President Barack Obama choose to publicly meet with an Islamic preacher in February who said the Koran declares gay sex “a despised act, it is haram, it is forbidden in Islam, completely, absolutely.”
The meeting in Baltimore came shortly after Breitbart publicized the Islamic cleric’s orthodox denigration of gays, which was posted on YouTube. It also came after Breitbart asked Obama’s gay political allies to comment on the Islamic cleric’s statements.
“You are a transgressing people,” said the cleric Imam Yaseen Shaikh, who sat on Obama’s left at the meeting. He is the man at the right hand side of the photo above, wearing a white hat. He is a senior leader of the Islamic Society of Baltimore, which Obama choose for the first presidential visit to a mosque in February 2016.
Being a homosexual “is an immoral act, it is a shameful act, it is despised act, it is haram, it is forbidden in Islam, completely, absolutely, from the Koran, the Hadith [recorded statements from Islam’s reputed founder, the leader Muhammad) and by consensus of the scholars from the beginning of Islam,” says Imam Yaseen Shaikh, who was hired in to serve as the head of Islamic teaching or Islamic “scholar” for the Islamic Society of Baltimore and its nearby Al-Rahmah school.
GLAAD, an LGBT-rights organization, did not respond to Breitbart News’ request for comment about Obama’s visit.
Shaikh, a senior leader of the Islamic Society of Baltimore, described “Homosexuality in Islam” in a lesson that has been posted to YouTube. He made these remarks at a mosque called “Masjid Ayesha” in London in 2013, prior to his joining the Islamic Society of Baltimore, according to the upload.
“So all the sources of Islamic law are very, very accurate and very open and clear about this, without any ambiguity, without any ambiguity,” Shaikh says, mixing Arabic with English, starting at 17:10 in the video.
Orthodox “Islamic law mandates the death penalty for homosexuality,” said Robert Spencer, an expert on Islam who runs JihadWatch.com. For example, one established story “has Muhammad saying: ‘Whoever is found conducting himself in the manner of the people of Lot, kill the doer and the receiver,'” Spencer told Breitbart.
Muhammad’s statement can’t be waived away, said Spencer. According to the Koran — which orthodox Muslims believe is a word-for-word unchangeable transcription of Allah’s divine book of commandments — “Muhammad is the ‘excellent example‘ for Muslims, to be obeyed in all things,” Spencer said.
In contrast, Christians are much freer to debate and reform Christianity, in part, because the New Testament consists of statements from fallible humans
“There is no chance, given Muhammad’s clear statement on this question [homosexuality] and his status for Islamic law, that Islam will be able to reform itself in the direction of tolerance toward gays,” Spencer said. “Those on the regressive Left who think they can reconcile Islam to liberal tolerance are in for a rude awakening: when they have outlived their usefulness to the jihadis, they will not be spared,” he added.
So far, that conflict has been suppressed. But the nightclub attack has exposed the deep ideological split within the Democratic Party’s politically-incoherent coalition, in which immigrant Muslims and U.S.-born secular gays and lesbians play prominent roles under a leadership group of secular progressives.
That’s a fundamental strategic problem for progressives, because they’re relying on immigration to import millions of Democratic-friendly voters to offset the increasingly anti-Democratic tilt of native-born centrist white Americans.
In his visit to the Baltimore mosque, Obama tried to recruit immigrant Muslims into the Democratic coalition. During a speech at the mosque, he declared that
like leaders everywhere, these [Muslim] leaders have been offering and need to continue to offer a positive vision for progress. And that includes political and economic progress…
It’s why we will continue to partner with Muslim American communities not just to help you protect against extremist threats, but to expand health care and education and opportunity. Because that’s the best way to build strong, resilient communities…
Understand your power to bring about change. Stay engaged in your community. Help move our country forward, your country forward.
But in his YouTube video, Shaikh complained about the political power of Obama’s allies in the gay advocacy groups.
“It is no secret that everywhere you look into society today, at every level, you find a representation of this community. On a social level, on a political level, on the educational boards, everywhere you look today you will find a representation of this community. They are an extremely powerful group,” he added.
“It has been imposed on us. We are having to accept it. We are having this discussion today,” Shaikh said of the LGBT movement’s supposed conspiracy to “make their way into television and the media.”
The LGBT movement is attempting to get Muslims to “have some sympathy for them. Have some empathy. To start accepting them, that this is okay,” he said.
Shaikh was particularly critical about “progressive Muslims” who want to accept homosexuality. “Sometimes you even hear from Muslims. This is the most disturbing thing, is when you hear Muslims say, ‘it doesn’t bother me.’”
“Unfortunately in recent times, there are some progressive groups within Muslims … I’m not going to sit there and talk about whether they are Muslim or not, because giving that judgement is not my duty here today. But unfortunately there has been the emergence of a few Muslim groups that claim legitimacy for their acts within the Islamic faith,” Shaikh said in his attack on progressive Muslims.
But Shaikh is a comparative moderate within Islam. He was born in Britain, and in his YouTube video, he suggested that Muslims need not punish homosexuals if the homosexuality is conducted only in private.
“If somebody is committing an immoral act, a disgusting act, a despised act… in their privacy… we can’t judge them because we don’t know about it.” But, he said, “when that act is brought out into the public space, that’s when we have a problem.”
Here’s the video:
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