Jihad and the West - Black Flag over Babylon Chapter Four Podcast Three

Entertainment in the Caliphate               Muslims have enjoyed music for centuries, relishing folk, religious, popular, and foreign songs. But the State outlawed most music. Soon after their conquest, State operatives confiscated or destroyed musical instruments. They also killed musicians. Some musicians have sold or hidden their instruments, too terrified to play them. A celebrated local musician, Ahmad, entertained refugees by pulling his piano in a wagon from one refugee camp to another to deliver his “concerts in the ruins.” Some found relief, if only fleeting, in his piano playing and lighthearted singing. But the State set his prized piano on fire. He said, “They burned it on my birthday.”               Others pay higher prices for enjoying a song. A fifteen-year-old boy was arrested in central Mosul for listening to “Western music” at his father’s grocery store. He was publicly beheaded. There are some exceptions to the ban on music. The music of Cat Stevens, Rock and Roll Hall of Famer, who became Yusuf Islam, is allowed. Nasheeds are songs that praise Allah and are sung without instrumental accompaniment. They are allowed, particularly if they promote the Caliphate. Generation Caliphate—Child Care and Education in the Islamic State “They told us we want to make an army to open Rome, and we will control the West and America.”  Taha Jalo Murada boy in Raqqa   “They arrive here as children and quickly turn into killing machines.” Commentary on boys’ education in Raqqa             The State views today’s children as tomorrow’s iron-souled leaders. This parallels the Nazis’ Hitler Youth and the Soviets’ Young Pioneers. The Caliphate grooms Generation Z to serve as a shock force to conquer the Middle East, North Africa, and parts of Europe. The boys are raised to obey even the harshest and most dangerous orders without hesitation.               Education for boys is very strict, particularly for those abducted from Yazidi or Christian households. They are taught how to behead men by first practicing on dolls. They are deprived of sleep and edible food. A boy explained, “We were given dirty food—rice and beans [and] sometimes soup, but it had worms in it.” They have no opportunity to fraternize without supervision.               The slightest infraction—being late for prayers, failing to handle weapons correctly—would result in a beating, as recounted by thirteen-year-old Taha, a boy who was grabbed from his Yazidi family. He was constantly terrified and beaten with sticks. Some boys of Taha’s age have been sent on suicide missions with bombs strapped around their waist. Taha explained, “We did not get enough training, but they said in the future you will fight for Jihad.”               Primary and secondary education is strikingly different from that in Europe. The State canceled all classes except religious studies. The State decided that basic principles of science are un-Islamic because they declare that there are physical rules of the universe that do not change.70 This is considered sacrilegious. Any equations that are connected to moneylending are forbidden. The Caliphate promotes works by Islamic scholar Mohammed ibn Abd al-Wahhab, founder of Wahhabism; Muhammad’s hadiths and biography; Quranic sciences; Islamic jurisprudence; and the Islamic doctrine. For the more secular-minded parents, home study has become popular.   Profile Nineteen: Profiles in Killing               Death is an ever-present part of daily life in the Islamic State. Many have watched the deaths of family members, friends, neighbors, and work and schoolmates. It has become part of the common culture, as during the Great Plague in Europe and the Thirty Years' War. The Caliphate has captured international headlines for both the frequency and cruelty of its death sentences. They justify the killings by reference to Islamic mandates.   Beheadings               In some Western civilizations, beheading was, according to the epoch, a noble way to die. Hanging was reserved for the lowborn. In Britain, bluebloods condemned to die were often, though not always, beheaded. As late as 1977, the guillotine was still being used in France. In America’s colonial era, severed heads of criminals were sometimes displayed on Boston Common.  Beheading also has a place in Islam’s early history. In 680 in Karbala, central Iraq, Muhammad’s favorite grandson, Hussein bin Ali, had his head chopped off by the soldiers of the Caliph.  In fact, Muslim history is rife with beheadings. Legendary Muslim warrior Saladin ordered the heads removed from 230 Knights Templar in 1187; Turkish invaders beheaded 800 martyrs in Otranto, Italy, in 1480.               Early in the Islamic State, beheading became popular, in part because it is often referenced in Sharia. In the Koran, Allah ordered his followers to smite the infidels’ necks. He said, in Koran 47:4, “When you meet those who disbelieve on the battlefield, smite at their necks until you have killed.” The Islamic State does this today. It also impales the severed heads of its enemies on spikes.   Stoning   “Even the monkeys practiced stoning.” From the Hadiths               Stoning is part of Sharia. Caliphate leaders endorse this punishment. The caliph Omar, one of Muhammad’s closest companions, maintained that the punishment of stoning for adultery was originally in the Koran. He said, “Surely Allah’s Apostle carried out the penalty . . . and so did we after him.” One hadith discusses a group of monkeys stoning a female monkey to death for adultery. The most accepted hadith, al-Bukhari, has four references to death by stoning.               In Sharia, adultery must be proven by four eyewitnesses to the actual act. But in the State, the legal standards are much lower. Sometimes gossip is sufficient evidence for the judges. Males to be stoned are buried to the waist, and women to the neck. After this is complete, a crowd pelts the condemned with rocks until the person dies. The condemned are tightly bound, and the soil around the hole into which they are placed is well compacted. According to Sharia, if the condemned can wrest themselves from the hole, they can live without punishment. Sometimes there are double stonings of unmarried couples found en flagrante.   Crucifixion               For Western readers, crucifixions are associated with Romans, Jesus, and Spartacus. Like stoning, crucifixion is a dreadful way to die. The condemned is either tied or nailed to a cross, and death usually comes from suffocation. Emperor Constantine abolished it in the fourth century for its cruelty. The Islamic State brought it back to the Middle East in the twenty-first century.               Sometimes crucifixion can be combined with other tortures. Passions often run high during Ramadan, and, in June 2016, the State reportedly whipped and then crucified three people for eating during the day.   Exotic Torture               The Caliphate experiments with killing. For example, the State murdered five prisoners by locking them in a metal cage and lowering them into a swimming pool. Filmed in Mosul with expensive underwater cameras, a seven-minute-long video captured the terror and agony of the drowning men. The cages were lifted from the pool, revealing dead and nearly dead men foaming at the mouth. Other depraved deaths include bathing the doomed in acid. .