Who is Daniel Pipes?

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The Truth About Daniel Pipes

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, August 15, 2003; Page A27

The president has nominated Islamic scholar Daniel Pipes to the board of directors of the U.S. Institute of Peace. This has resulted in a nasty eruption of McCarthyism. Pipes's nomination has been greeted by charges of Islamophobia, bigotry and extremism. Three Democratic senators (Ted Kennedy, Christopher Dodd and Tom Harkin) have shamefully signed on to this campaign, with quasi-Democrat Jim Jeffords tagging along.

Who is Daniel Pipes? Pipes is a former professor at the U.S. Naval War College. He has taught history and Islamic studies at Harvard and the University of Chicago. He is a scholar and the author of 12 books, four of which are on Islam. Unlike most of the complacent and clueless Middle East academic establishment, which specializes in the brotherhood of man and the perfidy of the United States, Pipes has for years been warning that the radical element within Islam posed a serious and growing threat to the United States.

During the decades when America slept, Pipes was among the very first to understand the dangers of Islamic radicalism. In his many writings he identified it, explained its roots -- including, most notably, Wahhabism as practiced and promoted by Saudi Arabia -- and warned of its plans to infiltrate and make war on the United States itself.

Sept. 11, 2001, demonstrated his prescience. Like most prophets, he is now being punished for being right. The main charge is that he is anti-Muslim. This is false. Pipes is scrupulous in making the distinction between radical Islam and moderate Islam. Indeed, he says, "Militant Islam is the problem, and moderate Islam is the solution."

The dilemma for a free society is that radical Islam lives within the bosom of moderate Islam. The general Islamic community is the place radicals can best disguise themselves and hide. Mosques are institutions that they can exploit to advance the cause. These are obvious truths.

But when Pipes states them, he is accused of bigotry. For example, critics thunder against Pipes's assertion that "mosques require a scrutiny beyond that applied to churches and temples."

This is bigoted? How is this even controversial? Wahhabists and other radical Islamists have established mosques and other religious institutions in dozens of countries. Some of these -- most notoriously in Pakistan -- had become the locus of not just radical but terrorist activity. Where do you think Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, was radicalized and recruited? In a Buddhist monastery? He was hatched in the now notorious Finsbury Park mosque in London.

Does that mean that all mosques or a majority of mosques or even many mosques harbor such activity? No. But it does mean any given mosque is more likely to harbor such activity than any given synagogue or church.

The attack on Pipes for stating this obvious truth is just another symptom of the absurd political correctness surrounding Islamic radicalism. It is the same political correctness that prohibits ethnic profiling on airplanes. We are all supposed to pretend that we have equal suspicions of terrorist intent and thus must give equal scrutiny to a 70-year-old Irish nun, a 50-year-old Jewish seminarian, and a 30-year-old man from Saudi Arabia. Your daughter is on that plane: To whom do you want the security guards to give their attention?

President Bush is considering bypassing the Senate and giving Pipes a recess appointment while Congress is out of town. For Bush, this would be an act of characteristic principle and courage. The problem, however, is that such an act makes the appointment look furtive. Worse, it lets the McCarthyites off too easy.

Pipes's appointment would be a great asset to the U.S. Institute of Peace. But it would be an even greater asset to the country to bring the Democrats' surrender to political correctness into the open. Let them declare themselves. Let the country see that for some of the most senior Democratic leaders, speaking the truth about Islamic radicalism is a disqualification for serious office.

Pipes's nomination has been endorsed by, among others, Fouad Ajami, Walter Berns, Donald Kagan, Sir John Keegan, Paul Kennedy, Harvey Mansfield and James Q. Wilson.

Who are you going to believe? Such unimpeachable and independent scholars? Or a quartet of craven senators?

© 2003 The Washington Post Company

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Type: Discussion • Score: 2 • Views: 4,049 • Replies: 40

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Re: Who is Daniel Pipes?
Interesting. I never heard of the man, I never even heard of the U.S. Institute of Peace, so this is all new to me.

The Washington Post article sounded convincing enough to me, they state their case well.

I did - since I never heard of the man - however, take the effort of googling on his name, and it does seem he is indeed a man of some very controversial views.

He says some sensible things, he says some things that seem a little out there to me, and thats fine for an academic position, freedom of debate, good. But in as far as this is a political post - considering he'd be appointed by the President and Congress - I can see where the furor might come from.

Lemme play advocate of the devil and show you some links:

http://www.danielpipes.org - his weblog and his latest columns, op-eds, etc. The last few are all from The New York Post.

He devoted one of them - "Discarding War's Rules" - to "Lee Harris, America's reigning philosopher of 9/11", summarising his views in agreement. Citing Harris, he writes: "Western restraint [..] insulates its enemies from the deserved consequences of their actions, and so unintentionally encourages their bad behavior. For the West to reverse this process requires much rougher means than it prefers to use", and praises the Bush administration for having "figured it out" and implemented new lines of policy, to wit, "Pre-empt", "Rehabilitate" ("Dismantle their polities, then reconstruct these along civilized lines") and "Impose a double standard":

Quote:

Act on the premise that the U.S. government alone is permitted to use force against other agents, who are not permitted to use force.

In brief, until those Harris calls "Islamic fantasists" play by the rules, Washington must be prepared to act like them, without rules.

http://rightwingnews.com/interviews/pipes.php - "An Interview With Daniel Pipes".

Features, for example, Pipes' views on the war against Iraq. Pipes notes it'll have "vast implications on every sort of level", and prodded whether they'd be "Largely positive or largely negative?", he replied, "Every single way positive that I can think of." Also features his views on Israel. Asked, "How do you think Israel should proceed from this point?", he answered:

"I think there is no substitute for victory. [..] Assuming it's Israeli victory, it means convincing the enemies of Israel that they cannot win and causing them to despair of their goals and give them up. Any kind of compromise solution is not going to work as Oslo so eloquently showed us."

Considering the nomination is for the US Institute of Peace, "a Congressionally sponsored think tank dedicated to "the peaceful resolution of international conflicts", it seems odd, to say the least, to nominate someone who rephrased the above view also as:

"a change of heart [..] is achieved by an Israeli victory and a Palestinian defeat [..] The Palestinians need to be defeated even more than Israel needs to defeat them".

This is pointed out by Mother Jones, http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/2003/22/we_420_01.html , which quotes Susannah Heschel, a professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth and co-chair of the liberal Jewish group Tikkun as noting, "It would be like appointing me to be the head of nuclear physics at Los Alamos."

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, one of Pipes' pet targets, even compiled an entire webpage with quotes by and about Pipes to make its point: http://www.cair-net.org/misc/people/daniel_pipes.html .

Featured quotes include The Nation's Kristine McNeil:

Quote:

Pipes is notorious in the academy for calling Muslims "barbarians" and "potential killers" in a 2001 National Review article and accusing them of scheming to "replace the [US] Constitution with the Koran," in a similar piece in Insight on the News. Along these lines, a 1990 National Review article insisted that "Western European societies are unprepared for the massive immigration of brown-skinned peoples cooking strange foods and maintaining different standards of hygiene....All immigrants bring exotic customs and attitudes, but Muslim customs are more troublesome than most."

Pipes heads "Campus Watch" - http://www.campus-watch.org - an initiative that aims to confront "analytical failures, the mixing of politics with scholarship, intolerance of alternative views, apologetics, and the abuse of power over students" by professors of Middle East Studies. It "invites student complaints of abuse" about their professors, compiling "dossiers" on the reported misdeeds of controversial academics.

As a gesture of solidarity, more than 100 academics subsequently contacted the Middle East Forum asking to be added to the list, but Campus Watch denies charges of McCarthyism: "Campus Watch fully respects the freedom of speech of those it debates while insisting on its own freedom to comment on their words and deeds."

Oddly enough, though, for someone waging such a crusade against "intolerance of alternative views", Pipes himself was speeching to demonstrators on the steps of a Colorado college when the latter dared invite Hanan Ashrawi, the Palestinian intellectual, for a keynote address. Though the College had invited pro-Israeli scholar Gideon Doron to respond to Mrs. Ashrawi with a subsequent keynote address, Pipes was implacable:

Quote:

"Simply put, the United States is engaged in a war on terror, and Mrs. Ashrawi is on the side of America's enemies [..] We should work so that this type of anti-American spokeswoman is not welcome on American campuses"

Well, et cetera. You may agree with him or you may not agree with him, but I think it's clear that those who claim Pipes has disqualified himself for a government-appointed post at the US Institute of Peace do not do so merely because of his "speaking the truth about Islamic radicalism". I think I would agree with them, judging on these few sources.

Nevertheless, should you wish to support him, you can: there's a petition online, at http://www.petitiononline.com/KN50711/petition.html . 6,646 people have signed thus far.

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Here's another source:

http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/2003/22/we_420_01.html

It seems that Daniel Pipes arouses controvery about his "peace" plans, and even some of his background knowledge.

One must also remember that Krauthammar's views are seen by many as being quite radically right, and he has been dropped as a commentator from several papers.

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Nimb

Thanks for the links and good to hear from----you are one of the more penetrating contributors. It would seem to me it's obvious that Dr. Pipes has it correct about the dangers of Islamic Extremism and is justified in his rather aggressive approach in combating it expecially on campuses. After all this is where the real clash of civilizations will be fought---hopefully not on the battlefield of US airliners, or with new technology to produce new anti-toxins and anti-serums.

It is difficult to argue that the extreme chilling nature of terrorism and the absolute intollerance for other religions by all Muslims justify extreme measures to combat it. Those who have the most to lose by Dr. Pipes appointment (the terrorists and their supporters) will present the strongest opposition to his appointment. The title of institute for Peace might present the same paradoxical analagy as our Dept of Defense. The best defense is a very very strong OFFENSE.

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Mama

What ever you or anyone thinks of Charles Krauthammer, he more often than not gets it correct ( I don't deny I favor bright right wing columnists) if only you have an open mind.

Dr. Pipes has the interests of the citizens of this country foremost in his mind and isn't constantly apologizing for our enemies. I find that comforting----thats why I wanted everyone to know about this controversy.

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Perception - it is only your perception that Krauthammer more often than not gets it correct (whatever "it" is.) Many other people have quite a different perception of Krauthammer's correctness. Further, since he is an opinion writer and not a reporter, what he writes is his own opinion. Of course you are perfectly free to agree with his opinion. This, however, makes neither you nor Krauthammer correct. I feel sure you do know the difference between an opinion writer and a reporter.

Just as I feel sure you know the differences that exist among many who call themselves Islamic experts. Daniel Pipes is considered an authority by many of his admirers, There are, however, differences of opinion there. Many experts on the Council of Foreign Relations hold differing views.

Since a perception of an idea or a statement does not include a certification of its veracity, I rest assured that this is simply your view of it, not to be confused with a flat statement of fact.

The other, regrettable, fact is that Bush has an increasing reputation of selecting only those people and reports that fit his views, which are not often well-rounded nor based on consultations with or readings by people who are knowledgeable in the fields.

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Mama

You are absolutely correct in every thing you said-----thanks for putting your OPINION on the line.

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perception wrote:

Thanks for the links and good to hear from----you are one of the more penetrating contributors.

Thanks ;-). I do usually disagree with you, though. Here too, as you'll have guessed ...

perception wrote:

It would seem to me it's obvious that Dr. Pipes has it correct about the dangers of Islamic Extremism and is justified in his rather aggressive approach in combating it expecially on campuses.

I dont think, judging from these few links, Pipes is making a convincing case that "the dangers of Islamic Extremism" are rampant on campuses.

I found it embarassing, personally, to find, first, the site where his organisation claims to be combatively campaigning against "intolerance of alternative views" in the Middle East Studies classrooms, and then reading the story about Ashrawi. Ashrawi here is known as one of the relatively reasonable voices on the Palestinian side, and jeez, that Colorado College actually was proposing a juxtaposition of two keynote addresses, one by Ashrawi and one by a pro-Israeli speaker. Yet there Pipes was, on the steps, demanding she'd be refused the right to speak, period. And even furnishing a dogmatic principle of why all such dissenting voices should be silenced: "We should work so that this type of anti-American spokeswoman is not welcome on American campuses".

Aren't campuses about learning? How is one to learn if one is not allowed to even hear "the other side"? For a person whose world apparently is one of such stark black and white, war and no compromise, search and destroy, to be appointed to the Institute of Peace is a bit far-fetched.

perception wrote:

Those who have the most to lose by Dr. Pipes appointment (the terrorists and their supporters) will present the strongest opposition to his appointment.

I think you'd be hard-pressed to identify the bulk of Pipes' opponents as "supporters of the terrorists".

perception wrote:

The title of institute for Peace might present the same paradoxical analagy as our Dept of Defense. The best defense is a very very strong OFFENSE.

Sounds like a recipe for escalation to me.

We have this kids hanging outside our house, they buy joints, come smoke 'em here. They can be pretty annoying sometimes, but some of the more fierce-looking ones suddenly will politely say goodday. We always say hello back, and when they make too much noise, we politely ask them to be quiet or go somewhere else. And they usually do! Only when they don't, do we start telling them off in no uncertain words, and if necessary we call the cops.

Now a neighbour woman of ours came round the other day, asked Anastasia to "not be so friendly" to these kids. Because they were bothering the neighbourhood, and we shouldnt "encourage" them. She gone crazy?! Lissen - the annoying ones - we'll "clamp down" on them, anyway, when they get annoying. But if we start off being rude to all of them in the first place, we can be sure that even the ones who are polite now, will turn very nasty very quickly - and they'd even be right! Then pretty soon we'd have escalation, and we have glass windows on the ground floor.

Choosing to be in principle peacible, and only retaliate aggressively once this or that kid's actually done something wrong, is not a question of being cowardly - its common sense, and a question of principle at that.

Replace "kids" with "Muslims" or "Muslim nations" and "the annoying ones" with "terrorists", and you'll get where I was going with that, and why I disagree with you.

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It's obvious it's one more fight in the trenches - progressives against neo conservatives, rather than McCarthyism.

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Nimh

We will not agree on much in politics so I invite you over to the philosophy and debate forum where I have started a thread called : Why do we think the way we do" ---it's right up your alley---I think. See you there.

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Thanks for the links and good to hear from----you are one of the more penetrating contributors. It would seem to me it's obvious that Dr. Pipes has it correct about the dangers of Islamic Extremism and is justified in his rather aggressive approach in combating it expecially on campuses. After all this is where the real clash of civilizations will be fought---hopefully not on the battlefield of US airliners, or with new technology to produce new anti-toxins and anti-serums.

Actually, the "Clash of Civilizations" arguement has fallen out of favour. Huntington's premise is overly simplistic and he lumps groups together as "civilizations" that have little in common. Pipes himself is guilty of over-generalizing Islam as a monolithic entity, which it is in no way. He also has called Turkish immigrants "barbarians," and debnigrates their culture, whilst ignoring the amount of violence and discrimination they face in their daily lives. Walter Hinteler can probably tell you more about the Auslander situation in Germany. Pipes is a bigot in search of a pulpit.
Much of Pipes' rhetoric reminds me of the comments of "experts on Judaism" in 1930s GErmany.

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These are excerpts. For the full article, click on the link provided.

http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/2003/22/we_420_01.html

Quote:

Daniel Pipes, Peacemaker?

Daniel Pipes says the only path to Middle East peace will come through a total Israeli military victory. So why has President Bush nominated him to the board of the government's leading peace think-tank?

By Michael Scherer
May 26, 2003

Pipes, who declined a request to speak with Mother Jones, told the audience at the recent Zionist conference that he could not comment about his nomination. But he did have a word for his political foes, particularly the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "My nomination is merely a stepping stone in their assertion of power to achieve a militant Islamic state," Pipes said. "To put it more graphically: the substitution of the Constitution by the Koran."

Pipes frequently issues such warnings, declaring that militant American Muslims intend to mount a second American Revolution, and impose Islamic law. In this context, he has criticized Bush for suggesting in public that Islam is a peaceful religion. "All Muslims, unfortunately, are suspect," he wrote in a recent book, though he added that only "10 to 15 percent" of Muslims are militant. If Muslims have jobs in the military, law enforcement or diplomacy, Pipes states in another column, "they need to be watched for connections to terrorism." He also finds Muslim immigration problematic: "All immigrants bring exotic customs and attitudes, but Muslim customs are more troublesome than most."

Pipes' personal views on the conflict can be traced back to the early days of the struggle. In 1923, Ze'ev Jabotinsky, an ideological father to the Israeli right wing, wrote that there would be no peace until the Arabs in Israel were psychologically crushed. "As long as the Arabs preserve a gleam of hope that they will succeed in getting rid of us, nothing in the world can cause them to relinquish that hope," he declared. More than a decade later, David Ben-Gurion, who would become Israel's first prime minister, echoed those sentiments. "For only after total despair on the part of the Arabs, a despair that will come not only from the failure of the disturbances and the attempt at rebellion, but also as a consequence of our growth as a country, may the Arabs possibly acquiesce in a Jewish state of Israel," he wrote in 1936.

Today, such views are most strongly held in Israel by right-wing political parties, and in America by Jewish supporters of the Israeli settlement movement and evangelical Christians, who have found common cause with the hard-line aspects of the pro-Israel lobby. Those groups were well represented at the Interfaith Zionist Leadership Summit, which began May 17 at the Omni Shoreham hotel in Washington D.C. Pipes was greeted there as a celebrity, receiving standing ovations before and after his speech.

Conservative icons Gary Bauer and Alan Keyes also addressed the conference, speaking about the conflict in religious terms. Bauer described Israel as God's biblical gift to the Jews, a religious edict that should not be abandoned. For Keyes, the fight against Palestinian terrorism was a Christian fight against evil. "Evil does not come from without," he thundered from the podium. "It comes from within." Other speakers, meanwhile, attacked the mainstream media for a rampant anti-Israel bias. The Bush administration's road map was derided as a "highway to appeasement," and the occupied territories were referred to as "disputed" or "administered" territories.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/950969.asp?cp1=1#BODY

Quote:

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Butrflynet wrote:

These are excerpts. For the full article, click on the link provided.

http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/2003/22/we_420_01.html

<ahem>.

It's cool that so many people are joining this thread - I found it really interesting myself, perception had me reading about this guy for an hour and a half, but ...

thats the third time that particular link got posted here. <grins>. read up, read up.

(or read down http://www.cair-net.org/misc/people/daniel_pipes.html to get all the controversy about the guy in a list).

(i just corrected all the links in my first post, btw - number of them accidentally included the comma or period after the url, so they didnt work when you clicked them. now they do).

perc, i'm not smart enough for the philosophy forum, i'm afraid! but thanks for the invite ;-)

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Gee, I guess we're all in agreement then. Wink

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Nimh

After reading the Hitchens piece, I'm thinking you all are correct about this guy. I like a hawk, but his proposed method of bringing peace to the land of Palestine seems over the top. I think I know where he's coming from because after all the Arab objective is the absolute destruction of Israel so he is saying that absolute military victory over the Palestinians will destroy their will to continue the fight. Hitchens maintains that the positions of the Right are well represented so Pipes far right views are not needed. I'm tending to agree that his talents could be be better utilized in a less visible position. OK---Hitchens and you guys convinced me. It would be wrong to support this appointment.

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perception wrote:

Nimh

I'm tending to agree that his talents could be be better utilized in a less visible position.

Like...horizontal, pulseless and apneic, perhaps? Smile

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Hobitbob wrote:
Actually, the "Clash of Civilizations" arguement has fallen out of favour. Huntington's premise is overly simplistic and he lumps groups together as "civilizations" that have little in common.

Are you one of those who only promotes or supports a position if it fashionable?

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perception wrote:

Hobitbob wrote:
Actually, the "Clash of Civilizations" arguement has fallen out of favour. Huntington's premise is overly simplistic and he lumps groups together as "civilizations" that have little in common.

Are you one of those who only promotes or supports a position if it fashionable?

Rather one who only supports positions that are academically valid. Huntington's position is not academically valid. See the July/August 2002 issue of Foreign Affairs for a critique of his position by Stanley Hoffman. Both Huntington and his student, Fukuyama, are guilty of too much generalizing and too little observation of human nature. Pipes,as a devotee of Huntington, suffers from similar errors in judgement. In addition, Pipes' bigotry blasts through his statments and wrtiting in a manner that is hard to ignore. I would again reccomend reading some of the anti-Jewish propoganda of the 1930s in Germany and comparing it to Pipes' writings. He falls into that same category of pseudo academics who produced articles that were meant to increase the fear of a foreign "other" that threatened to pollute the purity of German nationalism.
Don't get me wrong, Huntington's book IS entertaining, but of little value otherwise.

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perception wrote:

It is difficult to argue that the extreme chilling nature of terrorism and the absolute intollerance for other religions by all Muslims justify extreme measures to combat it.

I wonder where you get this piece of information from? Islam actually prescribes tolerance for those who are "people of the book," i.e. Jews and Christians. I would reccomend the following works:
Gregorian, VartanIslam: Mosaic, Not Monolith New York, Brookings Institute Press. 2003
Patai, Rafael, Inside The Arab Mind New York, Hatherleigh Press, 2002,
Brown, L. Carl, Religion and State: The Muslim Approach to PoliticsNew York, Columbia University Press. 2001
Hourani, Albert Habib, A History of the Arab PeoplesCambridge, MA, Havard. 1991
Armstrong, KarenThe Battle For God: Fundamentalism in Judaism,Christianity, and Islam. New York, Ballantine. 2001
Moore, Robert, The Formation of a Persecuting SocietyNew York, Blackwell. 1990
Nirenbirg, David, Communities of Violence:Persecution of Minorities in the Middle AgesNew York, Princeton. 1998
Nosser, Sayyed Hossein, Islam: Religion History and CivilizationNew York, Harper. 2002
Said, Edward, et. al., Covering Islam:How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the WorldNew York, Random House, 1996
Gerges, Fawaz A. America and Political Islam:Clash of Cultures or Clash of Interests?Cambridge,1999.
Esposito, John L. (ed), The Oxford History of IslamOxford, 2000.
Huntington, Samuel P. , The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the World OrderNew York, Simon and Schuster. 1997.
Hunter, Shireen T. The Future of Islam and the West: Clash of Civilizations, or Peaceful Co-existance?New York, Greenwood. 1998
I would also reccomend a good trranslation of the Koran.
This is a short list of background reading on the subject. I hope that this helps.

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Hobitbob wrote:

I wonder where you get this piece of information from? Islam actually prescribes tolerance for those who are "people of the book," i.e. Jews and Christians. I would reccomend the following works:

That may be the "academic" perception but then academic perception is usually quite different from reality. Perhaps you can explain why the number of christians "existing" ( I won't say living because that would be too generous) in Muslim countries is in steady decline. If not by murder then by persecution----tolerant ---don't make me laugh.

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Who is Daniel Pipes?

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