A brief debate with Tarek Fatah

Tarek, Tarek - Denial is not just a river in Egypt.

Tarek Fatah annot himself admit to the true nature of, and textual authority for all that we non-Muslims -- and sometimes Tarek Fatah himself -- deplore, though he recognizes here and there what is wrong with, Islam. Instead, he contents himself with a real hatred of the Arabs, whom he feels have presented an "Arab" version that does not correspond to the good, the true, the "Pakistani" version. It's amazing. He just can't bring himself to see what is in the Qur'an, Hadith, Sira, and for all of his presumably good intentions, he himself is so confused, and prone to so many of the same sly apologetics -- see his appearance on the Michael Coren Show (just put "Michael Coren Show" into the Search Box at JW) -- as are routinely used by other, more sinister characters.

Amazing to watch.

Fatah is an independent thinker.

There are times he whitewashes Islam to keep the mantle of #Islamic Reformer# but he is definitely without a shadow of a doubt against the Shaira having any influence on secular life, he stands absolutely opposed to the Tariq Ramadans of the world and is unwavering in women's rights and against anti-semitism.

We don't need to reduce everything and everyone to simplistic categories in this discussion of how to confront encroaching Sharia.

In amy ways, Fatah is an ally, in fact, in all the important ways.

"It's amazing. He just can't bring himself to see what is in the Qur'an, Hadith, Sira, and for all of his presumably good intentions, he himself is so confused, and prone to so many of the same sly apologetics --"

Hi Hugh, you know that it's not just Tarek Fatah but all Muslims who can't bring themselves to admit the truth about Quran, Sira, Hadith, Mo/allah. It's deliberate on their part and as such practice taqiyya in defense of this cult!!! Wonder if Tarek Fatah is his his real name - not an usual Pakistani/Muslim Muslim name. He seems more like an Arab and of course why would he be at all concerned about Kashmiri Pandits victims of Muslim atrocities and genocide in Kashmir, India.

So Fateh is an "enemy"? I think his views are confused but to label him an "enemy" is a bit lazy. But its more than that. It reflects a lack of perspective. Just like calling Andrew Bostom an "enabler" of "Islamic supremacism". How ridiculous! This really is a low point for Spencer and Jihad Watch. Its more like the equivalent of calling counter-jihadists apostates. OK, not as harsh, admittedly, but you get the point.

No, Tarek Fatah is not evil, and he would like an Islam that is not as Islam is. But he also refuses to recognize fully the real Islam that does exist, and he underestimates crazily the ability of "reformers" or "re-interpreters" to influence the primitive Muslim masses. He wishes, I suspect, that Aisha had not been nine years old when Muhammad had sexual intercourse with her, but instead of forthrightly recognizing this grim fact, he makes the conventional insistent argument that she was not six when she was "betrothed" and not nine when that "marriage' was fully consummaged rather than deal with what is in the texts (Qur'an, Hadith, Sira) and what, furthermore, almost all Muslims know perfectly well and understand, even if they do not wish to talk about it -- how could they? -- with Infidels, but prefer to misrepresent or prevaricate, some perhaps merely out of embarrassed confusion that they can never clear up.

What is interesting about Tarek Fatah is he's no Tariq Ramadan. He's not even a "sola scriptura" Mustafa Akyol, nor one of those who, such as the ignorant, and therefore apologetic Rexa Aslan, have had a good run, and are making good livings, as professional (Bright Young) Muslim Reformers, or at least those who push the line that we must do all we can to work "within the system" (of Islam) which is not so bad, not nearly as bad as some claim, and it's the only way to proceed, because the reza-aslans of this world, and apparently many non-Muslims who go along with them, cannot conceive of a strategy based on forthright reocgnition of the meaning and menace of Islam, by Infidels, and what's more, recognition of all the ways that the political, economic, social, intellectual, and moral failures of Muslim polities and peoples are directly ascribable to Islam itself.

Tarek Fatah reminds me of the late Anwar Sheikh, in that what may have first led Anwar Shaikh to distance himself from Islam was his recognition that Islam had been and always would be a vehicle for Arab supremacism. And one of Anwar Shaikh's most important books was "Islam: The Arab National Religion."

It is apparently impossible for Tarek Fatah to admit what is in the texts of Islam, because if he did, then the obvious next question is: well, why then do you, Tarek Fatah, continue to call yourself a Muslim? Why, when the whole belief-system is based on inculcating hostility, even murderous hostility, toward all non-Muslims, why, when Muhammad watched as the bound prisoners of the Banu Qurayza were decapitated, or greeted with pleasure the news of the death of Asma bint Marwan, or led the raid, for loot and women, and not to spread Islam, on the inoffensive farmers of the Khaybar Oasis, and yet is referred to as uswa hasana and al-insan al-kamil, that is the Model of Conduct and the Perfect Man, should you, Tarek Fatah, continue to be part of this, instead of bravely following Wafa Sultan, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Ali Sina, Ibn Warraq, Magdi Allam?

He has no answer. But he does share, though not coming to the same conclusions, an awareness that the Arabs are somehow to blame for the misery of Pakistan and Pakistanis, but he appears to have fashioned some notion of an "Arab Islam" that does not really exist, but for him is a comforting notion.

If he is confused, and even semi-mad at points, it is because the pressure of being a Muslim who knows all the bad things but cannot quite jettison Islam can have effects on the brain. It's hard to withstand that pressure, hard to keep up the false front and pretending to yourself that Islam is not what it is, but quite other.

And nowadays, too many non-Muslims are reading the texts, grasping the tenets, analyzing the psychology of Muslims (see Nicolai Sennels, for example, or that long-ago work by Andre Servier), and are not content to accept this kind of thing any longer.

And there is Tarek Fatah, trying still to convince others that his is the broad highway that will lead Muslims up and out of their self-made Slough of Ideological Despond, but what he offers turns out, I'm afraid, to be a dead-end.

And it is others -- articulate defectors from the Army of Islam -- who know the terrain best, and who can not only help to spring those Muslims ready to break out of their inherited ideological prison, but also help to lead them to that highway, the one that Tarek Fatah wrongly thought he had constructed.

Tarek Fatah is a child

Many Muslims exhibit what seems to be a strange unwillingness or inability to answer questions about their beliefs. Some become strangely angry at the questioner. Muslims of course are not unique in this respect.

Tarek Fatah is about as moderate a Muslim as you will find, where by moderate I mean someone who opposes sharia and militant jihad, and who rejects many disturbing aspects of the Hadith and so forth. But his recent angry over-the-top reaction to Wafa Sultan, and his previous angry reaction to Irshad Manji, suggests there may be other ways in which he is not so moderate. He is not moderate, for example, in being forthright about what the Islamic texts say, and about what mainstream (Muslim) Islamic scholarship accepts, about Aisha's age at the time Muhammad reportedly "consummated" his marriage to her, and about the rape of non-Muslim female "right-hand possessions" (slaves and captives). He tends to blame the problems on the distorted interpretations of the "Islamists" and the Islam-haters. In fact, I've never read him blame any of the problems on the Quran and Muhammad as such.

Now consider where Tarek Fatah is on the spectrum of Muslim belief: he is way out at the edge, a secularist. If a moderate and secularist, anti-sharia activist like Fatah reacts this way (in not answering the question and in being angered by it), and is unwilling to address certain problems in Islam, and is not forthright about certain issues, what can we conclude about the rest of Muslims, who aren't nearly as moderate as Fatah? It is reasonable to speculate that the majority of Muslims in the West are not as moderate as Fatah on any number of issues and attitudes. This is borne out, for example, in the polls and surveys which indicate that most Muslims in the U.K. want criminal prosecution and punishment of those who criticize Islam or "insult" Muhammad," and that the majority of American Muslims want homosexuality to be illegal.

Tarek Fatah: "...Do I need to present my credentials every time a Pakistan hater asks me to? ... Is this a membership application to test my credentials...? Please go ahead and deny my credentials..."

It has been my observation that a person who persistently touts his "credentials" is usually both insecure and immature. Playing the "credentials" card can almost always be interpreted to mean the player knows he has a weak hand and hopes to bluff the other players.

Fatah realizes, like Irshad Manji, that some people are going to want to call themselves Muslim for all kinds of reasons, and organize their life cycles and calenders according to something called Islam. What that Islam is matters to all of us and we need to allow for people to be moderate.

Whether you think that is a fools errand or not is separate to the fact of Fatah's character which I find to be worthy, in fact right now as he is being called names here he has posted on his FB page an article on Aqsa Parvez.

The modern world needs allies who call themselves Muslim.

The modern world needs no MohSlums! The world would be a lot happier place without Islamic misery spread over their and our lands.

Try to model my concept against yours- you will see the results there is no such stuff as a moderate MohSlum. If we had moderate MoSlums, this site would not get the kind of support it gets.

"The modern world needs allies who call themselves Muslim." -

Care to give us a couple of good reasons?"

Because Islam is not going away any time soon. In fact it is going to grow and whole swatches of Europe will become parts of its world.

There are plenty of people who continue to call themselves Muslims because they want to identify with their ancestry, homeland.

Fatah does not give up the mantle of being called a Muslim because he wants to reform his faith and keep it away from secular institutions.

He is not softening Islam to fool gullible fifth colum Westerners (whose spinelessness he detests) he is softening it so he can remain within its fold.

He has my complete support in this even if he is deluded, even if he is in denial.

Desidude--

With respect, you just don't know enough about Tarek Fatah's work.

He detests the application of Sharia in his home country, which he feels was ruined by it, and certainly not in Canada.

He knows well he would be the first taken out back and beheaded in any Caliphate.

He passes Spencer's test in avowing an Islam that wishes to exist permanently in equality with other faiths.

You and I may agree that this is the Islam of a few hundred that exists in their minds and no where on earth but please familiarize yourself with his writing before throwing him in with the likes of Tariq Ramadan (whom he also absolutely detests).

Eastview, no one is more aware of what you say about the risks to reformers than Fatah.

I believe in supporting people who are genuine reformers within Islam as Fatah is in my estimation.

The only points here I have objected to are against his character not against his practicality or likelihood of successfully reforming his faith.

"Please go ahead and deny my credentials to the society of pavitar souls. And please write under your real name."

As Mr. Spencer says, a rascist preposistion.

This is part of why I am extremely hesitent to trust or call him an "ally".

Many times from experience I've heard so-called self proclaimed muslim "moderaites" here end up shammed when their true intentions of stealth Jihad, support financialy of terrorism and anti-semetic rascism. That he outright denys the evils of the tennets of Islam, and even (I think quite openly) tries to obsticate and makes blatently false and rascist remarks pushes me even more twords being revilled at him.

But who was Benazier Bhutto after all ?
All I know of her is she was a very beautiful woman politician in Pakistan who got killed like her father did. You don't see beautiful women there, and certainly not women politicians. They say she shouted "Jihad" ? Jihad is so over them all that it doesn't mean much as an evidence. Jihad is "struggle" you know. It can mean a lot of things. Can anyone believe a woman politician can actually stand for Islam ?

Foolster, Fatah is the author of the upcoming "The Jew is Not My Enemy" so I guess he must be in super stealth mode of his anti-semitism.

Tarek Fatah failed the Aisha test. In doing so, he crashed and burned in dramatic style, though few seem to realize that he in fact failed the test. In doing so, he also failed the honesty test. His disgraceful, disgusting attacks on Wafa Sultan and on Islamic critics and apostates generally, during the recent controversy in March over Aisha's age, rules him out as a credible person. (Wafa Sultan had reportedly told a Jewish audience during a speaking engagement that Muhammad had raped a child, i.e., Aisha. Reportedly, Fatah disrupted the event. He then later used his column at the National Post to defame Sultan without discussing the Islamic textual basis for Sultan's statement about Muhammad raping a child). He used his position as a well-connected public spokesman for moderate Islam in Canada to launch a defamatory campaign against Wafa Sultan and anyone who tried to defend her. He didn't say he had a disagreement with Wafa Sultan about the importance of the Hadith. He flat out accused her of lying and "making up her story" about Muhammad having sex with 9-year-old Aisha. He still has not apologized to Wafa Sultan, even though he knowingly and recklessly endangered her life by announcing publicly that she had insulted Muhammad. It is doubtful that he will ever apologize to her, because he apparently believes that what he did, in using his position to attack her, was the right thing to do. After all, he is defending, in front of a largely naive and friendly non-Muslim audience, the public image of Islam and its prophet. If that audience knew that mainstream Islamic traditions accept that Aisha was 9 when 53- or 54-year-old Muhammad "consummated" the marriage to her, then Tarek Fatah's credibility would be shot and his career as the moderate Muslim spokesman would be sunk.

Fatah uses his connections and positions to spread da'wa and attack Islamic critics and apostates. To do this, he uses mainstream news articles, television, and radio. At minimum, he's causing confusion and damaging the efforts of Islam critics and apostates.

It was only some time after his National Post article, on the Michael Coren show, in which Fatah mentioned anything about the Hadith and what it had to say about Aisha's age. Even then, he tried to minimize it, marginalize, and dismiss it. He didn't tell the audience about the status of these Hadiths in mainstream (non-Western Muslim) Islamic scholarship, nor did he inform the audience that his own view--that Aisha was between about 14 and 20 when Muhammad married her--was not accepted by mainstream scholars, and is not based on any direct textual evidence, and that even the indirect evidence is full of holes and erroneous assumptions. On the contrary, later on his website Averroes Press, he tried to imply that there was widespread agreement among scholars that Aisha was much older than 9, and that only hadith-fabricators, "Islamists," and "Islam-haters" claimed that Aisha was 9.

This is all unacceptable. There many others in Canada who are opposing sharia. This can be done without Fatah.

Hugh wrote: Tarek Fatah is not evil, and he would like an Islam that is not as Islam is. But he also refuses to recognize fully the real Islam that does exist.

You are correct about one thing. Tarek Fatah is not evil and has great courage to stand where he is demonized by both Islamists and those who oppose them. Granted the Islam that Fatah values is an Islam not touched by the fanaticism of the current Wahhabi/Salafi movements. You should not forget that the Islam that many of Pakistan honor is a religion very close to Sufism.

Tarek Fatah is definitely not a covert Islamist and those who think that are off the mark. I agree that with this article Spencer has reached a new low. Kudoes to Fatah for braving the most inane of attacks!

Having just read Mr. Fatah's 2010 book "The Jew is not My Enemy," I am rather impressed.

As for racist, sexist, etc. elements in Muslim tradition, these differ in detail, not quality, from similar strains in Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc.

Fundamentalist literalism is a poison in whatever religion it develops and is always a mark of fear and insecurity borne of ignorance.

I can only hope that the largely secular "revolutions" going on right now in so many Muslim-majority countries do succeed in birthing democracies in which church and state and separated. This, of course, depends on the Western powers, especially the U.S.A., no longer supporting dictators because it serves their selfish interests and thirst for oil.