Islam, At Gunpoint...

A note to all whom decry a "clash of civilizations", or claim that we are fighting "terrorists", but NOT Muslims...what do you call it when civilians are kidnapped, abused, and forced to convert to Islam under penalty of death?

Two Fox News journalists held for 13 days in the Gaza Strip were released Sunday after they were shown on a videotape saying they converted to Islam.
The two journalists, American Steve Centanni, 60, and New Zealand cameraman Olaf Wiig, 36, "have liberated themselves" by converting to Islam, according to the statement accompanying a videotape from a group calling itself the Holy Jihad Brigades.

It gets uglier...

Centanni recounted how he and Wiig were pulled out of their car on August 14 and taken at gunpoint into another car. The kidnappers blindfolded them and handcuffed their hands behind their backs with plastic ties. They were then transferred to another car and driven to a building that they later learned was a garage.
"We were pushed down onto the dirt-covered concrete floor and we were forced to life face down with our handcuffs on," Centanni said.
"Olaf was in the same room with me. Our shoulders were wrenched back, very painful."
Both of the men were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint, Centanni said.
"We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," Centanni told FOX News. "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it, but it was something we felt we had to do because they had the guns, and we didn't know what the hell was going on."

Hot Air has some video, incidentally..

Now I'm not going to jump on Mr. Centanni, who has obviously been through a horrific ordeal. But as one of his first statements was -

“Don’t get me wrong, I have the highest respect for Islam..."

- well, I hope he was not of sound mind when that statement was made; otherwise the impression left is that one can be held hostages by ahderants to a religious belief, forced to convert to said belief, and then willfully embrace that belief afterward.
Hmmm, perhaps what the entire West needs is two weeks face down in the dirt to discover our love of the Koran....and don't think that little tidbit will escape the adherants of Allah. From View to the Right:

The kidnappers did not force Centanni and Wiig to convert to Islam because the kidnappers are “fascists” who “hate our freedoms.” They forced them to convert to Islam because they are Muslims who believe in Islam. Yes, Islam tells them to hate our freedoms. But the primary thing is the belief in Islam, not the hate of our freedoms. How can we successfully fight an enemy whose existence we don’t even recognize?

Moreover, such forced conversions are exactly what Muslims have been imposing on non-Muslims for the last 1,400 years, through jihad war, razzias (raids), kidnapping, slavery, conquest, and dhimmitude. In reply, the Muslims insist that they don’t force people to convert. Rather, as Sayyid Qutb argues, jihad war is waged to bring people under (divinely led) Islamic rule, thereby freeing them (freeing them from their false human will, that is) to choose Islam freely. What Muslims call “freedom” is what we call compulsion. In fear of being killed, and in hopes of being released, Steve Centanni agreed to convert to Islam. The choice was not what we would call a free one. But now, having become a Muslim and so transformed himself, he can’t take it back, even though the gun is no longer pointed at his head. And so he loves Big Brother—I mean, he has the “highest respect” for Islam.

Again, I'll wait until Centanni sees a psychiatrist before I bash him personally...but the post above brings another fear to the forefront - are we fighting against Islamic Fascists, or the Muslim religion as a whole? We have often spoke of the myth of the moderate Muslim; one that every politician and leader claims exists yet cannot ever be seen/heard decrying the terrorism, kidnappings, murder and general mayhem that is carried out in their name. If the moderate Muslim does not exists, then we are faced not only with armed Islamists that are attempting to bring the world under a 7th century Caliphate, but a Muslim civilian population worldwide that supports this turn of events.

Perhaps this is why Islamic terror plots grow so freely in England, Canada, and all over the Middle East - because the average Muslim believes these murderers are actually acting within the dictates of their religion. Or perhaps terrorists are simply the "armed wing" of the Muslim religion, if I may borrow the MSM lexicon applied to the likes of Hamas and Hezbollah.

But it is thought like these, I guess, that qualify me as a wing-nut...from one of View's comments:

...if someone said that Muslims are violent because they are followers of a religion that commands violence as a sacred obligation, he would be certified, not as an expert, but as an extremist.

Will the wall of political correctness blind us to what awaits us as Muslim militancy grows stronger, emboldened by its small victories, all under the watchful eye of future world leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ?