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In "Profs on Boston Bombing: Blame Right-Wingers, ‘Islamophobia,’ and Blowback," in FrontPage, May 7, Cinnamon Stillwell examines a rogue's gallery of Leftist and Islamic supremacist pseudo-academic hacks, including many who will be familiar to longtime Jihad Watch readers (notably Omid Safi), to reveal their lies, obfuscation, denial and finger-pointing regarding the Boston Marathon jihad bombings:

How did scholars of the Middle East and those engaged in moonlighting (non-specialists who write about the region) react to the Boston Marathon bombing on April 15, 2013? Before the smoke cleared, some were predicting that the perpetrators would be “right-wingers” who sought to “disrupt tax day,” “neo-Nazis,” or “lone wolves.” Given that Muslims constitute 30 of 32 of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s list of most wanted terrorists, this represents either wishful thinking or willful blindness.

Accordingly, after brothers Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev were identified as the perpetrators, scholars resorted to apologetics and obfuscation to explain away Islam’s role: the Tsarnaevs aren’t “real” Muslims; Islam and terrorism are incompatible; Islamic terrorism is no more significant than any other societal ill; “Islamophobia” and a wave of anti-Muslim hate crimes (that has yet to arrive) will ensue; and the attack was an example not of ideologically-rooted violence, but of logical “blowback” against American foreign policy.

What follows is a sampling of such inanity.

Early speculation on the identity of the perpetrators:

Ingrid Mattson, London & Windsor Community Chair in Islamic Studies, Huron University College:

Just paid my U.S. taxes which are due today. Almost forgot because of the attacks on Boston. Did the bombers intend to disrupt tax day?

And:

If we wake up to the news that the bombers were white men, who should issue press releases condemning the actions?

Jessica Stern, Task Force on National Security and Law, Hoover Institution, Stanford University:

[A] recipe for creating this kind of bomb was actually published in al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s online magazine known as ‘Inspire.’ And a couple of terrorist wannabes were inspired by that–al-Qaeda’s call for individuals to carry out their own jihad in America and try to detonate these bombs. . . . But it’s also important to recognize that the recipe was shared and lauded by Stormfront, which is a neo-Nazi website. And the whole idea of leaderless resistance, which comes out of the far right, neo-Nazi, patriot movement, also spread over to al-Qaeda-related groups. . . . So my guess is that this probably is a do-it-yourselfer kind of individual or individuals, or perhaps a small group. Either one that was inspired by al-Qaeda or perhaps neo-Nazis or anti-government patriot groups who have been known to act on Patriot’s Day. So the date of the attack suggests that we not overlook the possibility that this could be an American anti-government group.

Mark Ensalaco, associate professor of political science, University of Dayton:

My immediate reaction is this is something similar to Oklahoma City and the Olympics in Atlanta. Because it’s tax day and a holiday in Boston honoring revolutionaries who fought for America freedom, and many people from foreign nations were in attendance, I worry a right-wing extremist used a highly visible event such as the Boston Marathon to make a highly visible statement. It would be tragic if some mad man took a peaceful movement such as the tea party and acted in this way.

Eli Berman, Research Director, International Security Studies, University of California Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, University of California, San Diego:

This looks like an aberration. It’s called ‘lone wolf’ terrorism—it’s not attached to any organization.

As’ad AbuKhalil, professor of political science, California State University, Stanislaus:

The buffoons of Muslim-American organizations are holding a press conference in Washington, D.C. today. Why? Why are you so eager to speak on the matter when the manhunt is not even over? And what will you say? Condemn? Why not reinforce the view, by not speaking, that condemnation is to be assumed by all American about all Americans?  Do you see Jewish-American organizations rushing to hold press conferences every time a Jewish person commits an act of murder or terrorism? Why do you act suspicious when you are innocent? Why do you remind American bigots that they are not wrong in their suspicions of you? Why not issue a statement saying once and for all that you condemn all acts of terrorism like all other Americans and that for that, you will shut up if some Muslim kook or terrorist commits an act of murder or terrorism in the future?

Juan Cole, Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History, University of Michigan:

We don’t yet know who carried out the attack, but we know they either aren’t Muslims at all or they aren’t real Muslims, in the nature of the case.

Why the Tsarnaev brothers aren’t “real” Muslims:

Omid Safi, professor of Islamic studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill:

We don’t know much about the two brothers . . . The few pieces we have do not exactly add up to a life of pious observance of Islam. Their high school friends talk about the two brothers getting together, drinking, and smoking pot. . . . We have seen this before, in the case of the 9/11 hijackers who visited strip clubs and got loaded up on alcohol and porn before committing their atrocities—again, not the actions of Muslim role models.

Brian Glyn Williams, professor of Islamic history, University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth:

While he [Tamerlan Tsarnaev] was previously known to smoke marijuana and box, he ultimately found himself in a radical strain of Islam. But it was not the Islam most Muslims would recognize, it was almost a separate cult known as jihadism which seeks to construct what has been called the ‘Sixth Pillar of Islam’ i.e the fard (obligation) of jihad (there are actually only five pillars in Islam).

Juan Cole, Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History, University of Michigan:

Being a fanatic is, contrary to the impression both of Fox Cable News and some Muslim radicals, not actually the same as being a good Muslim; in fact, the Qur’an urges the use of reason and moderation. . . . All this shows that they were on an adolescent homocidal [sic] power trip, dressed up like al-Qaeda, the way the Aurora shooter was wearing an arsenal and dressed up like Batman. In any case, here are the signs that Dzhokhar in particular wasn’t ever observant, and Tamerlan’s later fanaticism led him and his brother to disregard Islamic ethics and laws.

Claims that Islam and terrorism are incompatible:

Hatem Bazian, senior lecturer in Near Eastern, University of California, Berkeley:

These acts of violence and terror have no place in Islam, which condemns such acts—in strongest possible terms—that takes lives of innocent people or causes pain and suffering.

Omid Safi, professor of Islamic studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill:

No matter what the experts on TV say, and for that matter what the two brothers might have said, here is one simple fact. Islamic law does not permit the random, indiscriminate killing of civilians. It is categorically forbidden. The Prophet Muhammad himself forbade the killing of women, elderly, civilians, and religious leaders.

Juan Cole, Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History, University of Michigan:

If the motive for terrorism is religious, it is impermissible in Islamic law. It is forbidden to attempt to impose Islam on other people. . . . Islamic law forbids aggressive warfare. . . . The killing of innocent non-combatants is forbidden. . . . Terrorism or hirabah is forbidden in Islamic law. . . . Sneak attacks are forbidden. Muslim commanders must give the enemy fair warning that war is imminent.

Muqtedar Khan, associate professor of political science and director of the Islamic Studies Program, University of Delaware:

To act in anger, even in the pursuit of justice is Un-Islamic. How do we teach our child that how one responds to injustice is the true measure of one’s values and a true reflection of who we are? How do we teach them that our Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) taught us—la darar wa la dirar—do no harm and do not reciprocate harm. Yes, Muhammad taught Muslims neither to initiate harm nor to reciprocate harm. This tradition is very widely known, at least to Muslims who know their religion.

Brian Glyn Williams, professor of Islamic history, University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth:

Dzhokar and Tamerlan are . . . two names with some heavy significance and import for jihadified Muslims of Chechen ancestry who may have found themselves drawn to the cult of Muslim holy war at the expense of other less radical aspects of the faith . . . most notably the passage in the Koran that states ‘killing one innocent person is like killing all humanity.’

Downplaying the significance of Islamic terrorism:

Omid Safi, professor of Islamic studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill:

As everyone is of course fully aware, there are some Muslims who engage in terrorist activities. There are also some Jews, some Christians, some atheists, some Hindus, etc. No religion has a monopoly on hatred and idiocy, and no religion has a monopoly on love, compassion, and beauty.

Dalia Mogahed, executive director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, co-author, with Georgetown University’s John Esposito, of Who Speaks for Islam?: What a Billion Muslims Really Think, and nonresident senior public policy scholar at the American University of Beirut:

I think that all terrorists are motivated by an ideology and some perceived grievances, but they all belong to some group and it’s important that we not conflate extremists with the entire group, because if we do that, we actually hand the extremists the legitimacy that they desire, to represent the entire community, which they do not.

Mark LeVine, professor of history, University of California, Irvine:

Why do we assume that if a young man is obsessed with extremely violent videos, websites and extreme music that he is psychologically disturbed, but if he’s obsessed with religion—not any religion, Islam only it appears—and begins following extremists online and viewing violent videos or reading violent literature that he’s become merely a ‘radical’—that is, he’s made a conscious and ‘sane’ political decision to attack and murder people in the name of an ideology, and isn’t suffering from some kind of mental illness?

As’ad AbuKhalil, professor of political science, California State University, Stanislaus:

If an Arab is behind it is terrorism and if an American is behind it is an explosion.

Predicting hate crimes and “Islamophobia”:

Akbar Ahmed, Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies, American University:

Americans, particularly the media, also need to recognize the damage that Islamophobia can cause in alienating these young Muslims away from the mainstream religious and civic community. Already there are stories circulating of a backlash against Muslims in the wake of the events in Boston.

Muqtedar Khan, associate professor of political science and director of the Islamic Studies Program, University of Delaware:

The bombing of the Boston marathon and the subsequent man-hunt for the young Dzhokar Tsarnaev, has once again focused everyone’s attention on the so-called threat of Islamic radicalism and on Muslims living in the West. It has also given anti-Muslim extremists all the ammunition they need to put Islamophobia and anti-Muslim campaigns on steroids.

Aziza Ahmed, assistant professor of law, Northeastern University:

TV shows like 24 portray Muslims as secret radicals, which gets reproduced as facts by news agencies. . . . After an act of violence, we often desire to assign blame and ask for vigilance for the sake of justice.

Omid Safi, professor of Islamic studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill:

How we as a nation move forward is critical. . . . Do we turn into an angry mob accusing all Muslims of a crime that two men committed? Do we turn this into an anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant hysteria? Or, do we insist that we as a people are better than what we have been through? Do we want to be heroes, like the ones that put their own lives on the line on Monday, and again in apprehending the suspects? Or do we give in to unjustified bloodlust?

As’ad AbuKhalil, professor of political science, California State University, Stanislaus:

I feel bad for Arab-Americans. At a time like this, when people speculate about the culpability of Arabs, I watch and read Arab-Americans striving to prove that they too are human beings, and that they too are Americans. Not that this works with bigots.

Dalia Mogahed, executive director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, co-author, with Georgetown University’s John Esposito, of Who Speaks for Islam?: What a Billion Muslims Really Think, and nonresident senior public policy scholar at the American University of Beirut:

I pray for the day . . . when these things happen that we look at each other as Americans and assume that we are all as disgusted by these horrific acts as anyone else. I don’t want to prove that I am against the killing of an eight-year-old. That to me is outrageous.

Khaled Abou El Fadl, Omar and Azmeralda Alfi Distinguished Professor in Islamic Law and chair of the Islamic Studies Interdepartmental Program, University of California, Los Angeles:

I have not seen a significant decrease [in anti-Muslim hate crimes since 9/11]. In fact, although I have had high hopes of [sic] our 2005-2006 that things would get better, there was an increasingly widening sort of cultural gap of misunderstanding.
[Ed. note: Click here to access FBI hate crimes statistics for 1996-2011.]

Blaming the attack on “blowback”:

Stephen Zunes, professor of politics and international studies and director of the Middle East studies program, University of San Francisco:

As we offer our thoughts/prayers to Boston bombing victims, let’s also remember the many equally innocent victims of U.S.-made bombs overseas.

And:

When people have been oppressed or dispossessed, whether it be Palestine or Kashmir or Chechnya, some people will take to desperate acts. . . . We need to keep into account that history instead of falling into ugly stereotypes about Muslims or immigrants or anything like that.

Richard Falk, Albert G. Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law and Practice and Professor Emeritus of Politics and International Affairs, Princeton University:

The American global domination project is bound to generate all kinds of resistance in the post-colonial world. In some respects the United States has been fortunate not to experience worse blowbacks, and these may yet happen, especially if there is no disposition to rethink U.S. relations to others in the world, starting with the Middle East. . . . America’s military prowess and the abiding confidence of its leaders in hard power diplomacy makes the United States a menace to the world and to itself. . . . We should be asking ourselves at this moment, ‘how many canaries will have to die before we awaken from our geopolitical fantasy of global domination?’

Omid Safi, professor of Islamic studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill:

There is a difference between justifying terrorist attacks, and understanding the role that our own government has played in causing grievances that lead to these attacks. There is a difference between explaining terrorist attacks away, and understanding that we as a country have committed actions that create resentment among millions of people in this world. We have become, and have been for a while, not a Republic but an Empire. . . . The United States’ actions abroad are a root cause of radicalization.

Mark LeVine, professor of history, University of California, Irvine:

[T]he Tsarnaev brothers can be seen as just one element of a global blowback against a world system that for centuries has produced war and violence on a massive scale. This is a system in which all of us are implicated—the bystanders at the marathon as much as the average citizen in Russia. . . . Do Americans want to admit that as a society they produce an incredible amount of violence, and that sometimes the structure of the society helps produce people like the Columbine, Newtown or Boston murderers? Do they have the time and willingness to consider the incredibly twisted path leading back to the 1940s Soviet Union and ending, at least on this occasion, at the Boston Marathon finish line?

Akbar Ahmed, Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies, American University:

Upon their arrival in the United States, Tamerlan and Dzhokhar joined a Muslim community that bore the scarlet letter of terrorism. Expecting hospitality, they felt alienated and disillusioned, even with all of the opportunities and privileges available to them as citizens of this country. They opted for an act of violent nihilism, of devastation and death. It was a mutation of their religious and tribal codes. Under no circumstances is there any justification for their actions.

Clearly, the specialists cited above are using their knowledge not to clarify, but to conceal; not to explain, but to apologize. When they serve as a source of propaganda rather than elucidation, the professoriate becomes a barrier to understanding. Moreover, the insistence that bigotry is endemic to the American character only promotes the very hysteria and division they decry. In turning to such “experts” in times of crisis, the media and the public at large are ill-served and often misled.

I had been scheduled to debate Sulma Khalid, a Muslim attorney, tonight at American University in Washington, DC, on the topic, "The Qur'an teaches warfare against and subjugation of unbelievers." I was going to argue in the affirmative, of course, and Khalid in the negative.

Yesterday afternoon at 4:22PM, however, I got this email from Sulma Khalid saying: "In light of the explosions that occurred in Boston a few moments ago, Washington DC and the University are in a heightened state of security and have decided to postpone the event due to it's [sic] controversial nature."

No new date was offered, although one might be in the future.

Now here is the salient question: why would a debate in Washington about the Qur'an have to be postponed because of terror bombings in Boston? After all, the mainstream media and the President of the United States have been hastening to ascribe the bombings to "right-wingers." Were Sulma Khalid and American University concerned that it might be an Islamic jihad attack that would make the answer to the question to be discussed in the debate rather glaringly obvious?

Once again an American university demonstrates its authoritarianism and opposition to the freedom of speech. From Atlas Shrugs:

Sign this petition here. and go to the protest if you can.

Protest against Univ of Penn decision on Modi, at U Penn Campus, March 23rd, 12-2:30 PM EST

Americans for Free Speech (AFS) is conducting a demonstration at the University of Pennsylvania campus on Saturday March 23 from 12 PM to 2:30 PM EST on the occasion of Wharton India Economic Forum meeting.  The venue is in front of Penn Museum (on South Street between 33rd and 32nd streets).  The demonstration is against the Wharton India Economic Forum (WIEF) summary dis-invitation of Mr. Narendra Modi after having extended him a formal invitation to be the keynote speaker.  Narendra Modi may be the future Prime Minister of India in the near future.  This craven action was due to Mr. Modi’s alleged human rights violations by only three professors, none of whom are from the business school.  All these charges are patently false based on recent Supreme Court of India report.

Buses are being arranged from Edison, NJ, Jersey City, NJ and Queens, NY.  We request protest attendees to register at our website http://WhartonProtest.blogspot.com as soon as possible, so that we can arrange for more buses if needed. US Congressmen, American Civil Rights Groups, and distinguished members of Indian American Community will be speaking at the meeting.

AFS is an organization formed in response to this unprecedented and undemocratic action by the University of Pennsylvania under pressure from a minority of students.  This action makes a travesty of the norms of academic debate in a civilized society.  The protest represents the outrage of the Indian American Community, Wharton and UPenn alumni, UPenn faculty, civil rights groups and other supporters.  We feel that Wharton has done grave injustice to its own principles of Freedom of Speech, to the principles on which our great country is built.

After extensive investigations, the highly respected Supreme Court of India completely exonerated Narendra Modi from charges by ideologues, for whom, sadly, truth does not seem to be the highest virtue.  The émigré Indian community is distressed that a few malafide activists at the University of Pennsylvania are engaging in blatantly false propaganda.  These faculty activists are not only depriving the university of healthy debate but also setting up a bad example with their untruths.  Things have come to such a pass today that these malafide activists repeating unproven and cooked up charges of human rights abuses of Narendra Modi have crossed the line.  They are now abusing the human rights of Narendra Modi himself.

What is even more shameful is that this is being done to a person who has done more for human rights of the minority communities in his state than any other chief minister in India.  His shrewd and sustained economic stewardship giving equal opportunity for advancement to all without discrimination is today considered a beacon without peer in India.  This even by distinguished religious leaders of the minority community in India.   (For specific details, please do visit our website http://whartonprotest.blogspot.com for the various lies and agitprop being propagated against Narendra Modi).

We earnestly request all members of the émigré Indian community and their mainstream friends here to support our demonstration.  Even if you are not in NY/NJ/CT area, please do inform your friends and relatives in this area to come and participate.

On my ABN show, Dr. Andrew Bostom and I discuss the mixed legacy of the great scholar Bernard Lewis, and the general deficiencies of academic study of Islam.

Andrew Bostom has full and illuminating background information here.

What a coincidence that this would be happening in Texas, of all places, where Governor Rick Perry partnered with the Aga Khan Foundation to develop a severely whitewashed, Islam-friendly curriculum. When Pamela Geller and I broke the story of that curriculum in 2011, the reaction was furious: one blogger demanded I stop linking him; another claimed that the curriculum material we had uncovered was not really the curriculum at all, and tried to pass off one teacher's private notes as the real curriculum; and former friends and associates denounced us with a cult-like fervor that I still find hard to believe that a clueless and compromised Norquistian nonentity like Rick Perry could have inspired.

Now, lo and behold, we find Texas public school students dressing in burqas. And they've already learned that "Allah is the Almighty God."

"State Investigation Launched After Students Dress in Burqas," by Todd Starnes for Fox News, February 25 (thanks to all who sent this in):

A Texas lawmaker is launching an investigation after a teacher reportedly invited female students to dress up in Islamic garb and then told her classroom they should call Muslim terrorists – freedom fighters.

State Sen. Dan Patrick, chairman of the senate education committee, told Fox News he is very disturbed by the photograph as well as reports that students were exposed to a story that blamed Egypt’s turmoil on democracy – rather than the Muslim Brotherhood.

“Parents are very sensitive to any issue that seems to be anti-American – that blames democracy for some sort of trouble in the world,” he said.

The lesson on Islam was taught in a world geography class at Lumberton High School. The teacher brought burqas and other Islamic clothing for the female students to wear. They were also assigned to write an essay based on a Washington Post story that blamed Egypt’s troubles on democracy – instead of the Muslim Brotherhood.

“I am outraged,” one of the parents, who asked not to be identified, told Fox News. “I felt my blood pressure go through my head.”

The parent said she was not aware of the lesson until she discovered a photograph of her 14-year-old daughter wearing a burqa on Facebook.

“As parents we should have been made aware this

“I felt like the line had been crossed,” she told Fox News. “Christian kids who want to pray have to do it outside of school hours – yet Islam is being taught to our kids during school hours.”

Sen. Patrick said he understands why the parents are upset.

“Could you imagine if someone asked a Muslim student to dress up as a priest,” the senator asked. “The parents of a Muslim student might be rather upset about that.”

The young girl’s father wondered why the teacher was giving children lessons about Islam in a geography class.

“She went from learning about Mexico to learning about Russia to learning about Islam,” he said. “Islam is not a country. Islam is not a continent.”

The parents said they confronted their daughter and told her to explain exactly what she had been taught.

“They were asked about their perception of Islam,” she said. “Most of the class said they thought about terrorism. And her response was, ‘we’re going to change the way we perceive Islam.’”

The teacher reportedly told the students that she did not necessarily agree with the lessons –but she was required to teach the material.

The Lumberton Independent School District released a statement to Fox News defending the class.

“The lesson that was offered focused on exposing students to world cultures, religions, customs and belief systems,” the statement read. “The lesson is not teaching a specific religion, and the students volunteered to wear the clothing.”

The school district said Judaism and Christianity were also part of the lesson. However, the parents said Christianity was not discussed in the classroom.

“The Christian perspective was not taught,” she said. “They went in-depth into Islam and I’m not comfortable with it.”

The district said the photograph does not reflect the entire aspect of the lesson.

“The lesson encompassed diversity education so students receive a firm understanding of our world and why people are motivated differently,” the statement read.

The parents said they immediately contacted the principal of the high school who defended the program and said it was required under CSCOPE – a controversial electronic curriculum system that provides online lesson plans for teachers.

“The principal told me it was world geography and they have to learn this stuff,” she said.

However, the school district said the lesson taught at the high school was not part of written CSCOPE lesson.

“This is the normal answer from every school using CSCOPE,” said Janice VanCleave, a vocal critic of the program and the founder of Texas CSCOPE Review. “They are definitely promoting the Islamic religion.”

VanCleave said the trouble is that teachers are not giving students the full story.

“They are not telling students how these young women are treated in this religion,” she told Fox News. “In the Islamic countries women are not treated well at all.”

Last month, evidence was presented at a state hearing showing that CSCOPE offered a number of lessons about Islam.

One particular lesson instructed teachers to provide classroom readings of selected texts from the Koran.

Students were also taught that Allah is God.

CSCOPE offered no comparable lessons on Christianity or Judaism, VanCleave told Fox News.

“I do think CSCOPE promotes the Islamic religion,” she said. “I don’t think it’s right to be proselytizing the Islamic religion in our schools.”

Patrick said every time they’ve asked CSCOPE leaders about the lessons on Islam, lawmakers were told “those were old lessons.”...

This story has been written up in Think Progress and the Huffington Post with the predictable sneering and arrogant Leftist slant: redneck yahoo Southern Congressman is "Islamophobic," and stupid and evil to boot.

What is not reported in any of the stories, however, is the likelihood that the books that Craven (heh) Community College acquired were inaccurate, deliberately misleading whitewashes of Islam that would only foster complacency in their readers, without enabling them to gain any awareness of the actual nature and magnitude of the threat of jihad and Islamic supremacism. That threat is not all that can be said or needs to be said about Islam, but it should not be ignored, downplayed, or denied. Yet there is an entire industry in the U.S. devoted to doing exactly those things, tarring those who raise awareness of that threat with "hatred," "bigotry," and "Islamophobia," and trying to shame Americans into thinking there's something wrong with resisting jihad and defending freedom.

Hamas-linked CAIR's Nihad Awad recently boasted about CAIR's having sent books on Islam to over 8,000 public libraries in the U.S. The books that Craven received are most likely of the same kind: smooth propaganda to advance the Islamic supremacist agenda, not actual explorations of Islam's real teachings and the way they are being lived out by Muslims today -- including jihad terrorists and Sharia supremacists.

I'd like to balance Craven's Islam offerings. I will give them, free-of-charge, copies of all eleven of my books, and will add in the twelfth when it comes out in late March. I'll even throw in the Horowitz Center pamphlets. Craven officials can find information about them here, and should feel free to contact me at director [at] jihadwatch.org.

"North Carolina Republican objects to college library purchase of books on Islam," by Alexander Nazaryan in the New York Daily News, January 16:

Rep. Walter Jones, a Republican from coastal North Carolina, is furious because a local community college is using a federal grant to purchase books on Islam and Muslim culture. 

The 25 books are coming to Craven Community College in New Bern as part of a National Endowment for the Humanities grant. A DVD or two will be purchased as well. 

Jones' objection, first picked up by the liberal website Think Progress, is on two fronts: First, the grant is simply a waste of money. Second, it is biased against Christianity.

In an interview with local affiliate WITN, Jones said, “I want to treat it fairly and I think too many times the Christian faith is not treated fairly. If they want to have book about the Muslim’s faith, let’s have equal number of books about Judeo-Christian [sic].”

Jones also said, "I'd rather see the $150 million spent to remodel schools in Craven County or build schools in the Craven community." (It may be noted here, however, that Jones' altruism goes only so far: On Tuesday evening, he was one of 179 Republicans to vote against superstorm Sandy disaster aid.)

As the Annoyed Librarian blogger for the Library Journal has pointed out, $150 million is actually the entire NEH budget. A little number-crunching brought Annoyed Librarian to the conclusion that the total Muslim Journeys grant equaled about $530,000, and that Craven Community College got all of $627.

None of this is likely to quell Jones' criticism. A banner on his website proudly proclaims his opposition to the "Muslim grant," with a statement quoting him as saying, "It is appalling to me that a federal agency like NEH is wasting taxpayer money on programs like this. It makes zero sense for the U.S. government to borrow money from China in order to promote the culture of Islamic civilizations."

The statement further says that Jones has enlisted the Craven-Pamlico Christian Coalition in providing resources to "balance" the influx of Islam-related books. It is not clear that Craven Community College is presently lacking in Judeo-Christian themed materials. 

The Leftist "educators" responsible for this are not only aiding and abetting a genocidal cause (for what else do you think would happen to the Jews there if Israel really were destroyed?); they're also hastening their own demise, for the same jihad that aims to destroy Israel also has their own homes in its sights.

"British textbook erases Israel," by Ryan Jones for Israel Today, December 31 (thanks to all who sent this in):

A popular textbook used by institutions and teachers to teach English as a second language to students in the UK has been found to have a serious anti-Israel bias.

"I teach English as a foreign language in a further education college in Nottingham, England. I came across the attached map and couldn't believe my eyes!" Liz Wiseman told Israel Today.

The textbook in question is "Skills in English Writing Level 1", which includes a map of the Middle East on which Israel is nowhere to be found.

While Wiseman acknowledges she was not obligated to use this particular textbook, it is one of the more popular and mainstream English Language Teaching (ELT) textbooks published by one of the more popular and mainstream ELT publishers, Garnet Education.

Garnet Education bills itself thus:

"Garnet Education is an independent English Language Teaching (ELT) publisher, specialising in English for Academic Purposes. We produce award-winning ELT books, multimedia resources and tests for students of all ages, from kindergarten to university."

This is far from an isolated incident, which is motivation for drawing attention to this particular case. It is not only in the Middle East where students, both adults and children, are being taught that Israel has no right to exist. The more students around the world are fed this brand of propaganda, the more remote prospects for true peace become.

Intimidation and thuggery shut down academic inquiry. The issues involved here go far beyond this incident, and beyond the evolution debate as well. The core question here is whether issues that Muslims, particularly Muslim rigorists, don't want examined and questions they do not wish to discuss can be examined anyway, or whether free inquiry must be extinguished in the face of their disapproval.

"Debate on Islam and evolution has to be called off after revolt by student societies," by Jerome Taylor in the Independent, December 14:

Organisers behind a British conference on Islam and evolution say they nearly had to cancel the event after receiving a torrent of opposition from Muslim students at one of the country’s top scientific universities, The Independent has leanred.

The Deen Institute, a Muslim debating forum which promotes critical thinking, had hoped to hold a conference entitled “Have Muslims misunderstood evolution?” early next year. Among the speakers invited to attend included Muslim scientists, imams who have promoted the compatibility of Islam and evolution as well as those who preach a form of Islamic creationism.

The initial plan was to hold the event next month at Imperial College London, one of the country’s foremost universities for scientific exploration and debate, in cooperation with the local Islamic student society. But the Deen Institute said it was forced to pull out when it became clear that opposition to the event from supporters of creationism began mounting. It is now being held without input from any Muslim student society at Logan Hall, a conference centre owned by the University of London.

“We eventually had to give up of getting any support from student societies because it was seen as simply too controversial,” Adam Deen, co-founder of the institute, told The Independent. Deen, who describes himself as a “conservative Muslim” who encourages critical thinking, said he was surprised to receive such opposition at a place of scientific study, particularly as he had made sure to invite all sides of the debate including those who preach creationism.

“It’s symptomatic of a bigger problem in the Muslim world where people representing practical Muslims have to be seen to be more literalist,” he said. “It’s almost like there’s an intellectual mafia movement who won’t allow any freedom of thought.”...

Almost!

However it is clear that opposition to the event has been increasing ever since the Deen Institute began publicising it. One source involved with preparations said: “As soon as it went live I was inundated with complaints. It’s sad because student societies should be desperate to host this kind of debate.”

Mr Deen’s public Facebook account illustrates many of the concerns people raised. In one comment Mohammad Ali Harrath, the founder of the highly influential Islam Channel, wrote: “This debate is a big mistake. It is shifting debate to make it a Muslim issue rather than an issue between atheists and creationists.”

Another commenter, Zeshan Sasjid, added: “Evolution is not Islamic. Prophet Adam did not have parents. A Muslim can’t believe that Prophet Adam.”

However others criticised their fellow believers for being overly literalist and shunning scientific research.

“If our faith is strong we can only gain from looking at, hearing and understanding difference,” wrote Amina Crashaw. “If this were not truth I would not be Muslim. Understanding difference include being open to finding something new to learn from the Qur’an. Not new facts but new depth.”

The row is informative because it illustrates some of the controversies currently occupying the Muslim world about the compatibility of science and whether critical thinking is being closed down by more literalist schools of thought.

Muslims believe the Qur’an is the indisputable word of God and therefore any scientific discovery which risks proving something within their holy book as incorrect is highly controversial, particularly among the more literalist schools of thought. For example, most Muslim scholars have long accepted scientifically proven cosmology but even up until his death in 1999, Sheikh Ibn Baaz, the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, continued to insist that the Sun revolved around the Earth based on his interpretation of Islamic texts.

Until recently evolution caused little friction with the majority of Muslim jurists and academics broadly accepting Darwin’s findings – albeit in a theistic sense. But in recent years creationism – much of it inspired by similar Christian right movements in the United States – has begun to receive wider acceptance.

Much of this newfound enthusiasm for attacking evolution has been pushed by Harun Yahya, a prominent Turkish theologian whose writings have been seized upon by literalists and those who exhibit a theological suspicion of science. Dr Oktar Babuna, a representative from the Harun Yahya movement, is scheduled to speak at the conference alongside Shaikh Yasir Qadhi, an influential imam who accepts evolution at a micro level but refuses to countenance the idea that man evolved from anything other than Adam himself.

Two Muslim scientists, American biologists Ehab Abouheif and Fatimah Jackson, will also speak alongside Usama Hasan, a British imam who preaches the commonly held scientific view that man is descended from ape-like forebears.

Hasan’s inclusion is particularly controversial because he enraged Muslim literalists in his own mosque in Leyton, east London, when he began preaching about evolution and criticised literalists for having a “children's madrasa-level understanding” of science compared to their Islamic forebears who once used to lead the world in such fields. The arguments eventually became so intense he was eventually forced out by hardliners....

You can see the sign: the Campus Fire Marshal orders the area to remain clear at all times. And underneath, a festive "Happy Eid" sign. Why there? Because that is where Muslims pray on campus at the University of California Irvine:

You can see the "This Area Is to Remain Clear At All Times" sign in the upper right, partially obscured by the tree. So if the Fire Marshal wants the area to remain clear at all times, why are Muslims praying there? Could it be that the University of California Irvine, which just adopted a divestment from Israel resolution reminiscent of Nazi calls to boycott Jewish shops, has quietly set aside this outdoor, public, conspicuous space for Muslim prayer (so that the Muslim presence on campus would be asserted far more effectively than it would be in an indoor prayer room), and had the Fire Marshall issue his decree so that non-Muslims wouldn't defile the mosque with their presence? (Non-Muslims are forbidden to enter mosques unless invited in for proselytizing purposes.)

Certainly the Muslims are unconcerned about the Fire Marshal's order, and consider the space so permanently theirs that they posted prayer times under the restricted area sign:

The Muslim Brotherhood-linked Muslim Student Association is pushing campuses nationwide to make special accommodation for Muslim students. It looks as if at the University of California Irvine they've succeeded spectacularly.

(Photos thanks to D.)

UPDATE: My informant at UCI has sent me more information:

1) About two years ago I entered this area (there was no Fire Marshal sign). I was approached by members of the MSU and asked to leave the area (they didn't come close to me)... They signaled me and I pretended not to understand. So one of them came closer and told me it was a prayer area and asked me to leave.

2) On Monday [name removed] phoned the UC Irvine Fire Marshal (at my request). We wanted to make sure they had placed the sign (they had). They claimed it was put up four years ago (untrue).

3) They told her that there are many such signs around campus and this area (untrue).

4) They told her they do not enforce the signs! (true)

5) Today [name removed] walked Ring Road (area). He found no other area with Fire Marshal signs.

6) This area also has a patio (benches / to eat and a vending machine). The "Sisters" usually sit at the tables (a few feet from prayer).

Last December I posted here about Professor Paul Derengowski, who was dismissed from Tarrant County College in Fort Worth, Texas for annoying Muslim students by quoting from Islamic texts. I have just received this message from him:

For the past year I’ve been living under a dark cloud. A cloud that was created one night (November 8, 2011) during a class I was teaching on Islam at Tarrant County College in Fort Worth, Texas. Two Muslim students who did not like me answering their questions about their beloved Muhammad and the sources I used to do it, namely the Koran and a Muslim scholar, set forth a campaign orchestrated long before that night ever arrived, to smear me as a person and force me out as a professor. For those interested, you can read more about that night here, as well as indulge yourself with all the firsthand documents, some of which produced by TCC which only contribute to the defamation due to their dubious nature.

Today, though, after much hard work and persistence, I’m ready to take this fight to the next level. But, I need your help. Since last December the Thomas More Law Center has been my advocate in all of this. Clearly TCC violated my rights as a professor, but the TMLC could not file the appropriate lawsuit because of a lack of knowing someone locally who could handle the footwork of filing the papers in federal court. Now that has changed.

My request for help is to cover the legal expense. It is an expense to not only safeguard my right to express myself, but an expense that everyone will pay, sooner or later, should they not get involved now, to safeguard their freedom to speak as well.

Therefore, for those interested in helping, I’m including the following PayPal link. No specified amount is designated. I leave that purely up to you. Thank you for your consideration and your generosity.

Prof. Derengowski Legal Fund

(https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=9BBQWY7UCGUUQ)

Given the fact that American college campuses are generally places where counter-jihadists cannot venture without bodyguards, and where they are routinely libeled with no opportunity given for rebuttal, and where they are shouted down and physically threatened when they do speak, this is no surprise: jihad terror is chic these days. It's multicultural. It's Leftist. It's cool. Marie-Helen Maras is meanwhile probably deeply concerned about "Islamophobia."

"NYU terrorism class asks students to plot terrorist attack," by Doug Auer and Kevin Sheehan for the New York Post, October 29:

It’s Terrorism 101.

A New York University class on transnational terrorism is requiring students to “hypothetically plan a terrorist attack” — and shocked cops say the outrageous lesson plan is an insult to the officers killed on Sept. 11.

The controversial course, taught by former Navy criminal investigator Marie-Helen Maras, asks the pupils to “step into [a terrorist’s] shoes” and write a 10- to 15-page paper on their battle plan.

“Some of the most notorious terrorists, including Anwar al-Awlaki, got their start on American campuses. It looks like after the CIA killed al-Awlaki, NYU is helping to produce successors,” said an outraged law-enforcement expert on terrorism....

For the assignment, Maras — who has a Ph.D. from Oxford and is also an associate professor at SUNY Farmingdale — instructs her pupils to consider all aspects of the attack.

“In your paper, you must describe your hypothetical attack and what will happen in the aftermath of the attack,” Maras wrote in the syllabus obtained by The Post.

They must factor in the methods of execution, sources of funding, number of operatives needed and the target government’s reaction, according to the paper’s outline.

At the same time, students must realistically stay within their chosen terror group’s “goals, capabilities, tactical profile, targeting pattern and operational area,” the syllabus states.

Given the detail required — and possibly concerned that the how-to terror manuals could land in the wrong hands — Maras warns that each page of a student’s paper must bear the disclaimer: “This is a hypothetical scenario for a university course on transnational terrorism.”

When told of the term paper, one ranking police officer who lost coworkers on 9/11 called it “the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”...

“I’m disgusted,” said the source. “What is this, we have our students do the work for the terrorists?”

Another source worried that the assignment could become a primer in plotting attacks rather than counter-terrorism.

“This flies in the face of the 11 years of hard work the NYPD has done in tracking down terrorists to the far reaches of the globe to make sure they never strike again,” said the source.

Other terrorists who studied in the US include 9/11 architect Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad and most recently Quazi Ahsan Nafis, the Bangladeshi student accused of plotting to bomb the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

The professor defended the course assignment.

“The exercise is meant to prepare students for the field, to prepare them for careers in intelligence, policing, counterterrorism. This is a grad-level assignment for a grad-level course,” Maras told The Post.

“Why didn’t the police call me if they have concerns? I have NYPD officers in my class,” she said.

The students are also supposed to imagine the counter-terrorism measures implemented in the attack’s aftermath, she added....

It violates Sharia to depict Muhammad -- especially as a fruit! Absurd Britannia Update: "Reading University Union ejects atheist society over 'blasphemous' pineapple," from Student Rights, October 4 (thanks to all who sent this in):

In January this year several student atheist societies in London caused controversy when they posted a picture from the popular ‘Jesus and Mo’ web comic on their Facebook pages.

This was followed at the London School of Economics (LSE) by the passing of a motion during a Student Union EGM which noted “recent Islamophobic incidents at the LSE”.

This was clearly targeted at the LSE Atheist Society, with one student speaking for the motion claiming that this publication was an Islamophobic act as “it is deeply insulting to a Muslim to depict the prophet Muhammad”.

By labelling the depiction of Muhammad as racist, the LSE Union essentially passed a blasphemy law, limiting student’s ability to criticise or mock religions and threatening punishment to those that do.

At the time, Student Rights were extremely disappointed, with Raheem Kassam stating that “the criticism or parody of religious figures, while objectionable to some, is not outside the purview of freedom of speech. Religions, like any philosophy should be and indeed remain open to scrutiny”.

Yesterday, as a new academic year begins, a similar attack on student’s freedom of expression took place at the University of Reading Freshers’ Fayre.

Students from the university Atheist, Humanist, and Secularist Society (RAHS) were forced to leave the Fayre after they included a pineapple labelled ‘Mohammed’ on their stall.

Staff from the Reading University Student Union (RUSU), as well as a number of Muslim students objected to this and asked the society to remove it, with a statement from the society stating that they were told “Either the pineapple goes, or you do”.

Considering that the pineapple was labelled in this way “to celebrate the fact that we live in a country in which free speech is protected, and where it is lawful to call a pineapple by whatever name one chooses” it is deeply concerning that RUSU have acted in this way.

In a statement given to Student Rights, RUSU said that "The Atheist, Humanist & Secularist society were asked to leave the Freshers’ Fayre after receiving complaints from individual students about a display they had on their stall. They were initially asked to remove the display and after refusal were asked to leave."...

Apart from the "radical" puffery, this is dead-on. "Criticizing Islam taboo in academia: ex-Yale expert says," by Janice Arnold for Canadian Jewish News, October 2 (thanks to Lachlan):

MONTREAL — Academics who study Islamic antisemitism are risking career advancement and younger scholars are shying away from the subject as a result, said Montreal native Charles A. Small, who headed a Yale University program in antisemitism until it was shut down last year amid controversy.

The Oxford-educated Small is currently the Koret Distinguished Scholar at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution in California and director of the New York-based Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy, which he founded.

While in Montreal to visit family for the holidays, Small gave a talk at the Canadian Institute for Jewish Research. The title summed up the dire situation that Small believes faces Israel, the Jewish community and anyone concerned with the preservation of democracy and human rights: “Incitement to Genocidal Antisemitism: Radical Islam and the Acquiescence of the Western Intellectuals and Policy Makers.”

“If you are critical of a reactionary social movement, somehow you are a racist, a neo-con fascist,” said Small. “The academy in the West is permeated [with this attitude.]”

Regrettably, he added, that view is also found among some Jewish intellectuals.

“Those scholars who have the courage to deal with this issue fear that they will not get jobs, or get promoted, or get published in the right journals… If you go against the grain, you’re out.”

Small blamed a prevailing “liberal, post-colonial” mindset among those running universities, and in some cases, because of funding from Muslim countries, such as the Gulf States.

Small portrayed himself as one of the few western intellectuals today who are saying clearly and publicly that radical Islam – and he includes the Muslim Brotherhood in that term – espouses an antisemitism that ultimately seeks to kill Jews.

“Pernicious antisemitism is at the core of radical Islam… It’s fueling the movement… whether its Sunni or Shiite,” he said. “The Iranian regime is theologically obligated to destroy Israel. The Muslim Brotherhood wants to obliterate Israel.”

The hatred is not only directed at a state – calls for the death of Jews can be heard in the mosques, he added.

Small believes that it was his outspokenness that cost him his post last year as director of the Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Antisemitism, which he founded five years earlier.

He recalled an associate provost at Yale telling him “we have to engage with Islam,” and appearing offended when Small replied that scholars must “scientifically and dispassionately” study any social movement and describe it as they find it.

Small deplored that U.S. President Barack Obama would meet with the new Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi, a Muslim Brotherhood leader, and that the Obama administration has been supporting them in Egypt on the grounds that it is moderate.

Nothing could be further from the truth, as far as Small is concerned. Not only is the movement antisemitic, but it’s “diametrically” opposed to democratic principles, such as equality.

“The Obama administration invited and aided the Muslim Brotherhood to take power in Egypt,” he said. “If you are going to support such a movement, at least draw a red line [on what’s acceptable.]”

Small also lamented the inaction by Jewish leaders on the threat of radical Islam. “We are asleep. We have to educate our students, our community, speak to our governments, march in the streets like we did for Soviet Jewry.”

Yep.

The idea that you have to have a degree in something in order to be able to speak about it competently and accurately is too absurd to warrant any serious reply. As Daniel Pipes points out here, when it comes to Islam, it is often just the opposite nowadays -- a fact for which we have the ideological straitjacket of the Middle East Studies Association to thank.

"MPAC Calls Me an 'Expert on Islam,'" by Daniel Pipes at History News Network, September 24:

Why thank you, Muslim Public Affairs Council, for this endorsement. It’s much appreciated, even if came in a 65-page pamphlet, Not Qualified: Exposing the Deception Behind America’s 25 Top Pseudo-Experts on Islam.

According to MPAC, a leading Islamist group based in Los Angeles, those 25 would be Andrew Bostom, William Boykin, Stephen Coughlin, Nonie Darwish, Steven Emerson, Brigitte Gabriel, Frank Gaffney, David Gaubatz, William Gawthrop, Pamela Geller, John Giduck, Sebastian Gorka, John Guandolo, Tawfik Hamid, David Horowitz, Raymond Ibrahim, Zuhdi Jasser, Andrew McCarthy, Walid Phares, Patrick Poole, Walid Shoebat, Robert Spencer, Erick Stakelback, David Yerushalmi … and me.

The gravamen of MPAC’s analysis is that members of this group overwhelmingly are not what it calls experts on Islam, where this term is defined as

[A]n individual who has formal academic qualifications in Islamic Studies from an accredited institute of higher education in the West or those institutes of higher education in Muslim-majority countries that rank among the world’s top 500 universities. In order to be classified as "expert", as defined above, one’s credentials must also be publicly verifiable.

According to MPAC, "Of the 25 people examined, only 1 (4%) had the qualifications to be considered an ‘expert’ on Islam." That 4% would be me. In another place, MPAC contradicts itself and allows that Raymond Ibrahim also has "the formal and verifiable academic credentials to be classified as an expert." Even more contradictorily, as the pamphlet title implies, MPAC says I am a "pseudo-expert" expert on Islam.

My first question is, why does MPAC chose individuals who make no claim to expertise in Islam (such as John Giduck and David Horowitz), but exclude critics with academic credentials in Islamic studies, such as Fouad Ajami, David Cook, David Forte, Efraim Karsh, Martin Kramer, Bernard Lewis, Michael Rubin, Philip Salzman, and Kemal Silay?

My main objection is to the emphasis on credentials. The field of Middle East studies demonstrates -- only too colorfully -- that possessing a PhD does not guarantee competence. Sadly, it’s almost the opposite.

Indeed. Look at Omid Safi and Reza Aslan.

It’s not where a person went to school in his or her twenties, the languages he or she knows, or his or her years living abroad that matters but the capabilities, knowledge, energy, and intelligence he or she subsequently displays. Speaking as someone who has the requisite degrees, languages, and years abroad, I despise this self-serving emphasis on academic pedigree which would exclude non-PhDs from commenting on things Muslim.

It is a natural consequence of the Islamic supremacist/Leftist control of Middle East studies in the U.S. If they were on the outs in the nation's colleges and universities, you'd hear Islamic supremacist groups like MPAC railing against the entrenched, hidebound academic establishment, the good old boy network, and emphasizing the fact that academic credentials do not make for accuracy, or lack thereof for unreliability.

A number of individuals on the MPAC list of 24 have made real contributions. Take the example of Robert Spencer: he has a mere M.A. in religious studies, lacks fluency in Middle Eastern languages, and has not lived in a Muslim-majority country, to be sure, but he has developed a deep erudition on Islam demonstrated in his many books. Indeed, I challenge MPAC to put him toe-to-toe with any PhD’d expert on Islam of its choosing. I nominate that foremost credentialist, John Esposito, for the job.

This made me smile, because indeed, when I challenged Esposito to debate, he sent me his resume. In any case, the list of these puffed-up pseudo-academic clowns who have ducked my debate challenge is very long. I am still ready to debate any of them. But none of them will accept. They claim that it is because of all my hateful hatefulness, but that is an obvious dodge, and in any case, irrelevant, since my books have more readers than all of theirs put together: if I am really so horribly hateful, it would be all the more urgent to refute me and show me up by defeating me in debate, so as to end my baneful influence forever. But none of them do it, because they all know they cannot. They all know that I am telling the truth, and thus they won't debate me because the debate would make that fact all too obvious.

This next part is very funny, considering how Salam al-Marayati is one of the most arrogant and unpleasant people in a field crowded with them:

(Amusingly, by insisting that only those with a degree in Islamic studies may comment on Islam and Muslims, MPAC has just fired its own staff. Its leader, Salam al-Marayati has an undergraduate degree in biochemistry and a graduate degree in business administration. And yet MPAC mires itself in deep Islamic issues.)...

Read it all.

Holland said: "The origins of Islam are a legitimate subject of historical enquiry and...the programme was in keeping with other series on the channel where the historical context of world religions were examined. It is important to stress as we do in the film that this is a historical endeavour and is not a critique of one of the major monotheistic religions."

However, as the author of another book on the historical development of Islam that challenges the canonical account, as well as other books that lay out honestly and accurately the texts and teachings of Islam, I can testify that any discussion of Islam that is not full of fulsome praise and distortions about the violent and supremacists texts and teachings of the Qur'an and Sunnah will inevitably meet with accusations of "bias" and "hate." Those who make such accusations are not neutral observers, but combatants in an ideological war, bent on discrediting and marginalizing those whom they perceive to be the "enemies of Islam" by tarring them with the taint of bias and bigotry. Such accusations are, in other words, just tactics, weapons of war, not honest analysis.

"Islam TV show triggers deluge of Ofcom complaints," by Ben Quinn in the Guardian, September 2 (thanks to Daniel):

The British historian behind a Channel 4 history of Islam has defended the programme after it triggered hundreds of complaints to the broadcaster and the television regulator Ofcom, which led to him being accused of distorting the history of the religion.

Islam: The Untold Story was billed by the channel as "an extraordinary detective story" in which historian Tom Holland found himself embroiled in "an underground but seismic debate: the issue of whether, as Muslims have always believed, Islam was born fully formed in all its fundamentals, or else evolved gradually, over many years".

But after it was broadcast on 28 July, Holland found himself on the receiving end of a torrent of criticism on Twitter and a lengthy critique by the Islam Research and Education Academy (IREA), which accused him of making "baseless assumptions" and engaging in "elective Scholarship".

"Tom Holland's assertion that there is no historical evidence for the seventh-century origins of Islam is historically inaccurate," the IREA said, alleging that his presentation was "clearly biased" and that he ignored the work of key scholars.

In a response issued by Channel 4, Holland said: "The origins of Islam are a legitimate subject of historical enquiry and that the programme was in keeping with other series on the channel where the historical context of world religions were examined.

"It is important to stress as we do in the film that this is a historical endeavour and is not a critique of one of the major monotheistic religions," he added.

The historian, a non-Muslim, went on: "An accusation laid against the film is one of bias and, although I believe that absolute objectivity is a chimera, what was incumbent upon us, in making the film, was to be upfront about my own ideological background and presumptions, and to acknowledge the very different perspective that Muslim faith provides."

Holland continued to field criticism on Twitter, where one user tweeted: "This fool Tom Holland who made this programme also created a book about Islam saying it was a religion made up by people over the years."

However, where there was also support. Dan Snow, who has hosted historical documentaries for the BBC and other channels, tweeted: "Dear angry mad people on twitter, it is conceivable that you know more than @holland_tom & the world's leading scholars, but very unlikely".

Indeed.

The email below was sent to a list that calls itself "Islam Female Leadership." It calls for contributions from "scholars" (i.e., politically correct dhimmi pseudo-academics) to the Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Women of Oxford Islamic Studies.

The list below of "topics requiring scholarship" is drastically incomplete, don't you think? Doesn't the Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Women need contributions about honor killing (not just "honor"), female genital mutilation, divinely-sanctioned wife-beating, child marriage, talaq divorce, the devaluing of women's testimony, the inequality of women's inheritance rights, and all the other injustices that women must endure under Islamic law?

If you have an idea for a paper, write in (politely and calmly) to Anne Whittaker, asking her if the Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Women is going to cover these issues revolving around the institutionalized oppression of women in Islam, and if not, why not?

Subject: contributing to the Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Women
From: Hilary Kalmbach
Date: Fri, July 27, 2012 3:34 pm
To: ISLAM-FEMALE-LEADERSHIP@JISCMAIL.AC.UK

Dear list members,

Please see the message below about the possibility of contributing to the Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Women. If you are interested in contributing, please get in touch directly with Anne.Whittaker@oup.com.

Best wishes,

Hilary

Call for Submissions from Oxford University Press

The Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Women, one in a series of five reference works on Islamic studies, will be published in 2013 as a part of Oxford's award-winning reference program, which includes The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World and Oxford Islamic Studies Online.

The Encyclopedia is currently seeking submissions from 500 to 4,000 words. Scholars worldwide who are interested in contributing to this major work of scholarship are encouraged to contact Anne.Whittaker@oup.com.

Topics requiring scholarship include:

* Medicine: Contemporary Practice
* Barakah
* Fitnah
* Taliban
* Honor
* Bazaar
* Tabaqat
* Education: Women's Religious Education
* Gender Construction: Contemporary Practices
* Aga Khan Foundation
* Financial Institutions
* International League of Muslim Women
* Relics
* Bahrain
* Cinema: North African Women's Contributions
* Da'wah, Women's Activities in
* Women's Philanthropy, Contemporary
* Women's Rights
* Algeria
* Popular Religion: Europe and the Americas
* Fatwa
* Social Reform and Women: Social Reform in Southeast Asia
* Cottage Industries and Handicrafts
* Human Rights
* Warriors, Contemporary Women

Anne Whittaker
Development Editor
Oxford University Press

Curses! Muhammad Waqi'ullah is on to us! "U.S.-Based Political Scientist Muhammad Waqi'ullah: The Neocon Movement, Established by Jews, Plans to Destroy the Islamic World by Brute Force and through 'Harmless' Films like Superman, Tom and Jerry," from MEMRI, June 4:

Following are excerpts from an interview with Muhammad Waqi’ullah, a US-based Sudanese professor of political science, which aired on Al-Majd TV on June 4, 2012. Waqi’ullah received his Ph.D. from the University of Mississipi [sic], and worked for the Institute of Islamic and Arabic Sciences in America in Fairfax, Virginia.

Muhammad Waqi’ullah: The neocon movement was established at US universities, especially at the University of Chicago. It was established by a group of Jewish professors, who fled Nazism. They wanted to fortify Western civilization against the leftist, secular, Nazi, and Fascist invasion.

Ultimately, they wanted to protect the Israelites, or the Jews, from annihilation by Western civilization. They infiltrated Western ideology, and specifically, American ideology, until the circumstances, under Bush Jr., enabled them to gain control over the country’s centers of power and to implement their ideas.

This led to the invasions with which they destroyed Islam and the Islamic world.

[...]

The neocons developed a very dangerous theory concerning the Islamic world. They taught it in the most important university – the National Defense University, in Maryland [sic].

Interviewer: What is this theory?

Muhammad Waqi’ullah: The destruction of the entire Islamic world.

Interviewer: Destruction?!

Muhammad Waqi’ullah: Yes, the destruction of the entire Islamic world by brute force. The US Department of Defense denounced this seminar, and issued a communiqué condemning it....

The Muslim fights for the sake of good, while the infidel fights for the sake of evil. It is a war of values, not of material interests or personal or national ambitions. It is a war of civilizations, a war of values. Islamic civilization defends the good.

[...]

Some films look the epitome of innocent, purity, and reliability. They look like nice harmless films, like the Superman movies or Tom and Jerry. People don’t sense the danger of these films, but these films instill Western philosophy, the theory of Thomas Hobbes [sic], which we discussed....

Aslan (left) with Ibish (right): Did Aslan tell all his best fat and gay jokes?

Aslan is so immature, psychologically stunted and intellectually bereft that he responds to criticism of his position only by regaling his opponents with geeky abuse about being fat and gay -- did he shower the mountainous Ibish with this kind of "analysis"?

Two Islamic supremacists debate the jihad against Israel while never bothering to mention the jihad against Israel. "UCLA’s ‘one state or two’ debate," by Jonah Lowenfeld in the Jewish Journal, May 15:

For anyone who missed the debate on May 15 at UCLA between Reza Aslan and Hussein Ibish over whether the Israeli-Palestinian conflict should be resolved by creating a Palestinian state alongside the Jewish one or by creating a single bi-national state, here’s the basic report of what went down.

As expected, Aslan argued that the two-state solution is “dead and buried,” and that everyone (the Israelis, the Palestinians, the Americans and other international bodies) should instead start investing resources and energy to create a single bi-national state with “soft borders.”

Ibish, meanwhile, rejected the idea that the window to create two states for two peoples has closed, and instead held out hope for the possibility that such a conflict-ending resolution could be reached in the region.

While they disagreed about what final resolution to aim for, a careful listener would have realized that Aslan and Ibish agreed on almost everything else about the conflict.

"Final solution" would be more apt than "final resolution" to describe what these two are aiming for.

Both scholars assigned blame for the failure of the peace process to many parties, but set the lion’s share of the blame at Israel’s feet. Both Ibish and Aslan saw the Israeli policy of settlement expansion as the primary reason for the failure of the peace process to progress in the nearly 20 years since the Oslo Accords were signed. Both acknowledged that, while most Israelis and most Palestinians (and most Americans, for that matter) want to see a two-state solution achieved, the likelihood of it being achieved anytime soon is very slim.

As one student in the audience put it afterward, “They’re on the same page, but they have different views.”

Of course. The idea of Ibish and Aslan debating anything is like holding an election in a one-party state: there may be plenty of choices, but in the end they're all the same choice anyway. In blaming Israel for the persistence and insolubility of the conflict, they ignore the jihadist intransigence of the "Palestinians," and the repeated aspiration, frequently enunciated on official PA TV, to destroy Israel utterly. Ibish and Aslan must know that Israel has made concession after concession (notably the withdrawal from Gaza) in hope of bringing about peace, but these concessions have never been reciprocated or even met with good will. And of course they do know this. That they ignore and try to obscure it, and ignore the role of jihad in the conflict altogether, reveals their true agenda, which is in service of that jihad.

But confronted with the question of how the parties should proceed in resolving this seemingly intractable conflict, the two Muslim scholars [sic] parted ways.

“I’m advocating the one-state solution for one simple reason: there is no other solution,” said Aslan, calling the prospect of two states for two peoples “a sham” and “a charade.”

Pointing to the 600,000 Israelis who are currently living beyond the so-called green line that divides pre-1967 Israel from the territories it conquered during the war that year, Aslan argued, in no uncertain terms, that the infrastructure of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank had simply crowded out any possible space for a second state.

“There will never be a Palestinian state,” he said. “Ever. That is the truth.”

Ibish disagreed. “The majority of Israelis are, rather strongly, in favor of two state solution; the majority of Palestinians are in favor of a two-state solution,” he said. “So it’s a question of political will.”

With that political will, Ibish said he believed that the Israelis would dismantle West Bank settlements in order to achieve peace, and cited the examples of Gaza and the Northern West Bank as evidence of their willingness to do so.

“Walls go up and walls come down,” Ibish said.

Throughout the debate, Ibish sounded both hopeful and pragmatic when compared with Aslan, and never more so than when Aslan described the bloody process by which he believed a single, bi-national state could actually come about.

“If you want me to be honest with you,” Aslan said,

That would be a first.

“I think that what we are going to see is a process through which the demographic balance [between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea] tips into apartheid, ethnic cleansing, until finally you have international mediation that leads to confederacy.”

If there is one state in the way Aslan imagines there will be, it will be a Palestinian Sharia state that will massacre Jews wholesale and press the survivors into dhimmitude. And Aslan must know this, also.

“If,” Ibish responded, “I wanted to exercise a radical dystopian imaginative leap of that kind, if I wanted to be Hieronymus Bosch of Israel and the Palestinians, sure, I can arrive at your conclusion after all this horror. Well I’m not willing to go there.”

“Even if it turns out you were right,” he continued, “I would be proud to stand here and tell you that I am not going to acquiesce to making that happen.”...

Aslan repeats jihadist propaganda about Israel practicing apartheid and ethnic cleansing, but ignores the Palestinians' repeatedly stated genocidal aspirations. Ibish, for his part, supports the establishment of a Palestinian state that would, like Gaza, immediately become another base for jihad attacks against Israel.

Neither discussed Israel's right to exist or acknowledged the jihad doctrine that makes the conflict endless.

And this is what passes for reasoned analyses on campuses across the U.S. these days.

He dared to insult Muhammad, and you know, that's illegal. What's that? The First Amendment? Pah! Eisenstein has violated multiculturalist sensibilities (and Islam's blasphemy laws, which coincide neatly with those sensibilities). Sharia Alert from Purdue University: "Prof sues over Muslim tiff," by Charles Wilson for the Associated Press, May 18 (thanks to Twostellas):

INDIANAPOLIS – A Purdue University political science professor has sued officials and other professors at the school’s campus in northwest Indiana for the treatment he received after he posted criticism of Muslims on Facebook.

Maurice Eisenstein claims in the suit that Purdue-Calumet officials violated his rights of freedom of speech and religion by subjecting him to a disciplinary investigation which eventually yielded mixed results.

The lawsuit filed May 10 in a Lake County court says Eisenstein was cleared of the initial allegation that he had violated the school’s policy against discrimination and harassment, but officials reprimanded him for what they considered retaliation against the two professors who filed the complaints.

“This is not the first time and it won’t be the last time we will see a university punish a student or professor for constitutionally protected speech on Facebook. Professors at public universities should not have to go to court to defend their free speech rights,” Greg Lukianoff, president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, said in a statement Wednesday.

FIRE, a non-profit educational foundation devoted to free speech, has sent letters to Chancellor Thomas Keon advocating Eisenstein’s position and tried to raise public awareness, but is not involved in the suit, said Adam Kissel, the group’s vice president.

The complaints were filed last fall amid student protests on the Hammond campus, citing comments Eisenstein, a 64-year-old Orthodox Jew, made inside and outside his classroom.

The complaints followed posts on his personal Facebook page questioning the response of moderate Muslims to other Muslims killing Christians in Nigeria, and insulting the prophet Muhammed....

The suit alleges that officials and professors conspired to smear Eisenstein’s reputation. It says officials violated Eisenstein’s rights of free speech and religion under the Indiana Constitution....

Islamic supremacist attempts to whitewash unpleasant elements of Muslim history are relentless and all-pervasive, and the foolish kuffar usually do not recognize them for what they are. But in this case they failed. "U.S. Court of Appeals rules in favor of the University of Minnesota in case involving the Turkish Coalition of America," from the University of Minnesota, May 3 (thanks to Winoceros):

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (05/03/2012) —The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit ruled in favor of the university today in a closely watched case involving First Amendment and academic freedom claims. The plaintiff in the case, Turkish Coalition of America, claimed that statements on a university department website that suggested that the Turkish Coalition’s information about the Armenian genocide was “unreliable” violated its free speech rights and were defamatory. A university student also allegedly feared he would be subjected to academic reprisals if he used information from the organization’s website in his own work.

The federal district court had previously granted the university’s motion to dismiss the claims, based principally upon its finding that the university’s website contained statements of faculty scholarly opinion and critique that were protected by the doctrine of academic freedom.

The Court of Appeals today affirmed the District Court’s dismissal of the plaintiff’s claims. It found the Turkish Coalition free speech claim failed because it could not show it had suffered any restrictions on its speech activities. The Court of Appeals also found that the Turkish Coalition’s defamation claims failed because the university faculty’s statements were either true or were statements of opinion, which cannot support a defamation claim. The Court of Appeals also found the student had no standing to bring any claims because he could not show he suffered any injury.

The case has been watched closely by scholars around the United States and the world because of its implications for principles of academic freedom.

U of M General Counsel Mark Rotenberg stated, “Today’s federal court decision confirms the right of universities and their faculty to offer scholarly criticism and critique on websites without fear of legal exposure. This protection is especially important when the scholarly opinions expressed by the faculty are controversial. We are very pleased to have successfully defended this important academic interest.”