The Camel in the Tent

“According to this classic tale, one cold night, a camel asks his master if he could put his head in the tent for warmth. ‘By all means and welcome,’ said the man; and the camel stretches his head into the tent. Soon after, the camel inquires if he may also bring his neck and front legs inside. Again, the master agrees. Finally, the camel asks, ‘May I not stand wholly within?’ With pity, the master beckons him into the warm tent. But when the camel comes forward it becomes clear that the tent is too small for them both. ‘I think,’ the camel said, ‘that there is not room for both of us here. It will be best for you to stand outside, as you are the smaller; there will then be room enough for me.’ And with that, the man is forced outside of his tent.“ ( i )

The story is “a metaphor for a situation where the permitting of a small, seemingly innocuous act will open the door for larger, clearly undesirable actions” ( ii ).

The camel and the tent can be representative of many things. Many countries in the world today are having to deal with Islamists working their way into the tent. Islamism is the radical element of the religion of Islam. It is “both a religious and a political ideology, seeking to achieve the global domination of Islam and Islamic culture as the main religion and social relations for all peoples and societies.” ( ii ). Not all adherents of Islam are Islamists but it is apparent that the Islamist movement will continue to grow as Islam grows. Islam is the second largest religion in the world after Christianity. As of 2023 there are more than 2 billion Muslims in the world. “In fact many researchers project that Muslims will outnumber Christians by the year 2050.” ( iii ).

No other religious movement in the world, other than the Islamists of Islam, has global dominance as its end goal. Again, not all Muslims are Islamists. As with Christianity and Judaism there are numerous sects within each and so it is within Islam. For example Islam consists of 4 main groups out of which come some 75 different sects. Within Christianity there are six main groups out of which come some 200 different denominations, in the US alone. Within Judaism proper, as I understand it, there are 4 sub groups. Just as there are radical elements within Christianity and within Judaism so also there are radical elements within Islam, and the radical element within Islam is Islamism. In the metaphor of the camel in the tent it is clear that Islamism wants the entire tent and there can be no room in it for unbelievers.

With regards to Hamas it “isn’t only a terrorists group, and it isn’t a Palestinian nationalist movement. It is a religious organization, incubated by the Egypt-based (Sunni based) Muslim Brotherhood. The Brotherhood, founded in 1928, departed from Islamic tradition and created Islamism, a totalitarian ideology to resist the pluralists West.” ( iv ).

Hamas is grounded in Islamism.

Hezbollah, the Party of God, “is one of the most important Islamists movements in the Middle East. Based in Lebanon, it has a powerful military wing … but it also runs a political party. … It has close links with Iran and Syria. … Since its foundation by a group of radical Shia clerics in 1982, Hezbollah has been blamed for major acts of violence in Lebanon, against Israel, and internationally too. Terrorism experts see it as a pioneer of mass causality suicide attacks.” ( v ). Hezbollah is grounded in Islamism.

The PLO, since it’s founding in 1964, has a complicated history and it is too lengthy to go into here. The main takeaway, however, is that the majority of the Palestinians in the West Bank are of the Sunni branch of Islam which connects them more with Hamas than Hezbollah. The PLO, however, is just another terrorists organization outside the tent of Israel with the goal of destroying Israel and the Jewish people. I cannot find any direct connection to Islamism within the PLO but I do find that many Palestinians have become disillusioned with the PLO and have defected to Hamas. Islamism, via Hamas, is working it’s way into the West Bank and the PLO may soon be a non-entity. Time will tell.

In much of Europe, and here in the US, the camel is well ensconced in the tent. The Islamists have secured positions of authority and power here in the US in City Councils, in City Governments, in State Governments and in the Federal Government. It would have been inconceivable, not so many years ago, that in a country founded on Judeo-Christian principles that someone could take their oath of office by swearing on a Quran. Our oath of office says that “I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic … so help me God”. This is the God of the Bible, not the god of the Quran.

In addition the Islamists in the US find unwitting partners in their goal of overthrowing this country. Those partners run the gamut and they are the radical left anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, anti-police, anti-American, anti-government, anti-constitutional federal republic, anti-everything that this country stands for. The ancient proverb that says that the enemy of my enemy is my friend comes to mind. The Islamists and their unwitting partners are now administrators and teachers in our schools, from the elementary schools to the universities. The inescapable evidence for this collusion can be seen in the most recent anti-Semitic, pro-Palestine virulent attacks on our Jewish citizens. Many of those involved in these protests and attacks were non-Palestinian, non-Arabic American citizens. Disturbed, ignorant, anti-American citizens. A house divided will not stand and we are presently a divided house!

The nation of Israel is unique in that her enemies are still, for the most part, outside of the tent of Israel. They are easily identifiable geographically. Here in the US we have no way of removing these Islamists and their sympathizers from our country. They are here in the tent and are a part of us now. Israel, however, can remove the threats and keep them out of the nation. I see no other option for Israel and its survival because the reality is that these Islamists want to totally destroy Israel and the Jewish people. They believe this religiously and they will never be convinced to make peace with Israel and the Jewish people. This is now Israel’s 8th war in the past 75 years. No more evidence is needed to conclude that the only way that there will ever be any measure of peace in Israel, for the foreseeable future, is through strength.

( i ) Mawar
( ii ) Wikipedia
( iii ) World Population Review
( iv ) Wall Street Journal
( v ) The Guardian