Reflections on my interview with Hamed Abdel-Samad

Hamed Abdel-Samad

Hamed Abdel-Samad is an Egyptian Exmuslim. He is fluent in Arabic (his mother tongue) and French, English and German.

These are my reflections I have after reading one of his books and interviewing him.

Most of the excuses used to dismiss exmuslims don’t work on him. He speaks Arabic. He grew up in a Muslim country. He memorized the Quran, the holy book of Islam in its entirety. He is also the son of an imam. He was even a part of the Muslim Brotherhood (an Islamist group i.e. wants to reestablish Islam politically). He knows the religion very well and these ad hominems don’t work on him.

Hamed was an outstanding guest. He spoke eloquently even though this is his third or fourth language.

What stood out to me was his humility. Hamed doesn’t brag about the dangers he is in or use them to score points with the audience. He only brought them up because I asked him about them after someone mentioned to me he was under police protection for credible threats to his life. Unlike a certain other popular Imam online who milked a dubious potentially forged ‘fatwa’ made calling for his death for all it was worth to sell more copies of his book, Hamed doesn’t complain. He doesn’t complain about the fact that he has to hide where he lives, that he has to wear a bulletproof vest when doing…