Buy This Book

It may not be the preferred genre for readers of sites like this, but today's release of The Jewel of Medina is worthy of support. If you'll remember, Random House pulled out of its agreement to publish this first novel by journalist Sherry Jones, saying it feared "it could incite acts of violence by a small, radical segment."

The novel focuses on A'isha, the youngest wife of the Prophet Muhammed.

After the Random House withdrawal, Jones quickly secured new publishers in the U.S. and England. But the London home of Gibson Square publisher Martin Rynja was firebombed in late September. Three men are in custody.

"It is a sad and dangerous precedent," Jones said in an interview with the London Telegraph. "We seem to live in a culture of fear and I think that's threatening the future of freedom of speech in the West."

In response, Beaufort Books pushed up the U.S. release date to today in an attempt to thwart any violent backlash here.

We wanted people to have a chance to read the book," Beaufort President Eric Kampmann told the Associated Press. "Once they read the book, we thought the violence part of this story would disappear and people would be focusing on the story, and the book and Sherry."

The Times of London calls it "a breezy historical romance." The Los Angeles Times isn't impressed:

"The Jewel of Medina" is a second-rate bodice ripper or, rather, a second-rate bodice ripper-style romance (it doesn't really have sex scenes). It's readable enough, but it suffers from large swaths of purple prose. Paragraphs read like ad copy for a Rudolph Valentino movie."

Other readers may gobble it up, lost in Jones' narrative and efforts to portray a story true to history. But that's the point. It should be judged on its merits as a work of fiction. The notion that it could be silenced by extreme voices should be challenged through our wallets.

Swimming Against the Tide

Millions of Americans recently received copies of the documentary "Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West" in their newspapers and mailboxes.

The documentary looks at the continuing threat posed by radical jihadists, including some graphic images of them in action. It also features interviews with people who pay attention to the radicals' words and deeds, including Investigative Project on Terrorism Executive Director Steven Emerson.

That has prompted an organized backlash written up in stories and editorials by newspapers throughout the country. Most of those clips quote representatives from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) without ever challenging what – if anything - in the DVD is inaccurate, and without hitting CAIR with some tough questions about its unseemly history.

Many of the articles offer the theory that the mass distribution is being done to benefit Republican John McCain's presidential campaign, and cite complaints that it is an unbalanced report that newspapers should have rejected, because the idea of a documentary with a point of view is just unheard of.

So it's good to see two columns push back in recent days. Both note the documentary's emphasis on the fact that the vast majority of Muslims do not share the warped interpretation of Islam used by terrorists to justify their violence. And both columns question the validity of the criticism against Obsession.

Columbus Dispatch editorial page editor Glenn Sheller notes that CAIR consistently lobbies to strip any reference to religion from terrorist acts committed by Muslims:

"For many years, CAIR has waged a campaign to intimidate and silence anyone who raises alarms about the dangers of Islamic extremism. CAIR's rationale is that discussions of Islamic extremism lead to animosity not just toward those who twist Islam into a justification for terrorism but toward all who practice Islam.

CAIR's concern is understandable, but its response is unreasonable. The group acts properly when it hammers home the point that only a small number of Muslims support religiously motivated violence and that targeting law-abiding Muslims is wrong. Where CAIR errs is in labeling anyone who discusses Islamic terrorism a bigot and hatemonger, an Islamophobe, to use CAIR's favorite slur."

At the Rocky Mountain News, columnist Dave Kopel cites a number of ways in which CAIR's credibility has been strained by its own actions and the actions of some of its past employees. Kopel wonders whether newspapers would treat complaints by the Ku Klux Klan about a documentary on racism with similar weight.

"But when the story is nothing more than CAIR announcing it is offended about something," Kopel concludes, "the announcement does not deserve an inch of the increasingly scarce news space in the papers."

Jewel of Medina Update

Sherry Jones is urging people in England to stand up in defense of her unpublished novel, The Jewel of Medina, after the home of its publisher was firebombed last weekend.

As we reported in August, Random House dropped plans to publish the novel about A'isha, the youngest wife of the Prophet Mohammed due to concerns the story "could incite acts of violence by a small, radical segment."

In London, Gibson Square announced plans to issue the book in October with publisher Martin Rynja issuing a statement of strong commitment:

"I immediately felt that it was imperative to publish it. In an open society there has to be open access to literary works, regardless of fear. As an independent publishing company, we feel strongly that we should not be afraid of the consequences of debate. If a novel of quality and skill that casts light on a beautiful subject we know too little of in the West, but have a genuine interest in, cannot be published here, it would truly mean that the clock has been turned back to the dark ages."

Rynja was not hurt in the firebombing of his home. Reports out of London, though, say the book's publication now be in doubt. The Daily Mail quotes Jones saying Rynja is courageous but "cannot fight this all by himself."

"You have to ask whether a thug with a gun or petrol bomb should be allowed to censor the people of Great Britain," Jones said.

Meanwhile, The New York Times reports that Beaufort Books, which stepped into the void left by Random House, closed its offices Monday to consult with law enforcement.

"Outrageously Empty Epithets"

Columnist Diane West pens that powerful phrase in a new column examining the spread of Sharia law in Europe.

She notes schools serving halal food to all students, regardless of their faith, and the absence of teaching Voltaire, Diderot and other authors whose works might offend Muslims. And in England, "Sharia courts are now officially part of the British legal system. According to press reports this week, the British government has quietly, cravenly elevated five Sharia courts to the level of tribunal hearings, thus making their rulings legally binding."

Those who try to slow the burgeoning tide, West says, are immediately cast as "extremists," "racists," "fascists" and "Nazis."

"Is advocating freedom of speech ‘extreme' or ‘fascist'? Is opposing Islam's law, which knows no race, ‘racist'? Is supporting Israel (which these parties do far more than other European parties) ‘Nazi'? The outrageously empty epithets of the Islamo-socialist left seem calculated to stop thought cold and trigger a massive rejection reflex. In this way, resistance becomes anathema, and Islamic law, unchecked, spreads across Europe."

The continent is not yet "lost," as she puts it. But the trends are ominous.

Balancing Security and Civil Rights

Australia's most significant terrorism trial ended Monday in Melbourne with six convictions in a conspiracy to assassinate the prime minister and attack sporting events. Four other men were acquitted.

In an editorial, The Australian argues that the verdicts prove new terror laws there work and that critics who condemned them as unfair to minority groups or otherwise threatened civil liberties have been proven wrong:

"Greg Barns, who defended Ezzit Raad, pointed to ‘a world of difference between preparing to act and acting, and merely thinking and talking'. Such cavalier thinking beggars belief. Every week, criminals go to jail for such crimes such as conspiracy to murder and conspiracy to commit fraud, without actually murdering or defrauding anyone. In such cases, it is the evidence of intention that matters.

Pushed to its logical conclusion, Mr Barns's argument implies that anti-terror laws should not be invoked until terrorist acts are unleashed."

Disturbing Signs in the Yemen Embassy Attack

Wednesday's suicide bombing attack targeting the U.S. Embassy in Yemen killed 16 people, including an American woman from Lackawanna, N.Y.

Jeff Stein in CQ Politics spoke with a number of veteran intelligence agents and analysts who say the attack shows Al Qaeda's ability to wage spectacular attacks hasn't been eliminated, even if the organization itself is considered weaker.

One retired agent told Stein the attack could have been far worse, and perhaps was designed to take over the embassy and hold its employees hostage in a repeat of the 1979 crisis in Iran. Reports indicate six attackers were killed, and while a group calling itself Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility, officials say the the use of multiple vehicles and attackers are "all the hallmarks" of an Al Qaeda attack.

More Crazy Conspiracy Theories From Salah Sultan

Ohio blogger Patrick Poole found an interesting interview a former local community leader recently gave to the Muslim Brotherhood-linked IslamOnline website. In it, Salah Sultan blames American Jews for killing President Kennedy.

Poole points out that Sultan also blames U.S. officials for the 9/11 attacks, saying they were planned "in order to enable the US to control and terrorize the entire world."

The posting has more about Sultan's prominence and community support in the Columbus area.

Sultan, who left the U.S. for Bahrain last year, came to Columbus as a research director for the Islamic Society of Greater Columbus and was religious director of a private religious school there.

The interview with IslamOnline was about the role U.S. Muslims can play in this election year. He falsely claims there are 8-10 million American Muslims, a figure higher than even the most generous estimates normally put forth by national advocacy groups. But he uses the figure to argue that, despite the numbers, Jewish money dictates American politics and "whomever wins becomes accountable to them," Sultan said.

That's when the Kennedy conspiracy comes in:

"Mr. Paul Findley's book "Silent No More" says that President Kennedy in his second elections had a shaky stand, and accordingly a man responsible for 300 Jewish organizations proposing to fund all his campaign on one condition which was to place the keys of foreign policy in his hands, and Kennedy refused such proposal. The result was the assassination of John Kennedy."

Poole notes that Sultan was hailed as "one of America's most-noted Muslim scholars" and as a moderate in local media.

M-I-C... Kill You Real Soon!

It doesn't exactly rank up there among threats against the West, but a clip of Saudi cleric Muhammad Al-Munajid discussing Islamic law and mice is a good example of the folly of religious extremism. Mice are evil and corrupting and should be killed.

Even cartoon mice. "In all cases," Munajid said in an Al Majd television appearance in Saudi Arabia August 27 and posted by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). Click here to read the translation and here to see the video.

Somebody better tell this guy to watch his back.

Wolf Continues Pressing State Dept. on Saudi School

U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) apparently isn't one to take no for an answer. Or, one to take no answer for an answer for that matter.

On Tuesday, Wolf wrote his third letter to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice demanding she take aggressive action to determine whether textbooks at a Saudi-run school in Virginia teach extremism and intolerance, including a book which states the killing an apostate or an adulterer is acceptable under Islamic law.

Wolf first wrote to Rice June 24, citing a new report from the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) and asking that the State Department translate a collection of textbooks from the Islamic Saudi Academy that it has to assess their content. "The State Department is not doing its duty," he handwrote next to his signature.

Receiving no response, he wrote again on July 14 noting the new school year was approaching and answers were needed before that. Wolf and the USCIRF argue that the State Department has authority to investigate the ISA, because the school is funded by the Saudi Arabian embassy. The Saudi ambassador to Washington leads the school's board of directors.

Wolf finally got a response Aug. 29 from Matthew Reynolds, acting Assistant Secretary for Legislative Affairs.

"With regard to the ISA in particular, the school has reported that it is in the process of adopting new religious curricula and textbooks for the 2008-09 school year. The ISA has stated publicly that the new school year's textbooks are currently being reviewed by professors at two American universities."

In a response Sept. 16 sent to Rice, Wolf made it clear he was under whelmed. The school year is well under way, he noted, and Reynolds' letter failed to address Wolf's repeated requests for State Department officials to work with the USCIRF to translate the textbooks in State's possession "to conclusively determine what is being taught at ISA."

Since the USCIRF report, similar reports have expressed the same concerns over intolerance and extremism in Saudi textbooks. Rice has the power to act, Wolf wrote, "and arguably [you] are obligated to do so given what is at stake."

HLF Jury Selection

Jason Trahan of the Dallas Morning News has a glimpse into the first day of jury selection for the retrial of five Holy Land Foundation officers accused of routing money to Hamas.

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