Tina Magaard on Islam: Asking for It?

Tina Magaard
10NewsDenmark

A Danish linguist named Tina Magaard has spent three years researching Islam's most basic texts, comparing them to other religions' texts, and concludes that "Jihadis are just following the example of Mohammed," or so reports 10NewsDenmark:

What is striking is not in itself that one can find murderous passages in the Islamic texts, as such passages can also be found in other religions. But it is striking how much space these passages takes up in the Islamic texts and how much they focus on a them-and-us-logic where infidels and apostates are characterized as dirty, rotten, criminal, hypocritical and dangerous. It it also striking how much these texts demand the reader to fight the infidels, both with the words and the sword. In many passages Mohammed plays a central role as one who encourages the use of violence, whether it comes to stonings, beheadings, acts of war or execution of critics and poets.

And she maintains that we must discuss this issue with European Muslims:

[W]e must take the bull by the horns and question whether Muhammad did the right thing when he, for example, ordered his critics murdered. [This is t]he discussion we need to take with European Muslims.

I agree that discussion is needed, but with which European Muslims - perchance with the Islamists, who will say that Muhammad's example justifies their own extremism, or with the typical European Muslim, who would rather ignore the issue of violence in Islam?

I'd like to ignore the issue, too, but the huge number of Islamists won't let me. Their violence forces me to pose questions, which may mean that I'm just asking for it . . .