Not the best video from the Young Turks but interesting nonetheless. I particularly agree with the guy about how speaking with a face veil is not an obstacle in understanding or learning.

In the end this is about free choice, a choice that does not effect anyone else, a choice that does not hinder a woman from going about the normal activities of daily life. Next we are going to be hearing about grocery stores not allowing people in who wear the face veil.

Hat tip: HGG

I’m absolutely no fan of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Unlike the neocon nutter Daniel Pipes who said that he was “rooting for Ahmadinejad,” I was praying for the opposition to win.  But I must always speak the truth, and therefore object to (the fraudulent liar) Robert Spencer’s absolutely deliberate misquoting of the Iranian president.  Spencer just published an article which he entitled as follows:

Ahmadinejad: “With God’s grace,” Israel “will be annihilated.”

In fact, Ahmadinejad did not say that.  The proof is in the news article Spencer himself linked to, which claims that the Iranian president said: “With God’s grace, this [Israeli] regime will be annihilated.”   A world of a difference.  Isn’t it the neocons themselves who call for the toppling of regimes in the Arab and Muslim majority world?  Isn’t it Spencer himself who calls for this, in countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, and even Iran?  So it’s ok to call for it against Muslim regimes, but not “Judeo-Christian” Western ones?

This deliberate misquoting of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad cannot be a mistake, because Robert Spencer–being the global expert of the Islamic world that he is–must be well aware of the now famous misquoting of Ahmadinejad in 2005; the Huffington Post reported:

As the Bush Administration beats the drums for another war of choice with another country that had nothing to do with 9/11, they are using another series of fabricated facts to indoctrinate the American people into thinking that Iran poses a serious threat to our security. At the core of these fabrications is the claim that on October 25, 2005, during a speech at the Ministry of Interior conference hall, the then newly-elected President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad remarked that “Israel must be wiped off the map.” As someone who was born in Tehran, lived there for seventeen years and is a native Farsi speaker, I have read the original transcripts of the speech in Farsi and want to inform you that Ahmadinejad never said “Israel must be wiped off the map,” but rather, his statement was grossly mistranslated and taken out of context, perhaps to help make a case for military action against Iran.

Let’s analyze what Ahmadinejad said. His exact words in Farsi were as follows: “Emam goft een rezhim-e eshghalgar-e qods bayad az safheh-ye ruzegar mahv shavad.”

The correct translation of the statement is as follows: “Imam said this occupying regime in Jerusalem must vanish from the page of times.”

And the word-to-word translation of the statement is as follows: Emam: Imam (Khomeini, leader of the 1979 revolution); Goft: said; Een: this; Rezhim-e eshghalgar: occupying regime; Qods: Jorusalem; Bayad: must; Az: from; Safheye: page of; Ruzegar: times; Mahv shaved: vanish.

Coming back to the recent quote reproduced by Spencer, Ahmadinejad obviously didn’t say for Israel to be annihilated.  The fact that he specifically used the term regime indicates that he absolutely was not calling for that.  This much you can tell just from reading the article that Spencer himself cited.  As for the news article itself, I wonder how accurate their translation is; did he really call for the regime’s annihilation or its elimination (a much less loaded term)?

Anyways, moving beyond Robert Spencer’s deliberate misquoting (which shows how truly fraudulent this man is), there is an even more glaring issue here.  Even if we pretend that Mahmoud Ahmedinejad called for the annihilation of Israel (which he didn’t), then what about the hate video that Robert Spencer just promoted on his website, where a Hindu extremist calls for the annihilation of Pakistan–to wipe it off the map?  It’s almost the exact same words as Spencer attributes to Ahmedinejad!  And this is in the translation that Spencer himself put up.  It is truly unbelievable how oblivious Spencer is to his profound double standards.  Or perhaps he is not oblivious at all (which is actually more likely), and just hopes that nobody important (aside from his loyal Islamophobic fan base) sees through his thin veneer of hate, bias, and double standards?

The brainwashed extremist girl declares:

…Soon our whole nation [of Hindustan] will rise.  When our people rise up, it will be very difficult for you [Pakistanis].  It will be disastrous for every inch of your land…Kashmir will continue to exist, but not Pakistan.  Who [amongst you] will voice such concerns?  Who will show the braveness to use the atom bombs we have [against Pakistan]?  Ask them [the Indian government] who is going to use the [atomic] weapons we have?  Whom are they waiting for?  Don’t worry what is happening now.  History is where it is. We have the capacity to change the geography of the world [by wiping out Pakistan]…everything between [the Pakistani cities of] Karachi to Rawalpindi will become worthless…There won’t be any Pakistan!  If you continue to believe this, I assure you that Pakistan won’t be present in the world for long.

Notice how she goes way past anything that Robert Spencer just criticized in Mahmoud Ahmedinejad’s speech.

And one can’t help but notice the absurdity of Spencer saying:

There just isn’t much that’s peaceful about the Iranian regime, but they expect us to believe the nuclear program is.

Earth to Captain Oblivious: you just promoted a video of a Hindu extremist advocating the use of nuclear weapons to absolutely destroy Pakistan and wipe it off the map.  You posted this only within the last few days, and we just published our article calling you out for this.   Maybe you should at least have waited a few weeks, with the hope that people would begin to forget the hate speech posted on your very own site.

What an absolutely unbelievable hypocritical fraudster Robert Spencer is.

(It should be noted that we here at LoonWatch are in no way, shape, or form insinuating that the extremist girl represents Hindus.  Clearly, she is part of a fringe minority of extremists.  Furthermore, I advise the readers not to be harsh with her; I’ve read some people calling her some pretty nasty things.  Calm down.  She’s only sixteen years old and brainwashed.  She’s probably never even seen a Pakistani in her life.  She wasn’t even alive when those events she mentioned in her speech happened.  It’s not her fault as much as those who indoctrinated her with this burning hatred.  I hope that one day, with age and maturity, she recants.  So go easy on her.  The true villains are those like Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller who are grown adults and yet promote her immature words.)

Update:

A loyal reader of our site (hat tip: Zam) pointed out to me that the JihadWatch.org article against Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was written by Marisol, not Spencer.  Nonetheless, it was posted on Spencer’s own site.  And we must assume that he approves of the message, since he has neither repudiated nor recalled the article.

More importantly, he has condemned Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s supposed statement multiple times in the past, such as here where Spencer laments: “Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad declared at a conference in Tehran entitled ‘The World without Zionism’ that Israel should be destroyed.”   Spencer entitles this article “Iran Calls for a New Holocaust.”  In fact, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad simply reproduced the words of Ayatollah Khomeini, just as Spencer reproduced the words of the Hindu extremist.

Of course, neither Ahmadinejad or the Ayatollah he quoted actually called for the annihilation of Israel or a New Holocaust (see Huffington Post article I referred to earlier); on the other hand, both the Hindu extremist and Spencer endorsed a call for a nuclear holocaust in Pakistan.  I’m sure Spencer condemns himself for that.

Robert Spencer with loon Pamela Geller

Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer hosted a video of a young Hindu girl obviously inspired by extremists such as the fanatics who destroyed the Babri Mosque on their respective websites. (hat tip: Jack) In the video she calls for “wiping Pakistan off the map.” Does that sound familiar? Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer now have no right to complain about Ahamdinejad’s statements to “wipe Israel off the map” as it rings hollow and hypocritical as they are more than happy to entertain the destruction of a whole country when it is predominantly “Mooslim.”

This is the video that both Pamela and Robert hosted on their site:

Pamela Geller commented that: “Perhaps with an online Colb. (collaboration) we can run her for president in ‘16. She gets it.”

Robert Spencer remarks: “The girl is right: do not fear. Fight back against the jihad. Fear hands the jihadis a weapon.”

One thing that Pamela and Robert don’t seem to understand or care about is that this girl’s hatred is not limited to Muslims but it extends to Christians and Americans. At 24 seconds the video translates what she says as, “Tell those clerics, Pakistanis and Jihadis that you do not fear bomb blasts and acts of terrorism,” in fact what she says is, “Tell those clerics, Pakistanis and Christians that you do not fear bomb blasts and acts of terrorism.” A mistranslation that seems to have ironically gone right over the head of the “scholar” Robert Spencer and his lunatic buddy Pamela Geller.

Commenters on Geller’s site were enthusiastic, calling the girl a “natural-born leader,” “incredible,” “amazing,” “fantastic,” while a few of the more “restrained” commenters argued that while they were all for nuking Pakistan it wouldn’t solve the problem. The video drew little heated debate and exchanges on JihadWatch with the usual commenters fawning over her calls for the destruction of Muslims, while a few critical voices accused of “taqiyyah” pointed out the fact that Spencer was a hypocrite for hosting this video.

As his arguments become exposed, so does he.

As many of you well know, I have taken it upon myself to refute Robert Spencer’s book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades), cover to cover, page by page, and line by line.  I have already written several articles refuting Spencer, exposing him for the fear-mongering fraudster that he is.

Omer Subhani, a reader of our website, blogged it out best:

Spencer dodging LoonWatch… again

Robert Spencer has said something like the following many times:

“…I am always happy to debate any serious Muslim spokesman…”

Really?

Then why not debate the writer of multiple refutations of your work?

That writer goes by the name of Danios and he or she writes over at Loon Watch. Danios has written numerous refutations of Spencer’s work without much of a peep leaking from Spencer. Yet, Spencer was more than happy to share with his audience a list of people he has formerly debated.

But no mention of anything written by anyone at Loon Watch.

I smell something. And it smells like chicken.

What’s the excuse? Danios is writing anonymously? That shouldn’t matter. Spencer, you have continuously proclaimed from the day you started writing your blog that you would debate anyone, anywhere, any time. Well, Danios has penned multiple refutations of your work and yet you have failed to reply. You have hinted at Danios’ work in previous posts, but you haven’t gotten around to refuting Danios. You have called Danios a “slick liar,” but have failed to respond substantively to what Danios wrote.

Why are you chickening out, Spencer?

You’re aware of Danios’ refutations of your work, but you won’t engage in dialog. Usually when someone doesn’t respond to another person’s argument it means that they’ve conceded the point. Maybe Danios’ refutations of your claims were so absolute that it really isn’t worth debating. If that’s the case, then be a man about it and say so.

Subhani notes that Robert Spencer referred to me as a “slick liar,” but it may interest you to know that Spencer was so frustrated that he went even further, declaring:

The slick liar who penned that piece ought to get 100 lashes

In another article, Spencer upped the ante, and decided that 100 was just not enough, and threw in one more for added effect:

The slick liar who penned that piece ought to get 101 lashes

Instead of using such violent language, why doesn’t Spencer just refute the points I raised?  Isn’t that always his gripe against those who write about him negatively in the media?

The “piece” I wrote for which I became a “slick liar” can be found here: Robert Spencer Rapes the Truth, Part 1: Does Sharia Reject the Testimony of a Rape Victim? In that article, I contest Spencer’s bold claim that in rape cases a woman’s testimony is rejected under Sharia.  And I promised that in part 2 (coming to a theater near you soon) I will discuss Spencer’s claim that under Sharia a woman is lashed if she claims rape but cannot produce four witnesses.

So let’s read Spencer’s response, which is as follows:

Recently someone forwarded me a pseudo-scholarly piece by a smooth Islamic apologist purporting to prove that I was wrong, wrong, wrong (and therefore evil as well, of course) about Islamic rules of evidence for crimes of zina (adultery, fornication, and other sexual offenses), and claiming that rape victims in the Islamic world are never punished for being raped. The slick liar who penned that piece ought to get 100 lashes instead of “Camille” for his obfuscation and enabling of this kind of torture of women.

OK, let’s take that one line at a time, shall we?  First, Spencer writes:

Recently someone forwarded me a pseudo-scholarly piece

Here is a really bad case of projection.  Robert Spencer tries passing himself off as a scholar, and therefore assumes that I would too.  Apparently, Spencer has no idea what a scholarly paper looks like, because if he did, he would know that my article is far too irreverent a piece to be scholarly.   Does that mean that every piece of writing that is not scholarly becomes pseudo-scholarly?  What an absurd understanding.  Do newspaper articles or op-eds then become pseudo-scholarly works?

Then, Spencer says:

by a smooth Islamic apologist

I haven’t revealed what religion (if any) I follow.  In fact, I think the fact that I approach these debates as a neutral outsider–instead of approaching them as a vested Muslim–is what gives me the edge over other people who have debated with Spencer.  And in any case, Spencer can then be considered “a smooth Catholic apologist.”  Actually, he’s more like a Catholic crusader who attacks the infidel Islamic world with his vitriolic pen.

He goes on:

I was wrong, wrong, wrong (and therefore evil as well, of course)

No complaints here.

Here is the real doozie:

and claiming that rape victims in the Islamic world are never punished for being raped.

I’ve noticed that Robert Spencer always does this in his polemical pieces.  First, he builds up his argument with half-truths, and then near the end he will insert an outright lie.  Nowhere did I claim that “rape victims in the Islamic world are never punished for being raped. “  This is a complete strawman argument.  Clearly, there are uneducated fundamentalists who do that, and who need to be stopped.  My contention with Spencer is his claim that such a thing is inherently part of Islam itself or the Islamic jurisprudential tradition.

Spencer then proceeds to report a case of a rape victim being punished in the Islamic world.  So instead of critically analyzing the arguments I put forward in my article (Robert Spencer Rapes the Truth, Part 1: Does Sharia Reject the Testimony of a Rape Victim?), Spencer constructs a strawman argument (claiming that I think or said that rape victims are never punished in the Islamic world) and then proceeds to knock it down by citing a case of just such a thing.  Clearly, Spencer’s need to construct a strawman is rooted in his inability to address any of my arguments.  Meanwhile, my own arguments against him are always precision guided surgical strikes.

My ever so dearest Robert Spencer: please do address the actual points I raised in the article.

Spencer Responds to My Latest Article on Dhimmitude

Awhile back, I published part 1 of my rebuttal of Robert Spencer on the topic of dhimmitude.  I already addressed Spencer’s bumbling reply to part 1.  Once again, he was absolutely unable to debate the actual topic, which was the historical treatment of dhimmis (vs perpetual serfs).  After Spencer refused to respond, I called him out as a chicken.

Then a few days back, I published part 2 of my dhimmitude series.  Just now, Spencer issued a response.  For some odd reason, however, Spencer refuses to take my name and suffices himself with veiled (but painfully obvious) references.  (Similarly, he refused to take LoonWatch’s blessed name when one of our intrepid writers broke the story about how FuckAllah.com and FuckIslam.com mysteriously redirected to his website; instead, he somehow chose to target CAIR, who simply reproduced our article.)

Spencer writes (emphasis is mine):

More or less on a regular basis I am sent purported refutations of what I say here and in my books — essays that purport to show that Islam doesn’t really teach warfare against unbelievers and their subjugation as inferiors under the rule of Islamic law,

Clearly a reference to yours truly.

Spencer goes on:

although these purported refutations usually content themselves with showing that Christians or someone else were doing something worse,

Completely false.  I only contented myself after proving that contemporary Muslims reject the Pact of Umar (a document which is so central to your Islamophobic viewpoint that you call it the “the foundation for Islamic law regarding the treatment of the dhimmis”).  So yes, I was quite pleased with myself after I toppled the foundation of your argument.  (I treated myself with ice cream.)

If you are referring to part 1, I had already been quite clear that my rebuttal would come in multiple parts, and that the first part would simply contest your claim that historically Muslims treated Jews worse than Christians did. And I have already answered this argument of yours in my response to your bumbling reply.  Or do we have to go through this again?  You had said earlier:

It is an extended (very extended) example of the familiar tu quoque fallacy in which Islamic apologists always indulge: other people have done evil, and therefore our evil is not so bad or not to be spoken of.

To which I had replied:

I certainly never said that the “evil is not so bad.”  What I said was that the “evil” (your choice of words) done to infidels in the Islamic realm was historically less than that done to infidels in Christendom.  And I said that to negate chapter four of your book, in which you specifically wrote “the idea that Jews fared better in Islamic lands than in Christian Europe is false,” and “the Muslim laws were much harsher for Jews than those of Christendom.”  I am fact-checking your book, and you made a claim, and I refuted it.  Simple as that.  Now it is up to you to either defend your initial claim or concede that you were wrong to state it.

Back to Spencer’s recent response, he goes on:

or that some document or other to which I refer in my books is held in no esteem by Muslims

That’s it?  You’ve conceded the point?  Wow.  This was easier than I thought.  Suddenly, you’ve moved the goalposts, as evidenced by what you say next:

or virtually anything other than actually proving that there exists a sect or school of Islam that teaches that Muslims must live with non-Muslims as equals on an indefinite basis

I’m starting to sense a pattern here.  Every time I refute one of your arguments, you will move to the next one.  But don’t worry, Spencer my love, your wish is my command.  In fact, the third (and final) part of my dhimmitude series will prove exactly what you asked for, namely that contemporary Muslims do believe that they should live with non-Muslims as equals.  Stay tuned for that.  (I’m sure by that time you’ll skip to another topic, never standing up like a man and defending the actual issue I write on.)

Then Spencer goes off on another tangent, writing:

In any case, the fundamental problem with all these alleged refutations is that if I am misunderstanding Islam, an awful lot of Muslims, including Islamic clerics who have devoted their lives to studying the Qur’an and Sunnah, misunderstand it in the same way. And here we have another. Afzali says he betrayed his religion, but that is, I suspect, just in order to bamboozle the unbelievers yet again.

Notice how Spencer tries to prove that there is a “fundamental problem with all these alleged refutations” by giving the example of Ahmad Afzali, an Imam who tipped off an Al-Qaeda militant.  Ummm…am I missing something here?  What does Ahmad Afzali have to do with any of my refutations of Spencer?  What does Afzali tipping off an Al-Qaeda militant have to do with the historical treatment of dhimmis vs perpetual serfs (part 1) or the Pact of Umar (part 2)?  It’s completely nonsensical and shows the sheer desperation Spencer is feeling right now.

How about instead of going off on random tangents you address the points I raised?  You obviously have enough time to rant about me on your website (although in a veiled manner), yet don’t have the time to construct a few decent logical arguments? Why then did you make the claim that “I am always happy to debate any serious Muslim spokesman”?  You after all call me an “Islamic apologist”, and I assume “Islamic apologists” are also “Muslim spokesmen”, so why don’t you debate me?  Your loyal readers argue that LoonWatch is “beneath you,” and thus “unworthy of your time.”  Yet, here you are ranting about me (albeit in a veiled manner); so why not better use that time to give more substantive responses?

Well, the answer is obvious: you’re a bully, and you’ve been bullying people for a very, very long time.  But like all bullies, when you meet someone your own size, you run away like the coward you are.  Sorry to burst your bubble, but I’m not going anywhere.  You are in quite a bind: if you try to respond to my arguments, the weakness of your case will become even more apparent.  If you decide not to engage me due to this fear, you still lose by virtue of forfeiture.  Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.  Either way is fine by me.

"The time for honoring yourself will soon be at an end."

Geert Wilders

At the same time that he is facing charges for hate speech his party is making advancements in local polls which bode ill for future national elections. Islamophobia is on the march!

For more on Wilders, read Krapuul.nl which is the number one site tracking Geert Wilders.

This is the second part of a three part rebuttal of Robert Spencer on the topic of dhimmitude.  Check out part 1 here, here, and here.

The Conspiracy

During the Middle Ages, a forged document–known as the Pact of Umar–came into existence; it stipulated certain very restrictive conditions that governed the lives of non-Muslims living under Islamic rule.  Robert Spencer outlines these humiliating conditions:

This Pact is worth close examination, because it became the foundation for Islamic law regarding the treatment of the dhimmis. With remarkably little variation, throughout Islamic history whenever Islamic law was strictly enforced, this is generally how non-Muslims were treated. Working from the full text as Ibn Kathir has it, these are the conditions the Christians accept in return for “safety for ourselves, children, property and followers of our religion” – conditions that, according to Ibn Kathir, “ensured their continued humiliation, degradation and disgrace.” The Christians will not:

1. Build “a monastery, church, or a sanctuary for a monk”;
2. “Restore any place of worship that needs restoration”;
3. Use such places “for the purpose of enmity against Muslims”;
4. “Allow a spy against Muslims into our churches and homes or hide deceit [or betrayal] against Muslims”;
5. Imitate the Muslims’ “clothing, caps, turbans, sandals, hairstyles, speech, nicknames and title names”;
6. “Ride on saddles, hang swords on the shoulders, collect weapons of any kind or carry these weapons”;
7. “Encrypt our stamps in Arabic”
8. “Sell liquor” – Christians in Iraq in the last few years ran afoul of Muslims reasserting this rule;
9. “Teach our children the Qur’an”;
10. “Publicize practices of Shirk” – that is, associating partners with Allah, such as regarding Jesus as Son of God. In other words, Christian and other non-Muslim religious practice will be private, if not downright furtive;
11. Build “crosses on the outside of our churches and demonstrating them and our books in public in Muslim fairways and markets” – again, Christian worship must not be public, where Muslims can see it and become annoyed;
12. “Sound the bells in our churches, except discreetly, or raise our voices while reciting our holy books inside our churches in the presence of Muslims, nor raise our voices [with prayer] at our funerals, or light torches in funeral processions in the fairways of Muslims, or their markets”;
13. “Bury our dead next to Muslim dead”;
14. “Buy servants who were captured by Muslims”;
15. “Invite anyone to Shirk” – that is, proselytize, although the Christians also agree not to:
16. “Prevent any of our fellows from embracing Islam, if they choose to do so.” Thus the Christians can be the objects of proselytizing, but must not engage in it themselves;
17. “Beat any Muslim.”

Meanwhile, the Christians will:

1. Allow Muslims to rest “in our churches whether they come by day or night”;
2. “Open the doors [of our houses of worship] for the wayfarer and passerby”;
3. Provide board and food for “those Muslims who come as guests” for three days;
4. “Respect Muslims, move from the places we sit in if they choose to sit in them” – shades of Jim Crow;
5. “Have the front of our hair cut, wear our customary clothes wherever we are, wear belts around our waist” – these are so that a Muslim recognizes a non-Muslim as such and doesn’t make the mistake of greeting him with As-salaamu aleikum, “Peace be upon you,” which is the Muslim greeting for a fellow Muslim;
6. “Be guides for Muslims and refrain from breaching their privacy in their homes.”

The Christians swore: “If we break any of these promises that we set for your benefit against ourselves, then our Dhimmah (promise of protection) is broken and you are allowed to do with us what you are allowed of people of defiance and rebellion.”

Today, the Islamophobes believe this document to be of critical importance, and it forms one of the pillars of their anti-Islam ideology.  Notice how Spencer calls the document “the foundation for Islamic law regarding the treatment of the dhimmis.”  Spencer et al. believe–or at least they would like you to believe–that Muslims are on the verge of once again implementing the Pact of Umar upon non-Muslims.  Spencer’s goal, as enunciated by his comrade-in-arms Pamela Geller, is to  “scare the bejeezus outta ya.” It is necessary then, these Islamophobic bigots argue, to get “them” before “they” get you.  (Most forms of hate revolve around instilling senseless fear.)

The Pact of Umar Has Fallen into Disuse and Obscurity

Admittedly, the Pact of Umar did reach some level of significance during the Middle Ages.  It is found in the books of many classical Islamic jurists, and was also implemented (inconsistently) to various degrees. (Please read this here.)  Yet, the reality is that the Pact of Umar has fallen into disuse and obscurity.  Whereas some of the medieval jurists gave importance to the document–such as Ibn Taymiyyah who went so far as to call it the foundation of Muslim-dhimmi relations–it is now virtually non-existent in modern day Islamic texts.  Mention of the document has now been relegated to two basic categories: reprints of medieval texts, and responses to critics of Islam.

I myself contacted several Muslim clerics, asking them about their opinion on the Pact of Umar.  The majority of them responded that they had no knowledge of the document (i.e. “I’d have to look it up”), or had only heard the name in passing.  In fact, the Pact of Umar has in the Islamic world fallen into such disuse and obscurity that the vast majority of Muslims have never heard of it.  Those who do know what it is almost invariably heard of it first from critics of Islam; many of them will then look up the Muslim responses to these anti-Islam attacks.  (How many Christians–including priests–have heard of the Church’s doctrine of Perpetual Servitude?)

The idea, furthered by lunatics like Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller, that Muslims are secretly instructed in the Pact of Umar (the “stealth Jihad” is coming to get you!) is not only conspiratorial but absurd.  Ninety-nine percent of Muslims have never heard of it–until of course Robert Spencer et al. inform them of it.  Zaid Shakir, an Islamic scholar from the Zaytuna Institute, said:

There is this absurd idea spread by these bigots that Muslims want to implement this pact today.  Most Muslims have never even heard of it! ^[1]

Robert Spencer et al. knows this very well.  So don’t be fooled by this Islamophobic conspiracy talk.  It is calculated fear-mongering.

But could it be that the Pact of Umar is inherently part of the Islamic religion, even if the vast majority of Muslims are not aware of this?  One only needs to read the Islamic responses to the anti-Islam ideologues to know that this is not the case.

Contemporary Muslims Recognize the Pact of Umar as a Forgery

The document is attributed by medieval jurists to Umar ibn al-Khattab, the second caliph (secular leader) of the early Muslim community.  However, modern day Islamic scholars–such as Yusuf al-Qaradawi ^[2], Maher Abu-Munshar, and Abdulaziz Sachedina–reject the authenticity of the Pact of Umar.  Abu-Munshar writes:

The humiliating conditions enumerated in the so-called “Pact of Umar” are utterly foreign to the mentality, thoughts and practices of this caliph…The deficiencies [in the textual integrity] support the contention that Umar was not the originator of the document.  In addition to the remarkable care and concern displayed in Umar’s attitute to dhimmis confirms the rejection of the so-called Pact of Umar as attributable to Caliph Umar Ibn al-Khattab.  The Pact of Umar was not the work of Umar Ibn al-Khattab. ^[3]

Sachedina writes:

It is a historical fact that the Prophet condemned oppression of the ahl al-dhimma [dhimmis] as a sinful deviation declaring in no uncertain terms, “On the Day of Judgment I myself will act as the accuser of any person who oppresses a person under the protection [dhimmi] of Islam, and lays excessive [financial or other social] burdens on him”. In the most highly rated compilation of Hadith among the Sunni Muslims, the Sahih of al-Bukhari, there is a chapter-heading that reads, “One should fight for the protection of the ahl al-dhimma and they should not be enslaved.” Under this heading Bukhari narrates the following instructions on the authority of Umar b. al-Khattab, when the latter was stabbed anddied of the wound inflicted upon him by a Persian slave: “I strongly recommend him [the next caliph] to take care of those non-Muslims who are under God and His Prophet’s protection [dhimmat allah wa dhimmat rasulih] in that he should remain faithful to them according to the covenant with them, and fight on their behalf and not burden them [by imposing high taxes] beyond their capacity. After reading these instructions, left by the caliph as the head of Muslim state to honor the sacred covenant offered by God and his emissary to the people of the Book, it is hard to believe that the Pact of Umar ascribed to the second caliph could be authentic in its representation of the situation of the non-Muslims in the early days of Islam. ^[4]

These Muslims argue that as a forgery the document has no religious value at all and ought to be ignored.  They believe that in actuality Umar ibn al-Khattab ratified the tolerant Umari Treaty, and not the restrictive Pact of Umar. The Umari Treaty explicitly prohibits Muslims from degrading or belittling non-Muslims; the text reads (emphasis is mine):

In the name of God, the Most Merciful, the Beneficent.

This is what the slave of God, Umar b.Al-Khattab, the Commander of the Faithful, has offered the people of Illyaa’ of security granting them amaan (protection) for their selves, their money, their churches, their children, their lowly and their innocent, and the remainder of their people:

Their churches are not to be taken, nor are they to be destroyed, nor are they to be degraded or belittled, neither are their crosses or their money [to be harmed], and they are not to be forced to change their religion, nor is any one of them to be harmed…

Upon what is in this book is the word of God, the covenant of His Messenger, of the Caliphs and of the believers if they gave what was required of them of the poll tax. ^[4]

Ibn Kathir, an Islamic exegist of the medieval era, writes that the Pact of Umar stipulated “conditions that ensured [the] continued humiliation, degradation and disgrace” of the People of the Book (see Tafsir Ibn Kathir, 9:29).  Surely then, argue contemporary Muslims, the Pact of Umar–which advocated “humiliation, degradation, and disgrace”–conflicted with the Umari Treaty, which categorically prohibited “degrad[ation] and belittle[ment]” of non-Muslims.

Western scholarship itself considers the Pact of Umar to be a forgery, falsely attributed to Umar ibn al-Khattab.  In fact, Umar was known for his relative mildness towards non-Muslim subjects, and the Umari Treaty is much more in line with his views than the Pact of Umar.  It is known that generally “the [Four] Rightly Guided Caliphs left the people of the protected religions alone.” ^[5]

Historian Abraham P. Bloch concludes:

Omar ibn al-Khattab (634-644), the second caliph, conquered Palestine, Syria, Iraq, Persia, and Egypt.  Jews and Christians were permitted to continue their communal existence.  Omar was a tolerant ruler, unlikely to impose humiliating conditions upon non-Muslims, or to infringe upon their religious and social freedoms.  His name has been erroneously associated…with the restrictive Covenant of Omar. ^[6]

Interestingly, not even Robert Spencer contests the doubtful historicity of the document.  Spencer writes:

Now: did I actually say the thing was historical? Nope…I wasn’t actually dealing with the question of whether or not it was a real seventh-century document. I was and am interested in the patent and manifest fact that it became the basis for Islamic law regarding dhimmis. Whether the law came first and then was read into a fictional pact Umar made, or whether there really was a Pact of Umar and the fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence) regarding dhimmis was influenced by it, simply doesn’t concern me, except as a matter of historical interest.

If we were debating the historical treatment of dhimmis, then Spencer’s point makes some sense.  I conceded as much in my rebuttal.  But now I will use Spencer’s own logic and conclude as follows: the actual historicity of the document is largely irrelevant so long as contemporary Muslims view it as a forgery.  (But in this case, the matter is even clearer: the document is a forgery and contemporary Muslims agree with that.)

In other words, if you witness a debate between an Islamophobe and a Muslim–with the former claiming that the Pact of Umar is authentic and/or that the classical scholars viewed it that way, and with the latter claiming that it is a forgery and therefore religiously invalid as a source–that in itself invalidates the Islamophobic line of argumentation.  Remember: their end game is to prove that Muslims today want to reimpose the dhimmitude as defined in the Pact of Umar.  But if contemporary Muslims view the document as a forgery–and this much is evidenced by their participation in the debate–then that’s all that matters.  If contemporary Muslims don’t view it as authentic (regardless of what the true historicity of the document is and/or what the classical scholars said), they would have no reason to reimpose it.

In conclusion, contemporary Islamic responses view the Pact of Umar as a forgery, and instead look to the tolerant Umari Treaty as more in line with the Islamic view.

The Pact of Umar is not a Part of Islamic Canon

There are of course some conservative Muslims (a small minority) who have written responses to the Pact of Umar and are unwilling to reject the historicity of the document, due to the fact (as pointed out by Spencer) that many classical scholars viewed it as authentic.  Does this fact prove Spencer’s point?  No.  Just because the document is viewed as authentic does not mean it is binding upon Muslims from a religious perspective.  The Pact of Umar is not contained in the Quran nor in the Sunnah, the twin canonical sources of Islam.  In other words, the document is not a religious document at all, but a secular and temporal agreement made between a secular/temporal authority (the caliph) and his subjects.  (I say “secular/temporal” because there is no pope in Islam; the caliph of the Muslims is their leader in worldly affairs, not religious ones.)

The pact was a political agreement made between two parties, not a divinely revealed religious text from God or His Messenger.  In fact, the document was said to be dictated by the Christians themselves, who supposedly said: “We made a condition on ourselves…”  The conservative Salafi/”Wahhabi” apologist Bassam Zawadi remarked: “How can the Pact of Umar be considered religiously inspired when it was from the mouths of the Christians themselves?” ^[7] In other words, Muslims believe that their religious doctrines come from God (the Quran) and His Messenger (the Sunnah).  How then can a Muslim take the words of a Christian–who doesn’t even believe in the prophethood of Muhammad–as being authoritative in matters of faith?  The Christians supposedly thought of the conditions themselves and requested them; how then can a Muslim think of these conditions as being from God or His Messenger?  (The idea that the Christians themselves requested such terms is of course absurd, which is why modern day scholarship considers the pact as a forgery;  but the point here is: those conservative Muslims who refuse to reject the authenticity of the document believe that the document was from the words of the Christians and as such they do not view it as being divine, infallible, or religiously binding.)

The classical scholars did debate whether the Pact of Umar ought to be “inherited” by the children of the Christians or be renegotiated each time.  Some of them did say that it does not need to be renegotiated but remained in effect for the children.  But the document was not binding because of the religious nature of the document; as discussed above, the Pact of Umar is not considered canonical.  Rather, the document was binding because of the religious obligation to fulfill covenants.  The Pact of Umar was a (secular and temporal) covenant of security between that particular government and the residents of the area.  It was to be fulfilled, as all covenants of security are binding.  (This is why I argue here that Muslim Americans are obligated to fulfill their covenant of security with the U.S. government.)

The jurisprudential tradition of Islam is known for its (sometimes excessive) reliance on legalism, much like the Jewish rabbinical tradition.  The classical scholars did argue that the mandatory conditions of the Pact of Umar had to be enforced, but at the same time they also forbade any additions to it.  The medieval jurist Imam al-Shawkani, a follower of the heterodox Zaydi Shi’ite sect ^[8], decreed that dhimmis ought to be forced to clean the latrines of the city.  This came to be known as the Latrines Decree.   Interestingly, the mainstream Muslim jurists of that era refuted Imam al-Shawkani and forbade such an addition, which they considered to be a violation of the Pact of Umar.  (One cannot add conditions to a document after it has been ratified.)  Jan Platvoet writes:

The Latrines Decree became an issue of judicial controversy…It caused confrontation between Muslim scholars (such as al-Shawkani and al-Kawkabani) almost all of whom belonged to the dominant Zaydi Shi’a…Most of them criticized the Decree, arguing that nothing can be added to or modified in the dhimma status…According to this line of argument, non-Muslims should be treated neither more leniently nor more harshly…These scholars felt they could not stand aloof while seeing the ardent wish of al-Shawkani and the authorities to worsen the dhimma stipulations. ^[9]

The purpose here is not to justify the discriminatory views of the medieval jurists: clearly, the need to protect the rights of minorities is morally more important than blindly enforcing a document.  But the point I am trying to make here is that the Pact of Umar was enforced not because it was viewed as being divine, canonical, or infallible, but because it was a temporal/secular covenant agreed upon by two parties, and thus ought to be honored like all covenants.  This is why modern day Muslims (even conservative ones) have no right to force the Pact of Umar on non-Muslims living in Muslim majority lands, since they [the non-Muslims] did not agree to such stipulations.  Remember: the classical jurists argued that the dhimmis ought to be fulfill the conditions of the Pact of Umar because “they themselves requested these terms!”

The Objectives Resolution (now a part of the Constitution of Pakistan) reads:

Adequate provision shall be made for the minorities to freely profess and practice their religions and develop their cultures…Wherein shall be guaranteed fundamental rights including equality of status, of opportunity and before law, social, economic and political justice, and freedom of thought, expression, belief, faith, worship and association, subject to law and public morality; Wherein adequate provisions shall be made to safeguard the legitimate interests of minorities and backward and depressed classes.

This enlightened piece of legislation is referred to as “The Islamic Provisions of the Constitution.” Clearly, contemporary Muslims believe freedom of religion and protection of minority rights to be inherently part of their religion. The Objectives Resolution is a covenant of security that guarantees protection to non-Muslims.  Enforcing the discriminatory conditions of the Pact of Umar would be impermissible in Islam because it would contradict the rights granted above.  Remember: additions to the covenant are not allowed, which is why the classical scholars forbade the Latrines Decree.  The modern day Pakistani government has a covenant that they must fulfill.

The conservative Salafi/”Wahhabi” instructor Ayman bin Khaled writes:

The Pact [of Umar] itself is just [because both sides agreed to it] and it is a contract like any other contract[;] if both sides agree to it then it is valid. No one was forced to accept such pact esp. knowing it was suggested by people of the book themselves. ^[10]

In other words, even the conservative Muslims who hold the document to be authentic believe that it cannot be enforced upon peoples against their will.  It was only historically applied, according to these conservative Muslims, because the Christians accepted the terms.  Not only this, but the Christians were the ones who came up with the terms to begin with.  (This, according to the traditional belief in the Islamic jurisprudential tradition.)

Precedent

Critics may argue that Umar ibn al-Khattab set a precedent, which could be emulated by Muslims today.  After all, Umar was one of the early caliphs of the Muslim community.  Yet, one could similarly argue that the manner in which the papacy treated Jews–the doctrine of Perpetual Servitude–could be considered precedent, which could be emulated by Christians today.  The papacy, unlike the caliphate, exerts far more power from a religious perspective than do caliphs.  Caliphs are not considered infallible, ever.

Furthermore, the Pact of Umar is not the only historical precedent Muslims can turn to.  Historically, there were many other covenants of security which were forged between the Islamic government and non-Muslim populations.  The very first constitution in Muslim history, the Constitution of Medina, is one such example.  In this document, signed by the Prophet Muhammad, the non-Muslims were granted “help and equality”; the document reads (emphasis is ours):

In the name of God the Compassionate, the Merciful.

This is a document from Muhammad the prophet (governing the relations) between the believers and Muslims of Quraysh and Yathrib, and those [non-Muslims] who followed them and joined them and labored with them.

They are one community (umma) to the exclusion of all men…

To the Jew who follows us belong help and equality. He shall not be wronged nor shall his enemies be aided. ^[11]

There are about forty-seven points enumerated in this document, and not a single one of them places any discriminatory or humiliating restrictions upon the non-Muslims.  They were not forced to wear certain clothing or hair cuts, nor forced to give up their chairs for Muslims, etc.  In all respects, they were treated as “equal[s]” and citizens of the same “nation” (ummah) as the Muslims, with similar rights and obligations as the Muslims.

After the Constitution of Medina, there is the example of the Treaty of Khaybar, signed between the Muslims and Jews of Khaybar.  Had the Prophet Muhammad wanted to “degrade” the non-Muslims with such “humiliating” restrictions as found in the Pact of Umar, then surely this would have been the time to do it, considering that–according to Islamic sources–the Jews of Khaybar had been found guilty of high treason.  Yet, we find in the Treaty of Khaybar none of the discriminatory laws of the Pact of Umar.  Similarly, the Prophet Muhammad signed the Treaty of Tabuk and the Treaty of Najran, two separate documents which afforded protection to non-Muslims without any mention of discriminatory laws, as long as taxes were paid to the government.

The Constitution of Medina promised Jews “equality”; another document attributed to the Prophet Muhammad, known as the Achtiname of Muhammad, afforded inalienable rights to Christians.  A copy of this document, sealed with an imprint representing the Prophet’s hand, is preserved in the library of St Catherine.  The Achtiname of Muhammad reads:

This is a message from Muhammad ibn Abdullah, as a covenant to those who adopt Christianity, near and far: we are with them.

Verily I, the servants, the helpers, and my followers defend them, because Christians are my citizens; and by God! I hold out against anything that displeases them.

No compulsion is to be on them. Neither are their judges to be removed from their jobs nor their monks from their monasteries. No one is to destroy a house of their religion, to damage it, or to carry anything from it to the Muslims’ houses.

Should anyone take any of these, he would spoil God’s covenant and disobey His Prophet. Verily, they are my allies and have my secure charter against all that they hate.

No one is to force them to travel or to oblige them to fight. The Muslims are to fight for them. If a female Christian is married to a Muslim, it is not to take place without her approval. She is not to be prevented from visiting her church to pray. Their churches are to be respected. They are neither to be prevented from repairing them nor the sacredness of their covenants.

No one of the (Islamic) nation is to disobey the covenant till the Last Day. ^[12]

The tone of voice in this document is 100% contrary to that in the Pact of Umar.  Nowhere does it say for Christians to be humiliated or degraded; in fact, Muslims are instructed to “hold out against anything that displeases” the Christians, and nothing can be done “that they hate.” (Surely, the humiliating conditions in the Pact of Umar would fall under this category, argue contemporary Muslims.)  Even more specifically, the Achtiname of Muhammad forbids preventing Christians from repairing their churches; the Pact of Umar violates this condition explicitly.  For the contemporary Muslim, the words and actions of the Prophet Muhammad would trump even those of the Companions such as Umar.  Furthermore, the Achtiname sets out inalienable rights that must not be violated “till the Last Day.” Whereas the Pact of Umar is restricted to a single population of a single time, the Achtiname of Muhammad is for those “near and far” and “till the Last Day.”

Dr. Muqtedar Khan, Director of Islamic Studies at the University of Delaware, writes:

The first and the final sentence of the charter are critical. They make the promise eternal and universal. Muhammed asserts that Muslims are with Christians near and far straight away rejecting any future attempts to limit the promise to St. Catherine alone. By ordering Muslims to obey it until the Day of Judgment the charter again undermines any future attempts to revoke the privileges. These rights are inalienable. Muhammed declared Christians, all of them, as his allies and he equated ill treatment of Christians with violating God’s covenant.

It should be noted that the authenticity of this document is disputed amongst Western scholarship–a fact that Islamophobes like Robert Spencer would be quick to mention.  It is strange, however, that they would so easily dismiss the Achtiname of Muhammad as a forgery, but then at the same time declare the Pact of Umar (which Western scholarship has declared to be a forgery) as the most authoritative Islamic document on the topic.  In other words, we have two documents, both of questionable authenticity, which contradict each other; one promises inalienable rights to a minority and the other invokes discriminatory conditions upon them.  The Islamophobe’s methodology is to highlight all the negative texts and dismiss the positive ones.  One could easily do such a hatchet job on Christianity, selectively quoting texts to paint a horrific picture.

Regardless of the historicity of the Achtiname of Muhammad, the fact is that contemporary Muslims view it as authentic and religiously binding (because it is attributed to the Prophet Muhammad).  In fact, the Muslim World League published the full text of the document in its journal (vol. 31, 2003).  So we can use Robert Spencer’s own logic here: the authenticity of the document is merely of “historical interest;” if contemporary Muslims view it as authentic and binding, then that’s all that matters.

Moving on, we have the example of the first caliph, Abu Bakr, who agreed to the following covenant with the non-Muslim peoples of Najran:

In the Name of God, the Most Beneficent, the Merciful.

This is the written statement of God’s slave Abu Bakr, the successor of Muhammad, the Prophet and Messenger of God.

He affirms your rights of [being] a protected neighbor: yourselves, your lands, your religious community, your wealth, retainers, and servants, those of you who are present or abroad, your bishops and monks, monasteries, and all that you own, be it great or small.  You shall not be deprived of any of it, and shall have full control over it. ^[13]

There is no mention of any discriminatory laws, such as found in the Pact of Umar.  Abu Bakr was the very first caliph of Islam, and as such, his example would serve as precedent over that of Umar’s.

Another example we have is of the Muslim general Khalid ibn Waleed, a Companion of the Prophet Muhammad, who wrote in his covenant with the people of Anat:

They are allowed to ring their bells at any time of the day or night, except at the Islamic prayer times. They are allowed to bear their crosses in their festivals. ^[14]

Both of these allowances would contradict the Pact of Umar, which forbade the Christians from loudly ringing their bells or from bearing their crosses publicly or enjoying their festivals outdoors.  Khalid ibn Waleed allowed them to ring their bells at any time day or night, so long as it did not coincide with the Islamic call to prayer (adhan) for the five daily prayers; there is no stipulation that they use clampers, a clause that would make the requirement not to ring the bells during the adhan moot.

In light of this evidence, it would seem inappropriate to focus on the Pact of Umar, and not on the more normative and prophetic Constitution of Medina, which is of undisputed authenticity.  Though the Prophet Muhammad had extensive dealings with non-Muslims, he never once advocated laws of humiliation and degradation on any minority group.  Surely this precedent is more important to contemporary Muslims than that set by the questionable Pact of Umar.  There were several covenants of security that were established in the early days of Islam, and it seems biased to focus exclusively on the most restrictive (and spurious) of them.

Turning the Tables Around

Robert Spencer’s line of argumentation is as follows: the Pact of Umar is inherently part of the Islamic religion; after all, it is attributed to the second caliph of Islam and endorsed by classical jurists.  Any attempts to dismiss the Pact of Umar by contemporary Muslims, Spencer would argue, are not only disingenuous but theologically weak.  I will now turn the tables on Spencer, and see how he likes using this same line of argumentation against his own religion: he is a Catholic and often white-washes the papacy’s legacy.  Criticism of the Catholic popes is simply not tolerated by Spencer.

In order for Spencer to prove his claim, he must establish that the Pact of Umar is inherently part of Islam.  Yet, any of his arguments are going to be weaker than arguments that could be made by critics of Catholicism with regard to the doctrines of Witness and of the Perpetual Servitude of infidels.  (I’ve discussed this Christian doctrine here.)  Pope after pope declared their belief in the doctrines of Witness and of the Perpetual Servitude of infidels, especially Jews.  Critics of Catholicism could argue that these two beliefs are inherently part of the religion, because the papal decrees are considered infallible.  Whereas Umar ibn al-Khattab was simply a temporal/secular/worldly leader without any divine authority (there is no pope in Sunni Islam), the pope was (and is) considered a religious leader with divine authority.  Whereas Muslims believe that Umar was not infallible, Catholics believe that the popes were (and are) infallible.  Furthermore, the Pact of Umar was not really written by Umar ibn al-Khattab at all (but forged by unknown persons who have no position of respect in the Islamic religion), whereas there is no doubt that the papal decrees declaring the doctrines of Witness and of Perpetual Servitude were issued from the popes.  These were official doctrines espoused by the infallible Church.

Spencer would argue back that Catholics don’t think the Church or the papacy are infallible in all aspects, only matters of theology, faith, and morals.  The Catholic Encyclopedia writes that the Church has “immunity from…error or failure; in particular in theological usage, the supernatural prerogative by which the Church of Christ is, by a special Divine assistance, preserved from liability to error in her definitive dogmatic teaching regarding matters of faith and morals.”  The encyclopedia goes on to say that “the infallibility claimed for the pope is the same in its nature, scope, and extent as that which the Church as a whole possesses; his ex cathedra teaching does not have to be ratified by the Church’s in order to be infallible.”

I’m no expert of Catholicism, but just from my outsider perspective, the papal decrees about the Jews (the doctrines of Witness and Perpetual Servitude) fit all the criteria necessary to be considered infallible.  It is, after all, a theological issue, expressed ex cathedra (”from the chair”).  Should I now run around wildly flailing my arms declaring that the doctrines of Witness and Perpetual Servitude are inherently part of the Catholic religion, and that the Catholics are about to enforce this upon us infidels?  Of course I’ve read Catholic responses which explain why these particular papal decrees are not considered infallible; however, as an impartial outsider, the explanations honestly seemed to be unconvincing mumbo-jumbo.  I in fact ask Robert Spencer to explain why these particular decrees are not infallible according to the Catholic doctrine.  I know he will respond with some complex explanation, so I am not saying that there is no explanation for why not.  I am simply saying that the explanation is neither simple, straightforward, nor very convincing to an outsider.  Meanwhile, the Islamic responses to why the Pact of Umar is not infallible are very easy to understand: the document is a forgery, the only infallible documents in the Islamic religion are the Quran and the authentic hadiths (Sunnah), etc. (If the papal decrees supporting the doctrines of Witness and Perpetual Servitude were found to be forged–and not from the papacy at all–it would suddenly become very easy for a Catholic to deny the infallibility/applicability of said doctrines.)

But let me be very clear: I am not trying to argue that the doctrines of Witness and Perpetual Servitude are inherently part of Catholicism.  I leave that decision up to the Catholic believers.  If they say these are not infallible, who am I to insist otherwise?  But I think Muslims should also be taken at their word, especially since their responses on this particular topic seem more straightforward.  If we give the benefit of the doubt to the Catholics, then why not to the Muslims?

Quranic Endorsement of the Pact of Umar?

Robert Spencer attempts to bolster his argument, by arguing that the Quran itself endorses the Pact of Umar. Spencer writes:

Verse 29 of chapter 9 of the Qur’an, as we saw last week, mandates that the Muslims fight against the Jews and Christians “until they pay the jizya [poll tax] with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.” …The imperative to subjugate non-Muslims as mandated by Qur’an 9:29 and elaborated by this Pact became and remained part of Islamic law.

We shall discuss this verse (9:29) in greater detail in part 3 of this series (does it really mandate Muslims to fight against the Jews and Christians?), but right now I will focus on the last line; Spencer uses the following translation: “until they pay the jizya [poll tax] with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.”  The Arabic word in question is “saghirun”, which some medieval jurists translated as debasement, humiliation, etc.  Robert Spencer loves these quotes, and pretends that they are the only interpretations that exist.  You can find the following quote on JihadWatch:

Dhimmis must be kept in a permanent state of abasement (saghar). This why jizya must be paid in a public ceremony in which the dhimmi at the moment of payment is given a tap on the neck and pushed forward to show him he has thus escaped the sword. This abasement is more important than the sum paid.

Yet, contemporary Muslims do not understand the verse this way.  In fact, there were many medieval Islamic jurists who rejected such discriminatory interpretations.  The classical jurist, Imam Ibn al-Qayyim, rejected the interpretation that “saghar” means debasement:

This is groundless and the verse doesn’t imply that. It is not related that the Prophet or the companions acted like that. The correct opinion regarding this verse is that the word “saghar” means “acceptance” by non-Muslims of the structure of the Muslim right and their payment of the poll tax. ^[15]

Ibn Qudama, another classical jurist, wrote that the Prophet Muhammad and the four rightly guided caliphs said that the poll tax ought to be taken with gentleness and respect. (see Al-Mughni, Vol. 4, p.250) ^[16] In fact, the classical jurist Imam al-Nawawi wrote that the majority of scholars rejected such an interpretation:

As for this aforementioned practice [of degrading or humiliating non-Muslims], I know of no sound support for it in this respect, and it is only mentioned by the scholars of Khurasan. The majority (jumhur) of scholars say that the Jizyah is to be taken with gentleness, as one would receive a debt (dayn). The reliably correct opinion is that this practice [of degradation or humiliation] is invalid and those who devised it should be refuted. It is not related that the Prophet or any of the rightly-guided caliphs did any such thing when collecting the Jizyah. ^[17]

If this was the case with the medieval jurists (who had no incentive to white-wash Islam), then it is no surprise that contemporary Muslims take a similar enlightened view.  They believe that the verse must be contextualized: it was revealed during a time in which the People of the Book–namely the powerful Roman empire–were seeking to snuff out the early Islamic nation-state.  In this context, the early Muslim community was instructed in the rules of war, and it was decreed that the enemy be fought until they laid down their arms and their belligerence was subdued.  But the opponents were to be left alone once they accepted the hegemony of the Islamic nation-state, just like any nation will fight its belligerent enemies until they are subdued.

Once again, when we apply the same line of argumentation to Christianity, Robert Spencer refuses to accept it.  If we point to the numerous verses used historically by the Church to justify the doctrines of Witness and Perpetual Servitude, suddenly Spencer cannot accept this methodology.  Numerous verses in the Bible can be used to justify the subjugation and exile of Jews (i.e. the doctrines of Witness and Perpetual Servitude).  For example, the Bible reads:

The Jews: Who both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary to all men…the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost. (I Thessalonians 2:14-16)

And there are many others.  Can these verses be interpreted in more tolerant ways?  Sure.  But so can the Quranic verse in question.  But the Islamophobes want to use one standard for Christianity and a completely different one for Islam.

But What about Extremist Muslims?

Fine, the vast majority of Muslims have never heard of the Pact of Umar, nor do they want to enforce it upon non-Muslims.  But what about the extremist Al-Qaeda types?  Is it not this document that motivates them to fight the West?  I do not think so.  Even most extremist Muslims have never heard of the Pact of Umar.  Again, those that have would most likely have first heard it from anti-Islam ideologues.  Maybe they wouldn’t reject it outright when they hear it from the anti-Islam critics, but the point is that no Muslim–not even the extremist ones–is being raised to follow this document.  It really has fallen into disuse and obscurity.  I am unaware of any Al-Qaeda literature, speeches, or videos making any reference to the Pact of Umar.  It is not the desire to reimpose the Pact of Umar that motivates them to fight; rather, they view their war with the West in terms of defensive Jihad against Western tyranny (this much is evidenced by their view that their holy war is fardh al-ayn and not fardh al-kifaya).

But ok, there are about one billion Muslims in the world…I can’t possibly deny that there may be a handful of Muslims out of the billion that believe in enforcing the Pact of Umar.  But it is really a measly minority, a fraction of even the extremist Muslim subset.  There are indeed many opinions championed by extremist Muslims that are worrisome, but this particular one (i.e. the Pact of Umar and its enforcement) does not find any level of significance in their discourse.  In fact, the paradigm trumpeted by extremists is: the Jewish/Christian West oppresses Muslims in the land, even though Muslims had historically treated them in an ideal way; based on this, they argue, Muslims must overthrow the West in order to reestablish this interfaith utopia.  For example, Hamas writes in its charter (interestingly quoted by none other than Robert Spencer!):

Under the shadow of Islam, it is possible for the members of the three religions: Islam,  Christianity, and Judaism to coexist in safety and security.  Safety and security can only prevail under the shadow of Islam, and recent and ancient history is the best witness to that effect…Islam accords his rights to everyone who has rights and averts aggression against the rights of others. ^[18]

Most Muslims (extremists included) believe that historically non-Muslims lived under Islamic rule in an interfaith utopia.  (This is of course not true.)  The extremists believe that overthrowing the Western hegemony is the only way to return to this.  Therefore, they believe when they come to power, all will be treated well (unlike the Western rule).  So the idea that Muslims want to reimpose the Pact of Umar on non-Muslims is way off.  Only a handful of Muslims would believe such a thing.  This fact is illustrated by Robert Spencer’s inability to quote Muslim scholars, leaders, intellectuals, etc. who have called for the reimposition of the Pact of Umar and/or its discriminatory provisions.  In his book, Spencer is only able to quote one contemporary Islamic cleric who said such a thing.  One.  (Some guy named Marzouq Salem al-Ghamdi, who said non-Muslims ought to “rise when a Muslim wishes to sit” and that they shouldn’t “ride horses”, etc.)  That’s it.  One single quote.  (I haven’t authenticated the quote, but I’ll just give it to him.)

I think I saw one other similar quote on his site, and that’s it.  That’s all Spencer can provide.  Two or three quotes from out of the billion Muslims.  That’s the best he can do.  That’s all he’s got.  Here, I will issue a direct challenge to Robert Spencer: provide us with a list of contemporary Muslim scholars, leaders, intellectuals, etc. who have called for a reimposition of the Pact of Umar and/or its discriminatory provisions.  List as many as you can.  Every single one.  Let’s see how long your list is. I guarantee you that it will be an incredibly short list.  That is why you will avoid this challenge like the intellectual chicken you are.

The Muslim World League published the full text of the Achtiname of Muhammad in its journal.  Can Spencer provide a similar contemporary reference for the Pact of Umar?  In fact, the only contemporary texts he will find on the Pact of Umar will be responses to anti-Islam ideologues.  I challenge Robert Spencer to provide as many contemporary Islamic texts that endorse the Pact of Umar as he can.  I will then provide a list of scholars/texts that reject the Pact of Umar altogether, and definitely my list will be longer than his.

Spencer’s desperation can be gauged from what he writes in his book (emphasis is mine):

All this is still part of the Sharia today. “The subject peoples,” according to a contemporary manual of Islamic law, must “pay the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya)” and “are distinguished from Muslims in dress, wearing a wide cloth belt (zunnar)…[etc etc]” ^[19]

I was surprised when I saw the words “contemporary manual.”  So I checked out the footnote, which cited Umdat al-Salik as the reference.  That’s a contemporary manual?  It was written six hundred and fifty years ago.  (Tisk, tisk…How dishonest.)  Like I said earlier, the only references to the Pact of Umar you will find now are (1) reprints of medieval texts, and (2) responses to anti-Islam ideologues.  (This is where the Islamophobes use their typical deceitful argument that such-and-such medieval text is “endorsed” by such and such Islamic authority; an endorsement of a text in the Islamic tradition does not at all mean 100% agreement on every single opinion. If that is the case, then show us that Islamic authority explicitly advocating the reimposition of the Pact of Umar.)

Nowhere in contemporary Islamic texts will you find an endorsement of the reimplementation of the Pact of Umar and its discriminatory conditions; meanwhile, contemporary Muslims widely publicize the Achtiname of Muhammad as a model for the treatment of non-Muslims. If you search Muslim websites, you will find the Achtiname of Muhammad published on them. If you search Islamophobic ones, you will find the Pact of Umar. (”No no, this is what you believe!”)

Christian Extremists Continue to Believe in Perpetual Servitude

Does the fact that there might be a handful of Muslims who believe in the reimposition of the Pact of Umar justify Spencer’s agenda?  Certainly not, especially when we consider the fact that a greater number of Christians still believe in the Perpetual Servitude of Jews.  We know that the extremist Muslims are the Al-Qaeda types.  OK, so who are the extremist Christians?  The white nationalists, a sizable portion of which are extremist Christians.  But those don’t count, argue the Islamophobes.  Why not?  Because they are loonies and racists.  So let me get this straight: the Muslim extremists aren’t also loonies?  How come the Muslim loonies define the Islamic threat, but the Christian loonies don’t define the Christian threat?  As for them being racists, so?  That’s completely in line with historic Christianity.  Unlike Islam, Christianity was wedded with racist thought, with bigoted theological positions revolving around the Mark of Cain.  (But let’s not be loony about what we say: clearly, the vast majority of Christians have jettisoned such beliefs.)  Fundamentalist Muslims rigidly adhere to medieval opinions, and so do the extreme right wing Christians…And nobody can deny that such racist opinions were not alien to historic Christianity.

People always wonder why there are so many extremist Muslims, but where are the extremist Christians?  In fact, it’s quite easy to identify them: they are the white nationalists.  (Not all of them are Christians, but a sizable portion are and they base their racism in Christian belief.)  In fact, white nationalism is becoming a scourge in the world arguably greater than extremist Al-Qaeda types.  There are millions of white nationalists in the world (they are greater in numbers than jihadists), and their movement is on the rise.  But of course, our minds have been infected with “stealth racism” (to borrow a term from Robert Spencer).  So when a Muslim flies a plane into a building, it’s automatically terrorism and we’re on high alert; when someone else does, then that doesn’t count as terrorism and who cares?  Well yeah, if you’re going to always exclude all non-Muslim acts of terrorism, then it’s no surprise you can blithely ask: why are all terrorists Muslim?  Similarly, if all Christian extremists “don’t count”, then of course there will be far more Muslim extremists in your books than Christian ones.

Anyways, the fact is that there exists a rising group of white nationalists who base their racism in historic Christian belief.  And if all of the Islamic community is to be shamed because there may be a handful of Muslims who believe in reimposing the Pact of Umar, then shouldn’t we have a similar reaction to Christianity?  After all, there exist far right wing Christians who believe that the doctrines of Witness and Perpetual Servitude ought to be reinforced.  Don’t believe me?  The white nationalist website, Stormfront (which boasts an impressive membership of a couple hundred thousand), published the following article, which argues that “the theologically correct, and socially just Catholic social policy is to subjugate [the Jews], regulate them, segregate them and expel them.” If you read that article in its entirety, you will come to know that these far right wing Christians base their belief in historic Christian beliefs and the traditional interpretations of the Bible.

Conclusion

The Pact of Umar has become the Islamophobe’s equivalent to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. I understand that there are certain shortcomings to this comparison, since the Protocols of the Elders of Zion were never accepted by Jews at all. But it is an apt comparison in so far as the xenophobes spreading a conspiracy that a certain religious group seeks to establish their rule and subjugate the natives. The reality is that this conspiracy is far-fetched and outright loony.  The vast majority of Muslims have never even heard of the document, let alone engage in a “stealth Jihad” to one day implement it.  Even extremist Muslims tend to focus on the utopic image of co-existence that supposedly existed in Islamic history.  The Pact of Umar has become an obscure text, with even Islamic scholars having a hard time recalling what exactly it is.  The only contemporary references to the document are in the form of responses against anti-Islam ideologues, invariably arguing against the Pact of Umar’s authenticity and/or applicability. No country on earth–including the ultraconservative Saudi Arabia and Iran–enforces the Pact of Umar. Yes, it is true that the rights of minorities are not properly protected in many Muslim majority countries, but this has nothing to do with the Pact of Umar.

The document may have reached some level of significance in the Islamic past, but it has now fallen into obscurity.  This is easy to understand when our Christian readers think about the doctrines of Witness and Perpetual Servitude.  I gander that virtually none of the Christians who read my article on that topic had ever even heard of the doctrines of Witness or Perpetual Servitude.  The first time they heard of it was from me.  This, even though these doctrines were of utmost importance at one time in Christian history.  Yet, now even religious Christians have no idea what these doctrines are.  In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Robert Spencer himself was unfamiliar with them.  When contemporary Christians do hear about these doctrines, they have to look for Christian responses, which explain (in a somewhat convoluted manner) why these doctrines are not infallible.

So why–when modern day Christians have no knowledge of a once popular doctrine in their religious tradition–is it so hard for them to believe that Muslims nowadays have no idea what the Pact of Umar is?  Robert Spencer and the rest of the Islamophobic goof troop trying to prove that Muslims want to reimpose the Pact of Umar is as inane as some Muslim fanatic trying to prove that the United States is attacking Muslim majority countries because they wish to reinforce the doctrine of Perpetual Servitude upon Muslims.  But for some reason, it’s so much easier to understand this about oneself, as opposed to the demonized other. 

You are a certified loon if you go on and on about how Muslims want to reimpose the Pact of Umar, just as a Muslim would be a loon if he were to claim that Christians were seeking to reimpose Perpetual Servitude.  Spencer, you are so proud of yourself that you found one spurious document from a caliph of Islam that became important in medieval Islamic texts; I can point to dozens of 100% authentic (and arguably infallible) papal decrees that became foundational to medieval Christian theology, restricting Jews and Muslims to a status of Perpetual Servitude…And yes, there continue to exist a section of Christians today who believe in reinforcing it.

(Cue Islamophobic whining of “tu quoque, tu quoque,” which translates to “please Danios stop hitting us back so hard, waah waah waah!” I will explain in a future article why this lame tu quoque chant is inappropriate and inapplicable in this context.)

Stay tuned for part 3 of this three part series, entitled “Do Muslims want to reimpose dhimmitude?” Danios has called part 2 his jab and part 3 will be his knockout punch.

Footnotes

refer back to article 1. Personal correspondence with Zaid Shakir; quote may be verified by directly contacting Shakir: http://www.zaidshakir.com/

refer back to article 2. Yusuf Qaradawi, Ghayr Al-Muslimeen fil Mujtama` Al-Islami

refer back to article 3. Maher Abu-Munshar, Islamic Jerusalem And Its Christians: A History of Tolerance And Tensions, pp.79-80

refer back to article 4. Tabari, Tarikh At-Tabari, Vol. 3, p.609

refer back to article 5. Mawdudi, The Rights Of The People of Covenant In The Islamic State, p.22

refer back to article 6. Abraham P. Bloch, One a Day: An Anthology of Jewish Historical Anniversaries for Every Day of the Year, p.314. ISBN 0881251089

refer back to article 7. Personal correspondence with Bassam Zawadi; quote may be verified by directly emailing Zawadi: b_zawadi@hotmail.com

refer back to article 8. It should be noted that Shawkani later converted to Sunni Islam.

refer back to article 9. Jan Platvoet, Pluralism and Identity: Studies in Ritual Behavior, 178-180. ISBN: 9004103732

refer back to article 10. Ayman bin Khaled, Multaqa Ahl al-Hadeeth

refer back to article 11. Ibn Ishaq, Sirat Rasul Allah

refer back to article 12. Testamentum et pactiones inter Mohammedem et Christianae fidei cultores. Paris, 1630

refer back to article 13. Abu Yusuf, Kitab al-Kharaj, p.79

refer back to article 14. Ibid., p. 146

refer back to article 15. Ahkam Ahlul Dhimma, Vol. 1, pp. 23-24

refer back to article 16. Hat tip: Bassam Zawadi

refer back to article 17. Rawdat al-Talibin, Volume 10, p.315-16

refer back to article 18. Robert Spencer, The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades), p.51

refer back to article 19. Ibid.

David Horowitz

David Horowitz, the former Marxist turned neo-Conservative and the person who funds such loathsome individuals as Robert Spencer and his Jihad Watch was at UMass where he faced strong opposition from students. He ended up calling Palestinians Nazis, said Islam is worse and more dangerous than Nazism and other crazy stuff.

Horowitz Brings Controversial Ideas to Student Union

By: Michelle Williams | February 25, 2010 | ShareThis

Editor’s Note: Due to the snow day, this article will appear in the paper edition of Thursday, Feb. 25. As such, the online article has been slightly updated.

Ashley Lesperance/Collegian

On Tuesday evening, former New Left radical turned conservative pundit and author of such works as “Hating Whitey: and Other Progressive Causes,” and “Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left,” David Horowitz spoke in the Cape Cod Lounge in the Student Union.

Outside the Lounge two UMass Police officers were stationed at the door, with numerous law enforcement officials inside in plainclothes.

Justin Thomas, vice president of the University of Massachusetts Republican Club, the RSO which brought Horowitz to UMass, defended the heavy police presence at the event, citing previous events including Don Feder’s speech in March 2009, which was disrupted by protesters.

David Horowitz is described by the Republican Club as a well-known author and lifelong civil rights activist. He was sponsored to speak at UMass for a payment of $5,000 plus expenses, including transportation, lodging, and payment for protection.

Those protesting disagree that his speech was worth funding.

“I am here protesting because, as a UMass student attending a public university, I don’t welcome homophobia, and Islamophobia that is integrated in Horowitz’s hate speech.” said Marah DeFlavia, a junior at UMass. “I feel that bringing Horowitz to this campus was socially irresponsible, and it sends a negative message regarding our campus.”

Protesters passed out flyers labeling Horowitz a racist, citing an article he wrote which likened calling Rush Limbaugh a racist to calling minorities racial epithets.

The evening seemed a perfect test of some of Horowitz’s primary tenets, as he has asserted that liberal thinkers suppress free thought in academia in such pieces as “The Professors: 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America.”

Ultimately, this forum turned out better than last year’s contested gathering. Some protesters did speak out, and while they were asked to leave, none were forcibly removed or arrested.

The UMPD also implemented security measures, including not allowing audience members to bring backpacks with them inside. Members of the audience were also asked not to hold up signs or interrupt, though some disruption did occur.

UMass student Alex Tuffile was excited for the night’s events, having read all of Horowitz’s books. When asked his thoughts on the protesters, after viewing them quietly passing out flyers, he responded that he liked them. Citing past speeches, specifically the Don Feder speech, Tuffile said he feels the security measures are necessary.

“It was a disaster. I don’t have a problem with people when they protest, but it was ugly,” he said.

Thomas, the Republican Club vice president, gave opening remarks and thanked everyone for attending the speech, stating that Horowitz’s presence would hopefully facilitate conversation and debate.

Thomas explained why the Republican Club chose Horowitz.

“David Horowitz has been a strong proponent of free speech on campus,” he said.

Horowitz also provided an outlet for the club to display a more conservative speaker.

“You may remember Ms. Meghan McCain, who brought a more independent viewpoint [coming to campus.] Surprisingly for some, she wasn’t conservative enough,” said Thomas.

Next to speak was Derek Khanna, the president of the Republican Club. Khanna spoke of Horowitz’s lack of political correctness and the need for such in the University environment. Khanna spoke of not being able to call his country a “she,” and said, “Today, we live in a society where use of the word ‘niggardly’ requires an apology,” which the audience greeted with hissing sounds.

As he took the stage, Horowitz began his speech with an attack on liberals.

“Universities were set up to be free institutions that taxpayers pay for. It is due to out of control spending on faculty and out of control governmental loans that tuition costs are so much,” said Horowitz.

He went on to call college professors lazy, claiming they only work “nine hours a week, eight months out of the year.”

He continued to claim that professors generally represent just one side of the aisle politically. Horowitz sat in on a 90 minute civil liberties class during Tuesday’s classes, which he felt did not show multiple viewpoints on the subject.

“The professor tried to sell students on the decency of the Supreme Court, and denied them key information,” he said, furthering that he believes an educator’s job should entail “teaching you how to think, not what to think.”

Midway through his speech, Horowitz spoke on an educational department with which his views are commonly connoted. Horowitz said that women’s studies departments’ goals are to “make students into radical feminists.”

On the issues of gender and racial hierarchies in society, Horowitz claimed such inequities do not exist in America. He also said, to much audience protest, that the women’s studies department “doesn’t actually care about women,” because of genital mutilation occurring in Islamic cultures.

Horowitz expanded on his view of education stating that “the entire liberal arts college cannot give you a good education.” The only department Horowitz felt was of value was the engineering college, because through science, he believes the department presents facts without political slant.

Horowitz also told the crowd his views on religion. He deemed Muslims radicals, citing a poll claiming ten percent of Muslims agreed with jihad, or holy war. Making numerous comparisons to Nazi Germany, Horowitz called the Islamic jihad worse.

“Islamists are worse than the Nazis, because even the Nazis did not tell the world that they want to exterminate the Jews,” he said. In another comparison to Nazis, he added, “there are good Muslims and bad Muslims just like there were good Germans and bad Germans.”

After an hour of speaking, Horowitz took questions. Numerous students asked him about the conflict between Israel and Palestine, to which Horowitz responded heatedly, “The Palestinians are Nazis. Every one of their elected officials are terrorists.”

He spoke of how the countries in the Middle East were created and had no right to the lands that now make up Israel. “The Jews were attacked. They had every right to expel every Arab from both Israel and, when they were attacked in ‘67, from the West Bank.”

Zamil Akhtar, president of the UMass Muslim Student Association, spoke of how every Muslim, himself included, did not support the jihad, and said, “You said that you had not heard Muslims condemn the jihad. I can show you hundreds of Muslim scholars that disagree.”

“You also spoke of genital mutilation,” added Akhtar, “which is not a part of the culture – of my culture – as you said.”

Horowitz asked if Akhtar would denounce Hamas, to which Akhtar responded he would, and retorted by asking Horowitz if he would denounce Ann Coulter’s Islamophobic remarks, to which he responded, “It was a very apt satire.”

On the differences between sex and gender, UMass student Ashley Lesperance tried to explain the differences between gender and sex.

“Gender is defined as socially constructed to oppress women, versus sex which is what you are born with, gender is what is in fact socially constructed,” Lesperance told Horowitz.

Horowitz retorted by referencing former Harvard President Larry Summers, who drew criticism when he claimed women had lesser scientific abilities than women.

“Women possibly have a lower aptitude for math and science than men. And that’s a gender difference. Women have a lower aptitude in mathematics than men, and that is a scientific fact,” said Horowitz.

After a 30 minute question-and-answer of agitated remarks between the protesters and Horowitz, he told audience members lined at the microphone that he was finished answering questions and was escorted out of the room by his bodyguard.

Michelle Williams can be reached at mnwillia@student.umass.edu

The Looniest Blogger Ever: Pamela Geller

Lets take a trip over the rainbow into loonyland where we will meet the Queen loon blogger Pamela Geller. Once here we must suspend all reality and truth.  Here Barack Obama is a Mooslim who is furthering Jihad and working to destroy Israel. Israel is light and goodness and vanilla ice cream fighting against the evil, dark smelly hordes of Izzzlaaaaaaaaaam. The Mooslims have taken over everything and must be destroyed before they destroy us.

That is what Geller’s every waking existence is like or at least the existence she purports to believe in on her comical conspiracy site, Atlas Shrugs. Her recent tirades include calls for Israel to nuke Muslim capitals/holy sites and Europe. Enjoy!

And I pray dearly that in the ungodly event that Tehran or its jihadi proxies (Hez’ballah, Hamas etc) target Israel with a nuke, that she retaliate with everything she has at Tehran, Mecca, and Medina……………

Not to mention Europe. They exterminated all their Jews, but that wasn’t enough. Those monsters then went on to import the next generation of Jew killers. (This New Hatred Comes from Muslim Immigrants. The Jewish People are Afraid Now)

So according to Pam, in response to a hypothetical situation in which Iran hits Israel with a nuke, it should respond with everything it has on not only Iran but Saudi Arabia, and Europe? If you didn’t get it, “Everything she has” is a not so subtle way of saying Israel should unload its stockpile of nukes.

Her hatred of Europe and desire to see it destroyed is very odd as well (she claims to defend Western civilization) and just exposes her genocidal predilections further, she wants the present generation of Europeans to pay for the sins of the Nazis (who weren’t all of Europe by the way). How crazy is she?

She also claims that the rise in anti-Semitism is linked to the “next generation of Jew killers” whom the Europeans imported. An insinuation that Muslim immigrants are at fault for rising violence against Jews in Europe, a statement completely devoid of any basis in fact. On the contrary recent research shows that the growing Muslim population is not linked to the growing anti-Semitism (which parallels growing Islamophobia). One point that illustrates this fact clearly is that Hungary which has almost no Muslim presence has seen the greatest increase in anti-Semitism,

Some commentators have tried to link the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe to a growing Muslim population there. But in Hungary, where there is hardly any Muslim presence, anti-Semitism is both more rabid and crude than anywhere else in Europe.

It seems that Pam’s deep hatred of Islam and Muslims has finally allowed her to complete the trifecta: first she advocated the destruction of the Golden Dome (Islam’s third holiest site), and now she seeks the destruction of Mecca and Medina.

Joseph Stack's attack

A man flies a plane into a federal building in a suicide mission in which he wishes to sacrifice himself for a political cause or objective, he must be a Muslim! Not so fast, Joseph Stack seems to have blown that idea to bits, highlighting a fact we have pointed out Ad nauseum, terrorism isn’t a Muslim only brand.

Joe Stack’s story is interesting for a number of reasons,one of them being the confusion on whether or not what he did is terrorism, though it fits the definition of terrorism to the letter,

premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets

News media outlets are a perfect example of the confusion over whether or not to label this an act of terrorism, or whether to label Joe Stack a terrorist. The confusion seems to stem from the fact that Stack is a middle aged White male who isn’t Muslim. If he had been Muslim there would be no confusion, instantly pundits would be in unanimous agreement that this is terrorism.

Glenn Greenwald breaks down the hypocrisy and the double standards quite succinctly, (I recommend all read his article, Terrorism: The Most Meaningless and Manipulated Word)

The New York Times‘ Brian Stelter documents the deep reluctance of cable news chatterers and government officials to label the incident an act of “terrorism,” even though — as Dave Neiwert ably documents — it perfectly fits, indeed is a classic illustration of, every official definition of that term.  The issue isn’t whether Stack’s grievances are real or his responses just; it is that the act unquestionably comports with the official definition.  But as NBC’s Pete Williams said of the official insistence that this was not an act of Terrorism:  there are “a couple of reasons to say that . . . One is he’s an American citizen.”  Fox News’ Megan Kelley asked Catherine Herridge about these denials:  ”I take it that they mean terrorism in the larger sense that most of us are used to?,” to which Herridge replied: “they mean terrorism in that capital T way.”

The things that make you go hmmm.

Think about that for a second, he is an “American citizen,” so he can’t commit terrorism? Jose Padilla was an American citizen, the una-bomber was an American citizen, Timothy McVeigh was an American citizen. Are they all exonerated because they were American citizens?

Megan Kelley’s words are even more illustrative of the Islamophobia that is commonplace now and buried deep within the American psyche, the “terrorism that we are used to” meaning terrorism can only be commited by Muslims. The “capital T,” might as well be a capital M for Muslim.

Joseph Stack is now being considered a hero and a martyr against big government and the intrusive tax system. Facebook pages and Twitter accounts are abuzz proclaiming Stack a “true American hero.”

The silence from Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer, who must be busy with their new Orwellian organization Freedom Defense Initiative is deafening. Other Conservatives are busy boohooing against the Left and claiming that they are being painted unjustly as “extremists and terrorists.” Now isn’t that ironic?

The Washington Post reports:

Allegations of religious bias are being leveled against a notable federal body: the one responsible for monitoring international religious freedom.

Some past commissioners, staff and former staff of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom say the agency charged with advising the president and Congress is rife, behind-the-scenes, with ideology and tribalism, with commissioners focusing on pet projects that are often based on their own religious background. In particular, they say an anti-Muslim bias runs through the commission’s work– a charge denied by its chairman, Leonard Leo.

…

From the start, critics say, the commission has disproportionately focused its efforts on the persecution of Christians, while too often ignoring other religious communities and downplaying their claims of persecution.

“It was predetermined who the bad guys are and who the good guys are,” said Khaled Abou El Fadl, a Muslim who served as a commissioner from 2003 to 2007 and teaches human rights at UCLA. “There is a very pronounced view of the world, and it is that victims of religious discrimination are invariably Christian. It was rather suffocating.”

Although the persecution of minorities in many Muslim majority countries cannot be denied, there is certainly no monopoly on religious intolerance.  Muslims are persecuted in many countries, such as in China, Russia, and Israel. To its credit, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom does address some of these issues.  Yet, former and current employees allege that this is only at the insistence of the staff, which often compensates for the pro-Christian and anti-Muslim bias.  The Washington Post article goes on:

Others who work or used to work for the commission said advocacy for Muslims and the balance typically evident in the commission’s public statements are due to the professional staff.

“When anti-Muslim violence is mentioned, it’s usually because staff forces it,” said Kustin, 26, a South Asia researcher for the commission until she resigned in July to protest commissioners withdrawing Ghori-Ahmad’s contract. “The staff compensates for the biases of the commissioners.”

…

As with other congressionally created bodies, the commission is not subject to the Freedom of Information Act, so meetings and internal communications are private. With commissioners allowed to focus on any issue, their work is vulnerable to charges of arbitrariness.

What really irks me is when ideologues exploit and abuse the suffering of people to further their agendas and push their hate-infested propaganda.  It is these people who gleefully report the persecution of their coreligionists in order simply to demonize what they see as “the other.”  They view it as a football match: each time they can report “the other” persecuting someone else, that’s a score!  The concern is not for the persecuted, but for demonizing a population.  Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller do it, and so do Usama bin Ladin and his cronies.  Two sides of the same coin.

We certainly cannot tolerate our tax dollars being used to further the propaganda of right wing Christians who view the world in a binary way.  These charges should be taken very seriously and thoroughly investigated.  And by investigated, I don’t mean it the way the Israeli government does when it says that.

Nonie Darwish

We are going to have an explosive breakdown of the clownish Nonie Darwish, another charlatan akin to Wafa Sultan who is milking the Islamophobic cash cow for all it’s worth. Jim Holstun, a professor at SUNY Buffalo wrote this great piece in 2008 that lays bear Nonie’s excessive Islamophobia, as well as her contradictions and lies.

Nonie Darwish and the al-Bureij Massacre

StandWithUs is a Zionist advocacy group in Los Angeles. It concentrates on US colleges and universities, offering fellowships, book donations, lectures, training and hands-on activism. I first heard about the group in 2005, after its Executive Director, Roz Rothstein, wrote my university’s president, provost and Arts and Sciences dean to warn them that I was teaching courses in Palestinian culture. She passed along some hysterical libels from anonymous community members (not my students), gave a detailed critique of my syllabuses, encouraged them to investigate me and two other colleagues, and helpfully suggested a few questions they might want to ask.

StandWithUs manages an impressive stable of Zionist speakers, including several who are Arabs, Muslims, or ex-Muslims: Brigitte Gabriel, Ishmael Khaldi, Walid Shoebat, Khaled Abu Toameh, and Nonie Darwish. Darwish, born an Egyptian Muslim, now an American Evangelical Christian, is one of the most energetic. She manages the website Arabs for Israel and has appeared on FOX News, on the website Frontpage Magazine, and in the film Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West. She is also the author of Now They Call Me Infidel: Why I Renounced Jihad for America, Israel, and the War on Terror. Penguin Books publishes it under its Sentinel imprint — a special line of conservative titles. Since her book’s publication in 2006, Darwish has toured extensively, speaking primarily at colleges and universities.

Now They Call Me Infidel has blurbs from all the usual crew: Daniel Pipes, David Horowitz, Robert Spencer, Bat Ye’Or, former Senator Rick Santorum, Representative Tom “Nuke Mecca” Tancredo, and General Paul Vallely, who advocates the final ethnic cleansing of all Palestinian citizens of Israel. In the book itself, Darwish interweaves stories of her Egyptian girlhood with potted accounts of female genital mutilation, arranged marriages, polygamy, veiling, domestic abuse, honor killings, sharia law, jihad, censorship, hate-oriented education, the rejection of modernity, the cult of martyrdom, Islamic imperialism, and the pathological, groundless hatred of Israel.

In her interviews and in her book, she insists that she is not anti-Arab or anti-Islamic, and even suggests from time to time that she is still a Muslim. Then she pivots nimbly and attacks “the Arab mind,” “the seething Arab street,” and “the Muslim world,” with its “culture of jihad,” “culture of death,” and “culture of envy.” There are “no real distinctions between moderate or radical Muslims,” and no significant differences within or among Arab or Muslim cultures: for Darwish, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser’s secular Arab nationalism was essentially jihadist. Darwish is allergic to social history: “I realized that the Arab-Israeli conflict is not a crisis over land, but a crisis of hate, lack of compassion, ingratitude, and insecurity.” Instead of history, scholarship, and footnotes, she gives us a watered-down version of Raphael Patai’s The Arab Mind: a dictionary of Islamophobic commonplaces underwritten by the authority of an ex-Muslim native informant: I was there — I know.

Darwish’s portraits of Israel and of the US, to which she emigrated in 1978, are diametrically opposite but equally fatuous: Israeli Jews are tolerant, pragmatic, and peace-loving. From 1967 to 1982, they made the Sinai bloom. Americans are honest, charitable, industrious, self-sufficient, intellectually curious, and benevolent toward the foreign nations to whom they bring liberty. They err only in their excess of credulous goodness: because of “the simplicity of American values such as truthfulness,” they risk falling prey to duplicitous jihadist immigrants and dangerous professors, who “indoctrinate American young people with the radical Muslim agenda.”

Her outsider’s view of America complements her insider’s view of the Arab and Muslim world, for imperial states want not only other people’s land and labor, but their love. Here, we may compare Now They Call Me Infidel not only to recent anti-Islamic conversion narratives like Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s Infidel (her conversion was to neoconservative atheism and the American Enterprise Institute), but to earlier works in the genre. In her 1964 Editions Gallimard autobiography, O mes soeurs musulmanes, pleurez! (O My Muslim Sisters, Weep!), Zoubeida Bittari recounts her escape from Algerian Muslim patriarchy to French Christian bliss as a domestic servant to a Pied-Noir family; Nonie Darwish finds friends, family, and faith in southern California, including a Republican women’s group, an American husband, and Christian fellowship in Pastor Dudley Rutherford’s Shepherd of the Hills Church. As Bittari helped French colons feel better about their ungratefully rebuffed civilizing mission in Algeria, so Darwish helps Americans feel better about the long and bumpy road to global democratization.

There are occasional flashes of something more individual and authentic in Darwish’s book. For instance, her reiterated heartfelt attack on Nasser’s rent control laws (her mother lived partly off of her Cairo rentals) helps us understand why she feels so much more at home in southern California, where she arrived with enough money to buy a house with a swimming pool. But as a whole, the book is tedious, predictable, and badly edited — born to be bought, scanned and displayed, not actually read. But this will not diminish the demand for Darwish as a lecturer, which derives not from her writing but from her parentage: her father was Colonel Mustafa Hafez, head of Egyptian army intelligence in the Gaza Strip in the early ’50s, who was killed by an Israeli letter bomb in July 1956. Every lecture notice, every interview, even the title page of her book announces her as “a Muslim Shahid’s Daughter.”

Throughout her book, Darwish struggles to maintain love and loyalty both to the father she lost at age eight and to the Israeli state that killed him. In a parting flourish, she says that “My father — and potentially my whole family — was sent to his death in Gaza by Nasser, who was consumed by his desire to destroy Israel,” and she fondly imagines him surviving and flying with assassinated Egyptian president Anwar Sadat to Israel. But this argument sometimes requires a torturous chronology: “When, on January 16, 1956, Nasser vowed a renewed offensive to destroy Israel, the pressure on my father to step up operations increased. More fedayeen groups were organized, and their training expanded to other areas of the Gaza Strip. Often my father was gone for days at a time. In an attempt to end the terror, Israel sent its commandos one night to our heavily guarded home.”

The problem here is that this early, failed assassination attempt occurred in 1953, when Hafez was struggling to prevent destabilizing Palestinian infiltration from Gaza into Israel. Things changed dramatically in February 1955, when then military commander Ariel Sharon’s Gaza raid killed 37 Egyptian soldiers and wounded 31. This raid brought shocked international condemnation, the end of Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett’s ongoing negotiations with Nasser, mass demonstrations of Palestinian refugees in the Gaza Strip, and Nasser’s decision to have Hafez organize and arm Palestinian fedayeen for cross-border forays. Israeli historians Avi Shlaim and Benny Morris see the raid as a turning point in Israeli-Arab relations. Darwish never mentions it.

Continuing with her discussion of the earlier undated raid on her family’s home (it actually occurred on 28-29 August 1953), she says, “My father was not at home that night, and the Israelis found only women and children — my mother, two maids, and five small children. The commandos left us unharmed. I personally did not even wake up or know of the incident until later in life, when I read a book written about my father. After I read it, I called my mother immediately, and she confirmed the story. The Israelis chose not [to] kill us even though the Egyptian-organized fedayeen did kill Israeli civilians, women and children.”

Young Nonie must have been a very sound sleeper, since one squad blew the gate off her house, injuring several civilians, and, by one account, proceeded to demolish the house. Grown-up Nonie seems not to know that the Israeli commandos were part of Ariel Sharon’s newly-organized Unit 101. While the one squad attacked her house, Sharon’s was cornered nearby in al-Bureij refugee camp. He decided they would bomb and shoot their way through the camp rather than retreat from it. General Vagn Bennike, the Danish UN Truce Chief, reported to the Security Council on the ensuing massacre: “Bombs were thrown through the windows of huts in which the refugees were sleeping and, as they fled, they were attacked by small arms and automatic weapons. The casualties were 20 killed, 27 seriously wounded, and 35 less seriously wounded.” Other sources estimate from 15 to 50 fatalities.

The Israeli army blamed the raid on rogue kibbutzniks, and Ariel Sharon tried to reassure his men, telling them that all the dead women were camp whores or murderous Palestinian infiltrators. But some of them remained shocked at what they had done. Participant Meir Barbut said they felt as if they were slaughtering the pathetic inhabitants of a Jewish transit camp: “The boys threw Molotov cocktails at [innocent] people, not at the saboteurs we had come to punish. It was shameful for the 101 and the IDF [Israel army].” Another asked, “Is this screaming, whimpering multitude … the enemy? … How did these fellahin sin against us?” In 2006, Palestinian journalist Laila El-Haddad interviewed a survivor for Al Jazeera English:

“Mohammad Nabahini, 55, was two at the time and lived in the camp. He survived the attack in the arms of his slain mother. ‘My father decided to stay behind when they attacked. He hid in a pile of firewood and pleaded with my mother to stay with him. She was too afraid, and fled with hundreds of others, only to return to take me and a few of her belongings with her,’ he said. ‘As she was escaping, her dress got caught in a fence around the camp, just over there,’ he gestured, near a field now covered with olive trees. ‘And then they threw a bomb at her, Sharon and his men. She tossed me on the ground behind her before she died.’”

Though Darwish never mentions it, the al-Bureij Massacre hasn’t exactly been a secret — both Zionist and anti-Zionist historians have described it clearly, with little disagreement save the number of fatalities, with the high-end estimate coming from an Israeli history. If it tends not to loom large in Palestinian historical memory, that’s because it was overshadowed just two months later by the Qibya Massacre, during which Sharon’s Unit 101 killed 67, women and children, demolishing buildings over their heads and shooting them down when they tried to flee — the tactic pioneered at al-Bureij. Given its propensity for civilian soft targets, this daredevil elite unit might be better described as a death squad.

We probably shouldn’t expect Nonie Darwish to alter her campus presentations anytime soon. The bookings by StandWithUs might dry up if she were to start supplementing her cautionary tales about sharia law, jihadi immigrants, and female genital mutilation with a serious discussion of Israeli massacres at Deir Yassin, Tantura, al-Bureij, Qibya, Kfar Qasim, Sabra and Shatila, and Beit Hanoun. In any case, Darwish prefers simple cultural generalities and intimate personal reflection to historical analysis. But since that’s the case, someone at her next lecture might ask if she remembers playing with any of the refugee children murdered at al-Bureij, and why the kindly Israeli commandos who spared her family decided to blow up Mohammad Nabahini’s mother.

Jim Holstun teaches world literature and Marxism at SUNY Buffalo and can be reached at jamesholstun A T hotmail D O T com.

Rabbi Nachum Shifren

Rabbi Nachum Shifren is a West Bank Settler, a teacher in the Los Angeles educational system and a surfer. The last time he came to the attention of the media was for his books on surfing and spirituality.  He implied then that he wasn’t into politics, Denise Dowling of Salon.com wrote at the time,

The Surfing Rabbi will talk religion, but not politics. If pressed on his views, it’s evident how he earned the nickname “Shifty.” “My politics are not germane to what I’m doing,” he demurs. “All I’m about is surfing.”

Yet even then there were hints that he was deeply political and that his allegiance was to extreme right-wing Zionist ideology,

Yet he opted to reside in Kfar Tapuah, a West Bank settlement perched a half-hour from the “lousy” Mediterranean surf. Kfar Tapuah is considered an extremely militant, right-wing, anti-government stronghold. “I’d compare its residents to white militants in the United States,” says Hagit Yaari, an Israeli spokesperson for Americans for Peace.

Kfar Tapuah is the settlement where Israeli police recently arrested an remorseless extremist Jewish settler who was killing Palestinians. Now Rabbi Shifren is running to be a State Senator in California and what he is saying doesn’t reflect the peaceful rhythms of the Ocean but instead reflects a hateful ideologue filled with bigotry against Islam. I haven’t investigated his past statements thoroughly but there is no need to waste time to find his views, his most recent article sums it up quite directly.

Shifren writes on a recent student protest at UC Irvine where 11 students were arrested for protesting the visit of Israel’s Ambassador to America, Michael Oren on the grounds that he represents a government which perpetrates “war crimes, violates international law, and subjugates and oppresses Palestinians.” Shifren believes that they will get off too lightly and he wants them jailed and expelled from the university.

In an article he penned, Cal. Senatorial Candidate Responds to Muslim Hooliganism, Rabbi Shifren writes that the protesters weren’t just “rude, and disrespectful students” but they “are the front line of an army of Muslims that is waiting patiently to take over and subvert our country.”

The article doesn’t make a lot of sense a lot of the time but he goes on to repeat many of the stereotypical essentialist, paranoid, anti-Muslim statements that we are used to from Islamophobes,

For instance the canard that Muslims only respect strength,

The rule that we in the West refuse to acknowledge is simply that to the muslim, whoever is perceived as strong, will be feared and will survive; and whoever is seen as weak, irresolute, or wavering, will be despised and will be vanquished.

He also states that he believes we are at war with Islam,

This will be a hard bullet for America to bite, but we are at war with Islam! Those who deny this are quislings or fifth-columnists — and very often, university professors and chancellors. With strong leadership, there would be no notions of “academic freedom” for those who come here to subvert and destroy.

These students weren’t just protesters but according to Rabbi Shifren are “Muslim terrorists-in-training,” who are “breeding” like crazy on our university campuses,

Make no mistake: these students are the probing squads that are testing the waters to see what they can get away with, positioning themselves to ultimately shut down the entire campus when they please. These are among the first salvos in a war that, until now, has been only academic and ideological — at least in this country.

If you want to see where we are headed, if we don’t find the courage to stand up to and defeat these muslim terrorists-in-training, just look to France, Spain, England and other countries where muslims have been allowed to get a toe-hold. Or consider the carnage caused by just one insane muslim terrorist at Fort Hood, then multiply that many times over, as more muslim terrorists consolidate their power base in our country — and our state and their favorite breeding grounds, our campuses!

Hurry, the Mooslims are coming, the Mooslims are coming, in fact they are here!

Without strength of character in our leaders, and the courage of our people, we are poised to become just another chapter in history — right next to the debauched and pillaged societies of Greece and Rome. The muslim onslaught is at the gates; they are weary of our self-indulgence and they abhor our eroding social mores and valueless culture. They are sharpening the long knives, knowing that their time will come shortly.

Of course Rabbi Shifren thinks he has the “strength of character” to be a leader, but the reality seems to be he that he is not fit to be a teacher. Can one imagine him teaching a diverse classroom of students that includes Middle Easterners and Muslims? Can we trust him to to be respectful, even handed? In fact can we trust him to educate and open the minds of youth when the bigotry that he revels in indicates that his mind is narrow and constricted?

I urge readers to contact the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) to lodge a formal complaint that due to the preponderance of bigoted and hate filled comments by Rabbi Nachum Shifren he is not fit to teach in the school system and should be disciplined.

LAUSD information:

Address: 333 S. Beaudry Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90017
Phone: (213) 241-4131 (thanks Usman)

The Video from the Protest at UC Irvine of Israeli Ambassador, Michael Oren:

Pamela Has a Big Head-Courtesy of Lex, Agent of Chaos

How many times do we have to put Pamela Geller through the ringer of truth until people realize that she is a bigot who is doing the Tea Bag shuffle, and who created her site for no other reason then to unleash her guttural, hate filled venom against Islam and Mooslims.

The pathological liar was on CNN Headline News’ Joy Behar Show where she attempted to stick up for another crazy Conservative charlatan: Sarah Palin.  Yes, that is the same network which Geller labeled as part of the “whores in the media,” but I guess they are less “whorish” when they are giving you air time?  Geller just can’t let a good opportunity pass her by.

Anyway, back to the show. Geller looked like a complete buffoon, constantly tripping over words, talking about the parents of other guests and appearing as coherent as Rush Limbaugh high on prescription drugs.

Watch for yourself:

See what I mean? I don’t know how she made it on to the Joy Behar Show, but I think it was for comedic effect and also to lampoon the clinically insane Right-wing, as Charles Johnson noted, “If Joy Behar was trying to make the right wing blogosphere (and fans of Sarah Palin) look terrible, she couldn’t have picked a better person.”

Pamela Geller isn’t in tune with reality that is why she can claim that she knows more about Ronald Reagan than his son, her botox was almost melting off her face as she gesticulated wildly about how Sarah Palin is victimized.  It was a shame that Geller was allowed to shriek for the majority of the time, I wanted to hear the more intelligent Stephanie Miller who can combine wit with biting political analysis, but next time.

Also when Geller digresses into personal shots at other guests people should bring up her crazy, zany conspiracy theories and challenge her on her hate filled beliefs. I want to see her taken to task for her wild statements because it seems she doesn’t really think she will ever have to defend them.

Check out Charles Johson’s post on LGF: Pamela Geller Shrieks on Joy Behar Show

Pamela Geller’s appearance last night on the Joy Behar show with Ron Reagan and Stephanie Miller perfectly demonstrates why Geller has become known on the Internet as the “shrieking harpy.”

Geller actually seems to think she came off well on this show, in which she tells Ron Reagan what his own father would have thought about Sarah Palin, and rants continuously like a howler monkey on crack throughout the whole segment. Notice that it ends as Joy Behar tells Geller, “You have not shut up.”

This obnoxious performance was a big hit on the wingnut blogs, of course.

Pamela Geller is a full-on, raving Birther. She tried to claim Barack Obama is the love child of Malcolm X, and she wasn’t kidding. She regularly uses terms like “libtard,” calls President Obama “Hussein,” and often compares him to Adolf Hitler. She promotes the neo-Nazi British National Party, and praises other fascist groups like the English Defense League and the Vlaams Belang. She doesn’t just criticize radical Islam; she’s a flat out, bigoted Muslim-hater who believes that every single Muslim is a terrorist by nature. And she has the personality of a treacherous rattlesnake.

If Joy Behar was trying to make the right wing blogosphere (and fans of Sarah Palin) look terrible, she couldn’t have picked a better person.

Al-Farooq Mosque vandalized with the words "Muslims go home."

This could be the handy work of a left over from the Tea Bagger Convention, or some self-styled Knights Templar Crusader. The message is clear: “Muslims Go Home.” That is essentially the message preached by Robert Spencer, Pamela Geller and their fascist friends in Europe.

Nashville Mosque Vandalized

State, local and federal officials are investigating vandalism discovered this morning at the Al-Farooq Mosque on 4th Avenue South.

The words “Muslim go home” and several crosses were spray-painted in red on the exterior of the building, and an expletive and hate-speech filled note was left at the youth center, according to a board member of the mosque.

“It was an unexpected thing,” said Salaad Nur. “It kind of shook us.”

Metro Police Sgt. Brooks Harris said he has notified the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation as well as the FBI to look for potential similarities with vandalism late last year at a mosque site in Murfreesboro.

Brooks was unsure if there was any physical evidence that might help them solve the crime.

“The key issue is, we’re really looking at this together with our state and federal partners and doing everything we can to get to the bottom of this, prevent it, and if there’s a solvability factor, we’ll find it.”

"Muslims Go home"

The Cross spray painted on the Mosque

Muslim Mosque Association

Of course Robert Spencer will say Islamophobia doesn’t exist.

Categories: Arrests, California crime, Vandalism

The Looniest Blogger Ever: Pamela Geller

Pamela Geller is up to her old antics, employing more over the top hyperbole peppered with frequent cases of verbal diarrhea.  Now she is saying that the Holocaust was the fault of the Mooslims, and that the Nazis were just adopting “Jihad.”

Nazis adopted the Muslim idea of Jihad –  total destruction and complete annihilation in the spirit of a Holy War.

Of course this was the next step for Pam, demonize the Muslims and Islam to its logical end, next she will be saying that Hitler was a Muslim. Where does she get this wild stuff, and then she claims that she isn’t a conspiracy theorist?

Pamela Geller seems to have stumbled on something that World War II scholars and Holocaust historians didn’t know, a fact that has been “suppressed” by the world in a conspiracy to further Islamic Jihad,

As the leading role the Islamic world played in the Holocaust comes out of the shadows and into the fore, and decent peoples recoil in repulsion, it is necessary for Islamic media, “scholars” and asshats-in-residence to rewrite history — as Islam has done so exceedingly and singularly well all throughout history.

Pam wants us to believe that the colonized Muslims in Africa and Asia somehow made the regular trip to Concentration Camps to gas Jews, and then went back home to be ruled by Europeans? Insane.

Other Insane stuff on her blog:

The not so new crusade against Muslim Chaplains in prison is also making the rounds on the anti-Muslim sites, and Pamela Geller is no exception. She lays it out succinctly as only a proud bigot can,

All Muslim Chaplains are Jihadists

Her insanity on Barack continues, calls him an “Usurper,” “Megalomaniac”, and something called “L-Dopa.”

This is the face of the Tea Party right wing, and Conservative blogs love her because she gives them what they want to hear; hate.  At least it’s a good laugh.

Here is a blast from the past from Keith Olberman who recognized the insanity of Pamela Geller a long time ago.(hat tip: Pamela Geller)

This Kumar isn’t going to White Castle for some tasty burgers after a wild night out smoking weed, but is setting his sights on Congress.  The Kumar we are speaking of is the less well known Vijay Kumar, who was born in Hyderabad, India and immigrated to the US in 1979. We covered two other Conservative candidates, Allen West and Lynne Torgerson, who are running on an Islamophobic platform and Kumar is no different.

Kumar seems to fit into the tea-baggers portion of the Republican party. He is a hawk on all the issues, from gun rights to immigration and of course “national security.”  His website is littered with anti-Islamic rhetoric and innuendo while sounding as genuine as a snake oil salesman.

Vijay Kumar Running for Congress

Realistically Kumar has no prospect of winning even if he won the Republican primary, since the 5th Congressional District in Tennessee has been held by Democrats ever since Reconstruction, but anything can happen in the wily world of politics, especially when a candidate tries to play on the fears of the people.

The most instructional point that highlights Kumar’s vapid intelligence and parroting of other Conservatives is the conspiracy theory he furthers, that “Sharia is taking over the US.”

Sharia (Islamic) Law is slowly permeating America. We are focused on the global “War on Terror” and are ignoring a more dangerous threat developing right within our country.

Muslims are beginning to insist that they do not have to follow our laws and customs.

He is trying to whip up hysteria by focusing on a minority, which it turns out is not a threat to our country. According to the Pew and Gallup polls, Muslims in America are amongst the most law abiding citizens in the US and are obviously not advocating a replacement of our system of laws. One can only come to Kumar’s conclusion if you take the words of fringe extremists as representing the majority of Muslims, which is itself an essentialist process of logic.

We should roundly condemn and reject Islamic reasoning that our legal system is man-made and corrupt, while Islamic Sharia law is divine law. It is not the place of immigrants to our nation to rewrite our system of laws to suit their tastes.

Of course, no immigrant is trying to rewrite our system of laws (except maybe Orly Taitz), I haven’t seen a Sharia bill proposed by a Congressman yet but notice another interesting and revealing point, the disdain in which Kumar holds immigrants.  It seems to go right over Kumar’s head that he was an immigrant to this country and if he were by some freak miracle made a Congressman he would be writing and “re-writing laws.”  His implication is that immigrants have no place in America but to remain quiet and invisible.

All of this, when Christianity in this country is under siege by radical proponents of “separation of church and state.” Where is the outrage at these Muslim demands for special religious privilege? There seems to be no limit to the disregard for the American culture that allowed Muslims to settle in our country. How wonderful it would be if Christians enjoyed the same freedoms in Muslim nations as Muslims are taking advantage of in America. But they don’t and never will.

Christianity is under siege?  This is a country in which over 70% profess to be Christians, so it doesn’t look like Christianity is going anywhere nor is it threatened.  Kumar’s hypocrisy becomes evident, he complains that no one is watching over the Constitution as ‘evil Mooslim immigrants undermine it,’ but when it comes to his faith of choice he feels those who uphold the “separation of church and state” are radical.   One must ask Kumar where he stands in regards to the Dominionist beliefs that some of his Christian brethren harbor, does he support their cause to overturn the Constitution and replace it with Biblical laws?

In the end Kumar is just another wanna-be, right-wing, tea bag affiliated nauseating politician who attempts to sucker voters by playing off of xenophobia, hate, racism and patriotism.  A cocktail that thankfully will be rejected by most voters in his district.

Europol releases an annual study of terrorism; the results do not support claims that "(nearly) all Muslims are terrorists"

Islamophobes have been popularizing the claim that “not all Muslims are terrorists, but (nearly) all terrorists are Muslims.”  Despite this idea becoming axiomatic in some circles, it is quite simply not factual.  In my previous article entitled “All Terrorists are Muslims…Except the 94% that Aren’t”, I used official FBI records to show that only 6% of terrorist attacks on U.S. soil from 1980 to 2005 were carried out by Islamic extremists.  The remaining 94% were from other groups (42% from Latinos, 24% from extreme left wing groups, 7% from extremist Jews, 5% from communists, and 16% from all other groups).

But what about across the pond?  The data gathered by Europol strengthens my argument even further. (hat tip: Koppe)  Europol publishes an annual report entitled EU Terrorism Situation and Trend Report.  On their official website, you can access the reports from 2007, 2008, and 2009.  (If anyone can find the reports from earlier than that, please let me know so we can include those as well.)

The results are stark, and prove decisively that not all terrorists are Muslims.  In fact, a whopping 99.6% of terrorist attacks in Europe were by non-Muslim groups; a good 84.8% of attacks were from separatist groups completely unrelated to Islam.  Leftist groups accounted for over sixteen times as much terrorism as radical Islamic groups.  Only a measly 0.4% of terrorist attacks from 2007 to 2009 could be attributed to extremist Muslims.

Here are the official tables provided in the reports…

For 2006:

For 2007:

For 2008:

(According to the report, there was 1 “Islamist attack” in the UK in 2008, which was omitted in the table above.  It has been included in the bar graph below.)

Just glancing at those tables is enough to know how absurd it is to claim that “all terrorists are Muslims.”  That statement is nowhere near the truth.  If we compile the data, it comes out to this:

On p.7, the 2009 Europol report concludes:

Islamist terrorism is still perceived as being the biggest threat worldwide, despite the fact that the EU only faced one Islamist terrorist attack in 2008.  This bomb attack took place in the UK…Separatist terrorism remains the terrorism area which affects the EU most. This includes Basque separatist terrorism in Spain and France, and Corsican terrorism in France…Past contacts between ETA and the FARC illustrate the fact that also separatist terrorist organizations seek cooperation partners outside the EU on the basis of common interests.  In the UK, dissident Irish republican groups, principally the RIRA and the CIRA, and other paramilitary groups may continue to engage in crime and violence.

Perception is not reality.  Due to the right wing’s influence and propaganda, people mistakenly think that Islamic terrorism is the greatest threat to the Western world.  It is even a commonly held belief that Islamic terrorism poses an existential threat–that the very survival of the Western world is at stake.  Of course, the reality is that there are other groups that engage in terrorism on a much larger scale, yet these terrorist incidents are minimized.  Acts of terrorism committed by Muslims are purposefully sensationalized and focused upon, culminating in the idea that “(nearly) all terrorists are Muslims.”

Terrorism from Islamic extremists is certainly a cause for concern, but it need not be an issue that creates mass hysteria.  Nor should it be allowed to be such a critical issue that we are willing to sacrifice our ideals or civil rights for fear of it.  Neither should we be reduced to a status of absolute sissitude.  We have analyzed data from America and Europe (a good portion of the entire Western world), and the threat from Islamic terrorism is much more minimal than commonly assumed; in the U.S., it accounts for 6% of terrorist attacks, and in Europe not even half of a percent.

It is only through sensationalism and fear mongering that the topic of Islamic terrorism is allowed to be used to demonize a religious community that happens to be a minority in the West.  When confronted by such lunacy, we ought to respond with the facts and the truth.

In a future article, we shall analyze the data for terrorism on the world stage in order to further strengthen our argument…

God's Law vs the laws of man

Shortly after the Fort Hood Shooting, I published an article entitled Muslim Americans Must Obey U.S. Laws; Major Nidal Hasan Violated Islamic Doctrine, in which I detailed how Islamic doctrine dictates that Muslims  are religiously obligated to obey the laws of the land.  (This is similar to the Jewish concept of dina d’malchuta dina.)  The article generated an interesting discussion, with Islamophobes struggling to prove that Major Nidal Hasan’s treason was sanctioned by the Islamic religion.

An Islamophobe who routinely comments on our site posted the following:

Volume 4, Book 52, Number 203:

Narrated Ibn ‘Umar:

The ‘Prophet said, “It is obligatory for one to listen to and obey (the ruler’s orders) unless these orders involve one disobedience (to Allah); but if an act of disobedience (to Allah) is imposed, he should not listen to or obey it.”

This hadith, and others similar to it, are used by Islamophobes to call into question the loyalty of Muslim Americans.  Muslims must obey the Sharia over and above the Constitution, they bellow. Yet, what these self-proclaimed defenders of the Western Judeo-Christian tradition fail to mention is that Christians believe in obeying God’s Law (the Christian Sharia) over and above the laws of the land.  If God’s Law and the Constitution were to be in conflict, the Christian would be religiously obligated to follow the former.

Let’s take a gander at some reputable Christian “fatwa sites”…The Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry decrees:

[Question:] Shall we obey God’s Law or human law?

[Answer:] …The simple answer is that Christians are to obey human law except where that human law violates God’s Law.  Our supreme duty is to obey God.  Since God tells us to also obey human laws, we should.  But, when they come in conflict, we are to “obey God rather than men.”

GotQuestions.org says (emphasis is mine):

Question: “Do Christians have to obey the laws of the land?”

Answer: …We are to obey the government God places over us…

The next question is “Is there a time when we should intentionally disobey the laws of the land?” The answer to that question may be found in Acts 5:27-29, “Having brought the apostles, they made them appear before the Sanhedrin to be questioned by the high priest. ‘We gave you strict orders not to teach in this Name,’ he said. ‘Yet you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and are determined to make us guilty of this man’s blood.’ Peter and the other apostles replied: ‘We must obey God rather than men!’” From this, it is clear that as long as the law of the land does not contradict the law of God, we are bound to obey the law of the land. As soon as the law of the land contradicts God’s command, we are to disobey the law of the land and obey God’s law…

And the same site says elsewhere:

God commands us to obey the governmental authorities. The only allowance we have for disobeying the authorities is if they demand that we disobey something God has commanded (Acts 5:29)

And:

Romans 13:1-7 makes it abundantly clear that God expects us to obey the laws of the government. The ONLY exception to this is when a law of the government forces you to disobey a command of God (Acts 5:29).

In fact, the Christian apologist Hugo Grotius (1583-1645)–who is called “the father of modern international law”–writes in his book The Law of War and Peace (as quoted on p.184 of William J Federer’s The Ten Commandments and Their Influence on American Law):

Among all good men one principle at any rate is established beyond controversy, that if the authorities issue any order that is contrary to the law of nature or to the commandments of God, the order should not be carried out. For when the Apostles said the obedience should be rendered to God rather than to men they appealed to an infallible rule of action.

In Judaism as well, there are times when a Jew is obligated to break the laws of the land; Rabbi Israel Schneider writes:

Indeed, there are times when the civil law, in conflict with the halacha [Jewish Law], is not binding.

In fact, this has created problems for the peace process, with some Jews refusing to evacuate the illegal settlements, thereby breaking international law in favor of their interpretation of the Halacha.  The Jerusalem Post writes:

Ex-IDF rabbis: Halacha is above military orders

A group of seven former IDF rabbis, including the former chief rabbis of the air force, the navy and the IDF Educational Division, have declared that in situations where Halacha and military orders clash, Halacha takes precedence.

So this belief, of following God’s commands above man’s, is shared by all three of the Abrahamic faiths.  It is strange then that Islamophobes, the self-proclaimed defenders of the Western Judeo-Christian tradition, only fear monger when it comes to Islamic beliefs.  It is this huge double standard that we have come to expose on our site.

Addendum:

A Muslim is religiously obligated to obey the laws of the land he lives in.  But he is only religiously permitted to live in non-Muslim lands in which he is free to practice his religion.  If the laws of the land would compel him to sin, then the Muslim is commanded to emigrate to another land where this is not the case.  (He is advised to leave the land, but is not permitted to rebel against the authority.)  Muslim Americans feel comfortable living in the United States of America, because of the country’s dedication to maintaining the freedom of worship.  As such, they feel there is no conflict between being an observant Muslim on the one hand and an American citizen on the other.

Muslim Americans are naturally weary of fighting their coreligionists in foreign wars that they feel are illegal and immoral.  However, there is currently no draft, and there has not been one for over thirty years.  (The draft is unconstitutional.)  As such, Muslims are not forced to fight in wars they feel are religiously impermissible, and thus there is no conflict.  At the same time, Muslim Americans feel that they have a very important role to play, building lines of communication and understanding between Muslims and Americans.  Muslim Americans believe in using all legal and peaceful political means at their disposal to bring their country away from war and to the path of peace.

And by never again, we mean never again to the Jews

CNN recently published an article entitled Study: Threat of Muslim-American terrorism in U.S. exaggerated; according to a study released by Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, “the terrorist threat posed by radicalized Muslim-Americans has been exaggerated.”

Yet, Americans continue to live in mortal fear of radical Islam, a fear propagated and inflamed by right wing Islamophobes.  If one follows the cable news networks, it seems as if all terrorists are Muslims.  It has even become axiomatic in some circles to chant: “Not all Muslims are terrorists, but nearly all terrorists are Muslims.” Muslims and their “leftist dhimmi allies” respond feebly, mentioning Waco as the one counter example, unwittingly affirming the belief that “nearly all terrorists are Muslims.”

But perception is not reality.  The data simply does not support such a hasty conclusion.  On the FBI’s official website, there exists a chronological list of all terrorist attacks committed on U.S. soil from the year 1980 all the way to 2005.  That list can be accessed here (scroll down all the way to the bottom).

Terrorist Attacks on U.S. Soil by Group, From 1980 to 2005, According to FBI Database

According to this data, there were more Jewish acts of terrorism within the United States than Islamic (7% vs 6%).  These radical Jews committed acts of terrorism in the name of their religion.  These were not terrorists who happened to be Jews; rather, they were extremist Jews who committed acts of terrorism based on their religious passions, just like Al-Qaeda and company.

Yet notice the disparity in media coverage between the two.  It would indeed be very interesting to construct a corresponding pie chart that depicted the level of media coverage of each group.  The reason that Muslim apologists and their “leftist dhimmi allies” cannot recall another non-Islamic act of terrorism other than Waco is due to the fact that the media gives menial (if any) coverage to such events.  If a terrorist attack does not fit the “Islam is the perennial and existential threat of our times” narrative, it is simply not paid much attention to, which in a circuitous manner reinforces and “proves” the preconceived narrative.  It is to such an extent that the average American has no image of his head of any Jewish or Latino terrorist; why should he when he has never even heard of the Jewish Defense League or the Ejercito Popular Boricua Macheteros?  Surely what he does not know does not exist!

The Islamophobes claim that Islam is intrinsically a terroristy religion.  The proof?  Well, just about every terrorist attack is Islamic, they retort.  Unfortunately for them, that’s not quite true.  More like six percent.  Using their defunct logic, these right wingers ought now to conclude that nearly all acts of terrorism are committed by Latinos (or Jews).  Let them dare say it…they couldn’t; it would be political and social suicide to say such a thing. Most Americans would shut down such talk as bigoted; yet, similar statements continue to be said of Islam, without any repercussions.

The Islamophobes live in a fantasy world where everyone is supposedly too “politically correct” to criticize Islam and Muslims.  Yet, the reality is the exact opposite: you can get away with saying anything against the crescent.  Can you imagine the reaction if I said that Latinos should be profiled because after all they are the ones who commit the most terrorism in the country?  (For the record: I don’t believe in such profiling, because I am–unlike the right wing nutters–a believer in American ideals.)

The moral of the story is that Americans ought to calm down when it comes to Islamic terrorism.  Right wingers always live in mortal fear–or rather, they try to make you feel that way.  In fact, Pamela Geller (the queen of internet Islamophobia) literally said her mission was to “scare the bejeezus outta ya.” Don’t be fooled, and don’t be a wuss.  You don’t live in constant fear of radicalized Latinos (unless you’re Lou Dobbs), even though they commit seven times more acts of terrorism than Muslims in America.  Why then are you wetting yourself over Islamic radicals?  In the words of Cenk Uygur: you’re at a ten when you need to be at a four.  Nobody is saying that Islamic terrorism is not a matter of concern, but no more so than the acts of terrorism committed by people of other faiths.  So calm the bleep down, and continue living your life.

UPDATE:

A reader by the name of Dima added:

The FBI Terrorism Report shows…[that] the highest number of terrorist incidents in the U.S. by region (90) took place in Puerto Rico.

SECOND UPDATE:

An Islamophobe commented on this article, saying that the statistics are flawed because they would count small acts such as “stealing rats from a lab” as an act of terrorism.  Of course, this is patently false.  Here is a breakdown of the terrorist attacks by type (the pie chart is from the FBI’s official website and can be accessed here):

Terrorism by Event, From 1980 to 2005, According to FBI Database

Robert Spencer with loon Pamela Geller

Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer are joining forces (a regular occurrence) and holding an “event” at the  Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) slated for February 19 from 10 am until noon. CPAC is billed as the “preeminent yearly conservative gathering” and will have such worthies as Glenn Beck (who will be the keynote speaker), Andrew Breitbart, John Ashcroft, Rush Limbaugh, Rick Santorum and many others. The sponsors include such far right-wing organizations as the David Horowitz Freedom Center, the John Birch Society, Focus on the Family, the Heritage Foundation and others.

I imagine there will be a cadre of undercover liberals and documentarians, the Max Blumenthal’s of the world who will cover all the craziness that we are accustomed to from right-wingers. If he is there, I am sure one of his exposes will be covering the anti-Muslim loonacy sure to be on display at the Geller-Spencer event.

Pamela Geller brought to our attention the event over on her website Atlas Drugs, oh excuse me Atlas Shrugs in which she practically begs for donations because she complains that she is not funded by big right wing groups or persons (just ask your buddy Spencer he gets paid a pretty penny by the David Horowitz Freedom Foundation). We can’t confirm whether Geller gets funded but it is a little hard to believe she doesn’t have her hand deep into the pockets of the right-wing hate racket.

Here is the hilarious post from Pam replete with her usual over the top verbiage and endless hyperbole:

Last year in an unprecedented event at CPAC, Geert Wilders met Joe Sixpack, and it was good.

This year, Atlas does not disappoint. We are ratcheting it up a few notches. Robert Spencer and I are organizing a joint venture to educate, elucidate and scare the bejeezus outta ya. (emphasis added)

Pam sums up in one sentence what her and her friends’ agenda is with regards to “Mooslims” and “Islam,” “to scare the bejeezus outta ya!” Can it be any clearer they are using the buffoons on their site, manipulating them with fear mongering, but don’t expect the zombies who are deluded into following her to budge because it seems they love a good horror show.

THIS IS A NOT A CPAC EVENT - THIS IS A GELLER-SPENCER EVENT.

Jihad: The Political Third Rail
What they’re not telling us about the war on America

It’s Friday, February 19th from 10 am until Noon.

We are still firming our speakers up, but here is a list of the invited:

Wafa Sultan [confirmed]
Doctor, author, “A God Who Hates”

Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff [confirmed]
Criminal complaint filed for  “hate speech” under Austrian law
Human Rights Activist

Steve Coughlin [confirmed]
Leading Islamic Specialist at the Pentagon, who was fired by Islamic infiltrators

Simon Deng
Former Slave in Sudan, leading human rights activist against jihad

Lt. Colonel Allen West [confirmed]
Running for Congress, Future Leadership

Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer

Invited:

Rifqa Bary [invited]
teenage apostate

Kurt Westergaard [invited]
Danish cartoonist targeted for death by axe-wielding Muslim

The latest assassination attempt on Kurt Westergaard’s life by an axe-wielding Muslim (in his home with his five year old granddaughter present) has thrown an axe a wrench into this …………

Rifqa Bary is a free American. She should be free to speak anywhere she wants. Should she not?

Plan to be at CPAC this year, or at least in DC, and set aside Friday, February 19th from 10 am to noon. I need your help getting it off the ground. I will not be charging for attendance, but it costs.

No one underwrites me. No one. Not a penny.

All of these right wing organizations have donors, big donors, small donors …. and fund raising arms. They are, by their very nature, fund raising machines. Not Atlas.

Huge thanks to BigFurHat for the killer art ………. he’s da best!

If you can contribute, please do (and those who have — G-d bless you).

The woman is after money! Does she have any self-respect at all?

Look at the all stars on the list of confirmed speakers, they include Wafa Sultan (bettter known as Wafa Stalin) who we exposed as a hateful, lying poseur playing off the ignorance of her audience and also an advocate for Nuking Muslims.  There is the Austrian, Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff whose claim to fame is that she has been charged with hate speech for saying “Muslims rape children” and believes that Austria’s culture is in danger because of Islam. There is Steve Coughlin who we are supposed to believe was an Islam specialist and was “fired from the Pentagon” by so-called “Islamic infiltrators.” Maybe these infiltrators were also the Islamic congressional interns who were “spying” on America for the world-wide Khaliphate? There is Simon Deng who seems to have taken his horrible experience in the Sudan into an all out crusade against Muslims, and of course there is the Biblical Literalist Allen West, the near court-martialed former lieutenant running for Congress on the platform that Palestine should not exist and that all Palestinians should move to Jordan.

Seems like a swell bunch doesn’t it? Well it doesn’t end there, they also “invited” Fathima Rifqa Bary, the poor girl whose life they have constantly intefered in and labeled as the “apostate.” Throughout the whole saga involving Rifqa Bary it is instructional to note that it is only Pam’s group that have been eager to label her an “apostate,” none of those evil Mooslim organizations, ISNA, CAIR, MPAC, ICNA, MAS, Muslim Advocates, etc. have ever called her “apostate.”

So if you want to get together to see a group of flunkies, bigots, charlatan’s and clowns then don’t miss out on this show February 19th that will “scare the beejuzus outta ya!”

Robert Spencer

A while back FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting) came out with an expose on some of the most influential and bigoted Islamophobes in the US. It is a report that well worth the read, and as you can guess Robert Spencer was one of the Islamophobes profiled.

Check it out:

Robert Spencer

According to the American Muslim and former Nixon advisor Robert Crane (TheAmericanMuslim.org, 10/20/07), Robert Spencer is “the principal leader…in the new academic field of Islam-bashing.”

Spencer is the author of several books attacking Islam, including the New York Times bestsellers The Truth About Muhammad, Founder of the World’s Most Intolerant Religion (Regnery, 2006) and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) (Regnery, 2005). He is the publisher of the “notoriously Islamophobic website” Jihad Watch (Guardian, 2/7/06), a subsidiary of the David Horowitz Freedom Center; a columnist for right-wing outlets like Human Events and WorldNetDaily; and a recurring guest on Glenn Beck’s CNN Headline News show, as well as several Fox News shows.

Though his scholarship has been questioned by Islamic scholars (e.g. Crane, TheAmericanMuslim.org, 10/20/07; Louay M. Safi, Media Monitors Network, 12/29/05; Khaleel Mohammed, FrontPage Magazine, 4/18/05), Spencer serves as an intellectual force in the movement, specializing in one-sided interpretations of the Quran. He has written (cited in Crane, TheAmericanMuslim.org, 10/20/07) of Osama bin Laden’s use of quotes from the Quran:

Of course, the devil can quote scripture for his own purpose, but Osama’s use of these and other passages in his messages is consistent (as we shall see) with traditional understanding of the Quran. When modern-day Jews and Christians read their Bibles, they simply don’t interpret the passages cited as exhorting them to violent actions against unbelievers. This is due to the influence of centuries of interpretative traditions that have moved them away from literalism regarding these passages. But in Islam, there is no comparable interpretative tradition.

Yet Islam does in fact have an interpretive tradition, which Spencer seems bent on ignoring. His New York Times bestseller The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam has been faulted (Crane, AmericanMuslim.org, 10/20/07) for promoting a Puffin English-language version of the Quran that contains no explanatory commentary as superior to versions which include “many thousands of footnotes evaluating 14 centuries of interpretative tradition” and “the wealth of classical Islamic scholarship on both the inner and outer meaning of the Quran and on the hadith that reflect this wisdom.”

According to Crane, “Spencer’s readers are carefully steered away from all contact with the Islamic interpretative tradition, which equals or exceeds that of any other religion, because any scholarly knowledge about Islam would expose all his extremist interpretations to ridicule.”

By selectively ignoring inconvenient Islamic texts and commentaries, Spencer concludes that Islam is innately extremist and violent, and

Unfortunately, however, jihad as warfare against non-believers in order to institute “Sharia” worldwide is not propaganda or ignorance, or a heretical doctrine held by a tiny minority of extremists. Instead, it is a constant element of mainstream Islamic theology. (Jihad Watch, 3/3/07).

Of course, a similarly selective reading of the Torah might lead one to conclude that Jews favor killing homosexuals, as well as those who wear garments that mix cotton and wool. Spencer’s methods have prompted even conservatives such as Dinesh D’Souza (who challenged his views on Islam in a C-SPAN debate–3/1/07– and on his blog–AOL News Bloggers, 3/2/07) and Stephen Schwartz (FrontPageMag.com, 10/28/04) to denounce him as one-sided and intolerant.

But those methods have made Spencer a mainstay in the Islamophobia circuit, featured, for example, at Horowitz’s 2007 Islamofascism Awareness events. And they haven’t decreased his popularity in official circles: His website boasts that he has led seminars on Islam and jihad for, among others, the U.S. Central Command, the Department of Homeland Security, the Joint Terrorism Task Force and “the U.S. intelligence community.”

Pat Robertson

The earthquake in Haiti and its tragic aftermath has been consuming the airwaves and media at large with many rushing to aid Haiti in this time of dire need. Then there are those who are using this situation to mock Haiti and claim that this is just retribution.

In what can only be termed as a racist apology for colonialism and imperialism Pat Robertson essentially stated that the Haitians didn’t fight for their independence and freedom but instead “swore a pact with the devil” in which they would “serve him” if he gets rid of the French. This sounds like the narrative the defeated French would create to explain how they lost their colony to “blacks” and to soothe their hurt honor.

As many of you may well know, I am writing a rebuttal of Robert Spencer’s book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades).  In chapter five of his Islamophobook, Spencer discusses the issue of Sharia and rape.  I have completed part 1 of my rebuttal, which can be found here.  As I was ferociously typing up part 2, it dawned on me that my audience may be unfamiliar with the Quranic verses in question, making it difficult for some of them to properly grasp the issue–or of fully understanding part 2 of my rebuttal.

Hence, I have decided to publish this article as a sort of background piece to part 2 of my rebuttal.  As such, it will not be–like my other articles–a direct refutation of Robert Spencer.  However, I believe that this article will serve a two-fold purpose.  First, it will, as I have discussed, provide the background necessary to properly understand part 2 of my rebuttal.  Second, it will clear up misconceptions about Islam…misconceptions that Islamophobes use as a big stick to whack Muslims over the head with.

Many people erroneously think that all mainstream interpretations of Islam necessarily criminalize zinnah (fornication and adultery)–fornicators are to be lashed and adulterers stoned, no questions asked.  Such a fundamentalist mentality clashes with the Western concept of freedom of choice; it is for this reason that Islamophobes argue that religious Muslims are intrinsically incompatible with Western values.  However, it is important to recognize the multiplicity of Islamic understandings that exist today; I will categorize the various interpretations of the anti-zinnah laws into fundamentalist, conservative, and reformist views.  Clearly, fundamentalist understandings ought not to be tolerated, but I would argue that reformist views (and perhaps conservative ones) are not completely incompatible with Western ideals…at least not any less so than Judaic and Christian views.

Background

According to the Law of Moses, as followed by the early Jewish community, the death penalty was meted out to adulterers; the Old Testament reads:

The adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death. (Leviticus, 20:10)

In order to be found guilty of adultery, there had to be two witnesses of good character who testified against the adulterers:

At the testimony of two or three witnesses they must be executed. They cannot be put to death on the testimony of only one witness. (Deuteronomy, 17:6)

Jewish rabbis dealt with this seemingly harsh law by purposefully making it difficult for the “prosecution” to meet the required burden of proof to secure a conviction.  They argued, for instance, that both witnesses must have (1) warned the adulterers of the graveness of their sin prior to the commission of the act, and (2) that they must have witnessed the actual act itself.  Naturally, these restrictions made the enforcement of this penalty a rare event.

Muslims believe in something called “progressive revelation”: accordingly, God revealed the Old Testament to the Jews, then the New Testament to the Christians, and lastly the “Final Testament” (the Quran) to the Muslims.  As such, there is–according to Islamic belief–a divine continuity in religious belief between Judaism, Christianity, and Islam; Islamic law (Sharia) is based in the Law of Moses, a continuation and “perfection” of it.

According to Islamic tradition, God–out of mercy for the people–softened the harsh Law: the Sharia al-Islam (Law of Islam) is and ought to be, they argue, an “easy law” that is milder than the Sharia al-Yahud (Law of the Jews). The Islamic texts, for example, narrate that some Jews approached the Prophet Muhammad for rulings, saying: “Let us go to this prophet, for he has been sent with an easy law.” ^[1] (The authenticity of the quote is irrelevant, as it is here being used only to illustrate the Muslim perception of their own law.) Consequently, reason the Muslims, God made the evidentiary requirement for the harsh anti-zinnah laws even more unattainable: the burden of proof was raised from two to four witnesses.  In this manner, the people were saved from severe punishments.

The doubling of the witnesses, from two to four, took place at a time when women were often accused of fornication, adultery, and harlotry.  Even if a woman could not be convicted of this charge, her reputation (and life) would be ruined.  To prevent this occurrence, the Quran stipulated that not only had the burden of proof been raised to four witnesses, but if a man dared accuse a woman of sexual immorality with anything less than that, he would be punished for slander:

And those who accuse chaste women [of fornication or adultery] and then do not produce four witnesses–lash them with eighty lashes and do not accept from them testimony ever after. And those are the defiantly disobedient. (Quran, 24:4-5)

The Prophet Muhammad gave details about this verse, seemingly affirming the restrictions placed by the Jewish rabbis, namely that the four witnesses (1) had to be of good character and (2) had to have actually witnessed the act of penetration; as Imam Mawsili and other jurists worded it, the witnesses must see the penis enter the vagina like the “Kohl needle entering the Kohl bottle.” ^[2]

According to Islamic doctrine, Muslims of good character must not gaze on the private parts of others; as such, the two conditions placed by the Prophet Muhammad seem to negate each other.  If after all the four witnesses had gazed on the private parts, then they could not possibly be considered of good character; why did they not avert their gaze?  Why did they not warn the sinners to cease and desist from their sin?  The burden of proof for zinnah thus became “near impossible” to meet, and in this manner, men were restrained from throwing around accusations of sexual immorality against women, for fear of being lashed for slander.

Fundamentalist Interpretation

Fundamentalist Muslims do not take into consideration mitigating texts.  Instead, they see that a verse in the Quran seems to advocate punishment for zinnah (fornication and adultery), and they rush to judgment, lashing and stoning on whim.  Contrary to popular misconception, fundamentalists usually lack rigorous religious education; at most, they may have attended substandard madrasahs (religious schools), but in general they are ignorant of the vast jurisprudential tradition of Islam.  Most importantly, they do not engage in contextual and inter-textual analytical exegesis of the Quran.  Reformist (and even conservative) Muslims argue that fundamentalists flout the very Quran that they claim to be following: by not assiduously adhering to the high evidentiary requirement prescribed by Islamic law, the fundamentalists have created a persecuting state–where citizens live in mortal fear of the heavy handed government.

Conservative Interpretation

Although on principle they agree that the anti-zinnah laws are Islamic, conservative Muslims follow the traditional Islamic view of what I call “religious obstructionism.”  On the one hand classical jurists affirmed the harsh penalties for lashing and stoning, but on the other hand they set up many roadblocks and obstacles to the enforcement of such penalties, making it “near impossible” to enact them.  This obstructionist approach is not unfamiliar, as it finds prominence in the Jewish rabbinical tradition.  Conservative Muslims today have adopted just such an approach, arguing that the four witnesses requirement is theoretically possible but practically improbable.

Conservative Muslims agree with reformist Muslims that the fundamentalists are incorrect in their haphazard and dangerous interpretation of the law. According to the conservative Muslims, the punishments of stoning and lashing would fall into almost complete (if not complete) disuse.  But it should be understood that they would block the enforcement of such penalties on a case-by-case basis, instead of the top-down approach of reformists.  Furthermore, the stoppage would be based not on a principled indignation but on a micro-technical legalistic level.  Dr. Khaled Abou El Fadl writes:

Muslim jurists questioned the morality of the death penalty, and also questioned whether the state should be allowed to execute its own citizens.  The way Muslim jurists responded to these challenges was to seek refuge in the technicalities of the law.  In other words, the juristic response was legalistic and profoundly technical.  Working with the micro-details and technicalities of the law, Muslim jurists challenged the discretion of the state and made it difficult for the state to carry out the death penalty, and also made it difficult for the state to claim that it had complied with all the procedural and evidentiary requirements in its application of this ultimate punishment…

The point is that the juristic response was legalistic, technical, and creative.  In light of the decisive and grave consequences of the death sentence, Muslim jurists were not willing to accept it without qualifications, and they seemed to have struggled with its implications and impact.  As often happens in a legalistic interpretive culture [such as the rabbinical tradition], Muslims jurists did not respond at the conceptualized or broad theory level.  While they accepted the death penalty in principle, at the level of the process and implementation, they made the infliction of the death penalty difficult…The moral paradigm that inspired Muslim jurists to endeavor to avoid the death penalty is well represented in an educational message that teachers of Islamic law in the classical age often repeated and emphasized to their students.  The message provided was this…It is always better to save the life of a thousand guilty persons than to unwittingly murder a single innocent person. ^[3]

Similar interpretations abound in the Jewish rabbinical tradition, resulting in what the Jewish Encyclopedia calls “the practical impossibility of convicting any adulteress” ^[4]–a phrase similar to the Islamic “near impossible.”  Conservative Muslims agree that the conviction of adulterers against their will is theoretically but not practically possible.

Reformist Interpretation

Reformist Muslims go one step further, and approach the issue from a more theoretical standpoint.  They focus more on the higher ethical objectives of the Islamic law (maqasid al-Sharia), from which they derive the Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh).  Reformist Muslims argue that the “near impossible” evidentiary requirement indicates that the anti-zinnah laws are meant not as laws of enforcement but of symbolic deterrence.  They believe that the Sharia was designed in such a way as to promote a more detached government with a very limited scope of powers; accordingly, reformists argue that the personal sexual lives of its citizens do not fall under the jurisdiction of the ideal Islamic state.  What goes on in the privacy of one’s own bedroom between two consenting adults by cover of night is not the business of the state.  As the Prophet Muhammad declared:

All of my community will be fine except for those who commit sin openly. Part of committing sin openly is when a man does something at night and God conceals it, but in the morning he says, “O So-and-so, last night I did such and such.” His Lord had covered his sin all night, but in the morning he removed the cover of God. ^[5]

A similar narration exists from the second Caliph of Islam:

A man came to the Prophet and said: “O Apostle of God! I have mingled with a woman in the outskirts of Medina…So, here am I, judge me according to what you decide.”

Umar bin Khattab replied: “God had kept your secret!  Why then didn’t you?” ^[6]

This indicates that the Islamic government’s role is primarily only in matters of the public square, not in the bedrooms of its citizens.  Meddling in the personal affairs of citizenry is both unnecessary and inappropriate.  Islam values the privacy of citizens, and forbids the government from spying on its citizens; it is for this reason that many Muslim Americans strongly believe in the fourth amendment and other such “privacy laws” enshrined in the American legal system.  Certainly, reason these Muslims, a government ought not to meddle in a citizen’s personal sex life.  According to Islam, the privacy of a person’s home must be respected by all others and is inviolable, such that even peeking through windows to see inside is forbidden, even for the Caliph (leader) of the Muslims:

The secrecy of the private life is untouchable.

The Qur’an decisively prohibits spying into and disclosing the secrets and private lives of people, and orders keeping secret any detect and sinful act which one has seen in a person: O you believe! Avoid much suspicion, for some suspicion is a grave sin (liable to God’s punishment); and do not spy (on one another) (Qur’an 49:12). Neither can a Muslim government spy on people to see whether they are committing a sin or crime unless there is decisive proof that they are committing something against the public peace. Likewise, spying into homes, opening and reading letters that belong to others, and listening to the conversations of other people are all wrong.

The second caliph of Islam, Umar ibn al-Khattab, was once walking on the streets of Medina, the capital, at night. Suddenly he heard noise coming from one of the houses, a noise indicating that somebody was drunk and singing loudly. Umar climbed over the wall, entered the house, and witnessed a very disappointing situation. He complained of the situation to the man inside, and said, “Did you think that God would allow you to hide this fault of yours?” The man replied, “O Caliph of the Muslims, stop and don’t rush. I committed one sin in the eyes of God; however, you have made three mistakes here. First of all, God says, Do not spy on one another (Qur’an 49:12), but you spied on me. Second, God says, Come to dwellings (in the normal way) by their doors (Qur’an 2:189), but you climbed over my wall, and finally God says, O you who believe! Do not enter dwellings other than your own until you have ascertained the permission of their residents and have greeted them with peace (Qur’an 24:27), but you entered my house without getting my permission and you did not greet me with peace.”

Umar was very upset with himself and replied, “If I forgive you, will you forgive me?” The man said, “Yes.” Then Umar said, “I forgive you,” and left the house. ^[7]

While the reformist Muslims affirm the judicial obstructionism of the conservatives, they bolster it by giving it a principled and conceptual basis.  This top-down understanding then is that private sins are between an individual and God; although such sins carry a heavenly punishment, they are generally not punished in this worldly life.  Of course, God’s heavenly punishment is stricter, which is why believers are commanded to cease and desist from their sins, and to repent sincerely.  “And God is Most Forgiving, Most Merciful.”

What’s the Point?

All of this discussion invariably leads a non-believer to ask: what’s the point of a law and a prescribed punishment if its enforcement is “near impossible”?  Wouldn’t it simply have been easier and more intuitive to have no such law to begin with?  Perhaps.  But the faithful believe that God acts in mysterious ways, the true reasons known only to Him.

Nonetheless, contemporary Muslims speculate that God prescribed a punishment that could not realistically be enforced for four reasons: (1) It is a legacy inherited from the Law of Moses, i.e. Sharia al-Yahud (Law of the Jews).  In other words, the punishment for adultery used to be much easier to carry out and was indeed done so.  This was for the people who came before Ummatul Muhammad (nation of Muhammad); it is understood by Muslims that the Law as prescribed to Bani Israel was decidedly much stricter.  Even Moses implored God to have more mercy on the community of Muhammad, fearful that the strict Law would break their backs.  Therefore, the harsh punishment legislated by the Old Law was made impotent by creating such a high evidentiary burden that it became impossible to fulfill.  Such a belief is consistent with the Islamic doctrine of progressive revelation.

To reiterate, the answer to “wouldn’t it be simpler to not have such a law to begin with?” is that the law was inherited from previous nations.  Muslims believe that the Islamic community was honored by inheriting the Abrahamic law and tradition; therefore, although the Law could be tweaked, it ought not to be abandoned or replaced altogether.  Rather, it was–according to an Islamic understanding–modified and “perfected” with mercy.  The anti-zinnah laws are based then in Abrahamic precedence, and are therefore affirmed but in a merciful and lenient way.  This explains why Muslims do not simply do away with the anti-zinnah laws altogether.  They honor the Abrahamic tradition but without the enforcement of harsh penalties for fornication and adultery, which have become symbolic in nature.

(2) The second reason is that the Sharia is making a moral point by associating in the mind of the believer an extremely harsh punishment with fornication and adultery, thereby making clear the gravity of the sin.  In Islamic quarters it is argued that contemporary society has made both fornication and adultery socially acceptable.  The Islamic law, on the other hand, equates these sins with lashing and death, even if these punishments are not generally enforced.

Dr. Khaled Abou El Fadl writes:

Obviously, in Islamic law the crime of fornication or adultery is hard, if not impossible, to prove. So why have the punishment at all? There are two competing values here.

Illicit sexual relations must be condemned. At the same time, people should mind their own business, and spying or slandering cannot be tolerated. The solution was to make the moral point that fornication and adultery are terrible crimes, and only if they could be proven would they be punished severely. Nevertheless, the issue is generally between a person and God. ^[8]

(3) Furthermore, in the largely illiterate societies of the past, it is likely that only the Islamic jurists were cognizant of the “judicial obstructionism” that saves believers from punishment.  As such, the law served as a deterrence, even if it were not in reality enforced.  This is similar to a parent threatening a child with an extremely harsh punishment simply as a scare tactic, knowing full well that he/she would never actually enforce it.  The threatening of punishment is thus a mercy in a way, as it causes a person to correct his/her conduct which will benefit him/her both in this life and the next.

(4) Following the third point, it is understood by contemporary Muslims that the law is one of deterrence, not of enforcement.  As the conservative Islamic scholar Muhammad ibn Adam al-Kawthari writes:

One should always keep in mind the objective and spirit of Shariah concerning the various legal punishments. The idea is not to enforce the punishment and make people suffer; rather the objective is to prevent harm, corruption and immorality in the society. Thus, legal punishments act as deterrents more than actually get people punished…

An example of this which comes to mind is that we see speed cameras being placed on many roads and streets (especially here in the UK!) in order to deter people from speeding in their vehicles. The idea behind these speed cameras is not to catch people speeding, rather to prevent people from speeding and causing accidents. If the aim was to catch people speeding, there would be no warning signs indicating that a camera is present. However, we see that whenever a speed camera is placed, many warnings are given that  beware this road has a speed camera . Many of the times, the camera is not even in operation, hence, the idea is to stop people speeding rather than catch and punish them.

The same is with the various legal punishments prescribed by Shariah, in that they are prescribed to prevent people from committing unlawful actions and corrupting the society, yet the rules and conditions for a legal punishment to be enforced are so stringent that very rarely would an individual be punished. The legal punishment is considered a deterrent, but if an individual did involve him/herself in some unlawful activity, the objective now is not to get the individual punished rather to save him/her from the punishment. ^[9]

The Sharia’s Objective of Averting Corporal Punishments

The punishment of fornicators and adulterers is historically rooted in the Judeo-Christian tradition that Muslims follow.  Yet, Muslims believe that the Sharia al-Islam was tweaked in such a way as to lean heavily towards the accused, thereby saving them from corporal punishments.  (This is not unlike the rabbinical tradition, which similarly mitigates the Law.)  In fact, Islamic authorities are commanded to find a “doubt” so that the accused can be acquitted.   Muhammad ibn Adam al-Kawthari quotes the Prophet Muhammad to this effect:

The Imam should try his best to avoid the legal punishment… This (trying to avert a legal punishment) has been explicitly mentioned in one Hadith. Sayyida Aisha narrates that the Messenger of Allah said:

“Keep the Muslims away from punishments as much as possible. If there is any way out for an offender to escape punishment, acquit him. It is better for a judge to make an error in acquittal than in conviction.” (Sunan Tirmidhi, no: 1424) ^[10]

Contemporary Muslims understand the command to find “any way out” to be a duty of the Islamic authorities.

Deterring Witnesses from Coming Forward

When four witnesses come forward, they are warned by the authorities that if their testimonies do not hold up, they will each be lashed eighty times.  This creates a great deterrent to any witnesses coming forward, for they know full well that the authorities will seek to acquit the accused based on any possible doubt.  For example, how is it that they could have gazed on the private parts of two having sexual relations?  Why did they not turn away?  Why did they not warn the sinners?  Why were they spying on the two?  And so on and so forth.

The jurisprudential practice is to “generate” a doubt such that the defendant is acquitted and the accusers punished.  This knowledge deters accusers from stepping forward; rather, they should hide the sin of their fellow believer, as it is of no business of theirs.  The accusers are deterred from coming forward for fear that one of the four of them would rescind his testimony, thereby condemning the rest to lashes.

It is for this reason that there exists in the lifetime of the Prophet Muhammad no single case of someone being convicted of fornication or adultery based on the testimony of four witnesses. Reformist (and even conservative) Muslims point to this as a strong proof that the intent of the Sharia was to deter accusers from stepping forward, barring this route to conviction and punishment.

Both reformist and conservative Muslims understand that it is impossible for the witnesses to see the penis clearly inserted into the vagina, because even “if you were among the four thighs you would never be able to give this testimony.”  In other words, not even the thighs of the two who are fornicating can properly witness the vaginal penetration, so how can anyone else do that?  The conservative “Wahhabi” ^[11] cleric Ibn Uthaymeen declared:

[The four witnesses] should describe zina in clear terms, such as saying: “I saw his penis in her vagina”. There is no alternative to that. If they say: “We saw him on top of her and they were naked”, that is not acceptable. Even if they say “We saw him doing with her what a man does with his wife,” that is not sufficient as testimony. They must say “We bear witness that his penis was in her vagina.” And this is very difficult, as the man said who was testified against at the time of ‘Umar: “If you were among the (four) thighs you would never be able to give this testimony.” Hence Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyah mentioned that at his time no case of zina was proven by means of testimony from the time of the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) until the time of Ibn Taymiyah. If no case was proven from that time until the other, then we do not know of any case that was proven by testimony up till our own times, because it is very difficult. ^[12]

So it is understood amongst both reformist and conservative Muslims that the “near impossible” requirement of four witnesses has never been fulfilled up until this day.  The ultraconservative site, Islam-qa, says:

This strictness with regard to testimony about zina serves only to achieve the purpose aimed at by sharee’ah, which is to conceal people and not spread immorality, and to make societies avoid accusations against people’s honour and aspersions on their lineages.

Al-Qurtubi (may Allaah have mercy on him) said in al-Jaami’ li Ahkaam al-Qur’aan (5/83):

Allaah has stated that testimony in a case of zina must be given by four people, so as to make it hard for those who are testifying to such a thing, and to conceal people. ^[13]

Photographic Images and DNA

It should be noted that conservative and reformist Muslim scholars agree that the four witnesses must have witnessed the actual act itself.  Photographic images or video footage are not admissible, not only because these can be doctored but because such an allowance would eliminate the Sharia’s objective of making the enforcement of these penalties “near impossible.”  This becomes clear by the fact that the jurists of today even forbid DNA proof to convict a person of fornication or adultery; the ultra-conservative Islamic cleric Muhammad Salih al-Munajjid declared that “zinaa…cannot be proven by DNA testing or by use of cameras and videos.” ^[14]

Self-Confession

In place of four witnesses, a person may confess four times to the sin.  Yet this too has many stringent requirements:

The confession must be uncoerced.  From an Islamic legal perspective, confessions under duress are inadmissible.  The authorities are legally obligated to investigate each case and ensure that the confessor was not pressured into coming forward by family or friends.  If there is any doubt whatsoever about this, the confession is to be rejected.

The confessor must be an adult of sane mind who confesses on four different occasions, knowing full well the consequences of such a confession. For example, the fourth Caliph of Islam came upon an insane woman who had confessed to adultery and was about to be stoned; he quickly brought a halt to the punishment and declared:

Do you know that there are three people whose actions are not recorded [against them]: a lunatic till he (or she) is restored to reason, a sleeper until he (or she) awakens, and a boy (or girl) until he (or she) becomes baligh (mature)…Why [then] is it that this woman is being stoned? ^[15]

It should be noted that there is no religious requirement for a Muslim to come forward to confess his/her sin.  In fact, he/she is encouraged to hide it and not reveal it; this is in accordance to the two hadiths which I have already quoted (and other textual proofs as well):

All of my community will be fine except for those who commit sin openly. Part of committing sin openly is when a man does something at night and God conceals it, but in the morning he says, “O So-and-so, last night I did such and such.” His Lord had covered his sin all night, but in the morning he removed the cover of God. ^[16]

And:

A man came to the Prophet and said: “O Apostle of God! I have mingled with a woman in the outskirts of Medina…So, here am I, judge me according to what you decide.”

Umar bin Khattab replied: “God had kept your secret!  Why then didn’t you?” ^[17]

In fact, the Islamic judge is religiously commanded to dissuade the confessor from going through with the confession.  The confessor is encouraged to simply repent from the sin, as “God is Most Forgiving.”  Muslims believe that sins can be expiated simply by prayer and the commission of good deeds. Seeking corporal punishment is not necessary to attain penance; in fact, it is highly discouraged.

In Sahih al-Bukhari (#6439), for example, it is narrated that a man confessed the sin of adultery to the Prophet Muhammad.  However, the latter kept turning his face away from the confessor, wishing not to hear it.  Such was the reluctance of the Prophet Muhammad when it came to enforcing such harsh punishments.  Commenting on this narration, Muhammad ibn Adam al-Kawthari writes:

The above incident shows the importance of trying to avert a legal punishment as much as possible. The man came and confessed to the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) that he had committed unlawful sexual intercourse, yet the Messenger of Allah ignored him, in order that he may change his mind. ^[18]

It is narrated that the Prophet Muhammad would turn away from confessors, not wanting to hear what they had to say:

A man of the tribe of Aslam came to the Prophet and testified four times against himself that he had had illicit intercourse with a woman, while all the time the Prophet was turning away from him. ^[19]

In another instance, a man by the name of Maiz ibn Malik confessed to the Prophet Muhammad that he committed zinnah.  The Prophet replied by saying: “Probably you have only kissed, or touched, or looked at her.”  This was the Prophet’s attempt to save the person from punishment, as only vaginal penetration is punishable; anything less than that–including kissing, fondling, masturbation of oneself or of one’s partner, and even anal and oral sex–is not punishable by the hadud (Islamic corporal punishments).

Based on this, the Islamic judge is instructed to dismiss the confession by saying “probably you have only kissed, or touched, or looked at her.” Muhammad ibn Adam al-Kawthari writes:

This famous incident of Ma’iz ibn Malik also gives the same message, in that the Imam (leader) should try his best to avoid the legal punishment. This is the reason why it is recommended to say to the one who confesses committing fornication that “You may only have touched, you may only have kissed, are you sure you had sex, think again properly of what you are saying and think of the consequences of your confession,” and other such things. ^[20]

Reformist Muslims argue that there is as such no room for the hanging judge in Islam; rather, Islamic judges ought to be merciful, generally leaning towards acquittal, at least in cases where the sin is against God and not a fellow human being.  The confessor is encouraged not to confess, or if he has already done so, to rescind his confession.  Maiz confessed to the sin of zinnah and told the Prophet Muhammad: “Purify me,” by which he meant to carry out corporal punishment and thus attain penance.  Yet, the Prophet Muhammad told Maiz not to seek the punishment but instead to simply pray to God for forgiveness; the Prophet said to Maiz:

Woe to you!  Go back and ask God for forgiveness and repent to Him. ^[21]

In fact, it is highly encouraged (mustahhab) in Islam not to self-confess the sin of fornication and adultery, in order that these harsh punishments not be implemented.  When Maiz insisted that he be punished, the Prophet Muhammad told a third person:

If you had covered him with your garment, it would have been better for you. ^[22]

Muslims believe that God covers up a person’s sins in the same way that clothing covers up a person’s nude and embarrassing parts.  Islam instructs believers to utilize this merciful garment of God, and they are thus encouraged not to “reveal what God has concealed.” Thus, the Prophet’s disciples looked down upon self-confession, even saying about the one who confessed to zinnah:

Look at this man whose fault was concealed by God but who would not leave the matter alone, so that he was stoned like a dog. ^[23]

The Prophet’s disciples had a dislike for self-confession, saying:

We, the Companions of the Apostle of God, used to talk mutually: “Would it have been that al-Ghamidiyyah and Maiz ibn Malik had but withdrawn [their confession] after their confession…[we] would not have pursued them (for punishment).” ^[24]

The ultraconservative Saudi scholar Salih al-Munajjid quotes various classical scholars that confirm the view that repentance is better than confession:

Question:

Will the zaani (fornicator) who repents be forgiven even if the hadd punishment is not carried out on him?

I would like to know if a person commits fornication and he truely repents towards Allah would he be forgiven in the hereafter if the hadd of hundred lashes is not carried out on him in this world. Can only repentance expiate him from this sin or unless and untill the hadd is not carried out on him he can never be forgiven and will be punished in the hereafter. Please answer in accordance with Quran and sunnah. I will be very grateful.

Answer:

Praise be to Allaah.

The carrying out of the hadd punishment for a sin for which that punishment has been prescribed is an expiation for that sin.

Sincere repentance from sin is also an expiation for sin, and “the one who repents from sin is like the one who did not sin.” And Allaah will turn his bad deeds into good deeds.

If he is sincere in his repentance, and prays a great deal for forgiveness, then he does not have to confess so that the hadd punishment may be carried out on him. Rather repentance is sufficient, in sha Allaah.

Allaah says (interpretation of the meaning):

And those who invoke not any other ilaah (god) along with Allaah, nor kill such person as Allaah has forbidden, except for just cause, nor commit illegal sexual intercourse–and whoever does this shall receive the punishment.

The torment will be doubled to him on the Day of Resurrection, and he will abide therein in disgrace;

Except those who repent and believe…and do righteous deeds; for those, Allaah will change their sins into good deeds, and Allaah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful. And whosoever repents and does righteous good deeds; then verily, he repents towards Allaah with true repentance.

[al-Furqaan 25:68-71]

…

In Saheeh Muslim (1695) it says that when Maa’iz came to the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) and confessed that he had committed zina and said, “Purify me (i.e., carry out the hadd punishment on me)”, he said to him, “Woe to you, go back and ask Allaah for forgiveness and repent to Him.”

[Imam] Al- Nawawi said:

This hadeeth indicates that the burden of sin is lifted from one who repents from major sins, and this is according to the consensus of the Muslims.

[Imam] Al-Haafiz Ibn Hajar said:

From this case – i.e. the case of Maa’iz when he confessed zina – it may be understood that it is mustahabb [highly recommended] for the one whose case is similar to repent to Allaah and to conceal himself and not mention his sin to anyone… This was affirmed by al-Shaafa’i who said: I prefer for the one who has committed a sin and been concealed by Allaah to conceal it himself and to repent.

Fath al-Baari, 12/124, 125

And it was narrated from ‘Abd-Allaah ibn ‘Umar (may Allaah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said: “Avoid these sins that Allaah has forbidden, but whoever does any of them, let him conceal himself with the concealment of Allaah and repent to Allaah, for whoever tells us of what he has done, we will carry out (the punishment prescribed in) the Book of Allaah on him [and we do not desire that].”

It was also narrated by al-Haakim in al-Mustadrak ‘ala al-Saheehayn (4/425) and by al-Bayhaqi (8/330); classed as saheeh by al-Albaani in Saheeh al-Jaami’, 149. ^[25]

And he writes elsewhere:

Repentance that is a matter between a person and his Lord is better for him than confessing his sin before a qaadi (judge) so that the hadd punishment may be carried out on him.

In Saheeh Muslim (1695) it is narrated that when Maa’iz came to the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) and said, “Purify me,” he said, “Woe to you! Go back and pray to Allaah for forgiveness and repent to Him.”

Al-Haafiz Ibn Hajar said:

It may be understood from this case – the case of Maa’iz when he confessed to having committed zina – that it is mustahabb for the one who falls into a similar sin to repent to Allaah and conceal his sin and not mention it to anyone, as Abu Bakr and ‘Umar said to Maa’iz. Whoever discovers anything of that nature should conceal it according to what we have mentioned; he should not expose it or refer the matter to the ruler, as the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said in this story: “If you had concealed it with your garment it would have been better for you.” Hence al-Shaafa’i (may Allaah be pleased with him) said: “If a person commits a sin and Allaah conceals it for him, I prefer for him to conceal it too and to repent,” and he quoted as evidence the story of Maa’iz with Abu Bakr and ‘Umar.

Fath al-Baari, 12/124, 125 ^[26]

The fatwa site SunniPath.com issued the following religious verdict:

Question:

I committed zina … What should I do? …I know that according to the Shariah, I should face lashings…So what should I do in order to make amends with Allah Ta’ala?

Answer:

In the Name of Allah, Most Merciful and Compassionate

Conceal Your Sin

It is recommended for the one who commits zina to conceal his mistake and not tell anyone about it.  Rather, he or she should turn to Allah in sincere repentance.  It is not necessary or recommended to confess at an Islamic court and face the hadd punishment, and if someone did confess, it would be recommended for them to withdraw their confession and not be punished (Tuhfat al-Muhtaj + Hashiyat  Abd al-Hamid, 9.113).

The Shafi’is have many proofs for their position.  Among them is that when Ma’iz came to the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) and asked him to purify him, the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) said to him,  “Allah have mercy on you!  Go away and ask Allah’s forgiveness!”   Ma’iz then left but soon returned and asked again to be purified, and the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) repeated what he had said.  The same thing then happened a third time, and it was only after the fourth time that the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) asked Ma iz some further Questions and ordered him to be punished (related by Muslim + others).  When the hadd punishment was enforced on him, Ma’iz tried to run away but those stoning him chased him down and forcibly enforced the punishment on him.  When the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) heard about this, he disapproved and said,  “Why didn’t you let him go? Perhaps he would have made repentance and Allah would have accepted his repentance.”  (Abu Dawud)  Ibn Hajar notes in his Tuhfa that all of the offers made by the Messenger of Allah and his subsequent disapproval of his companions actions indicate that it is superior for one not to confess to committing zina, and that even if one did, it is recommended to withdraw one s confession.  Otherwise, the Prophet’s (Allah bless him and give him peace) offers would be meaningless (Tuhfat al-Muhtaj, 9.113).

Another proof is that it is a sign of Allah’s mercy that He has concealed one’s sin from the sight of others, and the Shari’ah does not approve that one cast off this concealment despite Allah s having given it to one.

al-Khatib al-Shirbini explains in his commentary on the Minhaj:

It is sunna for the one who commits zina and anyone else who commits any act of disobedience to conceal his sin from others.  This is because of the hadith,  “Whoever commits any of these awful sins (qadhurat), let him conceal himself with the concealment of Allah, for verily, whoever exposes his action to us (man abda lana safhatahu), we will impose the hadd punishment upon him.”  (related by Hakim and Bayhaqi with a strong (qawiyy) chain of transmission).  Exposing one’s sin, then, in order to be punished by a hadd punishment or a discretionary punishment (tazir) goes against the recommended way…

Allah Loves to Forgive

Allah Most High told us in the Qur an:

“Say,  O my servants who have wronged themselves: despair not of Allah’s mercy; surely Allah forgives all sins; surely, He is Most Merciful and Compassionate.”   (39:53)

Commentators tell us that this verse is the most hope-inspiring verse in the Quran (arja ayatin fi kitabi llah).  Reading this verse should cause every believer to rejoice.

No matter how great the sin, the door of repentance is always open.  Allah loves to forgive.  The Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) told us in a famous hadith that if we did not sin, Allah would create other people who would sin so that He could forgive them.  He also told us that the one who repents from a sin is like the one who has no sin.

May Allah envelop us all with His mercy and forgiveness and gather us together in Paradise. ^[27]

In fact, a Muslim is obligated to think good of God, and know that His Mercy overcomes His retribution.  Therefore, a believer should not only repent from such sins, but feel confident that his/her repentance was accepted by God; failure to do so is a sign of disbelief in God and His Mercy, for God has already said: “O My slaves, you commit sin night and day, and I forgive all sins, so ask Me for forgiveness.” ^[28]

Some people erroneously believe that God will not or cannot forgive some sins, or that that they have sinned so much that the doors of repentance have been closed.  The redemptive Islamic faith, however, rejects such notions as being akin to doubting God’s Mercy.  God says in the Quran:

O My slaves who have transgressed against themselves (by sinning)! Despair not of the Mercy of God, for verily God forgives all sins. Truly, He is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful. (Quran, 39:53-54)

And God says further:

O son of Adam, so long as you call upon Me and put your hope in Me, I will forgive you for what you have done, and I shall not mind. O son of Adam, if your sins were to reach the clouds of the sky, and were you to ask Me for forgiveness, I will forgive you and I shall not mind. O son of Adam, if you were to come to Me with sins nearly the size of the earth…then I would bring you forgiveness… ^[29]

The Prophet Muhammad declared:

The one who repents from his sin is like the one who did not sin in the first place. ^[30]

Not only is the Islamic authority to dissuade the believer from confessing his sins, but he should also leave the opportunity open for the confessor to withdraw his confession, any time before or even during the enactment of the punishment. As Muhammad ibn Adam al-Kawthari writes:

If the confessor takes back his words before the punishment is enforced or during the punishment, he/she will be released and set free. (See: al-Ikhtiyar li talil al-Mukhtar, 2/311-316 and other major Hanafi Fiqh references) ^[31]

In one narration, a man confesses to adultery and insists upon the punishment for himself.  Yet, when the first stone was thrown at him, he reconsidered his ill-fated decision.  The Prophet Muhammad chastised his disciples for not letting the man go at this point:

While [the man] was being stoned he felt the effect of the stones and could not bear it and fled. But Abdullah ibn Unais [chased] him…and killed him. They then went to the Prophet and reported it to him.  [The Prophet] said: “Why did you not leave him alone? Perhaps he might have repented and been forgiven by God.” ^[32]

It seems then that it is preferable to simply seek repentance and forgiveness instead of justice and punishment. The Prophet Muhammad and his disciples discouraged self-confession, arguing that people ought to hide their sins and seek repentance from God alone.

The Call for a Moratorium on Corporal Punishments

Reformist Muslims argue that there would hardly be people today who would seek the punishment upon themselves, especially when they know that religiously it is preferable not do that. The atmosphere of the ideal Islamic state, they reason, should be one of forgiveness, not of persecution.  If the Prophet Muhammad detested punishing people based on their own self-confession, then how misguided are those fundamentalists who are known to drag unwilling women to be stoned against their will?

Many reformist Muslims have responded positively to Dr. Tariq Ramadan’s International Call for Moratorium on Corporal Punishment, Stoning and the Death Penalty in the Islamic World, commonly referred to by the less cumbersome name The Call for a Moratorium.  Ramadan, the leading reformist Muslim scholar of the world, argues that the manner in which various fundamentalists are implementing the hadud (corporal punishments) is so radically incorrect that there ought to be a complete moratorium on all such punishments until stringent and up-to-date standards are set.

In the meantime, Ramadan has called for a dialogue in the Islamic world in order to properly understand the matter, and to stop fundamentalist interpretations from spreading.  Whilst some conservative Muslims have reacted cautiously to Ramadan’s wording, they do agree with him that the fundamentalists are implementing the law in an incorrect fashion.

Fundamentalist Interpretations as a Backlash

Dr. Tariq Ramadan notes that the recent resurgence of fundamentalist interpretations can be traced to a reactionary feeling in the post-colonial Islamic world; enforcing such punishments evokes a negative response in the West, and because many in the Muslim world associate the West with colonialism and “neo-colonialism”, this reaction seems to validate their Islamic identity.  In other words, the logic is: the West is bad, the West does not like these punishments, and therefore these punishments are good.  This has more to do with identity politics than religious theology.  Writes Ramadan:

On the question of hudûd [corporal punishments], one sometimes sees popular support hoping or exacting a literal and immediate application because the latter [supposedly] would guarantee henceforth the “Islamic” character of a society…When one studies this phenomenon, two types of reasoning generally motivate these claims:

1. The literal and immediate application of the hudûd legally and socially provides a visible reference to Islam. The legislation, by its harshness, gives the feeling of fidelity to the Qur’anic injunctions that demands rigorous respect of the text…

2. The opposition and condemnations by the West supplies, paradoxically, the popular feeling of fidelity to the Islamic teachings; a reasoning that is antithetical, simple and simplistic. The intense opposition of the West is sufficient proof of the authentic Islamic character of the literal application of hudûd. Some will persuade themselves by asserting that the West has long since lost its moral references and became so permissive that the harshness of the Islamic penal code which punishes behaviors judged immoral, is by antithesis, the true and only alternative “to Western decadence”.

These formalistic and binary reasoning are fundamentally dangerous for they claim and grant an Islamic quality to a legislation, not in what it promotes, protects and applies justice to, but more so because it sanctions harsh and visible punishment to certain behaviors and in stark contrast and opposition to the Western laws, which are perceived as morally permissive and without a reference to religion[3]. One sees today that communities or Muslim people satisfy themselves with this type of legitimacy to back a government or a party that calls for an application of the sharî’a narrowly understood as a literal and immediate application of corporal punishment, stoning and the death penalty. When this type of popular passion takes hold, it is the first sign of a will to respond to various forms of frustration and humiliation by asserting an identity that perceives itself as Islamic (and anti-Western). Such an identity is not based on the comprehension of the objectives of the Islamic teachings (al maqâsid) or the different interpretations and conditions relating to the application of the hudûd…[but rather] a binary reasoning (less West is more Islam). ^[33]

The more the West pushes to remove such laws that are deemed Islamic, the more the people feel threatened by Western domination; they push back harder by calling for even stricter interpretation and implementation.  Such fundamentalist understandings have particular appeal in war-ravaged areas such as Afghanistan and Somalia.  The U.S.’s heavy handed policies in the Islamic world, coupled with a bombardment of traditional Islamic society with Western culture, has created  a reactionary backlash.  Instead of valuing the nuances and richness of Islamic jurisprudence, many Westerners denigrate all of Islam, thereby alienating the very population they are trying to influence.

But there is hope: reformist Muslims are forcing the Islamic world to have the much needed debate.  Even in the ultraconservative country of Saudi Arabia, for example, reformists who challenge the status quo are emerging.  The movement will be gradual in nature, and one cannot simply expect a reformation overnight.  Yet, the process has begun and is gaining momentum.

Pregnancy as a Proof

Pregnancy has been mentioned by some jurists as a proof for fornication in the case of an unmarried woman.  Yet, this requires some elaboration.  The pregnancy alone cannot be used to justify her punishment; the woman can simply deny the act of fornication.  She may for instance have engaged in illicit sexual conduct short of vaginal penetration, which may inadvertently have led to pregnancy. For example, the man could have ejaculated near her thighs and some semen may have entered the vagina that way.  (Remember: the legal punishment only applies to those cases where there is vaginal penetration; if a person confesses to sexual conduct short of vaginal penetration, there is no hadd punishment.)

Furthermore, the woman may have been raped, had sex whilst she was temporarily insane, or been asleep whilst a man ejaculated in her.  These excuses may seem extraordinary, but that’s the point: any doubt whatsoever should be enough to acquit the defendant, which is the goal of the Islamic court.  SunniPath.com, a fatwa site, answers the following question:

Question:

Is pregnancy considered sufficient evidence for the enactment of the hadd punishment for adultery?

Answer:

In the Name of Allah, Most Merciful and Compassionate

No.

The Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) commanded us in a famous hadith to ward off the hadd punishments with doubts [shubuhat].  Many punishments prescribed by Islamic Law often seem very harsh, but people forget that these punishments are only applied when certain very stringent conditions are met…

It is mentioned in Bughyat al-Mustarshidin that an unmarried woman who gets pregnant and does not confess to have committed fornication [zina] does not deserve the hadd punishment, since she could have been  accidentally had intercourse with  [wat  ul-shubha], she could have been asleep, she could have been insane (and hence not responsible for her actions) when the intercourse happened, or she could have been coerced, all of which are  doubts  [shubuhat] that make the hadd punishment inapplicable to her.  [Bughyat al-Mustarshidin, 249] ^[34]

Salman al-Oudah, a Saudi cleric, posted the following fatwa on his website:

Question: Can a single woman be accused and convicted of fornication on the strength of her falling pregnant?

Answered by Sheikh Sulaymân al-`Îsâ, professor at al-Imâm University in Riyadh

…The woman will not receive punishment just because of pregnancy. Women can fall pregnant without committing illegal sexual intercourse. A woman could be raped or coerced. In this case, she is a victim and not the perpetrator of a crime.

Therefore, she cannot be punished or even accused of misconduct merely on the strength of her falling pregnant. This opinion is held by many people of knowledge. Ibn Qudâmah said in his book al-Mughnî:

If a woman becomes pregnant without having a husband or a master, she may not be punished and, instead, she should be asked about it, if she claimed that she was coerced into it or that she committed adultery under dubious circumstances, or if she simply does not confess adultery then she will not be punished. This is the saying of Abu Hanîfah and al-Shâfi`î, because she may be pregnant as a result of a forceful intercourse or dubious circumstances. Punishment will be abandoned in case suspicion exists. It is well known that a woman could become pregnant without engaging in true intercourse. The woman may become pregnant if sperm is manually inserted into her vagina. This would explain how a virgin becomes pregnant. ^[35]

Although theoretically the punishment could be implemented based on pregnancy, practically it is never so, because there is always an element of doubt which wards off punishment.

Al-Li’an

The fourth (and last) means of a conviction is through the process of li’an.  After the Prophet Muhammad enacted such stringent laws barring men from accusing women of fornication and adultery, some of the husbands complained, asking what to do if they entered the home to find another man in their bed.  Should a husband who catches his wife red-handed be barred from testifying against her simply because he cannot fulfill the “near impossible” four witnesses requirement?  While it may be true that a stranger has no business meddling in the private affairs of a woman, isn’t the husband a special case because he is directly affected by her infidelity?

These concerns were brought to the Prophet Muhammad, and the verses of Al-Li’an were then revealed.  I discussed this in part 1 of my rebuttal:

Both the Quran and the Bible deal with the case of a husband accusing his wife of adultery.  The Quran declares that if a wife denies the charges, then she is exonerated by the law–her testimony is accepted over that of her husband’s, and any worldly punishment is waived.  The Quran declares:

As for those who accuse their wives but have no witnesses except themselves: let the testimony of one of them be four testimonies, swearing by God that he is of those who speaks the truth; And the fifth oath should be invoking the curse of God on himself if he is of those who lie. But it shall avert the punishment from her if she bears witness/testifies before God four times that the thing he says is indeed false, and if she takes an oath a fifth time that the wrath of God be upon her if he speaks the truth. (Quran, 24:6-9)

This is the Islamic law of Al-Li’an. The Bible, on the other hand, has the Law of Jealousy: if a husband suspects his wife of adultery, then he is to bring her to the priest.  The priest will then dump dust and ink into a container of water, and force her to drink the dirtied water.  If she gets sick from it (or dies), it proves the allegation that she was adulterous; if she does not fall sick, then she is exonerated.  Furthermore, the woman is to drink this water in a state of public humiliation: her head is to be uncovered (a sign of shame back then) and she is forced to stand at the east gate of the temple in sight of the people, so that she might serve as a reminder against lewdness.  (All this even before she drinks the contaminated water.)

The Bible declares:

The Test for an Unfaithful Wife

Then the LORD said to Moses, “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘If a man’s wife goes astray and is unfaithful to him by sleeping with another man, and this is hidden from her husband and her impurity is undetected since there is no witness against her and she has not been caught in the act, and if feelings of jealousy come over her husband and he suspects his wife and she is impure or if he is jealous and suspects her even though she is not impure–then he is to take his wife to the priest…

The priest shall bring her and have her stand before the LORD. Then he shall take some holy water in a clay jar and put some dust from the tabernacle floor into the water.…Then the priest shall put the woman under oath and say to her, “If no other man has slept with you and you have not gone astray and become impure while married to your husband, may this bitter water that brings a curse not harm you. But if you have gone astray while married to your husband and you have defiled yourself by sleeping with a man other than your husband”–here the priest is to put the woman under this curse of the oath–”may the LORD cause your people to curse and denounce you when he causes your thigh to waste away and your abdomen to swell. May this water that brings a curse enter your body so that your abdomen swells and your thigh wastes away. ” Then the woman is to say, “Amen. So be it.”

The priest is to write these curses on a scroll and then wash them off into the bitter water. He shall have the woman drink the bitter water that brings a curse, and this water will enter her and cause bitter suffering…He is to have the woman drink the water.  If she has defiled herself and been unfaithful to her husband, then when she is made to drink the water that brings a curse, it will go into her and cause bitter suffering; her abdomen will swell and her thigh waste away, and she will become accursed among her people.

If, however, the woman has not defiled herself and is free from impurity, she will be cleared of guilt and will be able to have children. This, then, is the law of jealousy when a woman goes astray and defiles herself while married to her husband, or when feelings of jealousy come over a man because he suspects his wife. The priest is to have her stand before the LORD and is to apply this entire law to her [i.e. death by stoning]. The husband will be innocent of any wrongdoing, but the woman will bear the consequences of her sin.’” (Numbers 5:11-31)

Matthew Henry, the eminent seventeenth and eighteenth century commentator on the Bible, explained these verses:

We have here the law concerning the solemn trial of a wife whose husband was jealous of her.

I. What was the case supposed:

1. That a man had some reason to suspect his wife to have committed adultery,

2. It is supposed to be a sin which great care is taken by the sinners to conceal, which there is no witness of…

3. The spirit of jealousy is supposed to come upon the husband…then he may compel her to drink the bitter water.  But the law here does not tie him to that particular method of proving the just cause of his suspicion; it might be otherwise proved. In case it could be proved that she had committed adultery, she was to be put to death (Lev. 20:10); but, if it was uncertain, then this law took place. Hence, (1.) Let all wives be admonished not to give any the least occasion for the suspicion of their chastity; it is not enough that they abstain from the evil of uncleanness, but they must abstain from all appearance of it, from every thing that looks like it, or leads to it, or may give the least umbrage to jealousy; for how great a matter may a little fire kindle! (2.) Let all husbands be admonished not to entertain any causeless or unjust suspicions of their wives…

II. The process of the trial must be thus:

(1.) Her husband must bring her to the priest, with the witnesses that could prove the ground of his suspicion, and desire that she might be put upon her trial. The Jews say that the priest was first to endeavour to persuade her to confess the truth…If she confessed, saying, “I am defiled,” she was not put to death, but was divorced and lost her dowry; if she said, “I am pure,” then they proceeded.

…

(3.) The priest was to prepare the water of jealousy…it must be [in] an earthen vessel, because the coarser and plainer every thing was the more agreeable it was to the occasion. Dust must be put into the water, to signify the reproach she lay under, and the shame she ought to take to herself, putting her mouth in the dust; but dust from the floor of the tabernacle…

(4.) The woman was to be set before the Lord, at the east gate of the temple-court (say the Jews), and her head was to be uncovered, in token of her sorrowful condition; and there she stood for a spectacle to the world, that other women might learn not to do after her lewdness, Eze. 23:48…

(5.) The priest was to adjure her to tell the truth, and to denounce the curse of God against her if she were guilty, and to declare what would be the effect of her drinking the water of jealousy, v. 19-22. He must assure her that, if she were innocent, the water would do her no harm, v. 19. None need fear the curse of the law if they have not broken the commands of the law. But, if she were guilty, this water would be poison to her, it would make her belly to swell and her thigh to rot, and she should be a curse or abomination among her people, v. 21, 22…

(6.) The priest was to write this curse in a scrip or scroll of parchment, verbatim-word for word, as he had expressed it, and then to wipe or scrape out what he had written into the water (v. 23), to signify that it was that curse which impregnated the water, and gave it its strength to effect what was intended. It signified that, if she were innocent, the curse should be blotted out and never appear against her, as it is written, Isa. 43:25, I am he that blotteth out thy transgression, and Ps. 51:9, Blot out my iniquities; but that, if she were guilty, the curse, as it was written, being infused into the water, would enter into her bowels with the water, even like oil into her bones (Ps. 109:18)…

(7.) The woman must then drink the water (v. 24); it is called the bitter water…

…

(9.) …If the suspected woman was really guilty, the water she drank would be poison to her (v. 27), her belly would swell and her thigh rot by a vile disease for vile deserts, and she would mourn at the last when her flesh and body were consumed, Prov. 5:11. Bishop Patrick says, from some of the Jewish writers, that the effect of these waters appeared immediately, she grew pale, and her eyes ready to start out of her head…

A special law for husbands exists in both Christianity and Islam.  Under Islamic law, the woman can avert the punishment simply by swearing to God that her husband is lying.  Even if she herself is lying when she does that, she can repent after that.  The Islamic exegist Ibn Kathir comments on the verses of Al-Li’an:

“But she shall avert the punishment” meaning, the prescribed punishment…Then God mentions His grace and kindness to His creation in that He has prescribed for them a way out of their difficulties. God says: “And had it not been for the grace of God and His mercy on you” meaning, many of your affairs would have been too difficult for you, “And that God is the One Who forgives and accepts repentance,” means, from His servants, even if that comes after they have sworn a confirmed oath. ^[36]

Although it will be counted as a sin against her for lying, she may be able to achieve penance by seeking forgiveness and correcting her ways.  Again, when it comes to convicting people of zinnah, the emphasis is always on acquittal.

The reasons for revelation of these Quranic verses revolved around husbands who walked in on their wives having sex with stranger men. They complained to the Prophet Muhammad, and then a problem arose.  Should these husbands be lashed for claiming that their wives had committed adultery?  After all, they hadn’t fulfilled the “near impossible” requirement of providing four witnesses.  Remember: the purpose of this requirement was to deter men from accusing women of being unchaste, because they should mind their own business; but could anyone doubt the fact that a wife’s disloyalty is a husband’s business?  So the question arose: did a husband have to provide four witnesses if he walked in on his wife having an affair with another man?

One of the Prophet’s disciples, a man by the name of Saad ibn Ubadah, said:

By God, O Messenger of God, I know that it [the verse requiring four witnesses] is true and is from God, but I am surprised. If I found some wicked man lying down with my wife, should I not disturb him until I have brought four witnesses?  By God, he would have finished what he was doing before I could bring them!

And later, a man by the name of Hilal ibn Umayyah walked in on his wife having sex with a stranger man.  He lamented to the Prophet Muhammad:

O Messenger of God, I came to my wife at night and found a man with her, and I saw with my own eyes and heard with my own ears.

The Prophet wanted to punish Hilal, for accusing a woman of being unchaste. Accusing a woman of fornication or adultery is considered a grave crime in Islam, which is the entire reason behind the four witnesses requirement. The Prophet Muhammad replied:

[Bring forth] evidence or the punishment on your back.

A group of the Muslims commented on the situation, saying:

We were being tested by what Saad bin Ubadah said, and now the Messenger of God will punish Hilal bin Umayyah and declare his testimony before people to be unacceptable.

Hilal responded:

By God, I hope that God will make for me a way out from this problem. O Messenger of God, I see how upset you are by what I have said, but God knows that I am telling the truth.

It was at that point that God revealed the verses of Al-Li’an to the Prophet Muhammad, as follows:

And for those who accuse their wives but have no witnesses except themselves, let the testimony of one of them be four testimonies by God. (Quran, 24:6)

In that way, Hilal was saved from punishment, and the Prophet Muhammad said:

Rejoice, O Hilal, for God has made a way out for you.

The wife denied Hilal’s claim and said:

He is lying.

She swore four times and then a fifth time that she was innocent.  According to the verses of Al-Li’an, the wife’s testimony trumps that of the husband’s.  The Prophet Muhammad declared the two forever divorced, but neither party was to receive any worldly punishment.

The woman became pregnant and gave birth to a child who looked nothing like her husband; in fact, the child looked exactly like the man that Hilal accused of having the affair with his wife.  From this, the Prophet Muhammad knew that the woman was guilty, but he declared:

Were it not for the Book of God, I would deal with her. ^[37]

In other words, the Quran constrained the people from punishing an adulterous woman, even when there was ample proof against her.  (This is also the reason that jurists today reject photographic evidence or DNA proof.)  Reformist Muslims criticize fundamentalists for convicting women based on spurious evidence, whereas the Prophet Muhammad didn’t do that even when he had rock solid proof.

Non-Muslims

It should be noted that the hadud (corporal punishments) of the Sharia are only applicable to Muslims.  In the classical era, the Islamic state did not enforce such laws upon non-Muslims.  Rather, the non-Muslims were free to rule themselves according to their own religious scriptures, in accordance to the practice of the Prophet Muhammad.  I discussed this in more detail here.

As for Muslims living in non-Muslim lands, it is understood by Islamic jurisprudence that there is no hadud applicable there, even upon Muslims.  The hadud is to be enforced only in the lands of Islam, under the auspices of the Imam or Caliph of the Muslims.  The fatwa site SunniPath.com says:

Hadd punishments are the province of the Imam of the Muslims, and are irrelevant for Muslims living in the West. ^[38]

Conclusion

There are four ways to secure a conviction for fornication and adultery: (1) four witnesses, (2) self-confession, (3) pregnancy, and (4) Al-Li’an.  Yet, Muslims believe that all four routes have been virtually closed off by the Mercy of God.  (1) The requirement of four witnesses is “near impossible” to fulfill: according to Islamic clerics, not a single case exists in the entire history of Islam in which it was fulfilled.  (2) As for self-confession, the Islamic tradition strongly recommends believers not to confess their sins or seek legal punishments; rather, they should repent to God in private and bask in His Mercy.  (3) As for pregnancy, it is not sufficient proof in and of itself; if an unmarried pregnant woman denies that she committed fornication, this is enough to save her from punishment.  (4) As for Al-Li’an, the wife’s testimony trumps the husband’s, and saves her from any punishment, even if she is really guilty.

The general rule, argue reformist Muslims, is that the government should mind its own business and not interfere in the private lives of its citizens.  As for the sexual escapades of its citizens, this does not fall under the jurisdiction of the Islamic state.  Rather, argue these Muslims, the authorities ought to educate the citizenry about the sinful nature of fornication and adultery, its ill effects on society, and the benefits of chastity.  Ultimately, it is better for people to abstain from sins based on their own moral compass than from the heavy hand of government.  It is for this reason that sexual sins remain unpunished in this world, according to reformist (and even conservative) Muslims.

When it comes to consensual sex between two consenting adults, there is no Islamic legal punishment that is enforced.  Robert Spencer has used this fact to claim that the Sharia takes a similar stance towards rape.  His argument is that the Islamic law requires four witnesses to prove rape, a “near impossible” requirement.  I shall refute his claim in my next article.

Footnotes

refer back to article 1. Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 38, #4435

refer back to article 2. al-Ikhtiyar li talil al-Mukhtar, 2/312-313

refer back to article 3. Khaled Abou El Fadl, The Death Penalty, Mercy, and Islam: A Call for Retrospection

refer back to article 4. http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=865&letter=A

refer back to article 5. Sahih al-Bukhari, Sahih al-Muslim

refer back to article 6. Sahih al-Muslim

refer back to article 7. http://www.fountainmagazine.com/article.php?ARTICLEID=1039

refer back to article 8. http://www.scholarofthehouse.org/islamicsexlaws.html

refer back to article 9. http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?HD=1&ID=4208&CATE=42

refer back to article 10. Ibid.

refer back to article 11. I have used the term “Wahhabi” here simply because the readers may be unfamiliar with the proper term “Salafi”.

refer back to article 12. al-Sharh al-Mumti’ (6/157)

refer back to article 13. http://islamqa.com/en/ref/88051/pregnancy%20proof

refer back to article 14. http://www.islam-qa.com/en/ref/6926

refer back to article 15. Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 38, #4387

refer back to article 16. Sahih al-Bukhari, Sahih al-Muslim

refer back to article 17. Sahih al-Muslim

refer back to article 18. http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?HD=1&ID=4208&CATE=42

refer back to article 19. Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 38, #4414

refer back to article 20. http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?HD=1&ID=4208&CATE=42

refer back to article 21. Sahih Muslim, #1695

refer back to article 22. Sunan Abu Dawud

refer back to article 23. Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 38, #4414

refer back to article 24. Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 38, #4420

refer back to article 25. http://www.islamqa.com/en/ref/27113/confession

refer back to article 26. http://www.islamqa.com/en/ref/23485

refer back to article 27. http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?HD=3&ID=1549&CATE=389

refer back to article 28. Sahih Muslim, #2577

refer back to article 29. Sahih al-Jami, #4338

refer back to article 30. Sahih al-Jami, #3008

refer back to article 31. http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?HD=1&ID=4208&CATE=42

refer back to article 32. Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 38, #4405

refer back to article 33. http://www.tariqramadan.com/spip.php?article264

refer back to article 34. http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?HD=3&ID=1550&CATE=389

refer back to article 35. http://islamtoday.com/show_detail_section.cfm?q_id=158&main_cat_id=6

refer back to article 36. Tafsir ibn Kathir, commentary on chapter 24

refer back to article 37. Ibid.; all quotes from the above story are taken from Tafsir ibn Kathir

refer back to article 38. http://qa.sunnipath.com/issue_view.asp?HD=3&ID=1550&CATE=389

Is Joyce Kaufman related to Joe Kaufman by any chance? Florida seems to have a high percentage of loons!

Cerabino: Publix Calendar Yanked through Political Mischief

Hey, don’t bother looking for your free Publix calendar.

The coupon-loaded calendar, which had been a yearly giveaway for the past five years, was yanked this past week from all of the chain’s South Florida supermarkets.

Why? Collateral damage of today’s political climate.

On Dec. 7, the 2010 calendar lists Islamic New Year, not Pearl Harbor Day.

There are two ways to react:

1. To get into a xenophobic tizzy while weaving this into a narrative of a vast anti-American conspiracy that leads right up to the subversive undercover-Muslim, Kenyan interloper in the White House.

Or …

2. To assume that the grocery store chain has no reason to offend people, and that Publix, in an effort to be inclusive, inadvertently became a victim of a synchronicity of dates and an unconscious omission.

Publix pointed out that Pearl Harbor Day had never been listed in the store’s calendars . And the Islamic New Year had been on the Publix calendar since 2006.

And nobody complained.

Not a political document

The rub is that this year the Islamic New Year, which changes dates because it is based on a lunar calendar, falls on Pearl Harbor Day.

And why does the calendar list Islamic New Year? For the same inclusive reason it lists the Jewish High Holidays, Chinese New Year and an international array of other dates, including Puerto Rico Commonwealth Constitutional Day, Haitian Flag Day, Boss’s Day and Administrative Assistant’s Day.

It’s not a political document. It’s a calendar with pictures of animals that you get for free, along with discount coupons. To make more of it is to engage in political mischief.

“I was driving home Tuesday night and Allen West told me to look at the Publix calendar,” said Joyce Kaufman, a WFTL-AM talk-show host.

West, a retired Army lieutenant colonel who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, is a Republican candidate running for the congressional seat held by Rep. Ron Klein, D-Boca Raton.

Radio host urges audience uprising

Kaufman, who advertises her radio show with the words “America first. No apologies,” didn’t require much arm twisting to parlay the quinella of Islamophobia and flag waving to her audience the next day.

“What relevance does Islamic New Year have in my country?” Kaufman told me. “Islam is an ideology, and it’s not friendly to me.”

She said World War II veterans were “terribly offended” and she urged her audience to show up at their local Publix to complain.

“You show this calendar to the manager and say, ‘What’s wrong with this picture?’ ”

Meanwhile, a “Dear Fellow Americans” e-mail was urging a boycott, citing an “un-American attitude” of Publix for “recognizing the Muslim New Year over Pearl Harbor Day.”

Publix wisely yanked the benign calendar, which had become a talking point in a cartoonish alternate universe.

“Based on feedback we have received this year, if a free calendar is produced for 2011, we will also include Pearl Harbor Day,” Publix spokesman Kim Jaeger said in a statement.

~ frank_cerabino@pbpost.com

Conspiracy alert! Czech Cardinal Miloslav Vlk says “Muslims” are gradually conquering Europe. The comment from the Cardinal is fairly tame but and is directed more towards domestic consumption but still feeds into the narrative of conspiracy. (via Islamophobia-watch)

Czech Cardinal says Christian Europe is to blame for Islamisation

Czech Cardinal Miloslav Vlk, the Archbishop of Prague, said Muslims were well placed to fill the spiritual void “created as Europeans systematically empty the Christian content of their lives”.

“Europe will pay dear for having left its spiritual foundations and that this is the last period that will not continue for decades when it may still have a chance to do something about it,” he said.

“Unless the Christians wake up, life may be Islamised and Christianity will not have the strength to imprint its character on the life of people, not to say society.”

The 77-year-old cardinal made his remarks in an interview to mark his retirement after spending 19 years as the leader of the Czech Church.

He said he did not blame Muslims for the crisis as Europeans had brought it upon themselves by exchanging their Christian culture for an aggressive secularism that embraced atheism.

“Europe has denied its Christian roots from which it has risen and which could give it the strength to fend off the danger that it will be conquered by Muslims, which is actually happening gradually,” he said.

“At the end of the Middle Ages and in the early modern age, Islam failed to conquer Europe with arms. The Christians beat them then.

“Today, when the fighting is done with spiritual weapons which Europe lacks while Muslims are perfectly armed, the fall of Europe is looming.”

He called on Christians to respond to the threat of Islamisation by living their own religious faith more observantly.

Last year Cardinal Jose Policarpo, the Patriarch of Lisbon, warned Catholic women against marrying Muslims.

Italian Cardinal Giacomo Biffi also urged the Italian government to give priority to Catholic migrants over Muslims in order to protect his country’s religious identity.

The Vatican has also opposed Turkey joining the European Union partly because the Muslim country does not share the continent’s Christian heritage

I am a little apprehensive in writing this piece because I don’t want to give more credence or traffic to some back water unknown Islamophobe then he deserves. However, I do think it is instructional considering the persistent affection and repetition with which they hold one particularly morbid fantasy: bombing Mecca.

I could go into a historical analysis of what we call the Nuclear Card, charting how various belligerents starting from the Crusader Raynald of Chatillon all the way to Tom Trancredo in the present day have employed the threat of destroying Mecca and Medina for their cause but I will leave that for another day.

In this case we have Bob Beers writing for the Canada Free Press which surprisingly gets a lot of traffic while peddling in some of the most hate filled and racist commentary on the internet but more on that later.

How About We Bomb Mecca?

By Bob Beers Friday, November 6, 2009

Major Malik Hassan, after being transferred from Walter Reed Hospital to Fort Hood decided to celebrate his promotion and transfer by shouting “God is great” in Arabic while gunning down a dozen of his fellow soldiers.

The mainstream media is falling all over itself today in an attempt to somehow paint this domestic Islamic terrorist as the victim rather than the perpetrator. Muslim-friendly to the point of being Muslim-centric, the news networks are even trying to do their reporting without mentioning the killer’s name.

It has been grudgingly revealed that Hassan had months before posted the glorification of suicide bombers on his own web site. There is information trickling out of Walter Reed that his promotion and transfer were not so much a reward but a way for the hospital to get rid of him. Can you imagine what the reporting would be like if his last name had been Smith and he was a Southern Baptist? How about if the web site had glorified the pro-life agenda? No, the news wouldn’t be at all politically correct, it would be screaming for the death penalty.

How many more innocents must be killed by islamofascists before that glorified cult is recognized for what it is? Adherents of the world’s most violent and intolerant religion flew terrified passengers into the World Trade Center’s towers screaming the same line Hassan yelled out as the coward machine-gunned down his fellow soldiers. Nearly every day we read about some innocent young girl being killed by her own relatives because she “dishonored” her family by doing something non-Islamic. I have come to believe that a devout Muslim is incapable of anything close to real love. A loving father would die to save his daughter’s life, not the honor of a phony religion. In reality they more closely resemble trained beasts rather than people. People simply do not act in that fashion on a regular basis. People have aberrations and in some cases will act stupidly or violently, but unless there is a real problem with their mental/emotional makeup they do not act as an Islamist does.

Before you come out of the woodwork to accuse me of not knowing what I’m writing about, let me assure you that I do. I spent a number of years studying comparative religion, including the one started by an Arab thief/con man/thug/pedophile named Muhammad. The worship of the Babylonian Moon God Allah was at one time a minor religion among hundreds in the Babylonian Empire. The followers of that religion had to make a pilgrimage to the temple each year and touch the idol of Allah in order to keep their ticket to heaven active. When Muhammad fanatically decided to revitalize his fading religion, the remnant of the idol was placed in Mecca where it still rests as the so-called “black rock”. Followers of Islam still must pay homage to that idol in order to fulfill their religious duty. If that duty is unfulfilled, they are out. So, what if the rock no longer exists? Hmmm? An interesting thought.

Some have posited that if something happened to the idol, the world’s Muslims would riot, throwing the world into gory chaos. They may be partially right, but not all would do this and if the world’s armies were diligent, it would be a good way of clearing out the villains. Even with that, I think the world would be better off because the Islamofascists would no longer have any hope of making it to their 72 virgins, regardless of how many school children they slaughtered. You cannot sacrifice to an idol that doesn’t exist.

If I were President this is what I would tell the Saudis, If one more terrorist incident happens in the US by any sect of your religion, even if you didn’t order it, say goodbye to your temple. Do you think there would be a few orders sent out to the training camps?

Well, at least I can dream.

Bob Beers no doubt is a sick puppy with sick dreams of apocalyptic chaos and destruction, he is not as sophisticated as a Robert Spencer who doesn’t condemn the idea of bombing Mecca but only thinks it’s a bad idea on practical grounds. What never fails to surprise me is the utter stupidity and lack of logic of die hard anti-Muslim Islamophobes like Beers. In their warped rationale threatening to bomb Mecca would some how deter terrorists instead of emboldening them. The fact is that if the US government or any government for that fact were crazy enough to follow up on the dreams of Bob Beers it would practically set the whole Muslim world, all 1.5 billion against the West.

We can rest assured at night that at the helm of our governments at the moment we have rational players who won’t succumb to such nightmarish fantasies, but who is to say that will always be the case? God forbid that a Sarah Palin type of politician were to become president, if that were to happen it would be cause enough to move the hand on the Nuclear Clock closer to doomsday.

Yet, why do so many take the Canada Free Press seriously? Their social networking editor is a ninth grader by the name of Chase Clift who in his spare time likes to volunteer for the Southern Secessionist Movement and also works for the Confederate Liberation Society which extols the virtues of the Confederacy and revisits history to condemn Abraham Lincoln. The Society’s goal is “an official Peace Treaty signed with the United States of America and a swift transfer of all powers to the government of the Confederate States of America.”

So much for their ramblings about being patriotic Americans, and one has to ask the seminal question of Robert Spencer here, “why are you listed as one of the columnists on Canada Free Press?”

Joe Kaufman

Joe Kaufman, a Kahanist inspired anti-Muslim crusader against “evil” CAIR has been outed by Susan Starkey, Council woman in Davie Town, Florida. This whole drama began when Kaufman’s hate organization (which is him and three other people) became offended that CAIR and some “Mooslims” had participated in a program to pick up litter from the streets. In their insane folly Kaufman and company accused Starkey of being an “Anti-Semite” and a supporter of “terrorism.”

Susan Starkey Responds to Anti-Semitism Allegations

Davie Town Council member Susan Starkey says she never said “Jews try to convert everyone,” as alleged by activist Joe Kaufman, of the Coral Springs-based Americans Against Hate.

The exchange occurred December 18 between Starkey and Jeff Rubinoff, at the holiday party of the Davie / Cooper Republican Club, of which Rubinoff is chairman. He wanted Starkey to take down an adopt-a-street sign that recognized the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Muslim group attacked by conservatives for ties to Hamas. The sign is near the intersection of College Avenue and Southwest 39th Avenue.

In an email, Starkey told Juice:

The statement he alleged ” Jews try to convert everyone”. I am stunned by and offended by the comments and written statements such as this made by Jeff Rubinoff and further perpetuated by Joe Kaufman. I would not say such statements that would offend anyone in this way.

There was at no time any “Anti-Semitic rant” made by me. Mr. Rubinoff is a member of the same activist group as Mr. Kaufman. Many statements made by Mr. Kaufman are hateful, prejudice and outright lies. I have had a wonderful opportunity to serve the town’s diverse population of 92,000 residents as well as a colleges and university professors and students within the town. I had promoted, supported and voted for a $18 Million dollar bond for which the town co-signed with the Broward Jewish Federation, and Davie JCC and Soref no other city in Broward stepped up to help. I have attended at invitation of my Jewish Community many events and functions. I supported Rabbi Pinny’s congregation in the Town of Davie and in fact meet with him and a friend today for guidance on this matter.

We should also note, for the record, that the Jewish faith is not one for proselytizing. In fact, it’s a mighty big hassle to convert to Judaism, at least compared to the ease with which you can become a Christian.

In an email yesterday to Starkey, I asked her to characterize her discussion with Rubinoff.

I would describe the holiday conversation on Dec. 18th a little out of the ordinary in the fact that Mr. Rubinoff was upset that Broward County and the Town of Davie had not immediately removed a sign that he and Mr. Kaufman insisted be removed. He demanded answers and I explained that we were looking into the matter. I have since learned that the sign in question is a part of the Broward County “Adopt a Street” Program to clean up litter on the streets and they are handled administratively by the County and Town Staff. No action is required of the County Commission or the Town Council. This is a volunteer program by organizations to pick up litter.

In yesterday’s post, I ventured a theory that the rupture between the two Republicans, Starkey and Rubinoff, was an illustration of larger statewide trend of conflict between the party’s moderates and its more conservative wing. Starkey’s environmental activism would seem to put her among the party’s moderates, while Rubinoff’s suspicions about CAIR suggests he’s in the more conservative crowd. Starkey responded:

Yes, I am a registered Republican but do not belong to any “clubs”. Municipal government is non-partisan. I consider myself a fiscal conservative environmentalist. I believe in strong family values, community, honesty and integrity and treating everyone fairly as I would like to be treated.I have know that both the Republicans and Democrats have divisions with extreme views sometimes on both sides. I prefer to stay involved with my issues within the town that are important to my residents and stay out of the fray, there is more than enough to keep us busy in trying to provide adequate quality services in these tough economic times.

Kaufman, who admits he didn’t witness the argument between Starkey and Rubinoff, rejects the idea that it was related to any trends of Republican Party tension. In an email responding to yesterday’s post he said:

Mr. Rubinoff’s interaction with Councilmember Starkey had absolutely nothing to do with any type of infighting between members of a political party, and it had absolutely nothing to do with any political issues. Rubinoff did what’s right, and he should be commended for it.

Your spin has absolutely no basis in fact whatsoever.

So there you have it.

While the year was great and we had a lot of highs there were some pieces that didn’t get the attention that they truly deserved due to Loonwatch not being as well known at the time.

Here are a list of 10 pieces you may have missed but shouldn’t have, also take a look through our archives for any past articles:

Douglas Farah’s Delusional Delight

Douglas Farah

Doug, yet another so-called “investigative consultant” tries to link U.S. Muslim orgs to planet Zorbex, that global superpower operating in perfect coordination yet total secrecy to sneak in an evil empire.

M.Cherif Bassiouni Rips Fake Scholar Robert Spencer

Cherif Bassiouni

Robert Spencer, and his proxies such as Hugh Fitzgerald fail miserably trying to character assassinate M. Cherif Bassiouni, read them get ripped in the process.

Update: Robert Spencer Whines and Wimpers after being Exposed

Robert Spencer: Exposed

Update: Robert Spencer cries “bloody censorship” after he is exposed and the ALA canceled his near platform to spout anti-Muslimisms.

Rabbi Brad Hirschfield’s Double Speak

Rabbi Brad Hirschfield

Rabbi Hirschfield seems like a good guy but on his blog he bizarrely criticizes Muslim objections to an anti-Muslim hate film he himself trashes, as “crying wolf.”

ADL Contradicts its Goals by Supporting Fascist

Abe Foxman’s support of Avigdor Lieberman is quite troubling for a number of reasons, most glaringly for its contradiction to the goals preached by the ADL.

Tawfik Hamid: The Shemp of the Three Stooges

Tawfik Hamid

Previously we wrote about the Three Stooges of Islamophobia: Walid Shoebat, Zachariah Anani, and Kamal Saleem but we forgot about Shemp — Tawfik Hamid.

Steven Emerson: “Wowser”

Steven Emerson likes to pass himself off as a gumshoe Investigative Journalist but his antics reveal that he is a poor imitation of Inspector Gadget.

Update: Freedumb of Speech Summit-Defenders of Delusion

The Freedumb of Speech Summit descended into a predictable Hate Summit, but were you expecting otherwise?

Spate of Islamophobic Gang Attacks on Elderly Muslims of London

Three year old girl, traumatized from watching her grandfather's brutal murder

A spate of racially motivated gang attacks against Muslims culminate in the death of a sixty-seven year old man, who was clubbed to death in front of his now traumatized granddaughter.

Fascist Leaves Daniel Pipes “Elated”

Avigdor Lieberman

Lieberman’s extreme world view and rhetoric has left observers around the world, including many Israelis, shocked and frightened. Not so, Daniel Pipes. Lieberman has him “elated.”

————————————————————————————————–

And here is a free bonus since Rabbi Hirschfield, while having a loonie moment, does not qualify as a loon in our books:

Robert Spencer: Teaming up with Euro-Supremacists Again

Robert Spencer, erstwhile ally of neo-Fascists, friend to advocates of genocide, and all around anti-Muslim is once again basking in the light of his own, made up self-importance.

This time it centers around his recent trip to Germany where he gave a speech at a rally in Berlin.

It has been a crazy 2009, we began our little adventure here at Loonwatch about eight months ago to monitor and expose the comical and disgusting world of Islamophobia. In that time we have gathered a pretty formidable team: Emperor, Garibaldi, Mooneye, Danios, Zingel, Darter and the sporadic contributors American Sole and Barbel.

The year has been wacky and sad, we witnessed Islamophobic murders, violence, and incitement, the continuing repitition of the double standard of castigating all Islam for the crimes of a few Muslims in the media, we saw crazy conspiracy theories revolving around Barack Obama’s supposed “Mooslimness” increase, and much more and Loonwatch has been in the middle of it all, documenting and breaking it down.

We have taken on Robert Spencer and JihadWatch, for the past few years he had been either mostly ignored or left unscathed but through our exposes such as Zingel’s devastating revelation that Spencer’s site was connected to “F***Islam.com” and Danios’ thorough and explosive dissections of Spencer’s arguments he has been exposed for the hateful fraud that he is. It doesn’t take a genius to realize that Spencer is scared of Loonwatch, when there was an open challenge for him to rebut our refutations he slithered into silence.

We have documented the Blog Wars in the anti-Muslim blogosphere, the humiliation they had to deal with when we exposed how they had fallen for one conspiracy theory after another such as the insane Gaza mass wedding pedophilia conspiracy. From the Fathima Rifqa Bary case all the way to the Swiss minaret ban we have covered it all, and we can only promise that with the continued participation and support of our indefatigable readers we will keep bringing explosive exposes and incisive commentary on the loony world of Islamophobia!

Without further ado these are the top ten most popular pieces of 2009 from Loonwatch (we tallied this by posting those pieces that had the most traffic on the site):

1.)Pamela Geller: The Looniest Blogger Ever

Pam Geller is the looniest blogger ever. Quite a distinction, but she has earned it through her vigilant anti-Muslimism, constant Islamophobia and hatred of Obama.

2.)Fathima Rifqa Bary Needs to Read Her Bible; Final Word on Islam and Apostasy

Fathima Rifqa Bary’s pastor has convinced her that the Quran commands her to be killed for converting. In this expose we deal with the veracity of the claim.

3.)Anti-Muslim Blogosphere Runs Amuck: Forced to Eat Crow

The anti-Muslim, Islamophobic Blogosphere was riled up and accusing the world of turning a blind eye to Pedophilia but then they had to eat crow. See why.

4.)Geert Wilders Wants to Tax Women who Wear the Hijab

Geert Wilders, friend of Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller calls for a tax on Muslim women who wear the hijab. Where are the condemnations against this attack on the values of “Western Civilization?”

5.)Wafa Sultan is Better Known as Wafa Stalin

Wafa Sultan

Wafa Sultan advocates the nuking of Islamic countries whose religion she likens to Nazism. She also seconds Geert Wilders call to ban the Quran.

6.)The Church’s Doctrine of “Perpetual Servitude” was Worse than “Dhimmitude”

Robert Spencer next to his Perpetual Serf Pamela Geller

Robert Spencer can’t stop talking about “dhimmitude.” In this mini-book, we neutralize the argument by examining the Church’s doctrine of “Perpetual Servitude.”

7.)Temple University Rejects Geert Wilders

Temple University Rejects Geert Wilders

Temple University administrators allow Geert Wilders hate speech over the unanimous objection and rejection of the student body and faculty. (Updated)

8.)Muslim Americans Must Obey U.S. Laws; Nidal Hasan Disobeyed Islamic Doctrine

Major Nidal Malik Hasan

Islam enjoins believers to obey the laws of the land, which is why millions of Muslims seek to be upstanding and loyal Americans.

9.)Loonwatch Exclusive: Robert Spencer’s “f**kallah.com” & “f**kislam.com”

"Islam Scholar" Robert Spencer Exposed

A LoonWatch Exclusive takes a look at the latest scandal associated with the internet’s premiere anti-Muslim bigot.

10.)Debbie Schlussel and the Great Blog Wars

Debbie Schlussel

Debbie Schlussel has been described by the LATimes as a trigger happy anti-Muslim zealot, she is also a pioneer in the Great (Civil) Blog War.

Dov Hikind, A Settler and New York Assemblyman supports Ethnically Profiling "Mooslims"

Just a few days ago we had a failed terrorism attack on an NWA flight in Detroit. Umar Abdulmutallab, a Nigerian, seems to have come under the sway of the extremist ideology of Al-Qaeda and attempted to blow up a plane in Detroit. The case is in some ways similar to the one involving Nidal Hasan who acted alone in his attack on Fort Hood, and reports are coming out now that Abdulmutallab may have acted alone as well. These actions put a strain on American Muslims, who we never tire to repeat, condemn these acts and are the strongest wall for law enforcement in preventing them.

In this climate, and whenever an attack or an attempted attack occurs we find that certain segments of the population seek to capitalize on them to push forward their agendas. In this instance we have a revealing video collection put together by Think Progress:

First we have Mike Gallagher, the Michael Savage wanna-be pretty much sounding as ignorant as possible, emphasizing names like “Abdul,” “Ahmed,” and “Mohammed” with a wry grin as means for profiling and creating a separate line at the airport. Then we have the aforementioned Islamophobe Peter King making the golly gee statement of the year, “100% of Islamic terrorists are Muslims.” Charles Johnson, of Little Green Footballs commented on that nicely, “In other news, 100% of Popes are Catholics.”

We also have failed Terrorism expert Steven Emerson contradicting himself in consecutive sentences,

There have been so many complaints about so called profiling by quote “Islamic civil rights groups” that they stop basically profiling and that basically led to not putting this guy on the terrorist watch list there would have been too much of an outcry. Number two, he was put on in the last month.

Emerson the genius.

Then there is the New York Assemblyman, Dov Hikind, who in a completely absurd and non-sensical move is calling for the ethnic profiling of Arabs and South Asians. A profile which the would-be bomber didn’t fit considering he was…drum roll please… NIGERIAN.

Dov Hikind dodges the rebuttal by Muslim Advocates’ Hussein Rashid, what is his answer to the fact that this case only seems to prove that ethnic profiling does not work?

The answer seems to be that Hikind is a racist, and notice in this clip how he only mentions Arabs as the ethnic “Mooslims” that he would have profiled, he must be Pamela Geller’s favorite politician after Sarah Palin, considering how he advocates the destruction of the Dome of the Rock and the construction of a Third Jewish Temple. (hat tip: Chasing Evil)

Newest Daniel Pipes Scandal

In our last post on notorious Islamophobe, Daniel Pipes, we analyzed some of the questionable and often hypocritical posturing he employs in his commentary on Islam and Muslims by offering an exhaustive rebuttal one of his many bizarre posts, “Hijabs on Western Political women.”

As I went through the images he had on his little photo display of Western women in Hijabs, I noticed one photo that did not look quite right. Apparently, the shady Mr. Pipes tried to sneak in a photo of Camilla Parker Bowles in a Hijab that included a photoshopped image of Prince Charles in what is presumably “full Muslim” garb. Prince Charles’ expensive Western suit was magically replaced with a gown, cloak, and turban. The sheer dishonesty in using the photoshopped version of that photo, despite the availability of many other photos taken on that day at that same spot showing Prince Charles dressed in a suit, deserves its own post here at LoonWatch.

Now, last time a career Islamophobe was exposed here at Loonwatch with their hand in the cookie jar, he tried to lay low and then he played dumb. We fully expect Daniel Pipes to enter the same plea.

Unfortunately for Mr. Know-it-all, the “I did not know” excuse is not going to fly:

a) the photo is clearly photoshopped to the naked eye, that is how I knew it was!

b) any elementary research on a photo with Camilla in a hijab (which is presumably how Pipes found this photo) results in many photos taken that day showing Prince Charles next to her in a suit.

The notion that Pipes could be this gullible and this sloppy raises questions about the accuracy of his research abilities - this of course is the best case scenario. The more realistic scenario is that Pipes is aware it is photoshopped but used it all the same just for dramatic effect, again underscoring his shady and sensationalist ways. This does not surprise us in the least, like his colleague Robert Spencer, Mr. Daniel Pipes is more of a propagandist and less of a scholar. By the way, a third possible scenario, yet unmentioned, is that someone in Mr. Daniel Pipes’ camp did the photoshopping which would then make the case against him even more dire - if that is at all possible at this point.

Photoshopped image of Prince Charles used by Daniel Pipes on danielpipes.com

Actual way Prince Charles appeared that day and in this photo shoot, as he toured Al Azhar mosque with Sheikh Tantawi. You can see the column and lanterns in the background, and the two girls (one in pink and the other in white headscarves behind him):

here is the same angle as the fake Pipes version, but panned out shot:

and finally, here is a snapshot of the fake image as it appears on danielpipes.com:

For shame! Mr. Pipes

Mr. Pipes, you have a lot of explaining to do!

- Zingel

Daniel Pipes: Bizarre Fixation on the Hijab

(Read an UPDATE here)

In a running column entitled, “Hijab on Western Political Women,” failed academic turned zaney anti-Muslim blogger, Daniel Pipes, sets out to (in his own words):

For fun, how about collecting those instances when female political leaders, especially leftist ones, don the hijab (Islamic headscarf)?

(What normal person sitting before a computer thinks up of such a bizarre thing to do when trying to “have fun” anyway? Welcome to the world of Pipes I guess. )

Pipes then includes photos of princess Diana, queen Elizabeth, Laura Bush, Hillary Clinton, Chelsea Clinton and Angelina Jolie, among others, wearing a Hijab when at various mosques.

This caused us to wonder, surely Mr. Pipes is not sexist. Surely, he would invite the same scrutiny to the men in their lives: princess Diana’s husband and queen Elizabeth’s son (prince Charles, heir to the British throne), Laura Bush’s father-in-law and husband (George H.W and George W., both U.S. Presidents), Chelsea Clinton’s dad and Hillary Clinton’s husband (Bill Clinton, U.S. President) and Angelina Jolie’s dad (actor Jon Voight). Surely Mr. Pipes would not want to give those men a pass, especially given all of them (but the last) are far more important politically than their women.

Well since Daniel Pipes is not very good at holding a mirror up to his face, we here at loonwatch volunteered to do that for him. Seeing that Mr. Pipes is Jewish, we put together the following photo display (true to a Daniel Pipes style presentation) - one that is relevant to his own religion not someone else’s - to see what he thinks of it and what he reckons it signifies.

So “for fun”, Mr. Pipes, how about  collecting those instances when Western (and Eastern) male political (and non-political) leaders, especially leftist (and rightist and centrist) ones, don the kippah or yarmulke (Jewish skullcap)?

We start with the most politically powerful men on the planet, U.S. presidents:

U.S. President Bill Clinton wearing a yarmulke

U.S. President George Bush wearing a yarmulke, flanked by Israeli ministers Shimon Peres and Ehud Olmert

U.S. President Barack Obama wearing a yarmulke while praying at the Western Wall

U.S. President George Herbert Bush (the father) wearing a yarmulke as he kisses the Western Wall

U.S. President George Bush wearing a yarmulke as he prays at the Western Wall

President George Bush wearing another yarmulke

American senator Joe Lieberman puts a yarmulke on the head of then presidential candidate, senator John McCain

And other politically powerful world leaders:

British prime minister, Gordon Brown, wearing a yarmulke

Then British prime minister Tony Blair wearing a yarmulke

French president Nicolas Sarkozy wearing a yarmulke

Then Japanese prime minister Junichiro Koizumi wearing a yarmulke as he prays at the Western wall

Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin wearing a yarmulke

Prince Charles of Wales, regent to the British crown, wearing a yarmulke

And other American political men:

"America's Mayor" Rudy Giuliani, mayor of New York City, wearing a yarmulke as then Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon looks on

Clinton's Special Middle East Coordinator Dennis Ross wearing a yarmulke

US ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, wearing a yarmulke - not in a temple but at a Republican National Convention

And to match Angelina Jolie, how about some entertainers including her own father:

Evangelical Christian actor Stephen Baldwin wearing a yarmulke - not at a temple but at a Republican National Convention

Actor Jon Voight (Angelina's dad) holding up his yarmulke at a Republican National Convention

The king of pop, Michael Jackson, wearing a yarmulke

And how about other world faith leaders:

His holiness, the Dalai Lama, wearing a yarmulke as he prays at the Western Wall

And speaking of political mixing with religious:

The "Mccippah", a play on "McCain" and "Kippah" (yarmulke), a feature at the Republican National Convention 2008

Now, we have a few simple questions to ask Mr. Pipes:

First let’s get real: clearly, Mr. Pipes is not interested in some irrelevant, uneventful “fun” on that merry temple of love and good times of his, danielpipes.com. Everything he writes and puts on there he does so with a purpose in mind. It seems that his “little fun” hijab photo display was yet another sorry attempt to cry “Islamization” and “dhimmi” and all of the favorite concepts he and his friends love to evoke.

So here goes the questions:

1. Do you believe that non-Muslim Western women who wear a hijab when visiting mosques or other Islamic religious settings are doing it as a sign of respect, or a sign of capitulation and a consequence of Islamization?

If the former then what’s the point of your running photo display? And if the latter which more logically seems to be the case, then:

2. Do you believe that non-Jewish Western men who wear a skullcap when visiting a temple or other Jewish religious settings are doing it as a sign of respect, or a sign of capitulation and a consequence of Judaization?

If the former, then why the double standard? And if the latter then why haven’t you sounded the alarm to save the West from Judaization.

More questions:

3. What would you say and how would you react if Western political women not only wore the hijab at the mosque but prayed there while they are at it? Would you see it as a lovely sign of camaraderie, an expression of tolerance, a sign that we all share a common God? Or would you cry “dhimmi”? Just curious.

(If the latter then kindly educate us: what is the “dhimmi” equivalent of a Western political man - a head of state no less - who does the same but within the context of Judaism rather than Islam?)

4. You seem to gloat about the reporter who took off the “Chador” (a traditional Islamic dress worn in conservative Iran) and threw it at Imam Khomeini whom she was interviewing. Now, I personally believe that Khomeini was a loony Imam. But I am just curious, would you also gloat if a reporter threw a yarmulke at some loony rabbi like say, Chief Rabbi Ovadia Yosef or Rabbi Yitzhak Shapira or Rabbi Jon Hausman? Just curious.

5.  Are you aware that Eritrea is not an Islamic country and that it has as many Christian citizens as it does Muslim. Are you aware that Hillary Clinton is not necessarily wearing a hijab in the photo of her in Eritrea, but a traditional Eritrean loose shawl worn by both Muslims and Christians there? Are you aware that every other American woman in that photo (and there are at least three) are not wearing a similar shawl clearly proving that it is Hillary’s choice not some enforced evil Islamic spell on Western women as seems to be implied. Q: So if it’s neither enforced, nor a hijab to begin with, why do you use that photo. A: expediency. Typical of Mr. Pipes.

6. Lastly, if some blog put up a display like the one above with the insinuation that there is some insidious force at play, would you not cry anti-Semitism? SO, given your photo display and the accompanying shady commentary, aren’t readers then well within their rights and the bounds of reason to cry Islamophobia? Just curious.

Mr. Pipes, we await your response to our questions. For the rest of our dear readers, this has been a little peek inside the  paranoid mindset of an Islamophobe and the convoluted, often petty, ways in which it processes our world.

(For the record, LoonWatch, unlike Mr. Pipes, takes the consistent position that both non-Muslim women wearing hijabs in Islamic religious settings and non-Jewish men wearing yarmulkes in Jewish religious settings is a sign of respect and nothing more. And that wearing them outside religious settings is indeed strange but a personal choice that is no cause for alarm or geopolitical analysis).

- Zingel

Author’s Note: Daniel Pipes makes a lame attempt to address the hijab/yarmulke comparison in a 2008 addendum to his article in which he “rejects” the comparison altogether, stating in typical Pipesian delusional style that such a comparison is irrelevant, and positing that the “tallit” the Jewish prayer shawl is instead more comparable to the Hijab.

This is nonsense.

The tallit is not worn in public everyday life the way Muslim women wear the Hijab in daily public activity (for Hijabis); however, Jewish skullcaps are worn in daily public living (for Jewish Orthodox men). The yarmulke, not the tallit, is the closest Jewish analogy to the Hijab.

He also implies that half the pictures of Western women wearing the Hijab is not in a mosque while most Western men who wear the skullcap are in a temple. Not true, they are exactly analogous and proportional. Most of the pictures of the Western women wearing a Hijab is in fact in a mosque or mosque setting and it is usually a simple headscarf not some full body chador as he implies but even his collection of pictures clearly contradict (Iran, a conservative theocracy, being the exception not the norm). On the flip side, our photo display has photos that debunk his insinuation that Western men wear yarmulkes only in temples.
READ AN UPDATE HERE

The Grinch Who Stole Christmas

The Grinch who stole Christmas is at it again.

For some, this “merry” time of the year is a special occasion to spread Islamophobia and hate around the United States.

First we had the loon pastors who turned a cheerful Christmas lights display into an occasion to spread their warm and fuzzy Christmas message “Islam is of the Devil.”

Then we had the anti-Muslim KKK (Kahane-Krazed Kaufman) rallying  his merry band of wackos against American Muslims who are partaking in an initiative to pick up litter from the streets because Moooslims are a dangerous terrorist threat.

Joe Kaufman

And now we have an email crusade aimed at pressuring the US postal service to stop including Islamic holidays in their holiday stamp group. The email crusade is replete with the general conspiracy nonsense we are used to from Islamophobes, that it was issued by President Obama (secret Muslim), linking the stamp to Muslim terrorists, etc. Take a quick read at the following news piece and then consider our little idea of how to push back against this rabid hate with just a few cents.

Muslim Stamp delivers e-mail boycott

St. Petersburg, Florida - It’s the holiday season and people are busy mailing out packages and greeting cards.

The Arabic says "Happy Festival."

The United States Postal Service offers a variety of holiday stamps including ones marking Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa. But there’s one stamp that some people aren’t giving the stamp of approval.

It’s the Eid Greetings stamp, which honors two Muslim holidays. There’s an e-mail going around calling on “patriotic Americans” to boycott it.

Ahmed Bedier, President of the Tampa Human Rights Council and a Muslim, has seen the e-mail and he finds it troubling. “This is a form of hate mail. Hate speech,” says Bedier. “It can be very dangerous and it’s full of basically a lot of misinformation.”

The e-mail sent to 10 Connects does contain some factual errors. It says the stamp is new and that President Obama had it issued. However, the stamp is far from new. It’s eight years old and was created when George W. Bush was president.

Besides talking about the stamp, the e-mail also lists a string of terrorist bombings linked to Muslim extremists. The e-mail says that using the stamp would be a slap in the face to Americans who died.

For Bedier, that message amounts to cyber hate. “That would be similar to sending out messages like it was a Catholic who committed the Oklahoma City bombing; it was a Catholic who did this, it was a Catholic who did that. Let’s get rid of the Catholics.”

But one thing Bedier would like to get rid of is this e-mail. Just like the mobs at the post office, variations of it seem to surface every year. And that’s one holiday tradition Bedier wishes more people would help extinguish.

“I would recommend just hitting the delete button.”

The U.S. Postal Service and several rumor-debunking websites like Snopes offer information about the Eid stamp and the e-mail.

Here’s the news report with the full story:

Of course, the US Postal Service is not carrying stamps for other religious holidays and traditions celebrated in America, it’s just Islam, because Islam you see is taking over:

So what do we do about it? Well, how about we heed the example of the Swiss Businessman who took a stance against hate? LoonWatch is asking everyone who opposes Islamophobia and all forms of hate - whether you are Muslim, Jewish, Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Atheist, or something else - to make it a point to purchase and use Eid stamps for all your mailings in 2010. With just 42 cents, that you will spend anyway, you can turn a mundane daily task into a powerful statement against hate. We would call for the same if say Hanukkah or Kwanzaa was being targeted in this way. Join in the campaign and pass it on!

Order here or from your local post office.

Joe Kaufman

We haven’t written much on Joe Kaufman recently, but that doesn’t mean he has fallen off our radar. Kaufman is in the same league of Islamophobic kookieness as Pamela Geller, and his radical if comical beliefs expose him as a somewhat dangerous if bumbling joker.

Recently, Kaufman went haywire over the participation of CAIR in the Broward County “adopt-a-street” program, a program where a group takes the initiative to “adopt” a street and clear it of litter. Kaufman was incensed and accused the county of giving into terrorism.

Adam Horowitz, of Mondoweiss, has an excellent piece on the goofy antics that make up Joe Kaufman’s crusade against the “adopt-a-street” program.

If this street gets cleaned the terrorists win

The South Florida Sun Sentinel is reporting that right-wing Jewish extremist, and one time vice-chairman of the Republican Jewish Coalition of South Florida, Joe Kaufman is leading the charge against one of this country’s greatest security threats: the Adopt-A-Street program in Florida’s Broward County. Kaufman is incensed that the county had the short sightedness to allow the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) to participate in its “adopt a street” program. And he’s not taking it lying down.

The Sun Sentinel explains:

A small group of demonstrators led by Americans Against Hate Chairman Joe Kaufman last Friday accused Broward County and the Town of Davie of supporting an organization with ties to Islamic terrorists.

A street sign in Davie sparked the anger of the demonstrators who protested in front of the Broward County Governmental Center in Fort Lauderdale on a rainy Friday afternoon.

The sign, at the southwest corner of College Avenue and Nova Drive, credits the Miami office of the Council on American Islamic Relations ( CAIR-FL) for its participation in a Broward County program to clear litter from an “adopted” street.

Kaufman said when he complained about the sign, a spokesman for the Town of Davie told him it would not be removed because CAIR had a Constitutional right to free speech.

“Freedom of speech is a poor excuse,” Kaufman said to the demonstrators. “This is not about free speech. It’s about terrorism.”(Emphasis added)

Let us interject here for a moment, as there is something very revealing in the comments from Kaufman. When he was told that this is a matter of free speech, and that CAIR (which has never been convicted of or charged with terrorism) has the right to participate in this program, Kaufman replied by saying that “this is not about free speech.” All of a sudden free speech no longer matters when “Mooslims” are involved. Kaufman, seems to believe free speech is only valuable when criticizing or defaming/hating Islam and Muslims but when it is extended to everyone it is “a poor excuse.”

This also reveals the wider hypocrisy in the Islamophobic movement, we hear the constant refrain from Robert Spencer, Pamela Geller, Wafa Sultan, etc. that Mooslims are trying to muzzle their voices, that Mooslims are “against free speech,” but as we have shown time and again when they are challenged and exposed they cry about being “libeled,” “intimidated,” “shocked” even calling for retractions and “apologies.” It seems to be a case of what’s good for the goose is not good for the gander, and Kaufman’s Freudian slip illustrates this very well.

Adam Horowitz continues,

The Sun Sentinel says that Muhammad Malik, the civil rights director of CAIR’s South Florida branch, responded by explaining, “the organization wanted to bring out people to pick up litter from the street, like any other group.”

If there was ever any doubt that segments of the Jewish community have totally lost touch with reality just check out this quote from Kaufman on the press release for the protest explaining why it was being held on Hanukkah:

“On Hanukkah, millions of people around the world celebrate the triumph of the Jewish people over those who wished to destroy them. We want Broward County to recognize the fact that those involved with Hamas, like the Greeks 2000 years before them, have a similar goal to destroy the Jews. And we want Broward County to know that it allowed a sign to be ‘adopted’ by a group connected to Hamas.”

And so Joe, you’re saying the Greeks also tried to destroy the Jews by cleaning their streets? That is almost as shocking as some of Americans Against Hate’s merchandise (and be sure to not miss this).

Is Kaufman’s war against CAIR picking up litter from the streets a surprise? No, it is a hilarious inside into the extremist character of Kaufman, moulded by the thoughts of Meir Kahane. Everything is Jihad and terror, cleaning up the streets is equal to destroying America. It would have been sad if it wasn’t so funny.

Who is he?:

Joe Kaufman, has been on the Anti-Muslim scene for quite a while now and is dubbed by the far Right-Wing FrontPageMag as, you guessed it…another one of their ”Investigative Journalists.”  That he has been influenced by Meir Kahane and the Kahanist ideology is well documented, as is his love and angst for Kahane.

In the past he has been accused of contributing to the terrorist organization founded by Kahane known as JDL (Jewish Defense League) while others accuse Kaufman of at the very least holding views that parallel JDL positions.

Kaufman’s unsavory associations and views are quite real and they are only dangerous to America if you’re stupid enough to swallow his conspiracy theories but other than that he is simply a half-baked paranoid conspiracy theorist, some what along the lines of the “9/11 Truthers.”

In every nook and cranny there is a “Mooslim”…hiding and ready to get ya…so beware and be afraid. Be veryyyy afraid goes his story.

In this special LoonWatch series we will detail the exploits and punchlines that Krazy Kaufman throws out there and attempts to pass on as serious journalism, commentary and investigation.

The Moral Contortionist

On November 25th, we wrote about a wacky article that the failed academic and full time Likud apologist, Daniel Pipes wrote for the Jerusalem Post, in which he argued that US Congressman Keith Ellison, intellectual Tariq Ramadan and President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan were a greater threat to Western Civilization than Al-Qaeda.

We wrote at the time,

According to the illogic of Pipes the greatest threat doesn’t come from Al-Qaeda, Ayatollah Khomeini or Nidal Hasan but rather from people like Dr. Tariq Ramadan and Congressman Keith Ellison. He accuses the two of being part of something he terms “Islamism 2.0.” This ridiculous term translates essentially into what Islamophobe Robert Spencer calls “Stealth Jihad,” or the subtle takeover of the West by peaceful, law-abiding Muslims who have a secret, sinister (stealth) goal to takeover the West and replace Democracy with Shariah law: in other words it’s a conspiracy theory.

Ayatollah Khomeini, Osama bin Laden, and Nidal Hasan represent Islamism 1.0, Recep Tayyip Erdogan (the prime minister of Turkey), Tariq Ramadan (a Swiss intellectual), and Keith Ellison (a US congressman) represent Islamism 2.0. The former kill more people but the latter pose a greater threat to Western civilization. (emphasis mine)

That Erdogan, Ramadan and Ellison can even be mentioned in the same sentence as equivalent to, or even more dangerous and threatening to the West than Bin Laden speaks volumes about Pipes’ preposterous agenda. Would Bin Laden have Turkey make peace with Armenia as Erdogan did? Would Bin Laden affirm Democracy as the way forward to better governance and equal rights as all three do? Would Bin Laden pledge to uphold the Constitution of the United States of America on Thomas Jefferson’s Qur’an as Keith Ellison did?

We never imagined Daniel Pipes would offer a response, as he usually isn’t too keen to get into a debate with anyone who challenges his weak and biased arguments. However, it seems this time Pipes couldn’t hold himself back. Prompted by a reader of his website, Aliya, who alerted Pipes to our rebuttal of his article, he responded by bringing the all too familiar response of those who have no arguments: comparing your subject to Hitler.

The questioner sounds like another loon that we know, Pamela Geller who surmised that Loonwatch was a George Soros funded website, but she takes it a step further and includes all the possible conspiracy theories she can think of, not only are we George Soros funded but we are an, “Islamist Jewish/Eurabian (apparently George Soros and Saudi funded) website.” I love these loons, if half of what they said were true (Alas, my meager pockets) we would be rolling in the dough!!  Soros and company we are still waiting on our checks!

Notice that Daniel Pipes really didn’t answer any of the arguments or questions in our article, my guess is he probably didn’t even read it. He looked at the way Aliya framed the question and answered it by equating Keith Ellison, Tariq Ramadan and Recep Erodogan, all fierce proponents of Democracy to the greatest mass-murderer of the 20th century. Quite despicable, and it seems to have become Daniel Pipes’ forte to side on the side of the despicable.

The real question however is, if Pipes is truly interested in “protecting Western Civilization,” why is he as silent as a mouse on the real threat: the new little Hitler’s springing up all over Europe? Why does Pipes ignore neo-fascist Geert Wilders who calls for the deportation of Mooslims, banning of the Quran, taxing the hijab, etc? Why does he not speak out against the fascist Northern League, why does he give his tacit approval of the minaret ban in Switzerland which he charachterizes as a vote against “Islamization?”

The new amendment also validates and potentially encourages resistance to Islamization throughout the continent.

The reality is ever clearer, Mr.Pipes doesn’t give two hoots about Democracy, for him Democracy is convenient when it fits his agenda but should be discarded the moment it is no longer of use.

The Looniest Blogger Ever: Pamela Geller

Note to LW Readers: Please Welcome our newest blogger, “Darter” who will be contributing regularly to the site.

We continue our coverage of the looniest blogger in the world, Pamela Geller, with a collection of her paranoid delusions and distortions from this past week.

First up, the SIOE (Stop the Islamisation of Europe) protest against the building of a new mosque in London. The event garnered an impressive fifteen “freedom fighters”, but Pamela’s outrage was reserved for the local Jews who refused to take part in the divisive event.

KAPO Mentality Takes Hold In The Face Of Islamic Annihilationists’ Second Holocaust

Rabbis attacked the campaign. “The show of unity from the Jewish community is in defiance of a website appeal by SIOE for 1,000 Jews carrying the Israeli flag to turn up.” Even the Rabbis abandon Israel when the going gets rough.

Stop the Islamisation of Europe held a rally protest in what can only be described as an Islamic fortress in the heart of Harrow. I strongly urged Jews to attend. Islamic anti-semitism is more poisonous, more dangerous than even Nazism was to the Jews. This promise of Jewish genocide is made “sacred” by Islamic texts.

As loonwatch has documented before, Euro-supremacists often use the Israeli flag to conceal their anti-Semitic tendencies, believing it gives them a free pass for their anti-Muslim bigotry. Pamela assumes that support for Israel is the only issue concerning Jews. Obviously the rabbis did not appreciate the misuse of the flag of Israel for Islamophobic propaganda.

Next up, a bizarre “stealth jihad” delusion from Pamela, Sharia Coke: 

This is Sharia going global. They are using local Muslims the world over to demand Sharia adherence by corporations and by the market place.

This is slowly leading to Nuremberg like Jewish laws as products are being branded as Jewish.

We all know that taking over the soda industry is one of the keys to the Mooslim domination of the world! Per her modus operandi, anything Muslim related can be assumed to be part of a global plot to impose Shari’ah law on unsuspecting dhimmis. And you can always throw in a Nazi reference for good measure.

Along the same lines, Pamela is upset that a Muslims group in Minnesota has put up an innocuous billboard  inviting people to ask questions about Islam. Ignorance keeps Pamela in business, so I can understand her strong opposition. I say, why can’t Muslims be allowed to educate the public about their faith? Do these same people who rail against Muslims have a problem when Christian groups put up billboards calling people to find Jesus? I imagine not. But with Muslims, it must be a jihadi plot.

Islam: This is Defamation of Religion

As a Jew, I am offended to my core. Muslims have no right to invoke Moses and Abraham. This is a delegitimization of Judaism. It is offensive and vile. And while Jesus is not my guy, the same thing goes for him. It is a delegitimization of Christianity. These are not Muslim prophets.

If people want to convert to Islam, goodbye Charlie. But leave my shiz alone. Vultures.

The belief that all the prophets, from Adam to Muhammad, carried the same message of Islam is a central belief for Muslims. Why not use this to bridge gaps between Muslims, Christians, and Jews? Certainly common ground can be found between the Abrahamic faiths.  But Pamela has such a knee-jerk reaction to anything Islamic that her loony mind can only see it as a delegitimization of Judaism and Christianity.

She then turns her attention to one of her favorite targets, President Barack Obama. Some veiled racism from Pamela the international relations expert, Obama acts “gangsta” but is really buddies with Iran, North Korea and the Mooslims.

Obama Threatens

He gets all tough and gangsta to those who don’t bend to his will, but he kisses the ass of Iran, North Korea and the OIC.

Her thoughts on the GITMO transfer to Illinois?

Outrage: GITMO Comes to Chicagoland

Obama is bringing his jihad to Illinois. Has anyone asked the people of Chicago if they want KSM’s soul mates in their state? Obama’s treachery is breathtaking. A killer’s paradise.

In fact, the town of Thomson, Illinois is looking forward to the economic boost from the prisoner transfer. The filling of the maximum-security prison would bring 3000 jobs to an area where 11% are unemployed. But why let facts get in the way of a good story? Such are the delusions of Pamela Geller. We will continue to expose her Islamophobia despite her efforts to call it common sense.

Robert Spencer, the author of the Islamophobook The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades)

This is a rebuttal of chapter five of Robert Spencer’s book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades), which is entitled “Islam oppresses women.” On pp.74-76, Spencer claims that the Sharia rejects a rape victim’s testimony.

Robert Spencer’s Claims

Says Spencer in his book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades):

Rape: Four witnesses needed

Most threatening of all to women may be the Muslim understanding of rape as it plays out in conjunction with Islamic restrictions on the validity of a woman’s testimony. In court, a woman’s testimony is worth half as much as that of a man. (Quran 2:282)

Islamic legal theorists have restricted the validity of a woman’s testimony even further by limiting it to, in the words of one Muslim legal manual, “cases involving property, or transactions dealing with property, such as sales.”  Otherwise only men can testify. And in cases of sexual misbehavior, four male witnesses are required…

Consequently, it is almost impossible to prove rape in lands that follow the dictates of the Sharia.  Men can commit rape with impunity: As long as they deny the charge and there are no witnesses, they will get off scot-free, because the victim’s testimony is inadmissible.  Even worse, if a woman accuses a man of rape, she may end up incriminating herself.  If the required male witnesses can’t be found, the victim’s charge of rape becomes an admission of adultery. ^[1]

Spencer also says the exact same thing on his website:

Consequently, it is even today virtually impossible to prove rape in lands that follow the dictates of the Sharia. Even worse, if a woman accuses a man of rape, she may end up incriminating herself. If the required male witnesses can’t be found, the victim’s charge of rape becomes an admission of adultery.

Let us analyze Spencer’s claims one point at a time:

Women as Witnesses under Sharia

Robert Spencer writes:

In court, a woman’s testimony is worth half as much as that of a man. (Quran 2:282)

Islamic legal theorists have restricted the validity of a woman’s testimony even further by limiting it to, in the words of one Muslim legal manual, “cases involving property, or transactions dealing with property, such as sales.”  Otherwise only men can testify.

There are two claims made here: (1) a woman’s testimony is worth half of a man’s;  (2) a woman’s testimony is accepted only in financial transactions (even then only by half), and rejected altogether in other cases, including rape.

Of course the reality is that Spencer has spoken a half-truth, which is what he normally does.  Spencer’s modus operandi is simple: he presents the absolutely most conservative view as if it is not only the most authoritative one but also the only one.  He then compares this ultraconservative Islamic opinion with the most liberal Judeo-Christian view, and then says aha!

The issue revolves around the following Quranic verse:

O you who believe! When you deal with each other in contracting a debt for a fixed time, then write it down; and let a scribe write it down between you with fairness…and call from among your men two witnesses; but if there are not two men, then one man and two women from among those whom you choose to be witnesses, so that if one of the two errs, the second of the two may remind the other. (Quran, 2:282)

Some Islamic jurists opined that the Quranic verse only permitted a woman’s testimony in cases related to financial transactions.  Therefore, they reasoned, it ought to be excluded in all other cases.  This opinion was prominent in the writings of medieval jurists, and is clung onto by some ultraconservative Muslims.

However, Spencer neglected to inform his readers of less stringent views that abound today.  Contemporary Muslims argue that the Quranic verse 2:282 has nothing to do with the courts or legal system in general:

…There is no verse anywhere in the Qur’an, which directs a court of law to consider a woman’s witness to be half reliable as that of a man. As for the verse 282 of Al-Baqarah, which is presented to substantiate the viewpoint in question, it has quite a different meaning and implication than what is construed from it…

Actually this verse addresses the common man. It does not relate to the law and thus gives no directive regarding judicial matters. In other words, it does not call upon the state, the legislative council or the legal authorities. This verse just invokes the common man’s attention for taking precautionary measures in case of a particular situation of conflict…

The verse states that when two or more individuals enter into an agreement for a loan for a fixed period of time, they should write it down thereby avoiding any misunderstanding or dispute. As a further safeguard to avoid such misunderstanding, they should make two men witnesses to the agreement. In case they are not able to find two men, then they may take two women instead of a man…Obviously, if this were a directive pertaining to judicial matters, it would have addressed the state or legal authorities. ^[2]

In other words, these Muslims argue that the Quranic verse cannot be generalized to all court cases; instead, it simply pertains to financial matters, and contracts of debt in specific.  It is argued that the women of pre-Islamic Arabia were generally unaware of the intricacies of the business world.  Tahir Haddad, an Islamic thinker of the early twentieth century, writes:

The fact that woman lagged behind man in all aspects of life [in the pre-Islamic times] made her less proficient in intellectual and mathematical tasks, especially since at that time she did not get her share of education and culture to prepare her for that…[which was taken into] account when it was decided that a woman’s testimony is worth half that of a man…[in] issue[s]…such as debts. ^[3]

The lack of business acumen that women of that particular time generally possessed was the reason that a woman’s singular testimony about a contract of debt might be rejected by the common man, resulting in conflicts.  The intent of the Quranic verse was after all to prevent infighting between Muslims, as was often the case between creditors and debtors.  Therefore, argue these contemporary Muslims, witnesses had to be produced who would be accepted by the common man as being authoritative.

Some contemporary Muslims even argue that such a restriction (i.e. the requirement of two women as witnesses instead of one) would not be applicable if the cause for the restriction (i.e. the lack of business acumen on the part of the woman) was not present.  The Islamic cleric Muzammil Siddiqi ^[4] issued the following fatwa (religious edict):

Question:

Does Islam regard the testimony of women as half of a man’s just in cases of transactions or in every case? Who are the scholars that maintain the first view? What is the evidence of those scholars saying that her testimony is not accepted in cases of murder and adultery?

Answer:

The word shahadah [testimony] in its various forms has occurred in the Qur’an about 156 times. There is only one case (Al-Baqarah 2:282) where there is a reference to gender. Apart from this one reference, there is no other place where the issue of gender is brought in the context of testimony. According to the Qur’an, it does not make any difference whether the person testifying is a male or female; the only objective is to ascertain accuracy and to establish justice and fairness. In one place in the Qur’an, there is an explicit reference that equates the testimonies of the male and female (See Surat An-Nur 24:6-9).

Only in the context of business transactions and loan contracts, it is mentioned that if two men are not available for testimony, then one man and two women are to be provided for that particular purpose (See Surat Al-Baqarah 2:282). The reason is not because of gender; it is given in the Qur’anic verse: If one errs, the other may remind her. Some scholars have suggested that this was due to the fact that most women in the past and even now were not involved in the intricate business dealings. So the Qur’an accepted their testimony, but to insure justice indicated that there should be two.

It is also important to note that the Shari`ah emphasizes that we follow the law exactly in the matters of worship; in economic dealings, however, the issue of justice is the main factor. If a judge sees that there is a woman who is very qualified and has good understanding of business transactions, the judge may consider her testimony equal to the testimony of a man. This will not be against the teachings of the Qur’an. ^[5]

Jamal Badawi, ^[6] another Islamic cleric (who Spencer himself quotes as an authority from time to time), comments:

The context of this passage (verse, or ayah) [verse 2:282] relates to testimony on financial transactions, which are often complex and laden with business jargon. The passage does not make blanket generalization [against the testimony of women]…In numerous societies, past and present, women generally may not be heavily involved with and experienced in business transactions. As such, they may not be completely cognizant of what is involved…

It must be added that unlike pure acts of worship, which must be observed exactly as taught by the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, testimony is a means to an end, ascertaining justice as a major objective of Islamic law. Therefore, it is the duty of a fair judge to be guided by this objective when assessing the worth and credibility of a given testimony, regardless of the gender of the witness. A witness of a female graduate of a business school is certainly far more worthy than the witness of an illiterate person with no business education or experience. ^[7]

Robert Spencer claims that the Sharia itself excludes a woman’s testimony in cases of rape; yet, this is not the interpretation of Sharia that many Mu