One of the Many Masks of Evil

From the Atlas Shrugs website: Former Muslims United press conference

"The worst kind of tyranny is of victims who are scared to speak." She explains that this is the situation of those who have left Islam. Being a Muslim, she says, does not involve a personal relationship with God. When it comes to Islam, however, one doesn't choose his religion, your birth certificate is stamped Muslim, and you have a relationship with the Islamic state.

Isn't that reminiscent of Communism? It's the same behind the mask.

The Muslim scriptures are inundated with commandments against those who leave the religion. It is being preached in mosques in America that one should kill the apostates wherever you find them. It is the law of Islam -- Hanafi, Hanbali, Shafi'i and Maliki schools of law all agree that the person who leaves Islam must be killed. What's worse than the law, however, is when the religious and legal system tells Muslims that they can kill apostates and not be punished. Islamic law gives the right to the Muslim on the street to kill the apostate. Under Islamic law, such a murderer will not go to jail. This happened in Egypt -- Faraj Foda was killed in front of his house and the killer is not prosecuted. This is the source of the apostates' fear -- any Muslim on the street may kill them, and have no fear of prosecution.

This is the most severe aspect of Islamic law -- turning father against children, turning brother against brother. I have been disinherited by my family already. Marriage of an apostate is immediately annulled. There was a case in Egypt in which a man was denounced as an apostate and was subjected to a third-party divorce. This is perfectly in keeping with the laws of Sharia. And we have people right here in America who believe in these laws. We are living in constant fear of our lives because we have left Islam. There is not a day that goes by in which I do not think of that threat. Radical Muslims call me "Jew-lover," right here on college campuses in the U.S. Why did Wafa Sultan have to leave her beautiful home to live in an apartment? Why did I recently write an article about an Egyptian journalist who denied he was an apostate but merely criticized some aspects of Sharia law, and was accused of an apostate? 5,000 mosques declared he was an apostate and a heretic. Hosni Mubarak also was denounced as an apostate for giving this man an award. We don't have to declare that we are apostates. We just have to act at variance with Sharia -- like the girl in Canada who acted like an apostate by refusing to wear the hijab and was killed by her father.

There is very little hope for reform in Islam. Nobody knows why Sadat was killed. I was a young woman living in Egypt. The radicals condemned Sadat as an apostate for making peace with Israel. Sadat told many of his confidants that he knew that by agreeing to peace with Israel he was signing his death warrant.

Why did I form this group, Former Muslims United? I felt extremely saddened when I saw children fleeing their homes in fear for their lives because they are apostates. We are going to have many more Rifqa Barys. I know kids in Los Angeles who are not attending mosques, and their parents are threatening them. We have not been speaking up. We have been in hiding. But now I have formed this group with Ibn Warraq, Wafa Sultan, Muhammad Asghar, Amil Imani. We are also calling upon Muslim leaders to sign our pledge. It is on our website. We hope that all the good and peace-loving Muslim groups will sign our pledge to show that they reject tyranny and fear. The worst kind of tyranny is when the person who is tyrannized is afraid to speak. We are also trying to reach the Federal Government. We have written to Attorney General Holder. We hope we can all work together to never allow this kind of tyranny to survive in America. The West is doing Muslims no favor with political correctness. By being politically correct, we are empowering those who want to kill us. The religion must pass the litmus test of human rights. By tolerating intolerance, we are telling the victims of Sharia, go fend for yourselves. We cannot help you.

--Nonie Darwish, at the Former Muslims United press conference

You have to fight evil or it will overtake you. It is as necessary as going to the bathroom or taking out the garbage. It's one of those unpleasant chores we wish we didn't have to do, but when you don't do it for a while things start getting very messy. It's much easier to nip it in the bud than wait, as we have done, until it's a life and death struggle.