“This is Islam”—Muslims know it, democracy-promoting Westerners refuse to know it

Raymond Ibrahim writes at Jihad Watch:

Egyptian Presidential Candidate Says No Freedom in Islam

In a recent TV interview, Hazim Abu Ismail, a candidate for Egypt’s presidency with affiliations to both the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis, made clear that the hijab, or veil for women, would be enforced under his leadership. More importantly, along the way, he exposed his views more generally—that there is little freedom under Islam. Especially telling is the military analogy he used: being a Muslim is like being a member of the military; you must obey all its dictates, including dress codes. He fails to add, however, that, whereas much military service is voluntary, in Islam, if you are simply born to Muslim parents, then you have joined Islam—whether you like it or not. Hence, all the persecution of Muslim apostates. But as Abu Ismail puts it, “This is Islam.”

See Ibrahim’s excerpt from the interview, in which Ismail explains that if a person is born into Islam, he has no choice but to obey the Islamic law, including the veil for women, which Ismail pledges to impose if he is elected president. And unlike Mitt Romneycare’s pledge to repeal Obamacare, Ismail’s pledge to place Egyptian women under the dehumanizing Islamic head and body cover is one on which we can have absolute certainty.

Now go over to Commentary and the Weekly Standard and the New York Times—all full-throated supporters of Obama’s act one year ago of pushing Mubarak out of power for the sake of “democracy”—and see if they have anything on presidential candidate Ismail. Actually, the liberal Times is more likely to have something on him, since over the last several months they’ve been covering the growth of “Islamist” (i.e. Islamic) power in Egypt, while conveniently neglecting to mention that the toppling of the Mubarak regime, which they cheered, had anything to do with it. The neocons, by contrast, have turned their heads away from Egypt. They walked down the street, the houses fell down behind them,—as always happens when neocons walk through a neighborhood—and now they’ve moved on to the next neighborhood.

Correction: Commentary has had occasional, angry blog posts (see this) about the ascendancy of Islamic power in Egypt, but, even more than the Times, has dropped into the memory hole the Arab Spring which by giving the Egyptians freedom gave them the freedom to choose Islamic rule. Those houses lying in ruins have nothing to do with us!

Posted by Lawrence Auster at February 11, 2012 09:44 AM | Send