Robert Azzi, Still With His “Ask-A-Muslim Anything” Shtick (Part One)

by Hugh Fitzgerald

For several years, Robert Azzi has been touring towns in New Hampshire, offering “Ask A Muslim-Anything” events to benighted Infidels. Having retired from his professional life as a photographer who specialized in taking photographs in the Middle East, and especially in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, he now dedicates time to explaining Islam to non-Muslims. In a spirit of ostentatious openness, he urges his audiences to ask anything about his, Robert Azzi’s, understanding of Islam, as he attempts to clear up misconceptions and undo stereotypes. He appears in meeting halls, libraries, schools, churches, wherever he can engage a space.

If you live in New Hampshire, and have a chance, go to one of these events, but go prepared. Even better would be to go not just prepared, but with a small group of the like-minded (two or three others), who will ask similar difficult questions. In that way you will not appear to be a lone and hostile crank, easily dismissed, but instead one of an inquiring group of genuinely interested Infidels, seeking enlightenment. If you and the others could meet in advance, you could prepare your  questions on notecards, and your responses to Azzi’s likely answers, along with textual support — from the Qur’an and Hadith — for your position.

Here, after a first question about Khashoggi, are some of those not-impossible questions:

1. “Mr. Azzi, I have a question about Jamal Khashoggi. What do you think should be the reaction of the  United States to his killing?”

Azzi will look a bit perturbed; it’s not a question he was expecting. But manfully, he’ll cautiously offer criticism of the Saudis, with whom he’s worked for a long time, and will make sure that Islam does not become part of the discussion.

“Well, that is not a question about Islam, of course, but about how governments deal with their opponents. And we all know that Kim Jong-il had his half-brother killed in Kuala Lumpur, and Vladimir Putin tried to poison Russian double agents in England. And I suppose the Israelis are the most  active in assassinating people abroad. As for the killing of Khashoggi, of course it should be condemned. No question. Our government has rightly deplored the killing. But I find it hard to believe that the Crown Prince was involved. I’ve known him since he was a boy. I’m sure this was an attempted rendition gone wrong. The Saudis don’t like dissent, and they do jail people, but in all their decades of rule I don’t know of a single assassination abroad ordered by a Saudi ruler. I think it was a rogue operation, and those responsible will pay for it. I think we’ve already delivered a message loud and clear, to the Saudis, of our disapproval.  But if you don’t mind, I’d like to get back to the subject of Islam. Yes, in the back.”

2. “What are the duties of non-Muslims in a traditional Muslim society? In other words, what do dhimmis have to do to be allowed to both stay alive and to practice their religion?”

This questioner’s  use of the word “dhimmi” is telling. Azzi now realizes he is dealing with someone who understands the dhimmi condition, and if he doesn’t answer more or less truthfully, he will be taken, rightly, to task.

He is likely to reply that dhimmis had mainly to pay the jizyah, which was only fair because they did not have to pay, as Muslims did, the zakat, and besides, they did receive protection from the Muslim government. Paying the jizyah, he may add, was a much better outcome for the Jews, who in medieval Christendom were often killed.

“Protection against whom?” you will ask. Robert Azzi, can only respond: “Against anyone, Christians, Muslims, Jews. The jizyah payment protected dhimmis against anyone.”

Questioner #2: “Isn’t it really meant as protection against attacks by Muslims themselves?”

Azzi: “Some people say that. I think the picture is quite a bit more complicated.”

You will then ask Azzi what, besides payment of the jizyah, were the other onerous conditions placed on non-Muslims. He will be forced — but only because he suspects, rightly, that you already know — to detail them, so he might begrudgingly have to admit to at least some of the following: the requirement that dhimmis not build new, nor repair old, houses of worship, that they ride donkeys, not horses; that they move out of the way of Muslims on roads and pathways; that they not be allowed to testify against Muslims in court, that they wear identifying marks on their clothes and dwellings, and so on. You will thus have gotten him to acknowledge that there was much more to being a dhimmi than the payment of jizyah.

Most of his audience of unwary Infidels will until now not have have heard anything about the dhimmi condition in Muslim societies, or about the payment of the jizyah. This new information will disturb their equanimity.

3. “Mr. Azzi, I found in reading the Qur’an, one verse — 98:6 — that describes Unbelievers as ‘the most vile of created beings.’ And another — 3:110 — about how Muslims are ‘the best of peoples.’ Can you tell me if Muslims really believe that, and if so, what can or should be done about it?”

Again, Azzi cannot deny the existence of these verses. He can only offer something along these lines:

Well, I’m a Muslim, and I certainly don’t think you are “the most vile of created beings.” [Laughter.] Do you have Muslim co-workers, Muslim friends? Do your kids perhaps have Muslim school friends? Do you think, as the conspiratorial Islamophobes want you to believe, that all these Muslims are merely hiding a deep contempt for you, that they really consider all of you “vile”? Look, let’s be sensible. This is just the kind of verse the extremists, ISIS and Al-Qaeda, like to focus on. They’ll quote it, but they won’t tell you that no one except people like them take it seriously. They’re in the business of distorting our religion for the sake of their own hunger for power — they want to conquer the world, make no mistake about it, but it’s got nothing to do with Islam, except in the sense that they want to exploit Islam for their own, un-Islamic ends. They want to be famous, the way bin Laden was. It’s not a good idea to give them the publicity they want. Sure, ISIS wants you to get all hot and bothered about these verses, wants you to think that not just ISIS, but the vast majority of moderate Muslims, think that way. It’s utter nonsense.

Let me repeat what we all know. Hundreds of thousands of Muslims, maybe millions, are anxious to move to Europe. Hundreds drown each year in the Mediterranean making the attempt. You’ve heard these stories. Well, for heaven’s sake, why would hundreds of thousands, even millions, of Muslims want to live among those very people whom they supposedly  believe to be the “most vile of created beings ”? [Laughter.] Why would they want their kids to go school with “the most vile of created beings”? [More laughter.] I rest my case.

You know, I always like to tell people that while we believe that the Qur’an is the literal Word of God, that it was not meant to be read literally. You have to understand more deeply. So don’t take that verse literally. What does it really mean? It’s a negative statement, greatly exaggerated for effect, against those particular people — the “Unbelievers” — whom the Muslims were fighting at the time. It’s not meant to apply to all non-Muslims, but only to those with whom Muhammad was then in a state of war. It’s swearing at the enemy. Do you know the kinds of things that were written in this country during World War II about the Germans and the Japanese? It was a lot worse than just being called “vile.” And now Germany and Japan are two of our closest allies.

In trying to understand the Qur’an, remember it’s a very difficult text in places, written in a classical Arabic quite different from modern Arabic, and the meaning is not always crystal clear. That shouldn’t surprise anyone — the text is 1400 years old. I always tell myself that when a verse goes against what, in its totality, Islam stands for, then I just don’t bother with that verse. If that verse says that Unbelievers are “vile,” I just ignore it. I know it’s not meant to apply outside its 1400-year-old context. That’s got nothing to do with the Islam I converted to as a young man or that I’ve been happily practicing for a half-century, and I think if you ask any Muslims you meet, they’ll tell you the exact same thing. Next question.

4. “It says in the Qur’an that a man can beat his wife if she is disobedient. Could you comment on that?”

Azzi:

Yes, I’m glad you asked that question, because islamophobes like to keep bringing that up. It’s true that some 1400 years ago, and not just in the Middle East but in Europe, men had far more control over their wives than they do today. I’m not excusing it, just putting it in its proper historical  perspective. So yes, if a wife was considered disobedient, in those days, then a Muslim husband could first of all reprimand her. If that didn’t change her behavior, she would have to sleep in a separate bed. And if she still was disobedient, and only then, the husband could “beat” his wife but only very lightly, using an instrument as small as a “miswak” — a small natural toothbrush. It’s a symbolic, not a real beating. Try hurting someone with a toothbrush. I rest my case.

And remember all that Muhammad did for women’s rights. I’ve heard it said that “Muhammad was the greatest champion of women’s rights the world has ever seen.” He didn’t want to force women to stay at home. His first wife Khadijah, who had a great influence on him, was no shrinking violet, but a successful businesswoman. The Qur’an provided women with explicit rights to inheritance, to property, gave them the right to testify in a court of law, and the right to divorce. It severely limited the use of violence against female children and women as well as on duress in marriage and community affairs. That isn’t gender equality in the modern sense, but it did give Muslim women greater rights than they had had in the pre-Islamic period. So I’d say that that verse about “beating a disobedient wife” should be seen in its proper context and given its intended meaning.  It should read: “beat with a toothbrush.” [Laughter]

Next question. Yes, there, on the end of the third row.

First published in Jihad Watch here and here.