Friday, November 7, 2008

Another misunderstander of "Stealth Jihad"

Robert Spencer quotes another approving blurb to his new book on Stealth Jihad, this time from Andrew McCarthy of National Review:

Legions of jihadists are determined to advance the cause of a universally dominant Islam -- not just by violence, but by encroaching Islamic law and custom through litigation, political correctness, and exploitation of the West's crisis of confidence.

The problem with this capsule description of Stealth Jihad lies in that one little copulative phrase, "not just by". It implies two independent strategies by jihadists, two independent jihads. The essential linkage of stealth jihad and violent jihad is thereby obscured, if not undermined. I would have phrased that capsule description this way:

Legions of jihadists are determined to advance the cause of a universally dominant Islam -- using a two-pronged strategy that combines various forms of violent jihad (which has always been throughout history and remains in the present a necessary element of jihad), with a stealthy insinuation and infiltration of encroaching Islamic law and custom through litigation, political correctness, and exploitation of the West's crisis of confidence.

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