Category Archives: Freedom of Speech

Homeland Security guidelines advise deference to pro-Shariah Muslim supremacists

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By Charles C. Johnson:

The Department of Homeland Security, which under Secretary Janet Napolitano has shown a keen interest in monitoring and warning about outspoken conservatives, takes a very different approach in monitoring political Islamists, according to a 2011 memo on protecting the free speech rights of pro-Shariah Muslim supremacists.

In a checklist obtained by The Daily Caller entitled “Countering Violent Extremism Dos and Don’ts” the DHS’s Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties notifies local and national law enforcement officials that it is Obama administration policy to consider specifically Islamic criticism of the American system of government legitimate.

This policy stands in stark contrast to the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis’ 2009 memo “Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment” [pdf], which warned of the dangers posed by pro-life advocates, critics of same-sex marriage and groups concerned with abiding by the U.S. Constitution, among others.

The advice of the Dos and Don’ts list is far more conciliatory. “Don’t use training that equates radical thought, religious expression, freedom to protest, or other constitutionally-protected activity, including disliking the U.S. government without being violent,” the manual’s authors write in a section on training being “sensitive to constitutional values.”

The manual, which was produced by an inter-agency working group from DHS and the National Counterterrorism Center, advises, “Trainers who equate the desire for Sharia law with criminal activity violate basic tenets of the First Amendment.”

The checklist also advised against using moderate Muslim “trainers who are self-professed ‘Muslim reformers’” because they “may further an interest group agenda instead of delivering generally accepted, unbiased information.”

The manual advises trainees not to assume Muslim Americans are “using democratic processes, like litigation and free speech, to subvert democracy and install Sharia law.”

Read more at Daily Caller

 

 

UN Pressures Germany to Bow to ‘Hate Speech’ Hysteria

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United-Nations-signBy Andrew Harrod & Sam Nunberg:

A recent decision by the United Nation’s (UN) Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) foreshadows an ominous future for free societies should Muslim entities like the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) achieve their goal of having “Islamophobia” defined internationally as a form of prejudice.

Former German central bank board member Thilo Sarrazin has got himself in trouble with the UN, as the Turkish Union in Berlin-Brandenburg (Türkischer Bund in Berlin-Brandenburg or TBB) stated with satisfaction in an April 18, 2013, German-language press release.  The spokesman of this German-Turkish interest group, Hilmi Kaya Turan, praised a February 26, 2013, “historic decision” by the CERD condemning Germany for not having prosecuted Sarrazin’s criticism of Arab and Turkish immigrants.

Sarrazin, a member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands or SPD), produced a storm of controversy with his August 2010 book Deutschland Schafft Sich Ab: Wie Wir Unser Land aufs Spiel Setzen (“Germany Abolishes Itself:  How We Are Risking Our Country”).  In the context of this controversy, CERD’s detailed 19-page decision extensively excerpted in English translation a fall 2009 interview with Sarrazin.  In the interview, the Berlin magazine Lettre International discussed some of the upcoming book’s themes.

CERD complained that “[i]n this interview, Mr. Sarrazin expressed himself in a derogatory and discriminatory way about social ‘lower classes’, which are not productive’ and would have to ‘disappear over time’ in order to create a city of the ‘elite’.”  Sarrazin specified that about 20% of Berlin’s population depended on welfare payments, which he wanted to cut, “above all to the lower class.”

Berlin’s indigent included within the immigrant population a “large number of Arabs and Turks in this city, whose numbers have grown through erroneous policies, have no productive function, except for the fruit and vegetable trade.” Compounding the problem for Sarrazin was a birthrate among Arabs and Turks about three times their percentage of the population.  Sarrazin thereby saw “Turks…conquering Germany just like the Kosovars conquered Kosovo: through a higher birth rate.”  Sarrazin “wouldn’t mind if” these immigrants “were East European Jews with about a 15% higher IQ than the one of Germans.”  Central to Sarrazin’s thesis was the assumption that “human ability is to some extent socially contingent and to some extent hereditary.” Sarrazin’s “solution to this problem” was “to generally prohibit influx, except for highly qualified individuals and not provide social welfare for immigrants anymore.”

As noted by CERD, Sarrazin’s interview comments prompted on October 23, 2009, a criminal complaint by the TBB under the German Criminal Code’s Article 130 against “Incitement to Hatred” (Volksverhetzung).  Yet upon review, German prosecutors suspended their investigations on November 23, 2009, deciding that Sarrazin’s views fell under the protection of free speech contained within Article 5 of Germany’s Basic Law (Grundgesetz).  Prosecutors quoted by CERD had judged Sarrazin’s statements as a “contribution to the intellectual debate in a question…very significant for the public.”

Read more at Front Page

See also:

Muslims Demand Germany “Make Islam Equal to Christianity” (gatestoneinstitute.com)

 

Terrorists Can Speak in Canada, Pamela Geller Can’t

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canadafreespeechBy Daniel Greenfield:

The Canadian reality is still different than the American reality. And the Canadian reality is different than the European reality. But the gaps between the three are shrinking.

York Regional Police threatened to remove a rabbi as one of the force’s chaplains if he hosted a controversial anti-Islamist speaker at his Thornhill synagogue.

Insp. Ricky Veerappan, of the force’s diversity, equity and inclusion bureau, confirmed he and officers from the service’s hate crimes unit met with Rabbi Mendel Kaplan of the Chabad Flamingo Synagogue on Tuesday.

Veerappan said he told Kaplan that Geller’s speech “would not be endorsed by York Regional Police” and that the rabbi’s role as a force chaplain would be thrown into question if he were to permit the event.

“If he did (host Geller), then we’d have to reassess our relationship with (Kaplan),” Veerappan said. “We serve the needs of the entire community. Some of the stuff that Ms. Geller speaks about runs contrary to the values of York Regional Police and the work we do in engaging our communities.”

Veerappan said a member of York Region’s Muslim community, whom he wouldn’t identify, brought Geller’s scheduled talk to the attention of police.

In March, the University of Toronto hosted controversial Muslim lecturer Tariq Ramadan, who has also spoken in Toronto at the annual Islamic faith conference, Reviving the Islamic Spirit. In October, Pakistani politician Imran Khan, a controversial critic of the U.S. war on terror, spoke in Brampton. Leila Khaled, a Palestinian revolutionary from the 1970s, is set speak at University of British Columbia on May 4.

The rules are fairly straightforward. Muslims are allowed to do anything they like because interfering with them might rile them up. And non-Muslims are only allowed to praise Islam because otherwise Muslims might get riled up.

There is no standard of behavior. Only a security concept that stakes everything on not riling Muslims up.  And that means free speech goes by the wayside.

Obama officials have engaged in similar efforts to silence and even imprison those who burned Korans or made movies offensive to Muslims. Every Western country is falling under the same mandate that conflates national security with not offending Muslims.

In the name of that inoffensiveness, Muslim speakers who promote terrorism are tolerated in order not to offend the Muslims who might otherwise turn to terrorism. And non-Muslims who oppose terrorism are silenced because if they speak, Muslims might turn to terrorism.

This is the upside down world that appeasement has given us where black is white and good is evil.

Read more at Front Page

 

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Pamela Geller’s Banned Synagogue Talk, April 14, 2013

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Introduced by David Yerushalmi, Pamela Geller gave this talk at Chabad of Great Neck, Long Island, after her scheduled talk was cancelled at Great Neck Synagogue under leftist and Islamic supremacist pressure. The Chabad house was packed and the overflow crowd watched on a jumbotron outside — nearly 1,000 people attended. Videographer Pamela Hall

 

Robert Spencer denounces Nassau County Human Rights Commissioner Habeeb Ahmed’s abuse of his office in initiating a smear campaign to intimidate the Great Neck Synagogue to cancel Pamela Geller’s talk, and the larger war against the freedom of speech. Videographer, Pamela Hall

David Wood: An Open Message to Rabbi Jerome Davidson (and Other Critics of Pamela Geller)

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Pamela Geller gagged in Great NeckDavid Wood:

My wife and I were looking forward to hearing Pamela Geller speak at Great Neck Synagogue this Sunday. Unfortunately, her speech was canceled due to a relentless campaign of intimidation by an “interfaith” coalition that included not only Muslims, but Jews and Christians as well. We can only wonder why these Jews and Christians, who find Pamela’s speech unacceptable, have no objection to the hate-filled claims we read in the Qur’an and Hadith.

If you happen to be in the New York area, Sunday’s events have been rescheduled elsewhere.

For those who would like to know what the Muslim sources say about unbelievers, here you go:

Qur’an 3:32—Say: Obey Allah and the Apostle; but if they turn back, then surely Allah does not love the unbelievers.

Qur’an 5:51—O you who believe! do not take the Jews and the Christians for friends; they are friends of each other; and whoever amongst you takes them for a friend, then surely he is one of them; surely Allah does not guide the unjust people.

Qur’an 9:29—Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the Religion of Truth, from among the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizyah with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.

Qur’an 9:30—And the Jews say: Uzair is the son of Allah; and the Christians say: The Messiah is the son of Allah; these are the words of their mouths; they imitate the saying of those who disbelieved before; may Allah destroy them; how they are turned away!

Qur’an 9:73—O Prophet! strive hard against the unbelievers and the hypocrites and be unyielding to them; and their abode is hell, and evil is the destination.

Qur’an 9:111—Surely Allah has bought of the believers their persons and their property for this, that they shall have the garden; they fight in Allah’s way, so they slay and are slain; a promise which is binding on Him in the Taurat and the Injeel and the Quran; and who is more faithful to his covenant than Allah? Rejoice therefore in the pledge which you have made; and that is the mighty achievement.

Qur’an 9:123—O you who believe! fight those of the unbelievers who are near to you and let them find in you hardness; and know that Allah is with those who guard (against evil).

Qur’an 47:35—Be not weary and fainthearted, crying for peace, when ye should be uppermost: for Allah is with you, and will never put you in loss for your (good) deeds.

Qur’an 48:29—Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and those who are with him are severe against disbelievers, and merciful among themselves.

Qur’an 98:6—Verily, those who disbelieve (in the religion of Islam, the Qur’an and Prophet Muhammad) from among the people of the Scripture (Jews and Christians) and Al-Mushrikun will abide in the Fire of Hell. They are the worst of creatures.

Sahih Muslim 33—It has been narrated on the authority of Abdullah b. Umar that the Messenger of Allah said: I have been commanded to fight against people till they testify that there is no god but Allah, that Muhammad is the messenger of Allah, and they establish prayer, and pay Zakat and if they do it, their blood and property are guaranteed protection on my behalf except when justified by law, and their affairs rest with Allah.

Sahih Muslim 4366—It has been narrated by ‘Umar b. al-Khattab that he heard the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) say: I will expel the Jews and Christians from the Arabian Peninsula and will not leave any but Muslim.

Al-Bukhari, Al-Adab al-Mufrad 1103—Abu Hurayra reported that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said, “Do not give the People of the Book the greeting first. Force them to the narrowest part of the road.”

Sahih al-Bukhari, Ch. 88—Narrated Ibn Umar that the Prophet said, “My livelihood is under the shade of my spear, and he who disobeys my orders will be humiliated by paying Jizya.”

For more on Jihad, click here.

 

FREE SPEECH DEMO AT HABEEB AHMED’S HUMAN RIGHTS OFFICE 1PM, SUNDAY: HABEEB MUST GO!

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Mr. Habeeb Ahmed, President-Elect, Islamic Center of Long Island

Mr. Habeeb Ahmed, President-Elect,
Islamic Center of Long Island

Pamela Geller:

After our event on sharia at the Chabad Synagogue on Sunday, where I have been rescheduled to speak at 10am, we will be reconvening in front of Habeeb Ahmed’s Human Rights Commission office. Ahmed used his office to strongarm and bully the Great Neck Synagogue to cancel my talk on Sunday. It’s not far away — only 20 minutes.

We wil we be reading Quranic texts and teachings that command Jew-hatred, demanding that Habeeb Ahmed and all Islamic clerics condemn the religious texts that fuel the hatred of Israel and Jewish people across the world. Let us truly further interfaith dialogue.

Don’t miss this protest.

We will convene at 1p. Join Robert Spencer, Dr. Andrew Bostom and myself. BE THERE

Nassau County Commission on Human Rights
240 Old Country Road,  Mineola, NY 11501

1pm

AFDI applauds the Nassau County Attorney’s office investigation. Habeed Ahmed “misused his title” to strongarm a Long Island synagogue into silencing free speech and enforcing the sharia. Habeeb apologized, but that is hardly enough. HE MUST GO (read these emails).

Here is the latest on Habeebgate, the alleged attempt by the Islamic supremacist Habeeb Ahmed of the Nassau County Human Rights Commission to use the power of his position deploy his mujahideen in a covert effort to intimidate the Great Neck synagogue into cancelling my scheduled speech there.

Habeeb and his accomplices ordered their minions to strongarm the shul, make calls, and get the synagogue leaders to cancel a proud Jew scheduled to speak at their synagogue. (more here)

As a result of this egregious violation of the public trust, we urge the Nassau County Executive to remove this thug from office.

We welcome this investigation and hope the imposition of sharia blasphemy laws using public office will be punished to the full extent of the law. American law for American courts. Stop sharia in America.

This is the day’s schedule: Pamela Geller and Cpl Lance Buckley’s father join Rabbi Yoseph Geisinsky to speak at Chabad at 10 am on Sunday.

1pm Free Speech Demo at Habeeb’s “Human Rights Commission” Office, 240 Old Country Road, Mineola. Bring flags and free speech signs.

7 pm Pamela Geller and Cpl Lance Buckley’s father join Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg to speak again — Temple Beth-El, 91 Jefferson Boulevard Edison, NJ.

 

Shadowing Europe with the ‘Islamophobia’ Canard

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20130411_shadow_report_2011-12by ANDREW E. HARROD:

On March 21, 2013, the United Nation’s observed its annual International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, commemorating the anniversary of the 1960 apartheid massacre in Sharpeville, South Africa.  Attempting to draw a parallel with the massacre, the Non-Governmental-Organization (NGO) grouping European Network Against Racism (ENAR) issued its Racism in Europe:  ENAR Shadow Report 2011-12 on racism in Europe the week earlier.  In the report’s associated Key Findings on Muslim Communities and Islamophobia, ENAR, an entity linked on its website to George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, calls upon European Union (EU) institutions to “recognize Islamophobia as a specific form of racism.”  ENAR’s cavalier invocation as “racism” of what has been analyzed as an Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) developed “thought crime of the totalitarian future” portends problematical developments with respect to the treatment of Islam amidst its critics in Europe.

Relating “racism” to Islam asks the obvious, “are Muslims a race?”  The Shadow Report does little to clarify the confusion, stating (page 2) that “Islamophobia describes an irrational fear, prejudice and hatred towards Islam, Muslims or Islamic culture.”  ENAR thus condemns not just animus against Muslim individuals, but also any undefined “irrational” opposition to Islam as an idea in faith or culture.   Accordingly, the report condemns as “Islamophobia” (13) not simply “criminal damage to Islamic buildings and violence against Muslims” but also “opposition to, as well as protests against, the building of mosques,” irrespective of any individual criticism of such mosques like the proposed New York City Ground Zero Mosque.

The Shadow Report similarly bemoans the poor public relations (PR) image concerning Islam and Muslims in Europe.  While noting (4) that the “news media plays a critical role in shaping public opinion,” the Shadow Report declares without any empirical substantiation that “news reporting of ethnic minorities…is generally negative and distorted.”  The report complains of a “tendency for the media to blame migrants and asylum seekers for high rates of unemployment and criminality.”

In contrast, the Shadow Report recommends (5) that supposedly objective journalists “[u]se positive terminology and encourage positive media reporting about ethnic and religious minorities and migrants to emphasize their economic, social and cultural contributions to European societies.”  This would be part of what the report (5) describes as a desired “ethical journalism, protective of values such as equality and dignity.”  Similarly (6), the report calls upon authorities to “[r]eview school curricula to ensure that they take into consideration the presence of minorities and migrants and their contribution to culture and society, and contribute to overcoming stereotypes and promoting inclusion.”

While promoting positive speech about Islam and Muslims along with other minority groups, the Shadow Report disturbingly calls for restricting negative speech on these matters.  The Key Findings and the report (5) both advocate a “courageous approach to tackling hate speech and racist rhetoric in the public discourse” and a “zero tolerance policy to stigmatizing comments and terminology likely to incite violence, racism or other forms of discrimination.”  While most EU members (4) “have legal provisions in place for tackling hate speech…in some cases they are insufficient or ineffective.”

Thus the report, in reiterating this charge on page 30, states that “[i]n some cases measures still need to be brought in.”  In particular, the report (5) deems “regulation of the internet” as “seriously inadequate and often completely lacking” even though “[s]ocial media and social networking sites have become a growing space for disseminating xenophobic, Islamophobic and racist discourse.”  EU members should accordingly “[r]einforce legislation to monitor hate on the internet and in the media.”

The report (30) identifies Austrian politicians, “particularly from far-right parties,” as “regular perpetrators of hate speech.”  The report references the October 14, 2011, acquittal of the provincial Freedom Party (Freiheitliche Partie Österreichs or FPÖ) chairman in Styria, Gerhard Kurzmann, of incitement charges.  The Styria FPÖ had posted on its website a game entitled Moschee Baba (Austrian slang for “Mosque Goodbye”) in which players targeted mosques, minarets, and muezzins on screen, something that brought prosecution accusations of replicating a shooting gallery.  The Shadow Report finds that this case “demonstrates the difficulty in successfully prosecuting hate speech in Austria, especially when the perpetrator is a public figure.”

Read more: Family Security Matters

Andrew E. Harrod serves as a Legal Clerk for The Legal Project, an activity of the Middle East Forum. Mr. Harrod is also a freelance researcher and writer who holds a PhD from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a JD from George Washington University Law School. This article was commissioned by The Legal Project.

 

Pat Condell takes aim at the “Organization of Islamic Criminals”

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Free speech will never be allowed to die…not in a blizzard of crooked UN resolutions and not in a million manufactured riots. There’s more chance that pigs will literally fly….

 

 

Learn more about the OIC’s attempt to criminalize criticism of Islam: Threat to Free Speech

 

Violence and Mainstream Islam

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Hundreds of thousands of Bengladeshi Muslims demonstrate and chant ,“Allah is great, hang the atheist bloggers.”

*****

April 8th, 2013 by Andrew Bostom:

Against the backdrop of 20,651 jihadist attacks since 9/11/2001, and the hundreds of thousands of Muslims in Dhaka, Bengladesh (hat tip Jihad Watch) on the march this past week, demanding the execution of “atheist bloggers” for “blaspheming” Islam, I was re-reading V.S. Naipaul’s second brilliant travelogue account of Asian Islamdom, circa 1995,  Beyond Belief.

Naipaul’s five month 1995 journey included sojourns in Iran, Pakistan, Malaysia, and Indonesia, supposedly more “moderate,” overall, than Arab Islamdom. Beyond Belief contains this simple, elegant description by a secular Pakistani journalist, i.e., a private apostate, who found mainstream Islamic violence unacceptable. Identified only as “Salman,” he proffered this explanation about the roots of traditionalist, mainstream Islamic violence—which must be considered when applying the term “moderate” to mainstream votaries of Islam:

…[T]he idea of jihad, holy war…was a special Muslim idea. He [Salman] explained it like this: “In Christianity, Christ died for all Christians. He can ensure heaven for them. In Islam, Mohammed can only make a submission in your favor for being a follower of his. It is only Allah who makes the final decision on the merit won by your good deeds. Nothing is greater, so far as goodness goes, than jihad in the name of Allah.” [Naipaul interjects] Jihad was not meant metaphorically. “The word of the Koran is taken very literally. It is blasphemous even to think of it as allegory. The Koran lays great store in jihad. It is one of the sayings of Mohammed–not in the Koran, it’s one of the traditions—‘If you see an un-Islamic practice you stop it by force. If you do not possess the power to stop it, you condemn it verbally. If not that also, then you condemn it in your heart.’ As far back as I can remember I have known this. I think this tradition gives the Muslim license to act violently.” [Naipaul adds] …he [Salman] understood both their [Muslims] need to win merit as followers of Mohammed, and also their fear of hell. [Salman again] “Endless whipping with fiery flames, and fire beyond imagination. Having to drink pus. It’s very graphic in the traditions. In the Koran there’s just mention of the fires and the endlessness of punishment.”

The canonical hadith alluded to by Naipaul’s “Salman,” are cited below, including the delightful spectacle of drinking pus in Hell:

I heard the Messenger of Allah say: “Whoever among you sees an evil action, let him change it with his hand (by action); if he cannot, then with his tongue (by speaking out); and if he cannot, then with his heart (by hating it and feeling it is wrong), and that is the weakest of faith.” [Sahih Muslim, The Book of Faith, Chapter 20, Clarifying That Forbidding Evil is Part of Faith; Faith Increases and Decreases; Enjoining What is Good and Forbidding What is Evil Are Obligatory; [177] 78- (49), pp.143-44, from: Vol. 1 English translation of Sahih Muslim From Hadith no. 01-1160, translated by Nasirrudin al-Khattab, Darussalam Books, Riyadh, 2007.]

Amr ibn Shu’ayb reported from his father on the authority of his grandfather that the Prophet said, “The arrogant will be (rasied and) gathered on the Day of Resurrection as ants in the garb of mankind. They will be covered with disgrace from all sides and they will be driven to a cell in Hell named Bulas. They will boil in the fire of Fires and will be given to drink the pus of the people of the Fire, extremely bad in odor.” [From Jami Tirmidhi (2500)]

 

U.S. Muslim calls for restrictions on free speech at event hosted by Obama appointee

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Qasim Rashid

Qasim Rashid

By Robert Spencer:

Qasim Rashid, an extraordinarily arrogant man who is deeply contemptuous of any opponent of the Islamic supremacist agenda, joins his fellow Ahmadi Harris Zafar in calling for restrictions on the freedom of speech. That is a recipe for tyranny, and it bodes ill that an Obama appointee was involved. “Obama’s Religious Freedom Appointee Involved in Muslim Event Calling for Limiting Freedom of Speech,” by Elizabeth Harrington for CNS News, March 26 (thanks to David):

(CNSNews.com) – America’s free-speech model is in desperate need of an update, says an American-Muslim human rights activist who recently spoke at an event linked to an Obama administration appointee.

Dr. Qasim Rashid argued that cyber-bullying laws could be used to limit freedom of expression – such as the burning of Korans — in war time:

“When a nation is at war, many things that might be said in times of peace are a hindrance to this effort,” Rashid said on March 19 at Howard University. “And their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight and…no court can regard them as protected by any constitutional right.”

Rashid began his remarks by personally thanking Dr. Azizah al-Hibri, appointed by President Barack Obama to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) in June 2011. Al-Hibri founded Karamah, a group devoted to the rights of Muslim women, and it was this group that invited Rashid to speak.

“I do want to start by thanking Karamah,” Rashid said. “I was fortunate enough to have several constitutional scholars look at this paper and provide feedback. Dr. al-Hibri, of course…”

The topic of the March 19 event at Howard University was titled, “The Limits of Free Speech in a Global Era: Does America’s Free Speech Model Endanger Muslim Americans?”

“Our understanding of free speech today is not some long-held 227- or 235-year understanding,” said Rashid, a member of the Muslim Writers Guild of America, who presented a paper titled “In Harm’s Way: The Desperate Need to Update America’s Current Free Speech Model.”

Read more at Jihad Watch

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