Vienna said:
I suppose it is really, except these days we are identifying the potentially violent ones.
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M*W: If you recall, the terrorists who flew planes into buildings on 9/11 were all your average clean cut, studious-looking young men who lived quietly among us in the USA.
Oh but M*W - didn't you know that it is muslim practice to lie and disguise to attack the "enemy" "kafirs" etc.
path has quite rightly pointed this out.....
How moral is lying?? Well according to Allah it is A-OK as long as you are lying to kafirs
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http://www.geocities.com/bharatvarsha1947/January_2003/destroykafirs.htm
Islamic concept of Al-Taqiyah to infiltrate and destroy kafir countries
According to Al-Taqiyah, Muslims were granted the Shar'iyee right (legitimacy) to infiltrate the Dar el-Harb (war zone), infiltrate the enemy's cities and forums and plant the seeds of discord and sedition. These agents were acting on behalf of the Muslim authority at war, and therefore were not considered as lying against or denouncing the tenants of Islam.
They were "legitimate" mujahedeen, whose mission was to undermine the enemy's resistance and level of mobilization. One of their major objectives was to cause a split among the enemy's camp while downplaying the issues related to Islam ("Oh, I am not religious." "Oh, that is not Islam, you are mistaken, there is so much misinformation." "Oh, it is in the interpretation." "Brother, Islam is all about peace and love and music just like in the 60s.") In many instances, they convinced their targeted audiences that Jihad is not aimed at them, that indigenous people are not targeted. Meanwhile the (allegedly) "un Islamic" Muslims continued their attacks on the target's property and life (e.g. Lashkar-e Toyiba, Mujahideen and Osama Bin Laden's
declaration of war against innocent American civilians).
http://www.studytoanswer.net/myths_ch8.html#ch8-7
These are examples of a practice known as taqiyya, which essentially means to lie for the sake of Islam. The intention is to deceive unbelievers about Islam, for the explicit purpose of assuaging doubts and concerns about Islam, and encouraging conversion. Taqiyya underlies the whole gamut of Muslim propaganda which is disseminated in the West, from the claim that Islam promotes equal rights for women, to the attempts at inflating the perceived number of Muslims. All are designed to draw people to Islam, by hook or by crook. The example given before of the Durham imam who went so far as to claim that he would be compelled by his religion to prevent a vandal from destroying the property of a church or synagogue is a typical example of taqiyya. It was said in a public forum for the express purpose of giving an appearance to the Islamic religion which does not reflect reality. Certainly, as has been seen, the historical attitudes of Muslims toward churches and synagogues has NOT been to protect them from vandalism, just the opposite is in fact the case. But, the lie must be told in the public forum so as to present Islam in a positive and tolerant light which will appeal to Westerners, which will cause them to believe that the image of Islam as an intolerant and violent religion are just myths created by Islam's enemies to defame the True Faith.
This sort of sanctified dishonesty is also justified in the minds of many Muslims on the basis that everyone else who opposes Islam is lying. For many Muslims, it is absolutely inconceivable that anyone could ever reject Islam on logical or rational grounds, therefore to claim to do so indicates a failing in intelligence or morality on the part of the infidel. Schuon quite insightfully illuminates us to the attitude of the Muslim mind,
"The intellectual - and thereby the rational - foundation of Islam results in the average Muslim having a curious tendency to believe that non-Muslims either know that Islam is the truth and reject it out of pure obstinacy, or else are simply ignorant of it and can be converted by elementary explanations; that anyone should be able to oppose Islam with a good conscience quite exceeds the Muslim's imagination, precisely because Islam coincides in his mind with the irresistible logic of things."27
This insight elucidates many things which those who deal with Muslims on a regular basis can readily observe. It explains why Muslim apologetic defense of Islam is so often very elementary, even childish, in its presentation, and often quickly breaks down into name-calling against the infidel who has refuted Islamic arguments. It enlightens us as to why Muslims will loudly trumpet the "logic" and "rationality" of Islam while simultaneously defending their faith with circular reasoning and other errors of logic. This is why Muslims can, without any apparent irony, claim that Islam is a "religion of peace", even when the testimony of both history and current events bellows the opposite. For most Muslims, the idea that an infidel could reject Islam because of a sincere concern for knowing the truth is absolutely inconceivable. Hence, the infidel must be lying when he or she present facts and arguments against Islam, and the infidel must be an especially tricky liar when the facts and arguments cannot be answered by the Muslim. Hence, the resort to taqiyya to turn aside infidel lies so that the logic of truth, a priori defined as anything Islamic, will stand firm.
Taqiyya goes beyond mere lying for propaganda purposes. The word comes from a root meaning "to guard against, to keep (oneself)". It thus also includes dissimulation by the Muslim to give the appearance of not being religious, so as not to arouse suspicion. In this vein, a Muslim, if necessary, may eat pork, drink alcohol, and even verbally deny the Islamic faith, as long as he does not "mean it in his heart". If the end result of the lie is perceived by the Muslim to be good for Islam or useful to bringing someone to "submission" to Allah, then the lie can be sanctioned through taqiyya. As al-Tabbarah writes,
"Lying is not always bad, to be sure; there are times when telling a lie is more profitable and better for the general welfare, and for the settlement of conciliation among people, than telling the truth. To this effect, the Prophet says: 'He is not a false person who (through lies) settles conciliation among people, supports good or says what is good."28
The taqiyya concept is also found in the Qur'an,
"Let not the believers Take for friends or helpers Unbelievers rather than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from Allah: except by way of precaution, that ye may Guard yourselves from them. But Allah cautions you (To remember) Himself; for the final goal is to Allah." (Surah 3:28)
Here, the Muslims are warned against taking unbelievers as friends, except if it will be beneficial to the Muslims as a way of defending Islam against its perceived enemies or preventing loss or danger from coming upon the Muslim because of his faith. In other words, the end justifies the means. If a Muslim must give the outward appearance of not being a Muslim, or must go against the general principle of not befriending infidels, then this is acceptable under the taqiyya doctrine. Keep in mind also that what is defined as "good" by the serious Muslim will be anything that aids the spread and eventual triumph of Islam over competing religions and ideologies. As such, this would tend to encourage infiltration of non-Muslim countries and institutions by Muslims who might pretend to support the organisations they join, but who are really working to undermine these for the greater goal of establishing Islam as supreme. Obvious recent examples of this sort of activity would be the misuse of their positions and access to information by Muslim members of America's armed forces, several of whom have been caught and arrested while attempting to pass information along to al-Qaeda and other militant Islamic terrorist organisations.
Perhaps related to its false presentation of itself is the Islamic tendency towards discouraging open inquiry about itself, by which is meant inquiry that is not shepherded by some sort of Muslim religious authority or a Muslim already well-versed in Islamic dogma. This is most plainly seen in the Islamic teaching that the Qur'an cannot be translated out of Arabic. Per strict Islamic traditional teaching, when the Qur'an is translated into some other language, it instantly ceases to be the true Qur'an, becoming instead a document which has had the admixture of man's thoughts and words interjected into it (presumably as a result of the translation process). Only the Qur'an in Arabic, according to Islam, is the true word of Allah. As a result, there are millions of Muslims all over the world who do not know Arabic, and who, when they respond to the muezzin call and hear the Qur'an chanted in Arabic, have not the slightest idea what is really being said. These people have to rely upon an imam or other religious leader to tell them what the Qur'an says, and what it means. Through this means, Islam maintains and enforces the submission of millions of non-Arab Muslims who have to rely upon the Arabic-speakers for knowledge of what their religion teaches and what their holy book says. Because of this teaching, Islam can be said to take on a role as a knowledge control cult much like the Jehovah's Witnesses (who are "encouraged" to read only what the Watchtower Society publishes) or other cults where independent examination of the religion's doctrines are discouraged or prohibited.
This sort of attitude is exactly what is presented in the Muslim traditions, too. In the Qur'an, we find that Muslims are encouraged not to ask hard questions about their own religion, and the reason is because they might lose their faith in Islam if they do,
"O ye who believe! Ask not questions about things which if made plain to you, may cause you trouble. Some people before you did ask such questions, and on that account lost their faith." (Surah 5:102-103)
This discouragement to open questioning is also seen in the ahadith, one of which records that Mohammed was asked about some matters which he did not want to have to answer, and got so angry when the questioner persisted that he grew enraged, red in the face29. Other statements in the ahadith also record Mohammed's adverse reaction to being challenged on the things he taught30. Maududi, one of the most prominent theologians of Islam in the modern age, likewise encourages Muslims to leave off asking the difficult to answer questions about their faith31. The tendency against open questioning and willingness to examine the beliefs of Islam suggests to us that Islam is not really interested in people investigating Islam for the truth's sake (despite what many a Muslim making dawah might say). Rather, it tells us that Islam seeks to suppress its internal inconsistencies and embarrassing teachings, things which might cause the Muslim to doubt his faith and even apostasise if he were to dwell on them.
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http://www.iidb.org/vbb/index.php
