Europe and Islam

This ABC News story on the European reaction is so slanted that it isn't really worth reading. (For instance, it mentions the attacks on Muslim schools in the Netherlands following Theo van Gogh's murder--which amounted to penny-ante vandalism, but makes no mention of the more serious Muslim attacks on Christian churches and schools.)

However, in trying to bend over backwards to cosset Islam, author Leela Jacinto unearths one very revealing quote about the van Gogh murder from Massoud Shadjareh, chairman of the Islamic Human Rights Commission:

"We do need infrastructure to limit extremism, and this has to come from all sides. If the Dutch government had prosecuted van Gogh for his racism, he may have been alive. I'm not saying that anything, absolutely anything legitimizes a killing, but we also need to limit hate speech--on all sides."

You see, if Theo van Gogh had just kept his trap shut, maybe he would still be alive, God be praised.

One of the great disappointments about President Bush has been his unwillingness to speak seriously about the civilizational--as opposed to physical--threat presented by radical Islamists.

Ironically, it may be Europe, which has been so loathe to confront the physical dangers of Islamofascism, which leads the way on the war's cultural front.