In her weekly Q&A session for the New York Times Sunday Magazine, reporter Deborah Solomon conducted a strongly hostile interview with Brigitte Gabriel, Lebanese-American journalist and opponent of radical Islam, while the headline blurb referred to Gabriel as a "radical Islamophobe."
The blurb:
The best-selling author and radical Islamophobe talks about why moderate Muslims are irrelevant, the lessons we should have learned from Lebanon and dressing like a French woman.
Is the Times calling Gabriel radical because she has an irrational fear ("phobia" or "-phobe") of Islam in general, or is "radical Islamophobe" a too-cute way of saying Gabriel has an irrational fear of radical Islam? Either way, the incredibly suspicious, hostile tone of Solomon's questioning is clear.
Here are some of the questions Solomon poses to Gabriel:
As a Lebanese-Christian immigrant who spent her girlhood amid the bloody devastation of the Lebanese civil war, you have lately emerged as one of the most vehement critics of radical Islam in this country. Are you concerned that your new book, "They Must Be Stopped," will feed animosity toward Muslims?
What about all the moderate Muslims who represent our hope for the future? Why don't you write about them?
Are you an agent of the U.S. government?
Are you underwritten by the C.I.A.?
When Gabriel said no, Solomon followed up:
But I see that R. James Woolsey, a former director of the C.I.A., serves on the board of American Congress for Truth, your educational foundation.
The pro-Israel media watchdog CAMERA has more, and argued:
Apparently in Deborah Solomon's world, one must be on the U.S. government payroll to want to sound the alarm about militant Muslim supremacists.
