Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi Responds to Obama's Cairo Speech

Following are excerpts from a Friday sermon delivered by prominent Sunni cleric and head of the International Union of Muslim Scholars Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi. The sermon aired on Qatar TV on June 5, 2009.

View this clip here.

View his website here.

Obama "Drew a Parallel Between the Koran and the Torah... But Everything in the Torah Constitutes a Call for War"

Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi: "The man [Obama] tried to quote from the Koran, as well as from the Torah and the New Testament. He drew a parallel between the Koran and the Torah in their call for peace. He quoted the Talmud and the Torah as saying that the Torah calls for peace. Never have I seen a single verse, paragraph, or sentence in the Torah which calls for peace. Everything in the Torah constitutes a call for war. They even call God 'Lord of Hosts' - they don't call Him 'Lord of the Universe' or 'the Compassionate, the Merciful.' [...]

"[The Torah contains] the notion of annihilation. We saw it when the Europeans went to America - they tried to annihilate the Indians. When they went to Australia, they tried to annihilate the aboriginal people. Indeed, they annihilated them. This is a biblical notion - annihilate them totally, do not leave a living soul among them. How could Obama draw a parallel between the Koran and the Torah?

"[Obama] Replaces One War With Another - Both Against the Muslims"

"In any case, we must not be too optimistic about his speech, but perhaps it is a step [forward]. Perhaps the man will change American policy, even if partially and in stages. Unfortunately, however, we have seen him pulling the soldiers out from Iraq, only to send them to Afghanistan. He replaces one war with another - both against the Muslims."

I don't know what Torah he reads, but mine is vastly different. The Torah is the First 5 Books of the Old Testament (Genesis, Exodus,Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy). There is some violence in the book (Cain and Able, Abraham's rescue of Lot, What Joseph's brothers did to him, G-d's plagues upon the Eyptians, you get the idea), it does not call for the destruction of a group of people (Joshua does).

It does have something that the Koran and Hadiths do not:

The Ten Commandments

Both in Exodus 20:2-17 and Deuteronomy 5:6-21 you will find these:

1. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me.
2. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My Commandments.
3. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.
4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.
5. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.
6. You shall not murder.
7. You shall not commit adultery.
8. You shall not steal.
9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
10. You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is your neighbor's.

You do not find these in Islam. They are not important to that faith. I guess that no one bothered to inform Muhammad of these basic laws of both Jews and Christians.

Nor do Jews have to call G-d:

'Lord of the Universe' or 'the Compassionate, the Merciful.

He is Ha Shem, King of the Universe, Adonai (My Lord), and others that show the respect and reverence Jews have for He Who Is Most High.

Jews know His compassion and love that they don't need to reinforce it every minute of the day. For it was by His Hand that the Children of Israel were led out of slavery into freedom. It was by His Hand that both Temples were built in Jerusalem. It was by His Hand that 61 years ago, Israel was born. And it will be by His Hand, and only His Hand tha the Temple will be rebuilt.

What one sees and hears from Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi is just the same old anti-Semetic rhetoric that is a common everyday occurance in the Muslim world.

One day there might come a Muslim leader who will actually read the Torah and disgard the hateful rhetoric of his faith, but I fear that pigs will fly first.