In Human Events this morning I discuss a few things Nidal Hasan's PowerPoint has in common with other presentations of Islam we've seen in the past:

Before he killed or wounded 54 Americans at Fort Hood on November 5, army psychiatrist Nidal Hasan had raised eyebrows with his Islamic proselytizing, which he carried on even when he was supposed to be conducting medical briefings. One such presentation has come to light: the June 2007 briefing which Hasan gave to other doctors at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Hasan's PowerPoint slides say many of the same things found in jihadist literature and propaganda throughout the Middle East and among its apologists here in America.

Hasan's Islam is rooted in traditional understandings of the faith as taught by the authoritative schools of Sunni Muslim jurisprudence. It also is the same Islam that is taught by groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas and Al-Qaeda.

In arguing that the Koran mandates defensive jihad against unbelievers, Hasan invokes the same Koranic verse that Osama bin Laden used as an epigraph on his "Letter to the American People" of October 2002: "Permission to fight (against disbelievers) is given to those (believers) who are fought against, because they have been wronged; and surely, Allah is able to give them victory."

Hasan also explains that Muslims are obligated to wage offensive jihad against unbelievers, with ominous taglines in his PowerPoint such as "we love death more than you love life." He quotes the Koranic verse calling for war against the "People of the Book" (that is, mainly Jews and Christians) until they "pay the tax in acknowledgment of [Islamic] superiority and they are in a state of subjection" (9:29). Hasan apparently told the assembled (and no doubt stunned) physicians that Muslims had a religious obligation to make war against and subjugate non-Muslims as inferiors under their rule.

Hasan's Islam coincides with that of the jihad terror group Hamas, which has announced its intention, once fully and firmly ensconced in power, to collect that Koran-mandated tax -- jizyah -- from the non-Muslims luckless enough to live within its domains. Most importantly of all, however, he makes the case that Muslims must not fight against other Muslims (as is mandated by Koran 4:92). Ominously, he recommends that because of this injunction, "Department of Defense should allow Muslims [sic] Soldiers the option of being released as 'Conscientious objectors' to increase troop morale and decrease adverse events."

Adverse events, perhaps, like his own jihad at Fort Hood. For he warned in his PowerPoint that "Muslims may be seen as moderate (compromising) but God is not." And further, "if Muslim groups can convince Muslims that they are fighting for God against injustices of the 'infidels'; ie: enemies of Islam, then Muslims can become a potent adversary ie: suicide bombing, etc."

It is this desire to correct the "injustices of the 'infidels' that has led the Muslim Brotherhood, the international Islamic organization (which operates under a variety of names in the United States), to engage in what it calls a "grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and 'sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all other religions." Hasan couldn't disagree -- not with his talk of offensive jihad and quoting of Muhammad the Islamic prophet saying, "I have been commanded to fight the people until they testify that there is no deity worthy of worship except Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah..."

And Allah, Nidal Hasan reminded his audience in his PowerPoint, "expects full loyalty. Promises heaven and threatens with hell." The clear trajectory of his argument is that Muslims may lay hold of that promise of heaven by waging war against Infidels, but that hell awaited those Muslims who might be foolish and traitorous enough to side with the Infidels and fight alongside them against Muslims.

No one in government or law enforcement has ever made any attempt to determine how prevalent such understandings of Islam are among Muslims in the United States. Yet it is of cardinal importance for those sworn to protect us to begin making such an attempt now. As we saw at Fort Hood, the lives of innocent people depend on it.