Fitzgerald: Defamation of Islam?

"U.S. fights Islamic anti-defamation push" – the headline of this Washington Times article

The phrase "anti-defamation" puts one naturally in mind of the Anti-Defamation League, a group formed to fight group defamation of Jews. The word, in that case, fit. But the word does not fit when it is used by members of the Islamintern International. For they are attempting not to stop "defamation" but to shut down any real study of Islam beyond the most transparent of apologetic toe-dipping (three abrahamic faiths, etc.), and to forestall any critical analysis of its texts, tenets, attitudes, and atmospherics.

What C. Snouck Hurgronje, Joseph Schacht, Henri Lammens, Charles-Emmanuel Bouquet, Edmond Fagnan, K. S. Lal, Samuel Zwemer, St. Clair Tisdall, and dozens of other dedicated scholars of Islam wrote about Islam does not constitute "defamation," but rather, scholarly and disinterested study. What defectors from the army of Islam -- Wafa Sultan, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Ibn Warraq, Ali Sina, and hundreds of others -- tell us about the Islam they were born into, and raised within, does not constitute "defamation."

It constitutes, rather, the truth. Or rather, it constitutes a series of truths, both scholarly and simple home truths, that can easily be shown to have a basis in the Qur'an, the Hadith, and Sira. The worldwide effort is on by powerful Muslims to shut down any examination of Islam by the very people whose lives, whose laws, whose everything, are threatened by the march of those conducting Jihad. And that Jihad is nothing more, and nothing less, than the "struggle" to remove all obstacles to the spread, and then the dominance, of Islam.

And the greatest obstacle in the Bilad al-kufr, the Lands of the Infidels, to the spread and then the dominance of Islam is knowledge, detailed and deep, of what Islam is all about.

And therefore an essential part of the worldwide Jihad is this attempt to stifle all study and analysis and criticism of Islam. It is more of a threat to the wellbeing of Infidels than anything else, because unless those Infidels can somehow acquire -- or at least if a critical mass can acquire -- a knowledge of the meaning and the menace of Islam, there may not be time to diminish a threat that, at this point, is still manageable. It is still manageable despite the Money Weapon -- that can be cut down to size, in a hundred ways. It is still manageable despite the worldwide Campaigns of Da'wa. Those, too, can be exposed, and opposed, and quite successfully if a certain attitude is brought to bear on the making of policy. It is still manageable despite the demographic conquest in Western Europe, which can also still be opposed successfully if certain attitudes are brought to bear on the making of policy. It is still manageable if the tenets of Islam, the immutable tenets and the attitudes to which Islam naturally gives rise, are understood. Manageable, yes. Just.

One way to respond to this “defamation” is to go to your nearest university library, and check out "The Achenese" by C. Snouck Hurgronje. Turn to the last few pages in the book, where the great Dutch Orientalist (who visited Mecca, and even took photographs of the place, in the 1880s -- quite a feat, which may have required him to recite the Shehadah and pretend to be Muslim) discusses the concept of Jihad. Xerox those pages. Make many copies. Type it out as a document. Now email to as many people as you can those pages by C. Snouck Hurgronje. That is one way to respond to this “defamation.”

During the Cold War, the Herzen Center (Karel van het Reve, Director) was an important ideological outpost for the right side, along with such samaritan organizations as that one-man band (and the one man was Leopold Labedz) that magazine of East European affairs, Survey. When the real history of the Cold War is written, Survey and Encounter and those Dutch such as Karel van het Reve will be given pride of place, or should be.

Where are the anti-Jihad equivalents now, in London or in Amsterdam or Paris, of those people and magazines and institutions, that received generous backing from the American government, and helped wage that famous "war of ideas" that in the end did help wear out the Soviet system, and cause even those within it to begin to question whether the whole thing made sense?

If the Western world refuses to recognize the contents of Islam, the menace of Islam, of course it will never support a new Encounter, a new Survey, a new Herzen Institute. It will never stand up for long against these spurious claims of “defamation.”

Perhaps no Western government dares to be directly involved. Okay, then, what foundations, what maecenases, are ready to step into the breach -- if only in order to preserve the world more or less in acceptable form, for if it is not so preserved, all the money in the world will not be much recompense.

Okay, Mr. and Mrs. Maecenas: all the phones are open. We are ready to take your pledges. These calls may be monitored for quality control.

Thanks jihad Watch