A glimpse into the future of the U.S. This can’t happen here, you say? We respect the freedom of speech, you say? Maybe that was true at one time, but it is no longer. Cowardice is pandemic. Newspapers all over the country refused to republish the notorious Muhammad cartoons out of a newfound “respect” for Islam that they never showed for negative portrayals of Christianity, which they hailed as “courageous.” Those who call attention to the ideological roots of jihad violence are excoriated as racist, bigoted “Islamophobes,” and most organizations on both the Left and the Right would never dare feature such people as speakers. Any organization that does is immediately denounced and called upon to apologize, and it usually does. So given that this is the climate today, what do you think the situation will be like in ten or twenty years?
“Influential Somali academic in hiding after ‘blasphemy’ death threats,” The New Arab, March 12, 2020:
An influential Somali academic and social reformer is in hiding due to threats to his life, after one of the country’s leading Muslim scholars called for his killing over allegations of blasphemy.
Prof. Mahmoud Jama Ahmed was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in jail in 2019 for “blasphemy” but was released in January after a presidential pardon.
Activists say Ahmed was forced into hiding after prominent imam, Adam Sunna, threatened his life during Friday prayers on 6 March.
“Killing this apostate is bad for him in this life but he will benefit from it in the afterlife,” he said, according to Humanists International.
Ahmed is unable to leave his hideout to work due to the dangers if he appears in public, having to rely on financial assistance from Humanists International to survive.
The advocacy group considers the 34-year-old intellectual to be at “extremely high-risk of a violent attack”….
In 2019, Ahmed authored two books – one called “Are You Free?” and another on freedom of press – which received a hostile reception from some Somalis due to contentious nature of some of the content.
Allegations of blasphemy relate to a Facebook post when he questioned the validity of rain prayers – known as Salat Al-Istisqa in Islam – in Somalia.
Police then detained Ahmed for a month, where he said he was subjected to ill-treatment and death threats by officers.
In April, he was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in jail for blasphemy but was eventually released after spending 307 days behind bars and banned from teaching for five years….