[ April 20, 2024 ]
The West has forgotten much of its history and rejected the rest, but the Islamic world remembers.
The Associated Press reported Saturday that “Turkey’s president has recited an Islamic prayer in the Hagia Sophia, a historic Istanbul landmark that has become a symbol of interfaith and diplomatic tensions.” Hagia Sophia was for nearly a millennium the grandest cathedral in the Christian world, until 1453, when the conquering Turks converted it into a mosque. Now it is a museum, but Erdogan has indicated many times that he wants to make it into a mosque again.
Inside the former great cathedral, Erdogan recited the first verse of the Qur’an, and said he was dedicating his prayer to the “souls of all who left us this work as inheritance, especially Istanbul’s conqueror.”
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Nowadays Erdogan frequently invokes and glorifies Turkey’s Ottoman past, reinforcing the impression that many hold, that he is intent on restoring the caliphate in Istanbul and maybe even declare himself caliph.
In any case, when he enters the Hagia Sophia and dedicates his Islamic prayer to “Istanbul’s conqueror,” he is inviting people to remember the Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II, the conqueror of Constantinople. In my forthcoming book The History of Jihad From Muhammad to ISIS (which you can preorder here), I recount how, after over seven hundred years of trying, the warriors of jihad finally entered the great city on May 29, 1453. When they did, they made the streets run with rivers of blood. Muslims raided monasteries and convents, emptying them of their inhabitants, and plundered private houses. They entered the Hagia Sophia, which for nearly a thousand years had been the grandest church in Christendom. The Muslims then killed the elderly and weak and led the rest off into slavery.
The Byzantine scholar Bessarion wrote to the Doge of Venice in July 1453, saying that Constantinople had been
…sacked by the most inhuman barbarians and the most savage enemies of the Christian faith, by the fiercest of wild beasts. The public treasure has been consumed, private wealth has been destroyed, the temples have been stripped of gold, silver, jewels, the relics of the saints, and other most precious ornaments. Men have been butchered like cattle, women abducted, virgins ravished, and children snatched from the arms of their parents.
When the slaughter and pillage was finished, Mehmet II ordered an Islamic scholar to mount the high pulpit of the Hagia Sophia and declare that there was no God but Allah, and Muhammad was his prophet. The magnificent old church was turned into a mosque; hundreds of other churches in Constantinople and elsewhere suffered the same fate. Millions of Christians joined the ranks of the dhimmis; others were enslaved, and many were killed.
These are the glories Erdogan was invoking. He was recalling one of the most decisive and devastating victories of the warrior of jihad over the forces of Christendom, at a time when what remains of Christendom has rejected Christianity and decided that its ancient and inveterate foes are really friends after all, and always were, and any conflict between Islam and Christianity must have been the Christians’ fault.
Why would Erdogan be so keen to glorify “Istanbul’s conqueror” now? Because the current situation gives the warriors of jihad the best opportunity they have had in centuries to finish the job of conquering Europe. The modern-day Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, in writing about “signs of the victory of Islam,” referred to a hadith:
The Prophet Muhammad was asked: “What city will be conquered first, Constantinople or Romiyya [Rome]?” He answered: “The city of Hirqil [ruled by the Byzantine emperor Heraclius] will be conquered first”—that is, Constantinople—Romiyya is the city called today ‘Rome,’ the capital of Italy. The city of Hirqil [that is, Constantinople] was conquered by the young 23-year-old Ottoman Muhammad bin Morad, known in history as Muhammad the Conqueror, in 1453. The other city, Romiyya, remains, and we hope and believe [that it too will be conquered]. This means that Islam will return to Europe as a conqueror and victor, after being expelled from it twice—once from the South, from Andalusia, and a second time from the East, when it knocked several times on the door of Athens.”
And now it is happening. Erdogan knows it, and is exultant in victory.
Robert Spencer is the director of Jihad Watch and author of the New York Times bestsellers The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) and The Truth About Muhammad. His new book is Confessions of an Islamophobe. Follow him on Twitter here. Like him on Facebook here.
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49 Comments
6 years ago
If western europe want to be part of erdogan’s caliphate, they are going about it the right way. History has a way of repeating itself to those who do not learn its lessons.
6 years ago
Reply to
Mahou Shoujo
Agree. Left/liberal pro-jihadi feminist welcome their own sexual predators https://tinyurl.com/y9uw74ne
6 years ago
Reply to
Mahou Shoujo
One thing is a certainty, Mahou, Western Europe inherently forgets or dismisses history. Those of us on the fringe are aware of this fact but not the mindless leaders. Yes, history repeats itself; however, the leaders have no grasp nor dare to grasp it. Honestly, Erdogan’s caliphate is nearing completion, for some unknown reason, I suspect Merkel and Macron have already converted to Islam; in doing so, they are guaranteed to keep their heads. Not that they need them as they are hollow.
6 years ago
Reply to
Ziggy46
You’ll be shocked by what these liberal schools haven’t told us.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCCbEMrNkWM
6 years ago
Reply to
WamBamThankYouMame
I am never shocked when it comes to our fetid Islamic, racist, Bolshevik educators. Our son went through this garbage, now our grandchildren. Parents should watch this video but it may upset their Liberal sensibilities.
6 years ago
Reply to
Ziggy46
I know! I’m almost dreading for my granddaughter to start college this fall.
6 years ago
Reply to
Janet
Keep the lines of communication OPEN.
They are cesspools of degeneracy.
Our last one is at a University. You should be concerned!
6 years ago
Reply to
felix1999
I just hope and pray that she doesn’t fall for all the liberal BS that these professors dish out. You know what I’m talking about. White guilt, how wonderful abortion is, how bad our military is and the list goes on. Trouble is that if you don’t agree with your professors or challenge them they’ll give you a rotten grade. Free speech is almost nil if you are a conservative on campus. It’s going to be interesting to say the least!
6 years ago
Reply to
Janet
Try education her before she goes, but most of all instill in her a belief in God Almighty and his laws. Tell her about Islam and about the lies she is likely to hear about it. Get her to read books by Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller.
6 years ago
Reply to
Ziggy46
ishat I would like to know from you is why you and your friends are not confronting schools and school boards over the Islamization and other indoctrination of children. I am a widowed grandfather with two grandchildren, 8 & 9 in has permanent custody, and there is not a thing over which I don’t challenge their school and school board when they try to brainwash these kids with garbage. What the hell has happened in North America? I’m South African and don’t just roll and play dead like the Canadians around me. This is just too important fight to bother about upsetting people, so upset them I do. So should you.
6 years ago
Reply to
WamBamThankYouMame
Finally someone else who will speak the truth! Thanks for the video. Interesting!
6 years ago
Reply to
WamBamThankYouMame
In fact it is not the Muslims of whom I am afraid, it is the pitiful excuses for leaders in the West. Merkel, Macron and Theresa May unless more mindless stupid and dishonest than I already consider them, know all about Muslim violence and rape, but turn a blind eye, too cowardly and visionless to take the ruthless action that is necessary to deal with the Muslim scourge that is descending on their countries. Justin Trudeau is just complicit and gullible fool, driven by political correctness and stupidity, so Canada is in for a rough ride down into misery. In truth, I don’t think that Donald Trump has yet gathered the magnitude of the task facing him in regard to Islam. When he brings back into educating about Islam, Robert Spencer and others like him, members of the FBI, CIA, NSA, Homeland Security, and ejects all Muslims who represent the enemy, and then does something about Islamization in schools, I’ll begin believing that reality has dawned on him. He can begin by telling General Mattis to stop talking crap about ISIS, al Qaeda and other Islamic savages “distorting Islam”, when they are the essence of Islam.
6 years ago
Reply to
Ziggy46
The problem’s islam will have to brutally and violently oppress will manifest themselves when sharia is implemented, then the hideous ugly truth of islam will no longer be masked with the veil of rare and exotic.
6 years ago
Reply to
Ziggy46
Merkel and Macron may indeed have converted, it would explain their otherwise INEXPLICABLE policies and behaviour. BUT IF THEY THINK THAT WILL SAVE THEIR ‘PRECIOUS’ LIVES, THEY HAD BETTER THINK AGAIN – (and have their plans to flee ready!)
6 years ago
Reply to
Mahou Shoujo
Exactly! But try telling that to the loons on the left. They haven’t got a clue!
6 years ago
Reply to
Janet
The stooges on the left think they can control muslims like they control each other, they are in for a shock.
6 years ago
They need to get rid of there current leaders b4 they can do anything else
6 years ago
In 1911, Islamic Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917, 1.5 million Christian Armenians, Greeks, Assyrians … unable to defend themselves, were rounded up by Muslims and exterminated.
Islamist , Recep Tayyip Erdogan .. recited his favorite poem : Ein Reich, Ein Volk, Ein Erdogan.
6 years ago
Reply to
taxpayer22
I read it was more like 2.5 million and the Greeks were slaughtered under the rule of Ataturk, the Turkish “secular hero”.
6 years ago
https://www.jihadwatch.org/2018/03/turkey-erdogan-recites-quran-inside-hagia-sophia-in-honor-of-istanbuls-conqueror
-> with the death cult, ‘… a clear conquest’ (not defense!!) https://quran.com/48/1-28 video
(Quran 48:1-28 last Sermon on the Mount ‘Arafat’, near Mecca) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUVk2rFtDkI
6 years ago
ErDOG is acting and talking S- like he has NEW political or military power. It’s as if he now has a set of balls because he’s being backed by Russia.
“…any conflict between islam and Christianity must have been the Christians’ fault.”
While the bible says thou shall not bear false witness, the koran says the infidels deceive. They plot and plan against pisslam, but allah is the great deceiver. The koran, written centuries after the bible, and pisslam, is more than belligerent, it ATTACKS the “unclean”. F-ing pisslamists are looking for a fight.
F- pisslam.
6 years ago
Mohammad is the satanic response of the life of Jesus.
6 years ago
Reply to
Phil McDonald
But TODAY in Church we all declared “CHRIST IS RISEN:- HE IS RISEN INDEED! HALELUIAH! HALELUIAH!” Those of the JEWISH faith have just celebrated the Feast of PASSOVER!
We HAVE to make the regular guy in the street REMEMBER THEIR CHRISTIAN OR JEWISH BIRTHRIGHT!
It is DOWN TO US! Not the Schools, Colleges or Universities! OUR children should be going there TO RE-EDUCATE THE EDUCATORS!
6 years ago
http://translate.google.com.br/translate?hl=pt-BR&sl=de&tl=en&u=https://www.gloria.tv/article/1bhUXAsrmeUKDzrCAFNDkhwPy Eyewitness reports of unimaginable ‘massacre’s 8:67 (-> all disbelievers 41:28)
of the Turks at the ‘conquest’ 48:1(-28) of Constantinople in 1453 …
6 years ago
Reply to
Thorsten
There were unimaginable atrocities on a grand scale by daesh not that
long ago, including the so-called white helmets. Who remembers those?
6 years ago
OT: the inner city of Flensburg is declared a “dangerous place” from German police
‘… happy murdering 4:89, 9:5 in the north’
-> ‘Is Flensburg yet diverse enough?’ (Robert Spencer) http://translate.google.com.br/translate?hl=pt-BR&sl=de&tl=en&u=http://www.pi-news.net/2018/03/flensburg-wird-s-zu-bunt-innenstadt-zum-gefaehrlichen-ort-erklaert/
Thank you Dr. evil mer‘kill’ (cdu) https://quran.com/8/17
6 years ago
Erdogan is rolling back the secularism of Attaturk and turning Turkey back into a Muslim state …their population in Anatolia is rural and Muslim and is outgrowing western secular Turkey at an ever increasing speed !
Turkey has recognised the weakness of the EU who cannot even summon up the national will to defend its borders and coastline against an unarmed migrant invasion ; naturally they are going to make the most of an opportunity to play the role of a latter day version of the Barbary Pirates by using migrants as a gun to the head by blackmailing the EU and holding them to ransom by threatening to turn the ”refugee”flow on or off at their convenience ; but who can blame them ? The EU are morons for allowing a foreign country to have the responsibility of border control for them !
6 years ago
Reply to
alfred5
Um, it was Ataturk that ordered the mass slaughter of Greeks, but maybe you don’t have a problem with that?
6 years ago
Reply to
IzlamDownpressesHumanity
Greece invaded Turkey when they assumed she was weak from the carnage of WW1 ; unfortunately Greeks were lousy fighters and were quickly defeated
6 years ago
Reply to
IzlamDownpressesHumanity
Turks are cruel ; they should have thought about that before they invaded
6 years ago
Yes, and we celebrate the 4th of July. It hasn’t been the Hagia Sophia for 500+ years. Get over it. It’s not even a mosque anymore. It’s a museum. Turkey is nice enough to preserve the Christian artifacts.
6 years ago
When they forget their history, they are doomed to repeat it.
6 years ago
Reply to
santashandler
HEY! Were you there and DIDN’T STOP THEM? Let’s face it, we have stood by (or filmed it ‘for posterity’!) AND DONE LITTLE OR NOTHING TO STOP THEM! (POLICE TOO!)
IT REALLY IS ‘DOWN TO US’! If it’s WORTH preserving, the PRESERVE IT!
6 years ago
He is a hard line Muslim. Nothing but bad news there.
He’s sly enough to BLACK MAIL the EU to not allow more “migrants” or “refugees” through his country to the EU. The EU PAYS him to not allow that. Let’s see how long that lasts as the EU runs out of money.
6 years ago
Reply to
felix1999
Erdogan is LAUGHING as he collects the ‘MARRAM’! The tax-money Christians must pay the Muslims TO REMAIN ALIVE!
6 years ago
History is doomed to repeat its self. Turkey need to be stomped In to the dust. While it still can be.
6 years ago
THE demons are making contact with this man. Riling him up to start World War III.
6 years ago
Erdogan needs to have an ‘accident’…the kind that is staged by the Mossad.
6 years ago
Erdogan will shot and his family will be blown up by a bomb in a very public place. There is a cost which the Islamo-fascist will have to pay for.
6 years ago
How visionless and stupid is Europe and in fact the West. Having abandoned it Judeo-Christian beliefs it now stands for nothing, believes in little of value, and is too cowardly to face up the reality of the Islamic savages confronting it. As to Erdogan we can dismiss with contempt his elation over Islam’s victory over Constantinople in 1453. “.. decisive and devastating victories of the warrior of jihad over the forces of Christendom” it was, but over a city of Christendom that had largely lost its faith and a shadow what it once had been. The black plague of 541–542AD had wiped out a third of the population. The Fourth Crusade further devastated it. The 20 year war with the Persian Empire had further reduced the Byzantine Empire, and although the Arabs took Jerusalem in 637AD they never conquered Constantine. When Mehmed II’s forces arrived in 1453 the city had less than 20 defenders and of these numbers were foreigners. Outside was an Islamic army of at least 80,000, helped by a Austrian designed and operated canon to smash down the walls. Erdogan has conveniently forgotten that by 1914 the Ottoman Turks, by then the ‘sick man of Europe’, it forces beaten all over, began crawling back to Constantinople.
