Tuesday, February 19, 2008
A Congressman is looking into Saudi influence buying in higher education: $20 Million Saudi Gift Is Questioned
A Virginia congressman has asked Georgetown University to explain how it used a $20 million donation from a Saudi prince for its academic center on Muslim and Christian relations.
Rep. Frank R. Wolf (R) sent a letter yesterday to university President John J. DeGioia expressing concern about the donation and asking whether the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding has ever produced any reports critical of Saudi Arabia...
Which makes Cinnamon Stillwell's piece today very timely, as she takes a look at Georgetown's notorious apologist, John Esposito: Esposito at Stanford
Georgetown professor John Esposito, director of the Saudi-financed Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding has a reputation as an apologist for radical Islam. And it's one he lived up to with a Stanford University speech last week titled, "Dying for God? Suicide Terrorism and Militant Islam."
Esposito claimed that Islamic terrorism grows primarily out of a sense of political and economic grievance and, of course, "occupation" on the part of "neo-colonial powers." This spin allowed him to deflect responsibility for Islamic terrorism to the West while negating the need for self-reflection among Muslims.
When an attendee asked him why no other impoverished or oppressed group around the world resorts to suicide bombings, Esposito stonewalled for several minutes before giving one of the few straight answers of the night: "I don't know."...
