09 May Mark Durie on the Glazov Gang – Islam’s Role in Boko Haram’s Kidnapping of Schoolgirls
In this interview I suffered a slip of the tongue and at one point said that Islam permits a man to have five wives. Of course the correct limit for the number of wives is four! Also, when I referred to Islam permitting sex with young...
01 May Tony Blair on the Islamist Threat
Tony Blair delivered a major speech on April 23 entitled, “Why the Middle East Matters”. In summary, he argued that the Middle East, far from being a “vast unfathomable mess” is deep in the throes of a multi-faceted struggle between a specific religious ideology on...
01 Mar The Rising Sex Traffic in Forced Islamic Marriage
Western nations are facing what has been called an “epidemic” of forced marriages of their young Muslim women. While those who compel young Muslim women and girls into marriages could be charged with human trafficking offences and also in some cases placed on the national...
26 Feb Multiculturalism’s Child Brides
Recent reports of under-age marriages in Australia are evidence that the authorities need to do more to enforce marriage laws in Western nations, and to restrict the practice of unregistered ‘clandestine’ religious marriages, particularly Islamic marriages. Two cases recently came to public attention of NSW girls...
14 Feb Islam’s Second Crisis: the troubles to come
In What Went Wrong, Bernard Lewis charted the decline of Islam in the modern era and the resulting theological crisis for the Muslim world. Now Islam is going through a second crisis, caused by the repeated failures of revivalist responses to the first crisis. This second...
12 Feb Andrew Brown on “Response to A GUIDE TO REFUTING JIHADISM”
Andrew Brown of the Guardian has commented on my response to A Guide to Refuting Jihadism, which was published on my blog, and also on Lapido Media. Brown writes: Can you dissuade fanatical jihadis using theological argument? by Andrew Brown (as revised on Feb 10, 2014) It doesn't really...
07 Feb Response to A GUIDE TO REFUTING JIHADISM – Critiquing radical Islamist claims to theological authenticity
The Henry Jackson Society had just launched a guide to rejecting jihadi theologies in Islam, A Guide to Refuting Jihadism by Rashad Ali and Hannah Stuart. There are also forewords by two Sheikhs, including one from Al-Azhar University, and endorsements from other Muslim leaders. Although...
01 Feb The Abrahamic Fallacy
Introduction The Abrahamic Fallacy is the belief that Abraham is a figure of unity for Islam, Christianity and Judaism. The phrase “Abrahamic Religions” has become very popular as a cover-term for these three faiths. It is particularly popular among Jewish and Christian progressives on the one hand,...