Nadir Ahmed, Muslim Apologist, Debates Bob On Subject of Muslim Violence

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Muslim Apologist Nadir Ahmed debates Christian Apologist Bob Siegel on the subject of violence in the name of Islam.
The debate is done without commercial interruptions and timed by a moderator, co-host Mike Fredenburg.

Bob Siegel’s Notes On Debate:

After opening statements and rebuttals, I inserted a discussion of Israel and the Palestinians during our Q and A. Some might think this was a tangent. Indeed, I have not seen it come up often when Muslims and Christians debate. I brought up Israel for two reasons:

1) Nadir stated at the beginning of the program that early Muslim battles were waged for the purpose of protecting Jews from Christian genocides. Therefore, I wanted to see how Nadir felt about the fact that many Muslims today do not recognize Israel’s right to even exist.

2) Frequently, when Muslim spokespeople are asked to renounce terrorism, the violence is obligatorily criticized, but then, almost in the same breath, we hear something about Israel being “just as much of a terror threat.” For this reason, it seemed proper to correct some of the historical revision about the Middle East. All too often, Israel’s “occupation” or America’s oil interests are given as reasons for uprisings, when truthfully, a lot of Muslims are committing violence because of Jihad commands in the Koran.

Several times during the debate, Nadir said I sounded hostile or angry. I did speak quite passionately while listing some of today’s Muslim atrocities, and next time I am given such a chance, I promise to speak every bit as passionately. But I was feeling no anger toward Nadir, neither did I say anything disparaging to him personally. He was treated with respect and his discussion of my alleged anger seemed like a distracting Ad Hominem. Still, since he raised the issue of hostility, I invite the audience to listen carefully to Nadir dubbing me a terrorist “worse than Osama Bin Laden” for using Bible prophecy to justify Israel “stealing Arab land.” He said it with a gentle, friendly voice but his actual words should be noted. In fact, no mention was made of Bible prophecy. (Not that doing so would be a demonstration of terrorism anyway.) Instead, I spoke about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict purely from a human rights perspective with undisputed historical fact.

On another subject, late in the show I was quoting a Koran verse, Surah 9:73. Nadir said he could not see some of the words in his versions. It turns out the quotation should have also included verse 74. The error was mine for saying “Surah 9:73,” when I should have said, “Surah 9:73-74.” However, since Nadir was insisting that such words do not exist in the Koran at all, the conversation remains relevant.

Despite the intense subject matter, I enjoy these debates. Nadir has agreed to come on my show again.