re: #65 Buck

To accept a tax from the people of the book to offer them limited protection?

Yes, there is.

No, neither Mubarak or Sadat were pious, but they both tried to use that angle to their advantage.

I think considering this a ‘tax’, is very shaky, especially since Surah 9 (which is what I assume you’re talking about), specifies that those who pay shall ‘feel subdued’. I do not think either Israel or the United States can be shown in that light at all, at all. Which doesn’t mean that a determined politician might not try to create spin.

Did Mubarak or Sadat ever actually characterize their agreement as an imposition of jizya? I would be interested to see links, if so.