From Europe News:
Norway's 'Beloved' Terrorist Heads Back to Iraq
AINA.org 10 January 2012
By Bruce Bawer
How time flies! It seems only yesterday that we folks in Norway first heard the name Mullah Krekar. The sometime leader of Ansar al-Islam -- which narrow-minded individuals insist on calling a terrorist organization, but which I prefer to think of as a heavily armed, Koran-toting Iraqi version of Rotary or the Knights of Columbus -- the charismatic Krekar has long since become every (well, not quite every) Norwegian's lovable grandpa. Now, after many years in Norway, he has announced that he will soon be leaving us and returning to Iraq, where he will continue to pursue the task to which he has consecrated his life: that of serving his God.
And oh, how many ways there are to serve God! Ansar al-Islam, according to the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies, has "burned down girls' schools and beaten and killed women for not wearing the burqa." Human Rights Watch notes that under its previous name, Jund al-Islam, Krekar's industrious associates took over villages in which they required, among other things, "the obligatory closure of offices and businesses during prayer time and enforced attendance by workers and proprietors at the mosque during those times; the veiling of women by wearing the traditional 'abaya; obligatory beards for men; segregation of the sexes; barring women from education and employment; the removal of any photographs of women on packaged goods brought into the region; the confiscation of musical instruments and the banning of music both in public and private; and the banning of satellite receivers and televisions." The Lord's work never ends!
Krekar first came to Norway in 1991 as an asylum seeker -- although, as is true of many Muslim asylum seekers, his professional obligations obliged him to travel frequently between his new nation and the country from which he had fled. But not till after 9/11 did his name become widely known here. Arrested in the Netherlands in 2002 on his way back to Norway from Iraq, he was released after four months and allowed to proceed to Norway, where he was again arrested and released -- a series of torments which, as the discerning reader will readily notice, are not unlike those visited upon Jesus by the Romans and the Sanhedrin. Krekar has lived in Oslo ever since, in apartments which (in newspaper photographs) look quite pleasant, with fine bookcases full of handsomely bound volumes in Arabic. A great man deserves no less.
Over the years Krekar has provided Norway with invaluable spiritual lessons of a sort that a few stubborn Norwegian officials have failed to appreciate, simply because Krekar's brand of evangelism involves guns, explosives, and the removal of limbs without anesthesia. Consequently they have persisted in attempts to take him away from us -- and have thus caused him no little amount of distress. Meanwhile those of us who appreciate Krekar can only be grateful for his long-term presence in our midst -- and cherish the memories.
Ah, the memories! Here's just a sampling:
2003:
Perhaps the key event in Krekar's emergence as a contemporary Norwegian folk hero was a speaking engagement at a popular Oslo café. Krekar was the guest of the Liberal Party's youth organization, which had invited him to give his political views. The place was packed to overflowing -- mostly, according to Morgenbladet, with "students in their twenties and thirties." They greeted the Man of the Hour with spontaneous applause. Morgenbladet quite aptly described Krekar's response -- a hand movement indicating that they should stop clapping -- as one of "humility." After offering a twenty-minute analysis of international affairs, the humble homme de guerre took questions and graciously accepted his fans' declarations of support. The event was the greatest success in the cafe's history. Morgenbladet called Krekar "Norway's beloved fundamentalist."
In March, in a demonstration of the petty abuses that unfeeling authorities can visit upon their betters, VG reported that the police had confiscated Krekar's wife's cookbook, and that the mullah had been forced to eat the same kind of cake -- apple! -- fifty days in a row.
In an interview with Der Spiegel, Krekar again showed his humility by offering unstinting praise for a colleague: "Osama bin Laden is a good man. He is the jewel in Islam's crown." Krekar confirmed that he had trained suicide bombers and -- in a sign of his generous readiness to share the delights of Islamic law with unbelievers -- declared his intention to help turn Norway into a sharia state. In August, apparently appreciative of the contribution Krekar was making to Norwegian society and culture, William Nygaard, head of the venerable Aschehoug publishing house, invited him to the company's annual garden party. (...)
Posted January 10th, 2012 by pk
Norway's 'Beloved' Terrorist Heads Back to Iraq
AINA.org 10 January 2012
By Bruce Bawer
How time flies! It seems only yesterday that we folks in Norway first heard the name Mullah Krekar. The sometime leader of Ansar al-Islam -- which narrow-minded individuals insist on calling a terrorist organization, but which I prefer to think of as a heavily armed, Koran-toting Iraqi version of Rotary or the Knights of Columbus -- the charismatic Krekar has long since become every (well, not quite every) Norwegian's lovable grandpa. Now, after many years in Norway, he has announced that he will soon be leaving us and returning to Iraq, where he will continue to pursue the task to which he has consecrated his life: that of serving his God.
And oh, how many ways there are to serve God! Ansar al-Islam, according to the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies, has "burned down girls' schools and beaten and killed women for not wearing the burqa." Human Rights Watch notes that under its previous name, Jund al-Islam, Krekar's industrious associates took over villages in which they required, among other things, "the obligatory closure of offices and businesses during prayer time and enforced attendance by workers and proprietors at the mosque during those times; the veiling of women by wearing the traditional 'abaya; obligatory beards for men; segregation of the sexes; barring women from education and employment; the removal of any photographs of women on packaged goods brought into the region; the confiscation of musical instruments and the banning of music both in public and private; and the banning of satellite receivers and televisions." The Lord's work never ends!
Krekar first came to Norway in 1991 as an asylum seeker -- although, as is true of many Muslim asylum seekers, his professional obligations obliged him to travel frequently between his new nation and the country from which he had fled. But not till after 9/11 did his name become widely known here. Arrested in the Netherlands in 2002 on his way back to Norway from Iraq, he was released after four months and allowed to proceed to Norway, where he was again arrested and released -- a series of torments which, as the discerning reader will readily notice, are not unlike those visited upon Jesus by the Romans and the Sanhedrin. Krekar has lived in Oslo ever since, in apartments which (in newspaper photographs) look quite pleasant, with fine bookcases full of handsomely bound volumes in Arabic. A great man deserves no less.
Over the years Krekar has provided Norway with invaluable spiritual lessons of a sort that a few stubborn Norwegian officials have failed to appreciate, simply because Krekar's brand of evangelism involves guns, explosives, and the removal of limbs without anesthesia. Consequently they have persisted in attempts to take him away from us -- and have thus caused him no little amount of distress. Meanwhile those of us who appreciate Krekar can only be grateful for his long-term presence in our midst -- and cherish the memories.
Ah, the memories! Here's just a sampling:
2003:
Perhaps the key event in Krekar's emergence as a contemporary Norwegian folk hero was a speaking engagement at a popular Oslo café. Krekar was the guest of the Liberal Party's youth organization, which had invited him to give his political views. The place was packed to overflowing -- mostly, according to Morgenbladet, with "students in their twenties and thirties." They greeted the Man of the Hour with spontaneous applause. Morgenbladet quite aptly described Krekar's response -- a hand movement indicating that they should stop clapping -- as one of "humility." After offering a twenty-minute analysis of international affairs, the humble homme de guerre took questions and graciously accepted his fans' declarations of support. The event was the greatest success in the cafe's history. Morgenbladet called Krekar "Norway's beloved fundamentalist."
In March, in a demonstration of the petty abuses that unfeeling authorities can visit upon their betters, VG reported that the police had confiscated Krekar's wife's cookbook, and that the mullah had been forced to eat the same kind of cake -- apple! -- fifty days in a row.
In an interview with Der Spiegel, Krekar again showed his humility by offering unstinting praise for a colleague: "Osama bin Laden is a good man. He is the jewel in Islam's crown." Krekar confirmed that he had trained suicide bombers and -- in a sign of his generous readiness to share the delights of Islamic law with unbelievers -- declared his intention to help turn Norway into a sharia state. In August, apparently appreciative of the contribution Krekar was making to Norwegian society and culture, William Nygaard, head of the venerable Aschehoug publishing house, invited him to the company's annual garden party. (...)
Posted January 10th, 2012 by pk
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