Transacting with Riyadh

Islam is a murderous religion. It takes the sword to those who fail to submit to Allah.

Andrew McCarthy describes how we see this playing out in the murderous regime ruling Saudi Arabia:

What is variously called “radical Islam,” Islamism, “political Islam,” or “Islamic extremism” (and don’t you dare ask what it is that they’re so extreme about) is better diagnosed as sharia supremacism. It is an ideology aimed at imposing the tenets of Islamic civilization and law, the necessary precondition for establishing Islamic societies.

More than in oil wealth, the Saudi king’s prestige in the umma — the notional worldwide community of Muslims — lies in his status as “Keeper of the Two Holy Mosques.” His kingdom, the birthplace of the prophet, is the cradle of Islam. There, Allah’s law, sharia, was revealed, and there it is vigorously enforced.

Common values with America? Sharia is authoritarian in the sense that it is imposed by the caliphate (the Islamic state) on its subjects: In theory, faithful enforcement of sharia makes the Saudi regime the sovereign, Allah’s representative on earth; the Saudi people are subjects bound to obey, not citizens entitled to make demands on a representative government. Sharia, moreover, is totalitarian in the sense that it really does aspire to control all facets of human life, great and trivial: governance, the use of force, restrictions on speech and property rights, interaction between the sexes, the arts, apparel, even hygiene. As illustrated by the beheadings, compliance with sharia strictures is compelled by often-brutal standards of crime and punishment.

Read the rest of Transacting with Riyadh.