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Jihad Watch reader Mike has sent me a new article by Louay Safi, the Indianapolis ISNA op who is unhappy that plans are afoot for me to lead a seminar for the Joint Terrorism Task Force in that city. I have replied to his attacks before, albeit belatedly. Since he mostly rehashes what he said in his earlier piece here, and I'm tired of cherry-picking the Qur'an, I think I'll cherry-pick his article instead, and just point out a couple of things.
First, he repeats a 1997 definition of the trumped-up term "Islamophobia" that I think bears scrutiny.
In Britain, the term “Islamophobia” was not used in government policy until 1997, when the race relations think tank Runnymede Trust published the report “Islamophobia: A Challenge For Us All." [1] In a section entitled The Nature of Islamophobia, the report itemizes eight features that Runnymede attributed to Islamophobia:* Islam is seen as a monolithic bloc, static and unresponsive to change.
The fact is that Islam is not a monolithic bloc, static and unresponsive to change. There are innumerable variations in Muslim observance all around the world. There are innumerable variations in cultural traditions of Islamic observance. It is also true that all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence teach that it is part of the responsibility of the Islamic community to wage war against and subjugate unbelievers, and that this view is sealed by scholarly consensus (ijma) and the closing-off of new rulings on settled issues (see here about the gates of ijtihad). Jihadists are capitalizing upon these facts to make recruits among peaceful Muslims by calling them back to what they are able to represent on the basis of the Qur'an, Sunnah, and Islamic jurisprudence as "pure Islam."
So in other words, it is the jihadists who are portraying the traditional teachings on jihad warfare as incumbent upon all Muslims, and unable to be changed. But when Western non-Muslims take note of this, it's called "Islamophobia."
* Islam is seen as separate and “other”. It does not have values in common with other cultures, is not affected by them and does not influence them.
This one is silly. No one is claiming that Islam has no values in common with other cultures, or exists in a vacuum. However, it is not the values in common that are a cause for Infidel concern, it is the values that are held by non-Muslims that Islam does not teach in any of its orthodox manifestations: freedom of conscience, equality of rights of all people before the law, including women and religious minorities, and so on.
* Islam is seen as inferior to the West. It is seen as barbaric, irrational, primitive, and sexist.
I am not going to apologize for saying that elements of traditional Islam are barbaric, irrational, primitive, and sexist. When Muslim clerics protest against a rape law that calls for forensic evidence to establish guilt, rather than disqualifying the victim's testimony and establishing guilt only on the testimony of four male witnesses (cf. Qur'an 24:13), yes, that is barbaric, irrational, primitive, and sexist. If Louay Safi and other Muslims want non-Muslims not to have this perception, let them go to Pakistan and Iran and elsewhere and take up their conflict with these clerics. But they don't. And they won't.
* Islam is seen as violent, aggressive, threatening, supportive of terrorism, and engaged in a Clash of Civilizations [an idea enunciated by Prof. Samuel P. Huntington, with the publication of his book, “The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order” Simon & Schuster; 1998].
Here again: when 49.9% of Muslims affirm that they support Osama, and when jihadists worldwide explain and justify their actions by reference to the Qur'an and Sunnah, the problem of seeing Islam as aggressive does not lie with "Islamophobes," but with Muslims.
* Islam is seen as a political ideology, used for political or military advantage.
Yet again: "Islamophobes" did not invent the idea of Islam as a political ideology. The man who recently said that "Muslims will take over the world" was not an "Islamophobe." The Muslims who decided that the Year One of the Islamic calendar would not be the year of Muhammad's birth or death, or the beginning of his prophethood, but rather the year of his becoming a political and military leader, was not an "Islamophobe."
* Criticisms made of 'the West' by Islam are rejected out of hand.
What is this monolithic "Islam" that Safi envisions criticizing the West? But anyway, yes, they are dismissed, and should be, because while the West has many problems, Westerners would be deceiving themselves with D'Souza-like abandon if they imagined that addressing any of the Muslim grievances against the West would end the jihad. The jihad proceeds from Islam's supremacist imperative, which does not depend on anything non-Muslims do, but simply on the fact that they are non-Muslims. Qur'an 9:29 tells Muslims to fight the People of the Book, not just the evil or immoral People of the Book.
* Hostility towards Islam is used to justify discriminatory practices towards Muslims and exclusion of Muslims from mainstream society. * Anti-Muslim hostility is seen as natural and normal.
Hogwash. Jihad actions and other Islamic supremacist activity calls for defensive action by non-Muslims. That's all.
Anyway, here's the unintended irony. Safi says about me:
Out of the hundreds of the Qur’anic verses left out of Spencer’s discussion are those that direct Muslims to initiate fighting only to repel aggression while urging them to seek peace when the other party seeks peace: “Fight in the way of God those who fight you, but do not commit aggression, for God loves not aggressors. And fight them wherever you meet them, and turn them out from where they have turned you out; for persecution is worse than slaughter. But if they cease, God is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful. And fight them on until there is no oppression and the religion is only for God, but if they cease, let there be no hostility except to those who practice oppression.” (2:190-193)
Did you catch that? I supposedly ignore Qur'anic verses "that direct Muslims to initiate fighting only to repel aggression while urging them to seek peace when the other party seeks peace." In support of this Safi quotes 2:190-193, which I've actually discussed at some length in both The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) and The Truth About Muhammad. But here's the irony. That verse contains this: "fight them on until there is no oppression and the religion is only for God."
So Muslims are to fight until "the religion is only for God." They are to fight, in other words, until Islam reigns supreme, for Islam is the only religion acceptable to Allah (Qur'an 3:85). If Muslims must fight until "the religion is only for God," they must fight until Islam is the dominant religion all over the world. So in accusing me of cherry-picking the Qur'an to portray Islam as violent, Safi has inadvertently highlighted a verse that is one of the principal foundations of the Islamic supremacist imperative.
Posted by Robert at March 29, 2007 8:44 AM
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I want to make a comment. There is some myth that all religion is "good" after you are educated about it. Only someone that is "ignorant" would have a problem with a religion. Where is the factual basis for this practice? Should I really assume that FGM, stoning, human sacrifice, mass suicide, are all good because they were historically used in religions?
After 9/11, I specifically started doing research to write about how Islam is a peaceful religion that is hijacked by radicals. They are equivalent to the KKK, and completely deviate from the example of Mohammed. My research was done using the words of Islamic writers, not biased westerners.
At the end, I couldn't buy into it. I did not see a basically peaceful religion that was hijacked. I didn't see the land of war and the land of peace as a good thing. I didn't see the greatness in Mohammed. I don't see the apocolyptic genocide of the Jews as a good thing (and it is part of Hamas foreign policy). And this is what I got from reading Islamic sources with a pro-Islam predisposition.
It is easier to attack critics instead of answering criticism.
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at March 29, 2007 10:22 AM
Louay Safi's knowledge of the Quran does not seem to be very impressive. He wrote:
"Out of the hundreds of the Qur’anic verses left out of Spencer’s discussion are those that direct Muslims to initiate fighting only to repel aggression while urging them to seek peace when the other party seeks peace"
There are not "hundreds of verses" in the Quran that tell Muslims to fight only to repel aggression. Verse 2:190 is one of only a few, out of the 160+ verses about fighting, that actually say anything about responding to aggression.
Here is the frame of reference problem once again, with Safi exploiting it. Safi seems to be playing to an audience which he believes--probably correctly--is still largely naive about the difference between western notions of peace and aggression and the Islamic conceptions for those terms. He may not fool many JWers, but he may fool plenty of general readers, especially those who want to believe only the best about Islam, the misunderstood religion that has been hijacked by a small minority of extremists.
In canonical Islam, "aggression" could include verbal criticism of Islam, in which case Muslims are instructed to fight physically (9:12-14; which is cited by Zawahiri, Bouyeri, et al).
"Seeking peace" in canonical Islam means seeking peace on Islamic terms: The non-Muslim party must be subject to the rule of Islam. Otherwise, Muslims must struggle (carry on jihad of all kinds) until the non-Muslims are brought under Islamic rule.
Posted by: Khaybar Oasis at March 29, 2007 10:28 AM
Out of the hundreds of the Qur’anic verses left out of Spencer’s discussion are those that direct Muslims to initiate fighting only to repel aggression while urging them to seek peace when the other party seeks peace
Let's see now. The Qur'an must contain at least 4,000 verses. "Hundreds" would indicate less than a thousand or so. Robert, it is clear that you stand accused of basing your analysis of the Qur'an on only a bit more than 75% of the Qur'an.
Yep, only 75% of the book is full of hateful, warmongering bloodlust, racial hatred, religious supremacism and misogyny. The rest is, well, pretty bland; it says things like "don't be aggressors (just be defensive -- oh, and you can go back a thousand years if you like, to uncover some perceived offense against which you can define your jihad as a defense)" (Parenthetical comment meaning only, from the Amplified Qur'an.)
So, Safi is claiming that you have "cherry-picked" only about 75% of the Qur'an, a miniscule amount compared to the one or two verses he can extract (not cherry-pick!) from the remaining 25%.
While I'm at it, here's the latest installment of randomly generated Qur'an verses. Let's see what it looks like from a statistical perspective:
Neither thirst nor toil nor hunger afflicteth them in mercy that they allow that which he expandeth and also the prayers of the months with Allah is Knower, Wise. Fight against such of you as believe. Those who believe not in Allah and His messenger toward those of the months which Allah hath hallowed, so that they (thus) have fallen. Lo! Hell is more worthy that thou shouldst mount them, thou didst tell: I cannot find whereon to mount you. They turned back in flight; Then Allah sent His messenger and did disbelieve after their treaty.
Yes, that's what the statistical text-generating software spat out after eating a Qur'anic Surah; funny, it appears to make as much (or more) sense than the original...
Posted by: Archimedes2 at March 29, 2007 10:46 AM
Khaybar Oasis,
Agreed. To us here now at JW, with many thanks to Robert and Co., Safi's Qur'anic reference was obviously, a self-inflicted wound that merely supports Robert's position. You are astute to point out that this immediate reflex that we here feel, will not be felt elsewhere, outside in the world of the ignorant masses of the West.
I also have grown to understand the open-endedness of Islam. The Qur'an seems to have intentional contradictions embedded within it, allowing it to be used in nearly every situation.
The mandate for Muslims to fight against "agression" is one of the most notable. Many of these verses are all well and good with one caveat....they only apply to Muslims. The mojority of the West is not privy to that reality. The all encompassing definition of "agression" also perpetuates the open-ended allowance for, and ultimately the mandate for, jihad.
Infidels everywhere need to understand that in the absence of our conversion to Islam, our subjugation through capitulation, a la jizya, or willfully laying our heads on the chopping block, we are and always will be commiting acts of "agression" against Islam.
A harsh reality, but a reality nontheless.
Posted by: awake at March 29, 2007 10:58 AM
D O N ' T -- M E S S -- W I T H -- M O !
"Political Islam’s most famous duality is the division of the world into believers, dar al Islam, and unbelievers, dar al harb. The largest part of the Trilogy (Quraan, Sira, Hadith) relates to treatment of the unbelievers, kafirs. Even Hell is political. There are 146 references to Hell in the Koran. Only 6% of those in Hell are there for moral failings—murder, theft, etc. The other 94% of the reasons for being in Hell are for the intellectual sin of disagreeing with Mohammed, a political crime. Hence, Islamic Hell is a political prison for those who speak against Islam."
From Bill Warner at Center for The Study of Political Islam:
http://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm?frm=5794&sec_id=5794
Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at March 29, 2007 10:58 AM
Khaybar, Khaybar ya yahood (just kidding),
Let's just hope that the so-called general readers wise up and realized they were played for fools when Safi incriminated himself.
Posted by: wrathofasma at March 29, 2007 11:14 AM
Having read the Koran and Hadiths, and knowing the bloody history of Islam's behavior in the world, I don't need to hear lame excuses for the pedophile warlord's expansionist, intolerant, terrorist creed.
1350 years of imperialistic tyranny is evidence enough for me.
Posted by: profitsbeard at March 29, 2007 12:00 PM
Follow the money in who funded the Islamophobia term.
It will have come out of a think tank ad agency paid for by Muslim oil dollars in league with the banking cartel which profits off those dollars.
Aborticide is a billion dollar baby. Homosexuality in disease is a billiong dollar child and Muslims in oil money are billion dollar teenagers which make the people who skim money trillions of dollars a year from opium in Kosovo to white slavery out of Russian.
Follow the money and one finds immediately why Christians, Americans and Patriots from France to England are under attack, because they don't have the money to be worth the terms Ameriphobe, Christophobe and Patriophobe.
That is why no one ever hears those terms or are pushed by the MSM.
Posted by: Lame Cherry at March 29, 2007 12:58 PM
It must be very tiring to continually have to deal with these apologists. I hope everyone at jihadwatch continues to have the energy to deal with the problem, since the "islam is a religion of peace" crowd obviously isn't going to go away.
Posted by: s at March 29, 2007 3:01 PM
Great when you can quote verse with these idiots. I just got back from a backpacking trip with a liberal friend of mine where there was much debate on this very subject. The arguement was started when I was called a "racist" for having some of the views I have on Islam. Well you can imagine the education this fellow had over the next few days. It was a lot of fun ..... best part of the trip i think. One mind at a time. Education, and reason is our only tool against Liberalism. Thankyou Robert for your books on this subject.
Posted by: Ameriki at March 29, 2007 3:52 PM
I will stop "cherry-picking" homicide-inducing Islamic verses when Muslims cease their "cherry-picking" weapons to massacre non-Muslim victims with.
Or when a snowball freezes in Hell (whichever happens first... actually I would say a snowball freezing in Hell will happen first).
Posted by: pythagoras at March 30, 2007 1:00 PM
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