USC provost orders USC-MSA to remove genocidal hadith from website on campus' internet server

I wrote an article for FrontPageMag regarding a decision by the USC provost to order the Muslim Students Association at USC to remove a Hadith which calls for the extermination of Jews as a path to redemption. Before reading the article, some clarification and background is necessary. Robert Spencer explains the hadith in question on his site, Jihad Watch: We cited that "infamous Hadith or saying of the prophet which calls on Muslims to kill Jews to bring about the Day of Judgment" in our Petition for Hadith Reform: We call on the Muslim Students Association to: -- Condemn and repudiate the hadith which reads: “The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: The time [of judgment] will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews and kill them; until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him!” (Sahih Muslim book 41, no. 6985); The MSA of the University of Southern California became a focal point of this effort because it hosts a major online hadith collection here, which of course included the genocidal hadith. When this was brought to the attention of USA Provost, C. L. Max Nikias, he declared that "the passage cited is truly despicable...The passage in the Hadith that you brought to our attention violates the USC Principles of Community, and it has no place on a USC website." Said Nikias: "I have ordered that the passage be removed." You can see a pdf of his letter here. If you scroll down in their hadith collection on this page, you'll find that the numbers of the hadiths go straight from 6980 to 6986. What were 6981 through 6985? Go here to find out. Here they are: Book 041, Number 6981: Ibn 'Umar reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: You will fight against the Jews and you will kill them until even a stone would say: Come here, Muslim, there is a Jew (hiding himself behind me) ; kill him. Book 041, Number 6982: Ubaidullah has reported this hadith with this chain of transmitters (and the Words are):" There is a Jew behind me." Book 041, Number 6983: Abdullah b. 'Umar reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: You and the Jews would fight against one another until a stone would say: Muslim, here is a Jew behind me; come and kill him. Book 041, Number 6984: Abdullah b. 'Umar reported that Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) said: The Jews will fight against you and you will gain victory over them until the stone would say: Muslim, here is a Jew behind me; kill him. Book 041, Number 6985: Abu Huraira reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him; but the tree Gharqad would not say, for it is the tree of the Jews. So it's great that the USC MSA took these down, isn't it? But please note that we had requested that they "repudiate this incitement." That isn't the same thing as removing it from their website. Why not? Well, for one thing, because it still remains on their website in other places. Many ahadith appear more than once in the canonical hadith collections -- and this is in traditional Islamic theology an indication of their authenticity. This is one of them. Here are some variants of the same hadith, in Bukhari, from the USC MSA website: Volume 4, Book 52, Number 176: Narrated 'Abdullah bin 'Umar: Allah's Apostle said, "You (i.e. Muslims) will fight wi the Jews till some of them will hide behind stones. The stones will (betray them) saying, 'O 'Abdullah (i.e. slave of Allah)! There is a Jew hiding behind me; so kill him.'" Volume 4, Book 52, Number 177: Narrated Abu Huraira: Allah's Apostle said, "The Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say. "O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him." Also this one: Volume 4, Book 56, Number 791: Narrated 'Abdullah bin 'Umar: I heard Allah's Apostle saying, "The Jews will fight with you, and you will be given victory over them so that a stone will say, 'O Muslim! There is a Jew behind me; kill him!' " Just in case these also vanish without a trace, I took some screen shots: Now: will we see the MSA of USC and other MSAs not just cover up the existence of this hadith, but also repudiate the genocidal imperative contained within it? I won't be holding my breath. ________________________________________________ “Hadith of Hate” Banned at USC By Reut R. Cohen FrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, August 22, 2008 As Muslim Student Association (MSA) chapters have become increasingly influential at universities and colleges around the country, critics have charged that it is a hate group that sympathizes with the international jihad and promulgates an anti-American and anti-Semitic ideology in its campus actions. In response, the MSA has claimed that it is merely another religious and cultural group similar to Hillel, a club for Jewish students, or the Newman Club for Catholics. That deception has been now unmasked at the University of Southern California, where the school’s Provost, Chrysostomos L. Max Nikias, reacting to a call from the David Horowitz Freedom Center and the Simon Wiesenthal Center, has ordered the campus MSA to remove a “despicable” hadith calling for Muslims to murder Jews as a condition for redemption from its website. David Horowitz, President of the Freedom Center, hails this as a breakthrough moment when the double standards that control the political and intellectual culture of most universities have finally been challenged. “Up to now, the slightest criticism of radical Islam on campus has been slammed as ‘Islamophobia,’ while Muslim groups and their radical fellow travelers have been allowed to say the most hateful things imaginable about Christians and Jews without any reaction from university administrators whatsoever,” Horowitz says. “Provost Nikias has called the hadith on the MSA website for what it is: despicable. Given the atmosphere that prevails on most campuses today, it was an act of integrity on his part to make this call and to demand that the MSA live up to basic standards of civility that should govern the university.” The hadith (sacred teaching) reads as follows: “Abu Huraira reported Allah’s Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him….” Its presence on the MSA website is consistent with other actions the Muslim group has initiated on the USC campus. In 2005, for instance, it hosted a conference featuring a speech by Islamist Ahmed Shama, who praised Hizbollah, Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, and told his listeners that the terrorists in post-Saddam Iraq were part—as was the Muslim Student Association itself—of a “global Islamic movement” and that it was “necessary to rise up against the occupation there.” The David Horowitz Freedom Center worked with the Simon Wiesenthal Center to draft a letter to Alan Casden, a USC trustee, about the “hadith of hate,” as it is often called. Disturbed that a call for genocide should be on the USC server, Casden contacted Provost Chrysostomos Nikias to express his concern. Nikias investigated the matter and sent Casden the following letter: “…The passage you cited is truly despicable and I share your concerns about its being on the USC server. We did some investigations and I have ordered the passage removed. “The passage in the Hadith that you brought to our attention violates the USC Principles of Community, and it has no place on a USC server.” The University of Southern California Principles of Community states in part: “No one has the right to denigrate another human being on the basis of race, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, etc. We will not tolerate verbal or written abuse, threats, harassment, intimidation or violence against person or property.” No student group other than the Muslim Student Association has posted any kind of material, religious or otherwise, calling for the destruction of a race or group. USC’s decision to remove the hadith from the school’s server marks the first time that an American university has acknowledged that the Muslim Student Association’s agenda involves the promotion of ethnic hatred. It is also the first time that an administrator has acted quickly to censure “despicable” material. Rabbi Aron Hier of the Simon Wiesenthal Center hailed Provost Nikias’ decision: “We commend USC for having the moral courage to stand up against those who hijack speech and religious freedoms and the goodwill of the campus community in order to spread hate and extremist violence.” “This episode shows that fighting injustice can produce results,” Freedom Center President David Horowitz added. “It also shows what kind of an organization the Muslim Students Association is, which is why the Freedom Center has launched a nationwide campaign, Stop the Jihad on Campus Week, which will culminate the week of October 13.” The goals of Stop the Jihad on Campus Week are to rally students across the country to sign a petition against the “hadith of hate” and to convince student governments to defund the Muslim Students Association. For more information, please visit www.terrorismawareness.org.