Tel-Chai Nation

Daniel Pipes recently gave a conference in Palm Beach, Florida, where he told about how ex-Muslims are the challenge Islam hasn't actually faced until modern times:

Pipes: Ex-Muslims are my topic today. Had you mentioned them to me just a few years ago, I would have said they have no significance beyond some individuals, mostly cowering in secret, not letting the world know their about their hostility to Islam. But I've recently concluded that they represent a significant phenomenon, especially as they challenge Islam in an unprecedented way, leaving Muslims with few effective defenses.

I shall focus here on the phenomenon of ex-Muslims in the West, leaving aside the Muslim-majority countries. The numbers are imprecise: one estimate has about 15,000 Muslims who de-convert or leave Islam every year in France and 100,000 who de-convert in the United States. Over time, this amounts to a significant population; perhaps one-quarter of people of Muslim origins living in the West are now ex-Muslims. They roughly counterbalance the converts to Islam, who tend to be better known, figures like Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, and Keith Ellison. That said, some ex-Muslims are also very well known, if much more discreet; hello, Barack Hussein Obama.

Yet Obama remained a very extreme leftist during his political career as POTUS, and even today, he's still quite leftist. It may be one thing to leave Islam, but unless one leaves leftist ideology behind, does it count well?

That said, the seminar Pipes gave is still very interesting, and makes for required reading and viewing (there's a video available at his site).

Labels: Europe, France, immigration, islam, jihad, misogyny, racism, United States