won the battle for language.
The medical community is so afraid of the trans community that they’re now afraid to give someone Blanchard’s diagnosis. Trans men are winning in medicine, and they’ve won the battle for language.
Think of the word “transvestite.” They’ve succeeded in making it a vulgar word, even though it just means men dressing like women. People are no longer allowed to tell the truth about men like me. Everyone now has to call us transgender instead.
The diagnostic code in my records at the VA should read Transvestic Disorder (302.3). Instead, the novel theories of Judith Butler and Anne Fausto-Sterling have been used to cover up the truths written about by Blanchard, J. Michael Bailey, and Alice Dreger.
I confess to having been motivated by autogynephilia during all of this. Blanchard was right.
Trauma, hypersexuality owing to childhood sexual abuse, and autogynephilia are all supposed to be red flags for those involved in the medical arts of psychology, psychiatry, and physical medicine—yet nobody except for the one therapist in Pittsburgh ever tried to stop me from changing my sex. They just kept helping me to harm myself.
Escaping to ‘Nonbinary’
Three years into my gender change from male to female, I looked hard into the mirror one day. When I did, the facade of femininity and womanhood crumbled.
Despite having taken or been injected with every hormone and antiandrogen concoction in the VA’s medical arsenal, I didn’t look anything like a female. People on the street agreed. Their harsh stares reflected the reality behind my fraudulent existence as a woman. Biological sex is immutable.
It took three years for that reality to set in with me.
When the fantasy of being a woman came to an end, I asked two of my doctors to allow me to become nonbinary instead of female to bail me out. Both readily agreed.
After pumping me full of hormones—the equivalent of 20 birth control pills per day—they each wrote a sex change letter. The two weren’t just bailing me out. They were getting themselves off the hook for my failed sex change. One worked at the VA. The other worked at Oregon Health & Science University.
To escape the delusion of having become a woman, I did something completely unprecedented in American history. In 2016, I convinced an Oregon judge to declare my sex to be nonbinary—neither male nor female.
In my psychotic mind, I had restored the mythical third sex to North America. And I became the first legally recognized nonbinary person in the country.
Celebrity Status
The landmark court decision catapulted me to instant fame within the LGBT community. For 10 nonstop days afterward, the media didn’t let me sleep. Reporters hung out in my Facebook feed, journalists clung to my every word, and a Portland television station beamed my wife and I into living rooms in the United Kingdom.
Then, before the judge’s ink had even dried on my Oregon sex change court order, a Washington, D.C.-based LGBT legal aid organization contacted me. “We want to help you change your birth certificate,” they offered.
Within months, I scored another historic win after the Department of Vital Records issued me a brand new birth certificate from Washington, D.C., where I was born. A local group called Whitman-Walker Health had gotten my sex designation on my birth certificate switched to “unknown.” It was the first timein D.C. history a birth certificate had been printed with a sex marker other than male or female.
Another transgender legal aid organization jumped on the Jamie Shupe bandwagon, too. Lambda Legal used my nonbinary court order to help convince a Colorado federal judge to order the State Department to issue a passport with an X marker (meaning nonbinary) to a separate plaintiff named Dana Zzyym.
LGBT organizations helping me to screw up my life had become a common theme. During my prior sex change to female, the New York-based Transgender Legal Defense & Education Fund had gotten my name legally changed. I didn’t like being named after the uncle who’d molested me. Instead of getting me therapy for that, they got me a new name.
A Pennsylvania judge didn’t question the name change, either. Wanting to help a transgender person, she had not only changed my name, but at my request she also sealed the court order, allowing me to skip out on a ton of debt I owed because of a failed home purchase and begin my new life as a woman. Instead of merging my file, two of the three credit bureaus issued me a brand new line of credit.
Walking Away From Fiction
It wasn’t until I came out against the sterilization and mutilation of gender-confused children and transgender military service members in 2017 that LGBT organizations stopped helping me. Most of the media retreated with them.
Overnight, I went from being a liberal media darling to a conservative pariah.
Both groups quickly began to realize that the transgender community had a runaway on their hands. Their solution was to completely ignore me and what my story had become. They also stopped acknowledging that I was behind the nonbinary option that now exists in 11 states.
The truth is that my sex change to nonbinary was a medical and scientific fraud. Consider the fact that before the historic court hearing occurred, my lawyer informed me that the judge had a transgender child.
I should have been treated. Instead, at every step, doctors, judges, and advocacy groups indulged my fiction.
Sure enough, the morning of my brief court hearing, the judge didn’t ask me a single question. Nor did this officer of the court demand to see any medical evidence alleging that I was born something magical. Within minutes, the judge just signed off on the court order.
I do not have any disorders of sexual development. All of my sexual confusion was in my head. I should have been treated. Instead, at every step, doctors, judges, and advocacy groups indulged my fiction.
The carnage that came from my court victory is just as precedent-setting as the decision itself. The judge’s order led to millions of taxpayer dollars being spent to put an X marker on driver’s licenses in 11 states so far. You can now become male, female, or nonbinary in all of them.
In my opinion, the judge in my case should have recused herself. In doing so, she would have spared me the ordeal still yet to come. She also would have saved me from having to bear the weight of the big secret behind my win.
I now believe that she wasn’t just validating my transgender identity. She was advancing her child’s transgender identity, too.
A sensible magistrate would have politely told me no and refused to sign such an outlandish legal request. “Gender is just a concept. Biological sex defines all of us,” that person would have said.
In January 2019, unable to advance the fraud for another single day, I reclaimed my male birth sex. The weight of the lie on my conscience was heavier than the value of the fame I’d gained from participating in this elaborate swindle.
Jamie Shupe obtaining a new military ID card with male sex designation in February 2019. (Photo: Jamie Shupe)
Two fake gender identities couldn’t hide the truth of my biological reality. There is no third gender or third sex. Like me, intersex people are either male or female. Their condition is the result of a disorder of sexual development, and they need help and compassion.
I played my part in pushing forward this grand illusion. I’m not the victim here. My wife, daughter, and the American taxpayers are—they are the real victims.
