Spencer trots out the “apes and pigs” lie again

Anyone who has not been deflected from reading Robert Spencer’s blogs by the nausea they generate will have noticed his “stuck-record” tendency of going back to the same themes time and time again: “taqiyya” and “kitman” are two of this most frequent accusations. When someone suggests, for example, that terrorism or oppression of women are due to some local custom and are not, in fact, from Islam itself, Spencer accuses him of “taqiyya”, i.e. lying.

In an entry posted today, Egyptian Progressive Criticizes Ibish, CAIR, Qaradawi, Spencer recycles a familiar accusation: that Muslims refer to Jews as “apes and pigs”, and that this is what they are called in the Qur’an. He quotes a series of verses as proof, presumably hoping that nobody will check. Here’s what the verses actually say:

2:65: “And certainly you have known those among you who exceeded the limits of the Sabbath, so We said to them: Be apes, despised and hated.” 5:59-60: “Say: O followers of the Book! do you find fault with us (for aught) except that we believe in Allah and in what has been revealed to us and what was revealed before, and that most of you are transgressors? Say: Shall I inform you of (him who is) worse than this in retribution from Allah? (Worse is he) whom Allah has cursed and brought His wrath upon, and of whom He made apes and swine, and he who served the Shaitan; these are worse in place and more erring from the straight path.” 7:166: says something similar to 2:65.

So, the reference is clearly to a particular group of Jews who broke the sabbath, as all Muslims understand it. So Hussain Ibish’s claim to Spencer that “that’s not in the Qur’an”, far from being false or demonstrating “profound chutzpah”, is in fact true; since “Jews are apes and pigs” is a different statement to “a group of Jews were turned into apes and pigs”.

Comment from Shamil Askov: “In the bible God inflicts similar punishments on the jews and yet no one seems to have a problem with this.”

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