Just want to go back on a point FD made earlier that he never did justify.
Talking about the treaty Muhammad's city-state of Medina had with the jewish tribes that lived there
he states: Quote:It was a loose agreement of mutual support that one by one, Muhammed had renegged on. He laid siege to the entire tribe for 25 days.
I asked for clarification on this "renegging" of the treaty, to which
FD answered: Quote:The wikipedia article I keep quoting from mentions that there was an agreement, but states that it is unknown whether it compelled them to fight, or merely not attack each other.
Picking up on his stated admission that the terms of the agreement were "unknown",
I pointed out that: Quote:You don't even know the terms of the treaty, but you are perfectly happy to claim with certainty that Muhammad broke them.
In desperation, FD attempts sarcasm in an attempt to deflect this glaring hole in his argument, but only digs himself in deeper:
Quote:I apologise. It was silly of me to assume that Muhammed wrote a treaty that excluded executing 700 POWs, and exiling the other two tribes.
I then spelled out the obvious, to which he (probably wisely) stopped responding:
Quote:No. Apologise and feel silly for thinking that Muhammad was somehow bound by a treaty that had already been broken - and not by him.
Naturally like all of FDs refuted claims it got lost in the pages and pages of "noise" of obfuscation and endless nitpicking.
But I feel its worth reiterating some key points that are rather fundamental to the overall debate every now and then. Here FD makes a rather key claim that Muhammad "one by one" broke the terms of the treaty - but then spectacularly fails to substantiate this with anything at all - and in the end quietly left it alone.
Lets go into more detail:
1. asked to clarify the claim that Muhammad "renegged" the agreements with the jews, FD responds by referencing a wiki article that states it is "unknown" whether the agreements compelled the members to actively fight for each other (in the event of an external attack), or merely not attack each other.
- firstly, as already pointed out, FD is merely highlighting the fact that the terms of the agreements are unknown, thus such a definite statement as Muhammad "renegged" on them "one by one" is obviously absurd.
- Secondly, in regards to
the wiki article FD is referring to, there is dispute regarding whether the Banu Qurayza were obliged to actively support the muslims, or merely remain neutral. But what is *NOT* in dispute (according to the article) is that the Banu Qurayza were not to either attack or conspire with the muslim's enemies. (An obvious point, but anyway). The article makes it very clear that there is no dispute on this point. And it is a *FACT*, that FD never even bothered to argue against, that the Banu Qurayza conspired with Muhammad's enemies while they were besieging the muslims.
2. After being so embarassingly off the mark with his wiki reference, FD then resorts to sarcasm, making the point that of course any genuine treaty wouldn't have include beheading people and/or driving them out. Therefore, by committing these acts, its Muhammad who broke it.
So after establishing that the jews had *ALREADY* broken the agreements by negotiating with a hostile enemy (again, FD never tries to dispute), it is somehow Muhammad who really reneged on them for acting against these traitors! Dare I make the painfully obvious point? - that once an agreement is broken, the agreement is broken - and people typically get punished for committing treason. Duh!