Geert Wilders: Manipulator of the Koran?

Our Flemish correspondent VH has translated a pair of articles about a letter from six scholars of Islam who claim that Geert Wilders manipulated the text of the Koran when he made his film Fitna.

VH suggests that the term “Stockholm Syndrome” should perhaps be changed to “Amsterdam syndrome”. He also says, “I think one of these professors has a university chair funded by Oman, but I will have to look into this.”

First, from Elsevier:

Experts: Wilders is manipulating Quran texts

by Marlou Visser

Six scholars in the field of the Koran have stated in a letter to the Amsterdam court, the OM (Public Prosecutor) and Moszkowicz (Wilders’ lawyer) that Wilders selectively quotes Koran texts and expresses himself in a misleading way. The goal of the six is, as they themselves say, to offer counterbalance to the experts Wilders will call to testify at his trial.

According to the six, Wilders is hiding away the more peaceful Koran verses, and in this way manipulates the image of the Islam. For a long time, most Muslims have advocated further spreading the faith by the sword, the Islam scholars write.

The six are the professors Fred Leemhuis (Arabist and well-known Quran translator), Jan Michiel Otto (law, sharia), Gerard Wiegers (religion studies), Pieter Sjoerd van Koningsveld (Islamology), Ruud Peters (Arabic language and culture), and Marlies ter Borg (Quran and Bible). They will not be called as witnesses at the trial of the PVV leader.

Wilders was allowed to ask three scholars of Islam to testify on his behalf at his trial. These are the well-known Islam-critical Arabists as Dr. Hans Jansen, Dr. Wafa Sultan and Dr. Simon Admiraal.

Wilders wanted to call eighteen witnesses, including radical Islamic “experience experts” such as Mohammed Bouyeri and two Iranian ayatollahs, and additionally a good number of law professors, including Elsevier columnist Dr. Afshin Ellian, but they were not allowed to testify.

Below is a response to the six professors written by the renowned Arabist Prof. Hans Jansen, who will testify at Geert Wilders’ trial:
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The letter is a wishful dream

by Hans Jansen

The letter written by the retired professors with regard to the Wilders Trial about the peacefulness of Islam leaves only one small thing to be desired. There are no references to sermons in mosques, to manuals of sharia, or Qur’anic commentaries. Also, the letter was not co-signed by Muslim religious leaders. At best the important Muslim theologian Tofiq Dibi [Green left MP, International Socialist supporter] agrees. The letter is a wishful dream: if only Islam could be as the letter-writers state.

Sermons in mosques, the manuals of sharia, and Quran commentaries call for the harassment, the murder of, and making war on dissenters. This is easily verified. What’s more, the Qur’an itself can very readily be interpreted as an instruction to engage in intimidation, assassination, murder, and war — but when the Amsterdam court says that the true meaning of the Qur’anic text is instead very peaceable, then all the problems with Islam will of course be resolved with a single blow. For it is after all inconceivable that Muslims would dare to understand the Qur’an as a license to kill when the Amsterdam court maintains that the Qur’an is actually not a license to kill.

[Arabist Hans Jansen is one of three witnesses in the Wilders Trial.]