NEW YORK (YBH.ME) – An Obama adviser, Dalia Mogahed, appeared via telephone on a British television show earlier this month where she stated that “the portrayal of Sharia [law] has been oversimplified in many cases” and “I think the reason so many women support Sharia is because they have a very different understanding of Sharia than the common perception in Western media.” The quotes taken on their own have caused a bit of a firestorm on the internet.
Dalia Mogahed misunderstood by U.S Conservatives and hardline Islam?
Ms. Mogahed later wrote about her experience on the show for the Huffington Post:
To my unpleasant surprise, I found out on air that I was joined by a member of Hizbul Tahrir (HT), a marginal but controversial group which denounces Western Democracy and calls for the creation of a pan-Islamic state in the Muslim world. The reaction to my reporting of Gallup’s findings on Muslim views of democracy, gender and Shari’a (Islam’s ethical and legal code) by both the HT representative and later the bloggers who’ve parsed my interview showed just how little either side was willing to understand the very people they so prolifically discuss.
Ms. Mogahed continued:
The HT representative on the program dismissed or “reinterpreted” findings I presented so as to not challenge the group’s simplistic utopian ideology which holds liberty in contempt as morally decadent. For example, as I regularly report, our research shows that far from denouncing democracy, Muslims around the world say it is among the things they most admire about the West.
She also had some choice words for the right-wing blogosphere who took issue with her statements:
As much as HT selectively ignored and exploited these findings to push their propaganda, many conservative pundits who diametrically oppose HT’s vision of the world, did much the same. To them, my crime was that I reported that many Muslim women wanted Sharia as a source of legislation. I also explained that Muslim women surveyed by Gallup said they believed they should have access to equal legal rights, free employment, voting without family influence, and even leadership positions in government. This suggests that many Muslim women see Sharia differently from those who use it to deny women rights. For simply stating results of survey research, I stood accused of “endorsing” Taliban-like rule, and downplaying the abuses done in the name of sharia.
After the interview she told the Washington Post that “I don’t regret anything I said. My regret is that I went on the show.” It is unclear how or if Ms. Mogahed was misled by the shows representatives before her appearance. During the show Ms. Mogahed repeatedly quoted research she had undertaken for Gallup. At no time is their a statement that “[p]romotes Sharia” as one blogger stated she did.
Ms. Mogahed was appointed to President Obama’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships in April of 2009. In an interview with Egypt’s Al Masry al Youm in mid-April, Ms. Mogahed declared her allegiance to the United States above all else, disappointing some in the Arab world.
Ms. Mogahed is also the Executive Director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies. Born in Egypt, she came to the United States with her parents 30 years ago. She holds a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Pittsburgh.
The entire show can be streamed on YouTube.
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John Romano is the publisher and editor of Yes, But However!, a musician, a former political correspondent for BBC Radio London, and a serial web entrepreneur. Follow him on twitter: twitter.com/yesbuthowever or John Romano on Google+John Romano article archive.
