EPGAH writes:
How do you know what the Muslims in your town TELL you is really how they feel, and not just “Taqiyyah”?
They’re not lying to me.
Most of the ones who bother to come here get over the “hate the infidels” bull. Hell, if they are even willing to work with Jews in New York, they cannot be too into the hate the infidel bullshit.
I have met a few Muslims who were somewhat radicalized. They don’t really try to hide it honestly.
I think this “taqiyya” thing is massively exaggerated. Taqqiya was supposed to allow Muslims to lie when they are in a population that is hostile and oppressive towards Muslims. That is, they are allowed to lie to get by in a hostile environment. The Jews, Alawi, Druze, Yezidis and others all have similar customs. I am afraid that most of this taqiyya bull is just Islamophobic nonsense.
Even the Palestinians in this town are not very radical. I met four of them. I was shocked at how moderate they were. I was much more radical on the subject of Israel than they were. They practically considered me to be a terrorist based on the way I talked. The attitude of many of the Palestinians who come to the US is “The Hell with the Israel-Palestine conflict. We are done with that BS, and we have to come to America to forget about it, move on and let bygones be bygones.”
I met two brothers who told me that the Jews had out and out stolen 50 acres of their family’s land in the West Bank and turned it into a military base. They never got paid one nickel for it, and the Jews are never going to give it back. But they didn’t even sound very radical when they were talking about that. They sounded like they wanted to forget about it and move on.
I will say one thing. Muslims here respect you a lot more if you are religious. I imagine they do not think too much of atheists. I told them that I went to the local Catholic Church and they were very happy like, “Good! You worship God! Everyone should have a religion.”
One of the Palestinians even said, “Why don’t you like Islam? There’s nothing wrong with Islam. Islam is just like Catholicism. There’s not much difference really.” He seemed to respect Catholicism as some sort of rather conservative creed that worshiped the same God the Muslims did.
One thing I will say though is if you get close to these Muslims here, they will try to convert you to Islam. They already tried that with me. They invite you to a big meal at the mosque, and apparently this is a way to try to convert you. Islam is definitely a proselytizing religion.
