Radical Islamist Leads Convention "Interfaith Service"

townhall.com ^ | August 10, 2008

[Free ThinkerNY]

Has anyone at the DNC even taken a minute to look into her background? If they did, they'd find this:

Though Dr. Ingrid Mattson appears moderate, she is insidious precisely because she maintains that facade while steadfastly refusing to criticize radical Islamists, claiming that there is no such thing as Wahhabism and that the term "Islamic terrorism" should not be used in the media. Most shocking of all, though, is how little concern she expressed about suicide bombings in an essay she wrote shortly after 9/11.

At a CNN-sponsored "town hall" forum in October 2001, Mattson — with a straight face — claimed that the radical, Saudi-sponsored form of Islam known as Wahhabism was akin to the Protestant movement in Christianity. Wahhabism "really was analogous to the European protestant reformation," she explained.

This wasn't an isolated use of the analogy. At a November 2003 roundtable sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies Conference, Mattson said the Wahhabist movement in Islam is "a very old struggle …between the more theologically austere Muslims who like Protestant Christianity believe that there should be no saints there should be no intervention between you and G-d."

Mattson takes a similar "see no evil" approach to the idea of Islamic terrorism. Mattson was one of several Muslim "scholars" quoted in a Washington Times article shortly after 9/11 who claimed that the media should not use the term "Islamic terrorism." Mattson took this stance despite the fact, as the Times paraphrased her, that "Islamic terrorists themselves use this term."

[eleni121]

Given the insanity spreading in general I am sure that Ingrid Mattson would be willing to speak and welcome at the GOP convention as well.

[Ziva]

Mattson was a speaker at a local interfaith breakfast in 2004, partially sponsored by the UJA. I wrote about it and fought it. I think the event may have been canceled, but the stench remained. Joel Mowbray wrote about it at http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0304/mowbray_2004_03_26.php3?printer_friendly.

"The reason Mattson is able to pass herself off as a moderate is probably because she clears the low bar set for most Muslims: the ability to explicitly condemn suicide bombings. But she hasn't done so for very long. In a remarkably revealing essay Mattson penned for Beliefnet.com in October 2001, she wrote that, until then, Palestinian suicide bombings "simply did not cross my mind as a priority among the many issues I felt needed to be addressed." She stated it as matter-of-factly and inconsequentially as someone who apologizes for forgetting to pick up the dry cleaning because it "simply did not cross my mind as a priority." "

[PGalt]

Thanks for posting; bump! BUMP!

[Ziva]

Guest Column: Ingrid Mattson vs. Freedom of Speech by Robert Spencer has the following:

"However, there are numerous indications in Mattson's article that free speech is precisely what she does not accept. When she says that "we do not have to agree with each other or love each other, but we have to afford respect to each other," she is not speaking of Muslims and their reactions to Wilders' film [Fitna]. Rather, she is referring to Wilders himself, as is clear from the sentence that follows: "This means that we do not deliberately try to humiliate each other." She clearly believes Wilders in creating the film Fitna, which offers violent quotations from the Qur'an and then shows Muslims acting upon them, was trying to humiliate Muslims: she claims that "Wilders has directed most of his hatred in recent years at Muslims," and says that "Wilders' actions are designed to hurt, offend, and even intimidate." She decries "the voices of self-proclaimed nationalists – really, racists – like Wilders, [who] often seem louder and more powerful because they are threatening.""

[PGalt]

Link did not open, Ziva. Is this the one?

http://jihadwatch.org/archives/021727.php

Thank you and thanks to Robert Spencer and the outstanding posters at jihadwatch.

[Man50D]

Saying there are moderate muslims is tantamount to saying there were moderate Nazis during WWII.

[PGalt]

Saying there are moderate muslims is tantamount to saying there were moderate Nazis during WWII.

BTTT!

[keane]

The thought of someone like Martin being taken seriously anywhere is so revolting that I’m having trouble focusing on this post...

But she is a great example of the recipe for success in the academic world, which isn’t intelligence or creativity, but instead “say the exact opposite of whatever common sense dictates.”

---

Remember kids: those of us who realize our adolescent nearsightedness grow up to be wise, and those of us who don’t grow up to be democrats.

---

Check out the blog - I demand it!
http://oldcorpsblog.blogspot.com/

[Melchior]

Ingrid Mattson is, I believe, a Canadian. She taught (and probably still does teach) at Hartford, whose seminary is a mish-mash of Islamist apologists.

[PGalt]

Thanks for the link. Some great stuff there.

[PGalt]

Thanks. I did not know that about her.

[CaptRon]

there should be no saints there should be no intervention between you and G-d."

Perhaps she can explain that all Muslim prayers seem to invoke Mohammed at the same time they evoke Allah. And while she's at it, maybe she can explain the outrage over the Mohammed cartoons.