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What would Prophet Mohammed have done?
globeandmail.com ^ | February 3, 2006 | TAREK FATAH

Posted on 02/05/2006 9:21:05 AM PST by Nachum

Keep to forgiveness (O Mohammed), and enjoin kindness, and turn away from the ignorant.

The Koran, Chapter 7, Verse 199

During his lifetime, Prophet Mohammed endured insults and ridicule on a daily basis. His opponents mocked his message and used physical violence to stop him from challenging the status quo.

At no stage during this ordeal did the Prophet lose his temper or react to these provocations. Tradition has it that he would, instead, offer a prayer of forgiveness to those who showed contempt for him.

Today, however, many followers of Prophet Muhammad are acting the exact opposite. Reacting to the provocative Danish cartoons about the Prophet, they are burning newspapers, threatening journalists, issuing bomb threats, yet claiming they are standing up for the Prophet himself.

I have seen the cartoons published by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. There is no question they are meant to hurt the feelings of Muslims. As I saw them, I had to restrain my anger. Once more, Muslims were being depicted as a violent people. (One particularly derisive cartoon showed the Prophet wearing a turban with a bomb inside it.)

No one in the Muslim community is willing to buy into the notion that these cartoons were not meant to promote racism against Muslims. The editors may say otherwise, but the community knows better when it is depicted as the "other," to be scorned and sidelined.

Caricaturing racial minorities has been a tradition in Europe and North America since long before it became acceptable to deride Muslims. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, it wasn't uncommon to see Jews and blacks depicted negatively. Today, thanks to the great work of many civil rights and anti-racism activists, no newspaper would invoke press freedom to depict Jews and blacks or their leaders the way the Danish paper depicted the Prophet.

Having said that, the way some Muslims have reacted to the provocation leaves a lot to be desired. Provoked, they walked blindfolded into a trap set for them, and came out worse than what they started with.

In Canada, we had a similar case, if not of the same magnitude. In the mid-90s, a Toronto man distributed highly inflammatory literature against Islam and the Prophet. Unlike our European colleagues and some fanatics of the Middle East, Canadian Muslims took up the case with the police and the gentleman was charged under Ontario hate laws and convicted. End of story.

In the Danish case, the Arab world's reaction, led by the Egyptian government, suggests there is more to it than meets the eye. Thousands in the Arab world have protested against the publication of the cartoons. The Danish paper has received bomb threats. Two armed groups threatened yesterday to target Frenchmen and Norwegians in the Palestinian territories, as well as Danes, after the caricatures were published in their countries.

Many believe that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's government is acting not for the love for Islam, but for love of the power it has usurped for decades.

Egyptian-American journalist Mona Eltahawy, a regular columnist for the London newspaper Sharq Alawsat, wrote in the Egyptian newspaper Al-Dastour: "Perhaps the Muslim governments who spearheaded the campaign -- led by Egypt -- felt this was an easy way to burnish their Islamic credentials at a time when domestic Islamists are stronger than they have been in many years."

For the Arab League to demand that the Danish government shut down the newspaper Jyllands-Posten shows how deeply entrenched dictatorial practices are in many Muslim countries. They are so accustomed to closing down their own newspapers, they could not understand why the Danish government could not issue a decree closing the Jyllands-Posten.

This posturing by Arab governments and Islamist movements is not in the tradition of Islam. These zealots should ask the question: What would Prophet Muhammad have done when faced with this insult?

He would, I suggest, have said a prayer for the cartoonist and "turned away from the ignorant," as Allah commanded him to do in the Qur'an.

Tarek Fatah is host of a weekly TV show on CTS-TV, The Muslim Chronicle, and is the communication director of the Muslim Canadian Congress. This article first appeared in The Globe and Mail.


TOPICS: Editorial; Foreign Affairs; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: done; have; koran; mohammed; prophet; what; would
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To: Nachum

21 posted on 02/05/2006 9:47:02 AM PST by blueminnesota
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To: river rat
Once more, Muslims were being depicted as a violent people.

Ya think?

22 posted on 02/05/2006 9:48:14 AM PST by USS Alaska (Nuke the terrorist savages - In Honor of Standing Wolf)
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To: Nachum
At no stage during this ordeal did the Prophet lose his temper or react to these provocations. Tradition has it that he would, instead, offer a prayer of forgiveness to those who showed contempt for him.

True he never lost his temper while murdering, raping and pillaging.

Just one more muslim lying about islam in a hope to fool people who do not take the time themselves to study this "religion".

23 posted on 02/05/2006 9:48:52 AM PST by Lady Heron
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To: Nachum

We have pried open the soft underbelly of the beast!

Don't stop now!

DRAW MORE CARTOONS!!!

Then the world will begin to see this trash for the Nazis that they are.

DRAW MORE CARTOONS!!!

ALL ARTISTS TO THEIR PALLETTES!

MORE CARTOONS HERE: http://retecool.com/comments.php?id=13539_0_1_0_C


Danish bloggers are having a field day...



While looking at the mob of angry islamo-facists with behead those that insult Islam signs...

I picture Munchkins from the Wizard of Oz singing, "We represent the lollipop league, the lollipop league, the lollipop league. And in the name of the lollipop league... we wish to welcome you to Munchkin Land."

Try it... it works well.

Just overlay the Jihadists with Munchkins and do the song.

See how it works for you.


Somebody needs to do a cartoon with Mohammed bent over, with his burka hiked up exposing his bare butt, pointing to his butt saying, “I got you're 72 virgins right here.”

And then we need to have T-shirts made with this cartoon.


24 posted on 02/05/2006 9:51:04 AM PST by MedicalMess
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To: Nachum
Keep to forgiveness (O Mohammed), and enjoin kindness, and turn away from the ignorant.

The Koran, Chapter 7, Verse 199

It is not fitting for the Prophet and those who believe, that they should pray for the forgiveness for disbelievers, even though they be close relatives, after it is clear to them that they are the inmates of the Flaming Hell Fire.

- The Koran, Chapter 9, Verse 113

Those who reject [Islamic] Faith, Allah will not forgive them nor guide them to any path except the way to Hell, to dwell therein forever. And this to Allah is easy.

- The Koran, Chapter 4, Verse 168

We smote them and they scattered. The impious met death. They became fuel for Hell. All who aren’t Muslims must go there. It will consume them while the Stoker [Allah] increases the heat. They had called Allah’s Apostle a liar. They claimed, ‘You are nothing but a sorcerer.’ So Allah destroyed them.

- Hadith Ishaq, Verse 344

Truly, if the Hypocrites stir up sedition, if the agitators in the City do not desist, We shall urge you to go against them and set you over them. They shall have a curse on them. Whenever they are found, they shall be seized and slain without mercy—a fierce slaughter—murdered, a horrible murdering.

- The Koran, Chapter 33, Verse 60


Jalalu'd-Din, as referenced at this page, lists 20 sets of verses which are generally accepted by all Islamic scholars to fall in the category of al-nasikh or al-mansukh (abrogating or abrogated) verses, including the following:

The much discussed "verses of the sword": "....fight and slay the pagans wherever ye find them and seize them, beleaguer them and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (or war)." (Sura 9:5) and "....when you meet the unbelievers (in fight) cut off their necks..." (Sura 47:4) are "said to have cancelled no less than 124 verses which enjoined toleration and patience." (A. Guillaume).

25 posted on 02/05/2006 9:52:44 AM PST by mvpel (Michael Pelletier)
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To: Nachum

Mohammed would have gotten stoned and screwed his nine year-old wife.


26 posted on 02/05/2006 9:59:35 AM PST by nonliberal (Graduate: Curtis E. LeMay School of International Relations)
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To: Dog Gone

Muslims are no more a race than Nazis are.


27 posted on 02/05/2006 9:59:43 AM PST by weegee (Happy Holidays! Tis the season of MLK, Chinese New Year, Tet, Valentine's, Presidents...)
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To: God luvs America

Yes. That is how the Imam defend the sex act. He "waited" several years.


28 posted on 02/05/2006 10:01:30 AM PST by weegee (Happy Holidays! Tis the season of MLK, Chinese New Year, Tet, Valentine's, Presidents...)
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To: vbmoneyspender; All
Actually all of this reaction is the same as that generated from the unsubstantiated reports of korans being flushed down the toilet.

Time Magazine (or was it Newsweak?) did not find their actions to be irresponsible.
29 posted on 02/05/2006 10:03:30 AM PST by weegee (Happy Holidays! Tis the season of MLK, Chinese New Year, Tet, Valentine's, Presidents...)
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To: Dog Gone

No one in the Muslim community is willing to buy into the notion that these cartoons were not meant to promote racism against Muslims.
Muslims are no more a race than Christians are.""

True- The entire reason for jihad is to eradicate all infidels. ANYONE who is NOT a Muslim, is considered an infidel.

The world needs to wake up to this fact.

I do not believe there is any peaceful nor common ground we can find with these radicals.


30 posted on 02/05/2006 10:11:04 AM PST by ridesthemiles
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To: Nachum
What would Prophet Mohammed have done?

Stuck the necks of the infidels (that is, lop their heads off)
Taken his cut (can't remember if it was set at 1/5 of the captured
booty or more)
Boinked as many of the captured infidel women and girls as
he could.
31 posted on 02/05/2006 10:14:19 AM PST by VOA
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To: Cornpone
You are correct. Mohammed's ascendency began with murder. The press doesn't know what it's talking about. Reporting based on myth is pure bunk.

This is because the vast majority of the press have not read the koran and therefor haven't the slightest clue of what they are talking about. Those members of the press who have read it are normally islam-a-nazies themselves and are practicing the islamic art of desiring their enemies. By the way have you noticed how suddenly there are so many islamic talking heads. I wonder how much MSM stock is controlled by islamic hands? We know that FOX is under control from the Paris riots.

32 posted on 02/05/2006 10:20:29 AM PST by fella ("(News) should be the maximum of information & minimum of comment." - Cobden)
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Because most Arabs were illiterate at the time Mohammed lived, and there were no cartoons, he didn't face this exact situation.

However there was a tradition of poetry recitation. Which, was often accompanied by a one-string violin or other very simple instruments. These poets not only new works from traditions, but composed new ones.

Two poets made a special practice of composing and peforming poems that mocked the Prophet and his new religion. At one point Muhammed asked "won't someone kill these people for me". They were dutifully murdered. One poet was a very old man, perhaps 100 years. The other was a woman with four children. The assassins killed her in her bed, where some of her childrend were sleeping.

Truely Mohammed is the greatest example of a human and his followers are just living his example in the modern world.

The author of this article is either completely ignorant of his own religions history, or lying. Given that Islam explicitly sanctions lying to non-believers, the latter is the more logical conclusion.


33 posted on 02/05/2006 10:22:32 AM PST by Jack Black
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To: Jack Black

and was not there also an old woman who was torn apart by camels, for mocking the forgiving gentle prophet, pbuh?

Mrs VS


34 posted on 02/05/2006 10:28:32 AM PST by VeritatisSplendor
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To: fella
As David Selbourne in his book, The Losing Battle with Islam, points out, the MSM is largely at the mercy of academia whose departments of eastern and Islamic studies are largely funded by Saudi Arabia and Iran. Increasingly these sources of terrrorist funding are controlling the direction of serious debate in western society. Unless we wake up to this fact we are doomed to suffer.
35 posted on 02/05/2006 10:28:37 AM PST by Cornpone (Who Dares Wins -- Defame Islam Today -- Tell the Truth About Mohammed)
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To: fella
desiring = deceiving

Dang that spell check.

36 posted on 02/05/2006 10:29:03 AM PST by fella ("(News) should be the maximum of information & minimum of comment." - Cobden)
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To: Nachum

>>>What would Prophet Mohammed have done?<<<

wrong question...

What would Willie do?
http://www.wnbiodiesel.com/


37 posted on 02/05/2006 10:33:22 AM PST by Liberty Valance (gone fishin')
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To: Nachum
Prophet Mohammed endured insults and ridicule on a daily basis. His opponents mocked his message and used physical violence to stop him from challenging the status quo. At no stage during this ordeal did the Prophet lose his temper or react to these provocations

Of course he didn't "react". "Reacting" implies doing something other than what one is already doing - which in his case, was killing infidels.

38 posted on 02/05/2006 10:38:06 AM PST by ctdonath2
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To: Nachum
The degree to which these morons are in denial is (almost) painful. I suppose I can't blame them for expecting us to be gullible....after all, they watch the same (liberal) press that I do.

Last night I read a few comment pages on JihadWatch.com which revealed the same sort of detachment from reality. Their world-view is so warped that they cannot even recognize a true view when pointed to with irrefutable evidence.

Oh no, you guys were talking about muzzies? I thought you were discussing Democrats ;'}
39 posted on 02/05/2006 11:17:19 AM PST by rockrr (Never argue with a man who buys ammo in bulk...)
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To: FerdieMurphy
Why he would have blown his top!

If he was alive today he would send some kid to blow his top at a pizza parlor. It a way of life for terrorist leadership now days don't you know. ;)

40 posted on 02/05/2006 11:19:14 AM PST by pepperhead (Kennedy's float, Mary Jo's don't!)
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