Muslim Rep. Rashida Tlaib to be sworn in on Jefferson’s Qur’an: “Muslims were there at the beginning”

Muslim Rep. Rashida Tlaib to be sworn in on Jefferson’s Qur’an: “Muslims were there at the beginning”

Tlaib’s statement here is part of the ongoing effort to rewrite early American history to put Muslims in it, and to recast Thomas Jefferson as an Islamophilic multiculturalist. Reality was different. Jefferson owned a Qur’an because he understood that one must know one’s enemy in order to know how to defeat him. 

In 1786, Jefferson and John Adams met in London with Sidi Haji Abdrahaman, the eyalet (administer) of Tripolitania’s ambassador to London. Jefferson recounted in a letter to Congress what Abdrahaman’s response was when he and Adams asked him “concerning the ground of the pretensions to make war upon nations who had done them no injury”: 

The ambassador answered us that it was founded on the Laws of the Prophet, that it was written in their Koran, that all nations who should not have answered their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as prisoners, and that every Mussulman who should be slain in battle was sure to go to Paradise.

What Thomas Jefferson actually thought about Islam:

Jefferson had multiple encounters - confirming musselmen's lack of integrity & persistent vile threats....hence the birth of the US Marines and subsequent success with the Barbary War.

FTA: "In 1786 Jefferson and John Adams met in London with Sidi Haji Abdrahaman"....

Later, in 1805, Tunisian envoy to the US, Sidi Soliman Mellimelli visited for 6 months.

"The backdrop to this state visit was the ongoing conflict between the United States and the Barbary states, autonomous provinces of the Ottoman Empire that rimmed the Mediterranean coast of North Africa. Soon after the Revolutionary War, and the consequent loss of the British navy's protection, American merchant vessels had become prey for Barbary corsairs.3 Jefferson was outraged by the demands of ransom for civilians captured from American vessels and by the Barbary states' expectation of annual tribute to be paid as insurance against future seizures. He took an uncharacteristically hawkish position against the prevailing thought that it was cheaper to pay tribute than maintain a navy to protect shipping from piracy."&"For his part, the Tunisian was surprised at the social freedom women enjoyed in America and was especially intrigued by several delegations of Native Americans from the western territories then visiting Washington. Mellimelli inquired which prophet the Indians followed — Moses, Jesus Christ, or Mohammed. When the Indians replied "none," and explained that they worshipped "the Great Spirit" alone, he was reported to have pronounced them "vile hereticks."