Imagining an Islamic State of America
Dr. Mateen Elass writes:
What might America look like under the full control of radical Islam? An Islamic State cannot exist without the imposition of Shari’a, so one of the first noticeable transitions would be from Constitutional to Islamic Law. After all, how could a state show allegiance to Allah without enshrining his perfect divine law as its national standard?
The First Amendment would be scrapped – the only freedom of religion is the freedom to embrace Islam; freedoms of expression and of the press would be limited to support of Islam, the prophet, the Qur’an and Allah. Opposition in the press or public discourse would be punished with swift, lethal consequences.
The freedom to bear arms as a natural right of resistance and self-preservation against violent oppression would be severely curtailed so such weapons could not be used against the Islamic regime.
The Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery would be recast to allow Muslim citizens to buy or sell slaves drawn from conquered nations.
The 18th Amendment, which had prohibited the manufacture or sale of alcohol within the USA, until it was overturned by the 21st Amendment, would be reinstated, as consumption of alcohol is deemed sinful to radical Islam.
The right to vote for women (19th Amendment) would probably be scrapped since Muhammad claimed that women were deficient in intelligence compared to men, and should not be relied on for important decisions (in Islamic jurisprudence a women’s testimony is considered half as reliable as a man’s). And then there’s polygamy. Islamic Law permits a Muslim man to have up to four wives at any one time. Mormon men might be inclined to rejoice at this, until they discover that in the Islamic State, this right only applies to Muslim men.
Atheists, polytheists, secular humanists, Native American traditionalists, Wiccans, Neo-pagans, Scientologists, New Agers of all flavors, and all non-monotheistic groups need to keep their eyes on the tea leaves. If an Islamic State arises on this continent, you would be wise to emigrate rapidly.
Muhammad and his companions referred to pre-Islamic Arab culture as the time of jahiliyya (an Arabic word meaning ignorance, stupidity and darkness). The light of Islam is supposed to dispel such darkness, but lands that have never come under the reign of Islam still evince this jahiliyya. That explains why wherever Islam spreads it quickly seeks to expunge significant signs of a country’s ignorant past. The Taliban closed girls’ schools, and blasted the Bamiyan Buddhas of Afghanistan into oblivion. ISIS has demolished ancient tombs, sledgehammered museum artifacts, razed the ruins of ancient temples, defaced pagan shrines, all in an attempt to prevent people from possibly turning to idol worship instead of revering Allah. What might happen in an Islamic State of America (ISA)? Artillery practice on Mt. Rushmore might be the place to start. Crosses would be expunged from headstones at Arlington Cemetery and all federal edifices (the Islamic Jesus has a particular obsession with the destruction of all crosses). Lady Liberty might be replaced with giant crossed swords, a symbol of Islam’s passion for power. Demolition of the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials would serve as warnings that no human beings are to be revered in potential competition with Allah. In ever expanding circles, pre-Islamic American history would be blotted out from the public sphere.
Hollywood would come under the purview of the religious police ( Saudi Arabia has its version known as “the mutawwa’”, who play the role of volunteers seeking “to promote virtue and prevent vice” ). Since Hollywood seems to thrive on the promotion of vice and prevention of virtue, the TV and motion picture industries might grind to a halt. More likely, however, is that they would become propaganda arms for the spread of Islamic ideology. Say goodbye to your package of four hundred cable/satellite channels – you never watched them anyway….Censorship will be the word of the century for the internet as well, as the ISA seeks to smother access to information not approved by conservative Islamic scholars.
No longer would people moan about Common Core. Schools would be converted to Qur’anic memorization centers at the earliest ages, followed by learning of Islamic law and history. Little time would be devoted to the arts and sciences. Scientific, industrial and theoretical research would rapidly decline, as their usefulness pales in comparison to being steeped Allah’s eternal will. You may have heard the folktale concerning the burning of the famed Library of Alexandria upon Egypt’s conquest by ‘Amr ibn al-Aas (my purported ancestor!) and his Muslim army in 642 AD. Having sent a query to Caliph ‘Umar about what to do with these books, he received the pithy reply, “If those books are in agreement with the Quran, we have no need of them; and if these are opposed to the Quran, destroy them.” Though anecdotal, this story accentuates the very real truth that over the centuries, Islam has held non-Quranic learning in low regard.
The beleaguered FDA might find new life in the ISA as the champion and adjudicator of halal food restrictions. Pork products and alcoholic beverages would be banned or restricted to side-alley shops limited to dhimmi-clients. If this troubles you, perhaps you should start stocking up on beer and bacon now.
Lastly, the religious landscape would begin to change radically. Church bells would be silenced by law, replaced instead by the ubiquitous Muslim call to prayer broadcast five times a day. Permits would not be issued for the building of new synagogues or churches, nor for expansion or repair of existing ones. Mosques, however, would populate the landscape in exponential numbers. Gone would be all public Christmas festivities and celebrations. No National Christmas Tree lightings. No hymns and carols over the airwaves. Worship by Christians would have to be muted, so that no passerby outside a church/home could overhear their singing or praising of God. Federal holidays would be replaced by the annual Islamic ‘Eid festivals.
But there is some good news. If the ISA were to become a reality, some of our country’s present problems would be quickly solved. We would no longer need to worry about immigration reform, as those streaming across our borders would be headed out rather than in. We wouldn’t be troubled over the proliferation of nuclear weapons to Middle Eastern and other Muslim countries – indeed we could become the primary supplier to our fellow Muslim allies once we joined the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). As a declining world power, we might enjoy no longer being the envy and scapegoat of much of the rest of the world. Our perennial struggles over separation of “church” and state would be finally and fully resolved – there is no separation under radical Islam, as theocracy is the name of the game. All citizens would be required to embrace Islam, except those wishing to continue practicing their Abrahamic faiths (Jews and Christians). They would have a second-class status in the ISA, be known as “dhimmi” and pay a significant “head tax” so as to remain protected by the Muslim state (much as shopkeepers in Mafia-controlled regions paid “protection money” to the Mafia so as not to be terrorized by the Mafia).
Of course, this is all hypothetical, based solely on teachings from the Qur’an and Hadith, and on the example of Muhammad as found in early Muslim biographies, and on early Muslim history (check out the Pact of Umar), and on subsequent Muslim conquests, and on the behavior of radical Muslim “governments” today (see, for example, Afghanistan under the Taliban, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and ISIS today).
But this could never happen in the USA because American citizens are all too aware of the threats posed by radical Islam to our Western, democratic values and inalienable rights, and we are prepared to defend them to the death. Right?
Time will tell.