Freedom of Religion in Lebanon

Submitted by BB King (United States), Nov 6, 2011 at 17:43

Ianus, you ask a lot of questions so I have decided to devote my responses to addressing one question at a time instead of jumbling up all of answers to all of your questions in one response. This will make it easier for me to systematically and sufficiently address your queries instead of jumping around and giving you fragmented and rudimentary answers. I shall start with the issue of religious tolerance in Lebanon.

You claim tolerance for non-Muslims cannot be found in the bulk of Lebanon but I cited Ibn Warraq, the brilliant Muslim apostate and champion of humanism who claims that Lebanon rejects the Muslim law of apostasy and accepts people for changing their faith within its territory. You conveniently ignored this passage and failed to reply to it, something you accuse me of doing to you. So here is the link again for your kind perusal http://www.iheu.org/node/1541. Furthermore, I think the U.S. govt. knows more than you and the U.S. claims the Lebanese govt. protects religious freedom in practice (http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2010/148830.htm) and there is no evidence of forced religious conversions within Lebanon. Now is the U.S. government with its extensive intelligence networks lying to us? If so, why should I believe you over my own govt.?

Next stay tuned for my response to your claim that Lebanon has no central government. After which I will address your query about the domestic abuse fatwa and your quoting of Walid Phares.

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