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RELIGION

To others, religion is not so much a source of conflict as a source of hope in sub- Saharan Africa, where religious leaders and movements are a major force in civil society and a key provider of relief and development for the needy, particularly given the widespread reality of failed states and collapsing government service   Pew Report

 

Religion and War Media Agendas Truth vs. Lies Religious Terrorsim Co-existence Religion and Conquest In the Name of God In Numbers Conclusion References [Comments]

Religion played and plays a critical role in the formation of civilizations and thus is a central aspect of our very humanity. Spiritual systems are found, without exception, in every indigenous society; independent of geography, independent of ethnicity and independent of time. Religion gets full billing anytime a building is blown up, but rarely credited for its role in shaping all the things we take for granted. Some argue that it was religion, and not agriculture, that allowed the formation of sophisticated human societies. Centralizing ethics meant that people could live in harmonious and productive relationships with each other: Thou shall not kill people of your own group, thou shall not steal, and thou shall not break ones marriage vows. And these are not laws exclusive to the Bible, but from Ancient Egypt 1000s of years before the Judeo-Christian world emerged.

We see a mirror of these ethics in the Hammurabi code, and even in other more recent native African faiths.

We have guided missiles and misguided man   Martin Luther King, Jr.

There is also no denying the role of religion in brainwashing people to either make them more passive (better slaves) or more aggressive (Siege of Jerusalem 1099). Religion was one of the tools of conquest in Africa. The likes of David Livingstone summed it up in his 3C's: Christianity, Commerce, and Civilization. But what is assigned to "religion" is more an issue of notions of European cultural supremacy. So Europeans were therefore really successful in brainwashing the people with an image of a White God, because of their message of the cultural supremacy of the white race. And contrary to popular belief the "religious" mission was not used in the conquest of much of India, Arabia, and Islamic Africa. Therefore it could not have been the principle agent for brainwashing people to accepting colonial domination.

And outside of these "religious" formations we have even more of how people are brainwashed into not uniting because of what is perceived as political allegiances and especially ethic allegiances— we must deal with the root, the general ignorance that allows people to be manipulated in these ways. Because most will agree that those who control power use religion in a scapegoat capacity. But religion like a bomb is a tool, it can be used to blow up a building or put a man in orbit. Any system, whether we call it religion, politics, ideological, can be hijacked for any objective the power-broker desires—good or bad.

One of the most famous examples exhausted in the trial of "religion and warfare" is the bloody crusades. Now what was the religious set-up in Jerusalem before the European invasion? : Most forget that Jews, Eastern Christians worked and lived alongside the Muslim majority in absolute peace—no conflict. Yet "In the name of God" the European Christians massacred 70,000 people of all faiths. The crusades clearly used God as the excuse for plunder.

But even after Saladin retook the city he deliberately invited back the Ethiopian monks and exempted them from taxation—not to mention the numerous acts of tolerance and humanity he showed even his enemies. We also see a similar level of tolerance in Andalusia (Islamic Spain) ruled by African Moors and Arabs, which was destroyed in 1492 by the Spanish inquisition. Again Jews, Muslims and Christians built an era that ushered in a Renaissance in Europe. And under this peaceful co-existence Judaism experience its "Golden age" with Maimonides (موسى بن ميمون); one of Judaism greatest scholars. This is an era pre-Geneva convention, pre-UN human rights, yet so-called non-secular configurations of governance were able to amicable foster a climate of tolerance and co-existence. It would therefore be safe to say that the history of religious tolerance is far greater than intolerance—especially outside of Europe. The news that makes history is when things fall apart, giving the illusion of perpetual sectarian conflict.

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THE NEW g-D

	Man has devised terrifying physical weapons of destruction and in our concern with them, we are apt to neglect the equally dangerous weapons of psychological destruction; the cynical use of mass hysteria, the emotional conditioning of millions, for no purpose than the Power of a few
	John Hammond [1]

Political scientist, Juan Linz noted that secularization had created a void which could be filled by a total ideology, making totalitarianism possible and Roger Griffin has characterized fascism as a type of anti-religious political religion. Such political religions vie with conventional, actual religions, and try to replace or eradicate them. God of the church verse god of capitalism is different spiritually, but from a social-economic standpoint, are direct competitors. According to a biographer of Mussolini, "Initially, fascism was fiercely anti-Catholic" — the Church being a competitor for dominion over the people's hearts.

Today you will hear academics and learned folk tell you how terrible religion is, ironically the very religion they said were so critical in Africa’s salvation 300 years ago. Christianity was useful in its Eurocentric dress for the last 200 years in creating new clients for Western products and subservient slaves. However, since then It has been replaced by the new ‘religion’ of democracy and capitalism.

This new god has even more efficient systems of creating new slaves and new clients. And as markets changed with politics the old best-seller (religion) started to become a hindrance to the expansion of globalized markets. But because of ways in which people see different configurations of power, there has been a failure to see that democracy is the fastest growing “religion”, far quicker to gain converts over diverse populations than any other ideology in history.

And because of democracies vagueness it can be easily twisted to get a desired outcome, so no need for “God says”. Now the final authority is not the Pope in a church, but Obama in the White House. A reason to invade Vietnam—democracy. To take away the wealth of Iraq—democracy, to assassinate Gaddafi – democracy and human rights. Religion would not have allowed such flexibility in justifying neo-colonialism. But under the banner of democracy US foreign policy is justified to jump across people’s borders and take at will.

I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.—Smedley D. Butler

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STATE or RELIGION

And do not let ill-will towards any folk incite you so that you swerve from dealing justly. Be just; that is nearest to heedfulness   The Quran 5:8

Religion and War Media Agendas Truth vs. Lies Religious Terrorsim State vs. Religion Co-existence Religion and Conquest In the Name of God Al-Qaeda In Numbers Conclusion

There is an anachronistic current underpinning the very trans-history of religious study. The entire dichotomy can be traced back to the legitimizing of the nation-state in Europe. During this period the state and the market have an overwhelming history of violence, which makes religion pale in comparison.  We are to believe the modern state was born as the ultimate peace maker in human affairs; a move that split religious realm from the political—giving birth to the modern set-up. So as humans ‘evolved’ out of the ‘primitiveness’ of devotion to God’s authority they made the state the new godhead—a transfer of loyalty and devotion from God to the state. Killing in the name of God was vilified, but killing for the state was legalized. So in one identical experience the perpetuator is a fanatic in another he is a patriot. The world is so blinded by the propaganda that language, and language alone, separate identical realities.

 

There is a direct inheritance of methodologies between the witch hunts that burned people at the stake in the Middle Ages into Salem America right into the 50’s with McCarthy’s Second Red Scare: Continued today in more sophisticated ways by the patriot act. The villain has gone from Witch, to Communist to Islamist: The configurations of power have gone from Church to State one casting out demons the other casting out communism and so-called terrorist. Witch-hunts have a peculiar benefit for the accuser even in Africa, as in Salem America, they often leave the accusers with the property of the so-called witches. In the witch hunt to create a “safer world” free from terrorism/Islam it results in the political expansion of Western interest in the globe.

If you look at any conflict; Nigeria, Palestine, or even Darfur, we can choose to identify the agent of the conflict as religious difference. However, very few in Nigeria are killing anyone because of a spiritual disagreement over a verse in the Qur'an. In Nigeria, for example, the North is relatively barren; education and infrastructure are also suffering compared to the South.  There is also what is perceived as a Europeanized colonialized mentality, which is more pronounced in the Southern territories that have a greater history of Western acquiesce. And this is very similar to the issues between what is now Northern and Southern Sudan, although it is articulated through an Arab supremacy lens: Divided loyalties between Arabization and Europeanization create far more animosity than Islam versus Christianity.

War is a continuation of politics by other means   Clausewitz

Muslim Refugees in Darfur

Now in Africa ethnic lines also follow religious and geographical lines. So one way of describing the North of Nigeria, in minimum terms, would be to say they are Islamic; doesnt mean all their actions are because of Islam. They are also predominately Hausa and Fulani, but 'Islamic' is just more convenient as a demographic difference when contrasted against their southern neighbors. When one group strikes they always target the symbols of their "oppression."

So an attack often has in religious characteristics; attacking a church for example. But deep within the belly of the problem is always some idea of inequity or entitlement.

Man has devised terrifying physical weapons of destruction and in our concern with them, we are apt to neglect the equally dangerous weapons of psychological destruction; the cynical use of mass hysteria, the emotional conditioning of millions, for no purpose than the POWER of a few   John Hammond[1]

So powerful are these myth or religion and conflict it forces itself upon conflicts void of religious issues. So the mere utterance of Darfur is assumed to have in religious elements despite all the evidence and detail that says both groups are Islamic. Still it is shaped as somehow a religious conflict and again the natural the demon is Islam.

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MEDIA AGENDAS

Blessed are the peacemakers for their shall be called Children of God   Bible

Where and when did the victims of persecution become the villains?—on TV. In Vietnam, in the conquest of America from the natives Americans, in Iraq, in every Western conflict the victims were categorized into "worthy" and "unworthy" depending upon Western interest in the conflict (Manufacturing Consent, Chomsky).

We are not 5 year olds, and when someone gives us something that looks bitter or sweet we have a higher mind to ask "What do you really want?” CNN et al has an agenda; do not drink the Kool-Aid. Do not be so easily sold and played by the burning headlines of BBC News. Not one report is there to do a dis-service to European interest.

For Europeans self-interest is an innate and unconscious act which requires no conspiracy theories or plotting to align and work in unison. The only people who do not behave like this are people so mentally oppressed they do as Malcolm suggest and worry about their master’s house first. 

Orwell wrote that:

indifference to objective truth is encouraged by the sealing off of one part of the world from another, which makes it harder and harder to discover what is actually happening. There can often be doubt about the most enormous events... .The calamities that are constantly being reported -- battles, massacres, famines, revolutions -- tend to inspire in the average person a feeling of unreality. One has no way of verifying the facts, one is not even fully certain that they have happened, and one is always presented with totally different interpretations from different sources. Probably the truth is undiscoverable but the facts will be so dishonestly set forth in that the ordinary reader can be forgiven either for swallowing lies or for failing to form an opinion 

It is no mystery what the motives behind  demonizing Mugabe are about, so is it a conspiracy to suggest that every Western news house had it in for Mugabe? Was the character attack for his human rights abuses, or for him throwing out their economic interest in the region? How could the world after seeing how much land the Whites in Zimbabwe had still take issue with Mugabe? How is it possible to shift the emphasis to African corruption without first explaining the inequity and horrendous racism that maintained White monopolies and economic apartheid? Was it also not clear in the assassination of Brother Gaddafi that the media again was all singing from the same score?

Despite all Gaddafi did, the reader struggled to find one headline in the West that said two good things about him. And yet with both Gaddafi and Mugabe the principle issues are overshadowed by minor considerations: Africans owning their own land is overshadowed by some aspects of nepotism. So it is okay to have economic apartheid as long as there is no nepotism—which one is more serious?

All of Gaddafi contributions are over shadowed by accusations of “human rights abuses” and “being in power too long.” Because of media people are focused on the propaganda statement “being in power too long” Gaddafi’s contributions were made irrelevant.

Now in  South Africa, where there is no issue of “being in power too long” people see democracy as the highest human achievement, despite the fact that the majority are poor and uneducated. So the power of the media can make you believe dirt is more valuable than gold. Your people can be starving, despondent, uneducated, violent, but as long as your democracy rotates puppets every 5 years and supports globalization then nothing else matters.

So with all the joys of hindsight, why would Western media and its henchmen in African skin treated and trusted as the gospel on African affairs? Even if the facts are true, i.e. war in Congo, genocide in Sudan, the objective of how that information is used is not in the interest of Africans. The West also cannot make up their mind, so if they want to report on rising fuel prices in Nigeria they must still somehow insert into the story links to Al-Qaeda and Islamic militants. Every Psychologist will tell you the more you repeat something—true or false, it becomes “truer” with every repetition. Until the reader accepts the information and the natural mental barriers of interrogation are destroyed: The mind no longer says “Wait a minute now, that doesn’t make sense.”

If CNN wants to sell headlines it is far easier to ride in on rising tide of Islamophobia. And if CNN wants to stay afloat they must have a rating that attracts advertisers. Now which headline gets a higher readership? "Ethnic clashes over resources in Darfur" or "Arabs killing black [sic] African"? "Rising fuel prices in Nigeria heighten ethnic tensions," or "Muslims burn church?" CNN must therefore appeal to the wide demographic; especially a demographic which spends money. Already conflict of interest is involved when you consider the USA is influenced by fundamentalist Christians and Zionist who have a long history of framing everything as "us" against "them." So if your audience is White conservative Christians then viewing the world through a religious lens reassures people of the age old religious dichotomy that only the West is famous for.

And this is beyond argument evident in how two actions are written about depending on the parties involved. If a man who happens to be Muslim goes on a killing spree it is "Muslim fanatic goes mad, "if a Christian does it, it is simple "Man goes mad." So likewise every conflict in Africa needs to be packaged into little bundles of "heart of darkness"—reassuring the cultural supremacy of European people over African people. It is then easy to continue to say "those savages over there."

If there is a riot in Northern Nigeria and they attack municipality buildings and then burned some churches in the process, the headlines will only say "Nigerian Muslims Burn Churches", what adds to the issue that is in most conflicts in Africa they will be either religious, or ethnic overtones—or both. It is not the moral mission of CNN to report balance, there is no need to stress this point as it is very obvious there is no such neutrality from either CNN, BBC, especially FOX or Al-Jazeera (Al-CNN). What may vary from news agency to news agency are spheres of politic interest. Al-Jazeera for example is pro-Palestinian but anti-Iran, anti-Pan-African, and ultimately pro-Western, liberal and mildly anti-Islamic. Fox News is well just plain old pro-everything Republican white-America and Israel. There is no point listing the news agency of South Africa or Kenya as they are basically regurgitating opinions from Reuters and the like. And just like no one reads the Sun (UK) for accuracy, all of the above should be treated with suspicion based upon each agency interest block, a further reading on critical issues needs to happen in order to understand the root of the conflict and the motives behind misreporting or spinning information.

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TRUTH IS OUT THERE

With regard to Nigeria the West is fully aware, above a certain intellectual readership level, that religion is not a key factor in the conflict:

Many Nigerians argue that the real reason for the violence isn't ethnic or religious differences but the scramble for land, scarce resources and political clout. Poverty, joblessness and corrupt politics drive extremists from both sides to commit horrendous atrocities. Although the nation rakes in billions of dollars in oil revenue annually, the majority of Nigerians scrape by on less than a dollar a day. In Plateau State, where Jos is located, Muslim cattle herders from the north and Christian farmers from the south vie for control of the fertile plains   TIME Magazine

Sectarian conflict erupted also in 1967, when three primarily Igbo eastern states seceded under the name Republic of Biafra, sparking a bloody three-year civil war. The attempt to break away ultimately failed, and Nigeria reintegrated the Igbo majority region in 1970. So this is the history of nationhood, why is religion painted all over it because the North is pro-Sharia. The objectives are no different, the idea of entitlement to govern their own affairs because of a perceived inequity in the current political formation.

In Nigeria the Christian-Muslim thing is the tip of the iceberg, what's underneath the water is a much more complex sociopolitical situation, which cannot be explained just in terms of the religious divide. You have a recipe ripe for conflict, and it just so happens to be Christian-Muslim   Andrew Kakabadse

But regardless of how much information is presented, the dead heads of this world will always go with the most emotional opinion which makes their rants hotter to the uninformed masses. Fingering religion in Africa is a far more compact sound bite than going into the ins and outs of inequity and entitlement.

In absence of religious disagreement Somalia has not seen peace in decades. In absence of religious tension Rwanda was the worse ethnic crisis by African hands. In the absence of religion Ethiopia and Eritrea are bitter. In absences of religion, Congo is a human rights disaster. If places like Somalia tell us anything it is that sameness is not a solution to conflict in Africa. Even before there were Sunni and Shia, Islam, just like Christianity, was plagued with conflict—despite being ideologically “monolithic” and in its infancy. And it is the same for all ideologies—political, social or religious.

Religious agreement has rarely secured peace, while we have all the evidence of who unified some communities has b despite having diverse communities; Tanzania being one. And Ethiopia is proving to be another.

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RELIGIOUS TERRORIST – SHARIA STATE

There has always been this game the media plays by painting the demands of "terrorist" as ridiculous, irrational and fanatic—that suicide bombers are mad men. All of this is done to distract us from dealing with the issues that would motivate people into this extreme form of warfare. We should take  issue with violence period, let that be clear, but even a "terrorist" would not have done so much damage to Sirte, Libya as the so-called purveyors of freedom have done.

Don’t let power configurations confuse or blur the issue, anyone using force of war on innocent non-combatant people is a terrorist. Why is this obvious opinion not common knowledge because this word “terrorism” is used by the person writing the newspaper to define the forces they are fighting against—like the barbarian in Greek writings.

You cannot resign a person’s motives or arguments to nonsense, irrational and crazy without deeper interrogation of their arguments. What is more terrifying than being chained and put on a European ship and taken away into 300 years of night? What is more terrifying that being a Palestinian family being bombed by an Israeli tank? Is that not terrorism? What about the threat of invasion the West holds over the heads of the entire developing world if they fail to conform and submit to their power dominance? Why is terrorism always linked today to something “religious”?

There are no rights unless they is a struggle (Jihad) for those rights. African-Americans had to go through a struggle, their rights were not handed to them. Without struggle (Jihad) their are no rights, and that is the way of Allah   Anwar al-Awlaki (Terrorist?)

Anwar Al-Awlaki was killed by the USA on Yemeni soil by a cowardly drone for his message of global resistance to their hegemony. We can look at his words and removed the religious overtones and see there are no different to any other revolutionary. Certainly Che said the same thing, Malcolm X said the same thing, Ho Chi Ming said the same thing, every revolutionary in history used the same rhetoric. And US war language has in even more hostility (see video clip) so from a neutral perspective why is Bush, Obama, Cheney, Condi, Powell considered the "good guys"? America has not only the power to broadcast their violent rhetoric they have the power to back it up with the military. And the world is in terror wondering about the consequences of their words. How many people died because of Bush? How many people died because of Anwar? What was his real crime? One American critic of the War on Terror Paul Craig Roberts wrote Awlaki gave "sermons critical of Washington's indiscriminate assaults on Muslim peoples" who "told Muslims that they did not have to passively accept American aggression". He called the assassination by Obama "The Day America Died" as the US lacked evidence either Awlaki were real threats or Al-Qaeda® operatives. For the open minded person isn't that what Obama is doing when he and every American president speaks about the patriotic duty of every America to wage war in the name of the American flag?

Let us be honest, America has an air tight campaign of hegemony. It first neutralizes you with the media, it then demonizes any ideological forms of rebellion by labelling such ideas as Islamist, it then has the right to war, but no one has the right to defend, it has the right to nuclear weapons but no one else can use them. The right to take your oil, the right to force you to trade, the right to cross your borders at will, and the right to make propaganda films to justify all of the above.

We must begin by acknowledging the hard truth that we will not eradicate violent conflict in our lifetimes. There will be times when nations--acting individually or in concert--will find the use of force not only necessary but morally justified. I make this statement mindful of the creed and lives of Gandhi and King. But as a head of state sworn to protect and defend my nation, I cannot be guided by their examples alone. For make no mistake: evil does exist in the world. A non-violent movement could not have halted Hitler's armies. Negotiations cannot convince al Qaeda's leaders to lay down their arms.   Obama

Obama speech, on war would get a node of agreement from most so-called Islamist or religious terrorist. Because how is it fundamentally different from Bin Ladin, or any other? Do innocents not die under Bin Ladin's campaign? Do even not more innocents die under Obama's campaign: And the difference not only the quantity but by also in the quality of Obama wars. How many non-combatant Westerners have these "terrorist" killed in post 9/11 - now? So what is Obama "defending" his nation against? He is really defending his nation's imperialist interest: And slipping people's names (even his own citizen's names) on an unchallengeable HIT LIST. It can be argued that most "terrorist" are defensive or reactionary to Western foreign policy. In a simple analysis the best way to stop terrorism is to leave them alone. No terrorist has ever made plans to attack Switzerland or Barbados. Terrorist do not actually want to "take over the world", but American politicians do. One group is housed within the framework of "religion" the other "political" blurring the obvious similarities from view.

Most Islamic terrorist are not even religious people, they however are always political people. Do we really believe the Palestine fighting for a liberated Palestine are praying 5 times a day and fighting for Islamic rule? The motives for terrorism always come back to entitlement and especially inequity. As Cabral said no one is fighting for the ideas in your head. So-called terrorist are people who have been denied a forum for redress their grievances and in that vacuum, overwhelmed by inequity they take extreme methods. To break the yoke of apartheid terrorism was a vital tool, to end the evils of slavery terrorism was used to weaken the viability of enslavement. Terrorism is neither here nor there in the true language of human conflict—only a methodology of conflict; defined in an out of reality by Western self-interest.

	Sharia is no different in its idealism to those of the founding fathers of Western democracy. Democracy’s boast of creating stronger civilizations is proven by the rise of the Western economy, and sharia boast has been proven in the strong nations in antiquity it has created. And let us remember the sharia was the system ruling Northern Nigeria before colonialism destroyed the Sokoto Empire.

Like it or not, sharia is just another political system. So why should we be afraid because Northern Nigerians and Somalis want it? Two systems that should make us run for the hills are “freemarket” and “neo-liberal globalization” but the advocates of these systems happen to own the media machine. If the people see merit in its configurations and power to govern then that is their business.

Religion and War Media Agendas Truth vs. Lies Religious Terrorsim State vs. Religion Co-existence Religion and Conquest In the Name of God Al-Qaeda In Numbers Conclusion

If we collated every report on Al-Qaeda® they would probably the largest military organization, after NATO, on the planet. They just seem to be everywhere (according to US state department). To the educated observer of world events it should be strange that anytime you hear of so-called "Terrorism" it has links to Al-Qaeda®? So powerful is Al-Qaeda® they got African-American non-Muslim terrorist operating on their behalf. What the world needs to know is that there is not much difference between Al-Qaeda®, Santa Claus and the Tooth fairy. All are largely figments of Western imagination. One rooted in Fear, and the others in consumerism. And the same way Santa Claus gets around the world in just one day, every terrorist event on planet Earth is via the omnipresent agency of Al-Qaeda® and their ominous "Network of Terror."™ Al-Qaeda® is the face of evil for public convenience.

Can you imagine how hard it would be for news groups and American foreign policy to come back every day with a new "terrorist" cell made up of 2-4 people? People would get confused. So create one big ugly boogie man and give that entity a simple name that American can brand.

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IN THE NAME OF GOD?

Of the total deaths from war, all the so-called religious wars combined do not equal wars motivated by nationality (i.e. the World Wars). Is Israel and Palestine a religious war? No, it is an ethnic conflict as many Arab-Christians are caught up in the Israeli occupation. Are there religious overtones, off course the ultra-Zionist zealots see the entire land as given to them by God—the God that only helps Jews. But let us also balance it with a stark reality the architect of Zionism.

When he published his book in 1896, "The Jewish State", he declared that the cure for anti-Semitism was the establishment of a Jewish state. As he saw it, the best place to establish this state was in Palestine. God was used only as a means to and end, and the hotter the fire of anti-Semitism the stronger the argument for the establishment of a Jewish state.

The conflict in Lebanon, like Nigeria had religious overtones but the actual conflict was over militarizing of Palestinian refugees. However, some argue that the earlier conflicts in Lebanon were an expression of bourgeoisie war for influence amongst different political personalities.
On the issue of religion splitting a country in half Stephen P. Cohen writes:

However, the divisions among Muslims that did exist were exploited by the British, who practiced divide and rule politics, displacing the Mughals and circumscribing other Islamic rulers. Moreover, the Hindus were the allies of the British, who used them to strike a balance with the Muslims; many Hindus, a fundamentally insecure people, hated Muslims and would have oppressed them in a one-man, one-vote democratic India. The Pakistan freedom movement united these disparate pieces of the national puzzle, and Pakistan was the expression of the national will of India's liberated Muslims   Stephen Cohen

Religious designations are sometimes used out of sheer convenience, as well as opportunism motives, for cultural and historical differences between combatants, giving the often misleading impression that the conflict is primarily about religious differences. For example, there is a common perception of the conflict in Northern Ireland is a religious conflict, as one side (Nationalists) was predominantly composed of Catholics and the other (Unionists) of Protestants.  So in characterizing or naming the belligerents we can see how Catholic versus Protestant comes into vogue. However, the more fundamental cause in fact ethnic or nationalistic rather than religious in nature. Since the native Irish were mostly Catholic and the later British-sponsored immigrants were mainly Protestant, the terms become shorthand for the two cultures, but it highly inaccurate to describe the conflict as a religious one.

William T. Cavanaugh, in his book The Myth of Religious Violence Secular Ideology and the Roots of Modern Conflict, challenges this conventional wisdom by examining how the twin categories of religion and the secular are constructed. A growing body of scholarly work explores how the category 'religion' has been constructed in the modern West. Cavanaugh draws on this scholarship to examine how timeless and transcultural categories of 'religion and 'the secular' are used in arguments that religion causes violence. He argues three points:

1) There is no trans-historical and transcultural essence of religion. What counts as religious or secular in any given context is a function of political configurations of power; 2) Such a transhistorical and transcultural concept of religion as non-rational and prone to violence is one of the foundational legitimating myths of Western society; 3) This myth can be and is used to legitimate neo-colonial violence against non-Western others, particularly the Muslim world. Basically an outgrowth of Europe’s civilizing mission.

Historians such as Jonathan Kirsch have made links between the European inquisitions, for example, and Stalin's persecutions in the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, McCarthy blacklists, and other secular events as being the same type of phenomenon as the Spanish inquisition—the difference is exclusively a self-serving point-of-view. Others, like Robert Pape, a political scientist who specializes in suicide terrorism, have made a case for secular motivations and reasons as being foundations of most suicide attacks that are often times labeled as "religious"

The central fact is that overwhelmingly suicide-terrorist attacks are not driven by religion as much as they are by a clear strategic objective: to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland. From Lebanon to Sri Lanka to Chechnya to Kashmir to the West Bank, every major suicide-terrorist campaign—over 95 percent of all the incidents—has had as its central objective to compel a democratic state to withdraw.   Robert Pape

This comes as bad news to the Zionist run Jihad-watch campaign that profits from demonizing Islam. Every suicide attack brings further proof and justification for their “them” against those “evil Muslims” cause. As stated before it is far easier to deal with religion as the cause than US foreign policy or even better neo-liberal globalization. How would Jihad watch look if they said these people are fighting against Western imperialism—no – it is far easier to say “religious nuts”—which then justifies imperialism. So when they invaded Iraq they were not fight soldiers defending their homes, but radical Islam. The invasion of Afghanistan and Somali was not people fighting for their land and resources but a bunch of Al-Qaeda friends.  But this is nothing new, the so-called myth of the savage Red man was created by the propagandist. It worked so well that the observer never asked what was the White man doing coming all the way from Europe in  someone else’s country and killing them for fighting for their land. These Native Americans were “crazy” for doing so.

SUDAN

While it is hard to expect the South to put up with the Northern contempt and domination it is still a muted victory for Southern Sudan who will now be targeted by Western agendas and imperialism because of the pressure from under-development. Some analysts keep fingering Islam vs. Christianity as the root of the conflict. However, the state authorities say more than 600 people from the Nuer community were killed, 200 children abducted, and as many as 25,000 cows were stolen. The attackers - from the Murle ethnic group - were responding to a recent assault by Nuer fighters in which an estimated 400 Murle were killed—not the first time (see 1991 Bor Massacre). But this is also happening everywhere especially the Jonglei state. No so-called "Arabs" no "Islam" and most of all no religion to blame this time.

The Brown (Islamic Arab) v Black (African) is just a tidy way for simple minds to understand a complex mess. For western designs, religion and race is a just convenient package for greedy pockets. Who wants to be bored with the reality of a South complicity in Europeanization and a North complicit in Arabization - too complex a story to fit in a CNN headline, too texty to fit in a Tweet. Who wants to deal with that ugly human personality of greed which lives and breaks out whenever opportunity and notions of entitlement rise up? And if your car is not starting and you think it is the battery, after replacing the battery and the care still doesn't start you should rule out that factor. With religion and without religion the region is a hot bed for conflict. Religion was never a dominant factor more over ethnic difference. And in absence of the Arabized master, new masters arise to fill those boots. Fixing Sudan means understanding issues beyond the party-line.

EUROPE

The thirty Year war in Europe on the side of the Lutheran Sweden and the last of the Thirty Years War was essentially a battle between Habsburgs and the Bourbons, the two great Catholics dynasties of Europe. Many other factors override religion in these examples. John Bossy describes the shift from religious to secular as “migration of the holy from the church to the state. The state became the new religion with all the properties, all the loyalties but none of the limitations of the so-called church.

In the late 1500’s- 1600’s Catholic churches and Protestant churches worked together to kill a third group, the Anabaptists.  On the surface, this is a story of two warring churches, banding together in light of the extreme depravity of this third movement—the Anabaptists.  The world has become so accustom to this narrative that it is used as irrefutable evidence of the myth of religion and violence in human societies: A myth which justifies the utter separation of church and state. But reality shows that the Anabaptists were not being killed by the Protestant or Catholic churches as such, because churches "as such" simply did not exist.  Anabaptists were being killed by princes of provinces, which were either Protestant or Catholic provinces.  Is this religious violence or secular?  No such distinctions can be made.  But in the case of motivation, the distinction is clearer.  Anabaptists were being killed not over exegetical or theological issues as such, but for what was seen as treason.  

But what act of the Anabaptist was considered treason?   Citizenship in Western Europe in the 1500’s baptism was not only initiation into the church, but also into citizenship.  The government therefore had a practical interest in keeping track of baptismal records, which were often the only census records they maintained. When the Anabaptist started baptizing adults, they were subverting citizenship process create anarchy in state structure. 

Historical Africa

Returning to Africa we see the Battle of Somb between Muslim Marabout and Serer people, clearly one side was Islamic and the other side was adherence to the Serer religion. But that does not mean the clash was over religion. Both groups were engaging in warfare in the interest of nation building and defence. The war would have gone ahead had the Muslim army been Jewish or even a rival religious group that was able to amass power. The Muslim-Christian wars of Ethiopia again expressed themselves along religious lines but they were also nation issues which were more in the foreground that the specific of religion.

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IN NUMBERS - THE CAUSE OF WAR 

There is absolutely no evidence in any record anywhere that shows so-called Wars in the name of God constitutes a major motive for wars—even when we factor in wars which have in religious overtones as “religious wars” still they are a substantial minority.

Death Toll

War

Gerography

Cause

72,000,000	World War II	Worldwide	Non-religious
36,000,000	An Lushan Rebellion	China	Non-religious
60,000,000	Mongol Conquests	Asia, Eastern Europe, Middle East	Non-religious
25,000,000	Qing dynasty conquest of the Ming Dynasty	China	Non-religious
30,000,000+	Taiping Rebellion	China	Non-religious
65,000,000	World War I	Worldwide	Non-religious
20,000,000	Conquest of Timur	Middle East, India, Central Asia, Russia	Non-religious
12,000,000	Dungan revolt	China	Non-religious
9,000,000	Russian Civil War	Russia	Non-religious
5,400,000	Second Congo War	Democratic Republic of the Congo	Non-religious
6,500,000	Napoleonic Wars	Europe, Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Ocean	Non-religious
11,500,000	Thirty Years' War	Holy Roman Empire	Non-religious
7,000,000	Yellow Turban Rebellion	China	Non-religious
4,000,000	Deluge	Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth	Non-religious
3,500,000	Korean War	Korean Peninsula	Non-religious
2,495,000	Vietnam war	Vietnam	Non-Religious
unknown	Shaka Zulu expansion	Southern Africa	Non-Religious

* Wikipedia statistics

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PROBLEM AND SOLUTION (AFRICA)

The country's 150 million people are divided about equally between Christians and Muslims and further splintered into about 250 different peoples. Jos, some 300 miles north of Nigeria's largest city, Lagos, sits smack-dab in the center of Nigeria's tumultuous "middle belt," a so-called cultural fault line that divides the country's Muslim north from the Christian south. The "middle belt" is a melting pot where the major ethnic groups of Nigeria — Hausa-Fulani Muslims and Yoruba and Igbo Christians — usually peacefully but sometimes collide   TIME Magazine

Religion and War Media Agendas Truth vs. Lies Religious Terrorsim State vs. Religion Co-existence Religion and Conquest In the Name of God Al-Qaeda In Numbers Conclusion

Religion, whether it is indigenous, Islamic or Christian offers humanity with yet another subject area for conflict. We can be simplistic and say “get rid of religion”, after doing this the problems will still continue because religion was only an agitator in a conflict with deeper roots; A convenient scapegoat to be used, if available, to provoke and justify conflict. Human beings do not evolve by throwing out areas of disagreement, but by learning to co-exist with diverse viewpoints. They also have the wisdom to not look at areas of religious disagreement but unite around areas of commonality. And where Africa is concerned there is no shortage of surfaces in ethics to unite around. When Africans are looking at each other they have historically never seen a monolithic people.

This is why slavery was so successful because regardless of what was happening on the coast Africans refused to put the difference aside and deal with a social dilemma—a Holocaust in which we still see the aftermath. This is why today in the Congo despite the horrors that Leopold brought, Africans celebrate him as the “bringer of civilization” , one person in Botswana said “When you walk into a village with a white person it is like walking with god”, another the “the good thing about slavery was I found Jesus.” The root of the problem is lack of consciousness and hence lack of agency. With or without Christianity you will find this mental condition all over Africa: In the villages in Benin and the mountains of Tanzania. Because Islam is generally non-White Muslim communities have a lower degree of White worship.

Some have the false beliefs that only the Abrahamic faiths bring religious tensions to the region. This is categorically disproven by the volume of conflicts which have always occurred without Abrahamic faiths: "Foreignness" is not a factor in the ferocity of the conflict. But because Abrahamic religions have greater ability to form larger cross-ethnic communities by that mere are more visible in terms of demographic. But that is a demographic issue i.e. if most people are Christian then there is a higher chance of a Christian person being involved in a conflict by mere numbers. And because Christianity is organized and defined it becomes easier in a lazy characterization to identity with the Christian identity.

What is painted as a religious problem is really an educational problem. Africans know less about each other than we realize. In this vacuum of information fear and distrust is fostered fanned on by self-serving leaders, opportunistic businessmen, irresponsible religious advocates, and idealistic nationalist. The uneducated non-worldly mind is easy prey to the cry of “religion”. Regardless of if it is the therapeutic calls of the Jesus priority jump up and down churches in South Africa and Nigeria, or the intolerance of so-called radical Islam in Somalia. The commonality in all these cases is intolerance and ignorance. Jesus is the priority and not Pan-Africanism therefore allowing ways to facilitate the exploitation of Africa as every issue is sorted out by “waiting for Jesus.” Intelligence and common sense is replaced by blind devotion or blind denial.  And it is understandable that all human beings have used “divinity” to understand and process a complex world into simple discrete units of “good” versus “evil.”

The challenge is how we save people from the Jesus dilemma especially found in evangelical aspects of Christianity. How do we save the Ethiopian from being so blinded by the Orthodox Church political power struggle with Muslims in Ethiopia that they see greater brotherhood. But the good news in places like Ethiopia is the government in the last 10 years has taken sincere steps to remedy this problem. Ethiopians have always forged a strong nationalist spirit, which has caused it to defend its borders against colonialism. In Ethiopia today both religions are given public space and the national TV regularly showcases educational programs. What happens is people are starting to see “we are not that different after all”. Every Christian in Ethiopia knows what Eid is about, and every Muslim understands Timket. The same is equally true for Tanzania and now South Africa (which has no history of religious conflict). To solve the race issue we do not sweep it under the carpet our stick our fingers in our ears and hum. We also do not deny race exist or advocate for its annulation as a solution. No, we engage it and deal with it as it is. Religion is part and parcel of Africa—has been from day dot—it will continue to be an aspect of humanity which can only be resolved with comprehension and tolerance.

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CONCLUSION

If we are looking to understand the pathology of conflict, in a bid to resolve it, we will fail if looking for the solutions in the wrong box. The doctor cannot be effective at curing cancer if he is misdiagnosing cancer as the common cold. Failure to understand addiction in any form makes solving it impossible. Hence why so much is invested in understanding the social and psychological aspects of addiction. In the old days of medicine a headache was cured by drilling holes in people’s heads. Bacterial diseases were believed to be demon possession. It is clear that misidentifying human conflict creates greater instability as the tools of resolution are servicing wrong areas. Someone might identify religion over agency and natural human power lust as the problem in Africa. After 200 years invested in this theory they will come to the realization that in the void of “religion” wars, strife, conflict still go on with equal ferocity: So misdiagnosis is a death sentence. Another path would be to deals with the roots of inequity and entitlement and create sustainable ways of dealing with human conflict.

If we are looking for reasons to disunite and satisfy populous rhetoric we can follow the path of every demigod that came to power. It is far easier to gain readership by inflaming the sensitive aspects in our society. Responsibility is the mark of maturity and it is with caution that the inflammatory subject of religion should be observed. Attacking anything sacred to any people is an act of inhumanity and disrespect to another human. While we should be critical of inherent dangers in the rise of commercialized Christianity or so-called elements of extremist Islam, or even regressive habits of indigenous faiths—we must always in the interest of unity speak balance and truth. Being African in the Pan-African set-up must mean more than black skin pigment. And if Africanity does not inform morality, responsibility and tolerance then it serves no function in advancing the Motherland.

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REFERENCE

1. http://www.pewforum.org/executive-summary-islam-and-christianity-in-sub-saharan-africa.aspx

2. Ali ibn Abi Talib (1984). Nahj al-Balagha (Peak of Eloquence), compiled by ash-Sharif ar-Radi. Alhoda UK. ISBN 0940368439.
3. declaring someone a non-believer
4. Muhammad Shareef, 1998
5. http://www.pewforum.org/executive-summary-islam-and-christianity-in-sub-saharan-africa.aspx
6. The Myth of religious wars and Conflict
7. http://www.theamericanconservative.com/article/2005/jul/18/00017

8. Alioune Sarr, Histoire du Sine-Saloum. Introduction, bibliographie et Notes par Charles Becker, BIFAN, Tome 46, Serie B, n° 3-4, 1986–1987. pp 37-39

9.250th Anniversary Issue of The Harrisonian p.24 by way of A History of Harrison College A study of an elite educational institution in a colonial polity, by Ralph A Jemmott, 2006, Glebe Land,St. George, Barbados

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