Fact vs. fiction on Muslim Obama

The New York Times’ public editor is taking the editorial page to task for running a piece strongly suggesting that many Muslims regard Sen. Barack Obama as Muslim apostate and would try to kill him as a result. Edward N. Luttwak, a military historian, wrote on May 12, that under Muslim law as it is […]

The New York Times’ public editor is taking the editorial page to task for running a piece strongly suggesting that many Muslims regard Sen. Barack Obama as Muslim apostate and would try to kill him as a result.

Edward N. Luttwak, a military historian, wrote on May 12, that under Muslim law as it is universally understood Obama was born a Muslim, and his “conversion” to Christianity was an act of apostasy, a capital offense and “the worst of all crimes that a Muslim can commit.” While no Muslim country would be likely to prosecute him, Luttwak said, a state visit to such a nation would present serious security challenges “because the very act of protecting him would be sinful for Islamic security guards.”

Obama was born to a Kenyan atheist father and an agnostic Kansan mother. Later, he was raised for a five years in Indonesia by his mother and by a nominally Muslim stepfather.


NYT public editor Clark Hoyt says he talked to five Muslim scholars, all of whom said Luttwak’s interpretation of Islamic law was wrong. Since Obama’s father and stepfather left the family, Obama is on his own, faith-wise, one scholar said. A second said that apostasy laws only apply to those who knowingly choose Islam and then renege. Another said that apostasy is not often punished by death in Islamic nations, even those run by Sharia, including Iran and Saudi Arabia.

“All the scholars argued that Luttwak had a rigid, simplistic view of Islam that failed to take into account its many strains and the subtleties of its religious law, which is separate from the secular laws in almost all Islamic nations.”

Hoyt concludes:”With a subject this charged, readers would have been far better served with more than a single, extreme point of view. When writers purport to educate readers about complex matters, and they are arguably wrong, I think The Times cannot label it opinion and let it go at that.”

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