Malaysian Prime Minister claims Isreal rules world by proxy.

[pellaeons_scion]

Didnt know about the keating snub. From what little I knew he was trying to bring us further in contact with our asian neighbours.

Perhaps boring dull and competant would be a good thing. Boring, dull and incompetant (howard) is a bad thing. At least boring and dull doesnt get fired up about issues such as religious difference etc.

As for a muslim bloc being a brake on US might? Dont know, if anything that idea might cause even more strife, and add to the Crusading Idea "Look out! The muslim empire is growing! They might even invade us!!!"*hysteria*

Ok thats a worse case scenario, granted. But a Muslim Bloc would probably cause further instability in world affairs.

...laptop battery 2 minutes and closing...damn power failures.

[AniThyng]

damned if you do, damned if you don't isn't it.

the idea is that a unified muslim world that is also economically and technologically sound will be capable of applying pressure on isreal to moderate its stand on the palestenians as well as preserve the independence of muslim states from foreign pressure and manipulation, as well as being able to rein in the extremist clerics and mullahs.

these things need time. to expect the sheiks and the influence of the mullahs to dissapear overnight is unrealistic. a rise in a muslim middle class in the arab world will change that, much as the muslim middle class in pacific rim and european countries do not actually advocate terrorism, although there is i grant a heavy bias against isreal.

the fact is arab states sponser terrorism, in the sense that they tacitly approve of hamas operating, well, i think it's bad too, but i'm afraid america cannot use herself as an example of a state who never sponsered..ahem, 'freedom fighters'., not in a way that will convince the arab governments anyway.


that said, this is about as realistic as expecting Iraq to rise from the ashes and become some sort of secular sucess in the near future...

[PainRack]

No, I advocate the seperation between church and state that causes this insanity.

As for participating in the commonwealth, he openly snubs and insults australia...not too many other nations do that. Howard deserves it for the most part, but Mahathir has been agitating against us before our current Moron of state. Im not even sure why..

Howard got elected back in the late 90s, right? Before then, relations were pretty good.

As far as I can see the muslim nations of the pacific arnt dominated by oil money? They seem to have relatively strong economies based on other industries, not just mineral wealth. As for the US not allowing the european nations to dictate policy to them, I dont think thats entirely relevant, or are you saying that nations should blithely ignore others and do whatever they please?

Not really. Indonesia, Brunei Darralusam and Phillipines certainly are commodoties producers and rely on the sale of resources like timber, oil, natural gas, copper to finance their economy. Malaysia is the only country to have moved away from being a commodity producer.

[Coyote]

P. Scion, considering the type of rhetoric that usually gets spouted by Muslim 'leaders', Mahatir actually is moderate. By not calling for another fucking Jihad and telling Muslims to look inward and find power by working hard as a communty to gain respect and purpose, well, that's an improvement over the crap from Nasser, bin-Laden, the Ayatollahs, Arafat, Yassin, and a host of others.

[pellaeons_scion]

By not calling for another fucking Jihad and telling Muslims to look inward and find power by working hard as a communty to gain respect and purpose, well, that's an improvement over the crap from Nasser, bin-Laden, the Ayatollahs, Arafat, Yassin, and a host of others.

On reflection, I guess that is a moderate position for a muslim leader...still a long way to go though.

Not really. Indonesia, Brunei Darralusam and Phillipines certainly are commodoties producers and rely on the sale of resources like timber, oil, natural gas, copper to finance their economy. Malaysia is the only country to have moved away from being a commodity producer.

Color me ignorant...

the idea is that a unified muslim world that is also economically and technologically sound will be capable of applying pressure on isreal to moderate its stand on the palestenians as well as preserve the independence of muslim states from foreign pressure and manipulation, as well as being able to rein in the extremist clerics and mullahs.

A nice idea, if that would work. I dont really see how it can, especially bringing the extremists to heel. And as for pressuring Israel, so far they dont seem to care what others think about what they do, the only real one who can exert that pressure on them would be the US...and I dont see that happening much, not really. If the US really wanted the Palestinian problem ended, I feel they could force the Israeli Govt to obey

the fact is arab states sponser terrorism, in the sense that they tacitly approve of hamas operating, well, i think it's bad too, but i'm afraid america cannot use herself as an example of a state who never sponsered..ahem, 'freedom fighters'., not in a way that will convince the arab governments anyway.

True. I dont think any nation can be totall innocent of that charge. Like the saying goes "Todays Terrorist is tomorrows freedom-fighter" All a matter of perspective I think. Im sure the Iraqi's would view Delta Force and other Blackops units as Terrorists....Ya know, Im not fond of Startrek greatly, but their almost utopia has a lot going for it..Irrelevant I know, but it was a random thought.

[AniThyng]

A nice idea, if that would work. I dont really see how it can, especially bringing the extremists to heel. And as for pressuring Israel, so far they dont seem to care what others think about what they do, the only real one who can exert that pressure on them would be the US...and I dont see that happening much, not really. If the US really wanted the Palestinian problem ended, I feel they could force the Israeli Govt to obey

yes, as Dr. M himself has said many times, the US is the only nation on earth that can rein in Isreal. Yet beyond mildly worded rebukes, they do not.

[MKSheppard]

Reading through this bit, some really fun choice bits:

To begin with, the Governments of all the Muslim countries can close ranks and have a common stand if not on all issues, at least on some major ones, such as on Palestine. We are all Muslims. We are all oppressed. We are all being humiliated. But we who have been raised by Allah above our fellow Muslims to rule our countries have never really tried to act in concert in order to exhibit at our level the brotherhood and unity that Islam enjoins upon us.

....

From being a single ummah we have allowed ourselves to be divided into numerous ects, mazhabs and tarikats, each more concerned with claiming to be the true Islam than our oneness as the Islamic ummah. We fail to notice that our detractors and enemies do not care whether we are true Muslims or not. To them we are all Muslims, followers of a religion and a Prophet whom they declare promotes terrorism, and we are all their sworn enemies. They will attack and kill us, invade our lands, bring down our Governments whether we are Sunnis or Syiahs, Alawait or Druze or whatever. And we aid and abet them by attacking and weakening each other, and sometimes by doing their bidding, acting as their proxies to attack fellow Muslims. We try to bring down our Governments through violence, succeeding to weaken and impoverish our countries.

.........

Apart from the new nation-states we also accepted the western democratic system. This also divided us because of the political parties and groups that we form, some of which claim Islam for themselves, reject the Islam of other parties and refuse to accept the results of the practice of democracy if they fail to gain power for themselves. They resort to violence, thus destabilising and weakening Muslim countries.

.....


With all these developments over the centuries the ummah and the Muslim civilisation became so weak that at one time there was not a single Muslim country which was not colonised or hegemonised by the Europeans. But regaining independence did not help to strengthen the Muslims. Their states were weak and badly administered, constantly in a state of turmoil. The Europeans could do what they liked with Muslim territories. It is not surprising that they should excise Muslim land to create the state of Israel to solve their Jewish problem. Divided, the Muslims could do nothing effective to stop the Balfour and Zionist transgression.

........


We are enjoined by our religion to prepare for the defence of the ummah. Unfortunately we stress not defence but the weapons of the time of the Prophet. Those weapons and horses cannot help to defend us any more. We need guns and rockets, bombs and warplanes, tanks and warships for our defence. But because we discouraged the learning of science and mathematics etc. as giving no merit for the akhirat, today we have no capacity to produce our own weapons for our defence. We have to buy our weapons from our detractors and enemies.

.......

Today we, the whole Muslim ummah are treated with contempt and dishonour. Our religion is denigrated. Our holy places desecrated. Our countries are occupied. Our people starved and killed.

None of our countries are truly independent. We are under pressure to conform to our oppressors' wishes about how we should behave, how we should govern our lands, how we should think even.

Today if they want to raid our country, kill our people, destroy our villages and towns, there is nothing substantial that we can do. Is it Islam which has caused all these? Or is it that we have failed to do our duty according to our religion?

....

There is a feeling of hopelessness among the Muslim countries and their people. They feel that they can do nothing right. They believe that things can only get worse. The Muslims will forever be oppressed and dominated by the Europeans and the Jews. They will forever be poor, backward and weak. Some believe, as I have said, this is the Will of Allah, that the proper state of the Muslims is to be poor and oppressed in this world.

...

It cannot be that there is no other way. 1.3 billion Muslims cannot be defeated by a few million Jews. There must be a way. And we can only find a way if we stop to think, to assess our weaknesses and our strength, to plan, to strategise and then to counter attack.

......


If we use the faculty to think that Allah has given us then we should know that we are acting irrationally. We fight without any objective, without any goal other than to hurt the enemy because they hurt us. Naively we expect them to surrender. We sacrifice lives unnecessarily, achieving nothing other than to attract more massive retaliation and humiliation.

It is surety time that we pause to think. But will this be wasting time? For well over half a century we have fought over Palestine. What have we achieved? Nothing. We are worse off than before. If we had paused to think then we could have devised a plan, a strategy that can win us final victory. Pausing and thinking calmly is not a waste of time. We have a need to make a strategic retreat and to calmly assess our situation.

....

We are actually very strong. 1.3 billion people cannot be simply wiped out. The Europeans killed 6 million Jews out of 12 million. But today the Jews rule this world by proxy. They get others to fight and die for them.

...

We must build up our strength in every field, not just in armed might. Our countries must be stable and well administered, must be economically and financially strong, industrially competent and technologically advanced. This will take time, but it can be done and it will be time well spent. We are enjoined by our religion to be patient. Innallahamaasabirin. Obviously there is virtue in being patient.

*slowly reaches for a Sniper rifle*

This guy needs to be killed ASAP, before he can become another Bin Laden.

I don't see a fucking thing about calling for PEACE; all I see is talking
about how Islam needs to unite, and pull back and plan logically instead
of blindly lashing out...and then strike back.

Of course, this kind of meshes well with the fact that 59% of
all Palestinians support Islamic JIhad and Hamas continuing attacks
on Israel, even if Israel withdraws from the Gaza Strip, West Bank,
and East Jerusalem and grants the Palestinians a state.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite? ... 6799672944

[MKSheppard]

P. Scion, considering the type of rhetoric that usually gets spouted by Muslim 'leaders', Mahatir actually is moderate. By not calling for another fucking Jihad and telling Muslims to look inward and find power by working hard as a communty to gain respect and purpose, well, that's an improvement over the crap from Nasser, bin-Laden, the Ayatollahs, Arafat, Yassin, and a host of others.

Read it a bit more carefully, Coyote. It's scary, I mean genuinely scary.

[AniThyng]

*slowly reaches for a Sniper rifle*

This guy needs to be killed ASAP, before he can become another Bin Laden.

Fuck you, asshole. i'm non-muslim and i live in his country and that's just bullshit. he's far from some sort of war-mongering infidel killing monster.

for fuck's sake, he sounds just like anyone saying that america will always need high-tech weapons to defend herself from threats, only in a rather blunt manner and rather unfortunately with the 'enemy' being YOU rather then US.[er..them. whetever...]

what, a CVBG is an intrument of PEACE? what a joke.

it's an instrument of war, and it's just that YOU have them and the muslim would doesn't that you cabn make lofty proclaimations about how aiming for economic, political and military parity is war-mongering.

i don't mean to offend you, but i'm pissed and i need to rant.




as for that last point, i think they'll stop and change thier mind when they realise that they actually have a state.

[MKSheppard]

Fuck you, asshole. i'm non-muslim and i live in his country and that's just bullshit. he's far from some sort of war-mongering infidel killing monster.

This guy just essentially said a "how to fight the west" plan thinly veield
as an attack on the Jews.

And it keeps getting better; his reply to all the criticism of the bullshit he
spewed forht a while back:

Excerpts from the opening speech at the June 2003 54th General Assembly of UMNO (United Malays National Organisation) by the Prime Minister of Malaysia, Dr Mahathir Mohamed

(Note: The comments by Dr. Mahathir on international affairs are so often consistent with the position of Islamic-World.net that we use his words as representative of our position)

The advances in jet passenger transportation and in telecommunication technology have made the world very small. All the countries of the world are now close neighbours. There is nothing that can be hidden or kept secret.

The concept of non-interference in the internal affairs of independent nations has been replaced by the concept of involvement indirectly or directly, including changing certain governments by foreign powers. If necessary force will be used for this purpose.

The collapse of the Eastern Communist Bloc has made this world a unipolar world, where the bloc which won, the capitalist bloc, will allow only the capitalist free market and liberal democratic system to be practiced in the world.

Globalisation has been introduced, designed by the Western countries to facilitate their control of the world economy.

It can be seen clearly that the Europeans wish to control the world again. At first this control was indirect, but today they have begun to invade and rule certain countries, ostensibly for their security but in fact to exploit the wealth in these countries.

The economies of East Asia grew rapidly since the end of World War II. Beginning with Japan; South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Southeast Asia grew rapidly. But the focus of attention is now China which dropped the Centrally Planned economy and accepted a limited free market system. In a very short space of time this poor Communist country has become a rich nation with the possibility of having a powerful military force.

This development has frightened China's close neighbours and the old enemies of China; i.e. Japan and South Korea.

The Western countries feel uncomfortable about China becoming a big economic power with a powerful military competency.

With this, the international climate has become very tense and challenging for everyone including Malaysia. And the Europeans have demonstrated a desire to return to their fierce old ways.

The history of the Malays during the British period can give us a lot of guidance regarding the character of the Europeans.

We have been colonised by three European races. For 450 years we have been under their colonial rule. Now we and other Asians face the possibility of once again being colonised by them.

Because of this we need to know the Europeans well for our fate, even our life will depend on how we interact with them and people of their origin. Here Europeans include those who migrated and set up new nations in America, Australia and New Zealand. They are often called white men or Westerners. But many are white and many who live in the West are not Europeans. The Europeans are people of the nations of Europe.The English say "call a spade a spade". Call anything by its real name. And so in this speech I will call the Europeans, Europeans.

I am not anti-European. I have many friends and acquaintances who are Europeans. I am embarrassed to criticise Europeans because those whom I know will feel hurt. The European countries which are friendly towards us will feel hurt. Certainly their media will condemn me as a racist. But I consider exposing who the Europeans are has become so important that the risk must be taken.

All Europeans have the same origins and culture i.e. based on the Greek and Roman civilisations. They are very clever, brave and have an insatiable curiosity. They are never satisfied with what they have and always want to improve on them, to make them better, more productive for whatever purpose. There is nothing, whether instrument or system or ideology which is not continuously improved by them.

Sometimes in their frenzy to improve everything they damage things and bring about bad results. But they are not deterred and they continue to try to improve things which they have or which other people have.

Unfortunately they are also very greedy and like to take forcibly the territories and rights of other people. Their 2,000-year history is full of endless wars to seize territories and enlarge their power worldwide.

At first their seizure was limited and confined to Europe. But when they mastered the skills of long distance sailing they extended their seizures and wars throughout the world. The Chinese, Arabs and Indians reached Southeast Asia earlier but did not fight to conquer this region. But when the Europeans arrived, the territories of Southeast Asia, like the territories of Africa, North and South America, Australia and the Pacific Islands, were seized by force of arms by them in order to make these territories their own, to seize the wealth, to oppress and denigrate and to commit genocide.

Because they like to wage war and seize other people's territories, their main interest is in the development and production of weapons to kill people more efficiently. There is no implement that is not modified to become lethal weapons, to give victory to them in war.

The Chinese invented explosives and used them to make noise in order to chase away the "dragons" and stop them from swallowing the sun and the moon during eclipses, or simply as firecrackers during festivals. But when the Europeans came across the Chinese explosives, the first thing that they thought of was how to use them to propel their cannon balls further.

Since then many weapons were invented to kill from long distances. Bombs, rockets, missiles, nuclear warheads and many more followed the cannon. Today the nuclear weapons that they have can destroy the whole world, but still they are not satisfied.

They are still researching and developing warheads which are more powerful and effective. In the history of the world only the Europeans have dropped nuclear bombs which destroyed cities causing the biggest number of people to be killed instantly merely with just two bombs.

When they invented the motorcar, soon after the armoured car made its appearance. The airplane resulted in bombers and fighter planes. Merchant ships resulted in warships and submarines. And all these are improved constantly in order to kill more people more efficiently.

Today billions of dollars are being spent to develop more sophisticated weapons, supplying them to their war machines, training their forces for war, getting ready to fight even though there are no enemies presently or in the future which threaten them. And they have demonstrated that they are ready to invent false allegations in order to go to war to kill children, old people, sick people and just anyone and consider all these people as mere collaterals, which cannot be allowed to come in the way of the achievement of their objective.

Fighting and the skills in killing are regarded as honourable by the Europeans. The champions among them are given the honorific title of "knights". Every now and then they would launch an attack to expand the territories of their Masters or Lords. That is why since ancient times their villages and towns are surrounded by stone walls and wide moats.

For them all differences must be settled by tests of strength. Whoever wins is right and is entitled to take all for himself. The loser loses all. That is also the way they settle the differences between the workers and the employers. The winner in the industrial action will get what he wants.

The history of Europe is the history of wars, the history of tests of strength. When they came into contact with non-Europeans in Africa, America and Asia, they went to war immediately in order to seize the territories of the local people, and to set up new countries and empires.

They did not show any charity or kindness. The local inhabitants were chased away and killed without compunction.

Many were the tribes which were made extinct by their attacks. Genocide for them is the final solution.

Actually they should feel sympathy for the local inhabitants because they themselves were expelled from their own countries in Europe. But when they reached what they consider the New World which is the old world for the inhabitants, they chased off the local inhabitants from their own land and seized all the properties of these people. Whoever resisted was attacked, killed or enslaved.

In their attempts to seize as large a territory as possible to create their new empires, the Europeans fought among themselves. Often the locals were forced to take part in their wars and pillaging.

The enmity between them increased because each of them wanted to expand their territories, to build empires, to become the most powerful nation in the world. Because of this they launched bigger wars involving the whole world.

The First World War was launched in 1914 and ended in 1918 after more than 20 million of their people and soldiers from the empires were killed and billions of dollars worth of property was destroyed.

Still they were not satisfied. Only 20 years after the First World War, they fought again in the Second World War. This time the destructive violence of the Europeans reached a peak. More than 50 million of their people and those of their empires were killed. They employed carpet-bombing to flatten whole cities with all the people.

Finally they dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, in a non- European country. Although these nuclear bombs gave victory to them, the Europeans were shocked at the power of nuclear weapons and the radiation which could kill the victims years after the bombs were dropped.

The Europeans felt frightened that a nuclear war between them would break out and their people would be killed and their countries destroyed by nuclear weapons. Because of this fear they made an international agreement to control the production, testing and use of nuclear weapons in war.

But several of them refused to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. They continued to study, develop and test various new nuclear devices for their bombs and warheads.

The Europeans hated the Jews even before they embraced Christianity. When they became Christians they blamed the Jews because a Jew had betrayed Christ to the Romans and was killed by crucifixion.

Because of this, until after the Second World War, the Europeans oppressed the Jews who had migrated to their countries. Every year they carried out Pogroms and Inquisitions indulging in the massacre of the Jews. The attempt to resolve the Jewish problem reached a peak during World War II when six million Jews were killed.

But after the Second World War the Jews were still in Europe. To force the Jews out of Europe, they seized the territory of the Arab Palestinians to create the state of Israel. Not only were the land, houses and farms of the Arab Palestinians seized, but the Arabs were chased out of their land which became Israel.

Since then West Asia has never been at peace. The attempts of the Palestinians to get back their territory were opposed by the Europeans. Instead they supported Israeli's seizure of more Palestinian land and the killing of Palestinians.

The throwing of stones by Palestinian children was met by bullets from Israeli forces which killed the children. But the Europeans did not condemn Israel. Instead, only the suicide bombings by the Palestinians were condemned by them.

The Sept 11 (2001) attack on America which supported Israel was made an excuse for the Anglo Saxon Europeans to return to their old violent ways.

Their strategy to fight terrorism is through attacking Muslim countries and Muslims, whether they are guilty or not.

By making all kinds of baseless accusations they launched attacks against Muslim countries, using their weapons of mass destruction, killing civilians and destroying the towns.

America and Britain did not care at all the condemnation of the world against their actions. Oppositions by their own people were ignored. They wish to show the world how powerful they are and anyone challenging them would be attacked by their military forces.

What I say here is all true. It is not the intention to frighten us, but so that we will take seriously the danger that we face. Again I would like to repeat that I am not anti- European or racist. It is not my wish to create hatred for the Europeans. But it is very imporant that we know this race and their activities in the past, because they will play a big role in our life and our race, our religion and our country. Our failure to know them will make it difficult for us to prepare and strategise for our own safety.

The struggle against Malayan Union and for independence is over. We have succeeded not only in ruling our country well after independence, but also in developing our country fast. Many of us think that once we become independent we will remain independent forever.

But today the danger that we face is greater than that which we faced in the middle of the 20th Century, when the British tried to seize Malay land to set up the Malayan Union.

Today we see how an attempt was made to make beggars of us by devaluing our currency. Today we see how the big powers attack and take over weak countries. The United Nations is clearly unable to protect anyone. There is no other power prepared to protect us if we become the object of attack.

The world that we have to face in the new decades and centuries will see numerous attempts by the Europeans to colonise us either indirectly or directly. If our country is not attacked, our minds, our culture, our religion and other things will become the target.

In the cultural and social fields they want to see unlimited freedom for the individual. For them the freedom of the individual cannot be questioned. They have rejected the institutions of marriage and family. Instead they accept the practice of free sex including sodomy as a right. Marriage between male and male, between female and female are officially recognised by them. What we call incest is not regarded as serious by them.

[MKSheppard]

Rant Cont:

The injunction against changes of religion among Muslims, laws which differ from their laws will be questioned by them. Their media will be used to denigrate all that we practise. The NGOs will be subverted in order to demand reviews of whatever is not liked by the Europeans, to amend and finally to reject what is considered as denying the rights of the individual.

The culture and the values which they will force us to accept will be hedonism, unlimited quest for pleasure, the satisfaction of base desires, particularly sexual desires. Our way of life must be the same as their way of life. Asian values do not exist for them.

Our economic system must follow the free market system conceived by them. Governments cannot be involved or have rules and regulations in order to help the weak. The problem of balancing the development between the races is not the responsibility of the free market. The free market is about the big, the strong, the capital rich taking all for themselves.

Nationals of a country cannot be given special treatment. Foreign companies must be free to enter any country to compete with local businesses and banks. The likelihood is that their giant corporations would swallow up the small local businesses, and we will become paid workers under them. Everything is said to depend upon merit and not the unequal and unjust competition with their big and experienced corporations. The result is that they will control every country's economy completely.

If anyone rejects the free market system proposed by the WTO, they will be subjected to punitive action intended to destroy their economy. Through the WTO the Europeans have introduced rule-based trading, that is, all trade within and outside the country must be subjected to the WTO rules invented by them. Whichever country fails to follow these rules will be subjected to various actions, such as sanctions etc. in order to destroy the country's economy.

When the Cold War between the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc was still on, the world was able to recover. The 60s, 70s and 80s saw remarkable progress in the economy of the world.

Relatively speaking the world at that time was peaceful and free from threats. With that the habit of traveling grew and flying as well as the manufacture of jet aircraft contributed to the economies of many countries in the world.

Millions of tourists and business travelers flooded the airports throughout the world forcing their expansion and increases in numbers yearly. Passenger jets which are bigger and able to fly further were developed and hundreds were produced and sold by companies like Boeing, Lockheed and Airbus. Luxury hotels were built worldwide, creating numerous jobs for people including those from the developing countries.

The development of the microchip, i.e. tiny electric circuits, revolutionised manufacturing. The microchip enables calculations to be speeded up by thousands of time and made possible the invention of the computer, and its use not only in calculating but in transmitting information by voice, in writing and through pictures to every corner of the world.

The demand for the microchips grew fast and plants to produce them were built everywhere, including in developing countries like Malaysia. The increasing wealth of some countries caused the demand for manufactured goods including motor vehicles to shoot up and many countries which switched from agriculture to manufacturing developed fast.

Malaysia achieved high growth with GDP above 8% continuously for 10 years. There seems to be nothing to prevent Malaysia from becoming a developed country by 2020.

Our policy is to prosper our neighbours. This is not just charity or a desire to help. The fact is that when neighbours are prosperous we will also become prosperous because we will be able to increase our trade with them. On the other hand when neighbours are beset with problems, the problems will spill over into our country. Clearly prospering your neighbour is a policy of enlightened self-interest. And this policy has brought a lot of benefit to us, contributing to regional stability and also the growth of the economy.

Truly the world after World War II was very prosperous. But the Europeans tried to improve things by changing the systems and practices of commerce, politics and social norms so as to become better and more fair.

Japan, which was so successful before, has become a victim of these new systems. Until now the Japanese cannot resurrect their ailing economy.

Malaysia, which was growing so well, was attacked by rogue currency traders who claimed that they had a responsibility to discipline governments. The result is that the growth of Malaysia's economy and those of East Asia have been stunted and even reversed. Until now restoration to the former level has not succeeded.

The restoration has become more difficult when the cheatings and commercial crimes in America were exposed. The dot com companies whose shares appreciated for no valid reason collapsed. After that the giant corporations like Enron, World Com, Arthur Anderson and tens of others big and small, were found to have cheated on their accounting.

Hijack became a word on everyone's lips when criminals seized passenger aircraft. The peak in this hijacking came when terrorists seized passenger aircraft and used them as guided missiles to destroy the World Trade Centre in New York. This frightened the tourists and the business travelers so that passenger loads fell below 30% in the US and elsewhere.

This has caused a tremendous decline in the hotel and other industries related to tourism. Nearly all American airlines became bankrupt with losses of hundreds of billions of dollars.

The hunt for the terrorists has made the world tense and unsafe. Bombs explode in many parts of the world. Afghanistan and Iraq were attacked and Syria and Iran were similarly threatened unless they changed their governments.

Thus the prosperity and the peace of 30 years in the world after the end of the Second World War has been brought to an end because of the attempt to improve on what was already working well. With the introduction of new approaches in the development of the economy of the world, with the frenzy to acquire wealth, with the disregard for the poverty and sufferings of so many in this world, with allowing the seizure of territories here and there, all the progress that had been made before has been destroyed.

Now the possibility of restoring the world's economy to the level of 1997 has become uncertain. It cannot be attained because instead of trying to calm the world, the powers that be are bent on using force in order to achieve their objectives.

In politics all countries are being required to practise liberal democracy. We admit that democracy is the best system of government ever invented by man. But it is not free from defects. For those who do not understand the limits of democracy, the likelihood is that governments which are weak, or corrupt will rule. At times anarchy will result from practising liberal democracy.

Democracy depends on popular support. This support can be obtained because the candidate or the party is skilled at governing and developing the country. But popular support can also be obtained because of racialism, because of deliberate misinterpretation of religion, or through bribing the voters.

At the same time the voter can also make use of racialism, religious injunctions, or demand for bribes for self or group. With this the winner which forms the government will not be the qualified and able, but will be those with thick racialism, or those who misinterpret religion or those who are corrupt. Government by such people will ruin the country, while the able and clean party will lose.

Maybe the intention of the Europeans to force the acceptance of democracy is good and they do not plan to damage the developing countries deliberately. They probably believe that democracy will help the developing countries the way it helped their own countries. But they forget the long period of time they took to understand and get benefits from this system.

The struggle for power in a newly democratic developing country has caused hundreds of parties to be formed. A strong government cannot possibly be formed if the electorate is divided by hundreds of parties. There will not be a party which will get enough representatives to form a strong government.

We in Malaysia have succeeded in practising democracy. But the Europeans are not happy. They wish to see frequent changes of government so that there will be no stability and development cannot take place. Their new slogan is "Regime Change". Because this has not happened and our country remains peaceful and successful they accuse us of being undemocratic and dictatorial.

Who are they to accuse our government as dictatorial? Aren't they the former colonialists whose rule was dictatorial and oppressive and have they not just invaded a weak country, killing many civilians in order to gain power over that country? Is their way of achieving Regime Change democratic? Look first in the mirror. The problem with the Europeans is that they award themselves the right to be the judge over their own views.

But their criticism may have a hidden agenda. Because we are not democratic, then interference by them in our domestic affairs would be justified. There will be many people in this country who will be influenced by their views and condemn the Government. The result will be instability for the country and it will not be able to develop and the people will suffer.

They will condemn this accusation. Saying, they have no ill intentions, no conspiracy to obstruct anyone's progress. They merely criticise. But we must not forget that their criticisms, even if baseless, have been used to justify their attack and occupation of a country.

The first person to talk of a Regime Change is Ariel Sharon, the Prime Minister of Israel. Arafat has to be replaced by a leader acceptable to them. Today the Europeans talk of the need to have Regime Change in many countries. Do not think that we will not be targeted.

This is the external environment which we face now and will face in the future. Allah be Praised until now we have succeeded in defending our freedom and our independence. This is because we are careful and able to avoid falling into the trap set by them.

Faced with these challenges what preparations must we make? I have mentioned the role of Islam in the life of the Malays. There is no influence greater than Islam in building the strength and the resistance of the Malays.

But the important thing is that we cling to the true teachings of Islam, the teachings which are all positive and constructive, the teachings which had given success to our Prophet Muhammad s.a.w., the teachings which had given great success to the early Muslims so much so that they were able to enlarge the Muslim territories to include almost the whole world and to maintain it for 1,300 years.

If we study closely we will find that the teachings of Islam stress good and honourable values. We are asked to read "Iqra" i.e. to seek knowledge. We are exhorted to be brothers in Islam, including in the party, outside the party, outside the country.

We are told to keep our promises and undertakings. We are asked to work hard, to acquire all kinds of skills which can help upgrade our defence and many more which are positive and constructive. We are also enjoined to reject what is bad and negative.

If we stick to all these good values and practise them, and we refer to them when faced with challenges, God Willing, we will succeed.

Islam will not disappoint us. Allah has not ordained that the fate of the Muslims will always be bad. The Qur'an has testified that Allah will not change the fortunes of any group unless that group strives to change its fortune itself. Allah has also clarified that all misfortunes are our own doing and only good fortunes come from Him.

And so it is not possible that our ill fortune at present is all from Allah. It comes from Muslims who only know how to appeal and pray for help but never try seriously to save and improve our fortunes. If we purposely chose to live at the foot of a volcano, do not blame Allah or regard it as preordained when the volcano erupts, bringing down our house on the top of our heads and we die.

Allah be Praised, for having given His insignificant slave this opportunity. I pray to Him to protect my race from the bad qualities and make them a people who are successful and honoured, who submit fully to all that our holy religion has taught us, to make them work hard, that May you protect and bring success to our people in order for us to become the model to the Muslim ummah, the people who submit to all your injunctions, Oh Allah, Amin.

With this prayer, with a heavy heart, yet with happiness, I declare officially open the 54th General Assembly of Umno.

[AniThyng]

hmm...

that's what operating from a religious and anti colonial mindset will do to you.

when his desired economic and scientific enlightenment comes to fruitation, suddenly he will realise that that anti-west rethoric is rather hollow.

i'm sorry, i can't put up much of a fight against that speech. i read it and said "shit. shut up already" too,

it's just that i can see his overall track record [he's being PM longer then i've been alive] abd it does not really match what he says in those speeches, and he has been in action moderate and tolerant. [of course he looks like a arch conservative in europe.]

but mustly he extorts for hard work and the seeking of knowledge and education. that is not at all evil and is far better then what is extorted by the mullahs.

and he has never supported the suicide attacks. malaysia does not fund terror groups, bar conspiricy theories of secret slush funds that no one has ever cooked up anyway. our military is slowly being modernised, and is really just for show and to remind Singapore that it is not the only country in SEA who can own advanced combat jets.

[besides, i love seeing those hornets fly over town.]


you know, i honestly don't think there is much to fear from a strong muslim world. a strong muslim world will be less fearful and insecure, and might actually be more open. i made teh comparison before, but as we can see from history, Germany in 1934 fell easily enough to extremism despite being a western country of great cultural legacy.

i really hope you guys can make a sucess out of iraq and afganistan. i really do. it's the only way you have to convincing the arab world that america is not out to crush and destroy them.