Islamo-Fascism Awareness

In search of Peace, not Prejudice during Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week at universities around the country, the DePaul Conservative Alliance sponsored a forum last night with speakers Amir Abbas Fakhravar and Robert Spencer. A former Iranian student leader who advocated peaceful demonstrations, Fakhravar escaped from Iran after enduring 5 years of torture and deprivation in prison. (Video of an earlier interview here.)

Many of his student friends had been thrown out windows to their deaths. Hundreds are executed in Iran every year. Fakhraver said Iran is deadly serious about developing nuclear weapons. The terrorist Revolutionary Guards hold all high offices and make up 2/3 of the parliament. Recently, Iran dismissed one of the few prominent "moderates" it conveniently kept on, its top nuclear negotiator, (a setback for diplomatic efforts even the MSM can not ignore). This is yet another unmistakable signal of Iran's serious nuclear intent. Fakhravar said Iran is already at war with us, as it purposely attacks our troops in Iraq with weapons and trained forces.

Robert Spencer is the author of numerous books on the threat of Islamo-Fascism and the need to engage it. Spencer points out there are now 8 women waiting to be stoned to death, having been convicted of adultery in Iran, the latest a young mother. Muslim males who wish to leave their religion are deserving of death under Sharia law according to the Koran, which is practiced in Iran. Iran executes minors.

Spencer recalls the death of Theo van Gogh, a Dutch filmmaker brutally murdered for making a provocative film showing battered women with Koranic verses written on their bodies. Van Gogh was shot as he rode his bike in the streets of Amsterdam, and as his throat was being slit asked, can't we talk about this. The murderer, Mohammed Bouyeri stabbed into his chest a note threatening Hirsi Ali next. At his trial, he said he was solely motivated by his faith, not his ethnicity, (nor any other excuse under liberal victimology).

Calling for new thinking, Spencer referred to Pope Benedicts's letter as an attempt to open a dialogue on faith and reason, which was answered by riots in the Islamic World and death threats to the Pope. He spoke of the hope that moderate Muslims would engage with us in this crucial dialogue, but said we are still waiting. Spencer supports efforts to aid proponents of democracy in Iran, pointing out the overall youth of the population, chafing at the brutal terror state it has grown up under, where attempts at free speech are met with torture or death.

Spencer concluded with the plea for us all to come to grips with this ideology of hate. His latest book is Religion of Peace: Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn't. I left when a questioner with a Red Star on his chest starting shouting at the mike. (Spencer sums that up here in an article today.)

UPDATE: Freedom Folks with more pix and video. (They lingered outside and got pix of the Lefties. I went in and got a seat, it was raining:)

UPDATE:Christopher Hitchens defends the term 'Islamofascism'. Via LGF. More comments at RCP.

UPDATE: Little Green Footballs links to this post, and has more here.

UPDATE: Related piece, "How to Understand Islam" by Malise Ruthven, via RCP.