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Robert Spencer’s Attacks on #MyJihad Campaign Debunked

By on October 5, 2012 in Loon Blogs

Robert Spencer’s Attacks on #MyJihad Campaign Debunked

Garibaldi of Loonwatch wrote about a recent twitter exchange between terrorist inspirer and pseudo-scholar Robert Spencer and Civil Rights activist Ahmed Rehab. Spencer was forced into undermining his career long effort to demonize Islam and Muslims, reluctantly conceding that the term Jihad means more than “terrorism” and “violence,” a position he is loathe to share on a daily basis with his readers since it doesn’t fit his scheme of evil Muslim hordes Islamizing the universe.

This fits a pattern of doublespeak on Spencer’s part: on the one hand he tells his audience that there are “no distinctions between peaceful and violent Muslims” and that the “only good Muslim is a bad Muslim,” yet when pressed in public about his positions he backtracks, and says things like, “Islam makes a lot of people be very moral and upright and live fine lives.”

This brings us to Spencer’s recent double speak, in which he tells his fans that the “true meaning” of Jihad is the one that is forwarded by radical Muslim preachers. Intriguingly, Spencer finds himself in the unenviable company of agreeing with extremists such as Omar Bakri, Anjum Chaudhry, Osama Bin Laden and others who believe that the targeted killing of innocents is a legitimate expression of Jihad in Islam.

Spencer’s article begins by first trying to delegitimize the #MyJihad campaign, he writes,

“The deceptive and misleading #MyJihad campaign…”

Off the bat one can see that Spencer has already made up his mind, for him anything that runs counter to the “Jihad is evil” mantra is unacceptable. That is why he is eager to hide the true import of the campaign: giving voice to how millions of Muslims relate to Jihad in their daily lives. The #MyJihad campaign also clearly states on both its website and Facebookpage that its goal is, “taking back Jihad from anti-Muslim and Muslim extremists alike.”

One would think that if Spencer was honest about promoting peace and justice (words he bandies about meaninglessly), and not being anti-Muslim he would welcome such an initiative. Of course Spencer would be out of a David Horowitz Subsidized job if he welcomed the campaign. Spencer goes on to write,

This campaign is designed to foster complacency among Americans, and to blind them to the fact that Islamic jihadists are committing violence in the name of jihad around the world every day.

Spencer is worried by the educational potentiality of the #MyJihad campaign and attempts once again to obfuscate its message. Clearly Spencer missed the memo about what this whole campaign actually is about, let’s repeat it for him,

“taking back Jihad from anti-Muslim and Muslim extremists alike.”

Robert Spencer’s many faulty claims regarding Jihad have been directly debunked in Danios’ Understanding Jihad series. In this series Danios tackles Spencer’s assertions one by one, adding context and facts and also criticizing the enormous falsities Spencer forwards about Jihad, thereby putting “Jihad” in proper perspective. This may be the reason why to this day Robert Spencer refuses to reply to Danios’ rebuttals in the series and has also ran away from Loonwatch’s open invitation to debate.

Also read Sheila Musaji’s article: AFDI/SIOA Roll Out 8 More Anti-Muslim Ads

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    • Jai

      Emperor,

      Robert Spencer’s many faulty claims regarding Jihad have been directly debunked in Danios’ Understanding Jihad series. In this series Danios tackles Spencer’s assertions one by one, adding context and facts and also criticizing the enormous falsities Spencer forwards about Jihad, thereby putting “Jihad” in proper perspective.

      Sheila Musaji’s article, mentioned at the end of the main Loonwatch article above, is definitely worth reading in full: http://theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/afdi-sioa-roll-out-another-anti-muslim-ad/0019401

      Not only does Pamela Geller plan at least 9 more anti-Muslim ads, but (no doubt in response to the escalating backlash) Robert Spencer himself has disingenuously started trying to publicly distance himself from the ad campaign.

      Furthermore, as Sheila Musaji’s article documents, it turns out that Robert Spencer is on record as publicly admitting that the word “jihad” certainly doesn’t necessarily mean anything negative, including “violence” or even “holy war”. Sheila’s article includes the URL link to Spencer’s own recent JihadWatch article on the subject: http://www.jihadwatch.org/2012/10/islamic-supremacist-writer-discovers-that-jihad-is-sometimes-connected-to-terrorism.html

      Quote from Spencer’s JihadWatch article:

      Robert Spencer: “This page [explaining Spencer’s decision for choosing the name “Jihad Watch”] has been linked to the front page of the Jihad Watch website since October 2003, and all that time it has said this: “Jihad (Arabic for ‘struggle’) is a central duty of every Muslim. Muslim theologians have spoken of many things as jihads: [for example] the struggle within the soul…..I discuss the various meanings of jihad, including that of spiritual struggle, in my 2003 book Onward Muslim Soldiers and many times elsewhere. On hundreds of radio shows over the years I have explained, as part of my basic explanation of the word, that “jihad” in Arabic has as many connotations and shades of meaning as “struggle” does in English — as I explained in this 2008 interview: “The word means ‘struggle,’ and has as many connotations as the English word ‘struggle’ does. The Islamic Republic of Iran has a Department of Agricultural Jihad, which has to do with the struggle to increase crop yields.””

      It proves that Robert Spencer & Pamela Geller are perfectly aware that they’re deliberately promoting misinformation about Islam & Muslims during their continuing anti-Muslim propaganda campaign, including the current ads in New York.

      Some enterprising organisation should simply create posters quoting Spencer’s statement above and display them right next to Geller’s ads in NY.

    • Hatethehaterz

      Nice article. I think one thing about the term jihad that deserves emphasis is that even in the context of violence and/or war, it only refers to self defense. This is something which I believe Danios also noted well in his series. It is never acceptable in Islam to be the aggressor in violent confrontation. Violence in Islam is only permitted for self defense or the defense of loved ones, or the weak or opressed. That is why the term “counter-jihad” will never really make sense. They are “countering” our right to defend ourselves? Of course we all know that term is simply a veil meant to obfuscate the true meaning of their “movement.” Which is merely anti-Muslim bigotry.

  • Seeker

    How’s Danios doing, anyway? Haven’t seen anything of him for a while. Starting to get a little nervous – you never know what kind of hateful people are out there. Other than that – quite interesting piece here. Loving the #MyJihad campaign.

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