He criticized all religious belief in his essay. But he’s not in fear for his life from an angry mob down the road at Oral Roberts University. “Former Muslim receiving death threats,” by Bill Sherman for Tulsa World, October 1 (thanks to Basil):
Sabri Husibi, a former Muslim who is now an atheist, says he has been ostracized and threatened with death since publication of a Tulsa World article Saturday in which he was critical of Islam and all other religions.
That article can be found here.
The article was written to promote a talk he gave the next day to the Tulsa Atheists organization.
Husibi, who has an unlisted telephone number, said he received about 30 calls Saturday from people who were cursing him, calling him a traitor and threatening him.
Most were foreign-born, Tulsa-area Muslims whom he knows, he said. He also received angry calls from friends and relatives in Syria.
One caller, whom Husibi would not identify, said that if he spoke at the meeting and said anything against Shariah (Islamic law), he would be killed.
Another caller offered Husibi’s young Muslim wife $10,000 to leave him and return to her native Syria, he said.
“Someone from Tulsa called my 76-year-old mother in Syria and said, ‘You’re not going to see your son anymore,’ ” he said.
His critics’ chief objection, he said, was to his statement that the Quran was written by men, not God, and has been changed over the years. They also objected to his comment that al-Qaida is respected by many Muslims. […]
On Tuesday, a clearly shaken Husibi asked that any future articles emphasize that he is not attacking Islam alone but all religions, including “fundamentalist Christians like Timothy McVeigh and fundamentalist Jews who kill Muslim children in the Gaza Strip.”
Husibi might take a step back at this point and reconsider who is calling for his head. And McVeigh, by the way, was an atheist at the time of the attacks. Before his execution, one article described him as agnostic — but still not a “fundamentalist Christian.”
He said Tulsa Muslims are awaiting an apology from him.
“I won’t apologize,” he said. “I’m not going to be a chicken. This is my right, to give my point of view.”
Hussam Albakri, Husibi’s second cousin, said he was surprised about the threats “because that’s not what our religion teaches us.”
Razi Hashmi, executive director of the Oklahoma chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, an Islamic civil-rights organization, said Husibi’s comments are protected as free speech….
Well, for now at least, no thanks to the Tiny Minority of Extremists at the Organization of the Islamic Conference, and courtroom jihadists in the U.S. and Canada. No thanks to CAIR, either, for that matter.