This is one case where silence isn't golden and ignorance isn't bliss.
They are dangerous and dumb
Jewish World Review Sept.
5, 2006 / 12 Elul, 5766
It's not easy to be shocked by jihad these days, five years and numberless
atrocities after the Twin Towers imploded on almost 3,000 fellow citizens.
That said, I admit my own jihad-fatigue was broken — shattered, really
— by the "conversion" to Islam of Fox journalists Steve Centanni and Olaf
Wiig videotaped during their two-week ordeal as captives of Palestinians
in Gaza.
Why? Andrew G. Bostom, writing at Frontpage mag. tells us forced conversions
to Islam "have been the norm, across three continents — Asia, Africa and
Europe — for over 13 centuries," and cites contemporary examples in the
jihad campaigns of Sudan and Indonesia. Even so, religious coercion, let
alone "jihad campaigns," still seems appallingly new to us — if by "us"
I can still make myself understood to mean, generally, Western peoples
in modern times. Indeed, I can't think of another hostage to jihad forced
into Islam — not even Daniel Pearl or Nicolas Berg, and not the U.S. Embassy
hostages in Tehran a quarter century ago.
Is this incident a tip-off to a new level of unabashed religious abuse
of traditionally (once upon a time) inviolate Westerners? In the "conversion"
video, we see such abuse as the American and the New Zealander sit, costumed
in Arabic robes, "forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," as Centanni
later revealed. Holding up a symbolic first finger, they read their lines
in both Arabic and English, proclaiming their "new" faith, declaring their
"new" names — Khaled and Ya'aqob — and calling on President Bush and Prime
Minister Blair to do likewise. I didn't see the videotape on television
(more on that below), but rather on Internet, where, like high-tech specters,
"Khaled" and "Ya'aqob" will haunt their freed selves into cyber-eternity.
Or will they? Whether this "conversion" is legit probably depends on
the eye or, rather, the religion of the beholder. The Koran says "there
is no compulsion in religion" — as did, absurdly, the video — but, as Robert
Spencer writes at Frontpage mag., traditional Islamic teachings about Muhammad,
which reveal that the Islamic prophet's invitation to Islam was accompanied
by "an inescapable threat" of subjugation and war, have left Islam with
a different interpretation of "compulsion" from the West. That is, given
accounts of Muhammad's own example, Islam doesn't really see forcible conversion
in commonly understood terms of "compulsion."
So, what if Centanni and Wiig "revert" to their non-Muslim identities?
Would such "apostasy" sentence them to death? (Leaving Islam is a capital
crime under Islamic law.) Shocking thought. Of course, there's something
even more shocking to the story than the religious charade itself.
No, it isn't the bizarre disclaimer Centanni felt compelled to append
to his account of the shotgun-conversion — "Don't get me wrong here. I
have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things
about it." While it's more than strange to hear a person who has been forced
to choose between death and Islam flack for Islam as he resumes his life,
there's something else. And it isn't praise for the "beautiful and kind-hearted"
Palestinian people Centanni slathered around the microphone at his Gaza
City press conference before, as Bostom noted, high-tailing it to safety
in infidel-Israel.
The most shocking thing about the Centanni-Wiig "conversion" is the
silence that has followed. First, there is silence from Islam. Shouldn't
Muslim religious leaders, and particularly "beautiful and kind-hearted"
Palestinian Muslim religious leaders, vehemently condemn the forced conversions?
As Bostom put it, "Will such Muslim authorities at least recognize the
acute predicament of Centanni and Wiig by issuing a fatwa stating that
their 'conversion,' being under duress, was not bona fide, condemning in
advance any Muslim who might now attack these journalists for 'apostasy'
from Islam?"
Yes, of course, they should — at least according to any Western understanding
of compulsion and morality — but don't hold your breath. Meanwhile, holding
their breath is exactly what Western media are doing when it comes to covering
(not covering) the story. Even Fox's Greta van Susteren, a tabloidesque
host who never met a bodily fluid she couldn't elaborate on, went delicate
on us the other night, failing, in a one-hour "exclusive" interview with
the two men, to ask a single question about their religious ordeal — presumably
at their request.
Why? Who or what is served by shutting up? Only forces of coercion
— a word which, after all, implies the nullification of individual will.
Which means this is one case where silence isn't golden and ignorance isn't
bliss. They are dangerous and dumb.
© 2006, Diana West
Russian version