Italian Mideast scholar accepts ZaHaV invite to speak

Zionists for Historical Veracity (ZaHaV) sponsored a lecture by Secretary General of the Italian-Muslim Assembly Sheikh Abdul Hadi Palazzi, who denounced religious justifications for Islamic terror and warned of extremist Muslim teachings throughout America and Europe in the Shapiro atrium on Sunday evening.

The event was called "Suicide Bomber, Martyrs or Apostates?-What Militant Islam Doesn't Want You To Hear" and it was attended by approximately 75 students and faculty.

During his speech, Palazzi compared Islamic terrorists to the Ku Klux Klan and bombers of abortion clinics in the United States.

"These groups all claim to abide to a religious feeling in order to legitimatize murder," he said. "I think there is a spread of extremism which claims to have a basis in religion. But Islam prohibits both suicide and the killing of civilians."

He then listed several sources that condemned these acts from hadith, or sayings and stories attributed to Muhammad.

Palazzi said that funds from Saudi Arabia are used to support extremist voices in Muslim organizations throughout the United States and Europe.

"In the West, there are many recently immigrated Muslims," Palazzi said. "These Muslims can't afford to pay for the mosque, but the extremist network has huge funds at its disposal."

ZaHaV President Elana Lichtenstein '05 said she hoped that campus organizations would unite to support the event. But when her group asked the Brandeis Muslim Students Association (BMSA) and the Brandeis Coalition for Tolerance (BCT) to endorse the event, both clubs declined.

Lichtenstein said that since ZaHaV's invitation to Daniel Pipes in November prompted large-scale protests on campus, she thought Palazzi's message would better appeal to the whole community.

"Here was a moderate Muslim," Lichtenstein said. "He's pro-democracy, pro-Israel. Based on some events last semester, Islam was given a bad light. But for this to be a source of controversy boggles my mind."

Ammad Bahalim '04, a founding member of BCT said that one of the reasons BCT refused to support the event is because Palazzi's message does not go along with the club's purpose.

"Palazzi has a tendency to polarize," Bahalim said. "We didn't think he would build bridges, and didn't think he was relevant to our goal."

According to BMSA member Bariza Umar '04, BMSA declined to endorse Palazzi's visit because of the group's apolitical mission. She said Muslims on campus are often unfairly labeled as a political body.

"There's this assumption that just because I'm Muslim I'm completely against Israel," she said. "I never cared about the Middle East until I got here."

After hearing Palazzi speak, Umar said she thought he could have made a similar argument with more authority if he had used sources from the Koran, instead of hadith.

Palazzi studied at the Al-Azhar University in Cairo, and in 1996 co-founded the Islam-Israel Fellowship of the Roots and Branches Association, a group that, according to its Web site, promotes cooperation between Muslims and Jews based on "correct Jewish understanding of the Bible and Jewish tradition, and a correct Muslim understanding of the Koran and Islamic Tradition."

Lichtenstein said she heard of Palazzi while traveling through Israel in a program with Hasbara, a coalition of groups serving as a U.S. affiliate of the World Zionist Organization.

ZaHaV received funding for Palazzi's visit by Hasbara and an emergency allocation by the Student Union.

"When we heard he was available, we jumped on the opportunity," Lichtenstein said.