Thomas Jefferson was a student of the Koran. He owned a two-volume English translation edition first published in 1734. He understood that the Koran’s peace initiatives were double-talk and one-sided. Peace meant the absence of any religious or political opposition. This is the indisputable history of Islam as historian Paul Johnson argues:

As early as 1786, Jefferson, who was serving as the ambassador to France, and John Adams, the Ambassador to Britain, met in London with Ambassador Abdrahaman, the Dey of Tripoli’s ambassador to Britain, in an attempt to negotiate a peace treaty based on Congress’ vote of funding. Peace would come at a price. If America wanted “temporary peace,” a one-year guarantee, it would cost $66,000 plus a 10% commission. “Everlasting peace” was a bargain at $160,000 plus the obligatory commission. This only applied to Tripoli. Other Islamic nations would also have to be paid. The amount came to $1.3 million. But as we saw above, there was no assurance that the treaties would be honored. In vain Jefferson and Adams tried to argue that the United States were not at war with Tripoli. In what way had the U.S provoked the Muslims, they asked? Ambassador Abdrahaman went on to explain “the finer points of Islamic jihad” to the Koranically challenged Jefferson and Adams. In a letter to John Jay, Jefferson wrote the following:

Abdrahaman was paraphrasing the Koran’s “rules of engagement” found in the 47 Surah:

“Whenever you encounter the ones who disbelieve [during wartime], seize them by their necks until once you have subdued them, then tie them up as prisoners, either in order to release them later on, or also to ask for ransom, until war lays down her burdens.”

Unless a nation submitted to an Islamic nation, whether it was the aggressor or not, that nation was by definition at war with Islam. Jihad means “to submit.” A non-aggressing nation is still at war with Islam as long as it hasn’t embraced Islam. Islam’s goal is to conquer the world, either by the submission of one’s will or by Allah’s sword (Robert Spencer, The Truth About Muhammad: Founder of the World's Most Intolerant Religion, 2006).

When President Jefferson refused to increase the tribute demanded by the Islamists, Tripoli declared war on the United States. A United States navy squadron, under Commander Edward Preble, blockaded Tripoli from 1803 to 1805. After rebel soldiers from Tripoli, led by United States Marines, captured the city of Derna, the Pasha of Tripoli signed a treaty promising to exact no more tribute.

We must realize that a Muslim country will not and cannot make a treaty with what it considers to be an infidel (Christian) nation unless it is a one-way street. Thomas Jefferson, embroiled with Islamic terrorists in his day, commented, “Too long, for the honor of nations, have those Barbarians been suffered [permitted] to trample on the sacred faith of treaties, on the rights and laws of human nature!” (Quoted in Joseph Wheelan, Jefferson's War: America's First War on Terror, 1801-1805, p. 102).

Little has changed since the eighteenth century. Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, who took office in August 2005, stated that “Anyone who signs a treaty which recognizes the entity of Israel means he has signed the surrender of the Muslim world.” According to the Koran, the United States, like Israel today, is considered an infidel nation. Ahmadinejad described the current Islamic relationship between the United States as an “historic war between the oppressor [the Christian United States] and the world of Islam.” For Ahmadinejad, this “historic war...dates backs hundreds of years” (Golnaz Esfandiari, Israel should be 'wiped off the map': Iran President, Oct. 27, 2005).

I am reminded of the sobering messages on the dedication page of J. A. Mitchell’s The Last American (1889) and the book’s closing words:

“To those thoughtful Persians who can read a warning in the sudden rise and swift extinction of a foolish people [the Americans] this volume is dedicated....Again upon the sea. This time for Persia, bearing our wounded and the ashes of the dead [last American]; those of the natives are reposing beneath the Great Temple [U.S. Capitol]. The skull of the last Mehrikan I shall present to the museum at Teheran.”

It’s no wonder that Jefferson studied the Koran. He realized that if Americans ever capitulated, the Muslims would be singing “From the Halls of Montezuma to the Shores of A-mer-i-ca.”

Hope of Israel Ministries -- Taking the Lead in the Search for Truth!

Hope of Israel Ministries P.O. Box 853 Azusa, CA 91702, U.S.A. www.hope-of-israel.org

Scan with your Smartphone for more information