Saudi TV Host Rips Into ‘Hypocrites’ Who Say Terrorists ‘Do Not Represent Islam’

A Saudi television host had harsh criticism for Muslims — specifically those in the Arab world — who insist that terrorism does not represent their faith, calling them “hypocrites.”

Saudi columnist and television anchor Nadine Al-Budair said in a recent monologue that in the wake of the Brussels attack, it was time for Muslims to own up to elements of their faith that encourage followers to commit terrorist attacks.

Saudi television columnist and anchor Nadine Al-Budair sees one faith group as being behind terrorism both internationally and at home in Saudi Arabia. (Image source: MEMRI)

“After the abominable Brussels bombings, it's time for us to feel shame and to stop acting as if the terrorists are a rarity,” she said, according to a translation from the Middle East Media Research Institute.

“We must admit that they are present everywhere, that their nationality is Arab, and that they adhere to the religion of Islam,” Al-Budair said as she pointed her finger at an education system that enforces memorization of hardline Salafist texts and where schools and universities “told them the others are infidels.”

She said it’s time Arab pundits and sheikhs own up to the fact that terrorism emerges from the Arab and Muslim world and is not a “rarity.” (Image source: MEMRI)

Al-Budair excoriated pundits who, following each terrorist attack, assert that the perpetrators do not represent Islam.

“Whenever terrorism massacres peaceful civilians, the smart alecs and the hypocrites vie with one another in saying that these people do not represent Islam or the Muslims. Perhaps one of them could tell us who does represent Islam and the Muslims,” she said.

Image source: MEMRI

She noted with cynicism that many in the Arab world try to prove – in her opinion with futility – that “everything that is happening has nothing to do with the Muslims, and that the terrorists are highway robbers and homeless alcoholics and drug addicts.”

“We all know that the number of the homeless in Europe is very high. They sleep in the streets and beg for alms, and some of them are alcoholics or drug addicts, but we do not expect these addicts or criminals to even consider coming here and blowing up a mosque or a street in our city. It is we who blow ourselves up. It is we who blow up others,” she said.

“Why do we shed our own conscience?” she asked. “Don't these perpetrators emerge from our environment? Don't their families belong to our society? Didn't anyone you know — someone from your city, a neighbor, someone from your street, a relative, a nephew, a grandson, a father, or a mother — go to Syria or Iraq to wage jihad?”

MEMRI reported that Al-Budair made her remarks on Saudi Arabia’s Rotana Khalijiyah TV on April 3:

--