PBS Dhimmitude, Part II

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See Part I of this post, here.

Also, see a related post, "Roundup Of Western Government-Enforced Dhimmitude," here.

Last night (April 19), PBS aired another segment in its "America At A Crossroads" series. This particular one, "Faith Without Fear," profiled a moderate Canadian Muslim, Irshad Manji, who is confronting certain aspects of radical/militant Islam, both in her own nation and in others. On whole, it was good.

But then, when given an opportunity to dispel one of the biggest lies to be perpetrated on the American people in recent memory --- that even Thomas Jefferson revered his copy of the Koran (told in the context of newly-minted Congressman Keith Ellison's use of it in his optional swearing-in ceremony) --- PBS not only punted, they actually advanced this lie.

I've seen parts of the following data in pieces in different places before, but this is the most concise account I've encountered --- from U.S. Veteran Dispatch:

Ellison's use of Jefferson's Quran as a prop illuminates a subject once well-known in the history of the United States, but, which today, is mostly forgotten - the Muslim pirate slavers who over many centuries enslaved millions of Africans and tens of thousands of Christian Europeans and Americans in the Islamic "Barbary" states.

Over the course of 10 centuries, Muslim pirates cruised the African and Mediterranean coastline, pillaging villages and seizing slaves.

The taking of slaves in pre-dawn raids on unsuspecting coastal villages had a high casualty rate. It was typical of Muslim raiders to kill off as many of the "non-Muslim" older men and women as possible so the preferred "booty" of only young women and children could be collected.

Young non-Muslim women were targeted because of their value as concubines in Islamic markets. Islamic law provides for the sexual interests of Muslim men by allowing them to take as many as four wives at one time and to have as many concubines as their fortunes allow.

Boys, as young as 9 or 10 years old, were often mutilated to create eunuchs who would bring higher prices in the slave markets of the Middle East. Muslim slave traders created "eunuch stations" along major African slave routes so the necessary surgery could be performed. It was estimated that only a small number of the boys subjected to the mutilation survived after the surgery.

When American colonists rebelled against British rule in 1776, American merchant ships lost Royal Navy protection. With no American Navy for protection, American ships were attacked and their Christian crews enslaved by Muslim pirates operating under the control of the "Dey of Algiers" --- an Islamist warlord ruling Algeria.

Because American commerce in the Mediterranean was being destroyed by the pirates, the Continental Congress agreed in 1784 to negotiate treaties with the four Barbary States. Congress appointed a special commission consisting of John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin, to oversee the
negotiations.

Lacking the ability to protect its merchant ships in the Mediterranean, the new America government tried to appease the Muslim slavers by agreeing to pay tribute and ransoms in order to retrieve seized American ships and buy the freedom of enslaved sailors.

Adams argued in favor of paying tribute as the cheapest way to get American commerce in the Mediterranean moving again. Jefferson was opposed. He believed there would be no end to the demands for tribute and wanted matters settled "through the medium of war." He proposed a league of trading nations to force an end to Muslim piracy.

In 1786, Jefferson, then the American ambassador to France, and Adams, then the American ambassador to Britain, met in London with Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja, the "Dey of Algiers" ambassador to Britain.

The Americans wanted to negotiate a peace treaty based on Congress' vote to appease. During the meeting Jefferson and Adams asked the Dey's ambassador why Muslims held so much hostility towards America, a nation with which they had no previous contacts.

In a later meeting with the American Congress, the two future presidents reported that Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja had answered that Islam "was founded on the Laws of their Prophet, that it was written in their Quran, that all nations who should not have acknowledged their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as Prisoners, and that every Musselman (Muslim) who should be slain in Battle was sure to go to Paradise."

(JQWorld: Gee, does this all sound familiar? Where have we heard this divine proclamation before? Oh, right - HERE, here, and in about a thousand other places that neither PBS, nor our MSM, nor American schools will touch with a 10-foot kaffiya)

For the following 15 years, the American government paid the Muslims millions of dollars for the safe passage of American ships or the return of American hostages. The payments in ransom and tribute amounted to 20 percent of United States government annual revenues in 1800.

(JQWorld: See definition of "jizya," here; then correlate this all to CAIR and MPAC's relentless quest for special considerations and laws for American Muslims, and compulsory "sensitivity training seminars" for all U.S. government employees, schools, universities, airport workers, hospital employees, etc., some of which is documented at JQWorld, here)

Not long after Jefferson's inauguration as president in 1801, he dispatched a group of frigates to defend American interests in the Mediterranean, and informed Congress.

Declaring that America was going to spend "millions for defense but not one
cent for tribute," Jefferson pressed the issue by deploying American Marines and many of America's best warships to the Muslim Barbary Coast.

The USS Constitution, USS Constellation, USS Philadelphia, USS Chesapeake, USS Argus, USS Syren and USS Intrepid all saw action.

In 1805, American Marines marched across the desert from Egypt into Tripolitania, forcing the surrender of Tripoli and the freeing of all American slaves.

During the Jefferson administration, the Muslim Barbary States, crumbling as a result of intense American naval bombardment and on shore raids by Marines, finally officially agreed to abandon slavery and piracy.

Jefferson's victory over the Muslims lives on today in the Marine Hymn, with the line, "From the halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli, We fight our country's battles in the air, on land and sea."

It wasn't until 1815 that the problem was fully settled by the total defeat of all the Muslim slave trading pirates.

For more information, see here, here, here and here.

Now, with the billions of dollars of expropriated wealth that PBS relies upon to produce such documentaries, one would think that the above research --- at least part of it --- would have made it into this much-heralded documentary.

The fact is, not a word of this vital information was included in PBS's documentary --- none.

No, the viewer is left with the impression (like the vast majority of American schoolchildren are, via our schools) that slavery is an American invention, not something it inherited from the "old world," where it still festers to this day --- or that militant Islamists were (and still are) some of the most notorious slave-takers and -traders.

This entire aspect of the documentary was depicted as being indicative of Mr. Jefferson's respect for Islam, and Rep. Ellison's use of Jefferson's copy of the Koran as a prime example of the freedoms that Muslims enjoy in America. And of course, not a word of how the militant Islamist insanity that drove America to such desperate measures 200 years ago relates to our present-day struggle to prevail in the war that militant Islamist totalitarians declared on America was included, either.

No, apparently according to PBS, violent, aggressive, militant jihad against innocent peoples and nations is a new phenomenon, that has absolutely no precedent or relevant history that we should keep in mind.

Newsflash, PBS: "Freedom" is not having money taken out of one's pocket in the form of taxation to support the propagation of ideas that one vehemently disagrees with, least of all those which are demonstrably untrue or biased.



Actually, Mr. Jefferson said it best:

"To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical."
- Bill for Religious Freedom, 1779 (2:545)

Uh-huh. Let's see PBS correlate that principle with how it handled Rep. Ellison's use of Mr. Jefferson's personal copy of the Koran --- versus the reality of it.

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UPDATE: MODERATE MUSLIM SPEAKS OUT AGAINST PBS DHIMMITUDE

M. Zuhdi Jassar, a Muslim reformer, physician and retired Lt. Commander in the U.S. Navy, dared to speak out against militant Islamists in the documentary that PBS funded, but which it now refuses to air.

In his biting criticism of PBS --- and of the mentality that underlies the whitewashing of radical Islamism that only contributes to throwing fuel on the fire, on the altar of "political correctness" or "multiculturalism" --- this courageous American has put his life on the line to speak out. Maybe PBS will get a spinal installation that will result in their having half of his courage.


UPDATE 2: REFORMED TERRORIST WARNS AGAINST APPEASING MILITANT ISLAMISTS

In this recent Wall Street Journal article, Tawfik Hamid, another physician and former Islamist terrorist, warns Western governments against their propensity to coddle radical Muslims, and their perpetual fear of "offending" them by exposing the true nature of what they are doing. This is a must-read.

UPDATE 3, APRIL 25: CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS EXPANDS ON THE JEFFERSON KORAN MYTH

How illuminating. Perhaps PBS just missed it? Now, you haven't. Read it here.

Original content is © Copyright 2007 by Jon Quixote. Email to jonquix@hotmail.com

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