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In a Friday, October 23, 2020 sermon at the East Plano Islamic Center (EPIC) in Plano, Texas, prominent American Islamic scholar Dr. Yasir Qadhi said that the recent beheading of French schoolteacher Samuel Paty was an "unfortunate incident" that is being used as a pretext for a "brutal" campaign in France against the Prophet Muhammad. He said that this attack is one of very few acts of violence committed by Muslims in France and that while the murder of Paty was wrong, it stemmed from anger at the way millions of Muslim citizens are treated in France. He also said that the French government’s "criminalization" of Islam in response to the attack will only make matters worse.
In addition, Dr. Qadhi said that this attack is "bait" and a "tactic," and that the French government and other Western leaders are praying for more Islamic terrorist attacks to take place so they can have an excuse to clamp down on Islam and Muslims. Dr. Qadhi urged his audience not to "stoop to their level." The sermon was streamed live on EPIC’s YouTube channel. Sheikh Yasir Qadhi is a Texas-based American scholar who has studied at the University of Houston, at the Islamic University of Madinah in Saudi Arabia, and at Yale University. For more about Dr. Yasir Qadhi, see MEMRI TV Clips No. 7640 and No. 7451.
Yasir Qadhi: "We are all painfully aware of what is happening in the land of France."
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"We are seeing this campaign, this brutal xenophobic, Islamophobic campaign. Against our nebi [prophet] and our rasul [messenger]. All under the guise of the freedom of speech. All as a result of a reaction of one unfortunate incident. They are using that incident of the beheading of one teacher for doing something to cause this entire campaign against our nebi [prophet].
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"When a president, when a country, when an army act like thugs, and they teach their own people to hate a minority, to have bad things about the minority, this is not freedom of speech. This is nothing but thuggery. This is nothing but an incitement of hatred. Freedom of speech does not apply over here. Less than 7% of France is Muslim. Less than 7%. Don’t tell me that the 90% are intimidated, they’re not going to speak their freedom. On the contrary, the acts of violence that happen at the hands of Muslims is negligible. One act – millions of Muslims.
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"But what is the response? The criminalization of the entire religion of Islam.
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"And we need to be brave enough to say this: the murder that happened was wrong, but it was not a murder that came from the books of fikh. This was a murder that came from the anger of how you are treating millions of your own citizens. This is not a justification; it is a contextualization. And what is the response? You want to make matters worse. This is not how a wise leader acts. You want to cause civil war between your own society.
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"We have to be very careful. This is a bait. They want more incidents to happen. Realize, dear Muslims, it is a tactic. And I speak of France, but this is the reality across the world, across the western world. They are waiting. Some of these people, they are praying for yet another terrorist attack. They want it to happen. Why? Because it will give them the authority to clamp down even more. It will give them the authority to demonize the entire Muslim population. So we cannot stoop to their level."
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