Judge orders best-selling writer to stand trial in Italy on charges she defamed
Islam in her book.
National
Review Comments on Fallaci's Book
ROME - A judge has ordered best-selling writer and journalist Oriana Fallaci to stand
trial in her native Italy on charges she defamed Islam in a recent book. The decision
angered Italy's justice minister but delighted Muslim activists, who accused Fallaci of
inciting religious hatred in her 2004 work "La Forza della Ragione" (The Force
of Reason). Fallaci lives in New York and has regularly provoked the wrath of Muslims with
her outspoken criticism of Islam following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on U.S. cities.
A large part of her book is dedicated to analyzing how the main European countries
pander to the arrogant demands of radical Muslim organizations. Fallaci uses the words of
Muslim leaders to support her thesis.
In "La Forza della Ragione," Fallaci wrote that terrorists had killed 6,000
people over the past 20 years in the name of the Koran and said the Islamic faith
"sows hatred in the place of love and slavery in the place of freedom." State
prosecutors originally dismissed accusations of defamation from an Italian Muslim
organization, and said Fallaci should not stand trial because she was merely exercising
her right to freedom of speech. But a preliminary judge in the northern Italian city
of Bergamo, Armando Grasso, rejected the prosecutors advice at a hearing on Tuesday
and said Fallaci should be indicted. Grasso's ruling homed in on 18 sentences in the book,
saying some of Fallaci's words were "without doubt offensive to Islam and to those
who practice that religious faith."
MUSLIMS HAIL DECISION - Adel Smith, a high-profile Muslim activist who brought the
original law suit, hailed the decision.
"It is the first time a judge has ordered a trial for defamation of the Islamic
faith," he told reporters. "But this isn't just about defamation. We would also
like (the court) to recognize that this is an incitement to religious hatred."
Justice Minister Roberto Castelli, who has a prickly relationship with the Italian
judiciary, said the ruling represented an attack on freedom of expression. "In Europe
we are seeing the birth of a movement that is looking to silence those who don't follow a
single mindset, within which it is forbidden to speak ill of Islam, of homosexuals or of
the children of homosexuals," Castelli was quoted as saying in an interview with
Radio Padania. "In Fallaci's book there is very strong criticism but not
defamation," Italian news agency ANSA quoted him as saying. There was no immediate
comment from Fallaci who is in her 70s and suffers from cancer. Just weeks after the Sept.
11 attacks, Fallaci published "La Rabbia e l'Orgoglio" ("The Rage and the
Pride"), in which she said the West was superior to Islamic society and complained
that Muslim immigrants had "multiplied like rats."
The book sold more than one million copies in Italy and at least 500,000 elsewhere in
Europe.
Fallaci received numerous death threats following its launch and "La Forza della
Ragione" was billed as her response to the outpouring of anger. No date was set for
the opening of the defamation trial.
(Reuters) May 25, 2005 — By Crispian Balmer
National
Review Comments on Fallaci's Book
Fallaci has her own interpretation of the massive Islamic immigration that is rapidly
changing the face of European cities. She sees it as part of the expansionism that has
characterized Islam since its birth. After reminding the reader how Islamic armies have
aimed for centuries at the heart of Europe (a part of history that is not taught anymore
in Europe, since it would offend the sensitivity of Muslim pupils), reaching France,
Poland, and Vienna, she lays out her case, claiming that the current flood of immigrants
from the Middle East and North Africa is part of a carefully planned strategy. Fallaci
uses the words of Muslim leaders to support this thesis.
In 1974, former Algerian President Houari Boumedienne said in a speech at the U.N.:
"One day millions of men will leave the southern hemisphere to go to the northern
hemisphere. And they will not go there as friends. Because they will go there to conquer
it. And they will conquer it with their sons. The wombs of our women will give us
victory." In other words, says Fallaci, what Islamic armies have not been able to do
with force in more than 1,000 years can be achieved in less than a century through high
birth rates. She cites as evidence a 1975 meeting of Islamic countries in Lahore, in which
they announced their project to transform the flow of Muslim immigrants in Europe in
"demographic preponderance."
The "sons of Allah," as Fallaci calls them, do not make a secret of their plans.
A Catholic bishop recounted that, during an interfaith meeting in Turkey, a respected
Muslim cleric told the crowd: "Thanks to your democratic laws we will invade you.
Thanks to our Islamic laws we will conquer you." But what really makes Fallaci's
blood boil is the West's inability to even acknowledge this aggression. A large part of
her book is dedicated to analyzing how the main European countries pander to the arrogant
demands of radical Muslim organizations, how they are unable to defend their Jewish
citizens from acts of Islamic militant violence (often blamed on neo-Nazis and almost
never on the Muslim perpetrators, even when the evidence clearly proves otherwise), and
said countries' unwillingness to be proud of their cultures and identities. |
