Wilders' Hate Film: Fitna

Yesterday, before the website LiveLeak pulled it, I viewed the hate film by Geert Wilders, "Fitna." Before I give my thoughts, I should add that even though the film was pulled from the one site, many people downloaded it and it could be found on YouTube and Google videos. I am not sure if they are still there, and I could care less. It really doesn't matter because there are many posts on Jihad Watch of people who have the video and some of them are hosting it.

Despite all the hype about this short film, Fitna was a run-of-the-mill Islamophobe propaganda film. It had all the usual components: video of 9/11 & 7/7, and the usual "it is not an anti-Muslim film without a beheading" video. Also, it had the usual cherry picked, partial ayahs (verses) of suras. It would have been amusing if it wasn't so maddening about these suras being taken out of context. The maddening part is something I have mentioned in the past, that is the ignorant people who view these incomplete verses as truth because they do not know any better...and they are being told this from a self-proclaimed "expert" of Islam. In this case, a Dutch politician who hates Muslims. Oh, I'm sorry, in a recent article, he stated that he "doesn't hate Muslims, he just hates Islam."

One of these ayahs was 4:56, where Allah is speaking, but the form being used is "We." Now, those who have some knowledge of the Qur'an, even the Islamophobic "experts" on Islam, know "We" means Allah, but for their purpose of inciting hatred against Muslims it is a clever way of misrepresenting a part of the Qur'an to people who do not have any knowledge of Allah's Book. To the uninformed, the "We" in this case means Muslims would do this to them. If the people had a chance to fully read the ayah and the ones before and after it, they would come to realize that this verse is talking about the Hellfire...and not actually about literally burning them in a fire.

Of course, it would not fit into anyone's anti-Islamic agenda to inform the people of this fact. Instead, Wilders couples this partial ayah with images of dead bodies to further mislead his audience and falsely lead them to believe that the Qur'an is filled with hate. The other ayahs/suras chosen for this hate film were equally misrepresented. One, which I didn't even write down, was so incomplete that it made no sense to me what point Wilders was trying to insinuate by even using it. It was closer to the end of the film so maybe he was running out of ideas.

The repercussions against Wilders are starting become known. The cartoonist, who blasphemed the Prophet (SAW), is bringing suit against Wilders for using the image twice in the film without permission. Copywrite charges are also possible by Dutch media for the headlines Wilders used without permission. Another of Wilders blunders was when he tried to show the murderer of VanGough, and instead showed the picture of a local rap artist. Ooops!

As usual, it is up to the Muslim Ummah (community) to do our best to prove that these lies against Islam are false. At times, this can seem like an uphill battle, one that is very discouraging. But if we keep our silence on these matters these lies will continue to spread to more and more ignorant people. We must continue to show our evidence to these people so, at the very least, they realize they are being misled by these "experts" and others in influential positions.

May Allah give the ummah the strength and guidance to help change peoples hearts. Ameen.