"Experts" on Islam and the MidEast

Bah! Anyone these days can claim to be an expert on anything. Why, just the other day, my cousin claimed that he's an expert in Tae Kwon Do... and he only has the green belt. Well, you get the idea.

But what I want to focus on is that there are many people out there who claim to be experts but are in the least bit knowledgeable about anything in the Middle East, concerning political, social, societal and religious affairs, etc, as well as Islam itself. I'll be focusing on several for this post.

The first is the hatemongering neoconservative propagandist Daniel Pipes. To start off, Daniel Pipes lives in the United States. He does not live in the Middle East, and I doubt he has been there long enough to know much about the place. Also, he's a Zionist, and a far right one at that, which makes his articles heavily opinionated. He claims to be an expert on what he calls "militant Islam". What the hell is "militant" Islam? Well, it's obvious that he objects to the fact that Islam is a peaceful religion, making him a full-blooded Islamophobe. What's more ironic is that he was appointed to the governmentally funded U.S. Institute for Peace. The irony is that Daniel Pipes does not want peace, although Dubya Bush, who claimed that he wants peace in the Middle East (google "road map"), appointed him. According to motherjones.com's Michael Scherer,

Like many other Middle East scholars, Daniel Pipes sees a way to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But unlike most of his peers, Pipes sees no room for negotiation, no hope for compromise and no use for diplomacy. "What war had achieved for Israel," Pipes explained at a recent Zionist conference in Washington DC, "diplomacy has undone."

His solution is simple: The Israeli military must force what Pipes describes as a "change of heart" by the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza -- a sapping of the Palestinian will to fight which can lead to a complete surrender. "How is a change of heart achieved? It is achieved by an Israeli victory and a Palestinian defeat," Pipes continued. "The Palestinians need to be defeated even more than Israel needs to defeat them."

Obviously, Mr. Pipes is unaware of the so-called "generous" offer at the Oslo Accords, and, more recently, the Camp David Accords. He is also unaware that the PLO, after years of battle against Israel, recognized it and sought for the two-state solution to the conflict.

Moreover, if you take a look at his attitudes towards Muslims and his works, you'll find a sense of paranoia and charisma in capturing the attention of the public and fearmongering against Muslims, who, according to him, could be susceptible to terrorist connections. Moreover, in many instances, he has actually misinterpreted Islamic verses in that "verses of tolerance are cancelled". In the Quran, nothing is cancelled, and nothing is substituted. If the verses truly were cancelled, they wouldn't be taught in Islamic schools today, but I'm getting off-topic.

What makes Daniel Pipes a simple paranoid hate-mongerer is that he actually inhibits intellectual thought, and supposedly fights for what he perceives to be "historical accuracy" in commenting on the MidEast. According to Voltaire-Net.org,

Daniel Pipes became famous as a hunter of the «fifth column» that emerged in American universities. In 2002, he created a section of the MEF, the Campus Watch, «an organization openly aimed at reporting the wrong analysis and the political distortions regarding Middle East studies». According to The Nation, one of the first measures taken by the organization was to open «McCarthy-styled-files» to the different professors they suspected were not quite pro-Israel. As a result, more than a hundred academicians contacted the Campus Watch for they wanted their names to be added to the list. This made Daniel Pipes furious and he described them as «advocates of the suicide attacks and the militant Islam».

What the hell? Since when did pro-Palestinian views become pro-terrorist? And since when were the anti-war crowd anti-peace? If anything, it's Pipes who is pro-terrorist and anti-peace. As the article suggests, Daniel Pipes is a McCarthyist: he'll root out anyone even remotely suspected of being pro-Palestinian or pro-Muslim. The article continues:

Likewise, he used other terms such as «self-hating» or «anti-Americans». In an article titled Americans at Universities who hate the United States, he made fun of all those who, like Noam Chomsky, has denounced the American intervention in Iraq refusing to see the «direct threat» that Saddam Hussein represented to the United States. To spread the idea that academicians and students were blind regarding the Islamic threat, he counted on Martin Kramer’s assistance, current editor in chief of the Middle East Quarterly and the Stanley Kurtz, a member of the Hoover Institution and collaborator of the National Review Online.

Well, he made a case for himself: he equates anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism, as well as Muslims with terrorism. If anyone thinks that Muslims are potential terrorists, they should go see a psychiatrist to address their xenophobia.

Whatever it is, Daniel Pipes is no expert, but a pure propagandist. His knowledge on Islam is lacking, to say the least, but to disspell it would be like disspelling all the myths on Islam, which is what I'm going to do later on.

Let's move on to the next "expert", Irshad Manji, the so-called "Muslim Refusenik". I find it funny that people call her a "Muslim reformist". Islam is not a body that can be changed, and, as I've proved in my addressing of the cartoon controversy, is not a homogeneous group. Moreover, Islam, in my opinion, does NOT need reformation. Shocking for you to hear that from me now, eh? Well, Islam is not being applied correctly in places it is giving a bad impression to the Western world.

However, Irshad Manji has never been to Iran, and knows neither Persian nor Arabic in order to read. She and Daniel Pipes are of the same feather: they flock together in their Islamophobic rantings. She urges outright that madrassas (schools in Islamic countries) teach militancy and intolerance of non-Muslims. While I agree to an extent that there are a few madrassahs in Pakistan and other backwater Muslim countries that teach such discrepancies, I disagree that madrassahs in general are the problem. Most madrassahs are located in Saudi Arabia, and according to the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Education,

At the time the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was founded in 1932, education was not accessible to everyone and limited to individualized instruction at religious schools in mosques in urban areas. These schools taught Islamic law and basic literacy skills. By the end of the century, Saudi Arabia had a nationwide educational system providing free training from preschool through university to all citizens. While the study of Islam remains at its core, the modern Saudi educational system provides quality instruction in diverse fields of modern and traditional arts and sciences. This diversity helps meet the Kingdom's growing need for highly-educated citizens to build on its rapid progress.

This main point that Ms. Manji argues is dispelled easily. Also, many of her main points were destroyed by a real MidEast expert, As'ad Abu Khalil, on DemocracyNow.org., in light of the cartoon controversy. In the interview, As'ad Abu Khalil says of Irshad Manji,

"Who are very much in favor of having people who are very much uniquely focused only on Islam. I mean, as it happens, the other guest writes on Islam without being trained or knowledgeable about it. If she would, she would know that there are many brave souls, free thinkers on the history of Islam who spoke out, and some of them died because they went against conventional wisdom, and they were braver against Islam, the religion. Many of them mocked Muhammed. Many of them mocked the Koran. And some of them lived with their heads on their shoulder, but she is totally ignorant about that, because that’s not her specialty.

I mean, her specialty is polemics against Islam, and that’s something very much appreciated in the United States. Yes, it is true there are many media in the Arab world that have published grotesque anti-Semitic depictions and images. But these are the responsibility of the government, and many of them are allies of the United States. And she is also, again, ignorant – perhaps she doesn’t know any Persian or Arabic -- to know that there’s a big debate and there’s a lot of condemnation about anti-Semitic writings that have come out in some of those publications."

As per this interview, Irshad Manji argues that Islam is a religion that is against freedom and Jews. One could use the same thing regarding Christianity when you take a look at the Dark Ages.

Moreover, if one takes a look at her style, it's obvious that she is voraciously self-hating. She'll think more negatively about Muslims and more positively about Jews, in the sense of racism and prejudice that I have outlined earlier. Also, she bashes Islam for not having peace groups for human rights. Well, to her dismay, she obviously is not an avid net-surfer, and probably has not used Google that much. If she did, she would know that there are organizations like Arabs for Israel, who are Muslim Arabs supportive of Israel; heck, even Al Zawahiri urged for Muslims to help Earthquake Victims. However, Irshad is obviously ignorant of the fact that women and humans in general have equal human rights as prescribed by Islam, which supposedly is her religion.

But enough of Irshad Manji: she and Daniel Pipes are pretty much the same, though she is no rabid Zionist like Pipes is. Let's move on to the next "expert": Robert Spencer. His book, "The Myth of Islamic Tolerance", is the biggest load of bullshit I have ever laid my eyes on. I'm going to dispell his main arguments one by one.

Robert Spencer argues that advocates of Islam have promulgated a myth of Islamic tolerance that can be dispelled by examining the persecution of the Zoroastrians in Iran; the Armenians in Turkey; the Buddhists and Hindus in India; and the Jews in Morocco, Cordoba, Granada, Marrakesh and Baghdad.

What Mr. Spencer doesn't realize is that the Jews in Morocco were attacked mainly by Berber raiders. Still, they don't represent the Islamic Empire. Moreover, the Berbers were mainly against any outsider, and are xenophobic. Granted, there have been cases of intolerance against the Jews, but the thing is, Spencer forgets to mention that the Berbers were also against the Muslim Arabs when they ruled Spain. The Zoroastrians in Iran received the brunt of intolerance when the radical mullahcracy was in power. However, the leadership itself is not representative of the people of Iran, who are just like us: tolerant and human. Also, the Armenians in Turkey were suffering persecution under the Ottoman rule, but so were Muslims in the Arabian Penninsula and Greece. The Hindus in India are not suffering one bit: in fact, the Hindus themselves are attacking Muslim and Christian minorities and forcing them to worship their own gods. The Buddhists are sadly caught in the crossfire. Jews, however, have been persecuted but such isolated incidents can be pointed out elsewhere, such as in places like Northern Ireland, where Catholics and Protestants are lashing out against each other, and Palestine, where Israeli Jews are persecuting Palestinian Christians and Muslims. However, it's not because of Islam or any other religion that provokes intolerance, but rather the changing climate of an area, social and political.

Ibn Warraq discusses the difficulties encountered when attempting to have an honest examination of this topic.

Ibn Warraq is himself an apostate, but, like most apostates, takes Islam at face-value. According to Irfan Khawaja, who read his book "Why I am not a Muslim",

"Most problematic of all, however, is the compiler’s agenda, which is not scholarship, but anti-Islam polemic. The author of an earlier book entitled Why I Am Not a Muslim (1995), “Ibn Warraq” and his co-conspirator “Ibn al-Rawandi” detest anything that, to them, smacks of apologetic; for this reason they criticize harshly several noted authors for their ‘bad faith’ or ‘moral ambiguity.’

Yet this book is itself a monument to duplicity. The compiler never has the honesty or courage to divulge his identity, even though a list of contributors (pp. 551-54) gives a biographical sketch of all the other contributors who, unlike “Ibn Warraq” and “Ibn al-Rawandi”, are already well-known.

Far more serious is the fact that this book is religious polemic attempting to masquerade as scholarship. It is a collection of basically sound articles, framed by a seriously flawed introduction, and put in the service of anti-Islamic polemic dedicated to the proposition that Islam is a sham and that honest scholarship on Islam requires gratuitous rudeness to Muslim sensibilities. "

He is obviously a second-party source, and that decreases his reliability.

Bat Ye'or discusses Dhimmitude historically and in modern contexts.

"Dhimmitude", according to the Medina Charter, is not a bad thing; it is just offering a status of protection to non-Muslims. A Dhimmi is a non-Muslim living under the protection of a Muslim state. He is exempt from duties of Islam like military and zakah but must instead pay a tax called jizyah. This jizyah is 1-2.5% of the annual income, which is as much as zakah. That's all that's required of a non-Muslim under Islam. Granted, there were a handful of intolerant Muslim rulers, but one can cite even more intolerant Christian rulers at the time of the Crusades and onwards, but Dhimmitude is by no means a bad status.

Middle Eastern scholars Walid Phares and Bat Ye'or discuss life under Islamic rule and the toll it has taken on Middle Eastern Christians such as the Lebanese Maronites, the Egyptian Copts; the Melkites; the Anglican, Protestant and Catholic southern Sudanese Africans; Christian Syrians; Iraqi Assyrians, Nestorians, Chaldeans, and Jacobites; Iranian Persians, Armenian and Assyrian Christians; and Palestinian Christians.

Walid Phares... biggest asshole around. Walid Phares hosts an "anti-terrorism" website. He's a Lebanese Christian rightwinger, probably a lot like WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farah. What Phares never mentions is what these groups have been suffering under Roman and Byzantian rule after the death of the Prophet Muhammad. The Copts called for the Muslims of the Arabian Penninsula to come for their help. Muslims under the command of Omar Ibn Al 'As came to the help of the Copts and granted them protection under Islamic rule. Lebanese Maronites, however, faced no such repression; if they are talking about the Lebanese civil war... they have reaped what they sowed: ever since Palestinian refugees flocked into Lebanon from Palestine, they were met with xenophobic racism on part of the Maronites, who are generally anti-Arab and anti-Muslim. The Iraqis, however, suffered mainly under the leadership of Al Hujjaj, a monster of a man who used to kill anyone who did not agree with him, even Muslims. Syrian Christians, however, are far from persecuted; in fact, it is a tradition in Syria not to refer to another person because of his religion. Iraqi Assyrians, however, are suffering from an ethnic cleansing by the Coalition (that's right, THE Coalition) because they are being misrepresented in Iraqi society. Then, of course, there was Saddam: a brutal secular dictator who, while opposite to Al Hujjaj in his beliefs, also killed those who were opposed to his regime. Palestinian Christians, however, are not suffering at all from the Muslims. Many fabricated propaganda stories arise from the idea that Muslims are persecuting their fellow Christians, when in fact Israel is the pressing force against the Palestinians in general:

"In order to better understand or contextualize the Palestinian Christian response, there is a need to reaffirm the traditionally excellent relations between Christians and their Muslim neighbors. This tradition of good Christian-Muslim relations has evolved through centuries of coexistence and exchange in the cities of Jerusalem, Nazareth, Bethlehem, Ramallah, and in the rural areas such as Zababdeh, Bir Zeit, and other towns and villages where Muslims and Christians live side-by-side and interact in their pursuit of daily pre-occupations and concerns." - Dr. Bernard Sabella, Associate Professor of Sociology, Bethlehem University

"Muslims believe in God and in Jesus as a prophet. We can meet on that common ground. At the Bible college, we reach out to Muslims in our community who are living in refugee camps. Their situation is terrible. We give them food and clothing and send visiting medical teams to them. Three years ago, we were grateful to see a big sign saying, 'We appreciate the work of Bethlehem Bible College' in front of one of the camps." - Dr. Bishara Awad, Founder and President of Bethlehem Bible College

Well, it seems that much of Islamic Tolerance is not a myth, but what really is a myth is that all Muslims are tolerant. The fact is that most are, but every now and then, people show intolerance. I can cite the same thing concerning Christians during the Crusades, the Dark Ages, the Spanish Inquisition, the Conquistadors of South America, and let's not forget the freedom-loving Americans who killed off many Native American tribes, and then that Hitler dude, who killed off many Jews...

But let's get back to the Middle East for a while and focus on another so-called "expert": Joan Peters.

She is one of many people, like Irshad, who have never been to the Middle East, yet she argues for the idea that present-day Israelis should feel no guilt for their ancestors who expelled the Palestinians from their homes. She argues that Palestinians themselves never existed and were never a nation. Well, the Palestinians are like the Red Indians: they never had a nation but are native to the land, and have their own dialect and culture. Then there is the idea that the Jews were living in Palestine before there were any Palestinians. The book itself was debunked by a prominent historian, Norman Finkelstein, who said that the book is "among the most spectacular frauds ever published on the Arab-Israeli conflict."

However, Dr. Muhammad Hallaj has offered a point-by-point debunking of the main arguments in this fraud of a book. Also, Justin McCarthy proves to us that indeed, even though there is a lack of data on the issue, that the Palestinians are indeed indigenous. Finkelstein also argues that since there is no proof for Palestinians immigrating from other countries and settling there, it is also proof that the Palestinians indeed lived in Palestine since the advent of the Muslims into the region, and that Palestinians do exist. Per Wikipedia,

In Arabic, Filasteen (فلسطين) has been the name of the region since the earliest medieval Arab geographers (adopted from the then-current Greek term Palaestina (Παλαιστινη), first used by Herodotus, itself derived ultimately from the name of the Philistines), and Filasteeni (فلسطسيني) was always a common adjectival noun (see Arabic grammar) adopted by natives of the region, starting as early as the first century after the Hijra (eg `Abdallah b. Muhayriz al-Jumahi al-Filastini[30], an ascetic who died in the early 700's.)

Of course, it is more than just that: Joan Peters also claims that the Palestinians left their homes on orders from their leaders, but this myth among others will be decimated later on.

Let's turn to another "expert": Joseph Farah, a Lebanese American conservative who makes empty claims in his "WorldNetDaily.org" website about Middle Easterners and the Palestinians. For one, like much of his Maronite brethren, he is anti-Islam and anti-Muslim, and is of the same feather as Pipes and Manji. However, he is anti-GOP, and I'll give him kudos for this and this alone. However, his grasp on the Israel-Palestine conflict comes to no prior knowledge. He claims that he has "been to the Middle East" and that "there are no Palestinians". He also cites Golda Meir, a well-known racist, as well as citing Zahir Muhsein in this article. What he does not know is that the quote itself is what it accuses Palestinians for being: a FAKE. Does he talk about it being a political tool? I mean, is it just because of one person's misguided opinion? It was a quote taken out of context, as usual.

Now, let's return to his analyses. Why would he be an expert on the MidEast, when in fact he attacks the ACLU for things that it is not? Moreover, he claims that Jerusalem is not sacred to Muslims, which is of course another lie. The farthest mosque that is mentioned is indeed Jerusalem's mosque of Al Aqsa. I can find many faults in this article that he wrote. He forgets that the Palestinians have a dialect, and have been living there for the time ever since the first Caliphates. Even if they were not Palestinians, evicting them forcefully from their homes is still inexcusable. That's why indeed the Palestinians do exist. It's not a forged identity that he and Joan Peters claim it to be. Moreover, he speaks of Arabs who are envious and greedy in an extremely racist manner, without regarding the fact that the Palestinians who have been living in Palestine just want to live their lives like everyone does, but Israel is crushing them under its boots.

Furthermore, what Mr. Zahir Muhsein meant about Palestinians not existing was by the fact that many people regard Arabs as one people, and definitely he was taken out of context:

"But all these [different peoples who had come to Canaan] were additions, sprigs grafted onto the parent tree...And that parent tree was Canaanite...[The Arab invaders of the 7th century A.D.] made Moslem converts of the natives, settled down as residents, and intermarried with them, with the result that all are now so completely Arabized that we cannot tell where the Canaanites leave off and the Arabs begin." Illene Beatty, "Arab and Jew in the Land of Canaan."

The Palestinians are going nowhere, whether Mr. Farah likes it or not.

Now, let's turn to one last "expert": Walid Phares. He claims to know what Jihad is, and actually calls Al Jazeera "jihad TV", but by looking at the English and Arabic websites of Al Jazeera, his accusations are easily nullified. Well, that's the main issue surrounding this "expert", along with the so-called "myth" of Islamic tolerance that I have disproved above.

Well, that's pretty much most of the big "experts" on the MidEast, who are really a bunch of propagandists and amateurs. Keep in mind that you should watch out for what sources you draw from, especially the more paranoid and dangerous ones out there.

Salaam, from
Saracen