In 2019, a journalist asked Iranian Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif why people are executed in Iran for being gay. His <a href="https://www.iranhr.net/media/files/Rapport_iran_2024-WEB.pdf">response</a>: “Our society has moral principles. And we live according to these principles … That means that the law is respected, and the law is obeyed.”
Under Islamic law, homosexuality is a crime punishable by imprisonment or execution for those who violate it. One could assume the conservative Islamic regime would produce similar consequences for transgenderism. But it is, in fact, legal and religiously permissible.
In the Western world, LGBT advancements are seen as a form of liberation. But in Iran, a complex dichotomy remains — where homosexuality can lead to death, yet transgenderism is given the green light. However, the practice is not celebrated so much as it is utilized as a cure for homosexuality. And in some cases, it is involuntary.
Transgenderism in Iran first surfaced in the 1980s. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founding supreme leader of the Islamic Republic, issued a fatwa — a religious decree — to legalize transgenderism, with the requirement that they are diagnosed with gender dysphoria and undergo surgery for sex changes. <a href="https://iranwire.com/en/women/124596-influential-iranian-women-maryam-khatoonpour-molkara-1950-2012/">Maryam Khatoon Molkara</a>, an Iranian transgender activist, is credited as the driving force of the movement. After years of writing letters and persisting with Khomeini, even visiting his home to plead his case, Molkara convinced the supreme leader to authorize transgender surgery in 1987.
Khomeini determined there was nothing in religious law that condemned transgenderism; rather, it could medically serve as a correction for the mental disorder.
A religious cleric, Hojatolislam Muhammad Mehdi Kariminia, famously <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7259057.stm">said</a> an operation is no more a sin than &#8220;changing wheat to flour to bread.&#8221;
He said, &#8220;Islam has a cure for people suffering from this problem. If they want to change their gender, the path is open.&#8221;
But Kariminia clarified his stance on homosexuality. &#8220;The discussion is fundamentally separate &#8230; Absolutely not related. Homosexuals are doing something unnatural and against religion,&#8221; Kariminia added.
However, ongoing reports suggest transgenderism in Iran may at times be exploited. Put plainly, some may be forced to transition.
A New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/10/world/middleeast/iran-transgender-surgery.html">article</a> published in October 2025 highlights the paradox: “For 40 years Iran has performed more gender transition surgeries than many other nations, largely a result of pressuring gay and gender-nonconforming citizens to undergo unwanted operations or risk the death penalty.”
The United Nations also expressed its concerns in a 2023 <a href="https://docs.un.org/en/CCPR/C/IRN/CO/4">report</a> that gay and lesbian Iranians are being &#8220;pressured into undergoing gender reassignment surgery without their free consent.”
An Associated Press <a href="https://apnews.com/article/a66b2167bb1744e6b12ba8ff1ef97c21">article</a> from 2018 stated that transgender surgery in Iran aims to cure the &#8220;disease,&#8221; and that those who &#8220;choose not to undergo surgery and get new documents can face arrest by police for dressing in a way that contradicts their government-recognized gender.”
As one of the few Muslim countries that offer these surgeries, Iran seems to be capitalizing on the endeavor: &#8220;Now, faced with an economy crippled by war and sanctions, the Islamic Republic is promoting its expertise to a global audience, hoping to attract transgender foreigners with the promise of inexpensive surgeries packaged with luxury hotel stays and sightseeing tours,&#8221; the Times noted.
According to the website of the medical company IranMedTour, compared to the cost of a transgender procedure in the United States (which can be $45,000), transgender surgery in Iran is much lower, with prices less than $12,000. &#8220;Other companies advertise procedures at government hospitals for as low as $4,500.”
The goal, according to the outlet citing Iranian media, is to raise over $7 billion annually in medical tourism.
What started as a plea for &#8220;transgender rights&#8221; from Molkara has turned into a compulsory crackdown on homosexuality and a vending machine bringing in cash from the rest of the world.

Trans_Gay_Fate_Iran

You Can Be Trans In Iran, But Being Gay Might Get You Killed

Global Politics

Iran

Islam

LGBTQ

Sharia Law

Transgender

transgender surgery

World

“You’re worried about Islamic terrorism? That is a false flag or an op.”
If you believe the people who tell you this, you are the sucker.
And if America ignores the very real problem of radical Islam, and you happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, you&#8217;ll end up dead. 
That is the message across America for the last couple of weeks, and it&#8217;s coming in loud and clear.
Yesterday alone, there were two Islamic terror attacks. The first happened at Old Dominion in Virginia, when ISIS-linked Mohamed Bailor Jalloh, 26, stormed a classroom and demanded to know if it was an ROTC class. He then shouted — wait for it — “Allahu akbar!”
I know: you&#8217;re shocked.
He shot and killed the professor, Army Lt. Col. Brandon A. Shah, a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom, and Atlantic Resolve, before a group of heroic cadets jumped into action and stabbed Jalloh to death.
So who was the terrorist? According to the New York Post, he was a naturalized citizen from Sierra Leone and a former Virginia National Guard member.
Were there any red flags? Just a few.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-2387-the-ben-shapiro-show?elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-974957" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp" alt="DailyWire+" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-300x50.webp 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-768x128.webp 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1536x256.webp 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-2048x341.webp 2048w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
Fox News reports that Jalloh was forced to leave the military after he tried to provide material support to ISIS. He was a follower of Anwar al Awlaki, the now-dead leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
The DOJ prosecution documents show Jalloh praised a July 2015 terror attack in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in which a radical Islamist killed four Marines and a Navy sailor. He was actually arrested in 2016 after attempting to buy an assault rifle in Northern Virginia and then sentenced to 11 years in prison. Then he was released just 15 months ago for good behavior.
Good behavior.
So we released an actual, honest-to-God, ISIS-affiliated terrorist into the population for “good behavior.” Did he drop his terror support somehow? If so, what was the evidence that he had? Why did America owe him a free run of the country after he decided to side with an actual, honest-to-God terrorist group?
It should be noted that Jalloh received the victim treatment from leftists in the media. In 2016, The Intercept, a far-left publication, printed a sympathetic piece quoting his family, who said he was set up by the FBI. His brother told The Intercept that Jalloh was just another “Mohammad” who got set up.
The problem, you see, was really Islamophobia. Never radical Islam, just Islamophobia.
So was that attack at Old Dominion the only radical Islamic terror attack of the day? Of course not. Halfway across the country, at one of the biggest Reform Jewish synagogues in America, a radical Muslim suspect named Ayman Mohamed Ghazali, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Lebanon who received a visa as the spouse of a U.S. citizen and was naturalized under the Obama administration, tried to drive an explosive-laden car into the entrance of a preschool with 140 students in attendance. 
According to the New York Post, “He barreled down the hallway before security opened fire, killing the suspect.” That attack started a fire in the building. The driver was killed while he was in the car. Police found in the car a rifle and mortar shells.
The suspect allegedly came from Dearborn Heights, Michigan. The synagogue was located 20 miles north of Dearborn, an Islam-dominated city represented in Congress by radical Islamic terror apologist Rashida Tlaib.
How radicalized is Dearborn? In recent days, some Dearborn mosques have been praising Ayatollah Khamenei. In 2025, the city decided to honor terror-supporting activist Osama Siblani with a street sign. Siblani is a radical Muslim who openly speaks of his pride in terror leaders like deceased Hezbollah head Hassan Nasrallah, whom he called a great leader, saying he was “proud” of him. He also advocated for Hezbollah to make Israel “taste the Lebanon poison.”
When a resident of Dearborn showed up at a city council meeting to protest naming a street after this radical Islamist, the mayor of Dearborn told him to get out of the city and then called him — wait for it — wait for it — wait for it — an Islamophobe.
Unsurprisingly, there were some people in the media who found excuses for the terror attack at the synagogue. Over on GB News, one commentator explained that this was an “Israeli temple” and thus presumably deserving of its fate. The argument here seems to be that if you are a pro-Israel Jew in the United States, then it&#8217;s totally fine for a terrorist to drive a car laden with explosives into your synagogue.
Ryan Grim, formerly of The Intercept, reported that the terrorist had family members recently killed by Israel and its current action against Hezbollah in Lebanon. Even if that&#8217;s true, it makes for a rather strange defense of these terrorist actions. The mass murder of 1,200 Jews on October 7 in Israel has caused precisely zero Jews, zero, to drive an explosives-laden car into a mosque or near a Muslim school.
There&#8217;s just something about radical Islam that isn&#8217;t quite the same.
Of course, as we have been following, the two attacks yesterday were not the first attacks of the last few weeks. Last week, we reported on a radical Islamic terror attack in Austin, Texas, in which a 53-year-old Senegalese immigrant to the United States killed three people and wounded 13 more. He happened to be wearing a sweatshirt that read —wait for it, wait for it — “Property of Allah.”
I know, you&#8217;re shocked.
Over the last weekend, we saw two ISIS-affiliated radical Muslims throw IEDs at a rally outside Gracie Mansion, all of which led the mayor of New York to spend extraordinary efforts condemning — wait for it, wait for it, you&#8217;re not going to believe it — Islamophobia.
How does this radical ideology spread in America?
The answer is twofold. First, we import people who are sympathetic to terrorism, and then addle-pated Americans argue that they ought to be mainstreamed.
That&#8217;s how you end up with Zohran Mamdani — yes, he is a terrorist supporter — as mayor of New York. It&#8217;s how Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar end up in Congress.
What should we do about it? First, we can stop future immigration from radical Islamic countries and other third-world areas where we can&#8217;t vet our immigrants at the source. You cannot import problems from other parts of the world, require zero assimilation, and then pretend that the big issue is “Islamophobia.”
Unfortunately, there are people dedicated to forcing our border wide open.
Secondly, we ought to enforce the law to revoke the citizenship of people who associate with terrorist groups or who favor totalitarian forms of government. That is, in fact, the law under title VIII, U.S. code, section 1484.
If enforced properly, this would mean revocation of citizenship for a wide variety of radical Islamists living in the United States right now. This law is difficult to enforce; it requires a high degree of evidentiary demonstration. But that degree ought to be met when you affiliate with an actual terrorist group, and if it is not, then the law itself ought to be changed to allow for revocation of such citizenship.
It is not our duty to people who seek to destroy America in the name of radical Islam.
Until the law is either enforced to the letter or changed, we have an enormous number of people in the United States who are devotees of radical Islam. What&#8217;s more, we&#8217;ve been told by one entire political party that mentioning this inconvenient fact is tantamount to Islamophobia.
Have Americans seen enough?

TOPSHOT-US-SHOOTING-SYNAGOGUE-MICHIGAN

The Deadly Cost Of Denial

Ben Shapiro

ISIS

Opinion

Radical Islamic Terror

Shooting

WASHINGTON—The Department of Justice has charged two &#8220;alleged ISIS-inspired terrorists&#8221; who authorities say attempted to bomb a New York City protest, Attorney General Pam Bondi announced on Monday.
Defendants Emir Balat, 18, and Ibrahim Kayumi, 19, are charged with five counts, including knowingly attempting to provide &#8220;material support or resources&#8221; to ISIS, a foreign terrorist organization; use of a weapon of mass destruction (an explosive device); transportation of explosive materials, interstate transportation and receipt of explosives &#8220;with the knowledge and intent that it would be used to kill, injure, and intimidate;&#8221; and unlawful possession of destructive devices.
&#8220;We will not allow ISIS’s poisonous, anti-American ideology to threaten this nation,&#8221; Bondi said in a statement on Monday. &#8220;Our law enforcement officers will remain vigilant.&#8221;
The two alleged terrorists are accused of attempting to detonate explosive devices near Gracie Mansion in Manhattan during a protest in the area, according to the unsealed DOJ complaint. Gracie Mansion is the official residence of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. The protest was &#8220;Stop the Islamic Takeover of New York City, Stop New York City Public Muslim Prayer,&#8221; and there was also a counterprotest called &#8220;Run Nazis Out of New York City.&#8221;
&#8220;Preliminary results of testing of one of the devices indicates that it contained a quantity of triacetone triperoxide (TATP), a highly volatile explosive material used in multiple terrorist attacks over the last decade,&#8221; the complaint states.
After the New York City Police Department arrested them, both Balat and Kayumi made statements &#8220;referring to ISIS,&#8221; authorities said.
<div id="attachment_1056151" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/doj-charges-two-isis-inspired-terrorists-who-attempted-to-bomb-nyc-protest/us-politics-new-york" rel="attachment wp-att-1056151"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1056151" class="wp-image-1056151 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/GettyImages-2265146814-864x576.jpg" alt="" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/GettyImages-2265146814-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/GettyImages-2265146814-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/GettyImages-2265146814-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/GettyImages-2265146814.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" /></a>New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks alongside New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch (L) during a news conference at Gracie Mansion in New York City on March 9, 2026. (Photo by Leonardo MUNOZ / AFP via Getty Images)</div>
&#8220;For example,&#8221; the complaint says, &#8220;as Kayumi was being placed inside an NYPD vehicle to be transported, an individual from the surrounding crowd yelled to Kayumi and asked, in substance and in part, why he had done this. Kayumi responded, in part and as captured on NYPD body-worn camera footage, &#8216;ISIS.'&#8221;
Both Balat and Kayumi also discussed ISIS in recorded post-arrest statements that they made after they received their Miranda rights, the complaint says. Balat wrote on a piece of paper that he had &#8220;pledged allegiance to the Islamic State,&#8221; and Kayumi said that he was affiliated with ISIS, watched ISIS propaganda on his phone, and was partly inspired to &#8220;carry out his actions that day by ISIS.&#8221;
Balat also said they wanted to carry out an even bigger attack than the Boston Marathon, which he said caused only &#8220;three deaths.&#8221;
Around 12:15 pm on Sunday, Balat ignited and threw an explosive device toward the area where the protesters were gathered, according to the complaint. Pictures show the alleged terrorist holding the device. Immediately after he allegedly threw it, he ran to another location down the block where he &#8220;received a second item.&#8221; After he allegedly ignited it, he dropped the device near several police officers, ran away from them, and jumped over a barricade before he was tackled and arrested by the NYPD. His cohort, Kayumi, was also arrested at the scene.
When Balat was arrested, he had a Turkish government identification card on his person that identified him as &#8220;Emir Balat&#8221; as well as a Pennsylvania driver&#8217;s license with his photograph and name. Authorities identified Kayumi through Border Patrol facial-recognition databases, the complaint states.
This is a breaking news story. Check back for updates.

DOJ Charges Two ‘ISIS-Inspired Terrorists’ Who Attempted To Bomb NYC Protest

Islamic Jihad

Pam Bondi

A terror scare erupted in America’s tourist hotspot when suspected homemade bombs packed with nuts, bolts, and screws were hurled toward a crowd.
The devices were tossed during dueling protests late Saturday morning near Gracie Mansion, the mayor’s residence on Manhattan’s Upper East Side in New York City.
NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said investigators are still working to determine whether the devices were functional explosives or hoaxes, adding the information released so far is early and could change as the investigation develops.
Police say the first protest began around 11 a.m. near Gracie Mansion. The demonstration — titled “Stop the Islamic Takeover of New York City, Stop New York City Public Muslim Prayer” — drew about 20 participants and was organized by individuals associated with January 6 defendant Jake Lang.
A counter-protest nearby called “Run the Nazis out of New York City, Stand Against Hate” drew roughly 125 people at its peak. Officers separated the two groups into designated protest areas, but tensions escalated shortly before noon.
At 12:15 p.m., police say a protester associated with the Lang demonstration used pepper spray against counter-protesters and was arrested.
Fast forward 20 minutes. The situation intensified.
Police say an 18-year-old counter-protester identified as Amir Balat lit and hurled an ignited device toward the protest area. Witnesses reported seeing flames and smoke trailing the device as it flew through the air before striking a barrier and extinguishing just feet from police officers.
Balat then ran from the scene, where investigators say he obtained a second device from a 19-year-old man tentatively identified as Ibrahim Nick.
Police say Balat lit that device while running before dropping it nearby. Officers quickly moved in, secured the area and took both men into custody. The incident was captured on NYPD surveillance cameras.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
WATCH: NYPD tackle man who allegedly set off a “homemade smoke bomb.” Police are now ordering everyone to clear the area.<a href="https://twitter.com/Bodittle?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Bodittle</a> | <a href="https://twitter.com/TPUSA?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@TPUSA</a> <a href="https://t.co/lUnciJLJ25">pic.twitter.com/lUnciJLJ25</a>
— FRONTLINES TPUSA (@FrontlinesTPUSA) <a href="https://twitter.com/FrontlinesTPUSA/status/2030341117053382819?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 7, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Bomb squad technicians responded to examine the devices. Tisch said early inspections suggest the objects appeared to be jars wrapped in black tape, slightly smaller than a football, packed with nuts, bolts, and screws and fitted with a hobby fuse that could be ignited.
Investigators are still working to determine whether the devices were functional improvised explosive devices or hoaxes, as it remains unclear whether they contained explosive material.
Both devices were transported by the bomb squad to the department’s Rodman’s Neck facility for further testing and analysis.
Police established a safety perimeter and searched the surrounding area for additional hazards, using canine units and manually inspecting garbage cans, vehicles, and nearby locations.
In total, six arrests were made in connection with the events. Those arrests include the two men accused of handling and deploying the devices, the protester who used pepper spray earlier in the demonstration, and additional individuals charged with disorderly conduct and obstructing traffic.
Some on social media are claiming Balat or Nick yelled “Allahu Akbar,” though that has not been confirmed by authorities.
Tisch praised officers who rushed toward the danger as the situation unfolded.
“I always speak about the police running toward the danger when everyone else runs away,” the commissioner said. “Let me be clear — that happened today.”
“I am grateful that there were no injuries associated with the incident,” she added.
Tisch said she has remained in contact with Mayor Zohran Mamdani throughout the day. Authorities say there is currently no indication the incident is connected to ongoing hostilities involving Iran, though the investigation remains active.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Watch as <a href="https://twitter.com/NYPDPC?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@NYPDPC</a> and NYPD executives brief the media on an ongoing investigation. <a href="https://t.co/FgTRZHumPV">https://t.co/FgTRZHumPV</a> <a href="https://t.co/MKsui1817S">pic.twitter.com/MKsui1817S</a>
— NYPD NEWS (@NYPDnews) <a href="https://twitter.com/NYPDnews/status/2030422025928310810?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 7, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Frontlines TPUSA reporter Bronson Alford told The Daily Wire that the counter-protesters from &#8220;Drive the Nazis out of New York&#8221; were not your average demonstrators.
“The protesters weren’t normal protesters; they were ANTIFA and their goal was to hurt as many conservative journalists as they could,” Alford told The Daily Wire. Alford said things escalated when protesters started screaming “Bomb, bomb, bomb.” His surroundings began to fill with smoke saying it smelled like something had been ignited.

New York City Attack

Arrests Made After Homemade Explosives Cause Terror Scare In NYC

New York City

Terrorism

U.S.

Zohran Mamdani

There are two basic ways to critique any belief system. You can critique it externally, by judging it according to standards it doesn’t accept, or you can judge it internally, by judging it according to standards it does accept.
Therefore, an external critique of Islam will judge it according to standards that come from outside its own sources, whether philosophical, historical, or theological, whereas an internal critique will begin from the Quran itself and ask whether Islam can stand on its own terms. 
The Islamic Dilemma is this kind of argument. It doesn’t impose Christian assumptions onto Islam. Instead, it begins with what the Quran itself says and follows those claims to their logical conclusion.
One of the strongest internal critiques of Islam is what’s commonly called the Islamic Dilemma. When followed carefully, it presents Muslims with a serious problem that can’t be resolved without undermining the authority of Islam itself.
The Quran repeatedly affirms that God revealed genuine Scripture before Muhammad, specifically the Torah and the Gospel. It speaks of these writings as guidance and light, given by Allah to earlier prophets. Just as importantly, the Quran commands Jews and Christians to judge by what God revealed in those Scriptures. Nowhere does the Quran clearly or explicitly teach that the Torah or the Gospel were lost, corrupted, or unreliable at the time of Muhammad.
The Quran doesn’t merely acknowledge earlier Scripture in passing. Instead, it repeatedly speaks of the Torah and the Gospel as real, authoritative revelations from God that were present and functioning in the world of Muhammad.
For example, Surah 5:44 states that “the Torah, in which was guidance and light,” was revealed by Allah and used for judgment. 
Likewise, Surah 5:46 affirms that Jesus was given the Gospel, “wherein is guidance and light,” confirming what came before it. 
These verses describe living Scriptures that guide God’s people, not lost or corrupted texts.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/plc-260226-sub?elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-1054605" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/Matt-Fradd-1024x171.jpg" alt="DailyWire+" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/Matt-Fradd-1024x171.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/Matt-Fradd-300x50.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/Matt-Fradd-768x128.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/Matt-Fradd-1536x256.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/Matt-Fradd.jpg 1800w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
More striking still, the Quran commands Jews and Christians to judge by these very writings. 
Surah 5:47 instructs Christians to “judge by what Allah has revealed in the Gospel.” 
Surah 5:68 tells both Jews and Christians that they have no firm standing unless they uphold the Torah and the Gospel. 
These commands only make sense if those Scriptures were accessible and trustworthy in the seventh century — when the Quran was written.
Finally, Surah 10:94 tells Muhammad himself that if he’s in doubt, he should ask those who read the Scripture before him. That appeal would be meaningless if those Scriptures were already corrupted or unreliable.
Taken together, these passages show that the Quran affirms the Torah and the Gospel as genuine revelation, present, readable, and authoritative at the time of Muhammad.
This creates a dilemma — with only two possible and mutually exclusive options.
Option one: The Torah and Gospel available in the seventh century were trustworthy.
If that’s true, then Islam faces a decisive contradiction. The Gospel preached in Muhammad’s time proclaims core Christian doctrines that Islam explicitly denies. It teaches that Jesus is the Son of God, that He was crucified, and that He rose from the dead. The Quran denies all three. So if the Gospel is trustworthy, then the Quran contradicts God’s prior revelation. That would mean the Quran can’t be from God.
Option two: The Torah and Gospel were corrupted before Muhammad.
This option also collapses Islam. If the Scriptures were corrupted, then Allah either failed to preserve his earlier revelation or allowed his followers to be misled for centuries. Worse still, the Quran commands Christians to judge by the Gospel they possess and appeals to those Scriptures as confirmation of Muhammad’s message. If those texts were already unreliable, then that doesn’t make sense. In that case, the Quran would be affirming and appealing to corrupted documents, which undermines its claim to divine wisdom.
Either way, Islam is trapped. It can’t affirm the Bible without contradicting itself, and it can’t deny the Bible without undermining its own authority.
Muslims often try to escape this dilemma by claiming that the original Torah and Gospel were pure but later altered. Yet that claim is historically unsupported. We possess New Testament manuscripts that predate Muhammad by hundreds of years, and they teach the same doctrines Christianity teaches today. There’s no evidence of a lost, non-Trinitarian, non-crucified version of the Gospel that Islam could appeal to. That so-called “original Gospel” exists only as a theological escape hatch.
The dilemma is therefore decisive. If the Bible is true, Islam is false. And if the Bible is false, then the Quran is false for affirming it. Islam depends on earlier revelation that it can’t consistently affirm or deny.
Christianity, by contrast, welcomes scrutiny of its historical claims. It stands or falls on events in history, especially the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. If Christ didn’t rise from the dead, then Christianity is false. Islam avoids history by rewriting it centuries later, but in doing so, it contradicts the very Scriptures it claims to respect.
The Islamic Dilemma doesn’t merely challenge Islam from the outside. Instead, it exposes an internal incoherence at the heart of its theology. And a revelation that contradicts itself can’t come from God.

Closeup of Muslim hands reading holy Quran book with Arabic text under warm light. Concept for Ramadan Kareem, Islamic religion prayer, spiritual faith, God worship, and reading scripture.

Can The Quran Affirm The Bible Without Contradicting Itself?

Bible

Catholicism

Christianity

Koran

Matt Fradd

Muslims

Religion

Authorities in Austin, Texas, released new information during a planned <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbS6W0mC3mE">press conference</a> on Thursday — including 911 calls made during the March 1 shooting and footage from body-worn cameras — and gave an update on the victims of the deadly rampage.
Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis said that some of the video had been deemed &#8220;too graphic&#8221; to release to the general public — and warned that even the video that was going to be released would be &#8220;difficult to see.&#8221;
One video, captured from a parked vehicle, showed the suspect walking into frame, carrying a rifle that Davis described as an &#8220;AR-15.&#8221; He raised the weapon to a firing position and drew down on a pedestrian, after which Davis stopped the video.
Another video showed the street view as bars began to close up for the night on Sunday and people spilled out into the street. Additional body cam footage from multiple officers showed them running toward the suspect — eventually engaging him in the firefight that killed him.
&#8220;As additional officers arrived, they were directed to the suspect’s location by brave people that were caught in this nightmare,&#8221; Davis said.
She also shared audio from two 911 calls. One was very difficult to understand, but someone could be heard on the line shouting at others to &#8220;get down. You need to go that way and get down &#8230; There has been a shooting &#8230; there are people dead over here. There have been multiple people shot. We need help right now.&#8221; Another caller said, &#8220;I heard six gunshots &#8230; there&#8217;s cops running towards it.&#8221;
The shooter was identified as 53-year-old Ndiaga Diagne, a Senegalese immigrant, and he wore a shirt featuring the Iranian flag under a hoodie that read &#8220;Property of Allah.&#8221;
Three people have died so far as a result of the shooting. Ryder Harrington, 19, and Savitha Shan, 21, were pronounced dead at the scene and Jorge Pederson, 30, was taken to the hospital but later taken off life support. Two other victims who have not been identified remain in critical condition. A total of 19 were struck by gunfire during the attack.
&#8220;I don’t think any of us can imagine what these families are going through right now, the suffering that they are dealing with. Our hearts are with them,&#8221; Davis said.
She reiterated previous statements saying that Diagne had not previously been known to law enforcement, explaining that his last contact with authorities had been a welfare check in 2022 based on concerns about his mental health.
The shooting is being investigated as potentially linked to terrorism.

Bodycam

Austin Police Release Body-Cam Footage, 911 Audio In Terror Probe

Austin

Media

Texas

A D.C.-area mosque pledged its loyalty on Sunday to &#8220;Our Leader Shaheed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei,&#8221; mourning his &#8220;martyrdom&#8221; after the Iranian dictator was killed in a U.S.-Israeli operation.
The Manassas Mosque is a sponsor, alongside left-wing groups like CodePink and the D.C. chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, of a &#8220;Stop the war on Iran&#8221; march on the White House planned for Monday night.
On its <a href="https://www.instagram.com/manassasmosque/?hl=en">Instagram</a> page, the mosque calls Iran&#8217;s dictator — not America&#8217;s elected representatives — its leader, and demands to &#8220;end US-Zionist aggression.&#8221; The picture was deleted after The Daily Wire captured it.
<div id="attachment_1052149" style="width: 380px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1052149" class="size-large wp-image-1052149" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/HCaZ46IWsAAnrH4-Edited-370x576.jpg" alt="" width="370" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/HCaZ46IWsAAnrH4-Edited-370x576.jpg 370w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/HCaZ46IWsAAnrH4-Edited-193x300.jpg 193w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/HCaZ46IWsAAnrH4-Edited-768x1194.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/HCaZ46IWsAAnrH4-Edited.jpg 922w" sizes=" (max-width: 370px) 100vw, 370px" />Screenshot via Manassas Mosque Instagram</div>
The mosque, about 30 minutes from the Pentagon in D.C.&#8217;s Virginia outskirts, is funded by the Alavi Foundation, which has spent tens of millions of dollars in America. The U.S. government has alleged that the foundation is a front for the Iranian regime.
In 2023, nine GOP congressmen <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/world/gop-reps-raise-alarm-bells-irans-influence-american-religious-institutions">wrote</a> to the Biden administration&#8217;s attorney general and director of national security, saying that the Manassas mosque received $200,000 from the Alavi Foundation and &#8220;a recent video inside the Mosque showed it is adorned with pictures of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps &#8230; This appears to be part of a network of regime-sponsored mosques acting as agents for a foreign adversary.&#8221;
After the October 2023 Hamas terrorist attack against Israel, the Manassas Mosque issued a newsletter that said, &#8220;We stand firmly with the Palestinian Resistance (Hamas),&#8221; according to <a href="https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/manassas-mosque/">InfluenceWatch</a>.
It has used racial divisions in the U.S. to infiltrate the Left, saying in 2020 that the death of George Floyd &#8220;exposes the facade of freedom and justice for all.&#8221;
In 2009, the then-head of the Alavi Foundation, Farshid Jahedi, was indicted for &#8220;allegedly destroying documents subpoenaed by a grand jury investigating the Alavi Foundation&#8217;s relationship with Bank Melli Iran and the ownership of a Manhattan office building,&#8221; the Department of Justice <a href="https://www.justice.gov/archive/usao/nys/pressreleases/May09/Jahedi,%20Farshid%20Indictment%20PR.pdf">said</a>. In 2010, during the Obama administration, he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to <a href="https://www.courthousenews.com/feds-slap-hand-of-alavis-ex-boss/">only</a> three months in prison and a $3,000 fine on two felony counts. 
<blockquote>
<h1>&#8220;They really have no idea what they&#8217;ve unleashed upon themselves. It is exactly in moments like this that resistance fighter are born.&#8221;</h1>
</blockquote>
The group built a skyscraper at 650 Fifth Avenue in New York using a loan from Iran, and Alavi, for years, used front groups to hide the forbidden relationship, the DOJ said in a 2008 <a href="https://akamai-staging.justice.gov/usao-sdny/programs/victim-witness-services/united-states-v-all-right-title-and-interest-assa-corp-08-civ-10934-rjh" target="_blank" rel="noopener">forfeiture action</a> against the Assa Corp., which the DOJ said was an offshore front group used by Alavi. In 2019, a jury verdict to seize the entire building for violating Iranian sanctions was overturned on appeal.
Its 2025 IRS filing includes <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/237345978/202542879349100704/full">buying land</a> in Virginia. It has also given <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/display_990/237345978/download990pdf_11_2021_prefixes_20-27%2F237345978_201803_990PF_2021110319126074">loans</a> for Muslims to study at U.S. colleges, and mortgages to establish new mosques in places like Beaverton, Oregon, and San Diego, California.
The Manassas Mosque&#8217;s imam is Abolfazl Bahram Nahidian, who in 2010 said that Israel was behind 9/11.
His daughter-in-law, Atefeh Rokhvand, has been a major player in high-profile, left-wing-adjacent advocacy against Israel.
A D.C. court ordered Rokhvand and others to pay a rabbi $182,000 for abusing the U.S. court system by attempting to have him prosecuted for &#8220;stalking&#8221; for coming to the Israeli embassy to pray, where they had staked out in a constant protest. A lawyer for Rokhvand previously replied to The Daily Wire&#8217;s questions by implying the rabbi was <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/anti-israel-activists-ordered-to-pay-182000-after-falsely-accusing-rabbi-of-stalking">greedy</a>, saying the $182,000 was for &#8220;over-inflated legal fees.&#8221;
Rokhvand was the &#8220;governor&#8221; of the around-the-clock stakeout of former Secretary of State Antony Blinken&#8217;s home, which involved throwing <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/soros-prosecutor-wont-shut-down-pro-palestinian-encampment-outside-antony-blinkens-home">fake blood</a> on his vehicle as he returned home. She previously taught third grade at a school affiliated with the mosque, and founded Teachers Against Genocide.
<div id="attachment_881199" style="width: 1210px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-881199" class="size-full wp-image-881199" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/02/embassy.jpg" alt="Hazami Barmada (center) and Atefeh Rokhvand (right) protesting the Israel embassy / Instagram" width="1200" height="600" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/02/embassy.jpg 1200w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/02/embassy-300x150.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/02/embassy-1024x512.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/02/embassy-768x384.jpg 768w" sizes=" (max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px" />Hazami Barmada (center) and Atefeh Rokhvand (right) protesting the Israeli embassy / Instagram</div>
On Instagram, Rokhvand this week posted a screenshot of a tweet saying, &#8220;they just canonized Kahmenei [sic]. And they really have no idea what they&#8217;ve unleashed upon themselves. It is exactly in moments like this that resistance fighter are born.&#8221;
Radical Islamists in the D.C. area have often used their daughters to embed in local Democrat politics. Several of the 9/11 hijackers worshipped at a different mosque, whose imam was later drone-struck by Barack Obama as a member of Al Qaeda. The daughter of a board member who hired that imam was later elected to the Fairfax County school board, where she <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/school-board-member-abrar-omeish-whose-father-led-september-11-hijackers-mosque-opposes-resolution-honoring-victims">opposed</a> a moment of silence honoring the victims of 9/11.
Several members of Congress, in response to The Daily Wire&#8217;s flagging of the mosque aligning with an enemy during wartime, called for members of the mosque to be denaturalized and deported.
&#8220;The enemy is inside the gates,&#8221; Rep. Keith Self (R-TX), a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said.
&#8220;Deport all who refuse to pledge allegiance to the United States of America,&#8221; Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) said.
&#8220;We need to get them the hell out of our country,&#8221; Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) said.
&#8220;Deport them. Now,&#8221; Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) said.

Manassas mosque

Mosque Near Pentagon Labels Iran’s Khamenei As Its ‘Martyred Leader’

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

General

Virginia

The West is in trouble.
One of the reasons is that the West has fundamentally failed to distinguish between tolerance of one another&#8217;s traditions and lifestyles on the one hand, and the bizarre bend-over-backward celebration that accompanies the undermining of traditions unique to the West.
A perfect example is what&#8217;s happening in Germany now. It seems like a small story, but it is indicative of a broader mindset that has been setting in throughout the West for generations.
In Germany, McDonald&#8217;s decided on an ad campaign. The German population is roughly 6.5% Muslim at this point. Muslims celebrate Ramadan around this time of year, which means they are fasting from sunup to sundown.
Fine. That is the Muslim tradition. There are a lot of Muslims who live in the West who are perfectly fine Western citizens.
McDonald’s is not halal, meaning food that religious Muslims can eat. If you are a Muslim who is celebrating Ramadan or commemorating Ramadan, chances are that you are eating halal in your non-Ramadan hours and in your non-fasting hours, because if you&#8217;re religious enough to actually not eat all day, you probably don&#8217;t go at sunset and find a rasher of bacon and eat it.
But McDonald&#8217;s decided to put up an ad campaign in Germany. The ad campaign removes the food from the billboards during Ramadan hours out of respect for Islam. The food appears on the billboard after sunset, but it disappears during the day, presumably so as not to tempt Muslims to feel hunger pangs.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-2376-wth-mc-donald-s-celebrates-ramadan"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-974957" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp" alt="DailyWire+" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-300x50.webp 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-768x128.webp 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1536x256.webp 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-2048x341.webp 2048w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
That is Bizarro World. It’s weird and self-defeating, and it bespeaks of something that lies at the heart of the cowardice of a lot of both corporations and people in the West.
It&#8217;s Bizarro World because McDonald&#8217;s is not halal. The people who are presumably going to be very moved by these billboards are not going to head over to McDonald&#8217;s after dusk and start chomping down on their cheeseburgers.
So what is McDonald&#8217;s doing? According to <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/mcdonalds-new-ad-campaign-empty-boxes-no-food-ramadan-germany-11578866?utm_source=chatgpt.com">Newsweek</a>: 
<blockquote>The campaign was created by the German agency Scholz &amp; Friends, whose concept centers on removing McDonald’s most recognizable visual element—its food—as a gesture of respect for those observing Ramadan.</blockquote>
This is strange. The reality is McDonald’s is a food company that sells food, and the vast majority of the food that you sell is not to the people to whom they’re trying to appeal.
Who exactly is McDonald&#8217;s appealing to? Who&#8217;s the target audience?
The answer is: The dullards in the West who believe that it is a mark of virtue to subsume your own values beneath the values of other cultures.
That is the problematic part. It is a strange form of cultural reparation that somehow the West owes it to other cultures to participate in their religious activities while subsuming its own interests.
I don&#8217;t think McDonald&#8217;s cares all that much in Germany about whether or not Muslims like McDonald&#8217;s. I think what German McDonald&#8217;s cares about is that there are a lot of people in Germany who see this as a form of left-wing social virtue signaling, in the same way that in the United States, you have major corporations that every year decide they&#8217;re going to signal for Black History Month or Gay Pride month.
But the basic idea is not that you are going to earn vast oodles of cash from doing that. The idea is you&#8217;re appealing to left-wing people in the United States who will give you more money because they believe that you share their values.
The reason that you see all these companies doing DEI in the United States is absolutely not because they think it&#8217;s going to be good for their balance sheet. Hiring on the basis of non-merit is always bad for the balance sheet.
The reason these companies do it is because they believe they can appeal to an entire group of consumers who have warm feelings toward them if they take their own corporate business interests, throw those aside, and start signaling their politics.
This is a major problem. It&#8217;s not unique to Germany and is a widespread symptom of a disease that is spread across the West, where you are supposed to be overtly apologetic about not celebrating Ramadan.
This is not a sign of cultural respect.
It&#8217;s a sign of cultural disintegration.
It would be the same thing as if companies in the UK decided that they were suddenly going to take female models and suddenly cover up their faces out of respect for radical Islam.
It&#8217;s saying something, but it&#8217;s not the thing they think they&#8217;re saying.
There is an assumption that in the Trump era, DEI is basically dead, that we&#8217;re never going back to a time when corporations were virtue signaling like this, when policy did not reflect this idea that the dominant American culture ought to be put under the foot of splinter cultures.
But the reality is that it can very easily come back.
It doesn&#8217;t take a lot for it to come back. All it takes is a group of people who see it as a mark of virtue to yell at their own culture and pretend that it is somehow inferior and owes it to other cultures to demonstrate its own inferiority.
There&#8217;s a piece from Time magazine titled “<a href="https://time.com/7377439/donald-trump-cant-kill-dei/">Why Donald Trump Can&#8217;t Kill DEI</a>.” The point the piece makes is that the anti-DEI era, which is a backlash to the Barack Obama/Joe Biden era, will be followed by a backlash to the backlash, and that all this stuff will come back with a vengeance.
The piece states:
<blockquote>Ideas of inclusion and diversity also permeate everyday institutions, including schools, universities, foundations, nonprofits, and corporations. &#8230; Many companies have retreated from DEI under legal and political pressure. What makes fewer headlines is that most companies that have sidled away from the acronym continue to affirm the values of DEI under a different name. &#8230; 
Boeing stated that it maintains “procedures aimed at encouraging an equality of opportunity.” Lowe’s has proclaimed that it remained “committed to fostering an environment where individuals are treated fairly, valued, respected, safe, and inspired to serve customers and the communities where we live and work.” These statements sure sound like diversity, equity, and inclusion to us. &#8230; The education sector is equally if not more committed: a 2025 review of 262 colleges and universities found that 245 of them still maintained DEI offices and programs.</blockquote>
This is only going to continue. What does it mean?
It means this will come back if Republicans lose the forward momentum.
I know that we&#8217;re also riding high on the horse right now because Donald Trump won and because Republicans are in charge of the legislative branches of the government.
But if you think this stuff can&#8217;t come back, you’re wrong.

Germany’s Milder Recession With Stimulus Offsetting Shutdown

WTH?! McDonald’s Celebrates … Ramadan

advertising

Europe

Germany

McDonald’s

Woke Culture

The following is an edited transcript from <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-1895-president-trump-s-trip-to-the-world-economic-forum-explained-in-5-minutes?elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">The Michael Knowles Show</a>.
* * *
What is the broader, deeper vision of the World Economic Forum? Bestselling author Yuval Noah Harari actually sums it up quite well. Harari is close to Klaus Schwab who, of course, was the longtime head of the World Economic Forum. Harari has effectively become the &#8220;court intellectual&#8221; of the WEF, and he has been unusually candid about what he thinks the future holds.
Harari has said openly that as we look into the future, the world is going to be run by artificial intelligence. Anything involving language — up to and including the Bible and religion itself — is going to be taken over by AI.
In his own words, Harari explains it this way:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Yuval Noah Harari speaking at the World Economic Forum just said that AI will soon take control of the Bible, and all the words written in it. The Bible absolutely accepts that challenge. Game on.
&#8220;The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth,… <a href="https://t.co/rA8S6YpQcT">pic.twitter.com/rA8S6YpQcT</a>
— Now The End Begins (@NowTheEndBegins) <a href="https://twitter.com/NowTheEndBegins/status/2013645014937604424?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 20, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Credit: @NowTheEndBegins/X.com
I’ve thought about Yuval Harari for a while now, and he could not make himself seem more villainous if he tried. He leans into it. He’s auditioning to be the Bond villain. He presents himself as the herald of the end times.
Now, to be fair, he’s not totally wrong about the influence of AI. AI has crept into all of our lives in one way or another. And we even cooperate with it constantly. In that sense, he’s right. But he gets the fundamental things wrong.
First of all, he says Jews refer to themselves as “the people of the book.” That’s a half-truth. Some people say it today, but Jews did not originate that phrase. Do you know where “people of the book” actually comes from? It comes from Islam. It’s a phrase from the Qur’an, used to refer to Jews and Christians in an attempt to present Islam as part of that same tradition.
“People of the book” is a Muslim term that Jews — and some Protestants — later appropriated. But when you really get down to it, setting Islam aside entirely, Judaism and Christianity are not fundamentally religions of the book.
They are religions of sacrifice.
It is true that since the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 A.D., Jews gather and conduct religious services in synagogues. But before that, Judaism was a religion of Temple sacrifice. Christianity, crucially, is also a religion of sacrifice. The centerpiece of Christian worship is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: the Blessed Sacrament, Christ in the Holy Eucharist — body, blood, soul, and divinity.
None of this diminishes the importance of Scripture. But Pope John Paul II corrected this misunderstanding beautifully when he said that Christianity is not the religion of a book. It is the religion of the Word of God. We are the people of the Word. Yes, we have Holy Scripture — inerrant and authored by God — but the center point is the Word Himself: the Word who became flesh and dwelt among us.
<div id="attachment_1031405" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1031405" class="size-large wp-image-1031405" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2256691657-864x576.jpg" alt="Yuval Noah Harari, historian and philosopher, during the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, on Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. The annual Davos gathering of political leaders, top executives and celebrities runs from Jan. 19-23. Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg via Getty Images" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2256691657-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2256691657-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2256691657-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2256691657.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" />Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg via Getty Images</div>
Once you understand that, Harari’s statement becomes even more jarring. He says that anything involving language, anything involving words, will be taken over and conquered by AI. But if the religion that animates our civilization is the religion of the Word — “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” — then what Harari is really saying is that AI is going to conquer God.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-1895-president-trump-s-trip-to-the-world-economic-forum-explained-in-5-minutes?elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">WATCH: The Michael Knowles Show</a></h3>
Harari is a smart guy, so he may be aware that this is exactly what he’s saying, even if he doesn’t state it explicitly. And if he’s not aware of it, that somehow makes it even worse.
The belief that AI will conquer God is what a lot of liberal, humanist, materialist, and atheist globalists actually believe. This isn’t the product of a few years or even a few decades. It’s the culmination of centuries of liberal thought. They intend to make their own god, and AI will be that god. They will worship it.
It’s no different from the Old Testament, where pagans worshipped dumb idols that God repeatedly warned them not to worship, lest they become dumb themselves. And that’s exactly what’s happened.
That’s why all these fancy elites, who went to elite schools, who have lots of money and impressive jobs, seem so dumb. That’s why someone like Yuval Harari, who probably has a very high IQ and has read an enormous number of books, ends up saying things that sound so profoundly foolish.
And that’s why you end up needing a guy like Trump to barge in and tell them.

Opening Day Of World Economic Forum (WEF) 2026

World Economic Forum Speaker Says, ‘AI Will Take Over Religion’

World Economic Forum Speaker Says, 'AI Will Take Over Religion'

Artificial Intelligence

Klaus Schwab

Michael Knowles

Scripture

Switzerland

World Economic Forum

Christians in Syria saw the largest increase in persecution among any country in the world last year as regime change and terrorism threw the Islamic nation into chaos, according to the Christian organization Open Doors, which published its annual persecution watch list Wednesday morning.
The Open Doors <a href="https://www.opendoorsus.org/en-US/persecution/countries/">2026 World Watch List</a> revealed that Syria jumped up to No. 6 in overall Christian persecution, after coming in at No. 18 in last year’s list. Syria is now only behind North Korea, Somalia, Yemen, Sudan, and Eritrea.
Open Doors CEO Ryan Brown told The Daily Wire that the recent political turmoil in Syria is the main contributing factor to the increase in persecution.
“With the fall of the Assad regime and as HTS [Hay&#8217;at Tahrir al-Sham] came into power, it created a lot of vacuums of control and authority,” Brown said. “The rule of law is weak in a number of areas, and in that, there’s just been a number of extremists that have just stepped into those voids.”
Brown pointed to multiple recent Islamic terror attacks targeting Syrian Christians, such as the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/jihadist-suicide-bomber-kills-20-wounds-dozens-more-at-orthodox-church" target="_blank" rel="noopener">suicide bombing</a> in June, when a terrorist opened fire on worshipers and then detonated a suicide vest, killing more than 20 Christians and wounding over 50 more. Christians in Syria are more likely to come under attack from Islamic terrorists who are fighting for control of certain areas in the unstable country, not from the government, which is now led by former HTS leader Ahmad al-Sharaa.
“The church is coming under attack especially in these areas where the government is not having a strong rule of law as part of this transition,” Brown added. “Traditionally, in some of these areas in Syria where the rule of law has not been strong, the tribalism becomes the ruling force and provides safety. Christian converts from Islam are typically rejected from these tribal infrastructures.”
It remains to be seen if al-Sharaa, a former terrorist leader, will tolerate Christians in Syria if he establishes a firm grip on the country. So far, the new Syrian leader has been actively seeking to take out Islamic terrorists that remain in Syria.
President Donald Trump met with al-Sharaa at the White House as he seeks to broker peace in the Middle East. The meeting marked the first time a Syrian leader and former jihadist met with the President of the United States.
Brown said the 12-spot change in Syria&#8217;s ranking between 2025 and 2026 was the largest year-over-year move for any country on the persecution watch list in more than a decade.
Syria, Nigeria, Pakistan, Libya, and Iran round out the top 10 of countries where Christians experience the most persecution, meaning that eight out of the top 10 countries on the 2026 World Watch List are majority Muslim nations.
<h3>Nigeria Was The ‘Epicenter’ Of Violence Against Christians In 2025</h3>
More Christians in Nigeria, which came in at No. 7 on the list, were killed for their faith than in any other country. Open Doors reported that 3,490 Nigerian Christians were killed last year, which was an increase from the estimated 3,100 killed in 2024. For comparison, 1,359 Christians are estimated to have been killed for their faith in all other countries combined in 2025.
Brown told The Daily Wire that Nigeria didn’t rank No. 1 on the persecution list because Open Doors considers multiple factors, not just violence, when ranking countries.
“The World Watch List looks at danger, but looks at a number of other factors as well. Nigeria would be the deadliest place to be a Christian, not necessarily the most difficult because there are places in the country where Christians are able to freely worship,” Brown said. “But Nigeria continues to be an epicenter of violence in parts of the country, in parts of the middle belt as well as in the northern parts of the country.”
Recent violence against Christians in Nigeria <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trumps-next-peace-push-focuses-on-nigeria-and-sudan-where-christians-are-killed-by-the-thousands?author=Zach+Jewell&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Trump%E2%80%99s+Next+Peace+Push+Focuses+On+Nigeria+And+Sudan%2C+Where+Christians+Are+Killed+By+The+Thousands" target="_blank" rel="noopener">gained the attention</a> of President Trump, who has pressured the Nigerian government to do more to protect Christians and <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-threatens-to-completely-wipe-out-the-islamic-terrorists-killing-nigerian-christians?author=Mary+Margaret+Olohan&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Trump+Threatens+To+%E2%80%98Completely+Wipe+Out+The+Islamic+Terrorists%E2%80%99+Killing+Nigerian+Christians" target="_blank" rel="noopener">threatened</a> to take out terrorists in the country if they continue to target them.
<h3>Iran Increased Pressure On Christians During Internal Turmoil And Conflict With Israel And U.S.</h3>
Iran, which ranks No. 10 on the World Watch List, has ramped up its crackdown on Christians in the country as they are viewed as “enemies of the state” and “agents of the West,” Brown explained.
The Iranian regime has arrested numerous Christians in recent months as it seeks to keep control amid growing tensions. The regime believes that Christians are influenced by the West and, therefore, plotting the overthrow of the government, and recent events have likely made the regime’s crackdown on Christians even harsher. Iran was humiliated in 2025 in its war with Israel and then by the United States, when President Trump ordered the U.S. military to strike Iranian nuclear sites.
Iran is in the midst of massive demonstrations as protesters have taken to the streets, mainly over the regime’s failure to address an economic collapse. Trump has warned that he could take more action against Iran if it massacres protesters. One report indicates that the Iranian government has killed at least 12,000 demonstrators.
<h3>China Continues To Target Christianity</h3>
China dropped from No. 15 on the list in 2025 to No. 17 this year, but the communist country remains brutal toward Christians. In September, the Chinese government began to monitor the online activity of Christians, especially clergymen, more closely.
“This was in continuation to the churches they closed down the previous year — there’s been an increase in that — but now looking to clamp down on some of the online activity of Christians in the area, making it difficult for them to communicate or to worship,” Brown said.
The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/china-escalates-persecution-of-christians-with-more-shocking-arrests" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a> earlier this month that China arrested more prominent church leaders, detaining at least seven Christians affiliated with the Early Rain Covenant Church in Chengdu, a city in southwestern China.
Brown said that people in China also face persecution from their local communities when they convert to Christianity, adding that many converts lose out on job or school opportunities, while some get their water or electricity cut off.
See the full list, and read a detailed report on each country in this year&#8217;s list <a href="https://www.opendoorsus.org/en-US/persecution/countries/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a>.

Suicide Bombing Targets Church In Damascus, Leaving 20 Dead And Dozens Injured

2026 Watch List Reveals Biggest Increases In Christian Persecution Across The Globe

China

Christian Persecution

Nigeria

Syria

Democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani&#8217;s swearing in ceremonies on Thursday will combine leftism and Islam, as the 34-year-old is set to become New York City&#8217;s first Muslim mayor when he places his hand on the Quran and is given the oath of office by Senator Bernie Sanders.
Mamdani will use three different Qurans in both of his swearing-in ceremonies on January 1, The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/31/nyregion/mamdani-quran-inauguration-muslim.html">reported</a>. For his first ceremony at midnight on Thursday, Mamdani will place his hand on his grandfather’s Quran as well as a Quran that belonged to black history activist Arturo Schomburg, according to the Times. In his second ceremony, Mamdani will again place his hand on his grandfather&#8217;s Quran and one that belongs to another family member.
Mamdani will be sworn in by New York Attorney General Letitia James after the clock strikes midnight on January 1, while Sanders will deliver the oath of office during a ceremony later in the day, the New York Post <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/12/31/us-news/zohran-mamdani-will-become-first-nyc-mayor-sworn-in-on-quran-when-he-takes-oath-of-office/">reported</a>.
The swearing-in ceremony will break with tradition as New York City mayors throughout history have placed their hands on Bibles when they were sworn in. Mamdani will become one of the few elected officials throughout the country to use a Quran for their swearing in, joining leftist Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and Minnesota Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar.
Mamdani spoke of his Islamic faith while on the campaign trail, even delivering a tearful address on Islamophobia after he claimed that his opponents, Andrew Cuomo and Curtis Sliwa, launched &#8220;racist&#8221; and &#8220;baseless&#8221; attacks on him.
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“Growing up in the shadow of 9/11, I have known what it means to live with an undercurrent of suspicion in this city,” Mamdani <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/zohran-mamdanis-islamophobia-speech-echoes-famous-norm-macdonald-joke">said</a> during his Islamophobia speech on October 24, adding, “To be Muslim in New York is to expect indignity, but indignity does not make us distinct. There are many New Yorkers who face it. It is the tolerance of that indignity that does.”
Mamdani also said that he was wrong for thinking that he could focus on his &#8220;central message&#8221; during his campaign and become &#8220;more than just my faith.&#8221;
&#8220;No amount of redirection is ever enough,” he said.
Mamdani&#8217;s election victory was <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/05/us/politics/mamdani-muslim.html">described</a> as a &#8220;breakthrough win for Muslim Americans&#8221; by The New York Times. Abdul El-Sayed, a Muslim Democrat running for U.S. Senate in Michigan, said of Mamdani&#8217;s election, “There is a constant effort to try and draw a small barrier around who can be American. That is what makes this moment so special.”

Mamdani To Be Sworn In With Hand On Quran As Bernie Sanders Gives Oath Of Office

Bernie Sanders

Leftism

Gen Z is particularly attuned to the threat of radical Islam, as a number of college students told The Daily Wire&#8217;s Isabel Brown at Turning Point USA&#8217;s AmFest.
Brown, the host of The Isabel Brown Show, moderated a panel discussion with three students, all active within TPUSA. One student said that the issue of Islam came entirely down to freedom of speech — and, in particular, freedom to dissent.
&#8220;Theoretically, if you disagree with the teachings of Christ, you can live in the United States and still abide by our laws and respect each other, but in a theocracy like what is under — the Middle East and Islam — you can&#8217;t,&#8221; he explained. &#8220;If you criticize Mohammed, you could genuinely put your life at risk. And we don&#8217;t have that in the United States, and I don&#8217;t think that we should.&#8221;
&#8220;When it comes to looking at different religions, the beautiful thing about America is that you can practice every kind of religion that you need. We have this freedom of religion,&#8221; the third panelist added. &#8220;So let me be clear — I don&#8217;t think we should just kick out all Muslims, I don&#8217;t think we should kick out people who practice the Islamic faith — but the idea that the Islamic faith is at all compatible with the Western world is a fallacy in and of itself.&#8221;
&#8220;When you look at the Koran versus the Bible, which is what America is based on, they don&#8217;t connect,&#8221; she added. &#8220;They don&#8217;t work together at all.&#8221;
&#8220;And that&#8217;s controversial to say because we have Muslims living in America. I don&#8217;t think it&#8217;s bad to be a Muslim living in America, I think it&#8217;s bad to want Islamic ideals to be put into America because they just don&#8217;t fit with the western world. You&#8217;ll see that happening in Europe — I believe that Europe has completely fallen now. You see this separation between cultures like we haven&#8217;t seen before and this dying of an entire race, an entire culture. What Europe was is dead now. And it will break my heart to see that happen in America.&#8221;
Brown pressed the students on whether they&#8217;d discussed the issue before — and whether their professors had said anything on the topic.
One said that the typical response was to simply slap &#8220;phobia&#8221; on the end of the word, saying &#8220;it&#8217;s Islamophobia if you even dare to question it. And the thing is, I think that means we need to question it. We need to question whether it&#8217;s actually compatible.&#8221;
The overwhelming assessment, from all three panelists, was that Islam was not compatible with Western values. Brown said that Charlie Kirk — the late TPUSA founder and her friend — agreed with this assessment.
&#8220;Charlie, more than anyone in the conservative movement, spoke often in the last few years about the dangers influence on Islam and Eastern philosophy on Western civilization, not just in the United States, but around Europe as well — where we&#8217;re seeing really crazy headlines over the past several months more than any time in our lifetime, right?&#8221; Brown began.
She went on to give examples, noting that Christmas markets and New Year&#8217;s Eve events were being canceled due to the threat posed by pro-Palestinian protesters and Islamic extremists, and that terrorist attacks around the world had increased dramatically — &#8220;and now that&#8217;s starting to seep into American culture here as well.&#8221;
After conceding that she herself had been &#8220;a little bit spicy&#8221; in recent weeks in her declarations that Islam — as an institution — was &#8220;incompatible&#8221; with Western ideals and, in particular, the United States, Brown explained that Islam did not place value on free speech or equality between the sexes, among other things.
One of the students noted that Charlie had always stressed the importance in differentiating between individual Muslims and Islam as a religious or political structure.
&#8220;It&#8217;s a completely incompatible concept that we could even allow these collective societies, like in the United States where now different tribes are fighting over who&#8217;s going to get elected in Minnesota, like that&#8217;s not really what America is supposed to be.&#8221;

Isabel Brown panel discussion

Gen Z Students Sound The Alarm On Islam And Democracy: ‘They Don’t Work Together At All.’

Politics

Western Civilization

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