Time Immortal

Islamist imam Syed Sohawardy has withdrawn his complaint against Mr. Levant’s publication of the Muhammed cartoons. Interestingly, he first announced this to the Calgary Herald editorial board; I can’t see the reasoning behind that move.

Ezra comments thusly:

If he’s really withdrawing the complaint, this is the first I’ve heard about it; and when I spoke with my lawyer this afternoon, the complaint was still proceeding against me.

It might be a lie — it wouldn’t be Soharwardy’s first, but then again, lying to an infidel newspaper isn’t immoral to someone like [Syed Soharwardy]. It’s called taqqiyah.

But even if Soharwardy withdraws his complaint against me, an identical complaint filed by the Edmonton Muslim Council still proceeds.

So why would Soharwardy do this — and why now?

The answer lies in another Arabic word: hudna. A hudna isn’t a peace treaty. It’s a temporary truce called by a Muslim warrior who’s losing in battle. It’s pretty easy to understand how hudnas work by watching Israel fight Hamas and Hezbollah. Those two terrorist groups lob rockets and send suicide bombers into Israel for months; then, every once in a while, Israel deploys its military and flattens Hamas and Hezbollah, who then call for a hudna. The UN intervenes, saving Hamas and Hezbollah to fight another day. That’s a hudna: a tactical truce for a strategic advantage.

Soharwardy wants a hudna because he’s losing badly. Not financially: he hasn’t spent a penny to further the complaint against me — that has been done courtesy of Ed Stelmach’s government and the taxpayers of Alberta, to the tune of $500,000, I’d guess. Nor has Soharwardy had to spend hundreds of hours battling against me at the commission — Alberta government employees do that for him. It’s because over the past two years — and the past month in particular — Soharwardy has become known for what he is: an Islamofascist imam, who’s trying to bring Saudi values to Canada. Though I’m being pummelled in a kangaroo court, he’s being pummelled in the court of public opinion. He didn’t expect it, and he hates it.

He hates that hundreds of bloggers ridicule him. He hates that my video clips, in which I describe his illiberal nature, have been viewed almost 500,000 times. He hates that his own enemies within his mosque have taken advantage of this media coverage to shine a light of scrutiny on the way he runs his mosque - from his financial irregularities, to his abusive treatment of women. These documents here, here, here and here, first published on my blog, have been viewed thousands of times and led to a series of newspaper items in the Calgary Herald and even the Washington Times. Soharwardy is embarrassed — as well he should be. He is no longer polite company. Now he’s known as a censor, a fascist, a sexist. He’s un-Canadian. And if the complaint against me goes to a tribunal, he’ll go through this again on a larger scale.

Two points to draw attention to. Firstly, this isn’t the only complaint that has been filed against Ezra Levant, and the other one is still in process. Secondly, by all indications, Syed Sohawardy has had a very sudden change of tune, since as little as two weeks ago he was threatening additional legal action against Mr. Levant. There’s not a great deal of room to draw breath over this issue, because the issue of Canadian Muslims abusing the already corrupt HRCs in an attempt to impose Saudi Arabian-style (or Iranian-style) Censorship is still very much at large. There’s also not a great body of evidence which suggests that there’s any merit or trustworthiness to Syed Sohawardy’s claim that he is withdrawing his complaint, and a much more substantial body of evidence which suggests that he’s telling another convoluted lie.

One more thing:

Well, back in the land of real laws and real rules of court, there’s a tort called “abuse of process“, and Soharwardy has just admitted to it.

Now, let’s reflect on something here. What the above means is that Ezra Levant will be pursuing legal action against Syed Sohawardy, to recover financial costs of having to defend himself against a spurious and unfounded human rights commission claim (that’s the way HRCs work, by the way — the plaintiff spends nothing, because it is a government “investigation”, while the defendant is responsible for his/her own legal fees), that is not to say that Levant is now employing in reverse the tactics that Sohawardy employed against him. In a civil court, both plaintiff and defendant pay their own way until a decision is reached — the case itself is judged on the merit of weight of evidence (not hurt feelings), and the loser will typically have to pay all or a portion of the winner’s legal fees. It’s a fair process, in other words, unlike a HRC tribunal.

Notes Jay Currie:

Now, no doubt the niceniks and the Kinsellians will moan about how Ezra will not give this ?Imam? a break and how mean Ezra?s being. Suing the man for abuse of process? How un-Canadian. I say go for it. It is well past time that people like this learn actions have consequences. Serious ones. A million dollars in damages? Go for it. It sends exactly the right message.

Personally, I say we’ve been tolerant enough in this country to last us all several lifetimes. If people wish to come to Canada and abuse the services and processes of the government to advance an Islamist agenda, it’s about time we stopped giving those abuses a pass and started hitting back. And given the choice, it’s better that we hit back with rhetoric and financial penalties — actual violence being substantially less preferable.