Amazingly, today the New York Times published Ayaan Hirsi Ali's op-ed, "Islam's Silent Moderates." Good for them! Also amazing is the courage of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, but we've become used to it. She begins her op-ed with a quote from the Koran
The woman and the man guilty of adultery or
fornication, flog each of them with 100 stripes: Let no compassion move
you in their case, in a matter prescribed by Allah, if you believe in
Allah and the Last Day. (Koran 24:2)
And continues:
IN the last few weeks, in three widely publicized episodes, we have seen Islamic justice enacted in ways that should make Muslim moderates rise up in horror. . . [She relates the incidents]
But while the incidents in Saudi Arabia, Sudan and India have done more to damage the image of Islamic justice than a dozen cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, the organizations that lined up to protest the hideous Danish offense to Islam are quiet now. . .
But take a look at the verse above: more compelling even than the order to flog adulterers is the command that the believer show no compassion. It is this order to choose Allah above his sense of conscience and compassion that imprisons the Muslim in a mindset that is archaic and extreme. . .
If moderate Muslims believe there should be no compassion shown to the girl from Qatif, [earlier described] then what exactly makes them so moderate?