It is refreshing to see a far-left outfit such as the Guardian come out for the freedom of expression and against Denmark’s capitulation to Sharia blasphemy laws, but its dismissal of Qur’an burnings as “bigotry” is shallow and propagandistic. Salwan Momika, who has engaged in a series of Qur’an desecrations in Sweden, is not a […]
Hugh Fitzgerald: Kenan Malik and the Art that Connects Europe and Islam
Recently an article — “Look at art for the deep connection between Europe and Islam” — appeared in the Guardian. The author, Kenan Malik, sometimes a critic of, and sometimes a sly apologist for, Islam, claimed that there was a deep respect in Renaissance Europe for the world of Islam. “Embodied in the Renaissance view […]
UK’s Guardian claims Arabic in Renaissance painting shows “deep connection between Europe and Islam”
The writing in the halos is actually not Arabic, but Pseudo-Kufic: Renaissance-era Europeans thought that the Arabic script was that which was used in Jesus’ time, so they thought that they were lending some historical authenticity to their representations by including some characters that resembled Arabic. That is all that is going on in Gentile […]