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by Michael Hoffman
While the U.S. ban on Islamic academic Tariq Ramadan is unjust, Hoffman argues that Prof. Ramadan's defense of Judaism is an offense against truth
The supposedly outstanding Muslim intellectual Tariq Ramadan who is professor of Islamic Studies at Fribourg, Switzerland, was recently denied a visa by the U.S. government in spite of being asked to serve as visiting professor at Notre Dame University in South Bend, Indiana.
While this denial is unjust and clearly the work of Zionist witch-hunters such as Daniel Pipes, Ramadan's canonization as a brilliant Islamic philosopher is premature to say the least, if we are to credit an interview he gave to the Israeli Haaretz newspaper, "My Fellow Muslims We Must Fight Anti-Semitism" (http://news.haaretz.co.il/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=168205).
If Ramadan made the statements attributed to him by Haaretz, then he has absolutely zero grasp of the religion of Judiasm and one must then ask, what does it mean to be "a top Islamic scholar" teaching at an elite European university, if Mr. Ramadan can't even get to first grade in his knowledge of Judaism?
In the Haaretz interview, Prof. Ramadan is alleged to have said, "To my regret, anti-Semitic utterances have been heard not only from frustrated and confused young Muslims, but also from certain Muslim intellectuals and imams... who in every crisis or political backsliding see the hand of the `Jewish lobby.' There is nothing in Islam that gives legitimization to Judeophobia...Anti-Semitism has no justification in Islam, the message of which demands respect for the Jewish religion and spirit, which are considered a noble expression of the People of the Book.... Leaders and imams have the responsibility to disseminate an unequivocal message about the profound connections between Islam and Judaism and Islam's recognition of Moses and the Torah."
It is difficult to believe that anyone claiming the status of Islamic intellectual could mouth such nonsense. Judaism is certainly not the religion of Moses and the Torah (Pentateuch, first five books of the Bible); it is the religion of Rashi, Maimonides, Yosef Karo, Yitzhak Luria and the several hundred books of the Mishnah, Gemara, Shulchan Aruch, Zohar, and commentaries upon commentaries that form rabbinic halakah, which both codify racism and nullify the Torah of Moses. The Old Testament creed praised by the prophet Mohammed bears no resemblance to the religion of Judaism that was concocted by the Pharisees in Babylon in the first few centuries A.D.
If, as Tariq Ramadan claims, the religion of the rabbis is the divine religion of The Book (Old Testament), rather than the man-made cult of "the books" (of the Talmud and Kabbalah), what are Muslims and all people of good will to make of the Talmud's teaching concerning Jesus, that he was a sorcerer who deserved to be killed and is now stewing in hell in boiling feces? And of the Kabbalah's declaration that Jesus and Mohammed are "dead dogs"?
Either Ramadan is not a scholar of Judaism and needs to learn from those who are, or he is indeed aware of these facts about Judaism and has glossed over them for purposes of pandering to politically correct, received opinion, in which case perhaps it is better that Ramadan does not teach at Notre Dame University.
Ramadan would seem to be part of a class of Islamic academics who are under pressure to attempt to improve the image of Islam in the Western media by adopting certain destructive mythologies, rather than boldly proclaiming truths which ignorant people in the West desperately need to hear for their own edification.
The fact that Zionist extremists procured a U.S. ban on Ramadan does not signify that Ramadan is indeed an authentic Islamic scholar of great erudition, rather, the ban is a telling comment on the depth of paranoia afflicting the Zionists, for whom any manifestation of Islam, however tepid, is grounds for repression.
Hoffman is a former reporter for the New York bureau of the Associated Press and an authority on the religion of Judaism. He is the author of "Judaism's Strange Gods," and co-author, with Moshe Liberman, of "The Israeli Holocaust Against the Palestinians."
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