Tomorrow, at a church in Hamburg, a Protestant pastor and an imam will officiate at a service to commemorate a young man who joined the jihad and died in Syria last year.
Below is the story from Evangelische Zeitung (“Protestant Times”). Many thanks to Egri Nök for the translation:
Christian-Islamic worship
Funeral for slain IS fighter in St. Pauli Church
He grew up in Hamburg and was radicalized. In 2015 he died in Syria. Now friends and family bid him farewell with a church service. His mother says: “I am still crying.”
Pastor Sieghard Wilm and Florence K., mother of the slain Florent ‘Bilal’ K. Photo credit: Thomas Morell
Hamburg. On Friday, May 27, a Christian-Muslim funeral will commemorate the young IS fighter “Bilal” who was killed last summer in Syria at the age of 17.
As a Christian, it is important for her to have a grave where she could lay down flowers, says the mother, Florence K. “I still cry.” The funeral service begins at 15 o’clock in the Protestant St. Pauli Church.
She is glad to have the opportunity for a funeral, says the mother. “A burden” fell from her heart. Such a farewell ceremony is important for his friends, too. The funeral service will be conducted by Pastor Sieghard Wilm and the Albanian Imam Abu Ahmed Jakobi. Florent Prince N., as his name was originally, was baptized as a Christian and converted to Islam later.
Florent was born in Cameroon, came to Germany as an infant, and grew up in St. Pauli [an inner-city district of Hamburg]. Probably when he was 14, he came into contact with the radical Salafist scene, and converted to Islam. In May last year, he travelled on a fake passport to Syria to fight for the Islamic State.
In Syria, it seems, he realised that the circumstances had little to do with what had been promised to him. He therefore recorded an audio message in Rakka in Southwestern Syria, in which he criticised the IS. Shortly thereafter, he was dead. In early March, the audio file was distributed. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution thinks it is possible that he was punished for his message by the IS.
Pastor Wilm himself knew Florent from his work with youth. He [Florent] had been a friend of the pastor’s foster son for several years, and active in the community. There are photographs of him climbing up the facade of St. Pauli Church. It was important to him, so Wilm, that Christians and Muslims celebrate together, to make it clear that they pray to a “god of peace”.
She was also proud of her son, the mother said. He wanted to warn other young men with his message. He had been a “good boy with a big heart”. She talked to him on the phone shortly before his death in Syria. However, they did not talk about politics, but “as mother and son.”
Commentary from the critical internet platform “heise”:
[…] To summarise it, in a Christian Church, in the heart of a traditionally leftist part of town [St. Pauli], there will be a service for a deceased who joined an Islamic fundamentalist terror militia and who lost his life under unknown circumstances. A service at which an Islamic preacher will preach, whose ambition it apparently has been for his whole life, to strengthen fundamentalist Islam in Libya.
This is called an interfaith dialogue, and is intended that Christians and Muslims celebrate together, to show, quoting the Abendblatt [local newspaper in Hamburg] that they pray to a “God of Peace”.
One feels slight doubts rising, if the responsible people in the church community realise who it is they will let pray. To quote Jesus: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
The translator adds these notes:
Initially, the audio message and the photographs were published by the Hamburg Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution on March 22, 2016.
They explain that the Islamic State portrays themselves as heroic and well-organised, and have well-produced propaganda films to attract Western jihadists. By publishing the message from “Bilal”, German officials hope to counteract the picture of well-organised and heroic fighters that the Islamic State are painting of themselves.
This group photo shows Bilal with the Salafist “Lies” (German imperative for “Read!”) organization, who give the Koran away to passers-by for free, something that has been plaguing German cities for years now.
Why are they holding a funeral service in a church for a murderous Muslim fanatic?
This is obscene. The pastor should be ashamed of himself. However given the state of organized Christianity in the West, I’m not surprised at his stupidity and moral cowardice.
It would seem he had a deathbed re-conversion.
And the church funeral seems to be for the sake of his mother. It will be seen by the muslims as an insult. That imam will probably have a fatwah issued against him for taking part in an infidel ritual.
IOW, it’s complicated.
Something I heard often in the Southern Baptist church in which I was raised: When you walk down the middle of the road, you usually get run over. These Damned Fools in so much of the church, on both sides of the pond, think they’ll be able to pull it off.
The Albanian imam is doing stealth jihad << subcategory taqiyya << sub-subcategory jihad of the interfaith spectacle. Purpose: to fool Westerners into thinking not all Muslims are bad, which softens up the former into a generalized state of accepting the fait accompli of innumerable, and growing, presence of Muslims in the West (sans the Tiny Minority of Extremists, of course).
The dead Salafist probably wouldn`t be happy that a christian church offers a prayer for him – probably he looses his 72 virgins for that reason..
It is insane. The leaders of Europe are leading their countries to the slaughter
Lemminghurl.
This idiot was fighting for takeover of Europe. Why would anyone have anything to do with him. He’s a degenerate.
“He [Florent] had been a friend of the pastor’s foster son for several years, and active in the community.”
You mean, he sold self-baked cookies and channelled the receipts to charities, or on Sundays he visited the elderly and the sick, or he helped children in the neighborhood with their homework, or he mowed pensioners’ lawns and things like that?
“There are photographs of him climbing up the facade of St. Pauli Church.”
Oh.
There should always be place for forgiveness in a true Christians heart
I wonder if people like this, he and Merkel, have any ties to Baader-Meinhof or similar crews? In the U.S. the ties to leftist terror are pretty much common knowledge at this point in history.
I believe the Euro DNA was ruined by decades of drugs, socialism and Abba.
The superior DNA of Western Europe disappeared in the evil cauldrons of two entirely unnecessary wars. They wiped out the best and brightest of two successive generations of men and thereby feminized the tattered remnant.
America lost her best men in the evils of 1861-65ff…700,000 – perhaps more. If we hadn’t been able to vacuum up the restless surplus Europeans back then, we’d have surely declined. Or become far more Chinese than we did at the time – or than we will be, generation after next.
History, Jeff E., history. Combine it with a modicum of study in moral philosophy and you’ll be good to go.
Further, Jeff E., get the reading lists of Dr Walter Williams’ classes at George Mason. He’s 83 and still going strong. You’ll learn economics painlessly and a lot more besides.
And look into the offerings of the History Dept at Hillsdale College. Here’s the registration to see online free offerings:
https://online.hillsdale.edu/home/register
Read, read, read: George Santayana’s works – some of them – are free on Kindle if you have one.
The best and most entertaining info on the history of England’s Parliament in the 19th century is surely the prolific fictions of Anthony Trollope. Again, all free on Kindle.
And for an entertaining start to moral philosophy, read the Father Brown mysteries by G.K. Chesterton.
Socialism’s evil influence began with the best of intentions in Germany. See the B’s essay on this from the other day:
https://gatesofvienna.net/2016/05/women-and-socialism/
Europe was ruined long before Abba sang a note.
America is huffing and puffing to catch up.
There are still considerable pockets of resistance. After all, the fact that Hofer was able to rally 50% of the vote is giving me some hope.
In our own country, we have the VB. I suppose the news that last week a terror cel of around eight was rounded up in Antwerp slipped under the radar of the international news for the simple reason that their plans were foiled beforehand.
They planned to detonate bombs in places “where many people meet and to take as many kuffars as possible with them”. One of the intended targets was Antwerp’s Central Station.
But before these plans started to crystallize, they “just” wanted to murder Filip Dewinter: http://www.hln.be/hln/nl/957/Binnenland/article/detail/2716680/2016/05/27/Antwerpse-terreurcel-beraamde-moordaanslag-op-Filip-Dewinter.dhtml
“I suppose the news that last week a terror cel of around eight was rounded up in Antwerp slipped under the radar of the international news for the simple reason that their plans were foiled beforehand.”
All terror plots that don’t succeed for one reason or another (usually foiled by Western intelligence) should be counted as successful — they should register the same impact on us as the ones that succeed, in terms of our alarm at the overall problem of terrorism.
Such an impact, appropriately recalibrated, may move more Westerners from their MOE meme (“only a minority of Muslims are the problem — we can get along with the rest”) to a more rational comprehensive prejudice against all Muslims.
A bit hard on Abba; it may be pop, but it’s very good pop.
St Pauli?
Ever been there?
That was maybe still is the most famous whorehouse district in Germany and perhaps in Europe. I remember seeing, when I was in the US Military years ago, on news stands the St Pauli Nachrichten with crazy stories about sex and perverts you can imagine. Hamburg was in the far north of West Germany and I was in southern Bavaria so I never bothered to go to Hamburg, but everyone knew about St.Pauli.
Not exactly a great place for any person to “grow up”. 25,000 people “live” there, but on any night that might equal the number of sex workers, to say nothing of the 50,000 to 75,000 visitors looking for whatever.