Harry's Place

Indeed, the writer is an ass.

The speech writer(s) might have been alluding to the Ottoman Turks who permitted Spanish Jews fleeing the Inquisition to enter their lands.

From Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sefardim

The most prominent sub-group consists of the descendants of the Jews expelled from Spain in 1492, who settled in various parts of the Ottoman Empire, in particular Salonica and Istanbul, and whose traditional language is Judaeo-Spanish, sometimes known as Ladino.

The writers probably mistook or failed to recognize the difference between the northerly kingdom of Aragon, Ferdy and Isabella proprietors http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aragon

for southern coastal Andalusia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andalusia

whoops. forgot to change the default screen ID.

Wiki entry for a famous American singer – songwriter who is a grandson of Turkish Jews: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedaka

Yes, I have a friend – Alfandary – whose family ended up in Turkey during that period.

Perhaps I’m reading it wrong. Perhaps he is talking about expulsions during the Inquisition FROM Cordoba and Andalusia. The ‘tolerance’ is that of the Ottomans – but they aren’t explicitly mentioned. They are only referred to.

Or perhaps there is something that happened in Cordoba that we don’t know about.

More likely a mangling of history by a writer trying to appeal to an audience than any deep knowledge of history suggestive of kindness extended by one persecuted community to another during the Inquisition.

Some people would also question the figure of 7 million Muslim Americans as being the estimation of CAIR rather than accurate statistics.

Also from Wiki:

The history of Islam in the US starts in the early 16th century with the confirmed arrival of Muslim explorer and sailor Estevanico of Azamor[26] and early Muslim visitors.[27] Once very small, the Muslim population has increased greatly in the last one hundred years. There is much controversy over recent estimates of the Muslim population in the US. Much of the growth has been driven by immigration and conversion.

Up to one-third of American Muslims are African Americans who have converted to Islam during the last seventy years, most of whom first joined the Nation of Islam, though many later transitioned into mainstream Sunnism.[28]

Research indicates that Muslims in the US are generally more assimilated and prosperous than Muslims in Europe.[29][30] Surveys also suggest, however, that they are less assimilated than other American subcultural and religious communities.[31] There are many Islamic political and charity organizations supporting this community.

Muslim immigration is rising as in 2005 alone more people from Islamic countries became legal permanent US residents than in any year in the previous two decades.[32][33] The number of Muslims in the US is controversial. The highest, generally-accepted estimate of Muslims (including children) in the United States is 2.35 million (0.6% of the total population).[34][35] Some sources mention estimates as high as 6-7 million.[36][37] Such estimates were accepted by media for some time, but any empirical basis for these higher numbers is not documented.[38][39]

I think it is a wee bit of mangling of history and aglomeration of events, thats all.

Very American!

Spanish inquisition? I wasn’t expecting that!

Mr Obama doesn’t know what his ‘Tele prompter’ is talking about.

Considering Pres Obama claimed that teh Americans had liberated Auschwitz, and his uncle was there, it’s shows a certain carelessness with the truth. As any fule kno, it was teh red Army who liberated Auschwitz.

No it doesn’t make any sense.

In Andalusia and Cordoba during the Inquisition we see the example of the proud Muslim tradition of tolerance.

Is the only way of constructing the phrase.

So during the Inquisition in (presumably more generally the region of ) Andalusia and (the city of Cordoba in Andalusia unless he means the even more ahistorical pre-reconquista kingdom of Cordoba ccentered on the city and its environs) Cordoba, an event or series of events took place that are typically illustrative of the proud Muslim tradition of tolerance (as opposed to say the non exemplary treatment of Maimonides).

Can’t think of anything.

Of coursse it might not have anything to do with the Inquisition this is meant just as a period, like Roman times or Jesus times.

So it could be that some Muslim or Muslims did something typical of their tradition of tolerance in Cordoba a city in Adalucia after 1478 but before they were all forced to evacuate or convert.

It might only be a tolerant thing among Muslims, such as commuting a death sentence for murder if the victim’s family accept a blood payment, or during lapidation not making the stones too small so that the agony lasts all day, or the giving of alms to the poor, or establishing a waqf for a hospital, or anything seen as tolerant whithin Muslim tradition happening whithin a given period of time.

It must be what he meant cos this way he can’t really be wrong and have made one of hte greatest historical howlers imaginable (dates are rather key things in history).

Or he was simply channeling Monty Python’s

‘Oh no not the Spanish Inquisition, I wish he hadn’t mentioned the Spanish Inquisition, Noone has time for …the Spanish inquisition’

I’ve no idea what the reference is supposed to mean.

If you take out the word Inquisition and replace it with another time period then you have a case you could make – to an extent at least.

If you leave the word Inquisition in, then its ahistorical nonsense.

“Inquisition” was possibly a spur-of-the-moment mistranslation of “reconquista”. Or misreading off the teleprompter. Doesn’t make much sense either, but only the speechwriter(s) can clear up the doubt.

SueR
4 June 2009, 7:40 pm

Considering Pres Obama claimed that teh Americans had liberated Auschwitz, and his uncle was there, it’s shows a certain carelessness with the truth. As any fule kno, it was teh red Army who liberated Auschwitz.

Actually Sue, there was a tank troop of black US soldiers who arrived before the Red Army. I heard one of the vets who had joined up as a teenager speaking at a church here in Toronto about a half dozen years ago, when a documentary honouring them for their contribution during WW II despite the racism they suffered at home was released.

Were there any Muslims left after the fall of Granada? I though they were given a few months or convert.

Preceded the Inquisition by any means.

Lynne T: Just done some quick googling and found out that black American soldiers were indeed the first into Buchenwald, a concentration camp for political prisoners on German soil, but the Soveit Army definitely liberated Auschwitz on 27th January 1945. And the claim about his uncle was on his mother’s side, not his Kenyan side anyway. He said that his (Great)uncle Dunham ‘marched’ with Patton.

Likely he had been watching the BBC Islamic History of Europe, where everything was wonderful.

It’s just Obumble in full flow

It’s just Obumble in full flow

He misunderestimated

I think we need Israelinurse at this point. She knows this stuff.

I googled ‘Cordoba, Islam and Jews’ and got this:

http://www.sephardicstudies.org/islam.html

No idea about the website.

“It’s just Obumble in full flow

He misunderestimated”

Awwww, having an actual Leader in the WH is going to be quite an education for you guys isn’t it?

Obama said “hoisted” when he must have meant “foisted” yesterday…

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/news/2009/06/090602_obama_transcript.shtml

A Bushism, perhaps? Or maybe his speech writers are slipping up.

I can’t possibly imagine what he was referring to? I suspect that someone got something wrong there.

Documents referring to the surrender of Granada actually stipulate that Jews were under no circumstance to have authority over the Muslim inhabitants re. taxation, governance etc i.e. Muslims were to have superior rights than Jews who were under Christian control.

Nobody expected the Spanish Inquisition in Al-andalus Cordoba and Seville – except illiterate American libs.

Such display of utter historical ignorance explains the essence Obama’s Cairo speech.

Da Da! Actually, Cipriano, I really don’t understand the remark at all; the timelines seem all wrong to me. There’s a beautiful 14th century synagogue in Cordoba though, and I can tell you that my children’s father’s family can trace their family tree back to the expulsion from Spain in 1492, after which they moved to Casablanca.

“A real leader in the WH” (Neil W.)? I wonder who could that be…

I guess the possibility that Obama made (yet another) mistake, is something “You Guys” can’t even contemplate.

Thank you, Israelinurse. I think Obama’s speechwriters were just looking for something nice to say – and there was a certain degree of tolerance for Jews and Christians in the Emirate of Cordoba – and were just a bit sloppy with the historical references, assuming that nobody of any importance would notice. Well, they were right there.

Yes, my father’s family can be traced back to West Somerset in 1500 too, For some reason, they weren’t quite as well travelled as yours….

Lynne T: Just done some quick googling and found out that black American soldiers were indeed the first into Buchenwald, a concentration camp for political prisoners on German soil, but the Soveit Army definitely liberated Auschwitz on 27th January 1945. And the claim about his uncle was on his mother’s side, not his Kenyan side anyway. He said that his (Great)uncle Dunham ‘marched’ with Patton.

Charles Payne did, actually, serve in Patton’s Army: I assume the reference is to the Third Army; Payne served in its 89th Division. It’s pretty clear he misspoke, and has been since the mixup was first reported in May 2008.

(OT. There’s a passage in, I think, one of Elie Weisel’s books about a black American soldier walking into Buchenwald: apparently, the soldier had some sort of breakdown, swearing and cursing for ages. Weisel says, if I remember correctly, that this reaction restored his faith in humanity.)

Cipriano -I’m going to have all the Americans here up in arms now, but maybe Obama’s speech writers do their research on the History Channel? There are some pretty wierd versions of history there. I once watched an entire one hour documentary on the subject of the terrible suffering of the Americans on the home front in WW2.

“It’s just Obumble in full flow

Awwww, having an actual Leader in the WH is going to be quite an education for you guys isn’t it?

Is it? Maybe it is. Let’s wait till we have one there, and then we’ll see.

I expect it is a boo-boo. Speech writer or Obama? Probably the speech writer, but I also have the impression that Obama knows little history and is unlikely to catch such things. History really isn’t taught in US schools anymore and there are probably few outside of enthusiasts who know any. And that includes college graduates.

The “Golden Age of Andalusia” is a myth:

The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise
http://www.mmisi.org/ir/41_02/fernandez-morera.pdf

I believe the African-American eyewitness in question (to Buchenwald) was Leon Bass:
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/142/

Lynne & Sue, African-American troops participated in the liberation of Buchenwald, not Auschwitz. I believe the most noted African-American eyewitness in question (to the liberation of Buchenwald, not Auschwitz) was Leon Bass:
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/142/

His uncle is white

I’m surprised Obama didn’t include a word of thanks in his speech to the Islamic world for bringing about the Renaissance in Europe. The BBC’s Frank Gardner told us on BBC World last night not to forget that Islam was responsible for the Renaissance, that is for the rebirth and rediscovery of knowledge in the arts and sciences that would ultimately lead to the scientific and industrial revolutions. In other words, Islam made the modern world and we ought to be grateful for that.

“Frank Gardner told us on BBC World last night not to forget that Islam was responsible for the Renaissance”

- if he meant the 12th century Renaissance, then he is partly correct.

If the meant ‘The Renaissance’ then he’s wrong and distorting the past to further present political agendas.

The problem is we keep talking up the Islamic influence on our lives n the past (some of which may or may not be accurate) and still try to ignore the influence right now. Obumble’s speech boiled down to a plea to be liked and not to be bothered by world events.

I know this will offend Obumble’s fans, but the man has not really shown any leadership yet: reading passionately from a teleprompter (when working) written by others (when knowing) does not constitute “leadership”

Well, our relationship with the Islamic ‘world’ goes like this: We project the qualities, attributes and features of our civilisation onto their backwaters, while they project their faults, defects and perversions onto us, regularly characterising westerners as decadent invaders, torturers, thieves and racists.

Hence, we always have a gaggle of naive westerners constantly attempting to portray islam as a beacon of enlightenment, as the ’savior’ of western civilisation, when it is anything but.

And conversly, we have the fundies referring to us as drunken sexual perves, while they get high on opium and dick 10 year olds.

Within 2 centuries of the Arab takeover of Alexandria, the city had degenerated into a backwater. The infrastructures and public facilities that had been maintained for centuries by Greeks and Romans fell apart. The Arabs, for example, found it an impossible task to repair the great lighthouse which had been built centuries earlier and which had been partially destroyed in an earthquake.

It was this same lighthouse that provided the model from which the islamic minaret derives. And it was Hagia Sophia in Constantinople which fournished the template from which most mosque designs have been struck.

So it was western architectural and engineering brilliance which provided the islamic world with its two primary icons; the mosque and the minaret.

The Islamic world doesn’t invent or create anything; it just steals the intellectual property of others, and then attempts to retrofit the booty with an Islamic identity.

That’s all there is to this.

All that we take to be quintessentially Islamic ‘discoveries’ and achievements-be it mosques, minarets or ‘arabic’ numerals- is all empty horseepoop that hasn’t any basis in fact.

We just cannot bring ourselves to believe that so many people could demonstrate such studied ignorance over such a long span of time, and so we compensate by bestowing upon the islamic world all sorts of brilliant qualities, attributes and achievements which, when more clolsely examined, turn out to be myths.

We assign it a cup size of 38DD, when it’s all just a boob-job.

Chuck: ‘History really isn’t taught in US schools anymore and there are probably few outside of enthusiasts who know any.’ Isn’t Dubbya a keen reader of history books?

Islam’s penchant for thievery begins with the Koran itself

The Talmud states:

“Whoever destroys a single soul, he is guilty as though he had destroyed a complete world; and whoever preserves a single soul, it is as though he had preserved a whole world.”

The Koran states:” Whoever kills an innocent, it is as if he has killed all mankind; and whoever saves a person, it is as if he has saved all mankind”.

Islam lifts whole passages from Jewish and Christian scriptures and then retrofits them with an islamic character.

The Koran is stolen scripture, dissimulated in an islamic veneer, whose meanings have been inverted to promote a perverse and warped morality.

The cross-post above concerning certain over-heated accusations of paedophilia against Islam mentions some posters by name. There appears to be no facility for ‘right of reply’ or for self-defence. Do you think this is fair?

The idea that Islamic culture was once a beacon of learning and enlightenment is a commonly held myth.

In fact, much of this has been exaggerated, often for quite transparent apologetic motives. The astrolabe was developed, if not perfected, long before Muhammad was born. The zero, which is often attributed to Muslims, and what we know today as “Arabic numerals” did not originate in Arabia, but in pre-Islamic India. Aristotle’s work was preserved in Arabic not initially by Muslims at all, but by Christians such as the fifth century priest Probus of Antioch, who introduced Aristotle to the Arabic-speaking world. Another Christian, Huneyn ibn-Ishaq (809-873), translated many works by Aristotle, Galen, Plato and Hippocrates into Syriac. His son then translated them into Arabic.

The Syrian Christian Yahya ibn ‘Adi (893-974) also translated works of philosophy into Arabic, and wrote one of his own, The Reformation of Morals. His student, another Christian named Abu ‘Ali ‘Isa ibn Zur’a (943-1008), also translated Aristotle and others from Syriac into Arabic. The first Arabic-language medical treatise was written by a Christian priest and translated into Arabic by a Jewish doctor in 683. The first hospital was founded in Baghdad during the Abbasid caliphate — not by a Muslim, but a Nestorian Christian. A pioneering medical school was founded at Gundeshapur in Persia — by Assyrian Christians.

In sum, there was a time when it was indeed true that Islamic culture was more advanced than that of Europeans, but that superiority corresponds exactly to the period when Muslims were able to draw on and advance the achievements of Byzantine and other civilizations.

But when the Muslim overlords had taken what they could from their subject peoples, and the Jewish and Christian communities had been stripped of their material and intellectual wealth and thoroughly subdued, Islam went into a period of intellectual decline from which it has not yet recovered.

Actually Sue, there was a tank troop of black US soldiers who arrived before the Red Army. I heard one of the vets who had joined up as a teenager speaking at a church here in Toronto about a half dozen years ago, when a documentary honouring them for their contribution during WW II despite the racism they suffered at home was released.

I think you, or they, are confusing Auschwitz with Buchenwald. Auschwitz was well behind the Soviet lines, in Poland. Buchenwald was within American lines, in Germany.

As I tried to mention above (somebody please release the moderation), the Auschwitz rumour is false, created by a politically-correct US television documentary trying too hard to show (at a time of internal US Jewish-black political conflict) the Jews owe something to African-Americans.

Obama, Cordoba, Inquisición
Comment from Cordoba:

http://www.callejadelasflores.org/?p=3552
http://www.callejadelasflores.org/?p=3524

Saludos cordiales desde Al-andalus

John P. @ 5 June 2009, 1:18 pm

“The Koran is stolen scripture, ”

Does it ever occur to you that adapted or translated might be both more diplomatic and more accurate?

Try now and instant karma! To paraphrase Obama’s speech, “peace man”. The muslim abuse in Papua is so typical. The papuans do not infiltritate the west or aussie as illegals to send back huge remittances for terror. They generally do not engage in terror so they are ignored by the UN. This is living under the muslim yoke in 2009!

Just an historically illiterate speech. What one expects from a politician.

I could have been a mistake, if instead of “during the Inquisition” Obama would have said “before the Inquisition” it would make sense.

SueR
5 June 2009, 1:21 pm

The cross-post above concerning certain over-heated accusations of paedophilia against Islam mentions some posters by name. There appears to be no facility for ‘right of reply’ or for self-defence. Do you think this is fair?

**************

I agree Sue R. – totally unfair AND dangerous since the post puts in the spotlight people who can be interpreted to have “insulted the Prophet”.

Such posts are completely unethical.

Does it ever occur to you that adapted or translated might be both more diplomatic and more accurate?

I’m not a diplomate, and no, saying the koran was “adapted” would not be accurate.