The Muslim who opened fire in Tel Aviv, murdering two people and injuring five more, was carrying a copy of the Qur’an. Now, the international media, or at least the BBC, was already baffled as to this man’s motive, and this news will mystify them still more: why on earth would a man intent on mass murder be carrying a peaceful copy of the Religion of Peace’s peaceful scriptures? Why would he have a copy of the holy book that — as all Western leaders routinely assure us — has nothing, nothing whatsoever, to do with inciting those who believe in it to commit acts of violence and terrorism? It is a mystery! Perhaps in the grinding poverty that no doubt drove him to this act, he was hoping to pawn this family heirloom copy of the Book of Peace for a few scraps of bread with which he could stave off his children’s starvation for a few more desperate hours. If only he had been given a job! If only he had been given some human dignity! Yes, that must be what it was all about: his carrying a copy of the Qur’an was a cry for help, a shout into the darkness: “Please, please help me live up to the ideals of this noble book of peace!” But alas, the world failed the Qur’an, and failed him, and drove him instead to commit this wholly understandable and excusable act of striking back against oppression.

For the ironically challenged who may happen upon that paragraph, please be assured that it was sarcastic. I do not believe that Islam is a Religion of Peace, or that the Qur’an is a book of peace, or that poverty causes terrorism, or that Israel is oppressing anyone, or that there is any conceivable excuse for this or any jihad murderer’s act. The paragraph above is an attempt to enter into the point of view of those who really believe that Islam eschews violence and that the Qur’an teaches peace, and to illustrate the cognitive dissonance in which they must entangle themselves in order to maintain this pretense, if they give this question any serious thought at all, which they do not.

“Report: Copy of Koran found in Tel Aviv gunman’s backpack,” Jerusalem Post, January 1, 2016 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):