Are enough Texans listening?
A year and a half ago I moved my family from California, where I had spent my entire adult life, to Texas. We left for the same reason as hundreds of thousands of other people in recent years: the state that should be paradise on earth had become, thanks to Democrat mismanagement – intentional, some might say – a Third World cesspit where a middle-class lifestyle was affordable only for the wealthy. My wife and I chose Texas for a variety of reasons; we knew it wasn’t paradise either, but it was definitely higher ground. Now I’m beginning to wonder if we were wrong about that.
Earlier this month I, along with something like a thousand others, had been registered to attend a three-day event just outside Dallas called the Israel Summit, featuring a full lineup of notable Jewish and Christian advocates for Israel and organized by a media initiative called the Israel Guys. The venue for the event was a public space but armed security was in place and the location was kept under wraps as long as possible.
Nonetheless, a mere few days before the summit, the organizers announced that a change of venue had been forced by current events:
After the devastating attack that left two Jewish-Israelis dead in Washington D.C. two weeks ago, the security establishment in Texas began analyzing the Israel Summit…
After several days of working with law enforcement, intelligence, the governor’s office, and other political and local leaders in Texas, it became clear that we would not be able to have the Israel Summit at the original venue.
Pastor George and Terri Pearsons from Eagle Mountain International Church, a much more private location about 35 miles farther away, offered their state-of-the-art facility instead, so the event was back on. Organizers assured event-goers that they were “working with some of the best private security in America, as well as local law enforcement to ensure that this event will be completely safe.”
Shortly thereafter, however, the event was postponed indefinitely altogether due to “jihadist threats.” They must have been serious and credible enough to shut things down despite the topnotch security and more isolated venue. The fact that a gathering as innocuous as a networking event of Jews and Christian Zionists in rural Texas could draw credible, violent, Islamist threats is eyebrow-raising – until you realize just how widespread the Islamist infiltration of the Lone Star State has been.
You may recall that it was in Garland, Texas – only about a 20-minute drive northeast of Dallas – that my Freedom Center colleague Robert Spencer and frequent Center cartoonist Bosch Fawstin were among the targets of a jihadist attack, almost exactly ten years ago, at an event awarding Fawstin first prize in a free speech contest. Fawstin had dared draw Muhammad in defiance of the fundamentalist injunction against representations of the Muslim prophet, a “blasphemy” for which the entire office of the satirical Charlie Hebdo magazine was slaughtered four months earlier in Paris. Two heavily armed jihadists were taken out by Garland law enforcement before that massacre could be reenacted on Texas soil. --->READ MORE HERE
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| FADEL SENNA/AFP/GETTY |
Islam grew faster than any other major religious group globally from 2010 to 2020, according to estimates released on Monday from Pew Research Center, a U.S.-based think tank.
Over the period, the number of Muslims worldwide increased by 347 million compared to 122 million for Christians, with the share of the world's population that is Christian actually falling, as the gains failed to keep up with population growth. The second biggest rise was recorded by the religiously unaffiliated.
Why It Matters
The rapid growth of Islam reflects significant demographic shifts that are altering the global religious landscape. For Americans, understanding these trends is vital as they influence migration, international relations and social dynamics both domestically and abroad. Experts found that higher birth rates and a younger median age among Muslims drove much of this surge, helping narrow the gap between Muslims and Christians worldwide.
What To Know
The Pew Research Center data from the time frame showed the number of Muslims globally reaching around 2 billion, as the proportion of the world's population that was Muslim rose from 23.9 percent to 25.6 percent.
Over the same time, Christians' share of the global population fell from 30.6 percent to 28.8 percent.
After Islam the biggest gains were recorded by the religiously unaffiliated, which saw their total increase by 300 million to 1.9 billion, representing 24.2 percent of the global population. This was a 0.9 percent increase in their share of the global population.
Out of the religions surveyed, only Buddhism saw its number of global adherents fall in absolute terms, by 19 million, to 324 million people.
Pew analyzed data from more than 2,700 sources spanning national censuses, demographic surveys and population registers. The study covered 201 countries or territories, accounting for nearly the entire world population.
Separately, data from Pew's Religious Landscape Study found the number of religiously unaffiliated increased from 2007, or in some cases 2014, and 2023-24 in every U.S. state except South Dakota. --->READ MORE HEREFollow link below to a relevant story:
+++++Top 10 American Cities With Significant Muslim Population+++++
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