The Text of Wafa Sultan’s Speech in Copenhagen

A couple of days ago I posted the video of Wafa Sultan’s June 14 speech in Copenhagen. I mentioned at the time that parts of the audio were hard to understand, and a reader named Kosher Kitty kindly rose to the occasion and transcribed the entire speech for Gates of Vienna:

Hello everyone. Thank you so much for inviting me to attend this conference. I am so honored to be here today.

Two years ago, in the aftermath of the turbulent times related to the Danish cartoon depiction of Muhammad, I traveled to your beautiful country to express my gratitude for your courage, to stand up and protect our valuable Western attribute to include freedom of speech, expression, and freedom of conscience. As you may remember, I insisted that publishing the cartoons was a very initial step to educate Muslims all over the world to acknowledge criticism and listen respectfully to how others view aspects of their religion.

Ever since, I have been closely watching Arabic media, and assure you that publication of those cartoons has played a major role in making a positive change. And if that crisis, Islamic ideology emblazoned in hatred, violence, and intolerance, had not been questioned or challenged by outsiders in such a strong manner, the cartoon episode changed the paradigm and so was a turning point from which there is no way back.

However, Muslims still find it difficult to accept responsibility for their actions, and the question is why. Muslims have been hostages to their belief system for 1400 years. They simply have not been exposed to the world outside their Islamic restricted prison. They follow blindly their dogma and aren’t at all capable of critically reflecting and self-criticizing.

For Muslims, self-evaluating and challenging their religion is a pure taboo. According to Bernard Lewis, and I confirm it, Muslims reject newness. On the other hand, Western political correctness, triggered by fear, under the umbrella of multicultural creed, has played a major supportive role in Muslims on [unintelligible] following their beliefs and behaviors without need to reform.

Islamists interpret Western society’s silence and soft approach as capitulation of their demands are therefore under the impression that they hold the upper hand on their path to submission of all others under Islam and sharia law. I recently read an article entitled “In the Casbah of Rotterdam” by Julio Mittu [or Mutti (sp?)] hopefully, I’m pronouncing his name the right way — an article which shockingly describes how Rotterdam, the second largest city in Holland, is becoming the first Muslim city in Europe.

The newspaper article included a quote made a year ago in form of a letter written by [unintelligible] Ismaili, a Rotterdam city councilman, where Ismaili stated: “Listen, up, crazy freaks, we’re here to stay. You’re the foreigners here. With Allah on my side, I am not afraid of anything. Take my advice. Convert to Islam and you will find peace.”

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It is obvious to me that Mr. Ismaili’s insult would not have been allowed to be printed 15 or even 10 years ago. This is because in the past Muslims like Ismaili felt too weak and outnumbered to publicly make such an appalling statement — or announcement. Now their populations have increased substantially, gaining Islamists power and muscle to openly express their true intention.

The majority in the West have easily taken their freedom for granted. They forget the history of European struggle to advance into the age of Enlightenment, to establish secular liberal democracy. Therefore, the general public is reluctant to protect these treasured values. At the same token [sic], they lack basic understanding of the nature, focus, and underlying principles that drive Muslims.

In Western culture, violence is a last resort. For Muslims, it’s culturally instinctive reaction. As a result, in the face of barbaric acts like honor killings, raping of non-Muslims, and organized vandalism by Muslims in European cities, government officials and law-abiding citizens, liberal academic elite, the liberal media, and the proponents of interfaith dialogue legitimize sharia-approved doctrines by ignoring them, or worse, by approving those doctrines to be woven in Western social fabric, thus creating a harmful, syncretic relationship.

On one hand, young Muslims are taught in mosques, schools, and at home that non-Muslims are kafr, infidels, and not respected, that Muslims must never assimilate into Western society, that death is valued over life, that Jews are pigs and monkeys, and that raping non-Muslim women is not a crime, that it is allowed to beat wives to discipline them, and I could go on and on listing unacceptable Muslim activities permitted by sharia law. At the same time, we hear entirely unreasonable messages of tolerance from many European leaders, including high-level government officials, such as a lawsuit pursued by a Dutch court against Geert Wilders for hate speech.

Hence, instead of defending his right to free speech, Wilders has been punished by [sic] exposing the struggle between Islamization of the West and the need to protect the free world. Instead of protecting Wilders’ rights to prefer true liberal values, he’s silenced and viewed as a racist Islamophobe. I believe that the Dutch case against Wilders is an expression of the powerful influence of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference over European institutions.

As you may know, the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, an association of 57 Islamic states, promotes a United Nations resolution to suppress voices of critical dissent against Islam. This initiative is a most destructive and dangerous proposal. I strongly urge its defeat.

Just like in the case of Mr. Wilders, the liberal establishment, cheered by the growing Muslim population, is successfully able to portray anyone who criticizes Islam as warmonger, anti-peace, right-wing extremist, racist, and Islamophobe. By now, this atmosphere of multiculturalism has been strident, consequently, the superficial political correctness tone adopted by the West has failed to recognize the danger of letting weeds creep into the Western garden to eventually destroy its humane beauty.

Fortunately, after September 11, and more specifically after the Danish cartoons riot, some courageous individuals in the West have realized the enormous aspect of the Islamic culture and boldly spoken up against it. Mr. Wilders is with us today. He is among these brave leaders. He is a true hero who has in spite of numerous obstacles risked his well-being to secure us all. By producing the documentary film Fitna, Mr. Wilders allowed the audience to question links between Islamic teachings and Muslims’ manifestations of their texts, letting viewers reach their own conclusion.

As an Arab, I am convinced that as people in the West learn the truth about Islam, many more would follow Geert Wilders’ footsteps. I therefore call upon Western government officials to study Islamic principles from their original Arabic textbooks without distortion or sugarcoating.

One of the principles is a very dangerous Islamic concept called in Arabic al-taqiyya. It allows and even commands Muslims to lie and deceive in order to achieve their defined objective, submitting the world to Islam and the sharia law.

To be sure, Islamists who follow the political ideology of subverting non-Muslims under Islam do use the concept of al-taqiyya. I believe that Muslims’ al-taqiyya and the West’s ignorance about the true intentions of Islamists both violate our right to know the truth, regardless of how evil or unintentional their objective is. The relationship between the two is the recipe for irreversible damage to liberal democracy and values of freedom, the foundation of European Union.

It is obvious that people in the West and especially those in position of leadership who live by Western moral code on which they were nurtured refuse to judge individuals on the basis of their religious affiliation, and that’s their right. But they don’t have the right to be ignorant or to disregard the fact that Islam is not only a religion, it is also a political doctrine that imposes itself by force.

That’s precisely what Mr. Wilders has been trying so hard to convey and that is exactly what the Saudi flag represents. Would you please take a look at the Saudi flag. The writing on the flag translates, No God but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet. Underneath that religious statement there is the large sword. It represents the superiority of Islam and its desire to impose it by force on the non-Muslim. This statement is the underlying foundation of Islam.

You may be familiar with the saying that it takes an entire village to raise a well adjusted, healthy child. In that spirit, I call anew, as a community of people, countries, and nations, caring to preserve that eternal child, our treasured freedom and liberty, to be bold and fully support Mr. Wilders [unintelligible] to preserve liberal democracy as your highest priority.

I call on you to please keep in mind that they who forget their history are doomed to repeat it, and they who don’t know their enemy will never be able to defeat it. As the wise said, Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or abridging the freedom of speech. There is no freedom without the freedom to criticize and exercise reasonable civil discussion; there is no values [sic] without mutual respect.

The threat of violence is the [unintelligible] of criminals, not civilization. As for you the Danish people, you are well known for your historical record as fighters against evil. I believe the Danish people indeed deserve credit for demolishing [sic] the first break in the Islamic prison wall. By doing that, I am certain, you opened the door and granted a sense of confidence to others in the European Union to get involved in fighting this predicament, which threatens our way of life and our core values. For that, I salute you.

Lastly, the great Thomas Paine, one of the founding fathers of the United States, stated: “If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, so that my child may live in peace.” So, let’s deal with this trouble now, right now, so our future generation may live in peace.

Thank you so much.