Keeping their monopoly on twisting facts for the Malaysian public. Sharia Alert. "Govt Bans 37 Publications On Islam Containing Twisted Facts," from Bernama:
KUALA LUMPUR, June 6 (Bernama) -- The Internal Security Ministry has banned 37 book titles and publications on Islam containing twisted facts that can undermine the faith of Muslims.
Secretary of the Publications and Quranic Texts Control Division Che Din Yusoh said today 21 of the publications were in the English language and published in the United States, United Kingdom and Jordan while 16 were in Bahasa Malaysia and published in Malaysia and Indonesia.
All the book titles and publications were banned by a prohibition order under the Printing Presses and Publications Act 1984, he said in a statement.
He said the prohibition order was imposed on the publications because their contents and text on Islam twisted facts and true Islamic teachings or contained elements that misled the faithful and humiliated the prophets.
"These publications can cause confusion and apprehension among Muslims and eventually jeopardise public order," he added.
The list of book titles and publications, the names of the authors, compilers or translators and publishers as well as the country of publication are contained in the Government Gazzette dated April 26 2007.
The full list can be found at the link above.
Are those books banned because they have "twisted facts", or because they can undermine the faith of islamo-fascists?
Somehow, I lean towards the later.
Hey, Robert, your books are not in the list. I guess your books don't have "twisted facts", and/or don't undermine the faith of the Muslims.
Robert, don't feel too badly that you didn't make their list. Only Islam can twist facts and distort truth, as set forth by the example of the false prophet Mohammed, Pork Be Upin Him.
Maybe next year your books will make the list.
Think they'll hand out golden decapitated heads to the authors of the books that are banned?
"He said the prohibition order was imposed on the publications because their contents and text on Islam twisted facts and true Islamic teachings or contained elements that misled the faithful and humiliated the prophets."
...well, Islam is a twisted entity and interpretation of true Islamic teaching varies greatly depending on who is doing the interpretation...and Islam has been misleading the Islamic faithful for over 1400 years...
...Islam is a deceitful master...
How come the Qu'ran ain't on that list?
I'm too busy to get to them now, but I appreciate the Malaysian government handing out a list of "must-read" books on Islam.
ONe would like those "twisted facts" exposed by the Malaysian government, so that we can all see for ourselves just how "twisted" they were.
http://freethebooks.blogspot.com/2006/11/banned-books-malaysia-101_05.html
The link has a detailed discussion of the problem of "banned" books in Malaysia. As usual, a tremendous amount of low-level corruption and incompetence is salted into the official pronouncements.
You should point out to Dinesh Dsouza that none of your books are on the list, therefore the Malaysian government is certifying that your books contain no "twisted facts"
Hmm, I didn't see anything written by Satan Khomeini on the banned list. Looks like sex with infants and animals won't undermine faith, mislead the faithful or jeopardize public order.
That's a load off my mind!
You know who is on the list?
John Esposito and Karen Armstrong.
Most of the rest of it appears to be drugs and porn.
Scuse me ...
*runs off to Amazon*
WSW
I hate it when people twist facts! Some folks even think that Islam is a warlike religion! Really.
Esposito and Armstrong certainly "twist facts" but not, I'm afraid, in the way that the Malaysian government had in mind. Surely the banning of their apologetic trash is surprising, but merely testifies to the fact that if a single less-than-rapturous word is said about Islam or Muhammad, then you can be cast, even if you are as trashy as armstrong, out.
While Armstrong has an audience of those who want to believe in the essential sameneess and goodness of Islam (well, goodness if not "sameness" because Armstrong clearly prefers Islam or her crazed verison of it to Christianity), Esposito has a slightly more upscale market, and Mesanostrans -- google "MESA Nostra" -- like to give students reading assignments in his cobbled-together coffee-table encyclopedias, with those pretty pictures, so heavy on the geometric patterns in blue mosques and those Iznik tulip-tiles, and the local color of the desert, and turbans, and wizened faces of the folkloristic Believers. Ernst Sells, Omi Safi, all kinds of people like Esposito. And if you scratch his back, he'll scratch yours.
Just ask, in that regard, the latest sammy-glick to get tenure because the faculty, knowing nothing about Islamic law, thought he must, he simply must, know what he is talking about. After all, he comes from an Orthodox Jewish family. He went to Harvard. Roy Mottahedeh gives him a glowing reference (should we not be impressed with Roy Mottahedeh, professor at Harvard?). And so does John Esposito. And so does someone from the Coalition Authority, about this candidate's "constitution-drafting" skills. But if you look beyond this, if you ask, say, Bernard Lewis what he thinks of Roy Mottahedeh, if you ask Ali Allawi (or just read his book) what he thought of that constitution-drafting, if you ask Bassam Tibi or Ibn Warraq or Ayaan Hirsi Ali or Magdi Allam what they think of Noah Feldman and whether they would recommnend him for a job as an "expert" in Islamic law, then quite a different story would emerge. Feldman pulled the wool over so many self-assured faculty eyes, with those references, that "resume," that one might suppose he would now choose to lie low, having pulled it off, but then, the noah-feldmans of this world never do. Now it's on to arranging, tenure for his wife. Houses in Cambridge are very expensive, you know.
So, can Robert's books carry the Islamic version of an imprimatur from the Malaysian government?
Im not sure if the Malaysian Goverment guys knows how to read & write.
1 or 2 years ago, they banned a book about Kundalini, a book about meditation, much like yoga,
The reason was there was one sentence that states:
"Practicing Kundalini brings you closer to god" or something equivelent.
Lets use this analogy as well:
"Cleaniness is next to godliness"
So, will any muslim reading this sentence want to ban a book containing this?
Well, for these ignorant clowns, life is all about allah & muhammad. Anything else must be destroyed.
Just to let you know 2007 is the year to Visit Malaysia & after all the shit that happened, I recommend otherwise.
One day, someone will expose what really happened on May 13, 1969, the day when the Malays lost an election & caused a riot that took hundreds of chinese lives. And witness said the rioters shouted what any jihadist would have shouted.
This single event shaped the Malay agenda or precicely the new muslim agenda.
Face it folks, Malaysia is run by jihadist.
Marisol said
It's an odd list. The "usual suspects" are missing: Robert Spencer, Ibn Warriq, Oriana Fallaci, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Melanie Phillips, etc. Instead, there are such titles as:
The Fifth Pillar A Spiritual Pilgrimage: David Zeidan (Piquant, Great Britain);
The Life and Times of Muhammad: Sir John Glubb (Madison Books, US);
Introducing Islam: The Basics: Kim Whiteheads (Mason Crest Publishers, Jordan);
The titles sound pretty innocuous.
Are Robert's books banned under some previous order? Or does his fact-based-cross-referenced annotations style make it more difficult for the Malay government to ban them?
The truth-tellers are not on the list of banned books right now, because they never had a chance of being published or distributed or permitted to exist in Malaysia. They are like emigre literature in the Soviet Union. Imagine, in 1948, obtaining a copy of Bunin's "Memoirs" or Aldanov's "Lenine" or Nabokov's "Invitation to a Beheading." Simply out of the question.
On the other hand, the books by those who are apologists, but whose apologetics are not identical to the Believer's View of Islam (first and permanently unrevised edition), might be banned because they would have in the past been allowed in, or possibly bought in less strict Muslim countries. Take Sir John Glubb. That is Glubb Pasha, for many years the man who ran the Arab Legion in Jordan, and who was trusted by the Arabs. His book is unlikely to be critical of Islam -- but perhaps it was not worshipful enough in its tone, and that might explain its being banned now, when clearly, in Malaysia, more extreme islamization is underway.
BAN THE CORE-RAN!!!
Why do they only ban books no-one has even heard of?
Then again, I've never seen a Spencer in any of my local bookstores, even though there doesn't seem to be any official ban.
Hugh,
Your comment on why certain books are on the list and others aren't is, in my observation, dead on. You will be pleased to hear that in Italy (Campania), every bookstore I come near, or for that matter, every big-box store that has a book section, has Magdi Allam, Hirsi Ali and others featured on the front racks, at eye level. It is very encouraging, even if the battle may already be over due to demographic trends.
I have just started Ali Allawi's book, I would be interested in your thoughts on it.
Cordially,
Just when I thought I caught up on reading, Spencer, Waraq, Phillips, Fallaci, Menezes,Gabrieel,Winn, Darwish, Hirsi Ali,Reliance of the Traveller, Qurans, Hadiths, now I find out there are 21 more books I need to read, guess I am lucky I cannot read Malay, I just don't have the time for that much reading. If these above authors have not been banned but these books have they must really be good.
"confusion and apprehension amongst muslims can eventually jeopordize public order". We all know how orderly all those good little muslims are when rioting over cartoons.
Confused muslim = moderate muslim.
Sure muslim = Jihadist.
Special Guest: you are right. I bought Ayaan's 'The Caged Virgin' and 'Infidel' a few months ago. As of today, still not banned! And the best part: at Kinokuniya (a large Japanese bookstore) they placed Ayaan's books next to the Qur'an! Goodness. I can imagine: If you want the Qu'ran, here it is. If you want something else, well, try Ayaan!
Special Guest: you are right. I bought Ayaan's 'The Caged Virgin' and 'Infidel' a few months ago. As of today, still not banned! And the best part: at Kinokuniya (a large Japanese bookstore) they placed Ayaan's books next to the Qur'an! Goodness. I can imagine: If you want the Qu'ran, here it is. If you want something else, well, try Ayaan!
Following on from my earlier post, I just can't get Robert Spencer's books, banned though they may not be!