Chesler Chronicles

October 22nd, 2007 11:11 am

The Heroic Nonie Darwish Faces Muslim “Mean Girl” Power at Wellesley

“The radical Muslims on American campuses are getting more belligerent, far more militant,” author and lecturer Nonie Darwish tells me. “They have perfected their intimidation and disruption techniques.”

Darwish is a beautiful and passionate speaker. She is an expressive, emotional orator, dramatically thrilling (as so many Arabs can be), but Darwish is also soft, almost maternal when she speaks. She is also very clear, very firm, and totally uncompromising. She grew up in Cairo and in Gaza and now lives in America. She has founded Arabs for Israel. She is pro-American and also concerned with women’s rights. Her first book, Now They Call Me Infidel: Why I Renounced Jihad for America, Israel, and the War on Terror, is clear-sighted, well-written, and extremely brave.

Darwish is the daughter of a high-ranking Egyptian military officer who died in battle against the Israelis and who is considered a “shahid,” or martyr. While she continues to love her father, she has “shaken off,” renounced, the hate propaganda with which she was raised.

Last week, on October 18, 2007, our hero Darwish spoke at the all-female Wellesley College as the guest of Hillel on campus. She was not treated as a hero; then again, maybe she was, maybe her treatment is precisely how heroes are greeted on American campuses today.

About 80-100 students came. Far more Muslim than Jewish students came and “so many” of the Muslim girls were wearing head-scarves.

According to Darwish, the female students in head-scarves did the following: As she spoke, they made exaggerated, “mean girl” faces at her. They rolled their eyes, practiced “disbelieving” facial expressions–did everything but stick out their tongues. And they continued to talk to each other in loud whispers while Darwish spoke: “How can she tell such lies!” “I was never, ever indoctrinated against Jews!” “Can you believe what she is saying?” “We do not call Jews pigs and apes, how can she lie about her own people?”

In addition to the “mean girl” faces and the continual loud whispering, one by one, at least four to five head-scarved girls, got up to leave the room during Darwish’s speech. This meant that each girl took two minutes to move to the end of her row, physically causing the other students to get up or twist aside, causing the entire room to look at the departing student, not at their invited guest–and then each girl did precisely the same thing when she returned two minutes later, presumably from a bathroom break.

They quadruple-teamed Darwish and did not stop until Darwish ended her lecture. Twenty to thirty minutes of soft-core, well-choreographed, goon squad behavior. “They are Hamas-trained” says Darwish.

“And all the while,” Darwish says, “the Jewish students cringed and cowered, so afraid that they might have hurt Muslim feelings. (Or rather, that the Muslims might physically hurt them afterwards. According to Darwish, one Jewish student told her that “she “was locking her door. I am scared.”)

She is probably right to be. During the Question and Answer period, many of the head-scarved students expressed calculated, injured outrage. “How dare (Hillel) bring this woman to our campus? How dare she insult Islam, tell lies about Islam” etc. “We are free under Islam, how can she deny this?”

Darwish had first been asked to speak about Muslim women who live under Muslim religious law. Then, at the last minute, Hillel had asked her to talk about something, anything else–about Israel, not about Islam. Apparently, the female Muslim chaplain on campus had warned the Hillel students not to allow Darwish to “say anything bad about Islam.”

One must not expose Islam’s long record of gender and religious apartheid and if one does, one is treated as a traitor and a liar and silenced in violent ways.

Ironically, the flyer describing Darwish’s visit advertised her speech as one about “peace.” Darwish was the last to know about it. Still, she rode the wave. “We can’t have peace unless each group engages in self-criticism which is what I am doing.”

The Muslim chaplain at Wellesley herself wears a headscarf, and arrived accompanied by a bearded male companion. Darwish asks: “Who is paying for all these Muslim chaplains on every American campus? Why are they needed? What is their real role?”

In Darwish’s view, “the happiest Muslims on earth are those who live under Judeo-Christian laws, not under Shari’a law.” These young girls are “disconnected from the reality of Islam.” Or, they are exercising the “only power anyone, men or women, are allowed to have: the power to enforce the status quo and to further the Muslim jihadic mission.”

Darwish repeated, many times, that “not all Muslims are terrorists, but so many terrorists are Muslims”; that she is “not speaking about peaceful Muslims or about each and every Muslim” but about Muslims who uphold a reactionary status quo.”

Darwish concludes: “Muslim girls like these are like gangsters. They know more about their rights in America than the Jewish girls do. The Muslim girls all have a chip on their shoulders.”

And then she is silent. Softly, she says: “We are fighting an avalanche. We are too few. I am frightened by my culture of origin. I am scared of my own people.”

I do not think that campus lecturers should have to face disruption and intimidation; such working conditions are far too hostile.

However, one of the approximately ten students who gratefully crowded around Darwish after her speech was over, wrote to thank her for her “powerful testimony.” This student apologized for how “disrespectfully” so many Wellesley students had treated Darwish. But she ended her note this way: “You are giving me the hope and strength to stand against extremism.”

All in all, it was a good day for heroes.

Pajamas Media appreciates your comments that abide by the following guidelines:

1. Avoid profanities or foul language unless it is contained in a necessary quote or is relevant to the comment.

2. Stay on topic.

3. Disagree, but avoid ad hominem attacks.

4. Threats are treated seriously and reported to law enforcement.

5. Spam and advertising are not permitted in the comments area.

The clause regarding "hate speech" has been deleted because readers criticized it as being too loosely defined. We agreed.

These guidelines are very general and cannot cover every possible situation. Please don't assume that Pajamas Media management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment. We reserve the right to filter or delete comments or to deny posting privileges entirely at our discretion. If you feel your comment was filtered inappropriately, please email us at story@pajamasmedia.com.

36 Comments

1. Legion:

Good for her- excellent article. Too bad the Main Stream Media will not pick up on it- perhaps they too are very afraid?

Oct 22, 2007 - 7:34 pm 2. Dinah Lord:

God bless, Nonie Darwish and all of those who are brave enough to speak out.

(This was a frightening display of what we are all up against.)

Oct 22, 2007 - 10:40 pm 3. anonymouse:

The Wellesley Muslim advisor is named Nancy Khalil, and she’s also a Muslim advisor at Boston College. She’s a protege of Imam Basyouny Nehela, the imam of the Islamic Society of Boston (many ties to Wahabi Islam in that crew). Khalil has been pushing the Muslim students to wear hijab, there’s a great deal of pressure to conform and be “true” Muslims.

Who pays for these imams? Around here it’s the Muslim American Society, which provides free imams to all the Boston colleges.

Oct 22, 2007 - 11:22 pm 4. C. Siegel:

Good for you, Nonie! Keep speaking truth to power, it’s the right thing to do.

Oct 23, 2007 - 2:52 am 5. Virginia Ray:

Nonie Darwish and the other Muslim women are heroic. They are the hope of the world. I echo her question; Who is paying for these Muslim chaplains? What purpose does a FEMALE Muslim chaplain serve and for who, – when no female can be any kind of cleric in a Muslim country. Why didn’t the official who invited Darwish interrupt the speech to tell the students that they were being bullies and preventing others from hearing the speaker and their conduct was unacceptable. Why haven’t I seen this woman on C-Span’s Book Notes?

Oct 23, 2007 - 4:22 am 6. Virginia Ray:

“Who pays for these imams? Around here it’s the Muslim American Society, which provides free imams to all the Boston colleges. ”

Who funds the Muslim American Society to the point that they can employ chaplains at all universities? Are their books open?

Oct 23, 2007 - 5:02 am 7. David Thomson:

“Too bad the Main Stream Media will not pick up on it- perhaps they too are very afraid?”

Physical fear may have something to do with it. Still, the fear of being called racists is more than enough to intimidate them. These Muslims are usually dark skinned. That’s all you really need to know. This is almost certainly the most important reason why the liberal “elites” are incapable of truly joining the fight against the Islamic nihilists.

Oct 23, 2007 - 8:30 am 8. Azzam:

If this can happen at Wellesley then the intimidation level at other schools may be outside the scale.
How is that possible?
Here are some research questions for students. They should find the answers and many of their concerns will be proven legitimate.
Q1. How did Nancy Khalil project herself into Wellesley? Trace her whole history, the agitation about the former Muslim Student Adviser, etc.
Q2. Why is it that the name of the Muslim Student Association was changed?
Q3. Is the role of an adviser to be that of a link to outside organizations (that do not reveal their denomination) and coerce students to join retreats (weekend jaunts, away from campus, with holy men who also do not reveal their denomination? (Do the parents know, this is happening? Wellesley may be in for a big Law suite.Aafia Siddiqui’s parents are thinking of suing MIT!)
Q4. How many times Nancy Khalil takes Wellesley students to the Islamic Society of Boston in Cambridge to be lectured by Mr. Basyouny Nehela during the overnight Tarbiya sessions? Does Wellesley have a complete biography of Mr. B. Nehela or at least his “denomination”? (Then parents can intelligently discuss the MSA scene at Wellesley with students. There is no Stealth denomination in Islam.)
Q5. Has Nancy Khalil revealed to Wellesley Administration the money flow through her hands to the Wellesley students? Where she gets it? Why it is given as “scholarships” to certain students and secretly? Is it not against the honor code to keep financial help secret and against the financial aid office rules to keep financial awards hidden?
Would Wellesley allow an adviser to continue who has built a secret financial kingdom unknown to the Scholarship Committees? (It exists. Have her deposed under oath and the truth will come out.)

Oct 23, 2007 - 10:28 am 9. Tantor:

The MSA is funded by Saudi Arabia, of course. The imams are supplied from Wahhabi seminaries funded by Saudi Arabia just as they supply the imams to prisons and to radicalize ordinary mosques.

Oct 23, 2007 - 8:10 pm 10. feh:

For better or for worse, many people, when reading your account, think that describing the behavior as mean girl looks, or getting up to use the restroom is not a description that goes along either with being Hamas trained or even with speech suppresion.

But a picture is worth a thousand words, and so a cell phone video of what happens would be worth???

When this happens again, I would suggest that Ms. Darwish make sure there is someone in the audience videotaping the event that will put the behaviors of everyone up on youtube.

Oct 23, 2007 - 8:34 pm 11. Bret:

While Ms. Darwish’s reception was unfortunately rude, it’s also pretty tame. As a counterpoint, consider the treatment of Ayaan Hirsi-Ali (not to mention her friend, the murdered Theo Van Gogh) to see how relatively tame this was.

Nonetheless, bravo to Ms. Darwish for persevering in the face of psychological intimidation.

Oct 23, 2007 - 9:07 pm 12. John Blake:

This stuff is tip-of-the-iceberg. Soon enough, there will occur a physical confrontation with Islamofascists of the Wahabi variety, most certainly funded by clandestine Saudi “charitable” organizations with close links to terrorist organizations.

As this cancer spreads, feckless and naive multi-culti proponents of PCBS will face a daunting choice: Grow up, face the reality of looming Muslim oppression, or “walk with open eyes to slavery.” Knowing cowards and moral equivocators when we see ‘em, we’ll bet enlightened Wellesley-ites will mewl and puke and take the latter.

Oct 23, 2007 - 9:24 pm 13. gs:

Presentations like this should be recorded, including the audience behavior. There’s something to be said for respecting the audience’s privacy even in a public event, but that is preempted when organized thuggery is being practiced.

Oct 23, 2007 - 9:58 pm 14. sonic:

A very inspiring account, I’ve taken the liberty of linking to it here

http://christopherhitchenswatch.blogspot.com/2007/10/islamo-facism-awareness-week-apology.html

Oct 23, 2007 - 11:12 pm 15. Processed Cheese Eating Quaqmire Monkey:

Thank goodness you folks are so suspicious or nothing whatsoever might have come from these whispered taunts and glancing tortures.

Oct 23, 2007 - 11:57 pm 16. g:

You’re kidding,right? You’re advocating recording members of the audience because they roll their eyes and whisper at a speaker?

Ah, yes. Let freedom ring.

Oct 24, 2007 - 12:06 am 17. Brett:

This is intimidation. The college should expel the girls and their advisors should be kicked off campus.

No, that would not be discrimination against muslims; it’s intolerance of hooliganism.

Many students are punished for much less.

Oct 24, 2007 - 12:36 am 18. feh:

You’re kidding,right? You’re advocating recording members of the audience because they roll their eyes and whisper at a speaker?

Don’t tase me bro!

Yeah, taping the presentation will prove or disprove the claim. We have the video cellphones, why not use them?

Oct 24, 2007 - 3:52 am 19. Gary Ruppert:

The fact is, the intimidation used by Jenny Jihad here gave me a chill down my spine and a cold pit of fear in my belly. Liberals might not want to be friends with people who use such tactics, and will use them on them too not just those the left disagree with and try to silence there free speach. These thugs should be put into camps. The headscarves, intimidating gestures and rudeness from the audience is de facto the same as terrorism.

Oct 24, 2007 - 8:20 am 20. kj:

This is satire right? Please, God, tell me this is satire.

Oct 24, 2007 - 9:04 am 21. Luke:

Holy Crap! You mean Muslim students ROLLED THEIR EYES?! They LOUDLY WHISPERED!!? And then they got up and left their seats DISRUPTIVELY!?! This is a new low for those dastardly Islamofascists.

Oct 24, 2007 - 9:39 am 22. jimvj:

We live under Judeo-Christian law?

Does that mean I have to stone to death my disobedient children? Do I have to quarantine my wife for seven days when she menstruates? It would be cheaper to stone murderers to death, rather than go thru all the legal steps we now have to, but do we have to stone adulterers to death? Gingrich & Giuliani too? (Tho’ I’m sure lots of you would line up to stone Bill Clinton;)

What the hell are you guys smoking (& inhaling)!?!

Oct 24, 2007 - 10:43 am 23. Vinny Vidivici:

Sure, Luke.

I guess a deliberate attempt to interfere with the free assembly rights of others — like trashing a Starbuck’s at an anti-globo circus — is just another form of ‘dissent’, eh?

Now that outright assault or heckling speakers off the stage on college campuses is being exposed to the wider world for the brown-shirt thuggery it truly is, time to find another way, preferrably one which deftly games the West’s cultural practices, its legal and media institutions and and its current grievance fetish.

What a shakedown.

Oct 24, 2007 - 10:44 am 24. Business of Life:

Islamo-Fascist Awareness Week

On over 100 campuses across the country, a large roster of speakers are talking about matters that are not being addressed in women’s studies programs or in Saudi-subsidized Middle Eastern studies departments. Kathryn Lopez interviewed David Horowitz …

Oct 24, 2007 - 11:43 am 25. Kristine:

Oh, come on. I deal with worse than this riding the bus every day!

No one had the guts to yell, “Hey, STFU over there!”? I would have! I agree that this is rude, boorish behavior, but “Hamas-trained”?

Yes, there’s a lot of crap pulled by true believers when others talk about Islam (and a lot of other topics). I’ve seen it. Put your foot down calmly and firmly when it happens. Recording on cell phones is a good idea, too.

My favorite line: “Excuse me, I came to listen to the other performance!”

Oct 24, 2007 - 12:49 pm 26. george:

A few things to note.

First, there is a great deal of academic literature, from both feminist and critical theory circles regarding hijab. That it’s viewed with suspicion by some of the above commenters is bizarre to me. There are several reasons muslim women in the U.S. (in the west generally) wear hijab–the reasons range from historical or familial identity to avoiding men’s leering. As for commenters who view hijab with suspicion, i think y’all should get over it. So the lady’s a muslim, and i’m not about to get bent out of shape when i see sikh men wear turbans, or jewish men wear kippot, or christians wear crosses. So what? Not everyone’s christian. Get over it.

Second, heckling speakers, protesting their presence, or “interfer[ing] with the free assembly rights of others” when done non-violently, is *not* “brown-shirt thuggery.” Brown-shirts were faschist thugs who beat people not for speaking, but for being different. Had there been a protest of shouts and similar, this would not be thuggery–it would be competing speech. That’s okay–faschism is something very different. See Franco’s Spain.

Third, Mr. Ruppert claim above is profoundly foolish. To quote:

“The headscarves, intimidating gestures and rudeness from the audience is de facto the same as terrorism.”

Really? Do you really think so? You believe that being rude to someone is *the same* as killing indiscriminately? Going to the restroom is not meaningfully different than plotting the death of innocents? Wearing hijab is morally equivalent to kidnapping people? Giving someone a dirty look because you disagree with her/him is “de facto” (meaning lit. “factually indistinguishable”–having the same outcomes as) terrorism?

You, sir, are an utter fool–last i checked, a lady wearing hijab didn’t “de facto” result in 3000 people dying. Call me an old-fashioned causal theory type, but i thought that was caused by 19 men flying two planes into buildings.

But then, i wasn’t given dirty looks by people who disagreed with me.

Oct 24, 2007 - 1:16 pm 27. Azzam:

Any lady wearing a head cover of any shape out of her own sweet will is no body’s business.
But institutionalizing a head cover in the form of Egyption Hijab through intimidation, peer pressure,acceptability scale, scholarly stories, financial rewards,
can be the business of moderate Muslims. May be the question was not framed properly. Is the Muslim Chaplain, Nancy Khalil a Hijab advocate or neutral?
If she is neutral then the question is: How many non-hijab girls have received the MAS or MCSS or ISB grants through her or through her recommendation?
It is not a profound philosophical question. Money and face of an individual……very simple to sort out. Publish a list of your recipients and tell us the percentage without head cover.(We will believe your answer).

Oct 24, 2007 - 5:15 pm 28. phyller cheslol:

Thank you for the warning. I did not realise that scarves could be such dangerous tools for enforcing the will of the islamo-fascist global conspiracy!

In protest I shall immediately burn all the scarves I own publicly. For good measure, I have also decided to burn my hats, yarmulke, collection of ladies’ hosiery, gimp mask, and any other head-covering accessories. That ought to show those rude brown people!

Oct 25, 2007 - 11:36 pm 29. Shaffer:

So what you’re saying is that Hamas, the feared and deadly terrorist organization, has now ventured into the dastardly realm of *training college students to disrupt presentations*!

Pray spare me a moment to curl into the foetal position and shudder at the obvious threat that poor presentation etiquitte poses to our very way of life. Clearly heckling is the on slippery slope to suicide bombings and unfashionable head scarves.

Oct 26, 2007 - 4:56 pm 30. Ruben Naftali:

In pre-Nazi Germany, Erich Fromm made a study that showed that most people were not sympathetic to Nazis, but the rest were not only sympathetic but had strong convictions about Nazism.
We all know the results 70 years ago.

I know the majority of Muslims don’t agree with the way their religion is being used and hijacked, but unless they speak up, the perception we all have is that there is a very strong correlation between Islam and violence.

Interesting, maybe the redemption will come from Muslim women, who seem to have more cojones than their male counterparts.

Oct 26, 2007 - 4:56 pm 31. Nonie Darwish:

I received this e-mail from a student at Wellesley:

Sent: Saturday, October 20, 2007 04:43 AM
Subject: Thank you

Mrs. Darwish,

Last night I attended the speech you made at Wellesley College. I am
sure that you did not feel welcome on our campus after being insulted by
so many in our audience. I want you to know that I am glad, and proud,
that you brought such an enlightening message to our politically
correctness obsessed population.
I, actually, happen to align myself with the mentality you mentioned in
“Obsession,” that America needs to wake up because “we are strangling
ourselves with political correctness.”

Not every person at the event last night is ignorant of the war of
radical Islam and its consequences for women, human rights, democracy
and the West-I certainly am not-and for those students who negatively
represented an unintelligent, and disrespectful side of Wellesley, I
sincerely apologize. You shed light on so many topics last night that
needed to be addressed-points for women’s rights, for religious rights
and for human rights-that were ignored or lost because people felt it
was easier to be offended than to recognize that extremist Islam is a
growing, international problem. I so wish people would have listened to
your message with open minds so that they could have heard what I heard,
that it is an atrocity that “Not offending religion has become more
important than human rights.” I personally agreed with every word you
said and I admire your boldness and courageousness to continue to speak
out for everything you (and I) believe to be true and just.

Despite all my agreements, there was one point last night when I was
confused. The moment came during the dialogue between you and the 2nd
woman who spoke to you after you finished your speech. When she
attempted to debunk your speech and your credibility by saying she had
no frame of reference to the indoctrination and hate speech taught in
Middle Eastern countries, you told her to watch the movie “Obsession.”
At the time I assumed it was a documentary, but I had not heard about
the movie before.

But because I am a student entirely dedicated to finding and promoting
the truth, I decided to research and find out just what the movie was
about, instead of dismissing it and demanding that as a movie it had no
relevance to your speech. I am so glad you mentioned Obsession-I am more
educated for having watched it. And after having watched it I find it
even more upsetting that the women who claimed to know so much about the
prevalence (or lack there of) of radical Islam, knew nothing of this
shocking and groundbreaking documentary and assumed it to be a popular
film. It might be comical if it weren’t so depictive of a world in
denial.

I have researched radical Islam for almost 2 years. I have looked into
Islam as a religious, political, economic, legal and social force in our
modern world and have repeatedly come across the criminalization of rape
in Pakistan under the Hudood Ordinance, women who are awaiting execution
for adultery in Iran and repeated occurences of women’s human rights
violations across the Middle East.

I have seen propaganda that is
indoctrinated savagely into the lives of many Palestinian children. I
have read much of the Qur’an, the Hadith and Sharia criminal law. And I
have seen a distinction between radical and moderate Muslims. Perhaps
this is why I had no trouble agreeing with your speech. But, then
again, it may have been that I wholeheartedly agreed with your words
because my heart desires peace in the Middle East and justice for women
living there.

Please do not look at Wellesley as a place where you made
no positive impact- I, and others, were deeply, positively affected by
your tremendous and desperately needed message. I want you to know that
you are giving me hope to stand up against extremism and to strive for a
more peaceful world; and just as I did last night during your entire
speech, I will continue to pray for you and the words you carry in your
heart.

Oct 28, 2007 - 5:20 pm 32. Andrew:

Hamas trains people to go to the restroom in synchronization?

How could they resort to such barbarism!?!

Dec 19, 2008 - 12:37 pm 33. Chesler Chronicles » Princeton, Columbia Cancel Free Speech: Darwish Silenced:

[...] Jihad for America, Israel, and the War on Terror, has faced on-campus hostility and disruption before. Over the years, I have interviewed her about this a number of times. Like many of us, she has also [...]

Nov 19, 2009 - 11:00 am 34. Two campus events of note. Nonie Darwish and Robert Spencer silenced. | Vlad Tepes:

Nov 19, 2009 - 2:11 pm 35. Macheterne i Paris « Snaphanen:

Nov 19, 2009 - 3:25 pm 36. OpinionEditorial — Blog — Princeton, Columbia Cancel Free Speech: Darwish Silenced:

Nov 19, 2009 - 10:43 pm