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Because They Hate: A Survivor of Islamic Terror Warns America

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This is a really great book. As I read it, I became aware that what is wrong with so many Americans (including me) is we are so uninformed, so uneducated about other parts of the world. I had little understanding, for example, of what the Lebanon "civil war" was all about. This book brought me up to speed on that and taught me so much much more. Reading the events of some 30 years ago seems very much like a deja vu for today. It's all so familiar. What happened then is happening now in exact parallel. I did not know, for example, how Lebanon of the 70s was so similar culturally (and governmentally) to the US of today. And how we are making the same mistakes that led to Lebanon's descent from a pinnacle of culture to hellish chaos.

Gabriel's story is so illuminating, so educational, so human, so revealing, so insightful passionate caring. It provided me with a still deeper picture of the true face of radical Islam than almost anything else I've read on the subject. It should be mentioned that the book is well written indeed, gripping and movingly paced. My thanks to Gabriel for writing this book, and my hope that her efforts not be wasted. She really deserves to be listened to.

Brigitte Gabriel's "Because They Hate" is a combination memoir and screed. The memoir is very strong. It is poignant and thrilling. The screed is flawed. Overall, though, the book's message is important and its importance transcends Gabriel's flaws as a writer. Throughout, Gabriel demonstrates the kind of dauntless courage that one wishes our political leaders and media elites would exercise.

Brigitte Gabriel was born to a 54-year-old Lebanese Christian woman who had had no other children. This unusual birth communicated to Gabriel that she had been born for a higher purpose, and she is determined to fulfill that purpose.

Her father was a successful restaurateur and landlord in an idyllic Lebanese village. Gabriel's parents loved her dearly.

The world came crashing down when jihadis began attacking Lebanese Christians.

Gabriel describes these assaults with all the power of a page-turning thriller and all the poignancy of many a great child's memoir of war. This portion of her book is so strong that I wish Gabriel had produced a memoir by itself.

Gabriel describes being shelled, living in a bunker, being wounded by shrapnel, and close-call visits to hospitals to have shrapnel removed without anesthesia. Again, when Gabriel barely survives being seriously wounded, her conviction that God put her on earth for a reason is reinforced.

Gabriel grows up and makes her way to Israel. In Israel she encounters humanitarian behavior that she had not encountered among Arabs. Israeli hospital employees work to save the lives of Muslims, though the Muslims curse them. An Israeli interpreter is very kind to Gabriel. Israeli doctors impress Gabriel with their off-duty conversations about literature. Israeli passers-by impress Gabriel with their cleanliness. She sees an Israeli child seek out a garbage can to throw away trash; she sees an Arab throw his garbage in the street.

Gabriel compares the compassionate, intelligent Jews she meets in real life with the stereotypical Jewish monsters, "monkeys and pigs," that are depicted in Muslim propaganda.

Gabriel has an epiphany. She realizes that the Muslim world is drowning in its irrational hatred of Jews, and that Israelis are operating under a different, more humanitarian, worldview.

These scenes are poignant and powerful.

The memoir takes up about half of the book. The rest of the book consists of a strident screed arguing that Jihad is a threat to America and that Americans are not doing enough to stop that threat.

It is not enough for Gabriel to point out the threat; she also offers solutions. These include this very important point: we need to find new energy sources. Petroleum funds jihad.

So far so good. But Gabriel could have benefited from some editing. While admiring Gabriel's blazing courage, the kind of courage that could serve as an example to everyone from political leaders to college presidents to NPR announcers, who are too intimidated by Political Correctness to speak harsh truths, Gabriel's anger does become grating.

Though Lebanese, for example, Gabriel works to distance herself from Arabs, saying that she descended from the Phoenicians. Her comments about Arabs will needlessly alienate readers. A critique of the dangerous dictate of jihad need not focus on Arab people and denigrate them racially.

Gabriel makes tacky and gratuitous comments about Bill Clinton and Dick Durbin, and expresses a great deal of anger and contempt against "ignorant and lazy" America and the West for not adequately protecting Lebanese Christians.

She hops from topic to topic, often not providing adequate background necessary for full understanding, for example, in her brief and incomplete mention of the massacre at Sabra and Shatila. Though the book contains footnotes, it does not contain an index, and it should have one.

Extreme statements in the book include the following: "...it is foolish to allow Muslims to take any type of science courses..." (227). Does Gabriel really mean this? If so, how does she plan to justify such a rule, or to enforce it?

I mention these flaws in the hopes that Gabriel and her editors will correct them in her next book. In her main point, Gabriel is not only correct, she is blazingly courageous in a world where people are afraid to speak this simple truth: jihad is a threat. It takes courage to say this; the fate of people like Pym Fortuyn, Theo van Gogh, and Salman Rushdie alerts us exactly to how much courage Gabriel, who was nearly killed by jihadis, displays here. I hope that in her next book, she displays a bit more cool headedness. But I do hope for her next book.

I had the opportunity to see Brigitte Gabriel speak the other night. She is an amazing person. I bought her book and read it within the next day. She has an important story to share and a talent for telling it.

Brigitte was raised a Maronite Christian in Lebanon but spent her formative years hiding with her parents in a bomb shelter. She saw her country destroyed by Muslims intent on Jihad and intent of the triumph of dar-al Islam.

Brigitte's history is compelling. She was raised in a society that was mostly tolerant and westernized-- to the point of being too tolerant of those that are intolerant (Muslims). This openness and tolerance and multiculturalist ideal was Lebanon's ruin. And, the free and open society the Lebanese prided themselves for having is, in effect, gone now and taken over by Islamofascist leaders (currently Hezbollah).

Brigitte reminds us (and teaches those that don't know) that the culture of Islam is truly incompatible with Western culture and Western ideals. Islam glorifies death and destruction in the name of Islam, or submission (to Allah). I am well-aware of those in the U.S. who do NOT want to recognize the truth and who do NOT want to recognize the threat we are facing. These people continually choose to ignore all the evidence that confronts them and ignore and denigrate those that speak the truth and share their stories.

The author's words of warning should be heeded. It seems those in the West continually ignore the Islamists' continual shouts of hatred and unequivocal warnings to achieve their goals of Islamic rule in addition to ignoring their continual attacks of war. The Islamists continually state their aims and act on it while the West-- at the risk of our own demise-- continually ignores the evidence that proves the Islamists are doing exactly what they say they are doing and will continue to do until their goal is achieved.

It's a great privilege to know Brigitte Gabriel and consider her a friend. One cannot praise her enough.

For more than five years, Gabriel has sacrificed everything to bring the truth about Islamic jihad to the American public; and it is gratifying and most wonderful that her message at last is reaching the public--in this incredible book--and even through the mainstream press, which too long refused to detail the sufferings of jihad survivors.

Brigitte's is a phenomenal book--and given her awe-inspiring personal saga, it could hardly have been otherwise. She tells her own horrific experience as a south Lebanese Christian, whose family, village and friends suffered the direst of consequences during the Islamic invasion of their once peaceful nation. In addition to laying siege to south Lebanon and Beirut, the Islamic fanatics launched a cruel, decades-long attack on Lebanon's peaceful Christian majority, bombarding their homes with rocket fire, starving them out, and committing thousands upon thousands of atrocities.

By now, the international community has become well-acquainted with the 1982 massacre of 500 Palestinian Arabs in the Sabra and Shatila villages by Christian Phalangists.

But the international community does not know of the thousands upon thousands of Lebanese Christians murdered in equally--and often, far more horrific--atrocities. Brigitte Gabriel witnessed such attacks first hand--and survived. Women were raped and murdered before their husbands, forced to murder their own children, and often, dismembered. Pregnant mothers' stomachs were carved open. The people were starved out. and forced into bomb shelters for years on end. Brigitte grew up in a bomb shelter--and came out only during "lulls," risking death, to forage for edible grass and water.

The Israelis, she writes, saved her and her mother, who was severely injured during the Islamic attacks.

It is shameful that anyone attempts to disparage Gabriel, or claims that things were not so. I did not know Brigitte during the 1970s, of course. But my dear Lebanese friend, Chris Khattar, who succumbed to Hodgkin's in 1992, often spoke of his similar experiences in Beirut, where Christians too often discovered their loved ones, in dark allies, with their throats slit.

Beirut was had been the Paris of the Middle East, a jewel among Middle Eastern cities, a predominantly Christian center of culture, trade and international banking. But in 1993 it became the scene of a horrific terror attack that took the lives of 241 U.S. Marines, Sailors and Soldiers deployed to maintain a fragile peace. And for decades before it became--and for decades after has remained--the victim of classical Islamic jihad.

What happened to Beirut and southern Lebanon--indeed, what happened to that once peaceful Christian-majority Middle Eastern enclave--should be one of the most compelling lessons in the education of American political leaders (on both sides of the aisle) on what can happen to a nation laid siege by Islam. American politicians of every stripe ignore this lesson at their peril.

Brigitte Gabriel is one of several key instructors. But she is hardly alone. Others include Prof. Habib C. Malik (Between Damascus and Jerusalem: Lebanon and Middle east Peace; The Challenge of Human Rights); Prof. Walid Phares (The War of Ideas, Future Jihad and Lebanese Christian Nationalism); Pakistani Christian Patrick Sookhdeo (A People Betrayed); Beit Sahur native Walid Shoebat (Why I Left Jihad) and Nazareth native Anis Shorrosh (Islam A Threat or a Challenge).

The fact is, anyone and everyone who hopes to save Western civilization--should put the lessons of these survivors of jihad at the top of their reading lists, and learn them by heart.

During World War II, one never heard U.S., British, Canadian or Australian leaders describe either their Nazi German or Japanese foes as following political creeds--different than our own--but acceptable all the same. Indeed, the Allies mounted very successful information campaigns to counter the Nazi and Kamikaze propaganda. Against Tokyo Rose and master liar Joseph Goebbels, Britain, America and their allies mass produced films and posters, induced Americans to invest in U.S. War Bonds--and did in every conceivable way evinced favorable publicity for the war effort.

But today, leaders totally ignorant of the highly political, and warlike precepts of Islam, insist on its good core intentions.

Meanwhile, the mainstream press has often done its level best to compromise security measures that protect hundreds of millions of civilians. Even former intelligence agents unaccountably work overtime these days to undermine American security. Apart from these willing, even intentional saboteurs--a big problem facing Western civilization is the false but widespread perception that it is impossible for us to fail.

Here's where the Brigitte Gabriels are so important: They present the Western world with stark alternatives--to either recognize, understand and defeat Islamic jihad, or allow it, to borrow from Nikita Khrushchev, to bury us.

--Alyssa A. Lappen

Anyone who has seen Brigitte Gabriel speak knows that she is strikingly attractive and charismatic. Her words convey deep conviction, emotional intensity, intelligence and learning. She writes in the same "up close and personal" manner.

Her account of her shattered childhood in war-torn Lebanon in the 1970's is one of the great depictions of the horrors of war. How she survived intact is nothing short of a miracle. Her harrowing experiences are not related in a self-pitying way, but to show what has led to her sense of "calling."

Ms. Gabriel was indoctrinated with anti-Semitism during her childhood schooling. When her mother was injured during the Israeli-Palestine fighting in the 70's she had to accompany her in an ambulance to an Israeli hospital. The young Ms. Gabriel was afraid of the Jews she had been taught to fear and despise. When she and her mother were treated with compassion and respect by the Israeli medical staff it was, as she describes it, a life-changing experience.

This first encounter with Western culture and its freedom, decency and respect for the individual completely turned her mind around. She had never experienced anything like it in Arab or Islamic culture. She fills in the details in her book, but to make a long story short Brigitte Gabriel eventually became an American citizen.

Her autobiography covers the first 100 pages of the book. The remaining 134 pages are a masterful polemic against Islam. Not just "radical Islam" but Islam "in toto." She argues persuasively that there is no such thing as "moderate Islam." She asks: "Where is their voice? Are they really there?" "The only liberal social thinkers in the Muslim Arab Islamo-fascist world are the dead ones."

It's amazing how much material Ms. Gabrial packs into these pages. She doesn't waste or mince words. She lists over 30 acts of terror from 1985 to 2001. Terrorist organizations and activities are described in Sudan, Nigeria, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Thailand and elsewhere. Demographics are shown which reveal that within a few generations Muslims will have population pluralities and majorities to change the laws and Constitutions of Western countries, including the United States. Her specifics make her arguments incontrovertible.

The final chapter of the book is titled: "What Must Be Done To Protect Our Country?" In these pages Ms. Gabriel lists numerous practical solutions to counter the insidious Islamic invasion of the West. She discusses a number of areas that can be strengthened and improved. To name but a few these include immigration reform, naturalization procedures, human intelligence, and profiling.

The appearance of this book is an important event. Brigitte Gabriel is going to leave her mark on America and the world. Her calling, as she describes it at the book's close, is to "protect America, the dream that became my address."

Normally, I'm not all that fond of anecdotal nonfiction. But I think Brigitte Gabriel has done a fine job with this book.

I found it interesting to see Gabriel's reaction to how nicely she was treated in Israel when she went to Jerusalem to get help for her injured mother. I had several Lebanese friends as a child, and I what I heard about Israel back then was not very complimentary, so I know how it feels to actually go to Israel without expecting Israelis to be better than people in other nations. It can be a very pleasant surprise.

Gabriel makes the point that what happened to Lebanon in the past three decades could happen elsewhere. And that's a good reason for us to read what she says about what did happen there.

In this book, we learn plenty about the failure of many in the media to warn us about some of the dangers we all face from Islamic extremism. Gabriel also tells us about the risks of allowing terrorists and terrorist sympathizers to set up shop in one's nation. The intent to be tolerant towards the intolerant can backfire in such cases.

In addition, there is a chapter on the failure of academia to live up to its standards in providing scholarship about Islamic fanaticism. Many top notch American universities accept money from Saudi Wahhabis and have Middle East Studies departments that are dominated by those who substitute Islamist propaganda for scholarly work. While this concerns Gabriel primarily because it is just one more aspect of a war against our society, it concerns me for an additional reason: it weakens academic departments as well as the reputation of academia in general. At this rate, I think entire academic fields such as history may fall into disrepute. I agree with Gabriel that we should all take advantage of websites that keep track of what has been happening on our campuses. The lies we are exposed to are incredible, and Gabriel does us all a service by showing us how bad some of them are.

What does the author conclude? Well, she says that we need to improve in several areas to combat the attacks on our society by Islamic religious fanatics. That includes controlling our borders, reforming immigration and naturalization procedures, getting better intelligence on terrorist groups, developing alternative energy sources, and banning the teaching of hatred. I think all these ideas merit some thought.

I highly recommend this fascinating book.

In Disneyland at Anaheim, California, there is a ride called "Its a Small World After All." Visitors get into a small boat which goes thru a meandering tunnel, with dolls of children from all over the world singing the catchy theme song in their native languages. Each national grouping is oh-so-cute-looking, dressed in native costumes. You leave the attraction with a warm, fuzzy feeling that people all over this planet are basically the same, and want the same things out of life that we do. To this Kumbayaesque worldview, Brigitte Gabriel's book says over and over, there are evil people all about this planet who do NOT want the same things out of life that we want, and they are dying to kill us, to boot. In fact, too many of them actually want to see their own children die as homicide bombers -- also known in Islam as holy martyrs ("shaheeds") -- in the same fashion that we Westerners would like to see our kids grow up to be successful professionals.

Americans, especially those whose parents were born in the U.S., for the most part have no concept of how Muslims in most parts of the world view us, our society, our values, and our aspirations. On this score, Brigitte Gabriel is our agent of reality without peer.

There is a Jewish saying that one who talks from the heart will reach the heart of another. This book speaks from the author's big heart. You can read many excellent recent books on radical Islam, Mohammed, Arabic history and culture, but none have the personal, experiential, human interest dimension of this riveting book. Many of the points the author makes have already been expressed by her colleagues, such as Steven Emerson and Robert Spencer, who contributed well-deserved encomiums on the back dust-jacket of Brigitte's book. Nonetheless, every reader will come away from this book with a deeper and broader understanding of what looks like a fifty-year-plus clash of civilizations, maybe even worse than the Cold War, which unfortunately our children and grandchildren will be living with.

When we rang in the new millenium in 2000 with gigantic New Year's Eve parties in all the great cities of the developed world, most of us were looking forward to a better and happier new century than the last one; unfortunately, on September 11, 2001, it began to dawn on us that maybe we were in for something else. As one wag put it, "Looks like we're in for a long, long century."

Yes, it looks more and more like a good part of this century will be dominated by the clash of Jihadist Islamofascism with the liberal, tolerant values of Western Civilization. We must therefore arm ourselves with knowledge of this ruthless, barbaric and dedicated enemy of our civilization. We must learn what religious war entails, because the Islamists have declared one against us, and, in point of fact, have for a quarter century been waging warfare upon us (the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979-1980 was the opening salvo).

Help save America from those who want to return the globe to the Dark Ages! Buy this book, read it, and pass it on.

And always remember that Walt Disney purposefully put "Its a Small World After All" in the section of his theme park appropriately called Fantasyland.

First off, she is amazing. Her courage, truth, wisdom, and awareness make her the person that she is. She shows the truth about radical Islam, and about the Palestinian society and how they manipulate the media and their people to hate Israel. There is not one thing that comes out of her mouth that I don't agree with. And I'm not kidding when I say I want her as my president! Anyways, the book is amazing and very easy to read and understand. She can definetely change the world.

This fascinating autobiographical account written from a Catholic Christian perspective is also documented history and tells the truth about Islamic Jihad; what it is, what it isn't, what it plans to become, why it's happening, and what needs to be done to stop it.

Unprecedented in world history, no other group, nation or country has the will, the cunning, the patience, the network, and the hate to achieve its global aspirations that Islamofascists do. They outbirth us almost 4 to 1. You will learn why they value human life so little that they believe they can sacrifice a few suicide bombers (children included) to accomplish their greater goals.

If you live in Western society, YOU BETTER READ THIS. You will learn why the West and the Middle East are opposites and why "never the two will meet", what they mean when they "negotiate", why you are an infidel and can be lied to, why they use violence, why they are growing stronger, more aggressive, and why they are outbirthing us; who they network with and why barring a major turn in events, they could win world domination very soon.

However, even if you don't have the will to do anything about trying to stop them, at least read it to find out what will happen to you if you don't and remember that "when your head is in the sand, what's left exposed makes a great target" (paraphrased) unless your head has already been severed by the sword. But then it's too late anyway, isn't it.

This book should be required reading for every elected politician and military officer. A chilling insight into the real face of Islam from an author who lived the nightmare. America desperately needs to wake up and smell the coffee and this book is a boiling pot of strong java. I hope we don't look back at this book one day and lament "We were warned..."