German ex-Muslim journalist who critiqued Islam kidnapped in Egypt

This is incredibly tragic, shocking, and beyond sad. Hamed Abdel-Samad is a well educated, well spoken humanitarian who never shunned his criticism of Islam despite many death threats. In the West where we now have so many problems with Muslims while the population is exploding, we need people like Abdel-Samad, Wafa Sultan, Noni Darwish and others to try and make our small minded politicians grasp the consequences for importing Islam. Without them our chances are small.

Abdel-Samad was born as the third of five children, the son of a Sunni Imam. At the age of four he was raped by a 15-year-old, at the age of eleven by a five-member group of young people in a cemetery. Abdel-Samad came to Germany in 1995 at the age of 23. He soon married a 18 years older woman. Abdel-Samad studied English and French in Cairo as well as political science in Augsburg. He worked as a scholar in Erfurt and Braunschweig. In Japan, where he was involved with eastern spirituality, he met his second wife. He taught and conducted research until the end of 2009 at the Institute for Jewish History and Culture at the University of Munich (dissertation topic: “Image of the Jews in Egyptian textbooks”). Subsequently he decided to become a full-time professional writer.

Abdel-Samad became known to the German public through his book Mein Abschied vom Himmel (My Farewell from Heaven) (2009). Following the book’s publication in Egypt a group issued a fatwa against Abdel-Samad and he was put under police protection.

“The constant feeling of being insulted is our [Muslims] swine flu. Every day, we think about who or what has offended us. People are frustrated throughout the Arab world. They don’t know what to do with their rage, and they look for scapegoats.” — Abdel-Samad

Abdel-Samad calls for an “Islam light” in Europe without shari’a, jihad, gender apartheid, proselytism and “entitlement mentality”. He criticized the German political establishment for appeasing Islam, while ignoring fears about Islam.

In an interview aired on Al-Hafez on June 7, 2013 (as translated by MEMRI), hardline Egyptian cleric and Al-Azhar professor Mahmoud Shaaban accused Abdel-Samad of committing “heresy” and stated that “he must be killed for being a heretic…if he refuses to recant.” Shaaban also stated that “that after he has been confronted with the evidence, his killing is permitted if the [Egyptian] government does not do it.”

We’ve added a video interview with Abdel-Samad below the news report. We can only hope and wish full-heartedly that he returns to safety.

Related:

1.  Video: Egyptian Cleric Mahmoud Shaaban Issues Fatwa: ‘Egyptian-German Scholar Should Be Killed for Heresy’ 
2.  Die Muslime sind zu empfindlich (The Muslims are too sensitive)
3.  ‘This Cursed Freedom’: Egyptian Recalls Shift from Radicalism to Mainstream in Germany

Author Hamed Abdel-Samad with his wife Connie in Copenhagen. Abdel-Samad says, “I wanted to get away from Europe, away from Islam, away from everything.”

German journalist ‘kidnapped’ in Egypt

Published: 25 Nov 2013 12:22 GMT+01:00

The German government has called on Egypt to help find a German journalist who has disappeared – feared kidnapped – in Cairo after receiving death threats from Islamic extremists.

Hamed Abdel-Samad’s brother told Egyptian news site youm7 he feared the writer had been kidnapped after he disappeared from near the Al-Azhar park in Cairo on Sunday afternoon.

The German Foreign Ministry has set up a crisis team to try to find Abdel-Samed, who writes for politics magazine Cicero and wrote a book in 2009 about Islam called Mein Abschied vom Himmel (My Farewell from Heaven).

Ministry spokesman Martin Schäfer said the German embassy in Cairo had no confirmation that Abdel-Samad had been kidnapped, but did confirm he had spoken with embassy staff about his personal safety while in Egypt.

The 41-year-old received death threats after publicly criticizing the Muslim Brotherhood.

Abdel-Samad moved to Germany 23 years ago to study politics in Augsburg and later took German citizenship. He and well-known journalist Henryk M. Broder won a television prize last year for a series in which they undertook a road trip around Germany in 2010, the Welt newspaper reported.

Abdel-Samad went to Egypt during the Arab Spring uprising in 2011 and in June this year criticized the Muslim Brotherhood which came to power after the revolution, prompting death threats.

Cicero magazine said in a statement on its website it was worried about his safety and called on the German government to help secure his release should the kidnapping reports be confirmed.