Mr. Ibrahim is exactly correct, but about 10 years (at least) too late. I was hearing the Islamist apologist tripe in graduate school in the ’90s. The Middle East Studies Association–MESA–is a bastion of this lunacy. I lost out on an academic job in Islamic History–despite a doctorate in the field, Arabic-proficiency, an extensive publishing record and tons of teaching experience–at Kennesaw State University in Georgia because some of the search committee did not like the fact that I had written articles elaborating on facts such as: in MUSLIM sources jihad means, well, jihad-as-holy-war; or beheading is sanctioned by a literal reading of the Qur’an. The P.C. crowd in the government and the media take their cues from the cowardice of the academy, where Islam and Muslims must always be presented in a positive light and the undeniable violent and misogynistic strains in Islamic thought must always be denied (which is one major reason the secularist intelligentsia hates Pope Benedict: he’s not afraid to speak the truth about Islamic civilization in this regard).
