We explore real-life reformation here in this informed, online community.
A few main principles of Hamas' ideology, as articulated in its Charter and in statements by its leaders and spokespersons, are the following:
--The conflict with Israel is a religious war between the Muslims and Jews that will continue until the End of Days.
--Jihad and martyrdom are the only way to liberate Palestine "from the river to the sea"
--All of Palestine, "from the Jordan river in the east to the Mediterranean in the west" is waqf land (i.e. a religious endowment sacred to Allah), so the religion forbids relinquishing even an inch of it. Peace negotiations and normalization with Israel are forbidden and anyone who engages in them is a traitor against Allah and His Prophet and is destined for Hell.
--Israel has no right to exist, and jihad against it must continue until it is eliminated and all of Palestine is liberated
--No Israelis are civilians. All Jews in Palestine, including children, are combatants and may be killed by every means: stabbed, beheaded or bombed, including in suicide operations.
--Tahdia (a temporary lull in fighting) with Israel is possible as a tactic, but the overall strategy is ongoing jihad
--Martyrdom is a supreme value and part of jihad. Martyrdom-seekers (i.e., suicide attackers) "love death as much as the enemy loves life" and are rewarded in Paradise.
--Antisemitism: Jihad is against the Jews, who are destined for annihilation.
--The Jews are "the descendants of apes and pigs"; they are subhuman or "microbes."
https://www.memri.org/reports/hamas-charter-%E2%80%93-ideology-behind-massacre
Even Marine Le Pen’s recent statements track this line: personal Islamic practice is compatible with the Republic; replacing French law with Sharia is not. French Muslims who are simply citizens practicing their "religious faith" “have no reason to worry” about a Le Pen election victory.
But can one be a practicing Muslim without demanding and practicing Sharia?
Eph 3:20 Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us,
Eph 3:21 to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
Serious numbers of migrants arrived in Massachusetts from 1630 - 1640. Roughly 21,000. By 1700 they had become 91,000. Their immediate priorities: having families, building farms, forming towns, and building institutions Old England never developed on local levels. But the new Americans didn’t just reproduce the country they left. They built institutions England didn’t yet have.
Year 1 — a seagoing vessel launched at Medford, 4 July 1631. The shipwrights had been sent out in 1629, ahead of the fleet.
Year 4 — representative government. Elected deputies sitting in the General Court.
Year 6 — Harvard. £400 voted for “a schoale or colledge.”
Year 8 — a printing press, the only one in British North America. Glover died on the voyage out; his widow Elizabeth moved the operation to Cambridge and got it running.
Year 10 — the Bay Psalm Book, the first book printed in America.
Year 11 — the Body of Liberties, read aloud at every General Court.
Year 12 — the 1642 law: every ...
