Jihad Watch is a program of the David Horowitz Freedom Center. When David Horowitz was interviewed recently on the leftist Campus Progress site, the interviewer tried to hang him for his association with a wretched fellow like me (as well as sometime Jihad Watch contributor Greg Davis, producer of the film Islam: What the West Needs to Know, in which I appear):
I”m sorry, your website has this description of a film you are promoting: –˜Islam: What the West Needs to Know” reveals the violent, expansionary ideology of the so called “˜religion”¦–
“”Yeah that’s Greg Davis”s film. Look””
So you disagree?
I haven’t actually seen this film. I”ve read parts of his book””
Right, but that is on your site, to be fair.
Well, I think that it’s a point of view. I”m not excluding from my site points of view that think that Islam is the problem. And the reason””I mean, I”ve discussed some of the reasons with you. I would not have somebody on my site who took this out on individual Muslims and I have a lot of Muslims who write for my site. And it’s not””again, we always have to keep in mind that Islam is a political religion, or where it’s a political religion it’s problematic. And I think that that’s what that book is about and the film. And I haven’t seen the actual film.
Right, but I mean, if the focus of the question is whether the problem is on Islam qua Islam or on fundamentalism”” you know, Robert Spencer has a book is called “Religion of Peace?: Why Christianity is and Islam isn’t” and he is one of the Front Page, major contributors [on FrontPage.org, Horowitz’s site] [Note: actually, the site is frontpagemagazine.com.]
“” Well I”ve read the book, it’s a good book. Read the book.
Do you disagree with the assertion in the title?
Well, I don’t disagree with any of the particulars. I have had my disputes with Spencer over this issue. It’s a huge and very complicated issue. It’s one that I intended, with [Islamo-fascism Awareness Week], to raise. But we haven’t been able to really raise it, because of the hate storm it was greeted by. If you can’t discuss it”””Is Islam a peaceful religion?–”it “s a good question. You know, when a Danish paper published some cartoons, they killed people, burned embassies. They killed some nuns in the Middle East. I didn’t see a lot of outrage coming from the Muslim community against that.
So this is a much bigger problem than people who want to just dismiss Spencer say. I don’t”¦ I have not in my web site or in anything I said, said that the United States shouldn’t be engaged, supporting Muslim countries, which we do. We support Pakistan. I think Saudi Arabia is really problematic but I haven’t said we should break off relations with Saudi Arabia. So I, you know, you have to””I think there’s an intellectual issue and, you know, Spencer is an expert in Islam and Greg Davis knows a hell of a lot more about it than I do. I”m not going to rule out their points of view and I”m certainly not going to consider them bigoted because I”ve read Spencer’s book, and if you see the way it’s argued, this is not the ravings of a religious bigot, this is a scholar of Islam who’s saying things, trying to tell you something. So, it needs to be discussed, not just attacked.
Indeed. But civil discussion and mutually respectful disputes about these issues, such as I have had with David Horowitz, are extremely hard to come by. Mostly the opposition just heaps abuse on those who speak honestly about the elements of Islam that jihadists use to recruit terrorists and justify their actions, or ignores them altogether. And meanwhile, of course, the jihad proceeds apace.