TAREK FATAH (SO WELL NAMED) SLAMS WAFA SULTAN…PLEASE SEE NOTE
FATAH (SO APPOSITELY NAMED) IS ONE OF THOSE “MODERATES” WHO MAKE THE SYNAGOGUE INTERFAITH APPEARANCES WITH THEIR DISINFORMATION…..READ JOANNE HILL’S RESPONSE AND THEN HIS…..PLEASE…..RSK
Tarek Fatah: From an ex-Muslim, true Islamophobia
Posted: March 12, 2010, 10:00 AM by NP Editor
Tarek Fatah
The words stung me like a jolt of electricity: “Muhammad was a child rapist.†As if the slur were not sufficient, the speaker then insinuated my Islamic faith was filth. “I am ‘clean’ of Islam,†she sneered to her Toronto audience. As far as hate speech goes, the shoe was suddenly on the other foot.
For years, radical Islamists have cited freedom of speech to defend their attacks on Christians, Jews, Hindus and liberal non-observant Muslims. A hateful tone is never far from the surface — although great care is taken to couch this cancer in ambiguity and double-speak. Take for instance the Toronto imam caught on videotape praying to Allah for the “defeat of the kufaar,†a thinly disguised reference to Christians and Jews.
As a Muslim, I learned very early in life to walk in my adversaries’ shoes to feel their pain. This is why I have not shied away from calling a spade a spade and outing the segregationist hate mongers within my community, an effort that has paid dividends in the slow decline of overt anti-Semitism and Hindu-hatred in the public religious discourse of Western Muslims.
But last week, it was not a Muslim cleric whose speech traumatized me; it was the words of an ex-Muslim.
Even a hardened secular Muslim such as myself was deeply hurt by what I heard that evening. I also was disappointed that the speech was at a synagogue, and the audience almost all Jews.
The speaker who caused me this anguish was Wafa Sultan, the Syrian-born American who shot to fame after her appearance on Al Jazeera Television in 2006, where she tore into the arguments of cleric Ibrahim al-Khouli about the ills of Muslim society. The 30-second clip went viral and won great acclaim even among Muslims who respected her for her candid and honest critique of what ails us as a people.
However, instead of using her newfound fame to challenge the established theocracies and corrupt kingdoms of the Middle east, Sultan veered off the deep end and could not resist the temptation of becoming the poster child of Islam haters, joining their ranks with the fervour of a convert.
Inside a Toronto synagogue last week, where she was debating with Prof. Daniel Pipes whether moderate Islam was a Western ally or a Western myth, Dr. Sultan wasted no time in lashing out at her former faith. Catering to the fears of her predominantly Jewish audience, she said, “Muhammad was a Jew killer.†To further inflame the crowd, Wafa Sultan delivered an astonishing account of how the Prophet had slaughtered Jews and then raped the wife of the defeated Jewish tribe.
The vitriol was so severe, it was left to the two Jewish speakers at the debate, the moderator Avi Benlolo and Prof. Pipes to praise Muslims and mention the fact that moderate Muslims were rising up against extremism. Benlolo specifically mentioned the recent 600-page fatwa by the Pakistani cleric Tahir ul Qadri denouncing suicide bombing and terrorism.
However, Wafa Sultan would not have any of that. She chided both Benlolo and Pipes for their naïveté. “There is no moderate Islam,†she wagged her finger at Pipes. There was only one Islam, she claimed — the Islam of rape, murder and hate.
To his credit — and this will surprise many of his Muslim naysayers — Daniel Pipes reminded his Jewish audience that Islam was not the bogeyman it has been made out to be. “Remember, for over 1,000 years, whenever Jews needed a place for sanctuary, they got it in Muslim lands … The problem is not Islam, it is Islamism,†he told them.
I left the synagogue deeply disturbed. In the fight against Islamofascism, Wafa Sultan’s hatred of Islam was cultivating the very forces she claims to be exposing. When a questioner asked her “What is the solution?†she just shrugged her shoulders. Perhaps the answer she had in mind was too outrageous even by her own standards: Force Muslims to convert or die.
Five hundred years ago, Isabel and Ferdinand “cleansed†Spain of Islam and Muslims, but we are still here. Surely, we can think of more productive solutions — and devote our attention to more productive minds — than this.
National Post
Tarek Fatah is the author of Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State. His next book, Unveiling the Myths that Fuel Muslim Anti-Semitism (McClelland & Stewart), will be launched in October 2010
By Joanne Hill
Tarek Fatah has used the National Post to present a one-sided, inaccurate and potentially dangerous editorial about statements made by Dr. Wafa Sultan during her March 3rd debate in Toronto with Dr. Daniel Pipes.
Mr. Fatah’s article is not an unbiased report: it is an opinion piece full of loaded terms such as slur, attack, hateful, anguish, Islam haters and vitriol. He misquotes Dr. Sultan and presents as fact a conclusion that is not supported by any of her statements: a conclusion that I believe puts her life in danger.
I am a freelance reporter; I covered the debate between Dr. Pipes and Dr. Sultan for the Jewish Tribune. I have an audio recording of the entire event, including the Question and Answer period, so I can state with complete accuracy what was and was not said by Dr. Sultan.
Mr. Fatah assumes the authority of a mind-reader to reveal what he claims is Dr. Sultan’s hidden intention. Given his first-hand experience of the eagerness of some Muslims (or “Islamists” if he would prefer) to issue death threats against anyone who is perceived as threatening Muslims, there are three reasons why I find it disturbing that he would attribute to Dr. Sultan this motivation: “Perhaps the answer she had in mind was too outrageous even by her own standards: Force Muslims to convert or die.”
This is disturbing, first of all, because Dr. Sultan said nothing that would lead the listener to come to this conclusion. When asked during the Q&A, “How do you get Muslims to reform? Do you expect them to convert to another religion?” Dr. Sultan replied:
“Give them the freedom to choose: that’s all I’m asking for. Give them the freedom to search, to ask, to be exposed to different sides, different values, different lifestyles. I can tell you from my very own experience, what has helped me to reform myself is being exposed to Western values and being free to express my conclusion. I always compare between my life under Islamic Sharia and my life as a free woman in America and I write about that on my website in Arabic. So when you expose people to different [sic], and you give them the freedom to choose, that’s all we need in the Islamic world. I’m not asking [them] to convert to a different religion; I’m asking to grant them the freedom to choose, the freedom to be, to follow whatever path they want to follow. That’s all.”
Second, this is what Dr. Sultan said at the conclusion of the Q & A:
“I’m not speaking up against Islam to please anyone but my conscience. We suffer a lot under Islamic Sharia. It is not fair. Enough is enough. We need to live our lives as human beings. I want you to know I’m not here to incite anyone against Muslims. Muslims are my family: my Mom, my brother, my sister. You know, I cannot peel off my own skin. I feel sorry for them because they are victims of a very hateful ideology. Really, if you take a look at any Islamic country, what do you see? Nothing but miserable situations, especially women who are living in this society. So I am speaking up to save them, looking for a better future for them. And believe it or not, when it comes to my readers in the Arab world, I feel it is easier for me to address my thoughts than to penetrate the Western mind. People in the West live by the Western ethical code which doesn’t allow them to judge people based on their religion – and there’s nothing wrong with that-but they need to know that Islam is not merely a religion: it is also a political ideology and that’s what I am fighting. That’s what I am speaking up against. And I hope one day, the future for our generation in the Muslim world will be much better than the life I lived under Islamic Sharia in Syria.”
And third, the terrible, secret motivation which Mr. Fatah attributes to Dr. Sultan is in fact a commandment made by Mohammed to his followers regarding non-Muslims:
“Fight in the name of Allah and in the way of Allah. Fight against those who disbelieve in Allah. Make a holy war… When you meet your enemies who are polytheists, invite them to three courses of action. If they respond to any one of these, you also accept it and withhold yourself from doing them any harm. Invite them to (accept) Islam; if they respond to you, accept it from them and desist from fighting against them… If they refuse to accept Islam, demand from them the Jizya. If they agree to pay, accept it from them and hold off your hands. If they refuse to pay the tax, seek Allah’s help and fight them.” (Source: Sahih Muslim Book 19, Hadith #4294.)
There is more.
Contrary to what Mr. Fatah writes, Dr. Sultan did not say: “Muhammed was a child rapist.”
Rather, she said: “As a married man, Mohammed raped Aisha when she was nine; he was 54.”
If Mr. Fatah is hurt by this statement, perhaps he should consider the source: Islamic doctrine. I challenge Mr. Fatah to deny this.
When she said, “There is no moderate Islam,” Dr. Sultan stated quite clearly, more than once, that she was quoting the Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who said in 2007 in response to the term “moderate Islam”: “These descriptions are very ugly, it is offensive and an insult to our religion. There is no moderate or immoderate Islam. Islam is Islam and that’s it.”
Again, perhaps Mr. Fatah should take umbrage with Mr. Erdogan unless he, like the people who took Macleans Magazine to the “human rights” courts, would suggest that it is no longer permissible in Canada to quote Muslims when they have said something unpleasant about Islam.
I was paying close attention throughout the debate and at no time did I see Dr. Sultan sneer. She did not say, per Mr. Fatah, “I am ‘clean’ of Islam.”
Dr. Sultan was speaking of the long, difficult process of breaking free from a religious upbringing that has been embedded in one’s psyche from childhood. She said, “It is not an easy process: it is very tough. I still behave, in many ways, as a Muslim. I debate in a way [that] I am right and everybody else is wrong.” This drew laughter and applause from the audience. Dr. Sultan continued, “So it’s under my skin. I don’t follow a specific religion. Of course I believe in God and I am empowered by Him.”
Mr. Fatah writes that he was “traumatized” by Dr. Sultan’s words. If this is truly the case, I would suggest that Mr. Fatah’s sensitive feelings render him too delicate for this Western society in which he has chosen to live, because we in the free world are not required to continually couch our statements in qualifiers or cushion our strong words. Dr. Sultan spoke plainly and strongly about her personal experience as a woman raised in an Islamic country under Sharia law. Contrary to Mr. Fatah’s characterization, she was funny, down-to-earth and as far from hateful as one can get.
Besides, even if Dr. Sultan does hate Islam, what business is that of Mr. Fatah’s? Is she not entitled to her express own opinion? As a Christian, I was irked when Dr. Pipes said that Christianity “started on a much lower base” than Islam. But so what? Only a fool would deny the history of crimes committed by Christians against Jews.
Why was Avi Benlolo required to spend at least 20 minutes after the debate placating the hurt feelings and smoothing the ruffled feathers of a self-described “hardened secular Muslim” who is supposed to be on the side of freedom of religion and freedom of speech?
I see at the bottom of Mr. Fatah’s article that his upcoming book is entitled, Unveiling the Myths that Fuel Muslim Anti- Semitism. On the night of the debate, Mr. Fatah informed Avi Benlolo (in my presence) without a trace of irony that his new book was going to be called, Why We Hate Jews.
Unlike Mr. Fatah, I will not presume to know his motivation in saying that to Mr. Benlolo or in writing his misleading editorial about Dr. Sultan. I will say, however, that I believe he owes Dr. Sultan, this newspaper and its readers an apology and a retraction.
National Post
AND FINALLY FATAH’S LIMP RESPONSE….
by TarekFatah
Mar 12 2010
7:20 PM
I am glad Joanne Hill has reproduced the exact quote from the speech of Wafa Sultan where she says: “As a married man, Mohammed raped Aisha when she was nine; he was 54.”How did I misquote her when I say Wafa Sultan accused Muhammad of being a child rapist?She accuses Muhammad of having raped a child and then her apoligist have the audacity to say there was nothing hateful about the statement!
Joanne Hill then asks, “Besides, even if Dr. Sultan does hate Islam, what business is that of Mr. Fatah’s?”
It is my business when the podium of a synagogue is used to spew hate against my religion, specially from a woman who was totally making up her story as she spoke.Wafa Sultan has not lived a single day under sharia law, yet her hosts and Joanne Hill have no problem making that claim. Jonanne writes:
“Dr. Sultan spoke plainly and strongly about her personal experience as a woman raised in an Islamic country under Sharia law.” Nonsense. Syria is a secular dictatorship under the Baath Party where those asking for sharia law have been bombed into smithereens in Hama and stay locked up in prison.
As far as saying that there is “no moderate Islam,” yes, Wafa Sultan did quote the Turkish PM, but it was to bolster her own argument, not to report on what the Turkish leader had said about Islam.She was repeatedly contradicted by Prof. Pipes and the long quote reproduced above, carefully avoids what Pipes said in response. Wafa, on more than one occasion simply shrugged her shoulders and had no answer to what was the solution.
The nonsense about her wish that Muslims were given a choice, reflects the woman’s total ignorance of the Muslim world. Only in the last year 500 million Muslims have exercised their choice and have voted to defeat sharia-promoting Islamists in Indonesia, Bangladesh and Pakistan.
Millions more march in Iran against the ayatollahs, but their chant id “Allah O Akbar”, not that “Muhammad is a rapist.” In Turkey, where Muslims have a choice, they have unfortunately chosen Islamists as have the people of Gaza and earlier Algeria.
Every hatemonger has always claimed they have no hatred towards the people they express hate. Not even the epitome of hate Mahmoud Ahmedinejad says that he hates Jews. It is what one says and does that matters, not what one proclaims as one’s defence to cover up a hateful slur like saying Muhammad raped a child.
I do not have to apologize to any hate-monger and specially those who use the house of God to spew contempt, be they Muslim or ex-Muslim.
The problem of hate is that it is almost always the victims of hate who feel it. Those who inflict hate and practise bigotry, bot racial and religious, rarely ever feel the pain of the victim. This is why there are so many non-Muslims claiming no hate was involved in her speech.
Which again begs the question:
1. Is there a Muslim who feels the words of Wafa Sultan that Prophet Muhammad raped a 9-year old Aisha as 57-year old married man were not hateful?
2. If accusing the most important man in Islam of rape is not judged as hatred towards that religion and his followers, then what would be classified as hate?
When Joanne Hill says, “Contrary to Mr. Fatah’s characterization, she was funny, down-to-earth and as far from hateful as one can get,” it reminds me of the time when it was acceptable for speakers to mock minorities, make fun of their leaders and the audience would find it “funny”. Not so funny for the one Muslim sitting among the 500.
It is also quite revealing that not one member of the audience found it objectionable that a synagogue was being used to slam the Prophet of Islam as a child rapist. Not one person raised an objection. We were reminded that the synagogue was a ‘house of sanctuary’ and that anyone causing trouble will be expelled from the assembly. Yet, calling the founder of Islam, a child rapist was deemed totally appropriate. Referring to Muhammad as a Jew killer seemed just fine to the 500 attendees.
When hate against Jews and Christians is spewed in mosques, I can say with al humility that I stand up and object and more than one occasion staged a walkout.
Fighting hate is meaningless if that fight is selfishly reserved for one’s own religious or racial community. I will not apologize for outing hate speech whether it is delivered by a Muslim or an ex-Muslim being honoured in a Synagogue.
As far as the title of my book, the Post has the sub-heading. Here is the full title:
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