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Ayaan Hirsi Ali (an ex-Muslim) explains why the war of ideas is best fought with the pen and a bit more. In both a recent Wall Street Journal article and in a television show, the author of the recent book "Heretic" which follows her past books entitled "Nomad" and "Infidel" suggests that even if the entire ISIS territory was re-gained militarily, the threat of Islamic jihadism will still re-emerge. Here perspectives are very much food for thought.

A brief excerpt of her Wall Street Journal article "Europe’s Terrorist War at Home: Learn from Israel, end the open-borders policy, and dig in for a long war of ideas against Islamists" dated November 15, 2015 states:

Here are three steps that European leaders could take to eradicate the cancer of Islamic extremism from their midst.

First, learn from Israel, which has been dealing with Islamist terror from the day it was born and dealing with much more frequent threats to its citizens’ security. True, Islamic extremists inside Israel today resort to using knives and cars as their weapons of choice, but that is because attacks like those in Paris last week are now simply impossible for the terrorists to organize. Instead of demonizing Israel, bring their experienced, trained experts to Europe to develop a coherent counterterror strategy.

Second, dig in for a long battle of ideas. European leaders will have to address the infrastructure of indoctrination: mosques, Muslim schools, websites, publishing houses and proselytizing material (pamphlets, books, treatises, sermons) that serve as conveyor belts to violence. Islamic extremists target Muslim populations through dawa (persuasion), convincing them that their ends are legitimate...

The complete article can be found here.  

Secondly, she was interviewed on Fox News on November 18, 2015, and expresses no regret for her "Submission" which details the status of women in Islam, and for which she has received death threats to this day. In the interview entitled  "Ayaan Hirsi Ali on Islam and Violence" she also debunks the common mantra that ISIS, Boko Haram and al-Shabab have nothing to do with the core of Islam. 

Two questions:

  1. Do any of her suggestions make sense?
  2. If this is actually more of an ideological than a military war, [although the carrying of the sword by governments to protect the vulnerable against injustice is a whole other subject] how can the church with the mind of Christ do what the Apostle Paul advocated in 2 Corinthians 10:3-6 where he says: "For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, being ready to punish every disobedience, when your obedience is complete."

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