On anniversary of 9/11, group of young Dutch Muslims begins dangerous fight for the right to abandon their faith

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

A group of young Muslim apostates launches a campaign today, the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on America, to make it easier to renounce Islam.

The provocative move reflects a growing rift between traditionalists and a younger generation raised on a diet of Dutch tolerance.

The Committee for Ex-Muslims promises to campaign for freedom of religion but has already upset the Islamic and political Establishments for stirring tensions among the million-strong Muslim community in the Netherlands.

Ehsan Jami, the committee’s founder, who rejected Islam after the attack on the twin towers in 2001, has become the most talked-about public figure in the Netherlands. He has been forced into hiding after a series of death threats and a recent attack.

The threats are taken seriously after the murder in 2002 of Pim Fortuyn, an antiimmigration politician, and in 2004 of Theo Van Gogh, an antiIslam film-maker.

Speaking to The Times at a secret location before the committee’s launch today, the Labour Party councillor said that the movement would declare war on radical Islam. Similar organisations campaigning for reform of the religion have sprung up across Europe and representatives from Britain and Germany will join the launch in The Hague today.

“Sharia schools say that they will kill the ones who leave Islam. In the West people get threatened, thrown out of their family, beaten up,” Mr Jami said. “In Islam you are born Muslim. You do not even choose to be Muslim. We want that to change, so that people are free to choose who they want to be and what they want to believe in.”

Mr Jami, 22, who has abandoned his studies as his political career has taken off, denied that the choice of September 11 was deliberately provocative towards the Islamic Establishment. “We chose the date because we want to make a clear statement that we no longer tolerate the intolerance of Islam, the terrorist attacks,” he said.

“In 1965 the Church in Holland made a declaration that freedom of conscience is above hanging on to religion, so you can choose whether you are going to be a Christian or not. What we are seeking is the same thing for Islam.”

Mr Jami, who has compared the rise of radical Islam to the threat from Nazism in the 1930s, is receiving only lukewarm support from his party which traditionally relies upon Muslim votes. His outspoken attack on radical Islam has led to a prelaunch walk-out from fellow committee founder Loubna Berrada, who herself rejected Islam.

She said: “I don’t wish to confront Islam itself. I only want to spread the message that Muslims should be allowed to leave Islam behind without being threatened.”

There have been suggestions that Mr Jami might defect to the right-wing Freedom Party, led by Geert Wilders, the most outspoken politician in the Netherlands, who has called for the Koran to be banned. But Mr Jami said: “I have respect for Wilders but we do not have the same ideology. I am for the freedom of religion.

“Banning something is not going to help. I am the opposite – everyone should read the Koran.” Mr Jami is being compared to Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali refugee who became a prominent Dutch politician campaigning for the reform of Islam but who left eventually for an academic career in the United States.

Jannie Groen, a writer for De Volksrant newspaper, said: “[Among Muslims] he is getting the same reaction as Ayaan Hirsi Ali that he is too confrontational but you are seeing other former Muslims now coming forward. So he has been able to put this issue of apostasy on the agenda, even though they do not want to be in the same room as him and he has had to pay a price.”

By the Book

— 14 passages in the Koran refer to apostasy

— According to Baidhawi’s commentary, Sura 4: 88-89 reads: “Whosoever turns back from his belief, openly or secretly, take him and kill him wheresoever ye find him, like any other infidel. Separate yourself from him altogether. Do not accept intercession in his regard.”

— The hadith, tradition and legend about Muhammad and his followers used as a basis of Sharia, tells of some atheists who were brought to “’Ali and he burnt them. The news of this reached Ibn Abbas who said: ‘If I had been in his place, I would not have burnt them, as Allah’s Apostate forbade it . . . I would have killed them according to the statement of Allah’s Apostate, ‘Whoever changed his [islamic] religion, then kill him’.”

— According to hadith, a special reward in Paradise is reserved for the killer of apostates

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/worl...icle2426314.ece

[Hilarious Clinton 452]

I see funerals in their future.

[Jasman0717 9]

Wow

[pedroh 21]

By the Book

— 14 passages in the Koran refer to apostasy

— According to Baidhawi’s commentary, Sura 4: 88-89 reads: “Whosoever turns back from his belief, openly or secretly, take him and kill him wheresoever ye find him, like any other infidel. Separate yourself from him altogether. Do not accept intercession in his regard.”

— The hadith, tradition and legend about Muhammad and his followers used as a basis of Sharia, tells of some atheists who were brought to “’Ali and he burnt them. The news of this reached Ibn Abbas who said: ‘If I had been in his place, I would not have burnt them, as Allah’s Apostate forbade it . . . I would have killed them according to the statement of Allah’s Apostate, ‘Whoever changed his [islamic] religion, then kill him’.”

— According to hadith, a special reward in Paradise is reserved for the killer of apostates

are you for real? well, that sounds like a very loving religion indeed..

[Ban Hammer 13,360]

[PetraPerson101 0]

:|

Seems it's en-vogue to bash Islam & Arabs lately.

Of all the places I've seen it, this is the last place I'd expect it.

One thing I always say when I go to a form - there's two things you should keep to yourself:

- Politics

- Religion

Unless, of course, you're looking for a fight. (flamewar)

Edited September 15, 2007 by Kasem

[mybackpages 0]

— According to Baidhawi's commentary, Sura 4: 88-89 reads: "Whosoever turns back from his belief, openly or secretly, take him and kill him wheresoever ye find him, like any other infidel. Separate yourself from him altogether. Do not accept intercession in his regard."

Two comments-

1) that is not an accurate translation

2) Those verses are talking about something completely different.

[pedroh 21]

— According to Baidhawi's commentary, Sura 4: 88-89 reads: "Whosoever turns back from his belief, openly or secretly, take him and kill him wheresoever ye find him, like any other infidel. Separate yourself from him altogether. Do not accept intercession in his regard."

Two comments-

1) that is not an accurate translation

2) Those verses are talking about something completely different.

what would be the appropiate context then?

[mybackpages 0]

— According to Baidhawi's commentary, Sura 4: 88-89 reads: "Whosoever turns back from his belief, openly or secretly, take him and kill him wheresoever ye find him, like any other infidel. Separate yourself from him altogether. Do not accept intercession in his regard."

Two comments-

1) that is not an accurate translation

2) Those verses are talking about something completely different.

what would be the appropiate context then?

A better translation would read as follows:

How, then, could you be of two minds about the hypocrites, seeing that God (Himself) has disowned them because of their guilt? Do you perchance, seek to guide those whom God lets go astray? They would love to see you deny the truth even though they would denyit, so that you should be like them. Do not, therefore, take them for you allies until they forsake the domain of evil for the sake of God; and if they revet to [open] enmity, seize them and slay them whereever you may find them.

It was reveal in the context of a war and discusses the hypocrisy and wavering between the sincere choice of right and wrong of those engaged in the battle. But even in this specific historic context there is larger general lesson to learn about the oneness of God and the inherent truth of the message even in the face of those that give lip service to these ideals.

[Saddle Bronc 124]

I see funerals in their future.

Not if they go to Brixton or Streatham.

Five years ago, the Fellowship's bookstall/church on Brixton Station Rd. helped a Sudanese taxi-driver leave Islam--he had come there after asking "his" mullah about polygamy (with the fact even the Koran states "Adham and Hawa", NOT "Adham and Hawa, Soraya,...); the mullah (same one who "disowned" the shoe-bomber on TV in 2001) was very riled by the question.