"Who are you going to believe..."

"...me or your lying eyes?"

[Syed Soharwardy] asked for a meeting with the Herald's editorial board via an e-mail, arguing that Levant was "attempting to paint me as a hate-mongering, anti-Semitic, Wahabi radical who wants to see Canada governed under sharia law. Nothing could be further from the truth."

While preparing for the meeting, a quick search on Canwest's library system showed a Jan. 17, 2004, column written by the cleric.

In it, he wrote: "Sharia cannot be customized for specific countries. These universal, divine laws are for all people of all countries for all times."

In the same column he also boasts: "I am one of the founding members of the Islamic Institute of Civil Justice. The mandate of the institute is to resolve disputes within existing Canadian laws by using the principles of conflict resolution from Islamic Law, or sharia."

His column is clear. He wanted to bring sharia to Canada and even helped found the organization that spearheaded the drive to do so.

But in our meeting, Soharwardy denied his own column. "I never asked to bring sharia in Canada," he now insists.

As for the allegation he's anti-Semitic, in 2000 he wrote in his newsletter: "Presently, what Israeli forces are doing to Palestinians is worse than the Holocaust of World War II." Comparing Israel's attempts to defend itself to the carting of millions of Jews in cattle cars to gas chambers is obscene.

In our meeting, he said the above quote was taken out of context, that he has numerous Jewish friends and holds a Hanukkah celebration at his mosque, the Al Madinah Calgary Islamic Centre.

[...]

While Christians from around the world were emptying their wallets to help the victims of this natural disaster, Muslim leaders were blaming the disaster on immoral Christian tourists in their countries.

Soharwardy seemingly got swept up in the wave of anti-Christian rhetoric and sent out a news release accusing Christians of kidnapping Muslim orphans in Indonesia. Again, he denied his own written words.

"I don't believe that, I just quoted what was in the newspaper and asked where are the wealthy Muslim governments, why are they not helping."

But here's what his Jan. 23, 2005, news release actually said: "ISCC...strongly condemns the exploitation of tsunami victims by the Christian missionaries. There have been several reports that the Christian missionaries are kidnapping Muslim children in Indonesia. ...It is now proven that the Christian missionaries do not help people on humanitarian grounds. They help people in order to exploit their needs and convert them to Christianity."

Maybe the guy who wrote Ron Paul's newsletters did it.

Damian P.

Posted by damian at February 16, 2008 08:34 PM