The Wall Street Journal reports:
The top U.S. commander in Afghanistan said the planned burning of Qurans on Sept. 11 by a Florida church could put the lives of American troops in danger and damage the war effort.
Gen. David Petraeus said the Taliban would exploit the demonstration for propaganda purposes, drumming up anger toward the U.S. and making it harder for allied troops to carry out their mission of protecting Afghan civilians.
“It could endanger troops and it could endanger the overall effort,” Gen. Petraeus said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. “It is precisely the kind of action the Taliban uses and could cause significant problems. Not just here, but everywhere in the world we are engaged with the Islamic community.”
On August 19, an internal warning issued by the FBI’s Jacksonville office stated:
The nature of this event… will likely garner the same, if not a larger, scale of international attention as historically similar events. This attention will most likely have political and national security implications which could involve the boycott of American goods and services, violent demonstrations within the United States and abroad, threats and/or acts of violence from terrorist organizations and/or lone extremist actors, and further segregation between the Muslim and non-Muslim American communities.
Even if the Dove World Outreach Center yields in response to the US government’s security concerns, much of the damage has already been done.
Pastor Terry Jones’ planned Quran burning is like every other act of book burning throughout history — from the actions of the Inquisition to those of the Nazis: a perverse celebration of ignorance.
There are countless books not worth reading but virtually none worth burning. Indeed, the very fact that individuals or groups of people feel driven to burn particular books, generally says less about those books than it does about the impoverished minds of the book burners.
Pastor Jones is presumably reveling in his fifteen minutes of fame, but in his cheap suit he should be seen for what he is: a member of a tawdry class of American religious hucksters who ply their trade by capitalizing on the ignorance in which too many unfortunate souls here pride themselves.
Here he is in action.
All the God merchants from Hagee to Roberston and this creep should be arrested as con men…that’s exactly what they are…preying on the ignorant.
RE: “…in his cheap suit…” – Woodward
MY COMMENT: That’s a cheap shot! His suit is from the Men’s Wearhouse. “I guarantee it.”
Ignorance can be cured by reading, asking, searching…but stupidity has no cure.
By burning a book (Quran) that glorifies Jesus Christ, and has a chapter named “Mary” in it is not right.
Should have pointed out his gin blossomed nose.
This character makes it clear that maybe America should not lead the world as it is a primitive country full of hustlers who think there’s a sucker born every minute. It was that motto that America was built on– and destroyed on, not by binLaden in 9/11 but by America’s “best&brightest” Wall Street crooks.
Thank the neocons for their promises of cash galore to all these freaks– money from Israel that is right out of the American taxpayer’s pocket. So there you are, thanks to neocon version of Zionism’s interests you are violating the Constitution without realizing it.
Maybe this is an extreme act but i think it is one worth giving a shot. how come it never makes news when moslems burn the bible, when they burn churches in Africa, maim people, kill children in Jos-Nigeria, preach hate messages from their mosques and chant death to christians and america?
Wake Up America, Wake Up!
What an imbacillic raving racist lunatic
The best argument is the one you have offered, Paul. Let people see and hear this deluded mental midget spout his line.
Of course, there are millions who will see and hear this drivel and not see it’s falsity — they have already been brainwashed by a culture that thrives on war, twisted perspectives, commodified information and news, over-consumption, and greed. We hoped Obama might be the voice and mind of reason who would point a way to connect with these people, who have closed their minds against the fellowship of man. So far, he seems to have blown it.
I would hope he does value the teachings of Islam as highly as those of Christianity — and recognize that no single religion has proprietary rights to humanity.
Pastor Jones mentions a demand to build churches in Iraq…..’Why can’t we build churches in Iraq?” runs his rhetoric.
Duh….Christianity was accepted in Iraq for centuries ( and still is in many other Middle Eastern countries outside the Gulf ) along with a number of Gnostic sects.
The sad truth is, that anti Christian purges in Iraq have only begun as part of a reaction against American and British invaders, in which some Christian Iraqis/Arabs are probably seen as collaborators, as were Mizrahi Jews before them in the 1950’s, after the founding of Israel.
On the whole though, like most propaganda, Pastor Jones’ rhetoric undeniably does have an aspect of truth to it — propaganda needs that aspect to convince the masses of its ‘wider message and truth.’
It is indeed true that in Europe, *some* Muslim communities are self ghettoising and willingly isolated from the mainstream culture and its mores and ways. It is true that *some * Muslim communities are intolerant in Europe.
But, even those aspects are part of a much wider array issues that need to be considered to reach understanding — England for example, often encouraged immigration from very poor, uneducated Bangladeshi and Pakistani communities — these groups tended to stick together for a number of reasons, amongst them being the fact that they were often placed in impoverished, under privileged white communities in UK, where life was tough and the struggle for survival intense.
Secondly, Muslims in Europe , often living in ghettos, justifiably ask — what are they supposed to integrate into in their new homes in the West anyway? What do they need to do,to be ‘one of us’ ? Binge drinking? Vomiting in the streets? Gong to soccer matches and having a fight outside the takeaway on the way home?
Thirdly, for their own reasons, the state in UK has whipped up and publicised Muslim ghetto fundamentalism in UK — after all, It looks better when the British government are planning another troop surge in Afghanistan to have a picture of screaming fundamentalist Muslims calling for Sharia on the tabloid’s front pages — Lots of the ‘fundamentalist’ Muslim groups in UK are certainly manipulated and ‘played’ by the state.
Europe is going through all kinds of painful identity issues, some connected to the experience of losing empire, status and power, some connected to notions of declining spirituality, and others connected to dwindling funds for infrastructure, health care, schooling and lack of livable urban space — Europe is over crowded.
However — none of those issues are the Muslim’s fault. And, to rub more salt in Europeans’ wounds, just as they are losing their old cultural notions of family structure,cohesion, spirituality and community — the Muslims are doing just the opposite : Muslim cohesion, family structure and love of their of religion is getting stronger and stronger.
That hurts. But it isn’t the Muslim’s ‘fault’ — But Europeans are raging against what they have lost in their own worlds — and turning it against the spiritual strength and increasing cohesion within Islam.
Finally, Pastor Jones is taking some admittedly, arguably contentious aspects of Islam — and then extending those to any and every “Muslim issue’ you can name — Palestine, Afghanistan, you name it — it’s all just BAD and it’s ALL ISLAM.
Probably he’s read the chapter in “Mein Kampf” on propaganda.
I remember seeing Norman Finkelstein in a lecture advising that chapter as essential reading if we are to deconstruct the bull___t thrown at us : he was right.
Chest Beating Monkey in the Jungle of Florida;
Suppose Dr. Terry Jones took the unintended advice of Mr. Mark Glenn; and throw with the Quran a couple of Talmuds in the fire, on the coming Sabath, and suppose Mr Jones was able to collect every copy of the Old, the New Testements, and every copy of the Quran existed on the face of the earth, and not to forget all the museums’ copies, and delete all these books from the internet too, and throw them all in the fire, and be sure that every page and line of these books is turned to ashes.
Does Dr. Jones know that it is only the Quran that will be, within a month, available as it is now complete with not a word or a letter missing.
Unlike any other book, the Quran has only one version that is memorized by at least one million Muslims, complete with authentication of reading and writing. Unfortunately, Mr Jones will only have his fading memory to preach his book, and then he will be contradicted by the other eight versions of his.
Of course, that is only a supposition, but some Muslims prefere Mr Jones to burn the Quran only, because they saw after the ‘Satanic Verses’ book, as the Islamic Centers in the UK statistics show, that forteen thousands new British covert to Islam, and after 9/11 over thirty thousands in the US.
As God said, ” It is We Who have sent down the Quran, and We will assuredly guard it.’ (Quran 15:9)
He lives in gainesville where many racist live and he is invoking war and if he truly knew the teachings of Christ whom he claims to follow he’d know that he said when you live by the sword you die by one. Now he may not be fighting but he’s invoking a war where innocent people will die. I think he is a selfish ignorant individual. GOD is telling him alright his GOD Satan theres a difference between the true GOD and Lucifer and he seems to follow those teachings. I don’t knock anyone for their religion this is a free country leave people alon pray to the true GOD and be done with it.
pastor jones i urge you to please not do this…please think about how your one action will inevitable affect others? I also urge you to read your bible because the Jesus I have come to know and love in my life would never be appreciative of such ignorance and hatred. Perhaps, you have a following of people that do agree with you and feel justified in some way to do this… may I remind you of the “fruit of the spirit.” You are so very misguided in this effort and this choice won’t just affect you…please, think about that.
So, there is something that needs to be said here. I believe, first if all, that Jones is an ignorant, Opportunistic, insensitive idiot. However, there are lots of people like this, and whether we like it or not, they have the constitutional right to acts of free speech. In other words, they have a protected right to burn whatever book they want to. This includes a variety of religious texts. If this church wants to hold an anti-Islam demonstration, they are allowed to in this country, as long as it does not advocate physical violence on the part of it’s demonstrators.
Criticism of Jones and his church are fully warranted. However, I do not know that it is healthy for Obama, the Pentagon, etc. to publicly condemn his actions without also acknowledging that he is within his rights to follow through in his book burning event. It sucks, but the more I hear of of condemnation from the white house and military organizations, the more concerned I am that they are using intimidation tactics to deprive a citizen of their right to free, albeit misguided, speech. If the head of the FBI calls you and requests that you desist…that is some serious pressure.
I am amazed that the same people who I agree with in condemning the actions of this dim-witted religious leader, are not also quick to feel alarmed by the Government’s very public intimidation of an individual executing his constitutional right.
Burning a Quran is guaranteed by the 1st Amendment? Rubbish. Send in the National Guard, seize the 200 Qurans from Jones and turn them over to an imam. Simple, effective way of telling Jones his 15 minutes is soooo over.
Great America and the great values:
Dr. Jones can not attract Americans to burn Quran. Muslims will never burn Bible and never disrespect Jesus (peace be upon him). Quran has a chapter on Mary and Jesus (PBUH). Nobody can abolish Quran. It is needed by Muslims and Non-Muslims who want to know why we were created in the first place.
Knowing God and our relationship with Him is eaternally peaceful. One needs to read Quran in Arabic (or translation which is NOT authentic no matter how one writes the meaning).
We need the guidance by our creator. Islam is not an enemy to USA. USA needs Islam as it gives the inner peace. It is needed by you and me. We are all Americans and whoever takes violence must be stopped.
May God bless America.