by Raymond Ibrahim<\/p>\n
Private Papers<\/em><\/p>\n P<\/span>revious to Pope Benedict XVI\u2019s November 30th<\/sup>\u00a0visit to the Hagia Sophia complex in Constantinople, Muslims and Turks expressed fear, apprehension, and rage. Turkey\u2019s independent paper\u00a0Vatan<\/i>\u00a0expressed it thus: \u201cThe risk is that Benedict will send Turkey\u2019s Muslims and much of the Islamic world into paroxysms of fury if there is any perception that the Pope is trying to re-appropriate a Christian center that fell to Muslims.\u201d Apparently praying, making the sign of the cross or any other gesture of Christian worship in Hagia Sophia constitutes an attempt to \u201cre-appropriate a Christian center that fell to Muslims.\u201d<\/p>\n Built in Constantinople in the 6th<\/sup>\u00a0century, Hagia Sophia \u2014 Greek for \u201cHoly Wisdom\u201d \u2014 was Christendom\u2019s greatest and most celebrated church.\u00a0 After parrying centuries of jihadi thrusts from Arabs, Constantinople was finally sacked by Turks in the jihad of 1453.\u00a0 Its crosses desecrated and icons defaced, this millennium-old church \u2014 as well as thousands of other churches in the then Byzantine Empire \u2014 was immediately converted into a mosque, the tall minarets of Islam surrounding it in triumph.\u00a0 (Ironically, when Benedict quoted a Byzantine emperor saying that Islam was spread by the sword, Muslims worldwide were outraged, more churches were desecrated and a nun was shot in the back.) As part of reformer Ataturk\u2019s drive to modernize Turkey, Hagia Sophia was secularized and transformed into a museum in 1935.<\/p>\n In protestation of Benedict\u2019s visit, a gang of Turks stormed and occupied Hagia Sophia on November 22nd<\/sup>, exclaiming \u201cAllahu Akbar!\u201d and warning \u201cPope! don\u2019t make a mistake; don\u2019t wear out our patience.\u201d\u00a0 On the day of the Pope\u2019s visit, another throng of Islamists waved banners saying \u201cPope get out of Turkey\u201d while chanting \u201cAya Sofya [Hagia Sophia] is Turkish and will remain Turkish.\u201d\u00a0 And of course al Qaeda in Iraq got in on the action by denouncing Benedict\u2019s visit on an Internet statement. (Meanwhile, one of the Pope\u2019s expressed purposes for visiting Turkey was to promote inter-religious dialogue and denounce violence in the name of God.)<\/p>\n Contrast such Islamic intolerance with the tolerance granted Muslims in regards to their Aqsa mosque.\u00a0 Just as with emperor Justinian\u2019s Hagia Sophia annexed by Islam, the Aqsa Mosque is a Muslim site annexed by Judaism.\u00a0 But unlike the permanent Muslim desecration of Hagia Sophia, one of Christendom\u2019s holiest sites, after Israel\u2019s victory in the 1967 war, the Jews did not deface or convert the Muslim mosque into a Jewish synagogue or temple \u2014 even though the Aqsa mosque is deliberately built atop the remains of the Temple Mount, the most important site in Judaeo-Christian eschatology.<\/p>\n Moreover, since reclaiming the Temple Mount, Israel has granted Muslims control over the Aqsa mosque (except during times of crises).\u00a0 And under Muslim control, Christians and Jews are barred from freely worshipping anywhere near the mosque. Despite such concessions, jihad has been declared on Israel, while Muslims worldwide are simultaneously demanding \u201cjustice\u201d from the world body.<\/p>\n All this illustrates well the privileged status many Muslims have come to expect for themselves in the international arena: when Muslims conquer non-Muslim territories, such as Constantinople \u2014 through fire and steel, with all the attendant human suffering and misery \u2014 those whom they conquered are not to expect any \u201capologies,\u201d let alone political or territorial concessions.\u00a0 Indeed, Turkey has yet to even\u00a0recognize<\/i>\u00a0its genocide against its Armenian population in 1917.<\/p>\n H<\/span>erein lies the conundrum.\u00a0 When Islamists wage jihad \u2014 past, present, and future \u2014 conquering and consolidating non-Muslim territories and centers in the name of Islam, never once considering to cede them back to their rightful owners, they ultimately demonstrate that they live by the age-old adage that \u201cmight makes right.\u201d\u00a0 That\u2019s fine; many peoples agree with this Hobbesian view. But there must be consistency.\u00a0 In other words, if we live in a world where the strong rule and the weak submit, why is it that whenever Muslim regions are conquered, such as in the case of Palestine, the same Islamists who would never concede one inch of\u00a0Islam\u2019s<\/i>\u00a0conquests resort to the United Nations demanding \u201cjustice,\u201d \u201crestitutions,\u201d \u201crights,\u201d and so forth?<\/p>\n Put another way, when Muslims beat infidels, it\u2019s just too bad for the latter: they must submit to their overlords\u2019 rules, that is, Islamic \u2014 not international or humanitarian \u2014 law, with all the attendant discrimination and humiliation mandated for non-Muslims. History unflinchingly proves this to the present day.\u00a0 Yet when Islam is beaten, demands for unprecedented apologies and concessions both humanitarian and secular are expected from the infidel world at large.<\/p>\n Double standards do not make for international justice. Either territorial conquests are always unjust and should therefore be ameliorated through concessions, or else they are not; they are merely manifestations of the natural order of things in which survival goes to the fittest. The excuse that the Islamic conquests are an expression of Allah\u2019s will and an altruistic service to infidels obviously must fail in the international arena.\u00a0\u00a0 Conquests are conquests.\u00a0 Nor does the passage of time exonerate crime.\u00a0 The fact that Turkey conquered Constantinople over 500 years ago does not prevent the Turkish government from returning Hagia Sophia to Christendom today \u2014 which would undoubtedly be a great gesture.\u00a0 But of course that can never be.\u00a0 The Muslim world would undergo a \u201cparoxysm of fury\u201d if a Christian pope dare pray in the conquered church; what would the Muslim world do if Hagia Sophia were actually converted back to a church?<\/p>\n Islam does not have \u2014 or at least\u00a0should\u00a0<\/i>not be granted \u2014 a monopoly over the dispensation of war and peace, conquests and concessions.\u00a0 There is nothing out of the ordinary if some Muslims wish to wage eternal jihad until Islam dominates the globe; in fact, by so doing, they are only being true to Islam and its doctrines.\u00a0 However, in such a setting \u2014 where the world is divided into two warring camps, Islam and Infidelity, or, in Islamic terms, the Abode of Islam and the Abode of War \u2014 how can Muslims expect any concessions from the international community?\u00a0 The natural conclusion of the view that \u201cmight makes right\u201d is \u201cto the victor go the spoils.\u201d<\/p>\n But of course, Muslims cannot be blamed for expecting special treatment for themselves, as well as believing that jihad is righteous and decreed by the Almighty. The West constantly goes out of its way to confirm such convictions.\u00a0 By constantly criticizing itself, apologizing and offering concessions \u2014 things the Islamic world has yet to do \u2014 the West reaffirms Islam\u2019s privileged status in the world.<\/p>\n A minor but revealing example: no Muslim map contains the word \u201cIsrael,\u201d only \u201cPalestine.\u201d\u00a0 Yet almost every Western map has the word \u201cIstanbul\u201d where \u201cConstantinople\u201d used to be.\u00a0 The implication is clear: the West fully acknowledges Islam\u2019s conquests of its own lands whereas Islam refuses to acknowledge its conquered state in Israel.<\/p>\n At any rate, what did the Pope do in his controversial visit to Hagia Sophia?\u00a0 He caved in, refrained from any gesture that could be misconstrued as Christian worship and instead worshipped in a mosque like a true\u00a0dhimmi\u00a0<\/i>\u2014 a subdued non-Muslim living under Islamic law \u2014 and acknowledging Islamic superiority.<\/p>\n And therein is the final lesson.\u00a0 Muslim zeal for their holy places and lands is not intrinsically blameworthy.\u00a0 Indeed, there\u2019s something to be said about being passionate and protective of one\u2019s own.\u00a0 Here the secular West \u2014 Christendom\u2019s prodigal son and true usurper \u2014 can learn something from Islam.\u00a0 For whenever and wherever the West concedes \u2014 ideologically, politically, and especially spiritually \u2014 Islam will be sure to conquer. \u00a0If might does not make right, zeal apparently does.<\/p>\n Raymond Ibrahim is a research librarian at the Library of Congress. His new book,\u00a0<\/i>The Al Qaeda Reader,\u00a0<\/i>which translates Osama bin Laden’s communiqu<\/i><\/span>\u00e9s,\u00a0will be available in April 2007<\/i>.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The fate of Hagia Sophia and the Aqsa Mosque by Raymond Ibrahim Private Papers Previous to Pope Benedict XVI\u2019s November 30th\u00a0visit to the Hagia Sophia complex in Constantinople, Muslims and Turks expressed fear, apprehension, and rage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[227,764],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-1r8","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":709,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/greatest-church-soon-to-be-mega-mosque\/","url_meta":{"origin":5526,"position":0},"title":"Greatest Church Soon To Be Mega Mosque?","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 14, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Raymond Ibrahim FrontPage Magazine Ostensibly dealing with a building, a recent report demonstrates how Turkey's populace \u2014 once deemed the most secular and liberal in the Muslim world \u2014 is reverting to its Islamic heritage, complete with animosity for the infidel West and dreams of Islam's glory days of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Religion"","block_context":{"text":"Religion","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/religion\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6094,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/christendoms-greatest-cathedral-to-become-a-mosque\/","url_meta":{"origin":5526,"position":1},"title":"Christendom’s Greatest Cathedral to Become a Mosque","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 19, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Raymond Ibrahim PJ Media While unrest in Turkey continues to capture attention, more subtle and more telling events concerning the Islamification of Turkey \u2014 and not just at the hands of Prime Minister Erdogan but majorities of Turks \u2014 are quietly transpiring. These include the fact that Turkey\u2019s Hagia\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Turkey"","block_context":{"text":"Turkey","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/the-middle-east\/turkey\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1480,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-two-faces-of-the-ground-zero-mosque\/","url_meta":{"origin":5526,"position":2},"title":"The Two Faces of the Ground Zero Mosque","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 27, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Raymond Ibrahim PJ Media Depending on whether Islamists address Americans or fellow Muslims, the same exact words they use often relay diametrically opposed meanings. One example: when Americans hear Muslims evoke \"justice,\" the former envision Western-style justice, whereas Muslims naturally have Sharia law justice in mind. Islamists obviously use\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Raymond Ibrahim"","block_context":{"text":"Raymond Ibrahim","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/our-contributors\/raymond-ibrahim\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5524,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/holy-wisdom\/","url_meta":{"origin":5526,"position":3},"title":"Holy Wisdom","author":"victorhanson","date":"December 7, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Why the Pope should call for the return of the Hagia Sophia by Bruce S. Thornton Private Papers Many in the West are congratulating Pope Benedict XVI\u2019s recent trip to Turkey, where in the Blue Mosque he prayed facing Mecca and made other gestures meant to salve the wounds raised\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Bruce S. Thornton"","block_context":{"text":"Bruce S. Thornton","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/our-contributors\/bruce-s-thornton\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3373,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/al-jazeera-and-history-the-fall-of-acre\/","url_meta":{"origin":5526,"position":4},"title":"Al-Jazeera and History: The Fall of Acre","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 22, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"by Raymond Ibrahim Jihad Watch Amidst the images of suffering and slain Palestinians, Iraqis, and Afghanis, the internationally (in)famous Arabic news station al-Jazeera today had an interesting five-minute segment that it played over several times: the fall of the Muslim city of Acre (Arabic: \u2018Akka\u2019) to the Crusaders, which after\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Raymond Ibrahim"","block_context":{"text":"Raymond Ibrahim","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/our-contributors\/raymond-ibrahim\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6261,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/muslim-persecution-of-christians-april-2013\/","url_meta":{"origin":5526,"position":5},"title":"Muslim Persecution of Christians: April, 2013","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 24, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Raymond Ibrahim \/\/\u00a0Gatestone Institute Before Egypt\u2019s President Muhammad Morsi was ousted, April was one of the worst months for Christian Copts there.\u00a0 On April 5 near Cairo, when a longstanding feud between a Christian family and a Muslim family\u2014based on male Muslims sexually harassing Christian girls\u2014culminated in the violent\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egypt"","block_context":{"text":"Egypt","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/the-middle-east\/egypt\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5526"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5526"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5526\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5527,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5526\/revisions\/5527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}