John Lewis on Islamic Totalitarianism

John Lewis has an excellent post on the rise of fundamentalist Islam in Turkey on Principles in Practice, highlighting the actual commands of the Koran that "an agency of the Turkish government [the "Presidency of Religious Affairs and the Religious Charitable Foundation"] will use as its basic guide for the next century." It's not good, as you might imagine.

Also, for my Israeli readers, Dr. Lewis will be speaking at Tel Aviv University on June 2nd. He writes:

I will be speaking at Tel Aviv University, Israel. on June 2, 2008, 18:00-20:00, Room 133 Gilman Building. The talk is sponsored by the Moshe Dayan Center. Thanks to Boaz Arad for arranging the invitation, and to the Ayn Rand Institute for logistical support.


Mr. Arad has translated my article 'No Substitute for Victory': The Defeat of Islamic Totalitarianism into Hebrew, for the journal Nativ [20.3, May-June, 2007]. [The Hebrew translation is here.] He has also translated my article 'Gifts from Heaven': The Meaning of the American Defeat of Japan, 1945 for the website Anochi. [The Hebrew translation is here.] Mr. Arad also translated an article by Yaron Brook and Alex Epstein entitled 'Just War Theory' vs. American Self-Defense, also from The Objective Standard.

Abstract of the talk: "The Inner Jihad and Islamic Totalitarianism."

This talk confronts and repudiates claims that jihad is not war, but rather a benign "inner struggle." These claims are ahistorical, and run contrary to the energetic statements of those waging war for Islam today. The purpose of such claims is to obfuscate the goal of imposing Islamic law by force. The outward manifestation of such obfuscation is the censorship and propaganda that exists in the Middle East today. This lecture will consider the relationship between this intellectual corruption and the rise of totalitarian Islam, a foe that must be confronted intellectually and defeated militarily.

I'd love to hear that talk!

Finally, I should note that Dr. Lewis' article "'No Substitute for Victory': The Defeat of Islamic Totalitarianism" has also been translated into Italian by Dr. Paolo Valerio Mantelli.