This Foreign Policy piece is a lurid fantasy about how a sinister and well-heeled cabal of racist, bigoted “Islamophobes” have smeared a thoughtful, mild-mannered academic, Professor Jonathan Brown, and opened him up to death threats, as part of a larger endeavor to do nothing less than deprive Muslims of the freedom of speech. In reality, just about the opposite is true, and this Foreign Policy article is a sterling example of the victimhood propaganda that the establishment media uses in order to cover for its own and deflect attention away from unpleasant realities of Islam. My comments are interspersed below.
“The Making of Islamophobia Inc.: A well-funded network is trying to strip the right to speak away from American Muslims and fanning the politics of fear,” by Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, Foreign Policy, March 16, 2017:
A decade ago, few outside the academy would have noticed Jonathan Brown’s lecture on slavery. A Washington native who looks a good bit younger than his 39 years, Brown is now a professor of Islamic studies at Georgetown University, where he directs the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding. He’s also a convert to Islam. Much of his work is aimed at making Islamic thought more accessible to general audiences.
But Brown’s attempts to explain the faith have made him a hate figure for the American right. A flood of articles accuse him of being an apologist for slavery and rape.
No, his “attempts to explain the faith” didn’t make him into a “hate figure.” His acting quite clearly as an apologist for slavery and rape did that, if he is actually a “hate figure” at all.
His family has received death and rape threats.
I very seriously doubt that. There are so very many fake anti-Muslim hate crimes, and it is the Left today, not the Right, that is thuggish, hateful and violent. Unless Brown publishes specifics of threats he has received, and reports them to law enforcement, as I myself have done many times with death threats I have received from his coreligionists, his claim warrants extreme skepticism.
It all started with good intentions. Brown is one of the majority of Muslims around the world who believes the Islamic State practices a warped interpretation of Islamic thought that blesses slavery, rape, and other crimes. But Brown also knows that not all Muslims are so quick to dismiss the jihadi group’s theology. Certainly the hundreds of foreign fighters who have trickled into Syria and Iraq to join its ranks find its ideas seductive. For some others, the veneer of religious authenticity used to justify Islamic State atrocities has led to a crisis of faith. And the cacophony of violence plaguing much of the Muslim world tends to drown out the voices of those most qualified to referee the religious confusion.
But Brown felt that he was called to try, hence his public lecture at the International Institute of Islamic Thought in Herndon, Virginia, on Feb. 7. In the first of what he intended as a three-part series, Brown addressed slavery in Islam, hoping to combat the idea that Islam could ever condone the subjugation and exploitation of human beings.
In reality, Brown did not combat the idea that Islam condoned slavery. He said: “I don’t think it’s morally evil to own somebody.” He also condoned rape of the female non-Muslim war captives: “Consent isn’t necessary for lawful sex.” Watch the video of his lecture for yourself and see. Apparently Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian didn’t do so herself, or doesn’t think anyone else will.
That was when he encountered a cacophony of a different sort — America’s far-right, anti-Muslim ecosystem that has adopted the same twisted interpretations of Islam that the Islamic State promotes. After the lecture, Brown endured a cascade of online attacks from conservative and alternative-right heavyweights such as Ann Coulter, Robert Spencer, and Milo Yiannopoulos, who claimed that he had actually condoned the acts he had set about to condemn. His university department was flooded with demands that he be fired.
In reality, it was a fellow Muslim, Umar Lee, who first blew the whistle on Brown’s apologetics for slavery and rape. The idea that his lecture condemned slavery and rape is false on its face. And of course he should be fired, if not for his justification of these abhorrent practices then for his dishonesty when the furor began, and his tendency to heap contempt upon those who called him out, rather than engage them intellectually. But Georgetown gets far too much Saudi money for that.
Brown is the victim of an increasingly empowered industry of Islamophobia that constricts the space for balanced and open dialogue, sidelining the very Muslims who are doing the most to promote peaceful, orthodox interpretations of Islam. The United States has powerful protections for speech and religious liberty that have allowed faith traditions to hammer out their theological debates in a free and protected environment.
But a targeted network now seeks to deny Muslims that freedom and to treat Islam as a dangerous political ideology rather than a religion — and, like the McCarthyites of the 1950s, to silence and discredit any Muslims who disagree….
The idea that I or anyone else is trying to silence Jonathan Brown is risible. Since he boasted that he would beat me handily in debate, I publicly accepted his challenge; his response to that was “my God you’re ugly.” So on the one hand we have me wanting a debate, and on the other hand we have Brown with his hatred and contempt trying to give people the impression that I am unworthy of serious consideration. So which one of us, exactly, is trying to silence, demonize and marginalize the other?
Anyway, Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian then follows with a long discussion of the evolution of Christian thinking in the U.S. about slavery, concluding it with this claim:
Islam in the United States today is increasingly — and systematically — denied that free and respected space for discussion….
Note the irony. Here is Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian running interference for Jonathan Brown’s rape and slavery apologetics in Foreign Policy, a prestigious and respected publication, and claiming that Islam in the United States is not getting a “free and respected space for discussion.” In reality, it is those of us whom she claims are responsible for this who are never granted a “free and respected space for discussion” in Foreign Policy or anywhere else in the establishment media.
Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian then summarizes Brown’s lecture, leaving out the quotes above and other indications that he condones slavery and rape. Then:
What Brown was attempting to do was build a bridge for American Muslims between their sacred scripture and their human rights sensibilities, as many Christian thinkers before him have done. For his efforts, he attracted the attention of an Islamophobic ecosystem designed to marginalize any Muslim who speaks out. Brown’s straightforward academic lecture was quickly transformed into fodder for a flood of unscrupulous articles painting him as someone who “justifies slavery and the rape of female slaves,” leaving him with a horrific online footprint that is likely to trail him for decades.
Nonsense. Brown wasn’t fired, and he is getting protection from the likes of Foreign Policy and the Washington Post. The ones who have the “horrific online footprint” that is likely to trail us for decades are those who pointed out what Brown said, and have been mocked, vilified, and defamed by people such as Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, and other smear merchants who came before her and have long demonized us as “Islamophobes” and bigots.
In the years after 9/11, a small but powerful network of funders and ideological activists has waged a major misinformation campaign, seeking to cast Islam as a diabolical threat that must be eradicated.
I have, of course, never said such a thing. I’ve merely pointed out how jihadis use the texts and teachings of Islam to justify violence and make recruits among peaceful Muslims. Those who point this out have been subjected to a 15-year-long campaign of character assassination, of which this present Foreign Policy article is just the latest example.
Their concerted efforts have resulted in an influential infrastructure of websites, activists, lawmakers, and grassroots organizations that hold sway in municipal councils and state legislatures — and now have the ear of the president of the United States.Between 2001 and 2009, seven charitable foundations donated $42.6 million to think tanks that promoted anti-Muslim rhetoric, as a 2011 report by the Center for American Progress revealed.
A highly misleading figure, and I doubt it is accurate, but even if we take it at face value, look how it is cooked: $42.6 million divided among numerous organizations over an eight-year period. That’s five million a year, divided among disparate organizations. Meanwhile, the Center for American Progress budget is upwards of $50 million in one year alone. So which exactly is the organized, well-heeled cabal of smear merchants?
These organizations include Frank Gaffney’s Center for Security Policy; Stop Islamization of America, founded by Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer; the website Jihad Watch, directed by Spencer; and the David Horowitz Freedom Center, which hosts Jihad Watch. These organizations came up with several talking points about Islam that they promoted among lawmakers, grassroots networks, and the Christian right. Chiefly among these ideas was the belief that sharia, or Islamic law, is a totalitarian political ideology that presents the greatest domestic threat facing the United States today; that the Muslim Brotherhood, a loosely organized international Islamist movement, has infiltrated the U.S. government; and that Islam commands believers to lie about their motives. In other words, no Muslim can be trusted; you must infiltrate their private spaces to learn what they think.
This campaign has been wildly successful. Gaffney is now a senior advisor to the Donald Trump White House. Gaffney’s influence extends throughout the administration. Kellyanne Conway, who ran Trump’s campaign and now serves as counselor to the president, managed polling for the Center for Security Policy. Stephen Bannon, former head of the alt-right website Breitbart and now White House chief strategist, frequently invited Gaffney to appear on Breitbart’s radio show.
Spencer’s website Jihad Watch, which received more than $500,000 in donations between 2001 and 2009 from those same seven foundations,
That is false. I have no contact whatsoever with most of those foundations, and have never received any money from most of them. But here again, even if the claim were true (it isn’t), that’s $62,500 per year over eight years, which doesn’t even cover operating expenses, while Soros is giving groups millions upon millions to smear and defame me and others.
has brought him global influence as well. He has published two New York Times bestsellers. The ideas he has promulgated on his site have resonated in the U.S. Tea Party movement and abroad: Anders Breivik, the self-styled Christian conservative who murdered 77 people in the worst mass killing Norway has seen since World War II, referred to Spencer and his website Jihad Watch 162 times in his manifesto, in which he justified his actions as necessary to combat the “ongoing Islamic Colonization of Europe.”
Re Breivik, see here (scroll down).
Jihad Watch even has a correspondent whose primary beat appears to be attending academic lectures around the Beltway, particularly at Georgetown, and publishing articles “exposing” the creeping ideology of radical Islam.
Actually, yes. That’s the estimable Andrew Harrod, who drives people like Brown crazy, because he draws attention to what they actually say.
Websites like Jihad Watch have proliferated, including sites such as Religion of Peace and Answering Islam, and sites that often repost their content, including World Net Daily, the Daily Caller, Heat Street, and, of course, Breitbart.
The effect has been to create a self-reinforcing online ecosystem that churns out frenzied headlines and constructs alternate online biographies, often displayed in first page results from any search engine, in which normal American Muslims are painted as Muslim Brotherhood-linked, jihad-loving, rape-defending threats to the American way of life. Brown’s lecture lasted like chum in shark-infested waters.
More hooey. Jonathan Brown is no “normal American Muslim.” His father-in-law, Sami al-Arian, is a convicted jihad terror leader. His remarks about slavery and rape in Islam were quite clear. At least he was honest about Islam condoning both, until the firestorm caused him to retreat into dissimulation.
It started with a blog post titled “Georgetown Professor Jonathan Brown Defends Slavery as Moral and Rape as Normal in Virginia Lecture” on a website called Student Voices. The author is a former cabdriver from St. Louis and a Muslim convert named Umar Lee, with a long history of flip-flopping between Christianity and extremist Islam who had attended the lecture. “Not knowing what to expect from Brown I was shocked when he basically went into a 90 minute defense of slavery which included an explicit endorsement of non-consensual sex,” Lee wrote. It’s unclear how that was Lee’s takeaway from a lecture explicitly intended to do the opposite.
Lee’s blog was quickly picked up by the website Jihad Watch, with its founder Robert Spencer getting into a round of Twitter sparring with Brown. On Feb. 10, Ann Coulter retweeted a related article from Heat Street to her 1.4 million followers, which read, “A Georgetown Islamic Studies professor defends slavery and says rape is okay because consent is a ‘Western’ concept.”
On Feb. 11, in an attempt to stem the bleeding, Brown tweeted, “Islam as a faith and I as a person condemn slavery, rape and concubinage.”
But it was too late. Soon dozens of articles were published proclaiming that Brown had defended slavery and rape as acceptable. Pamela Geller wrote about him; Milo Yiannopoulos featured Brown on his website and Facebook account. Brown received dozens of voice messages on his office phone telling him to pack his bags and leave the country, implying that people were coming to look for him and threatening to rape his wife.
By Feb. 15, the relatively mainstream conservative National Review had piled on, suggesting that Brown’s supposed defense of slavery may be related to his endowed chair, which is funded by a Saudi. By Feb. 20, it was on Fox News. On Feb. 22, Gaffney wrote a public letter to Georgetown University President John DeGioia calling for Brown’s termination. Brown told Foreign Policy that the university had remained very supportive; other academics have come out to back him….
Of course they did. They’re part of the same Leftist establishment that Brown and Foreign Policy is part of. Unlike the Right, they protect their own.
Ideologues are seeking to marginalize Muslims by making their speech and their activism relating to their religion come at a very high price. They believe that Muslims are malevolent, duplicitous, and dangerous, and these Islamophobes will bend the truth to fit their claims. In the process, they are denying Islam the same functional rights that Christianity enjoys and silencing the very people best poised to reconcile Islam with modern American life. Which may be the very point.
I don’t believe all Muslims are “malevolent, duplicitous, and dangerous.” I do believe Jonathan Brown is, based on my own experience with him. I do not “bend the truth to fit [my] claims,” and I challenge Foreign Policy or Brown to come up with even a single example of my doing so. But they won’t. This article shows that they aren’t interested in the truth, but only in demonizing those who call attention to the truth when it is inconvenient for them.
Angel Gabriel says
To illustrate what I think of Jonathan Brown — I put him in the same league as Cannibal Reza Aslan. The only thing I lament is that we don’t have video of someone throwing excrement at him as we do of Cannibal Reza Aslan.
mortimer says
Jonathan Brown endorsed ENSLAVEMENT and RAPE OF MARRIED CAPTIVES since the Koran endorses them and Sharia law is hugely concerned about THE ISLAMIC SLAVE INDUSTRY.
Jonathan Brown taught CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY at a major American university. HOW CAN HE CONTINUE TO HAVE A JOB?
Kathy Brown, Esq. says
Mortimer: That’s the wrong question, ‘how can he continue to have a job?’. He HAS a job BECAUSE he’s muslim, and pro-islam, pro-sharia, and pro-female sex slavery.
As for this lunatic womyn: She’s married to a throwback muslim fresh from Iran. Her latest piece ‘A Halal Christmas’ extols the virtues of halal slaughter of animals, and her husband’s homesickness for good old Iran where, of course, no one’s allowed to celebrate Christmas.
She’s certifiable. What else is new.
john spielman says
both she and all those who work for dept of islamic studies as Georgetown university are simply ACADEMIC WHORES who are doing their ” tricks” for their paymaster Saudi Prince. They will say anything and do anything even defending the indefensible: rights of muslims to own slaves, Female Genital Mutilation and even defending sharia law!
gravenimage says
Kathy, thanks for your background on Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian–I was wondering about her name. Her being married to a Mohammedan explains a lot, unfortunately.
Terry says
How can she (he) have an Armenian name.? (all Armenian names end in ‘ian”). I was/am unaware that there had been Armenians in Iran.
(Decades ago I had neighbors and a co-worker (unrelated) who were Armenians, and all said the same-re-names.
gravenimage says
Terry, this name origin site indeed confirms that this name is Iranian:
http://forebears.io/surnames/ebrahimian
It may possibly be one of those names that pre-date Islam and is related to Armenian names (since the main part of the name appears to refer to Abraham)–or it may just be a name-ending that was common to peoples in central Asia, and now is most common among those with Armenian names. But in any case, it is indeed most common in Iran, and then in nations where Iranians have immigrated to.
BC says
“who looks a good bit younger than his 39 years”, That tell you about the quality of her ‘journalism’ What have his appearance and age have to do with the issue?
gravenimage says
I noticed that, as well, BC–he wants to rape Infidel sex slaves, and boy is he dreamy! Gag me…
Joey Goest says
Georgetown has surpassed Berkeley as home for academic crackpots and Jihadi apologists.
Guest says
Colleges are run and owned by Liberals. What did you think was going to happen.
Custos Custodum says
Bottom line: “Foreign Policy” is now running interference for global SLAVERY.
gravenimage says
Hideous.
Gen Jones says
The good thing about this article is that Foreign Policy readers can follow the link here and read for themselves.
Diane Harvey says
“Damn, all those unpleasant truths and realities about Islam are slipping out more and more. We must do more to demonize the truth tellers. People are beginning to notice that Islam is kinda stupid, illogical, and cruel, and those truth tellers are actually, well, telling the truth about Islam.”
Terry says
Judging by the name of the author, she is (or her husband is) Armenian.
Is she aware of the SLAUGHTER AND GENOCIDE OF ARMENIANS BY THE TURKISH MUSLIMS?
That, incidentally, (is supposed to have been) the model for Hitler and his genocide of Jews. (Kill one person- terrible; kill 5 or 10- horrible; kill a million or millions-one cannot comprehend the number–in simple form).
She is (in my view) not the brightest pulb in the chandelier.
Frank Scarn says
No, she claims her owner-husband came from Iran.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/12/23/for-my-muslim-husband-my-moms-halal-christmas-is-the-perfect-antidote-to-trump/
Meshulam says
Clearly she is from the Marie Harf school of paper-thin intellect and confirmation bias nitwittery. Pathetic
no_one says
That author is a useful idiot. She didn’t have time to look at the lecture. She wrote what she was told to. She needs a paycheck to pay the bills and since she can’t get another job, she has to be a leftist journalist. I don’t care about “Foreign policy”.
gravenimage says
If she is married to a Muslim Iranian, she is probably deliberately whitewashing Islam.
No Fear says
“His family has received death and rape threats.” Threatening someone with rape is not suggestive of right wingers. I once had an online conversation with a Turkish muslim and he threatened to rape my mother. I sent a message in reply to him “She is sitting here right now. I will convey your message to her”. I told mum of his threat. She laughed. Mum is 82.
Jeanette says
But they will rape anything, elderly women, little boys, goats, you name it.
It’s funny as long as your mother is not in any immediate danger, but it could become unfunny any time!
gravenimage says
And how ridiculous is it that Jonathan Brown–I wonder what his Muslim name is?–is claiming that critics have used rape threats (without proof, that I have seen), when he himself was confirming that Muslims can rape Infidels.
In other words, what *he himself said* was a rape threat. Sounds like projection to me.
Emilie Green says
“. . . and these Islamophobes [who exist in their own special “ecosystem,” a word the author especially likes] will bend the truth to fit their claims.”
And the effort to bend the truth about Islam is made particularly easy by Mohammed himself since a straightforward reading of the Quran substantiates all of these Islamaphobes very points.
Jeanette says
AND gives Muslims the command to lie to non-Muslims (taqiyyah) – something not to be found in the sacred text of organizations that really ARE religions.
No Fear says
“I as a person condemn slavery, rape and concubinage.”
Good for you. The “prophet” Mohammed did not condemn those things.
Westman says
So why did Brown say, ““I don’t think it’s morally evil to own somebody.” and “Consent isn’t necessary for lawful sex.”
That kind of makes both Brown and Allen-Ebrahimian outright liars.
somehistory says
That smoke we all smell is from the burning of her pants. Liar, liar, pants on fire applies to her.
And the fire and smoke that will ascend from the burning of liars for satan will not be put out.
Terry says
Anders Breivik, the self-styled Christian conservative who murdered 77 people in the worst mass killing Norway has seen since World War II,
While in prison, he said that HE SUPPORTS MUSLIMS AND IS AGAINST THE ZIONISTS. ( I forgot which website had the translation-from Norwegian to English) of the interview, and hsi writings about this –ie. that he is not and wa snot anti-Muslim).
But, considering that Norway has been anti-Semetic for decades, I can understand that he is anti-Zionist ( code words for anti_Semetic) but sound snicer.
And, he is (in my view, i am not a psychiatrist) probably somewhat missing a few secrews in his head.
I would not take much (if anything) that he says, very seriously.
gravenimage says
Terry wrote:
Anders Breivik, the self-styled Christian conservative who murdered 77 people in the worst mass killing Norway has seen since World War II,
While in prison, he said that HE SUPPORTS MUSLIMS AND IS AGAINST THE ZIONISTS.
…………………..
This does not surprise. In his manifesto he said that he admired the tactics of Al Qaida and that he would ally with Muslims against his own people.
He never was an Anti-Jihadist, which should not surprise anyone.
px fragonard says
Yes but it’s legitimate to question why so many guys with screws loose and a lust for killing should wander into the same tent.
gravenimage says
That Breivik is a murderous thug who also admires Jihadists should not shock us.
davej says
It seems that all the “Christian-Muslim dialogue” studies are run by Muslims and funded by Saudi Arabia. It’s an invasion, a civilizational Jihad. They will stop at nothing to justify Islamic savagery while claiming to be “oppressed” by the “Islamophobes”.
America needs to drain the swamp that is liberal Islamic funded Universities.
Imnokuffar says
It is highly likely that the only thing that will finally wake the west up are More and More terrorist attacks.
Each one more horrific than the last or just the drip, drip, drip of attack after attack followed by more and more calls for social cohesion that will further encourage the Muslims and enrage increasing amounts of aware people.
Sadly, there will be those who will call for an unreachable peace and understanding and will lie, slander and betray their own countries.
gravenimage says
Not necessarily. Some craven fools seem to accept a high number of Jihad terror attacks as the “new normal”.
mortimer says
A huge part of Sharia law is concerned with regulating the SLAVERY INDUSTRY. This one fact proves that SLAVERY IS INHERENT to NORMATIVE ISLAM.
Jonathan Brown must DENY ISLAM by pretending not to approve of slavery or he must DENY LIBERAL WESTERN HUMAN RIGHTS”
Jonathan Brown cannot have it both ways. At the moment, he is DENYING ISLAM’S INHERENT SLAVERY which is too obvious to be hid.
The 1400-year slavery industry of Islam brought in much of its wealth. The end of Islam’s slave industry was forced by the European powers and was resisted tooth and nail by Muslim rulers.
gravenimage says
Sure he can have it both ways. He realized he went a bit to far in acknowledging just how savage Islam is, so now he is back-pedaling using Taqiyya. When Muslims feel emboldened they come clean.
gravenimage says
too far
Matthieu Baudin says
“…Brown … said: ‘I don’t think it’s morally evil to own somebody’ … [and] condoned rape of the female non-Muslim war captives: ‘Consent isn’t necessary for lawful sex.’ … Apparently Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian didn’t … [watch the video] herself, or doesn’t think anyone else will…”
Sometimes I’ve lost sleep after hearing a woman apologist, like Bethany, prattle on to culturally condone the practice of Clitoral Removal and to argue that action against it is unwarranted. I hope more and more people start to lose sleep and stand up to all of this old world barbarism; the excuses for slavery, rape and the genital mutilation of young girls.
SK says
You said “female”. These sort of people operate with the mindset that since you mentioned her gender, it means you don’t like what she said because you hate when her gender disagrees with you.
Just saying.
Kay says
I think what Matthieu means is that women, more than anyone, should be pro-women & girls and thus NOT be apologists for Mohammeden barbarism against females but should be against those practices as he is.
livingengine says
“I put him in the same league as Cannibal Reza Aslan.”
It’s funny you should say that because they do know each other.
http://www.arabamerica.com/events/answering-hate-with-love/
Angel Gabriel says
Good find.
Yes Jonathan Brown of Georgetown University is cut from the exact same cloth as Cannibal Reza Aslan.
gravenimage says
Thanks, livingengine.
Max Publius says
Not that it’s not already clear by Brown’s own self-indicting words, but some people need confirmation from a more neutral party. So here’s one: Umar Lee, also convert, also slammed Brown for his disgusting Islamic apologetics:
https://mystudentvoices.com/georgetown-professor-jonathan-defends-defends-slavery-as-moral-and-rape-as-normal-in-virginia-3c0aac65dd41#.njmf8apjc
gravenimage says
Umar Lee is an odd figure, Max. Here, he left Islam:
“Prominent American Muslim, Umar Lee, leaves Islam: ‘We were lied to’”
https://www.jihadwatch.org/2013/05/prominent-american-muslim-umar-lee-leaves-islam-we-were-lied-to
Then, apparently, he re-“reverted”.
It is good to see his outrage over slavery and rape–but note that he never actually deals with this being orthodox Islam. Instead, he acts as though Jonathan Brown just made it up.
Max Publius says
It’s obvious the author, Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, is a beholden, twisted Islamic convert herself. She’s not using her own mind any more than an intelligent North Korean is freely speaking his or her own mind around the “great leader.”
Shame on Foreign Policy for letting itself be used as a slander vehicle.
mortimer says
Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian has not done her homework, so this is another example of fake news which defends the indefensible and then slanders anyone who notices the bias.
The emperor has no clothes on and anyone who notices is a fool. Yeah, right.
(sarc/off)
gravenimage says
She’s done her homework, all right, Mortimer.
Unfortunately, her assignment is not reporting the truth, but whitewashing Islam. Here’s more from her:
“For my Muslim husband, my mom’s halal Christmas is the perfect antidote to Trump”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/12/23/for-my-muslim-husband-my-moms-halal-christmas-is-the-perfect-antidote-to-trump/?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-f%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
She cites the Boston Marathon Bombing not as an example of Jihad terrorism, but of Americans ‘turning against Muslims’.
She refers to the Jihad terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino as “a plague”–but not because they slaughtered innocent people, but because they made her feel “under siege” because Americans are leery of Jihadists.
She talks about “love fighting back”–not against people watching a race or attending a Christmas party being slaughtered, but against those who condemn such atrocities.
The only good thing is that quite a few of the comments are quite Islamo-savvy.
Jessica says
I particularly disliked the ‘you’re ugly’ comment, which I unilaterally oppose for many reasons and on many levels. Why is it that everyone seems to be getting everything so wrong? Islam is not a religion of peace; it does condone slavery; it is horrible to women; it is impossible to follow without starting to feel the need to execute Jews and Christians and to feel they are filth who must be subjugated and that having sex with children is noble and right, and women are inferior. That is what it preaches, and I’m yet to find a mosque or moderate Muslim cleric who opposes those teachings and has eliminated them from the Koran as part of his civic as well as holy duty. If these people exist, they should be out in their millions, saying they are, in fact, a very new branch of Islam, totally against the old one and against terrorism and jihad and have their new Korans and their mosques to prove it. NOT ONE. Therefore the only Muslims who aren’t on their way to jihad because they will at some stage be compelled to be, and secretly sniffing at the very idea of equality between the sexes, are the ones who don’t follow the Koran and haven’t any idea what’s in it. I am UTTERLY BEMUSED as to why everyone doesn’t see Islam as a threat and why there’s some kind of difficulty with the meaning of it. OK, I read books and understand words and can be said to be educated and a careful interpreter of language, but even a fool can read those words with no ambiguity: one doesn’t need some special education or high IQ to understand them. And one reads them with horror. That anyone actually follows those words and carries out the instructions – anyone at all – let alone vast numbers – is enough to make fear legitimate, but in the UK we have FGM and child brides and pedophilia and a prevention of complaint about any of these things and I can’t write or create or speak freely because of the bondage of the politically correct movement and the charges of Islamophobia the moment I utter a word. I am desperate for you to come to London and you’ve been banned. What to do, what to do. HELP.
Twerzig says
I will give his master 5 sheckels for him.
And no more.
But first I would see his teeth.
Then he will trained for the arena.
gravenimage says
As a Muslim, he only envisions himself as the slavemaster, of course. As a good Muslim, he will be the one doing the raping.
garegin says
“Concepts create idols; only wonder comprehends anything”
The problem is chasing after victim narratives. Where Muslims violent aggressors in history. Yep. Were they victims of other violent agressors. You bet. There is no need to make excuses for their sex fueled rampages on their unsuspecting neighbors so one can acknowledge that they’ve been wronged too.
Any five year looking at the Islamic conquests could see that Muslims weren’t cowing in the corner in their hijab like the mainstream media always shows in movies.
Shoot. You think blacks were all pacifics when the whites started trafficking them in slave ships?
RichardL says
Bethany is not an academic, she is an assistant editor and her very slim expertise is in Asia.
This looks like the editors using an expendable asset to push a point they think might backfire. Then they can say, it wasn’t her area of expertise.
FP has lost a lot of its standing in the last 10 years.
Shame that Robert Spencer needs to explain basics over and over again. I don’t know how he does it. Angelic patience…
Crusades Were Right! says
Apparently, slavery and rape are only wrong when the culprits look like the ones in “Roots”.
Terry Gain says
Anyway, Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian then follows with a long discussion of the evolution of Christian thinking in the U.S. about slavery, concluding it with this claim:
Islam in the United States today is increasingly — and systematically — denied that free and respected space for discussion….
——————
Christian doctrine never supported slavery and Christ never owned a slave, so nice try but false equivalence rebutted.
SK says
“Islam in the United States today is increasingly — and systematically — denied that free and respected space for discussion”
We’re not exactly big fans of what it states in that regard, particularly as far as the difference between the two belief systems is concerned.
I will admit that I do read Christian apologetics on the subject, such as http://christianthinktank.com/qnoslave.html
All the Christian outrage is centered around the differences, which exist.
Jeanette says
And furthermore, where exactly, is Islam finding this problem with “space for discussion”?
From everything I’ve seen in the last eight years, it’s Christianity that is being disrespected and denied whatever Muslims and liberals can get away with.
juanita says
I reviewed some of this so called Prof. YouTube footage and this man is babbling…..Christ never owned a slave and said to treat others as you would like to be treated.
Jeanette says
“Consent isn’t necessary for lawful sex.”
Every day I see another sentence that fits the description: This is all we need to know about Islam.
gravenimage says
Yes–Islam is *evil*. It is all about force and violence.
Carolyne says
If Professor Brown, is director of the Center for Islamic Studies at Georgetown, a department funded by Saudi royalty, then we can assume with reasonable certainty that he is on the Saudi payroll. Being such, what else could he say and retain his job? If he condemns slavery and rape, he is condemning the present day practices of his benefactors. Saudi money is very persuasive if one can judge by others, i.e. Hillary Clinton who received $30 million from Saudi Arabia. Their money has invaded our government and it would be interesting to know how much and to whom. But, of course, we never will. They own us.
Jeanette says
His Islam-loving wife must have been forced to have her Muslim FGM, since Saudis are quite into that.
So when you look at her, think of the photos in Ann Barnhardt’s video about that subject, and that smirk of hers will look very different:
29:00 – 35:00
bing.com/videos/search?q=ann+barnhardt+video+islam+sexual&view=detail&mid=78659C23DF2A43376AC778659C23DF2A43376AC7&FORM=VIRE
Geppetto says
Take this as a positive development. The “Islamophobes” are making headway.
Ms. Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian is a poster child for “their hands,” i.e., those the Muslim Brotherhood referred to in their infamous manifesto that describes their devious methodology to defeat the “infidels.” The latter include her and the millions of intellectual, college “educated” progressives like her who are convinced that they’re the smartest people on the planet. She, and all of her ilk, are the product of American academia, thoroughly indoctrinated and rendered unable to intelligently process or separate the inconvenient facts that challenges their iron clad, preciously held views; the most important being their inflated opinion of themselves. They are what they claim to despise and fear the most; fanatics. Useful idiots being expertly manipulated by their “peace, harmony and diversity” loving, Muslim handlers and immensely proud of their “wisdom and superiority.”
gravenimage says
Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian is married to an Iranian Muslim.
Angemon says
Citation needed, especially seeing how Brown *defended* slavery and rape.
gravenimage says
True. He isn’t whitewashing Islam–he is openly embracing its naked evil.
bobm says
you are dying islam ; just as your prophet did…. poison by the lies that tie you to death .. to your father.. the father of lies..
px fragonard says
Ebrahimian is an interesting name. The last three letters suggest Armenian name endings. The first part is a variant of the Arabic Ibrahim (Abraham).
gravenimage says
It’s an Iranian Muslim name. She is married to a Mohammedan.
Frank J. Verderber says
I do not know much about Jonathan Brown, except he turned from Christ Jesus to the Devil’s gospel. Saint John’s epistle would deem him an antichrist! I do not know what he found so unique in a religion that can be traced back to the Ebionites – a Judaising cult from the Eastern side of the Jordan river. In other words, Mohammad’s religion is no more than a third century Jewish desert cult that flooded the area of Eastern Saudi Arabia. Mohammad had Ebionite and Nestorian family members as priests and several of the women of his household were also Nestorian. Though Mohammad could not read or write, he was a good talker and he spread the Ebionite monotheist doctrines along with some time honored pagan traditions and told everyone to worship Al ilah – which only means “The God.” So Jonathan Brown tossed Jesus Christ and the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob, to become a bad shepherd of a made up monotheistic cosmology. As the Prophet David said; “may his right eye be taken out and his right arm hang limp at his side.” If their are any students of his that are reading this, have him explain the Ebionite connection with Islam – the source material has been around for 1,800 starting from before the Nicene fathers, and the Jewish sages since 1000 AD, and reiterated by the reformers. Even Jewish Scholars will tell you this if you ask. The reason the Jewish don’t spread the info of the Ebionite connection, some ignorants will blame the Jews for the cult of Islam! Get a real education, read classic history books; ie.: “The Apostolic Fathers”; “Ecclesiastical History” , by Eusebius Pamphilus; “History of the Christian Church” by Schaff; “History of the Christian Church” by Sheldon; and a good American Encyclopedia written before 1990 when Britannica swallowed up history and redacted it for its Gnosticism.
Frank J. Verderber, BSGS/ASCT
Alumnus of Westfield State University, Ma
Author
Frank J. Verderber says
I do not know much about Jonathan Brown, except he turned from Christ Jesus to the Devil’s gospel. Saint John’s epistle would deem him an antichrist! I do not know what he found so unique in a religion that can be traced back to the Ebionites – a Judaising cult from the Eastern side of the Jordan river. In other words, Mohammad’s religion is no more than a third century Jewish desert cult that flooded the area of Eastern Saudi Arabia. Mohammad had Ebionite and Nestorian family members as priests and several of the women of his household were also Nestorian. Though Mohammad could not read or write, he was a good talker and he spread the Ebionite monotheist doctrines along with some time honored pagan traditions and told everyone to worship Al ilah – which only means “The God.” So Jonathan Brown tossed Jesus Christ and the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob, to become a bad shepherd of a made up monotheistic cosmology. As the Prophet David said; “may his right eye be taken out and his right arm hang limp at his side.” If their are any students of his that are reading this, have him explain the Ebionite connection with Islam – the source material has been around for 1,800 starting from before the Nicene fathers, and the Jewish sages since 1000 AD, and reiterated by the reformers. Even Jewish Scholars will tell you this if you ask. The reason the Jewish don’t spread the info of the Ebionite connection, some ignorants will blame the Jews for the cult of Islam! Get a real education, read classic history books; ie.: “The Apostolic Fathers”; “Ecclesiastical History” , by Eusebius Pamphilus; “History of the Christian Church” by Schaff; “History of the Christian Church” by Sheldon; and a good American Encyclopedia written before 1990 when Britannica swallowed up history and redacted it for its Gnosticism.
Frank J. Verderber, BSGS/ASCT
Alumnus of Westfield State University, Ma
Author
UNCLE VLADDI says
Re: “Brown tweeted, “Islam as a faith and I as a person condemn slavery, rape and concubinage.”
NONSENSE and lies! Of course islam endorses slavery – the word “islam” itself means “slavery!”
ISLAM IS SLAVERY. Period. (“Submission” is an euphemism for slavery).
Islam extorts enslaves & murders non-muslims. Perpetual extortion is slavery.
So if islam is to enjoy protected Constitutional ‘religious’ status, so is slavery.
Like the early Arabs, libertine “liberal” criminals feel when threatened that the easiest solution is to become part of the problem! Extortion obviously works!
“Islam” means slavery. The Qur’an is a threat. It was written by an allegedly uncontrollable criminal to warn you to obey him or else the even more uncontrollable god who had made him uncontrollable would get you. Enslave your self to him, or be enslaved by him. Criminal hypocrites think “Enslave, or be enslaved!” (but “Slavery of me is worse than death to you”)!
As they cry “We want to be slaves!” each lying criminal hypocrite thinks to its self: “You’re a fool, and I’m better than you!”
When perceiving threats, craven delinquent fickle and treasonous libertine “liberal” criminals all feel the best solution is to become part of the problem!
gravenimage says
This Foreign Policy piece is a lurid fantasy about how a sinister and well-heeled cabal of racist, bigoted “Islamophobes” have smeared a thoughtful, mild-mannered academic, Professor Jonathan Brown, and opened him up to death threats, as part of a larger endeavor to do nothing less than deprive Muslims of the freedom of speech. In reality, just about the opposite is true…
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Exactly. Jonathan Brown–I wonder what his Muslim name is?–is *condoning the taking of Infidel women as sex slaves*, and makes clear that the victim’s consent is not needed, and that they can be raped with impunity by Muslims.
More:
“The Making of Islamophobia Inc.: A well-funded network is trying to strip the right to speak away from American Muslims and fanning the politics of fear,” by Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, Foreign Policy, March 16, 2017
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No one has taken away this savage’s right to speak. Instead, people are freely responding to the sickening *content* of his speech, with is *our* right.
More:
A decade ago, few outside the academy would have noticed Jonathan Brown’s lecture on slavery. A Washington native who looks a good bit younger than his 39 years…
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I don’t care if this witless tool thinks that this advocate for rape is good-looking or not. It is the vicious content of his words that are ugly.
More:
Much of his work is aimed at making Islamic thought more accessible to general audiences.
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And he was all too successful in this instance. Now many more Infidels know that Islam allows for the raping of sex slaves, and that Professor Brown himself approves.
More:
But Brown’s attempts to explain the faith have made him a hate figure for the American right. A flood of articles accuse him of being an apologist for slavery and rape.
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This is not an accusation–this is what *he himself* said. Can Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian refute that? Of course not.
More:
His family has received death and rape threats.
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That seems unlikely. Whereas, Jonathan Brown himself openly threatened Infidel women with kidnapping, slavery, and rape.
Does Allen-Ebrahimian have any problem *with that*?
More:
It all started with good intentions. Brown is one of the majority of Muslims around the world who believes the Islamic State practices a warped interpretation of Islamic thought that blesses slavery, rape, and other crimes.
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How is *confirming* that Islam does indeed practice slavery and rape–and that he himself *approves of it*–indicative of “good intentions” in any but the most Islamic sense? Certainly, it does not contradict anything the Islamic State does.
More:
But Brown also knows that not all Muslims are so quick to dismiss the jihadi group’s theology…
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Including, obviously, Brown himself…
More:
…Brown addressed slavery in Islam, hoping to combat the idea that Islam could ever condone the subjugation and exploitation of human beings.
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What *absolute crap*. This is *exactly* what Brown confirmed.
More:
Watch the video of his lecture for yourself and see. Apparently Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian didn’t do so herself, or doesn’t think anyone else will.
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Given how often she has engaged in whitewash of Islam before, likely the latter…
More:
That was when he encountered a cacophony of a different sort — America’s far-right, anti-Muslim ecosystem that has adopted the same twisted interpretations of Islam that the Islamic State promotes…
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What tripe. He could have trotted out the usual denial, and a few people might have noted his Taqiyya. What was really shocking here is that Brown let the mask slip.
More:
Brown is the victim of an increasingly empowered industry of Islamophobia that constricts the space for balanced and open dialogue, sidelining the very Muslims who are doing the most to promote peaceful, orthodox interpretations of Islam.
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Man, this is blatant Taqiyya.
More:
The United States has powerful protections for speech and religious liberty that have allowed faith traditions to hammer out their theological debates in a free and protected environment.
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No other faith is still having a debate about slavery. And yes–it is shocking that a professor is openly affirming that his own students can be taken as sex slaves and raped by him and his coreligionists, according to their faith.
More:
What Brown was attempting to do was build a bridge for American Muslims between their sacred scripture and their human rights sensibilities, as many Christian thinkers before him have done.
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If by this she meant that Brown was reassuring Muslims that it is lawful under Islam for them to rape their captives, then this is correct–this is not how civilized people look at “human rights sensibilities”, though.
More:
For his efforts, he attracted the attention of an Islamophobic ecosystem designed to marginalize any Muslim who speaks out. Brown’s straightforward academic lecture was quickly transformed into fodder for a flood of unscrupulous articles painting him as someone who “justifies slavery and the rape of female slaves,” leaving him with a horrific online footprint that is likely to trail him for decades.
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It wasn’t the “Islamophobes” who are responsible for that…
More:
Spencer’s website Jihad Watch, which received more than $500,000 in donations between 2001 and 2009 from those same seven foundations,
That is false. I have no contact whatsoever with most of those foundations, and have never received any money from most of them…
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And now she is just lying outright.
More:
The ideas he has promulgated on his site have resonated in the U.S. Tea Party movement and abroad: Anders Breivik…
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Firstly, conflating the somewhat unfocused but essentially decent Tea Party with the murderous Anders Breivik is just grotesque.
Then, Anders Breivik has openly said that the admires the tactics of Al Qaida, and he is fine with allying with Jihadists against ‘common enemies’. The idea that he followed someone who opposes violence is ludicrous.
More:
Websites like Jihad Watch have proliferated, including sites such as Religion of Peace and Answering Islam, and sites that often repost their content, including World Net Daily, the Daily Caller, Heat Street, and, of course, Breitbart.
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How dare the Infidels actually take note of the growing horror of violent Jihad. Previously, Allen-Ebrahimian only cited Jihad atrocities like 9/11 and the Boston Marathon Bombing as events that led not to the slaughter of innocent people, but that discomfited Muslims by being reported.
More:
On Feb. 11, in an attempt to stem the bleeding, Brown tweeted, “Islam as a faith and I as a person condemn slavery, rape and concubinage.”
But it was too late. Soon dozens of articles were published proclaiming that Brown had defended slavery and rape as acceptable.
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Still implying that only “Islamophobes” read his defense of slavery and rape as–well–a defense of slavery and rape.
More:
By Feb. 15, the relatively mainstream conservative National Review had piled on…
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The implication is that the National Review, too, is “Islamophobic”–rather than their also being concerned over a professor at a major university condoning slavery and rape.
More:
Ideologues are seeking to marginalize Muslims by making their speech and their activism relating to their religion come at a very high price.
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“Activism” mainstreaming the enslavement and rape of unbelievers *should* come at a very high price.
More:
They believe that Muslims are malevolent, duplicitous, and dangerous, and these Islamophobes will bend the truth to fit their claims. In the process, they are denying Islam the same functional rights that Christianity enjoys and silencing the very people best poised to reconcile Islam with modern American life. Which may be the very point.
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Where are Christians condoning slavery and rape? They are not.
And the idea that Brown is trying to “reconcile Islam with modern American life” is grotesque–unless, of course, she means that Muslims enslaving and raping unbelievers should be acceptable in modern America…
Brenda Romano says
We need a united campaign against Brown and his “friends.” Georgetown has alumni. Alumni usually support their colleges. We need to put Georgetown alumni on the hot seat to pull their funds from the university. We need to demand all federal monies be pulled from Georgetown. Since Georgetown is supposedly a Christian university, we need to contact any Christian institution which supplies money to Georgetown and demand they pull their financial support or we pull our funding from them. Boycott any individual or institution/company which refused to comply. Parents can stop sending the children to this university and stop funding their child’s education at this university. We can ask that no financial aid be given to students entering this cesspit. If they have a Board of Regents, we can demand that equal amounts of American value Professors (Conservative) be required at all universities. We can ask that the university be investigated by the FBI, NSA, Homeland Security and the Department of Education for promoting violence against women and the re-institution of slavery – in other words hate speech.
WE NEED TO GET TOUGH AND STAND UP TO PEOPLE WHO PROMOTE FILTH IN OUR SCHOOLS! WE NEED TO DENY THEM A FORUM. Free speech is great but not when it used to indoctrinate future generations.