(IsraelNN.com) Hamas leaders spoke to the Arabic language Ash-Sharq il-Awsat newspaper recently and explained that as Muslims, they are allowed to lie. In an interview printed on Thursday, senior Hamas terrorists explained, “A Muslim is permitted to say things that oppose his beliefs in order to prevent damages or to be saved from death.”
This approach, known in Arabic as “taqiyya,” was behind several Hamas leaders” recent public expression of support for Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, they explained. Senior Hamas terrorists in Samaria, who were recently released from jail, publicly expressed disapproval with the Hamas takeover of Gaza and said they supported the PA forces. The sources quoted in Ash-Sharq il-Awsat explained that the Samarian terrorists” announcement was not a sign of dissent within Hamas ranks, but rather a permitted use of “taqiyya” to deceive Abbas and avoid prison sentences. — from this news article
Of course taqiyya has its roots in Shi’a Islam. Shi”a who felt the need to lie about their own faith because they were fearful of Sunni Muslims elaborated upon such religiously sanctioned dissimulation. But by now it has its counterpart, with Qur’anic sources, in Sunni Islam. This is important to understand, the next time Tariq Ramadan or someone else indignantly exclaims that “taqiyya” is “a Shi’a doctrine.” Its sources are in Shi’ism; deception, including lying about the faith, is part of Sunni Islam as well.
Since we all know that Muslims may lie, may they also tell the truth? Of course they may, and the more forthright they are about it, the happier we should be.
Here’s a three-question quiz designed to illustrate how the followers of Muhammad’s statement “War is Deception” operate — sometimes telling what they believe to be the truth, sometimes mingling what they believe to be the truth with falsehood.
Question #1.
The leader of the Arab terrorist group As Saiqa –the one who led “Palestinian” Arab Muslims to massacre hundreds of Maronites at Damour, in Lebanon — Zuheir Mohsen, said the following to James Dorsey in a 1977 inteview in the Dutch newspaper “Trouw”:
“The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct “Palestinian people” to oppose Zionism.
“For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.”
When he said that, was Zuhair Mohsen lying, or telling the truth?
Question #2.
At the U.N. in 1988, Yassir Arafat said the following:
“The State of Palestine is an Arab State; its people are an integral Part of the Arab nation and of the nation’s heritage, its civilization, and its aspiration to attain its goals of social progress, unity and liberation. [The State of Palestine] is committed to the Charter of the League of Arab States, the United Nations Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights [apparently uniquely so, for not a single Arab state subscribes to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but rather to the “˜Muslim” version — the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights — which vitiates, in every important respect, every single one of the human rights that matter most] , and the principles of non-alignment.”
Which parts of what he said were lies, and he knew he was lying, and which parts did he believe to be true?
Question #3.
In the latest issue of The Economist (February 1-7, 2008), the leader of Hamas, Mamoud Zahar, says:
–˜We [Palestinians] were never an independent state in history,” he notes. “˜We were part of an Arab state and an Islamic state.–
Is Mahmoud Zahar telling the truth, as he sees it, or is he lying?
And why in this case, and in the other two examples I have given above, does it matter?
Please write on only one side of the blue book.