American Library Association: British order to remove books “unenforceable”
posted at 12:25 pm on August 17, 2007 by Bryan
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From the ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom:
OIF is hearing from librarians who are wondering if they must comply with a request from British publisher Cambridge University Press to remove the book Alms for Jihad: Charity and Terrorism in the Islamic World from the shelves of their libraries.
Alms for Jihad is the subject of a British libel lawsuit brought by Saudi banker Khalid bin Mahfouz, who has filed several similar lawsuits to contest claims that the Saudi government has used Islamic charities to fund terrorism. Cambridge University Press chose to settle the suit rather than risk a large damage award at trial. Under the settlement, Cambridge University Press has agreed to pulp unsold copies and to ask libraries to return the book to the publisher or destroy the book…
Unless there is an order from a U.S. court, the British settlement is unenforceable in the United States, and libraries are under no legal obligation to return or destroy the book. Libraries are considered to hold title to the individual copy or copies, and it is the library’s property to do with as it pleases. Given the intense interest in the book, and the desire of readers to learn about the controversy first hand, we recommend that U.S. libraries keep the book available for their users.
Librarians 1, Libel tourists 0.
(h/t Michael Rubin)
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Ha ha haha ha!
Pulchritudinous Patriot on August 17, 2007 at 12:34 PM
Will they ever republish it in this country? If not, if you want to read it, you better buy a copy quick or check out at your local library because copies are still going to disappear.
Blake on August 17, 2007 at 12:37 PM
Hahahaahha. My lib (librarian) isn’t gonna like this.
JiangxiDad on August 17, 2007 at 12:38 PM
Fixed.
amerpundit on August 17, 2007 at 12:38 PM
Sounds like another clog in the ol’ memory hole.
CurtZHP on August 17, 2007 at 12:38 PM
Sorry folks, but British courts have no jurisdiction in the US. Lets hope this kind of intimidation does not continue
GFB on August 17, 2007 at 12:41 PM
Great news! I hope that most of the US library copies have survived.
FloatingRock on August 17, 2007 at 12:42 PM
The next step is for the Saudis to take this to the Librarians Association of America, or some such, and i cant begin to wonder how the Free-speech defenders at our nation’s libraries will respond???
wait. yes i can. and thats what bugs me.
Grrrr.
Mike D. on August 17, 2007 at 12:45 PM
There are few organizations in America that drift farther left than the ALA, and this principled position will be a stern challenge to their ideological knee-jerking.
I will be stunned to hear that the librarians hold their copies.
Jaibones on August 17, 2007 at 12:47 PM
Someone needs to put it in PDF form and upload it to the net, especially places like:
mininova.org
and
thepiratebay.org
Tim Burton on August 17, 2007 at 12:47 PM
I may be mistaken, but aren’t there a lot of Marxists in the ALA? I would think that some of the librarians would be happy to deep-six that book.
juliesa on August 17, 2007 at 12:48 PM
How long before CAIR or some other Islamist group organizes a campaign for Muslims to check out this book from their local library, and make as many copies as they can simply “disappear”?
kayawanee on August 17, 2007 at 12:49 PM
Waiting for the liberals in America to bring suit with cair to force libraries in America to pulp all existing copies in the USA. It wont be long…
Swinehound on August 17, 2007 at 12:49 PM
Sure they don’t have to…but will they?
Anyone laying odds?
ej_pez on August 17, 2007 at 12:50 PM
Or that too.
Swinehound on August 17, 2007 at 12:51 PM
I would have been more brash.
Dear Publishing House Owned By Saudi Terror Financiers,
No.
Sincerely,
The Americans Library Association
gabriel sutherland on August 17, 2007 at 12:51 PM
here’s a hotair headline, apparently or supposedly Phillip Atkinson for “Family security matters” posted an article earlier this month calling for Bush to declare dictatorship powers and be our Caesar. I think the left is going nuts over it.
President for Life
jp on August 17, 2007 at 12:56 PM
These books are helpful and all, but they’re unnecessary. Only those who are willfully blind at this point are unaware that Islamic charities fund jihad. Every Muslim who pays zakat funds jihad, whether they’re aware of it or not. Every infidel who doesn’t believe what they see with their own lying eyes on television every day is suicidal.
PRCalDude on August 17, 2007 at 12:56 PM
Yeah, if there is no hope that the book can be republished somebody should release it as a BitTorrent.
Hopefully another publisher will be able to reprint it though, with a new cover stating, “The book that terrorist financiers don’t want you to see!”
And then people in the UK can go online and order copies fresh from the USA.
FloatingRock on August 17, 2007 at 12:59 PM
one used copy at half.com for $22.65
one on ebay for $157.00
dm60462 on August 17, 2007 at 1:01 PM
Well put. We here get it. How long will it take Joe/Jane 6-pack to get it?
Mojave Mark on August 17, 2007 at 1:05 PM
The Left never will get it, Mark. It’s like Mark Steyn and Bryan have been saying: another 9/11 or WMD attack won’t wake them up. They’ll continue to believe in paranoid conspiracy theories until their head is literally on the chopping block or they become Muslims. Most Western minds are completely incapable of discerning truth at this point.
PRCalDude on August 17, 2007 at 1:15 PM
Oh you’re talking about the endgame. Several scenarios:
1. We’re wrong and there is no terrorist threat. Good news for us.
2. We’re right, sooner or later they attack big time, we respond big time. Good news for us.
3. We’re right, sooner or later they attack big time, we run. Bad news for us.
4. To the mattresses. Guerrilla war in US.
JiangxiDad on August 17, 2007 at 1:25 PM
Sometimes even a broken clock is right.
VinceP1974 on August 17, 2007 at 1:26 PM
2 Thessionians 2:7 For the hidden power of lawlessness is already at work. However, the one who holds him back will do so until he is taken out of the way, and then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will destroy by the breath of his mouth and wipe out by the manifestation of his arrival.
2:9 The arrival of the lawless one will be by Satan’s working with all kinds of miracles and signs and false wonders,and with every kind of evil deception directed against those who are perishing, because they found no place in their hearts for the truth so as to be saved. Consequently God sends on them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false. And so all of them who have not believed the truth but have delighted in evil will be condemned.
VinceP1974 on August 17, 2007 at 1:31 PM
That’s great, but Western religion no longer has the power or prestige to use this message to mobilize the masses. They were too busy having those sweet KUMBAYA masses and rummage sales and casino nights and bingo. How you gonna compete with TV, the internet if your goal is to entertain people?
Dutch Bishop suggests we call God “Allah”
The new Pope opened his mouth once, and not again.
Western religion may survive, but it sur ‘aint gonna save us.
Better think of something else.
JiangxiDad on August 17, 2007 at 1:38 PM
I’d like you to consider two other categories: slow jihad and fast jihad.
Fast jihad involves overt terrorism, violence, and asymmetric warfare. The kind we see on the news.
Slow jihad is what we experience in the West: demographic hegemony (influx of Islamic immigrants who have high total fertility rates), use of the courts to bully/intimidate. The only way to stop the slow jihad is to stop immigration from Islamic countries and restrict visas from those same countries. Unless we’re willing to be called racists, this won’t happen.
You see, this one word will be the undoing of the entire West: ‘racism’. It immediately paralyzes whoever it’s used against and there is almost no recovery one you wear the scarlet letter ‘R’ on your chest.
The trend I see in the United States is something of a pincer: we import Muslims from Muslim countries and we import culturally incompatible millions from south of the border who are used to seeing the perfidious ‘Yanqui’ as the source of their problems. The arguments from both groups sound largely the same, so they converge. Caught in the middle is your average American who is too afraid of being branded a racist to say what needs to be said.
PRCalDude on August 17, 2007 at 1:40 PM
What’s so absurd is that our oh-so well educated and intellectual librarians had to ask is British law applied to them.
Maxx on August 17, 2007 at 1:42 PM
PR.I know. Is fixable, but only if pols. act.
Answer. DON’T import MUslims.
Seal the borders FIRST
Deport criminal aliens
Naturalize the rest. Demand “Americanization” in return for citizenship. i.e. english lang, civics ,etc
Promote Judeo-Christian ethos.
Otherwise…civil war. There’s not another Atlantic to cross.
JiangxiDad on August 17, 2007 at 1:48 PM
I’m surprised the ALA wouldn’t happily comply voluntarily since they are as leftist as this preposterous British court order.
urbancenturion on August 17, 2007 at 1:49 PM
Tell them the books are in the mail with this message:
Go P. Off.
pedestrian on August 17, 2007 at 2:00 PM
That may already be happening. When this issue first appeared here, I checked my local large library - UNC - and the book was listed as “available”. Today I checked and the book was listed as “on search”, which means that no-one has any idea where it is, and they are actively looking for it.
eeyore on August 17, 2007 at 2:20 PM
I’m still trying to order one of these books.
jediwebdude on August 17, 2007 at 2:21 PM
Hmmmm … if they can’t sell in the US, then they may have problems proving any financial loss during a copyright infringement suit …
Kristopher on August 17, 2007 at 2:28 PM
The link to the ALA given redirects to this….does anyone have the entire bit… I would like to get it to my library that has a copy of the book.
rslancer14 on August 17, 2007 at 2:30 PM
I’m an idgit….forget that..
rslancer14 on August 17, 2007 at 2:31 PM
The libraries that own a copy may need to protect it from vandals or outright theft until this all dies down.
jeanie on August 17, 2007 at 2:54 PM
Half.com says Alms is no longer available. Did the HotAir group just buy ‘em out or did Cambridge contact them?
mimi1220 on August 17, 2007 at 4:28 PM
The ALA is mainly a liberal organization. If they are on the side of libraries keep the book, they must have made a mistake. I know. I work in a library and see what books hit the shelves and what books don’t.
Qzsusy on August 17, 2007 at 5:10 PM
franklin.com has a digital download, $22
lsutiger on August 17, 2007 at 6:34 PM
Funny how this post just came up. Went to a local library during lunch… They have it, it’s not checked out… but strangely “missing”?
I have a search request in… wonder how many muslims go to that college?
BadBrad on August 17, 2007 at 6:42 PM
I got a copy from my local library’s interlibrary loan program. I’m reading it right now. heeheehee.
ConstantSorrow on August 17, 2007 at 7:28 PM
FYI: Amazon offers it as a digital download for $9.95
NightmareOnKStreet on August 17, 2007 at 9:13 PM
If the Amazon link above doesn’t work (I tried it after I posted and it didn’t work for me):
http://www.amazon.com/Alms-Jihad-Charity-Terrorism-Islamic/dp/B000LMPOTO/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-0520031-3267138?ie=UTF8&qid=1187399268&sr=8-1
NightmareOnKStreet on August 17, 2007 at 9:16 PM
An oligarch acting on behalf of a theocratic tyranny has frightened one of the oldest and most highly honored universities in the English-speaking countries into pulping a book about the efforts of that very tyranny to frighten men in the West into giving up their liberties. Your deflating remark seems completely beside the point.
Kralizec on August 17, 2007 at 9:34 PM
That appears to be just a review article, not the book itself.
Kralizec on August 17, 2007 at 9:38 PM
Mark Steyn has a column up on the pulped book.
Kralizec on August 17, 2007 at 9:53 PM
I stand corrected. Sorry about that!
NightmareOnKStreet on August 17, 2007 at 10:23 PM
We appreciate the effort, regardless.
Kralizec on August 17, 2007 at 10:55 PM
I can understand calling the flying imam lawsuit “intimidation”, but this one isn’t directed at a bunch of random average individuals, it’s directed at Cambridge University Press. As far as I’m concerned, if they don’t want to defend their book in court, it’s because they can’t. I really don’t like the idea of garbage floating around on our side. Leave the journalistic sewage to the libs.
Free speech does not mean you can slander with impunity. And I like it that way.
Darth Executor on August 18, 2007 at 1:02 AM
A libel suit win in England does not necessarily mean the work is trash.
The standards for what constitutes libel are very low under English law. This is why the islamitards sued there in the first place.
Jurisdiction shopping.
Kristopher on August 18, 2007 at 1:13 AM
Well said, brother. It
is gettinghas gotten to the point that if we try to stand his ground and protect our way of life, we are called racists. When they try to import their backwards beliefs into our country, they are meerly “protecting their heiritage.”Texas Nick 77 on August 18, 2007 at 2:29 AM
Oops. Need spell checker here: “this ground” instead of “his ground” and “merely” instead of “meerly.” Mea culpa.
Texas Nick 77 on August 18, 2007 at 3:09 AM
Excellent news
KCtheKat on August 18, 2007 at 9:44 AM
What win? They didn’t even fight it, they settled.
Can you be more specific? Either something is libel or it isn’t. You can’t “sort of lie” about somebody. You either do it or didn’t.
Darth Executor on August 18, 2007 at 10:09 AM
Cambridge University Press basically doesn’t want to spend the time and money to address the suit. The burden of proof lies on the defendant. In America, the First Amendment (Bill of Rights) is self evident. Meaning the burden of proof lies on the plaintiff. It has nothing to do with whether the book is a “Lie” or not.
KCtheKat on August 18, 2007 at 2:05 PM
Excellent news!
Josephine on August 18, 2007 at 2:22 PM
Apparently CUP doesn’t know that zagat is to buy sandals for beggars and bullets for jihadis , it has always been that way, no secret there,,,says so right in the koran.
They would win.
BL@KBIRD on August 18, 2007 at 2:52 PM
Ordered a download copy from Foltran Ltd. dba EBookImpressions.com in early August–they charged my credit card, but the download link produced an error. Have emailed support (emails returned) and customer service, telephoned (either busy or message that mailbox is full), contacted the CC clearinghouse and finally have disputed the charge with my bank. Still waiting. Be cautious out there.
Suzzsin on August 19, 2007 at 12:06 PM