Monday morning there was snow, ice, fog, flooding, locusts, flaming frogs, pestilence, sword, you name it here in Secure Undisclosed Locationville, and the planes weren't running. So I took the world's longest taxicab ride through several states so as not to miss what may have been the last public appearance of one of the heroes of our age, Oriana Fallaci. Then, after finding to my surprise that The City That Never Sleeps does so sleep and that a cup of coffee would be hard to come by, I holed up in a hotel room and wrote this report until 6:30AM Tuesday morning. Here it is, with apologies for any sleep-deprived delirium contained therein, from FrontPage:
“We are gathered here tonight,” announced David Horowitz, “to honor a warrior in the cause of human freedom.”Oriana Fallaci, who received the Center for the Study of Popular Culture’s Annie Taylor Award in New York Monday evening, has been a warrior for human freedom ever since she joined the anti-fascist resistance in 1944, at age fourteen. For over six decades, she has fought against those she has labeled “the bastards who decide our lives,” opposing all forms of tyranny and oppression, from Mussolini and Hitler to Osama bin Laden and Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi. She amassed a fearsome reputation as an interviewer, recounting of Ariel Sharon: “‘I know you’ve come to add another scalp to your necklace,’ he murmured almost with sadness when I went to interview him in 1982.” Other scalps on her necklace include that of Henry Kissinger, who termed his interview with Fallaci “the most disastrous conversation I ever had with any member of the press.” While interviewing the Ayatollah Khomeini, Fallaci called him a “tyrant” and tore off the chador she had had to wear in order to be admitted to his presence. According to Daniel Pipes in his introduction of Fallaci Monday night, she is also apparently one of the few who ever made the irascible old man laugh.
Today, at seventy-five years old, Fallaci still stands for freedom. She is suffering from cancer. She stated with her usual directness at the Taylor Awards ceremony: “I shall not last long.” But she has dedicated the four years since 9/11 to trying to awaken her native Italy, Europe and the world to the magnitude global jihad threat, which most analysts continue, whether from willful blindness, ignorance, or a misplaced strategic imperative, to misapprehend. Pipes noted that “she has her differences with the President. When he says that Islam a ‘religion of peace,’ she has said, ‘each time he says it on TV? I’m there alone, and I watch it and say, “Shut up! Shut up, Bush!” But he doesn’t listen to me.’”
And it isn’t, of course, just Bush. Fallaci spoke fervently Monday evening about how Western nations are selling their own homelands and culture to their mortal enemies. “We seem to live in real democracies,” she said, “but we really live in weak democracies ruled by despotism and fear.” Western elites – government and media – are paralyzed by fear, afraid to speak out against the life-destroying aspects of the Sharia law that Islamic jihadists want to impose on the rest of the world. The risk of offending Muslims is, in their calculus, apparently greater than the risk of national or civilizational suicide. Alexis de Tocqueville, according to Fallaci, explained that in dictatorial regimes, despotism strikes the body: the dissenter is tortured into silence. But in democratic regimes that have succumbed to corruption, despotism ignores the body and strikes at the soul. One is not tortured for dissent; instead, one is discredited for it. To affirm the patent fact that Islam is not a religion of peace today renders one “unelectable,” or “bigoted,” or beyond the bounds of what is fit to print. In despotic democratic regimes, Fallaci observed, everything can be spread except truth.
That is indeed the present-day situation. Most of the liberal and conservative mainstream not only will not feature trenchant criticisms like Fallaci’s of the violent and supremacist impulse within Islam; they will not even discuss them. Those who, like Fallaci, speak the truth about the motives and goals of the jihadists are vilified and marginalized, while the purveyors of comforting half-truths, distortions and lies fill the nation’s airwaves and newsprint. Fallaci herself faces the most frivolous of frivolous lawsuits in Italy for defamation of Islam; a Muslim group tried to have banned her searing, passionate response to 9/11, The Rage and the Pride.
Why does all this happen? In her speech Fallaci explained that it was to a great degree because “truth inspires fear.” When one hears the truth, one can only be silent or join the cause. It is a call to a personal revolution, an upheaval, a departure – perhaps forever – from a life of ease and comfort. So most will prefer not to hear the truth -- in no small part because of the difficulty of living up to it. Yet the real heroes, she said, are “those who raise their voices against anathemas and persecution,” while most succumb -- “and with their silence give their approval to the civil death of those who spoke out.”
“This,” Fallaci declared, “is what I have experienced the last four years.” She described how, since 9/11, the whole of Europe has become a “Niagara Falls of McCarthyism” – with the new Grand Inquisitors of the Left persecuting and victimizing all others. “In Europe, we too have our Ward Churchills, our Noam Chomskys, our Michael Moores, our Lewis Farrakhans.” And they are doing immense damage to the unity, will and cultural identity of the people. In Europe as in America, the new thought police ban Christmas observances to avoid offending Muslims; history is rewritten to depict Islam as having built a civilization of peace and mercy (regardless of the preponderance of evidence to the contrary), while Europe’s own Judeo-Christian civilization is regarded as “a spark of a cigarette – gone.” A spent force. In Leftist-controlled municipalities, police stand idly by while Muslim hooligans demonstrate their contempt for European society and culture by urinating upon and otherwise desecrating churches. Fallaci: “This is considered ‘freedom of expression’ – unless the offense is committed against Muslims.”
Meanwhile, the “religion of peace” myth and other falsehoods that interfere with our ability to defend ourselves are propagated aggressively by elected officials, the media, the Hollywood elite, and the justice system. Defenders of freedom are stripped of credibility and denied the means to get their message across. Or if they do get it across, they are not believed. “I really feel as a Cassandra,” said Fallaci, “or as one of the forgotten anti-fascists.” Yet she wears the Left’s attacks with defiant pride. “Since I wrote the trilogy (La Rabbia e l’Orgoglio (The Rage and the Pride), La Forza della Ragione (The Force of Reason), and L’Apocalisse (The Apocalypse), my real medals are the insults I get from the new McCarthyists.”Fallaci told the audience that she faced three years in prison in Italy if convicted in her trial for hate speech. “But can hate be prosecuted by law? It is a sentiment. It is a natural part of life. Like love, it cannot be proscribed by a legal code. It can be judged, but only on the basis of ethics and morality. If I have the right to love, then I have the right to hate also.”
Hate? “Yes, I do hate the bin Ladens and the Zarqawis. I do hate the bastards who burn churches in Europe. I hate the Chomskys and Moores and Farrakhans who sell us to the enemy. I hate them as I used to hate Mussolini and Hitler. For the cause of freedom, this is my sacrosanct right.”
What’s more, Fallaci pointed out that Europe’s hate speech laws never seem to be used against the “professional haters, who hate me much more than I hate them”: the Muslims who hate as part of their ideology. While Fallaci faces three years in prison in Italy, “any Muslim can unhook a crucifix from a wall in a school or hospital and throw it into the garbage,” with little fear of consequences. Also unprosecuted, she said, were those responsible for a vile little publication entitled Islam Punishes Oriana Fallaci, which urges Muslims to kill her, invoking five Qur’anic passages about “perverse women.” In Italy Fallaci must be guarded around the clock; but no effort has been made to bring those who threatened her to justice.
Yet for all the isolation and the verbal abuse to which her enemies have subjected her, Fallaci remains indomitable – and has found an unlikely ally in Pope Benedict XVI, whom she warmly praised Monday night. Fallaci, who identified herself as an atheist (a “Catholic atheist”), was the first individual granted a private audience with the new Pope. She stated that the Islamic challenge had opened up a void in the West that only spirituality could fill – “unless the Church also misses its appointment with history. But I don’t think it will.”
Despite these warm words for the Pope and the ancient institution he heads, however, Fallaci announced that at the risk of disappointing many of her hearers, “I am not a conservative. I don’t sympathize with the Right more than I do with the Left. I cannot b associated with the Right or with the Left.” Why not? Because, she said, both Right and Left have been guilty of the “abuse of democracy, demagogic egalitarianism, denial of merit, tyranny of the majority, and lack of self-discipline” that are sapping the strength of Europe today. “Europe’s Islamic invasion has been backed by the Left, yes. But it would never have reached the point it has if the Right had not been complicit.”
Another indication of that complicity was, according to Fallaci, the American Right’s support for the entry of Turkey into the European Union – which both Fallaci and her friend in the Vatican oppose. “European citizens do not want Turkey in our home. Condoleeza Rice should stop exercising realpolitik at our expense.” And in America, she asked why the Right was so complacent before Leftist outrages such as the ongoing war against Christmas, the removal of the Ten Commandments monument from the Alabama courthouse, the amending of the noise ordinance to allow for the Muslim call to prayer over loudspeakers (but not church bells) in Hamtramck, Michigan, and others. Why, she asked, was Ward Churchill not fired for calling the 9/11 victims “Little Eichmanns,” while Michael Graham was fired for suggesting that Islam might have something to do with present-day terrorism?
This, Fallaci concluded, is the war we are really fighting. “I do not see Islamic terrorism as the main weapon of the war that the sons of Allah have unleashed upon us. It is the bloodiest, but not the most pernicious or catastrophic aspect of this war.” Far more dangerous to the West in the long run is unrestricted Muslim immigration, which already has brought at least 25 million Muslims to Europe (not counting, Fallaci said, the huge numbers of illegal aliens). That number will double by 2016 and, as Bernard Lewis and others have predicted, almost certainly create a Muslim Europe by 2100.
Yet all this immigration has not been accompanied by integration and assimilation – not because of European racism, but by the Muslims’ own choice. Fallaci noted that many other groups have assimilated into European societies, but Muslims have not. “They don even care to learn our language. They only obey the rules and laws of Sharia.” They do not want to learn European ways; rather, “they want to impose on us their own habits and way of life. They have no intention of integrating with us. On the contrary, they demand that we integrate with them.” Today’s Islamic expansionism, therefore, does not need the armies and fleets with which the Ottoman Empire once terrorized Europe. It only needs the immigrants, whom short-sighted politicians and befuddled multiculturalists continue to welcome. Fallaci said that Europeans – French, Dutch, Germans, English, Italians – are about to reach the status of the Comanches, Cherokees, and Sioux: “We will end up on their reservation.” She noted that some Muslim spokesmen, confident of their imminent supremacy, already refer to non-Muslim Europeans as “indigenous people” or “aboriginals.”
What to do about all this? Establish dialogue with Muslim leaders? Try to strengthen moderate Islam? Fallaci was dismissive of both options. Muslims have no intention of entering into genuine dialogue with non-Muslims, she said, and “I do not believe in moderate Islam. What moderate Islam? Is it enough not to cut heads off? Moderate Islam is another invention of ours.” Adopting Western dress, she said, was easy; adopting Western values was not.
Then Fallaci threw down the gauntlet to the multicultural, politically correct, and fearful. “There is not,” she asserted, “good Islam or bad Islam. There is just Islam. And Islam is the Qur’an. And the Qur’an is the Mein Kampf of this movement. The Qur’an demands the annihilation or subjugation of the other, and wants to substitute totalitarianism for democracy. Read it over, that Mein Kampf. In whatever version, you will find that all the evil that the sons of Allah commit against themselves and against others is in it.” As jarring as such language is to contemporary sensibilities, Fallaci here made a statement of fact that can be verified or disproved. And indeed: Islamic terrorists such as Osama bin Laden, Zarqawi, and others have never hesitated to quote the Qur’an copiously to justify their actions. It remains for those who identify themselves as moderate Muslims to convince violent Muslims that they are misusing the Qur’an – if indeed they are – and should lay down their arms. They have had no notable success in this so far.
Fallaci’s a voice of rare courage. “I am not as young and energetic as you are,” she told the crowd Monday night. “I am hopelessly ill. I shall not last long.” When she is gone, we may hope – for all our sakes – that many others will be ready to step into the breach and speak the truth as she did, whatever the cost, as she did. As Oriana Fallaci so memorably demonstrated in her address on receiving the Annie Taylor Award, nothing less than our civilization itself is at stake.
Bravo. She was one of the first to row against the tide of idiotic political irresponsibility, and she became ostracized as a consequence. Of course, when one achieves the greatness of a woman like Fallaci, one is never alone.
The pen really is mightier than the sword. Sun Tzu said some 2500 years ago "Know thy enemy". Thanks to Fallaci and many others, some of us do.
Oriana's criticism of the Right is mainly one of complicity; having been vanquished in the culture wars, the Right has accepted many of the corrupting sacred cows of political correctness imposed upon society by the Left.
As we read the profundity and wisdom being offered by this courageous woman, let us also recognize and appreciate David Horowitz for honoring her and providing her a platform from which she can speak out and be heard. His service to the cause of freedom is no less significant than Robert Spencer himself.
I think of her and Bat Ye'or as the twin towers of knowledge.
Who is there of the next generation?
Granny:
Despair not. There is Hugh Fitzgerald. Ibn Warraq. Trifkovic. Bostom. Others, too, and more will arise.
The cause of freedom will never lack for defenders. Even if the jihadists win, their victory will not be total, never. There will be new Pelayos who will take to the mountains and await their opportunity, and when it comes, they will seize it.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
Mr Spencer
Thank you. I am indeed suffering the gloom today of a snivelling cold which clouds my usual positive attitude.
And you left yourself out, which is typical understatement, which ommission I can correct.
I am indeed suffering the gloom today of a snivelling cold which clouds my usual positive attitude.
You have my sympathy. I'm just getting over one. Your best bet is to make the most of it and to snap and snarl at everyone you come across. Worked for me, anyway.
If you run out of tissues, here's Tony Benn in that snotrag of a 'newspaper', The Guardian.
Er, Tony, what happened three years later to make a bit of a difference? Idiot.
Fallaci - well, I like the substance of her writing, but the style is awful. Maybe it's just poorly translated.
It's not poorly translated. Oriana writes out of indignation so words just pour out of her.
Perfectly justified considering the circumstances. She wrote "la rabbia e l'orgoglio" right after 9/11.
Back then when I heard president GW Bush saying: "islam means peace", basically letting islam get away with murder and aggression, my blood also boiled.
It took a child to point out that the emperor had no clothes. Truth is spontaneous.
Oriana has guts and a clear mind. She needs no style to deserve my respect and honor.
"I don’t sympathize with the Right more than I do with the Left."
Hmmm, I think she's trying to broaden her appeal here. In reality, though, virtually everything she's said in the last four years seems to demonstrate more sympathy with right than left. While she mauls the left over multiculturalism, the most she can muster against the right is a vague charge of "complicity". And it's really more a case of cowardice than complicity, anyway.
The only "conservatives" complicit in any of this are the hardcore libertarians, who, in the pro-business zeal, fail to comprehend the harm that bottom-line-driven, cheap-labor mass immigration is causing.
The translation of Oriana Fallaci's books should have been done by someone other than Oriana Fallaci. If they have been a great success in Italy, as they deserve to be everywhere, it is because the language she uses, the allusions to Italian and even to Tuscan men and events, are understood at once. Readers who, like one poster above, recognize and therefore are not disturbed by her frequent italianisms in these self-englished versions, readers who will not be put off by these allusions, may not receive those english versions as others -- that wider possible audience -- will or do. But those allusions, that manner of writing, even the punctuation that fits in Italian but comes across as strange in English (lower-case to beat the band, if the band is directed by e.e. cummings; seemingly breathless because comma-less lists), and a pitch that to demure and sober English readers, used to litotic understatement, or to the drab dunstable prose of The New Duranty Times ("just the facts, ma'am" and not a hint of a lively personality behind any of the words, with all literary or historical allusion, or even a hint of wordplay -- perfectly acceptable in Italian journalism, acceptable and desirable -- is leached out, or more likely never existed, in the bland offerings that appear in the American press, that somewhere along the line got the idea that the journalist should be effaced, and no sign of endearing quick-wittedness allowed).
Fallaci might consider commmissioning someone to retranslate her previously englished books again. Amour-propre has no place here.
demure and sober English readers
Are you talkin' to me?
That litotic understatement isn't all it's cracked up to be.
Cara Oriana likened the Quran to Mein Kampf. Be that as it may, none other than the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin el-Husseini, appointed mufti by British officials in 1921, stated that there was a strong similarity between Islam and National Socialism. This was in a speech he gave to the Bosnian Muslim SS division [the Handschar]. He was a Nazi collaborator and spent most of WW2 in the Nazi-fascist domain, organizing Muslim troops to fight for the Nazis, broadcasting Nazi propaganda to the Arabs and the Soviet Muslims, and urging the Germans to kill more Jews faster.
Husseini's speech likening Islam to Nazism is found in Joseph Schechtman, The Mufti and the Fuehrer. Parts of this speech and related info may be found on the Net through google.
As to the "conservative-liberal" or "right-left" wrangle, I feel that this nomenclature does not fit our reality today. Indeed, business interests were influential in the Truman Administration's decision in 1951 to allow the ARAMCO to exploit the Foreign Tax Credit law if Saudi Arabia would call the royalties that ARAMCO paid it an "oil income tax." Thus ARAMCO could deduct dollar for dollar all of the "oil income tax" that it paid to the Saudi royals from its corporate income tax, thus making the wahhabis rich. And today the Americans are paying for it in more than just money. And most of those business interests of 1951 were likely Republicans, although the Truman adminstration was Democratic.
"litotic understatment..."
Oh god, you got me. How can I face myself in the morning?
Maybe it's my lack of coffee, but I thought the above speech was just brilliant. However, my own admiration aside, quibbles about language will only serve to obscure the message, and her message ought to speak to the very souls of those who wish a safe and free democracy for their children. Oriana Fallaci's voice speaks for truth above all political affiliations. That makes her a woman of valour in my book.
Not only is Fallaci deeply inspiring, but Spencer's article, with Fallaci's words, provides a good overview of the entire situation, with a lot of appropriate details. I sent it to a non-paranoid friend of mine.
"what if a keen of a lean wind flays
screaming hills with sleet and snow:
strangles valleys by ropes of thing
and stifles forests in white ago?
Blow hope to terror; blow seeing to blind
(blow pity to envy and soul to mind)
-whose hearts are mountains, roots are trees,
it's they shall cry hello to the spring"
--Reading the words and history of this incredible woman, with Hugh's reference to e.e.cummings, brought this to mind.
The only "conservatives" complicit in any of this are the hardcore libertarians, who, in the pro-business zeal, fail to comprehend the harm that bottom-line-driven, cheap-labor mass immigration is causing.
Libertarians generally support liberty for individuals to move to where the jobs are, for the benefit of the individual. I think you would have trouble finding a libertarian who supports corporate welfare. Nor is it easy to find a single libertarian who supports anti-liberty sharia law.
To a woman imprisoned in a burkha, the lefty says, "I can't impose my equally rotten culture upon you." The righty says, "I admire your spirituality and your conservation of ancient ways." The libertarian says, "Toss off that burkha, baby. Nobody owns you. You are free."
Fallaci says: "Europe’s Islamic invasion has been backed by the Left, yes. But it would never have reached the point it has if the Right had not been complicit."
And why has the Right been complicit? The answer is that, surrounding and dominating the politics of Left and Right is the culture of PC, which is Leftist.
At best, the Right has found itself to have no choice but to kowtow to the PC line.
At worst, people on the Right have come to believe in the PC givens that dominate public discourse. Some of those PC givens are good, or innocuous. Others -- that Islam cannot be criticized and critics of Islam are "racist haters" -- are crippling the West's self-defense against an epochal threat.
The Left has achieved a cultural victory over the past two generations.
That cultural victory is so broad and deep that not only does the Right have to follow the PC line to be electable, but the thoughts and feelings of millions of ordinary Western people, Left and Right, of all walks of life -- from schoolteachers to bus drivers to government employees to "elites" -- have been deformed by the PC ideology.
"At best, the Right has found itself to have no choice but to kowtow to the PC line."
Doc, we have to call this what it is:
Cowardice.
If an 18-year-old rifleman can shoot his way through Fallujah, a well-heeled conservative at, say, National Review, can surely tell CAIR to shove off.
/Waiting for Churchill.
Mr. Spencer's reflections on Fallacis speech are brilliant and beautiful, lots of thanks to him for this one.
But is Fallaci's speech going to be published too? Does anyone know?
"There are moments in Life when keeping silent becomes a fault, and speaking an obligation, A civic duty, a moral challenge, a categorical imperative from which we cannot escape." Oriana Fallaci
I purchased her last book "The Rage and the Pride" -- I enjoyed the truth of her words. I am thankful to JW for making me aware of this strong woman. Her words mirror my heart.....a Patriot and a woman of great courage. I love her strength and her direct approach--I wish more people would speak their truth and stop worrying about being politically correct all the time.
Mad Jack-
"Cowardice"
I think there is a vein of liberalism running through the conservatives and vice versa. At some point, one has to call a spade a spade and stop fretting about how it might be construed. The right isn't muzzled by the left but like the left has it's own agenda.
There are a few Noblemen out there that subscribe to no PARTY agenda but actually serve the people. They are the ones we must rally behind.
My re-post (from 8/6/2004)
Oriana, Queen of Spades
Oriana Fallaci,
bella Oriana,
wielding your words,
sharp swords of truth,
in your own fashion,
in true compassion.
In calling a spade a spade,
your greatness is made
and inspires others.
So rest Oriana, rest,
you've done your best.
Your words live on,
we will not forget.
This is one of the best articles Robert has ever posted. For within Oriana’s words and Spencer’s commentary, is the definition of the problem, who’s responsible (debatable), and more importantly, the solution. There are so many truths and words of wisdom in her speech that they probably deserve a permanent JW thread in their own right. Call it Oriana’s Freedom Portal if you will. But I’d like to comment on this statement:
“If I have the right to love, then I have the right to hate also.”
This is a very powerful and profound statement and in my opinion holds the antidote to the Islamic poison that has entered the west’s circulatory system. Hate is, as we all know probably the worst of human emotions. But if applied in a consciously sober manner, can be the catalyst to our victory over Islamofacism.
Our enemy already possesses and uses this emotion with great affect. For it has been thoroughly instilled into them as part of their ideology. And unless we learn to hate our enemy with equal enthusiasm, we simply cannot win.
We must learn to hate Political Islam. If so called moderate Muslims can’t show us the difference between them and the radicals, then we must learn to hate Islam period. For once we learn to hate, we can throw the moral equivalence argument out the window. We can forego the PC nonsense and without fear, call a spade a spade. Remember all the weird names the GI’s came up with for their WWII foes,Gooks, Nips, Krauts? They used these names in a hateful manner and enabled them to dehumanize their foe and do what was necessary to win the war. And until we can learn to call a mobot a mobot, we haven’t prepared ourselves psychologically to win this war.
Here is a link to a very interesting article that helped prepare WWII GI’s to hate their enemy. Written by a private, and found to be of such significance, it was eventually distributed to the entire US Army. I am certainly not advocating the mass killing of Muslims, but only to point out that hate can be a useful tool in this war on terror.
http://blogs.wdevs.com/karl/archive/2004/10/20/917.aspx
Fallaci:
“I am not as young and energetic as you are,” she told the crowd Monday night. “I am hopelessly ill. I shall not last long.”
Ms. Fallaci, your contributions will last long. We will make sure of it.
Spencer:
“…nothing less than our civilization itself is at stake.”
“Why, [Fallaci] asked, was Ward Churchill not fired for calling the 9/11 victims “Little Eichmanns,” while Michael Graham was fired for suggesting that Islam might have something to do with present-day terrorism?”
Professional hate-mongers like Ward Churchill are protected by tenure, combined with the misguided political correctness which seeks to conceal truth and give free reign to falsehood. Churchill’s comments about the victims of 9/11 were actually worse than bin Laden’s own comments! Churchill’s more compassionate colleage in hate-mongering, Osama bin Laden, said that it was “unfortunate” that the civilian victims of his terrorist attacks, which he targetted deliberately, had to die. Where exactly does that leave Mr. Churchill on the moral spectrum? Or does he even register on that scale?
Michael Graham’s comments were true—if anything, understated. Not only is terrorism directed against infidels linked to Islam, the core doctrines demand it as a religious duty to be carried out until the Last Day if necessary. If those Muslims called upon to terrorize the enemy in jihad (9:5, 9:29) fail to do so, then they are hypocrites and Allah will punish them in hell (see the Koran’s Suras 8 and 9).
The Koran says that disbelief (see “oppression” and “persecution,” below) is worse than being killed in warfare or slaughter. Our society today seems to believe that allegations of political incorrectness (“oppression” and “persecution”) is worse than being killed in warfare or slaughter. Strange times we live in. But perhaps not so strange for Fallaci, who experienced and opposed fascism in her youth, and, now in her wisdom, and no less passionate, has no trouble recognizing that enemy today, despite its disguises.
Fallaci, from Spencer’s article:
“Fallaci threw down the gauntlet to the multicultural, politically correct, and fearful. “There is not,” she asserted, “good Islam or bad Islam. There is just Islam. And Islam is the Qur’an. And the Qur’an is the Mein Kampf of this movement. The Qur’an demands the annihilation or subjugation of the other, and wants to substitute totalitarianism for democracy. Read it over, that Mein Kampf. In whatever version, you will find that all the evil that the sons of Allah commit against themselves and against others is in it.””
Spencer:
“…nothing less than our civilization itself is at stake.”
What Ms. Fallaci has to say about Islam as practiced is supported by her decades of observations and experiences as a journalist. Her statements about the Koran are also backed up (see below).
Verses in the Koran must always be understood within the context of the ultimate goal of Islam. Allah sent Mohammad (and his followers) to conquer all other religions (9:33, 48:28, 61:9). To achieve this ultimate goal, Muslims must convert, subjugate, or kill all non-Muslims until all religion is for Allah (2:193, 8:39). This is the context that contains and overrules all contexts in Islam.
Here’s part of the basis for why Ms. Fallaci compares the Koran to Mein Kampf. (In the Hadith reports, which have been cited many times on this site, you will also find Mohammad’s orders for the expulsion and extermination of the Jews).
Violent Imperialism
2:193 And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is for Allah. But if they desist, then let there be no hostility except against wrong-doers.
8:39 And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is all for Allah. But if they cease, then lo! Allah is Seer of what they do.
Mission Statement
61:9 He it is Who hath sent His messenger with the guidance and the religion of truth, that He may make it conqueror of all religion however much idolaters may be averse.
48:28 He it is Who hath sent His messenger with the guidance and the religion of truth, that He may cause it to prevail over all religion. And Allah sufficeth as a Witness.
9:33 He it is Who hath sent His messenger with the guidance and the Religion of Truth, that He may cause it to prevail over all religion, however much the idolaters may be averse.
The Highest Moral Ruling in Islam: Disbelief is Worse than Killing.
2:191 And slay them wherever ye find them, and drive them out of the places whence they drove you out, for persecution is worse than slaughter. And fight not with them at the Inviolable Place of Worship until they first attack you there, but if they attack you (there) then slay them. Such is the reward of disbelievers.
2:217 They question thee (O Muhammad) with regard to warfare in the sacred month. Say: Warfare therein is a great (transgression), but to turn (men) from the way of Allah, and to disbelieve in Him and in the Inviolable Place of Worship, and to expel His people thence, is a greater with Allah; for persecution is worse than killing. And they will not cease from fighting against you till they have made you renegades from your religion, if they can. And whoso becometh a renegade and dieth in his disbelief: such are they whose works have fallen both in the world and the Hereafter. Such are rightful owners of the Fire: they will abide therein.
Notes on the Koran's terminology:
Disbelief or the presence and words and deeds of disbelievers is considered oppression and persecution of Islam. (And no, the Koran does not use the U.N.’s or Amnesty International’s definitions of oppression and persecution!).
Disbelief is considered aggression against Islam. And yes, 2:191 and 2:217 do say disbelief is worse than warfare or slaughter (i.e., worse than killing a believing Muslim--a crime which is itself punishable by death).
Disbelievers are the wrong-doers. Disbelief, and in particular turning away from Islam (apostacy) or turning others away from Islam, or impeding it’s propagation, are the worst crimes.
Poetess,
Very lovely poem.
Why is Europe dying? Why now? Why is North Korea in better emotional shape than Europe? What makes people in Iran more interested in their own existence than are Europeans? Above I see one of Europe's most active intellectuals dying of cancer and still fighting. An old woman is fighting to the end. Below I looked at this site below to see how things go in Sweden.
http://gatesofvienna.blogspot.com/2005/04/cultural-self-denial.html
Spencer points out that we won't disappear entirely, but why are we facing this struggle at all? What ails our souls so badly that we are giving up and dying so that only old ladies dying are fighting back?
"As an example we could mention the numerous casualties suffered due to Arab espionage. Our men trusted the Arabs, made friends with them, tolerated them near positions. Then the bombs and shells came and fell right into those positions where the Arabs had previously been. Dead men didn't need to hate anymore, but the survivors learned their lessons."-http://blogs.wdevs.com/karl/archive/2004/10/20/917.aspx
Hmmm.
sonofwalker, it is what happens when selfishness and greed become accepted social behavior and individuals take no responsibility for their actions.
Thank you Cornelius, Oriana Fallaci has been one of my heros for a long while.
"...it is what happens when selfishness and greed become accepted social behavior and individuals take no responsibility for their actions."
I remember reading about a girl who was a Nazi youth leader during WWII who became disillusioned with the Third Reich and became a Christian. She was grateful to American soldiers who helped her escape to the west and repaid their kindness by speaking at various military bases in the U.S. about her conversion and about how wonderful America is. I listened to some tapes she made about why people seemed to be easily brainwashed in Germany circa 1939. She said, and this is important, that when people will no longer practice self control or inner control of self, something else will step in to cause outer controls. In other words, as we lower our standards of behavior, don't mind our manners, take things that don't belong to us, like somebody elses husband or wife and generally become more indifferent to the needs of others, we lose our moral focus, which offers clarity and help in choosing between right and wrong. When that line becomes blurred because we don't care anymore, others who have a vested interest in controlling us step right in and take away the last freedoms we have. Can we really say as a society that the morals we accept today are working to make our world a better place? Do we feel more loved, more loving, safer, more free than we did, say, fifty years ago?
Islam believes it has the cornerstone on morals which is such a joke when you hear that a woman can be beaten for showing a hand or foot out from under that ugly thing that they wear in Islamic countries, but it's perfectly okay to "marry" a little girl or several wives or rape a woman as long as four witnesses weren't watching. Give me a break. But the truth is, Islam is just the sort of thing that will rear it's ugly head and cause us untold misery if we relinquish our responsibility to our own morals and continue to take no responsibility for our actions.
We cannot live in a vacuum. Something will always step in to take the place of what we have lost.
Knowledge of the Koran will liberate the World! l have no doubt it will happen...Oriani Fallaci is the spark that did not die! some will remember her words, and when the time is right, the fight begins to liberate Europe! Thankyou for Robert Spencer for bringing the above article to our attention!
l want to make certain, that when l said "Knowledge ofthe Koran" will liberate the world... knowing the evil lurking in the words of the Koran will become a clarion call for all to know it's destruction is of paramount importance!
Twba: " I think you would have trouble finding a libertarian who supports corporate welfare."
No trouble at all, actually. Ever heard of Cato? The Wall St Journal (with their "Open The Border - Now" stance on immigration)?
There's virtually no better ideological cover for corporate welfare than Randian objectivism/libertarianism.
Twba: " I think you would have trouble finding a libertarian who supports corporate welfare."
No trouble at all, actually. Ever heard of Cato? The Wall St Journal (with their "Open The Border - Now" stance on immigration)?
There's virtually no better ideological cover for corporate welfare than Randian objectivism/libertarianism.
I'm hardly suggesting that libertariansim per se is supportive of Islam/Islamism. Rather it's unshakeable devotion to economic growth as the sole means to individual betterment blinds it to the fact that, basically, all men are not created equal and that inviting men as drastically different to you as Muslims are into your land all in the name of economic advancement, you miss the point that their presence causes problems enough to negate any economic improvements (and worse).
I wish she would request an "audience" with President Bush and Condi, or at least send her books to them.
I wonder why it is that Ms.Fallaci can see and articulate the looming Islamic threat with perfect clarity, yet so few are receptive to her warnings. Why? She is a respected journalist with an impeccable reputation and distinguished career. But like Enoch Powell, she dared to broach an untouchable subject, then laid it bare and exposed its hideous face. So now she is persona non grata, ostracized for telling the truth.
I can certainly relate to her frustration. I don't have her fame or talent, but I understand the threat of Islam and I feel like I'm beating my brains out trying to warn others, most of whom aren't the least bit concerned or interested.
I feel like I'm trapped in a recurring nightmare, screaming at the top of my lungs but my voice doesn't work. I'm walking down a city street that turns into a meadow. It is night, but there are dim lights in the meadow. Thousands and thousands of muslim women in black shrouds are lying in the grass side-by-side as far as the eye can see, giving birth to twins, triplets, quadruplets. The cacophony of screaming babies is earsplitting and the mothers just lie there, endlessly spawning. Screaming, bloody little bodies and black shrouds cover the entire landscape for miles. I cannot actually see them, but I know all of the babies are boys. I'm running as fast as I can but it's like slow motion, and I cannot get past them. When the excruciating din of caterwauling infants becomes unbearable, I wake up. I have had this nightmare numerous times, as recently as last night. If I have it again, I hope it occurs to me to turn around and run back toward the city, instead of trying to get past the field.
Sometimes I really wish I was as clueless to the Islamic scourge as most people are. At times I am optimistic that the world will snap out of its collective daze any minute and start fighting back. And then Bush goes on TV and tells us that Islam is a great religion of peace. It's so depressing. God bless Orianna Fallaci.
Bravo! the world owes Adriana and the many other valiant voices of the ant-Jihadist and ant-Islamic movement a debt of gratitude,
We must continue to wake up the people!
We must take steps to stop and reverse the hidden Jihad!
As I see my children, I pledge to them that I will not rest till this evil is exposed, fought and defeated and the truth is the best weapon.
Thank you Robert and Hugh for your work here at Jihadwatch.
This is not a left or right thing it's an ant-jihad thing.
Yes, Robert and there will be many... a Battle of Covadonga and Tours and Vienna and Lepanto, both with the truth and the force of the Pen and the sword, till we are free and have freed the violent followers of Jihad.
Christopher Hitchens on Oriana (from Holy Writ, April 2003, The Atlantic Monthly):
Houellebecq's work is cynical and anomic but also literary and complex, and its characters contain contradictions. The same cannot be said for the writing of Oriana Fallaci, the celebrated Italian journalist whose high-octane interviews with powerful men had such éclat in the seventies, and whose memoir of her dead lover, the Greek resistance fighter Alexander Panagoulis, might be described as a classic of hysterical materialism. If utterance is given to a foul thought in the pages of The Rage and the Pride, the author is only too eager to claim it for herself. Written in the hot flush that overtook her on September 11, and originally published as a screed in the Milan daily Corriere della Sera, this is a sort of primer in how not to write about Islam. Fallaci claims in her introduction that in order to shorten the diatribe for newspaper purposes she "set aside the most violent passages." I wonder what those passages can have been like; the residue is replete with an obsessive interest in excrement, disease, sexual mania, and insectlike reproduction, insofar as these apply to Muslims in general and to Muslim immigrants in Europe in particular. A sampling, which preserves her style and punctuation and spelling:
"The fad or rather the hypocrisy, the shit, that calls "local tradition" the infibulation. I mean the bestial practice by which, in order to prevent them from enjoying sex, Moslems cut young girls' clitoris and sew up the large lips of the vulvas. All that remains is a tiny opening through which the poor creatures urinate, and imagine the torment of a defloration ... thank God I never had any sentimental or sexual or friendly rapport with an Arab man. In my opinion there is something in his brothers of faith which repels the women of good taste."
In other words—and there are a great many of them—Fallaci ignores her own pro forma injunction to remember that Islam is a faith, not a race. Her horror is for the shabby, swarthy stranger who uses the street as a bathroom (she can't stay off this subject) and eyes passing girls in a lascivious manner. I've read it all before, in histories of migration. You can even find it in the fastidious revulsion with which assimilated European and American Jews greeted their lank-haired, scrofulous brethren when they came shuffling in from the Pale of Settlement.
Hugh,
I guess I am the "one poster above" you mention. (we are in opposite timezones).
I am sorry but I read Oriana in the original Italian version, so I was able to appreciate her burst of indignation as it poured out of her. I try to always read untranslated works as far as I can.
To do what you suggest would be not a translation but a paraphrase of her book.
Her book is like a lightning bolt against the weakness and cowardice of the Western democracies and their leaders in the face of the war Islam has declared on them.
Amour propre plays no role here, what you ask for is a complete rewriting of the book with an English-speaking audience in mind.
The comparison I have made with a child crying that the Emperor has no clothes is a good illustration. Who cares about style and Tuscanisms when there are passages that are crystakl clear?
Long live Oriana!
Randall,
You said:
“In other words—and there are a great many of them—Fallaci ignores her own pro forma injunction to remember that Islam is a faith, not a race.”
Wrong. You are assuming (a) that ‘Arab’ is a racial category, and (b) that Ms. Fallaci is using ‘Arab’ as a racial category. Neither assumptions are supported by the facts.
Definition of Arab: “1. a member of a Semitic people originally from the Arabian Peninsula between the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf, now widely scattered throughout the Near east and N. Africa. 2. a member of any Arab-speaking people.” (Semitic refers to language or a broad ethnic group).
Arab is primarily a cultural linguistic category, an ethnic category, not a racial one. Ms. Fallaci says “his brothers of faith”—identifying the religion associated with an ethnic group, not a race. Any identification of a loosely-defined genetic group of people associated with Arab culture is due to factors outside of Ms. Fallaci’s control.
While it is true that not all Arabs are Muslims, and not all (nor even most) Muslims are Arabs, Islam itself does specifically identify itself with Arab culture and language. The Koran was revealed and written in Arabic, supposedly the language of Allah, to Arabic people. The prophet Mohammad was supposed to be the best, the last, and delivering his message first and directly to the ‘best’ of people. Korans translated into any other language than Arabic are considered not true Korans and must be given some other name such as ‘Noble Koran,’ ‘The Meaning of the Koran,’ etc. Devout Muslims (Arabic or otherwise) make the pilgrimage to, as well as bow toward, Mecca. Saudi Arabia is considered sacred Islamic land. No other religions are allowed to be practiced ‘openly’ (thank you, Mohideen) on it. These elements (and there are more) linking Islam and Arab ethnicity are factual, historical, and are in no way the fault of Ms. Fallaci.
Given that Ms. Fallaci has been explicit and clear on this point, why would you ignore those statements, and then pick a dubious example to try and portray her as racist?
Your remarks, and those of Hitchens, about Ms. Fallaci’s style strike me as small, in light of the fact that, as Spencer wrote, “…nothing less than our civilization itself is at stake.” Fallaci is clear and gets the message across. She says ‘read the Koran’. Many people still have not done that, and that’s why we need people like Fallaci who have the courage to get the message across.
I will agree that Fallaci can be over-the-top and rude. There are no excuses for the “they breed like rats” comment. On the other hand, the facts are over-the-top and rude. There is no pleasant way to describe the facts. The statistical projections, and their implications, are uglier. The Muslim youths who rioted in France said (to the effect that) ‘Who cares. We’re going to be the majority soon anyway.’ The Muslims Ms. Fallaci sees do urinate and defecate on or in Churches deliberately as an act of desecration. They do a lot worse. Should Ms. Fallaci not report the ugly facts? Should she give manners to those she describes? The Koran contains insults toward non-Muslims that make Ms. Fallaci’s comments seem sweet by comparison. Should we conceal this? Who benefits by the rude facts being concealed?
Insults are not the chief concern. It is death and dhimmitude that concern the non-Muslims. Why not devote some time, randall, to criticizing the people who would kill Ms. Fallaci (or any one of us) for exposing Islam?
Who complains when Ms. Fallaci calls her fellow Italians scared "rabbits," who are afraid of being called racist, or when she calls the unscrupulous Italian politicians "little hyenas"?
(In the Rage and the Pride)
Why is it (alleged to be) a criminal offence when she uses beastial terms to describe the behaviour of certain Islamists, but not when she uses those terms to describe anyone else?
Archimedes is right that what is most important is not what Oriana Fallaci wrote but the actual content of the Quran and its hatemongering against everybody who is not a Muslim believer. The Quran is read and believed by hundreds of millions, who read it, recite it, listen to recitations, and so on. Thus it is infinitely more dangerous than Oriana's books, best sellers though they may be.
Now, Randall did not supply any quote from Fallaci referring to the skin color of the Arabs. I made the point on another post here at JW/DW that skin color is a red herring in the Israeli-Arab conflict. It is a red herring used by Arab and Western "leftist" spokesmen/propagandists. In fact there are plenty of swarthy Jews and pale-skinned Arabs. Not having read Fallaci's books, I don't know for sure whether or not she disparages the Arabs on account of skin color. Yet, I did read her article in Panorama in March or April 2002 about the repercussions in Italy and the West of the terrorist attacks on Israel and Israel's attempt to resist them. I don't recall any reference to skin color there. And why should she refer to it? She is aware that many fellow Italians are swarthy, as well as many Jews, Armenians [victims of Muslims in WW One], Greeks, etc. So I have to assume that Randall is dragging in skin color as a red herring, which is a typical ploy of the propaganda of the pro-Arab "left." The argument seems to be that the darker one is the more one must be innocent. The rule is applied even when it doesn't fit, as between Jews and Arabs in Israel [and I see Arabs every day in Jerusalem]. Indeed, the rule is disregarded totally when Arabs [and arabized blacks] in Sudan are murdering southern Sudanese Blacks. In this way, what was originally a way of drawing on -or borrowing- the moral capital of Blacks in America who were descended from slaves, in order to give some undeserved moral "coloration" to Arabs, enables the now assumed innocence and moral perfection of the Arabs to be used against Blacks. Randall ought to stop his/her use of the skin color red herring.
Archimedes, Eliyahu, Sheik -
Perhaps you should actually read the post, in which I said quite plainly at the very tippy top:
"Christopher Hitchens on Oriana (from Holy Writ, April 2003, The Atlantic Monthly):"
meaning that Christopher Hitchens, not I, wrote the article you are objecting too. Feel free to read the whole article on www.theatlantic.com, in which he states his admiration for Ibn Warraq and others while at the same time providing the comments I quoted on Oriana.
I think it provides an good counter-argument to the adoration expressed here. There is a right way and wrong way to go about opposing the jihadists. Oriana's way is the wrong way, just serving to strengthen, not weaken, then. Robert's support and adoration of her is, in my opinion, shameful.The enemy of your enemy should not always be your friend.
As Hitchen says about the Rage: "this is a sort of primer in how not to write about Islam."
I agree.
Orianni Fallacci is a great woman. I am deeply saddened about her tragic illness. We wish this woman of courage insight and wisdom all the best.
May she hear all our words of encouragement. And may we all gain strength from her strength and vision.
Deliver us all from Islam. Amen.
Randall,
My apologies for attributing Hitchens' material to you. I did read the top, of course, but mistook the last paragraph in the post in question to be your own writing. Maybe putting quotation marks around the whole excerpt might have helped avoid this confusion.
As I indicated, I was addressing both you and Hitchens anyway. And anyway, you now say you agree with Hitchens' claims! So you're not off the hook! You should respond and at least try to defend against our arguments.
By quoting Hitchens without any disclaimer, and by calling Spencer's endorsement of Ms. Fallaci "shameful," plus your failure to explicitly distance yourself from Hitchens' erroneous claims about Ms. Fallaci, could be taken to mean that you are calling Fallaci's comments racist. Is this your view? If it is not, retract the by-proxy "racist" accusation. But if it is your view, support your claim and show a clear-cut example of this alleged racism.
As I said, your point, and Hitchens', is small. There's more than one way to attack the problem of hard-core Islamism.
Randall,
I’ve read the Hitchens article. Here’s the rest of my response on it.
With statements like this, Hitchens, in reference to a different work of Fallaci, calls her writing “hysterical materialism” and says this in reference to The Rage and the Pride, “written in the hot flush that overtook her”(after 9/11). If he practices what he preaches, these are Hitchens’ “stringently”-chosen words. Keep in mind that Fallaci was objecting to the misogyny of traditional Islam (in one of her criticisms)—that’s part of what she was raging about.
Hitchens:
“It takes only a moment of reflection; the very moment that Fallaci did not permit herself, or of which she is incapable--to establish that genital mutilation is also practiced by animists and Christians and is forbidden or not practiced in many Muslim societies.”
Fallaci’s point stands: Many Muslims still practice it.
Hitchens:
“Or that stoning to death--which is mandated in the Old Testament--is (like infibulation) unmentioned in the Koran.”
Re: Stoning. This is not in the Koran, but the Koran does, by its own account, endorse the Torah, except where Mohammad-Allah makes a modification or revision. Secondly, Hitchens is trading in half-truths. Stoning is clearly endorsed in reliable Hadiths ( see Spencer’s article http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=18062 ). The Koran does also permit some very hard punishments for adultery including 100 lashes for Muslims, or even summary execution (33:57-62; see “those in whose hearts is a disease” who (along with hypocrites and alarmists) “will be slain with a (fierce) slaughter,” which has always been the law of Allah—Pickthall translation). Next, the Koran explicitly orders men to beat wives deemed to be disobedient http://answering-islam.org/Silas/wife-beating.htm . It does not forbid the use of hard objects—and what, after all, is a man’s fist?
Another thing in the Koran: Women guilty of lewdness must be confined to the house until death (4:15).
Hitchens:
“Or that Pakistanis and Bangladeshis are the most industrious, enterprising, and law-abiding immigrants to Britain, and display the most reverence for education. I might add that they are much keener on daily ablutions than many of their happy-go-lucky Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Celtic hosts. (The injunction to wash is actually in the stipulations of Islam ...)”
1. These kind statements about the majority of Pakistanis and Bangladeshis in Britain are all well and good, but is their good behaviour attributable to following the Koran? Following the Koran would put them in clear conflict with the Laws of Britain. This article of Hitchens was written before 7/7, but, surprisingly, after the Rushdie fall-out in 1989, and the news about just how deeply Britain has been infiltrated by Islamists who would like to see it overthrown.
2. Yes, Muslim men must wash up before prayer if they’ve touched a woman. If they cannot find water, they should wash themselves with dirt (5:6; 4:43).
Hitchens:
“The Turks in Germany must be among the sturdiest of all Europeans. And this is in a generation or so. Among them, as among newer arrivals in the United States, Holland, France, and Italy, there is an argument about the place of faith and the role of the secular state. But it is an argument within the Islamic world, not an argument between it and some imagined "Christendom." Fallaci's book, too, has brought down calls for censorship that ought to be steadily resisted: Islamic groups claiming the protection of multiculturalism should (and, I predict, will) appreciate that they must honor the same precept themselves--and also see to it that Islamic societies make more room for dissent and pluralism.”
On this last point, only, I agree with the sentiment, but this is a pretty optimistic outlook, to say the least.
Hitchens touches on Andalusia:
“Islam is, despite its apparent inflexibility, quite adaptable to local conditions. Its best historic moments, in Andalusia and Bosnia and Alexandria, have involved synthesis with other faiths and cultures. We are all now heavily invested in the outcome of the civil war or civil wars that are taking place within the Muslim world.”
1. Andalusia (a.k.a. An-delusia). There have been so many articles on this site or linked to it, discussing these myths. Here’s one just http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=5016
2. These are just civil wars within Islam? 9/11, 3/11, 7/7…read this site Hitchens! It is clear that many of these wars are directed against us.
Fallaci was the woman who stood before the Ayatollah took of the veil or covering that she was forced to wear and threw it at him. We, and Hitchens, could learn from her courageousness.
Hitchens is one of the British image-spinners who have been promoting Arab [and other Islamic] aggression since WW2. His references to Islam's "best moments" in Bosnia and Andalusia show that he an ignoramus about history who happens to write very elegantly. So the insinuation about Oriana detesting Arabs because of allegedly swarthy skin-color is Hitchens', not Randall's. Well, that is just what I expect from Hitchens. One might think that he came to the US from Britain in order to do some image-spinning among the benighted Yankees. Anyhow, the British upper crusty promotion of Arabs and Islam over the years has now struck home as it were, as the British population now has its 7/7, just like the USA its 9/11 and Spain its 3/11, and here in Israel too many dates to count.
Hitchens deploys certain dishonorable methods in his polemics: insinuation, innuendo, straw man, false attribution, false inference, etc. He is really rather gifted in his craft.
Sometimes I think that he may have come to the USA from Britain to spin certain images, including apologetics for Islam and the Arabs, among the benighted Yanks.
I forgot to add that Hitchens is insinuating that Oriana Fallaci is a racist with his "swarthy" insertion into her words.
If she really did use the words or make a generalization based on skin-color, then prove it to me. Otherwise we have to conclude that Hitchens is just maligning and libelling her.
Eliyahu,
Regarding the "swarthy" comment, that is purely an addition of Hitchens. I re-read The Rage and Pride before responding to Randall, and no "swarthy." There are also other commentators who've called her essay racist, but none of them can show an example of racism from the essay.
I must say that Hitchens' (Atlantic Monthly, 2003) review is very shallow. In that article, he did not grasp the nature of the threat, and seems to have missed the bigger issues.
Archimedes,
Thanks for letting me know that the "swarthy" remark was not in Oriana's book. I haven't read her books, but I have read some articles, one in Il Foglio on the Terry Schiavo case [earlier this year] and one in Panorama in 3/2002 or 4/2002, as I indicate above, and maybe isolated passages from articles and books. Hitchens was putting words in her mouth, words which did not ring true to me. I expect that dishonest technique from Hitchens. Anyhow, I thank you for confirming my suspicion that it was Hitchens who falsely insinuated or falsely attributed [without quotation marks, apparently] the "swarthy" remark to her, trying to her smear as a racist by innuendo.
To anybody,
Do you know if it is possible to meet Oriana Fallaci, and if yes, how, when and where ? I have been wishing to meet her for years. Any advice, email address etc. are welcome. Thank you.