Often some of the best commentary and discussion about Israel and the West comes from ex-Muslims. Simply think of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, or Mosab Hassan Yousef, or Mark Gabriel. I have written often about these brave individuals. See these articles for example:
Danny Burmawi is another such individual. He lived in Jordan and Lebanon, but converted to Christianity in 2007 and left for America with his family in 2023. His brand-new book Islam, Israel and the West (Gerasa Books, 2025) is another excellent example of the mental and moral clarity on what is happening in the Middle East and around the world that arises from someone who had been a part of the Islamic world.
The book’s six chapters tell us what his emphasis is:
What is Islam?
The Islamic War on Israel
Why Islam is Incompatible with the West
Rebranding Israel
The Foreign God
The New Frontiers
Consider what he says about the real nature of Islam. He reminds us of what far too many people fail to understand: Islam is not just another ‘religion’. Instead, it is a political ideology in which mosque and state are indivisible. As such, Islam is an evangelistic faith – or more accurately, an imperialistic faith. The whole world must be conquered for Islam.
And it all began with ‘the Prophet’. Says Burmawi:
If Muhammad made war, war is sanctified. If he ordered assassinations, those are jurisprudential precedents. If he expressed hostility towards Jews or Christians, that hostility becomes doctrine. The Sunnah records his campaigns, his treatment of captives, his treaty-making, his punishments, and his judgments in disputes. These are not anecdotes; they are templates. The hadith literature, authenticated through chains of transmission and integrated into every facet of jurisprudence, ensures his example is ever-binding. (pp. 19-20)
He goes on to say this about Muhammad:
His decisions, habits, and silences are all binding. His will becomes law. His person becomes the lens of revelation. This is why Islam cannot be apolitical if Muhammad was political. And he was. His community was not a church; it was a state. Every major domain of Islamic governance (siyasa), warfare (jihad), taxation (zakat, jizya), punishment (hudud), and treaty making (‘ahd) finds precedent in his actions. The command to fight disbelievers until they submit Qur’an 9:29) is not merely textual; it is historical. Muhammed did not only preach jihad; he led it. He did not merely warn against dissent; he ordered executions. He did not only urge submission; he enforced it.
In this sense, Islam is not simply the preservation of a message. It is the institutionalization of a life. Muslims are not called to obey abstract principles but to emulate a man whose every decision is sacred precedent. Mohammed is not symbolic; he is supreme authority who forms the canon. (p. 21)
And he says this about the political goal of Islam:
The Qur’an repeatedly emphasizes the duty to establish Allah’s rule on earth (hukm Allah), as seen in verses such as 9:33: “It is He who sent His Messenger with guidance and the religion of truth to manifest it over all religion.” This is not symbolic. It is expansionist in design and strategic in execution. The concept of Dar al-Islam (the abode of submission) versus Dar al-Harb (the abode of war) illustrates that Islam is not content to remain a private faith; it defines itself in terms of jurisdiction and territorial reach. (p. 23)
ISLAM, ISRAEL AND THE WEST: A Former Muslim's Analysisby Burmawi, Danny (Author)
Equally important to understand is how Islam views Israel. Hatred of the Jews goes right back to the days of Muhammad of course. It has never abated. So it has nothing to do with just the modern state of Israel. Writes Burmawi:
The war against Israel is not a border dispute. It is not about settlements, checkpoints, or territory. It is a theological crusade rooted in an Islamic ideology that demands the eradication of Jewish sovereignty to restore a global caliphate. In this worldview, Israel’s existence is not just inconvenient—it is an affront to Allah’s will. Hamas embodies this vision… (pp. 60-61)
In the light of this reality, glib talk about some ‘two-state solution’ in Gaza rings hollow:
Statehood demands more than international sympathy. A two-state solution requires recognition of the other’s right to exist. It requires responsibility, stability, and the abandonment of death-worship as a political creed. So long as Palestinian ideology exalts conquest over coexistence and martyrdom over life, Israel will do what any sovereign nation must: defend its people. Barriers, checkpoints, and military infrastructure are not instruments of colonial expansion. They are Shields against annihilation.
The truth is simple: the two-state solution is not dormant – it is obsolete. It is eclipsed by an ideology that sees the very existence of Israel not as a partner for peace, but as a theological offense to be erased. Until that ideology changes, no border will be wide enough, and no concession deep enough, to buy peace. (p. 60)
As has often been noted, there is a massive conflict between modern, pluralistic and free societies and the tribal backwaters of the Muslim mindset and ethos. The two cannot coexist. Burmawi emphasises this point as well:
So, what happens when you build an entire civilization on the unalterable example of a tribal, pre-modern, warlord society? You freeze ethics in time. You take a snapshot of 7th-century Arabia and make it eternal. You strip future generations of the ability to reach higher. Many Muslims are decent, kind, intelligent human beings. The issue is not individual virtue, it’s systemic limitation. Islam’s framework does not allow its followers to evolve past its founder. That’s the bottleneck. That is why Islamic reform always fails. The ceiling is too low.
What happens when people who sincerely revere such a figure settle in liberal, open societies? They don’t simply become pluralistic citizens. Their highest loyalty remains to a system that views secular law as inferior, democracy as optional, free speech as blasphemy, and gender equality as rebellion. The society around them may offer liberties, but their frame tells them these liberties are dangerous. This creates two devastating consequences.
First, the erosion of social cohesion….
Second, the subversion of policy…. (pp. 104-105)
And recognising what David Horowitz called the “unholy alliance” is also imperative if we are to win this war. Islam and the left are fully in bed together. Never mind that when Islamists gain power and control, the first ones to lose their heads (often literally) are these leftist dupes. Says Burmawi:
For the left, Islam was a strategic windfall. The left’s power depends on cultivating and amplifying narratives of victimhood, and Islam came with a ready-made archive of grievance – colonial encounters, wars, Orientalist scholarship – that fit neatly into the intersectional hierarchy of “the oppressed.” Especially in the post-9/11 era, Muslims became the perfect political foot soldiers in the left’s perpetual campaign against the West, mobilized under banners of anti-racism, anti-imperialism, and “equity.” The left’s hostility toward Christianity, viewed as the cultural backbone of the West, made Islam even more attractive as a partner. (p. 139)
And again:
Western nations, despite their innovations in democracy, science, and human rights, are branded eternal colonialists. Success itself becomes suspect: the powerful are always wrong, the weak always right. Truth dissolves into relativism; identity fragments into 200 genders, leaving generations adrift in confusion.
This culture, obsessed with dismantling every structure built by traditional power, has found in Islam a convenient ally. Islam’s civilizational stagnation, caused by its own theological rigidity, has left it defeated, and being non-Western, and “brown”, defeated by the West, made it a combination that, in the eyes of the radical left, as the ultimate oppressed victim. As a result, Islam is enlisted as a comrade in the crusade against the true centers of power. In this narrative, Israel stands as everything Islam is not, successful, resilient, a flourishing outpost of modernity amid chaos. For that very reason, it is vilified, as a symbol of whiteness, Western imperialism, Judeo-Christian dominance, and colonial entitlement. In this distorted moral framework, Israel becomes the archetypal villain, a stand-in for all that must be obliterated in the name of “justice.”
This is the poisonous worldview nurtured in the home of Mahmood Mamdani, the father of Zohran Mamdani the [mayor of New York City]…. (pp. 209-210)
Hmm, is all this starting to make sense now? Thank you Danny Burmawi for sharing much-needed truth. At just over 200 pages, this volume is not a laborious read. Indeed, given the book’s content and how well it is expressed, it can be perused rather quickly. I urge you to get a copy now.
Yes indeed, just in case the message hasn’t been gotten yet. Very suscinct.
Thanks Bruce.