#2457: I.Q. al Rassooli

I.Q. al Rassooli is an anti-Islam activist most famous for his youtube series “Idiots Guide to Islam” and as author of the book Lifting the Veil: The True Faces of Muhammad and Islam, which seems to be mostly a transcription of parts of his youtube videos. He does not appear to have any credentials in any field relevant to his “research”, but takes the fact that scholars don’t bother to engage with the claims in his book or videos to demonstrate that he is nevertheless right. 

According to al Rassooli, every Muslim supports violent jihad, and those who claim that they don’t – that would ostensibly include former President Obama – are simply lying. Moreover, anyone who disagrees with that claim, al Rassooli says, belongs in a “mental asylum.” And polls that purport to show that many Muslims in the US don’t support the imposition are of Sharia are false, because those who insist they don’t are simply engaging in taqiyya. In other words, that the evidence straightforwardly refutes his claims, is evidence that the polls lie, which is evidence that he is right. So it goes. “Every Muslim wants Sharia,” asserts al Rassooli, and when they say they don’t, it’s “a deception, it’s called taqiyya. Taqiyya is Islamic sanctified religious deception. What do you think Obama is? Obama is all about taqiyya. He lies to protect Islam. Eight years he has been lying to protect Islam. Eight years. This is called taqiyya,” because the more times you repeat an unfounded claim, the truer it gets.  

So what should Americans do? According to al Rassooli, “you have to close every single mosque. You have to remove every single imam. You must not allow sharia. You must not allow hijab … This is exactly what needs to be done.” All in the name of religious freedom, of course.  

Diagnosis: The boiling stew of anger, hate and paranoia that is the mind of I.Q al Rassooli seems to persist entirely insulated from reality. Yet, his books and videos do seem to have a number of (equally deranged) fans. One might be excused for being worried about what they might end up doing.