Seeking Andalusia - What Happened to Islam?
January 6, 2009 / 10037
“It is enough to know that the economy of all Arab countries is weaker than the economy of one country that had once been part of our world when we used to truly adhere to Islam. That country is the lost al-Andalus. No Muslim territory should ever become non-Muslim…. Let the whole world know that we shall never accept the tragedy of Andalusia.”
Osama bin Laden, “Message to the Muslim People,” on Al-Jazeera, in January 2004, lamenting the decline of the Islamic world.
“The death brigades penetrated into the European crusader heartland, and struck a painful blow at one of the foundations of the crusader coalition. This is part of a settling of old accounts with crusader Spain.”
Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades of al-Qaida, claiming responsibility for the March 11, 2004 bombings in Madrid that killed over 200 persons.
Spain just isn’t what it used to be, and in al-Qaida’s view, that’s the problem. The religious zealotry that propels today’s radical Islamists can only be explained within the context of history. The odyssey that has carried the Arab Muslim world from the heights of its ancient glory to its modern day abyss is a story that spans 1,400 years and innumerable humiliations most of which can be traced to its own failings.
There was a time when Europeans, seeking enlightenment and learning, studied at the feet of Islamic scholars. It is a time long past but not forgotten, at least by those who seek to restore their lost empire at any and all costs. Since its Golden Age during the Moorish Empire a millennium ago, Islamic history has been in an steady tailspin that has led to a culture of victimhood and death fueled by religious hatred, sectarian violence, centuries of isolation from Western enlightenment, and an overwhelming almost mystical desire to restore past glories.
Today, the Arab world is constituted by a series of 22 failed states bereft, for the most part, of progressive leaders and unable to produce one single manufactured product that can compete on world markets. Far from being an enlightened civilization, it has become a cultural backwater replete with massive poverty, repressive governments, vast illiteracy, medieval laws, rising Islamist anger and a gross domestic product less than that of (coincidentally) Spain.
But it has not always been this way. Islam arose in the Arabian Peninsula in the 7th century. Like Christianity, it officially condemned forced conversions, but unlike Christianity, Islam instructed its followers to ensure that the world was under the political control of the Faithful. Hence, Islam’s political domination could be, and was, spread by the sword.
Islamic cavalries burst out of Arabia and quickly took control of the Middle East, Byzantium and Persia. The Middle Eastern armies of the Christian Byzantine Empire were defeated and annihilated in 636, and Jerusalem fell in 638. By the early 8th century Arab Islamic forces had conquered North Africa, reached the Straits of Gibraltar and crossed into Visigothic Spain. By 712, they had reached the center of the Iberian Peninsula, and by the 730s, they were raiding deep into the heart of France until defeated by the Frankish leader Charles Martel at the Battle of Poitiers in 732.
As Paul Crawford, points out in “Crusades: Political and Military Background,” gradually retreating south over a period of centuries, they eventually consolidated their power in southern Spain. There, over the next 800 years, the Arabs managed to develop a majestic civilization on the Iberian Peninsula - a civilization that came to be known as Andalusia. For Muslims, al-Andalus (Andalusia) remains not only a symbol of vanished greatness, but a kind of alternative vision of Islam - a vision sought by Islamists today, but unattainable in the modern era unless Islam itself is reformed. Read more …
Batman 3 Posters
January 6, 2009 / 65716
Here we have 3 new poster from Batman 3
Dr. Frank’n Monster : Parental Guidance Required
January 6, 2009 / 357
Items you will need: Oxford shirt, tie, leggings, adult-size Bermuda shorts, safety pins, black jacket or shirt, kid-size khaki pants, belt, rubber bands, packing tape, sneakers, Frankenstein-monster mask, white lab coat, wig, glasses, heavy black shoes or boots.
Hellevator - The Bottled Fools (Japanese) 2004, Synopsis, Plot, Trailer and Poster
January 6, 2009 / 1384
AKA : Gusher no binds me/Gusha no bindume/Gusha no binzume/Hellevator/The Bottled Fools
Year : 2004
Directed : Hiroki Yamaguchi
Genre : Horror / Sci-Fi
Runtime : 1 hr. 37 min.
Country : Japan
Language : Japanese
Subtitles : English soft subs
IMDB : Hellevator : The Bottled Fools
Cast : Luchino Fujisaki, Yoshiichi Kawada, Ryôsuke Koshiba
Set almost completely in a claustrophobic transport elevator between towns stacked on top of one another, a hellish scenario unfolds.
The post modern masses that squeeze into this public transport system are cell-phone addicted businessmen, a child with a human brain as a pet, leather clad law enforcers, and a 17 year old school girl with psychic abilities.
They are joined by a pair of convicted homicidal rapists, and soon the order of society is torn apart. Outbursts of excessive violence and utter bloody chaos take over. Read more …
Video Games Yeti Sports Images
January 6, 2009 / 1820
Video Games
The Yeti has appeared in several video games including Pokémon (as the Abomasnow in Pokémon Diamond and Pearl), Cabela’s Dangerous Hunts 2, Spyro: Year of the Dragon, Gladius, as the Abominable Snow Monster in SkiFree.
Mr. Nutz, and in PC game Zoo Tycoon Complete Collection, and in the Tibet levels of Tomb Raider II, as the Yeti.
The Yeti is also a high leveled monster in MapleStory, and there are many different varieties of this monster. Read more …
Magical Signs of the Jewish Cabala —The Six-Pointed Star, Babylonian Witchcraft, and the Hollywood Perdition of Jerry Seinfeld and Associates
January 5, 2009 / 9166
He said furthermore unto me, Son of man, seest thou what they do? even the great abominations that the house of Israel committeth here…
Ezekiel 8:6
Kabbalism is a system of Jewish mysticism and magic and is the foundational element in modern witchcraft. Virtually all of the great witches and sorcerers of this century were Kabbalists.
— William J. Schnoebelen, in The Dark Side of Freemasonry
In the decades of the 70s, 80s, and 90s, the hottest spiritual trend was the New Age movement. As we move forward through the first decade of the 21st century, the latest cure-all spiritual phenomenon seems to be the
Jewish Cabala (or Kabbalah). The Cabala is not new, of course. It’s been around for centuries. The Cabala is actually ancient magic. It is an exotic blend of devilish, sometimes fanciful, New Age mystical practices topped by a philosophical bent of Jewish supremacism. Orthodox Judaism, or phariseeism, is rife with cabalism, and Jewish rabbis are the Cabala’s greatest promoters.
Celebrities and Cabala
The recent explosion in mainstream interest in cabalism is boosted by the many big-name celebrities who have recently been hawking cabalism as the miraculous answer to all of man’s problems. An undercover BBC reporter who infiltrated a London cabala group witnessed singer Madonna and Guy Ritchie chanting mystic spells to “cleanse” Chernobyl, the site in Ukraine of a nuclear plant disaster in 1986
Other news accounts link entertainers Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Roseanne Barr, Demi Moore, Shirley MacLaine, Ashton Kutcher, Sandra Bernhard, Barbra Streisand, Dianne Keaton, Gwyneth Paltrow, Goldie Hawn, Elizabeth Taylor, Michael Jackson, Mick Jagger, Uri Gellar, Diane Ladd, Laura Dern and a legion of other “stars” with practice of cabala.
Look closely when you see any of these people on TV or pictured in magazines and you’ll often see the characteristic red string wristband they wear. Lately, former President Bill Clinton’s been spotted wearing it—he’s a cabalist—and so has Florida’s politician Katherine Harris, who became a famous household icon as Florida’s Republican Secretary of State during the bizarre 2000 election snafu. Republican bigwig and former House Speaker, Newt Gingrich is reported to be a cabala advocate, and some say conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh and his rabbi are also into the cabala. Read more …
Raiders Of The Damned (2005) A review from Zombiefans!
January 4, 2009 / 3155
Their bodies are rotting corpses, but their minds are still hideously alive! In the final days of World War III, an unleashed biochemical weapon rendered Earth a post-apocalyptic wasteland overrun by cannibalistic zombies. When a helicopter carrying a group of scientists - humanity’s last hope for survival - crashes in zombie central, a military ops team led by Dr. Lewis (Richard Grieco, If Looks Could Kill, TV’s 21 Jump Street) is dispatched to rescue them. Now it’s up to the only soldiers still alive to fight the bloodthirsty zombies for control of the planet - or die trying!
Overview:
World War III has recently come to an end but that doesn’t mean the survivors are safe. During the war a biological weapon was used called Agent 9-X. This agent then mutated as it combined with the nuclear fallout. This combination creates a new problem. Those infected die with the exception of their brains. Thus turning them into cannibalistic zombies.
What is left of the government has attempted to contain them behind giant walls, but will these walls be able to contain them? A former military colonel that is now a zombie plans on leading an attack, breaching the walls that contain them.
The Story:
The movie opens with a helicopter flying over the containment wall that keeps Read more …
