In 2016, the New York Times ran an article about the 551 times Donald Trump had personally insulted people. It’s safe to say that since 2016, anyone trying to count Trump’s insults would have lost track. However, the insult he just gave new Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, in response to her using the “F-word” toward him, might be the most ruthless take-down that the POTUS has ever dropped on anyone. And, it just went over everyone’s head.
Tlaib, one of the first Muslim women elected to Congress, called for the impeachment of President Trump within hours of being sworn into office. The Muslim, representing a district in Michigan, said:
People love you and you win. And when your son looks at you and says, ‘Momma, look you won. Bullies don’t win.’ And I said, ‘Baby, they don’t, because we’re gonna go in there and we’re gonna impeach the mother****er.’
Aside from the sheer lack of civility from Tlaib, or the irony that rarely has Trump been so blunt or profane (the only time my memory serves Trump used that term was in reference to potential foreign enemies and not fellow Americans), or the irony that Tlaib’s comment is a perfect example of bullying speech, the way Trump responded to Tlaib is jaw-dropping if you consider his words.
Trump said in a press conference:
I thought her comments were disgraceful. She dishonored herself and dishonored her family. I think it was highly disrespectful to the United States of America.
Secularists see this comment at face-value as a random, milquetoast jab at Tlaib. It was not, and the comment demonstrates that Trump has a better grasp of Islam than most Americans.
Tlaib is Islamic. That’s her schtick. That’s why she was elected in Michigan’s 13th Congressional District. Her hatred for Trump is due to his defense of Western Culture, the War on Terror, and his proposed ban on immigration from terrorist nations (which happen to all be Islamic).
One of Islam’s core doctrinal teachings is that of honor and dishonor. These are the equivalent to Christians concepts of atonement or repentance; these are theologically loaded concepts. Anyone familiar with the Quran or Islamic culture would recognize this. Tlaib certainly recognizes this.
In Islam, the use of profanity is considered haram, or that which is forbidden by Islamic law.
In fact, Islamic writings say that to curse is to be “dishonored.”
ن الله حرم الجنه علی کل فحاش بدی قلیل الحیاء لایبال ما قال و لا ما قیل له (کافی، ج۲، ص۳۲۳؛ وسائل، ج۱۱، ص۳۲۹؛ تحف العقول، ص۴۱۶).
The punishment for dishonor for Islamic women is…death.
Furthermore, women who even speak sexually explicit things in Islam have dishonored themselves and their families and are, therefore, punishable by death. Surely Tlaib has crossed that threshold.
Although denied by sympathizers of Islam, there is no doubt of the correlation between so-called ‘honor-killings’ and followers of the Quran. In fact, Trump’s 2017 executive order was designed to track honor-killings among Islamic immigrants in the United States, because the offense is often swept under the rug as ordinary “domestic violence.”
In reality, honor killings and Islam go together like peanut butter and jelly.
Human Rights Watch defines “honor killing” as “acts of vengeance, usually death, committed by male family members against female family members, who are held to have brought dishonor upon the family.”
In Islamic culture, honor killings are carried out upon women who have “dishonored” their family by:
- adultery
- pre-marital sex
- speaking with an unrelated man
- refusal of forced marriage
- being a victim of rape
- speaking lewdly or in a sexually lascivious way in regard to sexual acts
In Islamic nations like Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Jordan, Syria, Libya, Kuwait, Yemen, Lebanon, Egypt, Sudan, the Gaza Strip, Tunisia, Pakistan, Nigeria and Somalia, legal action is typically not taken against the murderer carrying out the honor killing. In fact, even in relatively moderate Jordan, the penalty for an honor killing may be as low as six months in jail. In fact, in certain cases there is no penalty for an honor killing in Jordan, depending upon the reason (killing an adulterous woman has no penalty at all).
It’s hard to see the
If any of your women are guilty of lewdness, take the evidence of four (reliable) witness from amongst you against them; if they testify, confine them to houses until death do claim them. Or God
ordain for them some (other) way.
While English renderings of this verse say “commit unlawful sexual intercourse,” the literal Arabic renderings say, “lewdness,” which would include less explicitly sexual acts, like perverted speech or crude behavior (most English renderings of the Quran censor the more extreme translation of the original tongue).
In short, what President Trump basically said was, “If this woman really wants to practice her religion, she should be confined to her house or put to death.”
Perhaps Trump’s understanding of Islam is deeper than what we might at first give credit. His insult truly was a mic-drop type of moment that flew over the heads of most Americans who are not as aware of the danger of radical Islam.
