Barack Obama adviser says Sharia Law is misunderstood

Telegraph ^ | October 8 | Andrew Gilligan and Alex Spillius

[PghBaldy]

President Barack Obama's adviser on Muslim affairs, Dalia Mogahed, has provoked controversy by appearing on a British television show hosted by a member of an extremist group to talk about Sharia Law.

They called for Sharia Law to be "the source of legislation" and said that women should not be "permitted to hold a position of leadership in government". Miss Mogahed made no challenge to these demands and said that "promiscuity" and the "breakdown of traditional values" were what Muslims admired least about the West. She said: "I think the reason so many women support Sharia is because they have a very different understanding of sharia than the common perception in Western media. "The majority of women around the world associate gender justice, or justice for women, with sharia compliance. "The portrayal of Sharia has been oversimplified in many cases."

[BenLurkin]

[anglian]

“appearing on a British television show hosted by a member of an extremist group - Hizb ut Tahir al-Islami party (Islamic Party of Liberation) http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/hizb-ut-tahrir.htm Dalia Mogahed, a high-profile member of President Barack Obama’s Faith Advisory Council, has taken part in a Hizb ut-Tahrir (HT) run televised discussion programme on the UK-based Islam Channel alongside two members of HT.
CTN BRIEFING: Obama’s advisor and Hizb ut-Tahrir: A missed opportunity?
CTN 07/10/2009

During the 45-minute discussion programme, in which Mogahed took part via phone, she did not challenge the two HT’s members’ overt advocacy of the Caliphate or their wider interpretation of Islam and likewise she did not attempt to promote democratic, pluralist and secular values. During the programme, HT members openly:

- Called for the re-creation of “Islamic Khilafah state” in which they said that women are “not permitted to hold a position of leadership in government”.
- Called for Sharia law to be “the source of legislation” and for “strict regulation in terms of social laws” (saying that “men and women cannot socialize” and “they cannot be alone together”).
- Attacked secular “man-made law” and the west’s “lethal cocktail” of “liberty” and “capitalism” which they blamed for “promiscuity”, “pornography”, “teenage pregnancies” and “adultery”.

During the 45-minute debate, Dalia Mogahed did not directly challenge the HT members on any of these issues.

A spokesman for Counter-Terrorism News, said:

“HT is a group that advocates creating a non-democratic apartheid state based on institutional discrimination on the basis of religion and gender. It also has a record, in the UK and elsewhere, of inspiring individuals to commit terrorist violence. It is vital that prominent political figures not empower such Islamist organisations through engaging with them uncritically. Engagement for engagement’s sake risks empowering such extremists rather than isolating them. Dalia Mogahed has given Hizb ut-Tahrir a propaganda coup.”
http://www.counterterrorismnews.com/home/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1468:ctn-briefing-obamas-advisor-and-hizb-ut-tahrir-a-missed-opportunity&catid=47:americas&Itemid=37