UPDATE: Khaled Abou El Fadl’s article about Tariq Ramadan, discussed below, has been removed, without explanation. Could even Abou El Fadl himself have realized its shoddiness and incoherence? — Ed.
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Khaled Abou El Fadl is a professor of law at UCLA who stands very high in Khaled Abou El Fadl’s estimation. He runs a website, searchforbeauty.org, which is devoted to the life and works of Khaled Abou El Fadl. According to Khaled Abou El Fadl, Khaled Abou El Fadl is a most distinguished scholar: “Dr. Khaled Abou El Fadl is one of the world’s leading authorities on Shari’ah, Islamic law and Islam, and a prominent scholar in the field of human rights. He is the Omar and Azmeralda Alfi Distinguished Professor of Law at the UCLA School of Law where he teaches International Human Rights; Islamic Jurisprudence; Law and Terrorism; Islam and Human Rights” and much, much more.
“One of the world’s leading authorities”… “a prominent scholar”… “a distinguished professor of law” who has “among his many honors and distinctions…” — here follows a long list sufficient to impress anyone. “In 2017 and 2005, he was also listed as one of LawDragon’s Top 500 Lawyers in the Nation. In 2013, he was recognized among ‘The 50 Smartest People of Faith‘ by TheBestSchools.org, and was awarded the ‘American Muslim Achievement Award’ in 2014. He has been ranked among ‘The Power 500 List of the World’s Most Influential Arabs’ and ‘The World’s 500 Most Influential Muslims.’”
A prolific scholar and prominent public intellectual, Dr. Abou El Fadl is the author of numerous books and articles on various topics in Islam and Islamic law. He has lectured on and taught Islamic law throughout the United States and Europe in academic and non-academic environments for over twenty years. His work has been translated into numerous languages including Arabic, Persian, French, Norwegian, Dutch, Ethiopian, Russian, Vietnamese and Japanese, among others.”
My goodness, what a distinguished, prominent, leading, prolific, scholarly, influential public intellectual, who is also, in case you’ve forgotten, among the 50 smartest people of faith in the entire world. If you want to find out even more about Khaled Abou El Fadl and his achievements, as recorded by Khaled Abou El Fadl, his very own website will fill you in on every detail about him, not just his many honors as the “distinguished, prominent, leading, prolific, scholarly, influential public intellectual, among the 50 smartest people of faith in the entire world,” but also provide links to his books, his articles, his lectures, his fatwas, his khutbahs, his circle of learning that have done so much to win him the accolades he so richly deserves. Just go here, for here is Allah’s plenty.
Dr. Abou El Fadl has now issued an anguished cri de coeur, a cry of righteous anger, at the outrageous miscarriage of justice now being endured by Tariq Ramadan:
What is happening to Tariq Ramadan in France is disgraceful and simply ignominious. I can no longer maintain my silence before this grotesque travesty of justice. Since rape charges were filed against him in France, Tariq Ramadan’s case has been marred by procedural irregularities, denials of due process, and evidence of insidious discrimination. In fact, Ramadan’s mistreatment by the French courts, and his virtual public lynching by the French media has been so outrageously unfair to the point of rising to the level of outright persecution.
Alain Gabon and others have already detailed the record of persecution and abuse by the French authorities in this case, and more than one hundred prominent academics and scholars have signed a statement demanding fair treatment and due process rights for Tariq Ramadan.
Indeed, it sounds bad. Tariq Ramadan’s case has “been marred by procedural irregularities, denials of due process, and evidence of insidious discrimination.” And others have “detailed the record of persecution and abuse by the French authorities.” To start with, why was Tariq Ramadan taken into custody rather than permitted to post bail and be subject to house arrest?
Ramadan was being treated by the book. There are seven possible reasons for keeping an accused in custody under Article 144 of the Code de Procedure pénale. The decision of the magistrate to keep Ramadan in custody was challenged by his original lawyer, Yassine Bouzrou, in front of three new judges. On the basis of the material gathered by investigators, these three judges decided that there was good cause to prevent Tariq Ramadan from possibly: 1) tampering with the evidence (paragraph 1 of Art. 144); 2) intimidating witnesses, victims, or their families (paragraph 2); 3) preventing him from fleeing France and French justice, especially as he has no official ties here (paragraph 5); or 4) being the cause of “exceptional and persistent” public unrest, possibly due to the gravity or notoriety of the crimes of which he stands accused (paragraph 7). All of these were reasonable worries, especially since if Ramadan had not been held in preventive custody he could help organize the intimidating of witnesses and their families (threats were indeed made to the family of one of his accusers). Nor was the possibility of flight from France a spurious worry. Ramadan has a vast following, with two million followers on Facebook and 200,000 on Twitter; there are online petitions, signed by over 150,000 people, demanding his release. If he were not held in custody, some of that vast following could help him flee the country, or they might, encouraged by him, engage in mass public protests in his support.
After Yassine Bouzrou left, Ramadan took on, as his new lawyer, the most distinguished Maître Emmanuel Marsigny, who promptly appealed the earlier decision to keep him in custody. That decision was upheld by still another group of three judges in the Court of Appeals in Paris. They, too, ruled that Ramadan should remain in custody. This is standard practice in cases of rape: preventive custody is needed so that the accused will have a harder time threatening, or harming, those accusing him.
So why do I write? I write first because as a Muslim, I am outraged by the embarrassing silence of Muslim organizations and leaders before the undeniable lynching of a prominent Muslim scholar. The same organizations who at one time rode on the coattails of Tariq Ramadan’s prominence and fame, and that competed for bragging rights by having Tariq Ramadan on their slate of confirmed speakers in their conferences and symposiums, have now conveniently abandoned him and his family to their plight.
What “embarrassing silence of Muslim organizations and leaders” does he mean? Has he not noticed the online petition signed by more than 155,000 people, a list that includes Muslim leaders? Has he seen the petition signed by 130 French notables, Muslim and non-Muslim, in support of Ramadan? Has he forgotten that Nadia Karmous, head of the Association of Muslim Women in Switzerland, has supported the theologian as “a reliable and caring person”? Is she not a Muslim leader? Is her organization not a Muslim organization? At a recent “Annual Meeting of Muslims of France” held in Bourget, a “support committee” for Ramadan was started. According to Asmar Lafar, the president of the “Muslims of France” organization, Ramadan’s pensée (“thinking/worldview”) is still “intact” despite the rape accusations. Does Khaled Abou El Fadl not consider the group “Muslims of France” to be a “Muslim organization”?
The second reason I write is that as a student of history and law, Ramadan’s case reminds me of the shameful Dreyfus affair in which the enlightened French legal system wrongfully tried and convicted an innocent man, simply because he was a Jew. I write because I strongly suspect that the way that Ramadan’s case is being handled evidences clear political and religious biases, and that these biases account for the numerous irregularities that plague France’s judicial proceedings. I write because I am deeply troubled about the mockery being made of the presumption of innocence, and because there is substantial evidence that Tariq Ramadan is not treated as a suspect properly facing rape charges, but is effectively a political prisoner being persecuted by his sworn ideological enemies. Having studied a whole host of criminal cases filed against suspected rapists in France, there is no question that Tariq Ramadan’s treatment is not justified by the charges, allegations, or investigatory proceedings of the case.
Dreyfus was convicted on the basis of no real evidence whatsoever: someone had delivered French army secrets to the German embassy in Paris; Dreyfus, as a Jew, was an ideal suspect — after all, for antisemites, could a Jew really be a loyal Frenchman? Antisemitic members of the military, the Catholic clergy, and committed antisemites such as Maurice Drumont, editor of La Libre Parole, pushed for and defended the conviction of Dreyfus. The long sorry tale, including the attempts to attribute to Dreyfus handwritten notes that were clearly not his and to concoct wild fictions about why he might have given secrets to the Germans, ultimately ended, after Dreyfus spent a decade in jail, with his release. The real guilty party, Major Esterhazy, was allowed to retire from the army and spent the rest of his life in an English village, escaping punishment, and saving the French army from what would have been, after the conviction of the innocent Dreyfus, a scandalous business.
There has been nothing like the Dreyfus business, no cabal of anti-Muslim groups equivalent to the antisemitic anti-Dreyfusards.
And the main point is this: There was no evidence, only prejudice, against Dreyfus. There are many accusers of Tariq Ramadan. There is evidence, ranging from intimate knowledge of his anatomy, to the exact dates and times he was in various hotel rooms in France where he has been accused of having met, then violently assaulted and raped, four women. There is the fact that he paid off another woman $27,000 to silence her. There are the five women, aside from the accusers we know about, with whom he has admitted having sexual relations. There are the four women in Switzerland who, as teenagers and the pupils of Tariq Ramadan, were taken advantage of sexually. Of the four accusers of Tariq Ramadan in France, three are Muslim. A fifth accuser is a Muslim American who claims Ramadan raped her in Washington; she now lives in Kuwait. Her case is still to be heard. The Muslim women continue to call themselves Muslims, though at least one, Henda Ayari, has said she is no longer a Salafist.
How can all these Muslim women be considered part of an anti-Muslim cabal? And how can a man with so many different accusers, in four different countries, who have charged him with rape and extreme sexual violence, be compared to the wholly innocent Dreyfus, framed by the French military?
Here is a partial account of the irregularities and problems in this case:
Tariq Ramadan has been languishing in preventive detention since February of this year. No date for trial has been set, and it is not even certain whether there will be a trial.
Tariq Ramadan has not been “languishing” any more than any other prisoner. In fact, the French state, aware of how many partisans of Ramadan around the world are watching this case, has no doubt bent over backwards to make sure he receives better treatment than the average prisoner. He is in preventive detention because it is justified, as we have said, under the provisions of Article 144 of the Code de Procédure pénale. Fears of his flight, or of his organizing campaigns among his supporters against his accusers, even possibly threatening them or their families, are a few of the reasons that three different panels of judges upheld his being kept in custody. Furthermore, it is standard to keep those accused of rape in preventive detention; Ramadan was not being singled out.
The case was built on alleged charges by three women. But Ramadan was not treated as a normal criminal defendant. His case was inexplicably transferred to the jurisdiction of prosecutor Francois Molins, someone who has made a career of prosecuting terrorism cases in which the suspects were invariably Muslim.
Ramadan was treated as a normal criminal defendant. He had the right to choose his lawyer — he ended up with a famous criminal defense lawyer. He had the right to appeal judgements, and he did so, several times in the case of the decision to keep him in custody. Ramadan’s case was moved from Rouen to Paris, but not “inexplicably.” Paris is where, when necessary, the prisoner would have instant access to the French hospitals where he can get the best care for his multiple sclerosis; he has already paid several visits to the Hôpital universitaire Pitié-Salpêtrière, a celebrated teaching hospital. The French are sparing no expense to make sure that Tariq Ramadan is given the best medical care. Paris is also the current home of two of the accusers. It makes sense to conduct this high-profile case in the capital.
As for Francois Molins, he has, pace Khaled Abou El Fadl, not “made a career of prosecuting terrorism cases in which the suspects were invariably Muslim.” If the suspects are invariably Muslim, it’s because all the terrorism in France is now being carried out by Muslims — that’s not some deliberate act of prejudice on the part of Francois Molins. Nor has he “made a career” out of prosecuting terrorism cases. He is, rather, the chief prosecutor, who oversees all criminal cases in Paris. There is no special court for terrorism cases, which is why Molins has overseen a few of the major terrorism cases. So what? Khaled About El Fadl seems to think Molins has been involved in building the case against Tariq Ramadan. He has not, in any way, been involved in the collection, or sifting of evidence. He has not taken any part in the prosecution of Tariq Ramadan.
Molins treated Tariq Ramadan precisely as he would treat a terrorism suspect. Ramadan was placed in solitary confinement; his access to family, attorneys and his own case files were severely restricted; and he was denied mail privileges and any privacy rights.
Molins did not treat Tariq Ramadan “as he would treat a terrorism suspect.” Khaled Abou El Fadl apparently believes that Molins placed Ramadan in a cell by himself in order to punish him. First, it was not Molins, but prison authorities at two different prisons, first Fleury-Mérogis and then Fresnes, who decided that Ramadan should be given his own cell. There was concern that other prisoners might attack him; he was placed in a cell of his own for his own safety. Many prisoners, in the greatly overcrowded French prisons, would dearly love to have a cell to themselves. As for Khaled Abou El Fadl’s claim that Ramadan was denied access to attorneys, that never happened. And while he was denied access to his family, this was not indefinite, as Abou El Fadl seems to think. Such access is routinely denied for 30 days to all those put in preventive custody; the only difference was that Ramadan was denied access to his family for 45 days from the time he was taken into custody on February 2. An extra 15 days of being denied such access does not strike one as a colossal injustice.
Shockingly, Ramadan was detained for months before being allowed to speak or introduce any exculpatory evidence on his own behalf. Only on June 5 of this year was he finally allowed to offer testimony and evidence in rebuttal. In legal terms, by the terms of his confinement, Ramadan has been placed in disadvantageous circumstances, where his ability to defend himself against the charges are severely restricted. The problem with the imposed restrictions are not just psychological but they constrain the ability of the defendant to conduct research, deliberate with counsel, and launch a vigorous defense against the charges made. Imagine trying to organize a defense against serious charges when you are imprisoned in solitary confinement twenty-three hours a day, allowed only short sojourns outside your cell, denied access to a library or a computer, denied access to most mail, denied writing and reading material, and denied access to your own case file!
Tariq Ramadan is being represented by one of the very best criminal defense lawyers in France, Marsigny. How has being placed in a cell by himself damaged Ramadan’s ability to organize a defense? Would Ramadan be able to organize that defense better were he in a cell with two or three or four others? A cell to oneself is ideal for preparing a defense. And who, after all, is really preparing the defense? It’s not Ramadan himself, but his celebrated defense lawyer. Ramadan was not deliberately being prevented from offering testimony and evidence in rebuttal until June 5; that was when the testimony of others was complete and it was his turn to answer; had his accusers finished earlier, he would have had a chance to offer testimony and evidence “in rebuttal” earlier. No one was deliberately trying to delay his appearance. The judges’ calendar is not a conspiracy.
Khaled Abou El Fadl appears to believe that Ramadan was “denied writing and reading material.” Where is the evidence for this? Ramadan was placed alone in a cell, for his own safety, but not cut off from the world. His family could both visit him, and telephone him, by prearrangement, after the first 45 days. His lawyers have been in constant contact with him. His defense is being prepared by one of the best criminal lawyers in the country. He has given that lawyer every scrap of information that helps his case. What more, by way of preparing his defense, does he need?
Add to this, Tariq Ramadan is very ill, and it is not an exaggeration to say that the conditions of his confinement are tortuous. The conditions of his confinement are leading to a severe deterioration in his health and may even lead to his death. Despite overwhelming medical documentation, the French court has refused to place him in a hospital and to provide him with adequate medical treatment.
Repeatedly, Tariq Ramadan and his lawyers have tried to use the fact of his multiple sclerosis as a reason for freeing him from preventive custody. And repeatedly doctors have examined him, and concluded that his condition was not such that it required him to be freed, that his illness could be properly treated in detention. What Khaled Abou El Fadl describes as “overwhelming medical documentation” proving the need to free him has been contradicted by almost all of the doctors who have examined Ramadan. Save for one prison doctor, the medical experts assigned to examine Ramadan have concluded he can receive, and is receiving, perfectly adequate treatment while in prison. When his lawyer sought to get Ramadan freed, on the basis of his MS, two medical experts listed with the Court of Appeals ordered that Ramadan be sent to several of the best teaching hospitals in Paris, where he underwent medical tests. The doctors involved concluded that Ramadan’s form of multiple sclerosis was of the slow-acting “benign form.” They also concluded that his claim to be suffering from another condition, sensory axonal neuropathy, was false. And most important, they concluded that he could indeed receive adequate treatment in prison.
Everyone knows that in such a high-profile case as that of Tariq Ramadan, the French state — its judges, and its doctors — will do everything they can to ensure that he receives the best possible care, for they are well aware of the consequences if his care were to be proven inadequate in any way. His visits to the Hôpital universitaire Pitié-Salpêtrière, the most celebrated teaching hospital in France, have been paid for by the government. Far from suffering terribly, as Khaled Abou El Fadl wants you to think, Tariq Ramadan is now getting the best possible treatment, arranged by the state, better than what he had been receiving before being taken into custody at the beginning of February.
The presumption of innocence means that we must presume a person to be innocent until proven otherwise. But this is not the way that Ramadan is being treated. The way he is being treated is reminiscent of the way French courts have treated terrorism suspects, where their rights to due process have been severely restricted because of purported national security interests.
Has Ramadan really been treated the way terrorism suspects are treated? Was he placed in a maximum security prison, in solitary confinement, denied the right to talk to anyone save his lawyer? Is he confined to his cell round-the-clock, or is he allowed out for an hour of supervised exercise? Is he being subject to endless interrogations? To threats of any kind? Of course not.
Tariq Ramadan’s case, however, is not supposed to be about terrorism but about alleged sexual assaults. The court has produced no convincing justifications for all the restrictions placed on him in prison, leave alone for refusing to treat him like the overwhelming number of defendants facing similar charges, who are released in some supervised capacity until the date of their trial.
Again, Khaled Abou El Fadl makes wild claims. When he says the court “has produced no convincing justifications for all the restrictions placed on him in prison” he ignores the reason for putting Ramadan in his own cell, which is his own safety. He continues to believe that there are restrictions on Ramadan’s contact with his lawyer(s); there are not now, and there never were any, restrictions beyond those placed on any other prisoner. As for the restrictions placed on visits by Ramadan’s family, that was only for the first 45 days of his detention, and such restrictions are standard for those in preventive detention, though — and this is the only difference in the case of Ramadan — they usually last 30 days. El Fadl says that the court has “refused to treat him like the overwhelming number of defendants facing similar charges, who are released in some supervised capacity until the date of their trial.” No — those facing “similar charges,” that is, rape, are hardly ever “released income supervised capacity.” A police official has said that in indictments for rape, preventive custody is standard. If Abou El Fadl has some information that contradicts that official statement of the gendarmerie, he should bring it forth. For example, he should tell us exactly how many people, indicted for rape in France, have been “released in some supervised capacity”? Who should we believe — the French police, or Khaled Abou El Fadl?
In fact, most recently the French government uncovered a terrorist plot by a white nationalist group, named the AFO, to attack and murder Muslims all over France. Although the ten members of the AFO admitted that they planned to execute deadly attacks against mosques and Muslim schools in France, the leader of the group and most of its members were charged and granted supervised release immediately. The AFO defendants have not suffered anything even close to what has been inflicted upon Tariq Ramadan.
The AFO members have not done anything like what Tariq Ramadan has been accused by many different accusers — four in France, one in Belgium, one in the United States, four in Switzerland — of doing. They have, in fact, as yet done nothing. Dispersed geographically, they were in the initial stages of planning attacks on Muslims. Such planning is, of course, a crime, but some were further along in planning than others, and therefore, deemed more dangerous.
The ten members of the AFO were not released “immediately.” Four were released under judicial supervision, but only after having been held for several days in detention. Six others are still being held in custody. Either Khaled Abou El Fadl did not bother to find out that six of the ten AFO members were not released, or he knew, but decided to ignore the fact in order to make his (false) point about how Tariq Ramadan suffered so terribly while the AFO members were immediately set free.
I must admit that I might be less sympathetic to Tariq Ramadan’s plight if the evidence against him by the three purported victims was stronger. The truth is that to date, no credible evidence has been presented against Ramadan. The first plaintiff, Henda Ayari, has offered inconsistent narratives, particularly about her relationship with the second plaintiff, and about coordinating their joint sexual assault narratives against Ramadan. She has well-documented and long-standing relations with Ramadan’s ideological foes, including some of the more notorious Islamophobes of France. More recently, she has received the support of American Islamophobes, such as the infamous Robert Spencer. Disturbingly, Ayari has become a pop celebrity in the French media and has turned her purported victimhood into a full-time career.
Henda Ayari has been completely consistent in her charge of rape by Ramadan: that is, the nature of the violent sexual assault, in all its disturbing detail. She did make one correction to her story, having discovered in reviewing her diaries that her encounter with Ramadan took place in May, not March, of 2012. As for her supposed connections to well-known Islamophobes in France, Henda Ayari has repeatedly said that while she is no longer a Salafist, she remains a Muslim. It is amusing to see Khaled Abou El Fadl mention the support given Henda Ayari by “American Islamophobes, such as the infamous Robert Spencer.” That should be enough to condemn her forever to the outer darkness.
In many ways, the second plaintiff, fares even worse. A documented and proven French white supremacist who has an extensive record of advocating genocidal pogroms against Muslims in France and Europe, like Ayari, she has an extensive and well-documented association with Caroline Fourest, Ramadan’s arch-enemy and the author of Brother Tariq, a book of pristine and unadulterated Islamophobia published in 2008. Like Ayari, her testimony has been contradictory, inconsistent, and unsubstantiated.
Khaled About El Fadl claims that “Christelle” is a “documented and proven French white supremacist” with “an extensive record of advocating genocidal pogroms against Muslims.” Christelle is a French convert to Islam. She has not declared herself to be anything but a Muslim. She has been accused of starting a pro-Marine Le Pen website. She denies it. I have looked on the Internet for any credible evidence that Christelle is a “proven white supremacist” with “an extensive record of advocating genocidal pogroms against Muslims.” I can find no such evidence, but of course would be grateful if Khaled Abou El Fadl might supply us all with a few more details, and a few links.
Abou El Fadl’s attempt to blacken the name of Caroline Fourest, accusing her of “unadulterated Islamophobia,” is passing strange. I presume Khaled Abou El Fadl is unaware of Caroline Fourest’s reputation in France as a ferocious enemy of the right, as can be seen in her book Marine Le Pen Unmasked. Her brilliant expose of Tariq Ramadan’s “double language,” which has allowed him to be mistakenly perceived as a “moderate” by some, while in his remarks to Muslim audiences, especially in asides and unscheduled interventions, he makes clear his desire that Europe become thoroughly islamized, was devastating to Ramadan’s image in France.
As to the third plaintiff, well, she is no longer a plaintiff. Her claims were so weak that even the French court, that has so far ignored the inconsistencies and contradictions of the others, was forced to dismiss her case. In the June 5 hearing, Ramadan’s attorney presented ample evidence that her story was an outright lie, and her case was dismissed. So as of now, Ramadan remains detained in solitary confinement and continues to be treated like a terrorism suspect might be treated in France because of the accusations made by these two plaintiffs.
The charges made by the accuser, “Marie,” were thrown out for several reasons. First, “Marie” was no innocent, but an ex-escort girl, that is, a call girl, who had already been involved in a famous sex scandal in France involving special “evenings” — at such sites as the Hotel Carlton in Lille (l’ affaire du Carlton de Lille) — where such notables as Dominique Strauss-Kahn, former director of the IMF, enjoyed the favors of high-end prostitutes. There is no hint of any such background in the lives of any of Ramadan’s other accusers.
Second, “Marie” — her real name is Mounia Barrouj — claimed to have been raped by Ramadan in France, London, and Brussels nine times, over sixteen months between 2013 and 2014. Both Henda Ayari and “Christelle” claimed to have been raped only once. The judges obviously felt that if “Marie” kept coming back to Ramadan eight times after her initial “rape,” that made more plausible Ramadan’s contention that their relationship was not forced by him, but mutually agreed on. He who had claimed a few months ago never to have engaged in adultery recently changed his story, and before the judges he admitted that his encounters with “Marie” were sexual, and involved mild (!) S and M. These “sexual games,” as Ramadan and his lawyers called this sordidness, were — they claimed — consensual. Why would “Marie” keep agreeing to meet with Ramadan if she had been previously raped by him, against her will, again and again?
The judges found that argument convincing.
Let me state this as clearly as I can: the problem with this case is discrimination –Tariq Ramadan is not being treated like any similarly situated defendant facing the same set of charges; the problem is denial of due process – the conditions of Ramadan’s confinement effectively deny him the opportunity to launch a vigorous defense in his own behalf; and the problem is persecution – not only have Ramadan and his family been subjected to a lynching in the French media, but there is cumulative evidence that Ramadan’s political foes have conspired with the plaintiffs to compile these often inconsistent narratives of sexual assault.
It needs to be repeated: Tariq Ramadan has been treated not worse, but better, than “similarly situated defendants.” He is being defended by one of the best defense lawyers in the country. He has been given a cell of his own to ensure his safety. He was placed in preventive custody because, in rape cases in France, that is perfectly standard. He has had no difficulty in planning his defense with his lawyer. He was kept from seeing his family for 45 days after he was taken into custody, rather than the usual 30 days in such cases — and that is the only example of his being treated “worse” than how others “similarly situated” are treated. He has had access to the best doctors in the foremost teaching hospitals in France. French authorities are determined to make sure that they cannot be accused of providing substandard care for his multiple sclerosis.
Moreover, the French state has been complicit in exploiting the opportunity offered by the charges brought to persecute a Muslim public intellectual, who for years has been a thorn in the side of France’s government. The problem is that, like the Muslim ban which was recently upheld by the US Supreme Court, there is ample evidence of anti-Muslim animus that is being conveniently ignored by the French court. The very serious problem is that, considering the track record of the French court thus far, it is highly doubtful that the French system can offer someone like Tariq Ramadan a fair and just trial. Like the infamous Dreyfus case, with every passing day, this is looking more and more like a political assassination and not a fair adjudication.
Khaled Abou El Fadl now drags in Trump v. Hawaii as part of his piling-it-on rhetoric — I’m surprised he didn’t mention that “no one cares about the plight of the Palestinians.” What he wrongly describes as that “Muslim ban” actually affects only 5% of the world’s Muslims, those who live in five Muslim countries (and in Venezuela and North Korea) where the governments, in the judgement of our security services, lack sufficient information about their own citizens, and the ability to share that information with the American government, to satisfy American security requirements. But that is not how Professor Khaled El Fadl sees it. He sees on every side only persecution, injustice, unfairness, Islamophobia.
He claims, but does not offer any evidence, that “it is highly doubtful that the French system can offer someone like Tariq Ramadan a fair and just trial.” That’s quite a claim. Scholar of the House Professor Khaled Abou El Fadl fails to provide examples of how the French state has been “complicit” in “exploiting the opportunity offered by the charges brought to persecute a Muslim public intellectual.” What has the French state done by way of “persecuting” this “Muslim public intellectual”? How is he now being treated by the French government? He was given a cell to himself — notice that is one thing his lawyer does not complain about — for his own safety. He’s managed to hire the best defense lawyer his loyal and deep-pocketed claque can buy. The state itself provides him with, and pays for, visits when needed to the best specialists treating multiple sclerosis, at the famous Salpetriere hospital, visits that supplement the regular ministrations of the prison doctor. He receives massage therapy every week.
In the Dreyfus Affair, an innocent man had to be convicted and imprisoned for years before French Jews realized that the ideals of the French Republic of liberty, equality, and fraternity did not include them, and that as citizens, they enjoyed second-class status. But the Dreyfus Affair also became a wake-up call for Jews in France and Europe to aggressively claim dignity and equal rights as citizens, and not to shy away from demanding their due as a people. The Dreyfus Affair was also a transformative event in the history of European Jewry, because it convinced so many Jewish intellectuals of the imperative of becoming conscientious of their collective identity, dignity, and solidarity as a people before they could hope to achieve equal rights as citizens.
Khaled Abou El Fadl has the gall to compare Tariq Ramadan, a man whom at least ten women, in four countries, have accused of sexual assault, including four who were his underage pupils at the time, assaults that in some cases included rape and extreme sexual violence, to the completely innocent Dreyfus. It’s clear where this is going: Khaled Abou El Fadl wants to take the case of Ramadan, grab the ball of victimization, and dribble it down the court of debased public opinion, in order to make us believe that Muslims are the “new Jews.” If we look at Europe today, and the widespread attacks on Jews by Muslims, including torture and murder (Ilan Halimi, Sarah Halimi, Mireille Knoll, and eight other Jews murdered in France), it is hard not to conclude that it’s not the Muslims, but again the Jews, who are the real “new Jews.”
I am forced to wonder what it will take to wake up Muslims to the fact that the Ramadan affair is quickly becoming symptomatic of the gross disempowerment and political meekness of Muslims all over Europe? I must say that I cannot resist the rather gloomy thought that a people who do not recognize the importance of rushing to the aid of their brightest and sharpest when they are unfairly treated and denied basic justice, will be hard pressed to win respect as a people.
What “gross disempowerment and political meekness of Muslims” all over Europe is he talking about? Think of all the no-go areas, in France, Germany, the U.K., Sweden, where Muslims rule and the representatives of the state — police and firemen — must enter only with great caution. Think of the Muslims who commandeer public spaces, including streets and squares, where they pray together, blocking pedestrians and traffic. Muslims engage in sexual assaults on those women who, as non-Muslims, are deemed to be fair game. Think of the thousands of girls whose lives have been ruined by the Muslim grooming gangs in the United Kingdom. Muslim rates of criminality are, depending on the country, from 2-4 times that of non-Muslims, including non-Muslim immigrants. Muslim students in France have objected to studying certain subjects, such as the Crusades, the history of the French monarchy, the Enlightenment and, of course, the Holocaust. Does all that suggest the “political weakness of Muslims”?
Khaled Abou El Fald needn’t worry that Muslims have abandoned Tariq Ramadan. Some have signed online petitions demanding he be freed. Just one of them has 155,000 signatures. They’ve held demonstrations in favor of Ramadan in front of French embassies and consulates around the world. They haven’t forgotten that Tariq Ramadan is “one of the world’s foremost Islamic scholars” and a “towering intellect” — making him very much like, come to think of it, another star in the firmament of Islamic faith — none other than Professor Khaled Abou El Fadl himself.
gravenimage says
Khaled Abou El Fadl: Tariq Ramadan is the New Dreyfus
………………
How *dare* the Infidels take charges of rape seriously? Don’t they know that this is not a crime in Islam if the victims are Infidels or lax Muslims?
Ibrahim itace muhammed says
Liar Gravenimage, what are authorities that muslim raping Infidel lady is not a crime as you and Mr spencer has been spewing? In my previous comment I made it clear that a Muslim can only have sex with a war captive (ma malakat aimanihim) in a valid jihad fighting and assigned to him and he put her in his family system,which means having sex with even war captive not assigned is a rape (if not consensual) and Zina if consensual. In this issue non of the alleged Victims is a war captive.Ignorant liar Gravenimage and Mr spencer assume that a muslims could just take an infidel lady wherever he finds her and have sex with her as sex slave. whoever does that is liable to death penalty for rape or zina (if the sex is consensual) according to sharia. Alas! Mr spencer knows this settled position of Islam ,yet he continues saying muslims can rape Infidel ladies whereever they find them citing Quranic verses and Hadiths. This is an intellectual dishonesty.
Michael Copeland says
“Their women are yours to take. Allah made them yours. Why don’t you enslave them?”
Sheikh Saad al Beraik
Andy says
Oh, Canada
Meanwhile in Canada You have a paper Canadian African Muslim from Somalia as a “Canadian” immigration Minister???
Ahmed Hussen Has Got to Go
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pS_ApoSdqNM
Ibrahim itace muhammed says
Michael, you an ignorant fool. The sheikh was referring to Quranic verse saying chaste women among Christians and Jews are permissible for Muslims tò marry, not have sex with them outside marriage as you have misconceived.If you don’t know anything, why commenting?Remember,your churchmen have been having anus and vaginal sex with kids under their care,is that not more heinous crime than what Ramadan was alleged to have committed, yet non of them was incarcerated.
Andy says
To:
Ibrahim itace muhammed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sp_LA2qE4aM
gravenimage says
Michael Copeland wrote:
“Their women are yours to take. Allah made them yours. Why don’t you enslave them?”
Sheikh Saad al Beraik
Ibrahim itace muhammed replied:
Michael, you an ignorant fool. The sheikh was referring to Quranic verse saying chaste women among Christians and Jews are permissible for Muslims tò marry, not have sex with them outside marriage as you have misconceived.If you don’t know anything, why commenting?
………………………
This is what Sheikh Saad al-Beraik actually said in full:
“Muslim Brothers in Palestine, do not have any mercy neither compassion on the Jews, their blood, their money, their flesh. Their women are yours to take, legitimately. God made them yours. Why don”t you enslave their women? Why don”t you wage jihad? Why don”t you pillage them?”
https://www.jpost.com/Blogs/Fighting-Back/The-Real-Islamophobia-365217
Pretending that this is about consensual marriage is, of course, ludicrous. It is just as Michael Copeland said–it is about abducting Jewish women and using them as sex slaves, just as Muslims have done for centuries.
More:
Remember,your churchmen have been having anus and vaginal sex with kids under their care,is that not more heinous crime than what Ramadan was alleged to have committed, yet non of them was incarcerated.
………………………
The idea that pedophilia is legal in the West is, of course, absurd–this is not Dar-al-Islam (Ibrahim itace muhammed has affirmed that Muslims can “marry” children no matter how young).
Rape and pedophilia are both illegal in the civilized world, much to this Mohammedan’s chagrin.
BC says
The dishonesty is yours Muhammad and you are as dishonest as your ‘prophet’. It is a well known and well established fact that Muslim men in many cases, and as your clerics have stated think that unveiled women are like uncovered meat.
There are many cases taking place all the time in Western countries where Muslims choose to abide, but not to abide by the law of the land in which they are uninvited guests. They even cannot keep their dirty hands off small children, including unprotected Muslim children in refugee centres, without mentioning adults.The only laws they choose to follow are the laws of Islam
Ibrahim itace muhammed says
Ignorant liar Gravenimage, the Quran used “warptives”,not abducted or kidnapped persons, which means it is not permissible to abduct Infidel women and kidnap their children even if they are from hostile Infidel nations. The condition is those hostile combatants captured at battle front together with members of their family.
Julea Bacall says
A woman is a female human being. Never ever should anyone rape her, not even a husband. Especially Not a husband who claims to love. A big problem is Qur’an does not teach right from wrong but only old Warlord rules. Never,ever should anyone rape or have slaves, whether you dislike the place they came from or not. Slavery is too WRONG. Rape is too wrong. I feel sure you know that. I know its hard to find out we were NOT all told all the truth by people….parents, governments, preachers whatever. It happens in some degree to all of us. But we all are capable of realizing what is actually true. We are. rationalizing, pretending, looking the other way, following the crowd etc is all easy but not real.
gravenimage says
The foul Ibrahim itace muhammed wrote:
Ignorant liar Gravenimage, the Quran used “warptives”,not abducted or kidnapped persons, which means it is not permissible to abduct Infidel women and kidnap their children even if they are from hostile Infidel nations. The condition is those hostile combatants captured at battle front together with members of their family.
…………………
No, there is no such word as “warptives”. Ibrahim itace muhammed probably means “war captives”.
This is a distinction without a difference–seizing non-combatants and enslaving them is no different from abduction and kidnapping–in fact, it *is* abduction and kidnapping.
Civilized Infidels are not taking “war captives” and raping them and using them as sex slaves. Muslims have *sacralized* this savagery, though.
Moreover, the “Prophet” Muhammed regularly invaded people’s lands and raped and enslaved any woman and children they got their hands on.
This is–as Ibrahim itace muhammed well knows–mainstream Islam.
gravenimage says
The appalling Ibrahim itace muhammed wrote:
Liar Gravenimage, what are authorities that muslim raping Infidel lady is not a crime as you and Mr spencer has been spewing? In my previous comment I made it clear that a Muslim can only have sex with a war captive (ma malakat aimanihim) in a valid jihad fighting and assigned to him and he put her in his family system,which means having sex with even war captive not assigned is a rape (if not consensual) and Zina if consensual. In this issue non of the alleged Victims is a war captive.
………………………..
The appalling Ibrahim itace muhammed is here confirming that Muslims can rape Infidels and keep them as sex slaves. The “Prophet” Muhammed raped his victims and kept them as sex slaves, and in fact chided his thuggish “companions” for *not* raping their captives.
To this day Muslim nations arrest, flog, and even stone rape victims to death, either for reporting the rape or for being impregnated by their rapist–because in Islam rape cannot be “proven” unless it is attested to by four adult male Muslims.
More:
Ignorant liar Gravenimage and Mr spencer assume that a muslims could just take an infidel lady wherever he finds her and have sex with her as sex slave. whoever does that is liable to death penalty for rape or zina (if the sex is consensual) according to sharia. Alas! Mr spencer knows this settled position of Islam ,yet he continues saying muslims can rape Infidel ladies whereever they find them citing Quranic verses and Hadiths. This is an intellectual dishonesty.
………………………..
Where have Muslims *ever* been given the death penalty for raping Infidels? I cannot find a single case in Dar-al-Islam. Prosecution even for the rape of Muslim women is vanishingly rare, and usually has more to do with class or wealth (if the victim’s family was of a higher status than the rapist) where it ever does happen.
The fact is that the victim is more likely to be prosecuted than the rapist under Islam.
strong aingel says
It apears Mr Ramadon has ben treating the women as Foundlings then (RotT k28.1). That said some of them were muslima and if he is found guilty “it is ” Permissible to kill rapists forthwith Book o7.5 …
Michael Copeland says
Exactly: one rule for the “best of peoples raised up for mankind” and another for the filthy kuffar.
Hear the “towering intellect”, the “prominent Muslim scholar”, Ramadan himself:
“Tell the infidels in public, ‘we respect your laws and your constitutions’, which we Muslims believe that these are as worthless as the paper they are written on. The only law we must respect and apply is the Shari’a.”
https://gatesofvienna.net/2018/01/tariq-ramadan-freedom-of-conscience/
gravenimage says
+1
J D S says
The reason Muslims fight RAPE charges so hard is simply because in the Muslim world…There is no such thing as rape…..After all their ” perfect man” muhammad ( if he ever actually existed) was a rapist and pedophile….So why would they not use a “self” esteemed elite lawyer from UCLA….(how did he get his job?) -to defend Tariq Ramadan in the press and other ways, and probably have the best lawyer in the country to defend him in the courts…Let’s put it this way. ..if the common man…not “the perfect?man” was being tried for these crimes The jailers would already be digging a hole under the jail to put him even before he was convicted…What a farce this Tariq Ramadan has turned out to be.
What a farce all this Muslim “invasion..for a better word” has brought upon the free people’s of the world.
Am I a racist or islamophobic? NO! Just someone who sees through what they are doing and want none of it for my country or any part of the free world.
i
Ibrahim itace muhammed says
J D S, do you know that your satan god you call Holy Spirit is a homosexual and shares sex activities with you whenever you have sex with your women smearing his horrible bad smells on them? that is why your women produce disgusting bad smells.
gravenimage says
This is the kind of irrational insanity pious Muslims like Ibrahim itace muhammed come up with when you say you oppose rape.
Carol the 1st says
We can only speculate as to how a creep like Ibby gets to smell so many.unsanitary butts.
gravenimage says
True, Carol. He is obsessed with this.
Savvy Kafir says
Agreed. I want the same amount of Islam in the civilized world as cholera-infected s**t in my drinking water.
That analogy seems more & more apt every day.
Emilie Green says
When I went to Professor Khaled Abou El Fadl’s website I was indeed intimidated. All the distinctions, the prominences, the prolific scholarly works, the countless influences of the intellect emanating from one of the 50 smartest people of the Islamic faith in the entire world burst out on my screen with an intensity of light so great that my entire office basement became illuminated, preventing me from seeing one word from the great one himself. Alas, I’m an unworthy.
lol. Too bad Tom Wolfe has laid down his pen. This Khaled buffoon would serve as a great example of Wolfe’s fine art.
gravenimage says
Ha ha
Andy says
Words of Wisdom
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzwe2tuOXIE
DBM echo says
Here he hands out a word salad of incredible nonsense that every listener to this foolishness should be asking, “They pay this guy?”
Khaled Abou El Fadl – Islamic Law and the Rights of Others [it must be a gag topic since Islam doesn’t have the Golden Rule, and has 1400 years of brutality to Others to prove it, along with millions of deaths]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dAiRGGNkZ0
Michael Copeland says
Is this a Monty Python sketch?
Billy Chickens says
Look at him … surrounded by books he probably never read. Oh wait. He wrote them all.
Wellington says
Khaled Abou El Fadl and Tariq Ramadan. Two examples of what all free peoples face if we let skunks like these two lecture us on what is right and wrong. So, excellent exposure of another Muslim skunk by Hugh Fitzgerald.
I would add that I find any Muslim who is a professor of law in a free country like America an insult to liberty. Might as well have a Neo-Nazi, a KKK member, an anarchist or a Marxist as a professor of law at an institution of higher learning in a free Western nation as have a Muslim as such.
No difference; none whatsoever, since Islam is as much a mortal enemy of freedom and equality under the law as the other heinous, egregious belief systems (or organization) that I already mentioned. Any devout Muslim who is a professor of law at any American law school is, at best, a complete fool, at worst, a deceiver of the first rank. No exceptions.
Frank Anderson says
Wellington, I spent 3 years in law school, with more or less 2 dozen professors. There were some who were devoted liberals and others who displayed no personal preferences. My law school was not ranked highly but did well enough that I passed 2 bar exams each on the first try, and still have my licenses after soon to be 38 years in spite of many challenges. If going to a “top-ranked” law school means listening to evil liars like this, I did well with my choice. The problem with bad professors is that they not only give bad information, but also bad grades to those who see through their lies.
Susan B says
“The problem with bad professors is that they not only give bad information, but also bad grades to those who see through their lies.”
So the brightest and the most qualified need to fail or to sell their souls to pass. There in lies the state of professionals in the west. Liars and soul sellers.
Frank Anderson says
Susan B, that was the reason I left accounting school. I was trying to find a way to recover from reporting criminal conduct as a lawyer. I worked too hard to earn my law licenses, and then to keep them, to throw them away because of nothing more than self-serving corruption.
Julea Bacall says
I don’t think he aid they were ALL bad.
Wellington says
My sister is an attorney as well, Frank, and she has told me that in her experience the worst lawyers for sheer competency are Ivy League grads. I have heard this from other lawyers too. Where I went to law school the attrition rate was around 40%. Sure this law school took more applicants than an Ivy league law school like Penn does, but it was well known when I went to law school back in the 1980’s that if you could get into an Ivy school it was almost impossible to flunk out of one.
Frank Anderson says
Wellington, mine was a third. Once the first year was complete, the entering class of 320 dropped to 230, allowing for a few transfers in for some reason. One of my favorite professors, who prepared me well for civil procedure and conflict of law on the bar exams, also demonstrated many good qualities in class as he showed points of issues that I had not considered before. He had his views that were not concealed. But he never punished any who differed. I will always be grateful.
Frank Anderson says
P.S. When I went to accounting school about 10 years after finishing law school, I was in the final course of the undergraduate program, Auditing, and halfway through the Masters program. The professor teaching the Auditing course had to teach and grade according to the various accounting societies’ rules and requirements, including a clearly illegal view of non-existent accountant-client confidentiality. The whole purpose of hiring an accountant is to produce in a common language a report of financial condition and conduct that others can read and understand.
This professor was not evil, nor was he a liar. But the rules were flatly illegal from research that I spent about a year doing for articles that I hoped to be published. I explained to him that I had to drop the course and end my effort because if I wrote what was required to pass the course, and the bars of the states who issued my licenses found out, I would almost certainly be disbarred. Shortly after that Enron, WorldCom, Adelphia and Tyco “irregularities” made the headlines, accounting firms merged, and accountants went to jail. I am not sure whether the rules have changed.
We know the rules of islam have not changed because they are final, perfect, complete and unchangeable. We also know that islam teaches that lying to infidels is always permitted and encouraged whenever advantage can be obtained. How can we get those who are not collaborators or traitors to see that?
Julea Bacall says
What an excellent example of wrong beliefs (for some agenda or just innocently passed on as ‘truth’) causing such harmful/wrong actions.
Frank Anderson says
J.B. the professor was teaching exactly what was required by the AICPA for the students to pass the CPA examination. Completely contrary to the law (The law recognizes no accountant-client privilege or confidentiality) the AICPA required accountants under its discipline to refrain from reporting criminal or fraudulent conduct until ordered by a court of competent jurisdiction. That is why a number of “Big 7” accounting firms merged (more correctly collapsed) in the wake of their self-serving deliberate ignorance of corporate fraud and misconduct. The AICPA claimed that it could discipline an accountant who obeyed the law, by reporting criminal conduct, in violation of AICPA rules. With “anonymous” grading, I could not be the only person in the class to point this out on a test. Nor could I write flatly illegal statements to pass a test and then face charges of misconduct with the bar.
AICPA was not alone as an organization calling for a self-granted, self-serving, illegal confidentiality, because who will hire an accountant or lawyer that will report misconduct? “Deliberate ignorance constitutes knowledge of the truth.” Wyle v. R.J. Reynolds, 709 F.2d 585 (9th Cir. 1983). Deliberately ignorant accountants wound up in jail. And customers and shareholders lost hundreds of billions of dollars.
Flavius Claudius Iulianus says
Haaaaaaaaaa!!!
These Mohammadans, they are so self-consistent (sarc).
They blame the Jews for everything and then equate themselves to the plight of the Jews.
Susan B says
+1
Westman says
El Fadl: “So why do I write? I write first because as a Muslim, I am outraged by the embarrassing silence of Muslim organizations and leaders before the undeniable lynching of a prominent Muslim scholar.”
For being a brilliant lawyer El Fadl is certainly short on understanding of what image means to Muslim Organizations. They have been silenced BY embarrassment about the undeniable actions of Tariq Ramadan, who, by his own admission, made frequent visits to a prostitute and committed adultery.
Regardless of the outcome of the rape trial, Tariq has done a “Jimmy Swaggart” and can never be held forward again as a Muslim scholar of good character. And no “Islamophobe” is responsible for it – Tariq did it to himself. His good character facade was fake and no lawyer, not even the superlative, “self-described best of the best”, lying El Fadl, can restore it.
It seems the “embarrassing silent” Muslim Organizations have suddenly became more intelligent than El Fadl, who still thinks there is mileage in a dead horse. One would guess they wish El Fadl would be silent and stop digging the hole deeper.
Westman says
Perhaps some “Muslim Organizations” are also asking, “What is S & M?”
jewcat says
‘What is S & M?’
Islam. Both sadistic and masochistic together.
infidel says
TIME TO SEPARATE THE LIBERAL FROM THE LEFT. This is a MUST READ art from India for all JW readers..
https://swarajyamag.com/politics/time-to-separate-the-liberal-from-the-left
Angel says
Khaled Abou El Fadl is a joke. A fat, ugly and immensely idiotic joke. No matter how many of his lectures any sane person will suffer through, it is impossible to make any sense out of his incoherent verbiage. It’s a good thing he has himself to cheer himself as such a star, because no one else in his/her right mind can do the same. He is the epitome of intellectual fraud. Kudos to Hugh Fitzgerald for spending so much time and writing in such excruciating details what in the end amounts to nothing, coming from someone who is not worth wasting 1/10 of the time needed to do so. The guy is a complete idiot and should be simply ignored.
Hugh Fitzgerald says
I don’t think he should be ignored; he has an endowed chair at the University of California; he publishes; he has a following. He deserves to be held up for inspection and the ridicule that his own paean to himself, his website, naturally provokes. .
gravenimage says
Very much agree, Hugh.
Jaladhi says
Why are such charlatans working in the US universities?? All such “Islamic experts” should be fired as the students get nothing but the lies about Islam!! When will our universities realizes this??
Frank Anderson says
I have a highly regarded friend who is a rabbi. A Ph.D is approximately 77 semester hours, or about 3 years of work after a Bachelor’s degree. The rabbinical education is 5 years after a Bachelor’s. In the course of that 5 years, a muslim professor lied to this man; and he refused ever after to even consider any other voice about islam. This started for the rabbi well over 30 years ago. These “token” muslims have been around a long time and doing a lot of damage to the truth.
End PC says
What universities realize is that there is big money in PC diversity of subjects, bogus or not. They are a money & leftist influence making racket.
Ibrahim itace muhammed says
Dirty Hindu barbarian Jaladhi, you mean for muslim experts to be replaced with Idol worshipers because most Americans are mithraist christians whose religion is inspired by the same satan who inspired filthy idol worships? Remember ,Muslims outnumber Hindu barbarians in the evil United States and as such they have to protest for the fear that they could be polluted with savage ideas like using sticks or iron rods to have sex with outcaste ladies instead of penises. Jaladhi, when last you did it?
gravenimage says
Of course, Muslims are mostly “experts” in Taqiyya and stealth Jihad.
And the number of Hindus and Muslims in the US is roughly the same–about 1% for each.
And he has said this last many times–that Muslims raping Infidels is Halal as long as they use their penises. Just appalling.
Douglas J Light says
Send him into exile on Devil’s Island if he really wants to become a martyr like Alfred Dreyfus.
Jak says
What a freak! Izlammic jurisprudence? Now there is a true oxymoron. When there was real legal scholarship this ass would be “drummed out of the corps”
The Istanbulian says
It was not enough to steal their culture and land. Now muslims are stealing their martyrs. El Fatl want to volunteer yourself first for some gas chambers? No? Thought not. He will keep stealing – especially snacks after midnight.
gravenimage says
Here’s the foul Khaled Abou El Fadl on his grotesquely named “Search for Beauty” blog whitewashing child rape:
https://www.searchforbeauty.org/2016/06/30/my-good-friend-confronted-me-on-the-issue-of-the-prophet-s-wife-aisha-and-asked-did-muhammad-rape-a-child-i-was-disturbed-and-confounded-and-did-not-answer/