0:00
(upbeat music)
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- This is Undaunted Life, a man's podcast.
0:21
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
0:23
Let's get into it.
0:24
Our guys today, we got a special guest on the podcast.
0:25
His name is Kasim Hafiz.
0:27
He's featured in the 2020 documentary
0:29
"Never Again."
0:31
So that documentary seeks to educate others
0:33
on the horrors and consequences of anti-Semitism.
0:35
So this film follows the journey
0:37
of a Holocaust survivor, actually a guy that was sent
0:39
to Auschwitz at the age of 14,
0:41
a guy named Irving Roth, and a former radical Islamist,
0:44
and that is Kasim, as they seek to leave behind
0:47
a legacy of love over hate.
0:49
And so it's a crazy documentary.
0:51
Obviously guys, the documentary never again
0:53
will be in the show notes for you to check out.
0:55
But I really, really enjoyed my conversation with Kasim,
0:57
'cause even from the very beginning,
0:58
this is a guy that now lives in America
1:00
and he absolutely loves America.
1:02
But his families from Pakistan,
1:03
he grew up in the UK, moved to Canada at one point
1:06
and then came to America.
1:07
And he has a deep and abiding patriotism for this country.
1:11
And he said something interesting
1:12
at the beginning of our interview.
1:13
He said, you know, growing up in the UK
1:15
I never really felt British,
1:16
but having only lived in the US for a few years,
1:19
like I'm so patriotic and I love the US.
1:21
He's got the American flag tattooed on his arm
1:23
and he showed it during the interview.
1:24
Such a fun interview.
1:26
Well, not a great, you know, fun, you know,
1:28
subject matter necessarily,
1:30
but this is a guy growing up in the UK
1:32
that was radicalized at one point.
1:34
So he would go back and visit Pakistan.
1:35
He was radicalized by the BDS movement,
1:38
the anti-Israel movement.
1:39
It's been a lot of time talking about that
1:41
in this particular podcast.
1:42
But there was some very interesting things
1:44
that led to him really considering his worldview
1:46
and considering, you know, what he was doing with himself
1:49
because he was literally, you know,
1:50
in training to become an Islamic fundamentalist terrorist
1:54
and to kill innocent Westerners.
1:56
And so that was something that he was training to do,
1:59
but his life got turned completely upside down
2:01
and he eventually became a follower of Christ.
2:04
And we literally get into all of that in this interview.
2:07
I mean, I love it.
2:07
There was so much there.
2:09
I was just sad we were running out of time towards the end
2:11
'cause I was like, I had so many other questions for him.
2:13
So maybe we'll have him back on in the future
2:15
to talk about that.
2:16
But a tremendously valuable conversation.
2:17
I know you guys are gonna love it,
2:19
but without further ado, let's get into it.
2:21
Qaseem Hafiz, welcome to Undaunted Life of Man's podcast.
2:25
- Thank you very much.
2:26
Thanks for having me on.
2:26
I'm pretty pumped about this.
2:27
I'm excited.
2:28
- Yeah, I'm excited to have you on.
2:30
So obviously I talked a little bit about this
2:32
in the introduction, but you grew up in the UK,
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but your parents are from Pakistan.
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And so there are some, you know, things in terms of
2:39
what we think here stateside as to what that looks like
2:41
'cause we've heard a lot about, you know,
2:43
those entities and different people from different countries
2:45
not really integrating into UK culture
2:48
and all these different things.
2:49
But I mean, you lived that.
2:50
You grew up kind of steeped in that over there in the UK.
2:53
So talk to me a little bit about your upbringing.
2:55
- Sure.
2:56
So Yaji touched on an important topic
2:59
and identity wise and it comes to nationalities.
3:02
I'm kind of all over the place.
3:04
So yeah, so my parents came from Pakistan.
3:07
I grew up in England and it's kind of accurate.
3:11
And that was one of the most interesting things to me
3:15
moving to the US.
3:16
So predominantly, I grew up in a profoundly Muslim, Pakistani community.
3:21
And I think that's kind of common for immigrants anywhere,
3:23
especially when the culture is so different
3:25
and the language is different.
3:28
But there has been this in the UK, especially,
3:32
actually let me back that up actually.
3:34
All right, Americans, I love this country.
3:38
Much to my wife's amusement.
3:39
My wife is American and she's always amused
3:41
because I am so patriotic.
3:43
I mean, I've got the American flag on my forearm.
3:45
I mean, it's a thing.
3:47
And my reason for that is because I've only been in the US
3:51
for four years, five years, but I feel American.
3:55
Like this feels like home.
3:56
There's no part of me where I'm like,
3:58
am I really American?
3:59
Am I not?
4:00
Growing up in Britain, even though I was born there,
4:03
I never really felt British.
4:05
I'm all with being Pakistani.
4:07
Because in America, and it drives me insane,
4:10
so many Americans have this perception
4:12
that we are the greatest evil in the world.
4:14
But genuinely, the way Americans look at their own country
4:17
is from this perspective of really privileged ignorance,
4:22
that they've never been anywhere else.
4:23
So they feel that America's so racist.
4:26
America is like, look, I've lived it, it's not.
4:30
And that's the thing, in Britain and much of Europe,
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unless there is a perception that to be European,
4:36
you have to be white, and that is within Europe.
4:39
And that's what I grew up around.
4:40
So I identified more with being Pakistani than British,
4:44
even though I never lived in Pakistan.
4:46
I'm British, you know, for my accent, I'm British.
4:49
And I always give people this statistic.
4:52
If you want to see that in practical terms,
4:54
don't take my word for it.
4:55
How many Muslims, Pakistani Muslim, Bangladeshi Muslims,
5:00
how many of those Muslims in Europe
5:02
went off to join ISIS a lot?
5:05
How many from America and Canada went off to join ISIS?
5:08
So I'm dead, but a small number.
5:09
How many enlist in the British military?
5:13
Again, the last time I checked, it was less than 1,000.
5:16
How many Muslims are serving in the American military?
5:20
A lot, like it's a thing.
5:22
There's no debate for a lot of Americans,
5:25
Muslim Americans about joining the military,
5:27
regardless of the background.
5:29
So it's a huge difference, massive.
5:33
And I think many Americans don't understand this
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because they live in this bubble
5:37
and believe whatever Instagram meme they read.
5:40
But for me, so straight away, growing up,
5:43
I feel isolated from the very country that I call home.
5:46
I don't feel part of it.
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And that creates a lot of problems.
5:50
- Okay, so let's talk a little bit more about that
5:52
because I was gonna be giving you the breaking news
5:54
that, hey, Kasim, why are you here in the US?
5:56
We're the worst of all the countries in the world.
5:58
We're the most racist.
6:00
We're the hardest to get along with.
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But I've never really thought about it
6:02
in terms of what people think in the UK.
6:04
So you're unique in that.
6:06
You grew up as a brown person, as they would call you,
6:08
even though that's one of the dumbest things
6:10
you could characterize somebody as.
6:11
It's like, hey, look what shade of color you are.
6:13
So as a brown person, growing up in the UK,
6:16
then coming over here to the US,
6:18
I gotta say, I'm a little bit surprised
6:20
at how patriotic you are about the US,
6:21
but you said something that was very interesting.
6:23
So growing up in the UK, you never felt British,
6:27
but you've been in the US for a few years
6:29
and you're like, you're sold out for America.
6:31
Take me into that a little bit more
6:33
because I'm a very patriotic American
6:34
and I'm unapologetic about that.
6:36
Call me, whatever you wanna call me,
6:37
Christian Nationalists, call me any of those things.
6:39
I'm like, great, keep all of those labels on me.
6:42
I love them, but tell me a little bit more about that
6:44
because I don't know that I've ever heard it couch that way.
6:48
- Right, so before I moved to the US, I lived in Canada
6:52
and Canada was home for me, loved it,
6:55
met my wife, she was from Florida originally.
6:58
She said there is no chance I'm living in a place
7:00
where it snows nine months ago.
7:03
Like that was, I did not wanna move here.
7:05
Like full cards on the table, I was like, I'm not moving.
7:09
I moved, but, and it was literally from day one,
7:14
like I struggled to connect with the US initially
7:17
because I had a perception of it.
7:19
Like many people, especially in Europe.
7:22
Europeans have, I'm talking broad strokes,
7:24
this very arrogant, like, we're so kind of intellectual
7:29
and so tolerant, I live there, I'm good.
7:32
Your tolerance nearly caused me to kill other people.
7:36
We'll get to that, but so it's what America represents,
7:40
like genuinely.
7:41
And it may sound kind of, you know,
7:44
very philosophical, but what America represents
7:48
is incredible, like genuinely, and you see it every day.
7:51
You turn off the TV for like five minutes
7:53
and all of the trash about all the negative things happening,
7:58
you are seeing diverse communities.
8:00
And again, like I hate using to diverse communities,
8:03
but you're seeing people just living their life.
8:05
You're seeing, you look at a kind of book
8:08
with the, it has everyone who's ever been awarded
8:12
the Medal of Honor.
8:14
You look through that,
8:15
you see the true face of America.
8:17
And the true face of America isn't one color.
8:20
It isn't, and I don't need to,
8:21
and this is one of the things I love about America,
8:24
but I'm going beyond what it stands for,
8:26
how it came into existence.
8:28
All these things I love, like George Washington
8:30
is one of my heroes.
8:31
But the one thing I love about America is there is,
8:36
there is not among the normal people that I meet,
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people don't care what your color is
8:43
or what your accent is or whatever.
8:45
The racism that I've experienced here,
8:47
and look, where there are people
8:49
is always going to be racism.
8:50
That's a fact of life.
8:52
Like it's just the racism I've experienced
8:55
is from people who are so arrogant
8:59
and feel that they're above it.
9:01
From the people who criticize everyone else
9:03
for being racist.
9:04
The people who in the most broad strokes,
9:06
and again, not getting political,
9:08
but the people who say, well, Republicans are racist.
9:10
Those kind of people who's like,
9:12
racism of low expectations and racism of,
9:15
because you're brown, you know,
9:17
I need to hold your hand almost is what I've experienced.
9:21
- Flowing ad budget on metrics that look great
9:23
till the CFO sees them.
9:25
- That's bullspend.
9:26
And marketers are calling it out in dashboard confessions.
9:30
- I remember telling my boss,
9:32
it'll be good for the brand when leads were slow.
9:36
Yeah, it wasn't.
9:38
- Cut the bullspend.
9:39
LinkedIn lets you target by company, job title, and more.
9:43
Advertise on LinkedIn.
9:44
Spend $250 on your first campaign
9:46
and get a $250 credit, go to linkedin.com/campaign
9:49
terms and conditions apply.
9:50
- Yeah, it's so patriarchal, and dude,
9:53
you can get political, you can get philosophical,
9:55
you can get however you want to get on this podcast.
9:56
And I'm trying not to blow up my own interview
9:58
'cause I want to talk a lot about the documentary
9:59
and a lot about kind of some other things,
10:02
but you mentioned George Washington there.
10:03
So if you've read anything about George Washington,
10:06
you realize that he is just,
10:08
he was just an incredible, incredible human,
10:10
but what do you think about these modern ignorant Americans
10:14
that look back on a George Washington or Thomas Jefferson
10:18
or a Theodore Roosevelt or any of these types of people,
10:21
they demand that they have their universities
10:23
named after them changed, that their statues be torn down,
10:26
that Mount Rushmore be taken down
10:28
because I'm sure they have a problem
10:29
with Abraham Lincoln too.
10:31
Like for you, having family from Pakistan,
10:33
going up Muslim, going up in the UK,
10:36
moving to North America and this specifically landing
10:38
in the United States, I've been here my entire life.
10:40
It seems crazy to me that you can go get a useless degree
10:43
and then all of a sudden tell me
10:44
that I shouldn't be proud of my forefathers,
10:46
but for you as an outsider that's now an insider,
10:48
what do you think about all that?
10:50
- So stupid.
10:51
Like literally it's the dumbest crap I've ever seen.
10:55
It's judging people from 200 years ago
10:59
about how we think the world should be now is dumb.
11:02
It's like if you were around in 1776,
11:05
you wouldn't be saying half of the stuff you're saying now.
11:07
Like, and it's so, it's stupid.
11:10
Like maybe in 50 years, people will look back at us
11:13
and go, wow, you guys were really cool
11:15
with buying stuff from China
11:17
while they were doing all this awful stuff
11:19
to their own people.
11:19
You guys were a disgusting generation.
11:22
Well, it's, everybody wants to be so,
11:26
and it's not even activism, it's like slactivism.
11:30
It's like, I felt uniquely British last week
11:33
when the queen died surprised me too, to be honest,
11:36
but like, well, she was responsible for this.
11:39
It's like, please shut up.
11:41
Like genuinely, what are you talking about?
11:43
- Yeah, I couldn't believe that they use that as a chance
11:46
to dunk on colonization or on slavery on all that.
11:49
It's like, hey dummy, what country was the first country
11:53
in the history of recorded humanity
11:57
to get rid of the slave trade?
11:59
Do you remember what country that was?
12:00
Yeah, it was Britain, okay?
12:02
So let's stop with all this nonsense.
12:05
And anyway, I don't want to get too far into that rabbit hole
12:07
'cause I do want to get into the main thrust
12:08
of what we're going to be talking about today.
12:10
So for you, you have a very unique story.
12:12
Obviously you've had a very circuitous route
12:14
even just getting to this country,
12:15
but you used to be an anti-Semite.
12:17
And so that was, as you would describe it,
12:20
a very hateful ideology.
12:23
So for you, I guess, first of all, let's define terms.
12:26
Not everybody knows what anti-Semite is.
12:28
They don't know why.
12:28
Why does semi mean Jew and why is it anti and blah blah?
12:31
So to find what that means, but then for you,
12:33
where did that hateful ideology come from?
12:37
- So the term comes from, I believe it's a German scientist,
12:41
our good friends, the Europeans,
12:43
who to make Jew hatred more scientific.
12:45
So it's very specific because you always hear when we talk about,
12:49
and when I've talked about anti-Semitism,
12:51
there'll be so often an Arab background,
12:53
but with both semites, this term is very specific, all right?
12:56
You know, to quite a good friend,
12:57
it's not all about you, but it's very specific,
13:01
hatred of the Jews, creating Jews differently,
13:05
double standard, all the kind of, you know,
13:06
whatever you involve with bigotry or racism of anything
13:10
towards a particular group.
13:12
Specific towards the Jews is what anti-Semitism is.
13:16
And yeah, that was part of past with who I was for a long time.
13:20
- Yeah, and so for you, I guess where did that start?
13:23
Like, so was that like a family thing?
13:25
'Cause I do remember in the documentary
13:27
that we'll talk about here in a second,
13:28
and just knowing a little bit about your story,
13:30
that you growing up as a Muslim in the UK,
13:34
that you were influenced almost like,
13:36
it was almost thrust upon you that,
13:37
hey, you're a victim, like, hey, you know,
13:40
Kasim, I don't know if you know this or not, but you're a victim,
13:42
and you should think that way,
13:44
and you should treat yourself that way.
13:45
But what that victim ideology created for you
13:48
was a little bit of this circular logic,
13:50
saying that it's basically the Jews
13:52
that are the reason why you're having this plight.
13:55
So I guess talk about that victimhood ideology
13:57
and how that kind of fed your anti-Semitism.
14:00
- Sure, so yeah, so, you know, like I mentioned earlier,
14:03
I grew up in a predominantly Muslim factory neighborhood.
14:06
And again, I think it's very common
14:08
in immigrants anywhere in the world,
14:10
where they're always like growing pains,
14:12
coming to a new society, which is so different.
14:14
Like my grandparents didn't come with PhDs,
14:17
they were manual workers and, you know,
14:19
working factories and stuff.
14:20
So you're not gonna instantly live in the best neighborhood.
14:25
It's just part of life.
14:27
But it is what it is.
14:29
But these groups and people,
14:30
what they did was go, well,
14:32
you're a victim of Western society.
14:34
Like, and if you look at that as a statement,
14:37
what the heck does that even mean?
14:39
Like genuinely, what does that mean?
14:41
It's like when I hear people say America is racist.
14:45
The landmass, 300 million people,
14:47
like what does that mean?
14:49
- Yeah, who are you talking about exactly?
14:50
- Right, so you hear those statements
14:54
and what is, and I still see it today.
14:57
I mean, all over.
14:59
You have the idea that, okay, there is an issue.
15:02
And those issues could be for whatever reason.
15:05
You find someone to blame who is a they.
15:10
It's a group, it's the Jews.
15:12
Like, what does that mean?
15:13
Every single--
15:14
- Yeah, like this nameless, faceless,
15:16
nonspecific entity kind of a deal.
15:18
- Right.
15:19
And I genuinely believe that's very intentional
15:21
because that way you can never address
15:24
the roots of your victimhood.
15:26
Because who do you, like, could I speak to, you know,
15:29
Mr. the West?
15:29
Like, there's no way to address that victimhood.
15:32
So you're then stuck in this cycle of hopelessness
15:36
and anger and you are so easy to be manipulated.
15:39
I mean, we've seen that in the last few years.
15:41
Like, it's so easy, it's kind of scary.
15:44
- When it starts with you othering people,
15:46
'cause obviously if you spent any time
15:47
looking at the totalitarian regimes of the 20th century,
15:50
the easiest thing to do to start out those regimes
15:53
and to have this authoritarian or totalitarian top down thing
15:56
is to other a particular group of people.
15:58
Whether, you know,
16:00
whether its Pol Pot in Cambodia or, you know,
16:03
Stalin in the Soviet Union or Hitler in Germany, obviously.
16:06
Like, that's always something you do
16:08
is you other a group of people
16:09
and that always leads to genocide.
16:11
So we really need to get into this documentary
16:13
called Never Again.
16:15
Because, you know, I wanted to set up kind of your background
16:17
and everything because all of that
16:19
is a major through point of this documentary.
16:21
But let's just start, you know, basic, basic
16:23
because you are one of the stars of that film.
16:25
What is this documentary about?
16:27
And I guess, how did you specifically get involved
16:29
and then we'll start going through it?
16:31
- Sure, so it's essentially two stories,
16:35
which kind of interweave into one.
16:37
Irving Roth, who was a friend who suddenly passed away
16:39
a few years ago, was a Holocaust survivor and me.
16:44
And basically what we looked at was, okay,
16:47
Irving survived the Holocaust,
16:48
one of the worst manifestations of antisemitism.
16:52
And there is a tendency, and, you know, recent poll
16:55
in the show and how little people know about the Holocaust
16:57
in 2022, there is a tendency to look at the Holocaust
17:02
as over there, as something over there
17:05
that happened in the past.
17:07
And then you look at me who was born in the West,
17:09
educated in the West, but I had these same views
17:12
to the point where I wanted to kill Jews.
17:15
Like I wanted to physically murder people,
17:17
I wanted to damage the West, you know,
17:20
and my antisemitism and anti-Western,
17:23
anti-Americanism were all wrapped into one.
17:25
So we're showing those two journeys
17:28
and basically how I came out of that and what changed.
17:33
And as I say, you see the message in it, you know,
17:35
it's one that there is hope.
17:37
So that's kind of the core of the film, I guess.
17:42
- Okay, so I appreciate you giving us that idea.
17:44
So obviously you just kind of like mentioned it
17:46
as if you were ordering, you know, at a restaurant,
17:49
but you were at the point where you were essentially training
17:52
to kill non-muslims, right?
17:54
And so that's one thing.
17:56
So take me through that a little bit
17:58
because it's one thing in the,
17:59
obviously there is a delineation between Muslims
18:04
that don't feel the need to do any of the things
18:06
in the 9th Surah of the Quran.
18:07
They don't feel any need to kill the infidel
18:09
or tax people or, you know, chop off limbs
18:11
or any of those types of things.
18:13
But at some point, if we can use such a broad term,
18:16
you were radicalized into thinking that,
18:19
hey, you're not just a practicing Muslim,
18:21
that that praise and, you know,
18:23
those all the things that a Muslim would do,
18:25
but that you need to train to actually do for Allah
18:28
what He calls you to do and to basically do violence
18:32
upon the Western world if I could speak about it so broadly.
18:34
So that's a really, really broad way
18:36
to lead into a discussion like that.
18:38
But take me through that because you don't just wake up
18:42
one day and think, hey, you know,
18:43
I'm thinking about becoming a suicide bomber
18:45
or hey, I'm thinking about, you know,
18:46
taking a bunch of people out with this attack
18:48
in this particular place.
18:49
So walk me through how you got to that point.
18:51
- Sure. So like we did discussed earlier
18:54
about the victimhood, so you're stuck in this circle
18:56
of hopelessness and anger and that just continues to build.
19:00
And with everything you see, yeah, which,
19:03
I would, you know what, I'm going to stuff,
19:04
not everything you're fed because it isn't.
19:07
It's not your, these things are intentional.
19:09
And, you know, what was really interesting,
19:13
and this was years back, so it's become a bigger issue now,
19:16
the use of, I'm just going to use the 10 fake news
19:19
'cause that's what it was.
19:21
You know, you're shown images of things
19:24
and told this is happening in Palestine.
19:26
This is what America is doing in Iraq.
19:29
And 99.9% of the time, it's all fake
19:32
and it's all pulled from somewhere else.
19:34
But you don't know that.
19:36
I mean, before social media, it was just flyers.
19:39
Now it's social media, so it's much more widespread.
19:41
What does that do?
19:42
It takes the already victim mindset you have,
19:45
the anger you have, and it's weaponizing it even more
19:48
'cause now the people that are oppressing you
19:51
are these awful child killers.
19:53
So, you're stuck in this box of hopelessness,
19:57
and then these extremist groups,
20:00
whoever they may be, Lashkare Deva, Al-Qaeda, ISIS today,
20:04
they create the problem,
20:06
and then they present themselves as a solution.
20:08
And it's as simple as that, you're a victim.
20:11
Everything is hopeless.
20:12
The only way that we can fight back is by using violence.
20:16
And one of the most dangerous things
20:18
when you get into the victim mindset is the,
20:21
that's bad, but, and what I mean by that is, like 9/11,
20:25
when 9/11 happened, I was like, that's awful,
20:29
but I can understand why it happened.
20:31
Like, it's this, yeah, innocent people died,
20:34
families have been destroyed,
20:36
people who had nothing to do with anything were murdered.
20:38
And you're like, well, I see the bad of it,
20:41
but at the same time, America kinda deserved it.
20:43
And once you cross that line, it's very easy to now
20:47
start walking to the line of wanting to take action yourself.
20:51
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21:19
- Yeah, and I mean, that's a crazy thing
21:21
to hear you reflect on it now.
21:22
I could even just hear it in your voice.
21:24
It's almost like you're shocked
21:25
that you ever had that thought and kinda went through it
21:27
because especially when we just had the anniversary here
21:30
recently, this will be coming out a few weeks later,
21:32
but we just had the anniversary 21st anniversary
21:34
of the 9/11 attacks.
21:35
And to know that there are people around the globe
21:37
that celebrate that day,
21:38
like that's one of my angriest days of the year.
21:40
And I make sure I watch the documentaries,
21:42
I watch the planes, I watch the people jumping
21:44
to their death.
21:44
And I watch the people mourning for their loved ones
21:47
because it's like, I don't ever wanna lose
21:48
that stinging feeling because I've got two young boys
21:51
that this is gonna be like a distant memory.
21:53
It's not even like a distant memory,
21:54
but like whenever I was growing up,
21:56
it's about as far away as the moon landing was for me.
21:59
And like, that's how far it was.
22:01
It was like, that may as well have been like centuries ago.
22:04
And so I wanna make sure I still feel that.
22:06
But this obviously leads to a discussion about Islam
22:10
versus radical Islam.
22:12
So we're constantly talking about radical Islam,
22:15
but then I've read and studied some of the works of a guy
22:18
like Nabil Kureshi who was a Muslim
22:20
that became a Christian apologist in those types of things
22:23
and hearing him kind of dig in to things
22:25
like what's being said in the Quran,
22:29
like what's being said in the ninth Surah,
22:31
which I've already talked about,
22:32
which is the bloodiest Surah of the Quran
22:34
and the least abrogated of as the last one
22:37
that we got from the so-called Prophet Muhammad.
22:39
So talk to me a little bit about that
22:41
because I think it's way more appropriate
22:43
to say something along the lines of,
22:44
that's not extremist Islam, that's not radical Islam.
22:47
It's more like fundamentalist Islam.
22:49
But I know that words are important.
22:51
So I don't wanna describe something inaccurately.
22:54
So you've lived that world.
22:55
So take me through that.
22:57
- Okay, so that's an important point to bring up.
22:59
So if we look at the Middle East,
23:03
if we look at Islam,
23:04
there is a huge problem in the Western world
23:08
where we look at the world,
23:10
the way we want to see it rather than the reality.
23:12
And that you can talk about foreign policy,
23:14
other faiths, other cultures, whatever.
23:17
And I think that's the situation when we look at Islam.
23:22
Look, there are issues within Islam
23:24
which are fundamentally problematic to be,
23:26
if it's really diplomatically,
23:28
there are core texts which say some horrific things.
23:32
And these are things that need to be addressed
23:35
by the Muslim community.
23:36
And there are things that we can't pretend don't exist
23:39
'cause it helps no one.
23:41
And what is really important to bear in mind is this.
23:46
When we think about the word reformation,
23:49
'cause people always say Islam needs to reform.
23:51
I've heard that for a long time.
23:54
If you think about reformation in a Christian sense,
23:56
it normally drives the faith forward in a way.
23:58
It looks at the time, it looks at scripture.
24:01
And as long as it keeps to scripture,
24:04
it moves things along, I guess.
24:08
If you look at reformation within Islam
24:10
and you can go back a thousand years,
24:13
every reformation movement has been to drive Islam
24:17
backwards, not forward.
24:18
And what I mean that is literally geographically,
24:21
they look at the world, be it the Muslim Brotherhood,
24:23
be it the Wahhabis, be it ISIS,
24:25
they look at the world and go look,
24:27
perfect Islam was in seventh century Arabia with Muhammad.
24:31
Everything new is problematic and it's not true Islam.
24:35
And people always,
24:39
I think one of the biggest phrases
24:41
that strikes me in saying is,
24:42
well, they're not real Muslims.
24:44
Firstly, it's incredibly arrogant
24:46
for a Western professor who isn't Muslim
24:49
and his experience of Islam is doing a gap year in Syria.
24:54
That doesn't make you an expert.
24:57
And two, Islam is very strict about in Muhammad's own words
25:01
that you can't call somebody a non-Muslim,
25:04
or you simply can't call someone a non-Muslim
25:07
when there isn't 100% proof they are non-Muslim,
25:12
makes the person who said it non-Muslim.
25:14
Like that's Islamic dog print.
25:16
So there are the way Islam is set up with the Quran,
25:21
with the Khadis, it makes it very difficult
25:25
for it to move forward.
25:26
And it makes those key points,
25:29
calling Christians and Jews, pigs and monkeys,
25:32
talking about slaying the unbelievers,
25:35
talking about so many things ingrained to the faith
25:40
and how that gets addressed.
25:42
I genuinely don't know.
25:44
I don't have an answer.
25:45
And many Muslims live without knowing that,
25:48
without knowing those parts of the faith,
25:51
because the majority of Muslims aren't Arab,
25:53
the Quran's an Arabic,
25:54
and Muslims are required to read the Quran Arabic.
25:56
So then you're going on someone's interpretation translation
25:59
of it, and some won't ever read the whole Quran.
26:03
But I think you've raised an incredibly valid and true point,
26:06
these are fundamental to the faith of Islam.
26:10
And if you look at the spread of Islam,
26:14
it wasn't like there was a poll going around the world
26:17
as this mission rate spreading the good news,
26:20
it was spread by military conquest.
26:23
And that was by Muhammad's closest companions,
26:26
the people who, the equivalent of,
26:29
if you're saying like the disciples,
26:30
they lived with him, they, you know, ate with him,
26:33
and they were the closest to him.
26:35
And they led these wars of conquest
26:38
in what they saw as non-Muslim lands.
26:40
So these are fundamental issues that need to be addressed.
26:43
And they're fundamental issues that we do no one as service,
26:46
neither in the Muslim world or non-Muslim world
26:49
by pretending that they don't exist
26:50
and using terms as such as not real Islam
26:53
and things like that.
26:55
- Well, Kasim, you bring up a lot of things
26:57
that the majority of people in the world don't know,
26:59
they don't know that there's a Quran.
27:01
And then there's the Hadith,
27:02
which are basically like the writings that came after,
27:05
which are a lot of the traditions that were written down,
27:06
there's a bunch of them, some are nonsense,
27:09
some are considered to be like basically right up there
27:12
with the Quran, yes, you're not allowed to read the Quran
27:14
in anything other than Arabic,
27:15
otherwise you're not actually reading the actual Quran.
27:18
And just I think there's an overwhelming ignorance
27:21
from people as to what's actually even said.
27:23
So when you see some, you know,
27:25
it's all the person on the news quoting something
27:27
from the Quran that sounds super peaceful.
27:29
It's like, yeah, but all that was abrogated, right?
27:32
Basically, you know, the Prophet said,
27:34
yeah, all that stuff I said back in the day.
27:36
Yeah, I didn't really mean any of that happy stuff.
27:38
You know, let's get to kind of what we're talking about now.
27:40
So you brought up a lot of important things
27:42
and we don't have a whole lot more time
27:43
to go into the parts of Islam.
27:45
But one thing that was interesting
27:47
in the documentary, never again,
27:49
is that you were on a trip back to Pakistan
27:52
and you got to see a Muslim fundamentalist terrorist group
27:56
right up close and personal.
27:58
And that was seemingly a turning point for you.
28:00
And I guess that take us through that
28:02
because, you know, most people will never get
28:03
to experience such a thing, but it seemed natural
28:06
for you to kind of be attracted to what this group was doing.
28:09
So what was the group?
28:10
What were you doing with them?
28:11
What did all that look like?
28:12
- Sure. So I went back to Pakistan 2000 to see family.
28:16
There was nothing, no sort of radical plan there.
28:20
And if you think about my mentality as I'm a victim,
28:25
Islam and Muslims have been persecuted by the West,
28:27
it's all hopeless.
28:28
And then you see this terrorist group
28:31
who are very, you know, loud about what they believe.
28:35
You know, they have literature and posters
28:37
with the American flag on fire,
28:39
the Israeli flag on fire, you know, captions such as,
28:42
you know, destroy the unbelievers, et cetera, et cetera,
28:45
you know, proudly displaying their weapons.
28:49
When you look at that from the mindset that I'm in
28:51
and it's almost empowering, and, you know,
28:54
you look at the group of Al-Shiret Dei-Bah
28:56
who attacks the anti-base terror group,
28:58
they were responsible for the Mumbai attacks many years ago.
29:02
So you look at it and then again,
29:04
I looked at Al-Shiret Dei-Bah and was like,
29:05
well, you know, there's committed terror attacks
29:07
which killed civilians.
29:09
But you make the justification go, yeah, that's bad.
29:11
But when you see what they're fighting for, you know,
29:14
the greater good, the ends justify the means.
29:17
So it was empowering.
29:18
And when I came back to the UK,
29:19
I was wanted to know more about them.
29:22
I wanted to kind of adopt that mentality.
29:24
And, you know, I went in 2009, 11 happened a year later
29:29
and it further reinforced this attitude
29:31
that the only way to make a difference.
29:33
The only way to be heard was through violence.
29:37
I mean, in 2000, 2001, you also had the second
29:39
and the father happening in Israel with suicide bonds,
29:42
et cetera.
29:43
So it just reinforced the fact that violence
29:45
is the only way, you know, I cringe saying this,
29:48
violence is the only way in language
29:50
that these people understand.
29:52
'Cause that's how I saw it.
29:53
It was us against them in these very black and white terms.
29:56
- Well, and it's such a unique thing
29:59
that you experienced and that you went through,
30:01
but obviously we're on the other side of that now.
30:03
And I don't wanna give away too much in the documentary
30:05
'cause I wanna make sure you guys check it out.
30:06
It will be in the show notes
30:07
so you can check out the documentary never again.
30:09
But there was a book that you gotta hold up
30:12
that really was a red pill moment for you.
30:15
And that book was The Case for Israel by Alan Dershowitz.
30:18
And so he's a world famous attorney
30:20
and certainly famous here in the United States of America.
30:22
But that was a book that somehow you gotta hold up,
30:25
you can take us through how you gotta hold of it.
30:27
But again, you were steeped in this anti-Semitic,
30:29
anti-Jewish, anti-Israel, you know, BDS type, you know,
30:34
rhetoric and maybe you give us a little bit,
30:37
I'm packing a lot of stuff into one question.
30:39
But give us an idea of what the BDS movement is
30:42
and kind of the rise of that in Europe and America.
30:45
But then make sure we get to The Case for Israel
30:47
with Alan Dershowitz and kind of what that book did for you.
30:50
- Sure.
30:51
So some BDS stands for boycott, divest and sanction.
30:54
It's a movement which has grown very popular,
30:56
especially on American campuses.
30:58
And even in facets of the government
31:01
would say that America and whoever need to boycott Israel,
31:05
divest from Israel and sanction Israel
31:07
as a means to put pressure on Israel
31:10
to essentially cease to exist.
31:14
And this is the nefarious thing about it
31:16
because it's packaged in this.
31:18
This is about justice and human rights.
31:20
When it's not, it's simply about weak, it's to weaken Israel.
31:24
It's to weaken Israel economically,
31:26
it's to weaken Israel militarily.
31:28
And the ridiculous thing about BDS is,
31:31
as much as they say they care about the Palestinians,
31:33
BDS is essentially put Palestinians out of work.
31:37
It has made it, there was the soda stream factory
31:41
which employed a lot of Palestinians,
31:42
a lot of Palestinians worked there
31:44
because the wages were better
31:45
than working for Palestinian companies.
31:48
And it moved into, moved territory where it was
31:52
because BDS protested and said it was in disputed territory
31:56
and a lot of Palestinians lost their job.
31:58
But somehow for, you know, the latte-sipping activist
32:02
sitting in Boston, that is a victory for the Palestinians.
32:05
It is, and that's what so much of the activism
32:08
is so narcissistic and just so all about them
32:13
rather than how does this help be the core, the issue?
32:16
How does this, essentially,
32:17
how does this make the world safer
32:19
and how does it create an environment
32:21
where peace can flourish?
32:22
And BDS mentions nothing about Palestinian terrorism.
32:25
It doesn't talk about, you know,
32:26
the daily attempts by Palestinian terror groups
32:28
to murder Israelis.
32:29
That is, apparently, not anger they care about.
32:34
So for me, you know, steeped in this again,
32:38
Israel and the Jews became really my kind of focus
32:41
'cause it's seen as a two-step plan almost, you know,
32:43
and the Iranian leaders say it best,
32:46
they see Israel as the little Satan
32:48
that they need to wipe out first
32:49
and then America's the big Satan.
32:51
So I came across this book called "A Case for Israel"
32:55
when I was ready to go back to Pakistan
32:58
and join the terror group.
32:59
And I just found it a bookstore.
33:01
And I saw it and I was kind of blown away from a,
33:05
I can't believe someone would write a book like this.
33:07
Like for me, Israel was like the new Nazis.
33:09
And again, I had been in my own echo chamber
33:12
of everything I believe was just being validated
33:14
by my group of friends and everyone around me.
33:17
So I buy this book with this arrogance of,
33:20
I know the truth, this is just gonna show me
33:24
what these people believe and how wrong they are.
33:26
And it had the opposite effect.
33:30
It essentially caused a crack in the glass.
33:34
Like I had this glass of my truth.
33:37
That's because I am my truth, which isn't the truth.
33:40
And this posed questions which had never come,
33:44
and they were very basic things.
33:46
Like the idea that the Jewish people
33:48
have had a presence in the holy land for thousands of years.
33:50
The Jerusalem is the center of the Jewish world.
33:53
That in 1948, you know, the Zionists accepted
33:57
every peace agreement, every partition plan.
33:59
It was, the Arabs had tried to destroy them.
34:02
And these things were completely alien to me.
34:06
But you don't read one book and go, I got it wrong.
34:09
After, you know, you are looking to murder people.
34:11
But that sent me on this journey to essentially prove
34:15
this wrong, but inadvertently I then came face to face
34:20
with the actual reality.
34:22
- And so that journey actually took you to Israel.
34:25
And you were there basically to confirm your priors
34:28
about Israel, that it was an evil place
34:30
filled with evil people.
34:31
And then you get there and it wasn't like that.
34:34
I've never been to Israel.
34:35
It's certainly on my list.
34:36
But talk about your experience in Israel,
34:39
but then specifically you had a very unique experience
34:41
when you went to the Western Wall for the first time.
34:43
So take us through that.
34:45
- So what stood out about Israel initially
34:50
was how normal it was.
34:52
It sounds really strange, but you have images of wall zones
34:55
and all these kind of strange things.
34:58
But it was fairly normal.
35:01
And just looking around, you know,
35:03
there are people who are visibly Jewish and Muslim.
35:06
And, you know, it's one of the only places in the world
35:08
that you'll still see like monks walking around
35:11
in Jerusalem or, you know, Greek Orthodox priests
35:14
would call God.
35:15
So that was really interesting to me, just seeing that.
35:18
And the normality and just the day to day
35:23
was kind of shattering everything I had been told and believed.
35:27
'Cause, you know, people to this day
35:28
call Israel an apartheid state where, you know,
35:31
there is this segregation or, you know,
35:33
they call Israel racist, which, you know,
35:36
it seems to be the thing nowadays.
35:39
If you want to discredit somebody
35:41
or basically take away any right for them to speak
35:46
or be heard, accuse them of racism.
35:49
Regardless of it's proven or unproven, you know,
35:51
you throw those words out and that's it.
35:55
So seeing that was impactful, just talking to people.
35:59
But, you know, for me, what I will always say
36:02
is the turning point was that the Western Wall.
36:04
I go to the Western Wall, not really knowing any what it was,
36:08
but I'm like, I don't know how this works, you know,
36:10
like at this point I'm a Muslim.
36:12
And, you know, I go to the Western Wall,
36:14
I kind of just imitate people around me
36:16
and like put my hand on the wall or forehead.
36:18
It really was a moment of clarity.
36:21
It was this moment where I was able to kind of
36:24
shut out the outside noises and step back
36:28
and go, look, here you are in Jerusalem,
36:31
you're in the center of the Jewish Wall,
36:33
you're in a Jewish state, you're in Israel,
36:35
this country that you hated.
36:37
This country that when people were getting killed
36:39
in terror attacks, you essentially celebrated.
36:42
Inside, you were celebrating.
36:45
And it was that moment where I thought,
36:47
after experiencing everything and being there for a few days,
36:50
how have I got to this point?
36:52
How growing up in the West,
36:55
in the British education system,
36:57
have I got to a point where I,
37:01
one, with celebrating the murder of people
37:03
who have done nothing to me at all,
37:06
and two, wanting to now kill these same people,
37:11
men, women and children.
37:12
Like, that's not a question of,
37:14
there's something wrong with your moral compass,
37:15
that's the question of your moral compass no longer exists.
37:20
And that was, that was jarring,
37:21
and that really was, you know,
37:23
that I would say the turning point,
37:25
if there was a single turning point.
37:27
- Yeah, and the thing about it,
37:28
Kasim, is, you know, when you look back on life,
37:30
most of us have gradual turns in our life.
37:33
Like, a lot of us don't have those big light bulb moments,
37:36
or it was at that moment I knew I was gonna be a doctor,
37:38
or it was at that moment that I knew that she was the one,
37:41
or like, we don't really have that,
37:42
that's more Hollywood,
37:43
that's more like television type thing.
37:45
But for you, I mean, that wasn't just something cool
37:48
to put in a documentary, that was really a thing,
37:50
that kind of led to the opening of your viewpoint
37:53
on the state of Israel and the Israeli people,
37:55
but even your own faith,
37:56
and I wanna get to your own faith here in a little bit,
37:58
but I guess in general, as Americans,
38:00
we know, you know, if you're a patriotic American,
38:03
and certainly if you're on the right,
38:04
you know that you're supposed to support Israel,
38:06
but we don't know why the state of Israel
38:08
is so important to the Jewish people,
38:10
and really to the world overall.
38:12
I remember talking with a guy,
38:14
I believe his family was from Pakistan,
38:17
but he's here in America, and he was like, you know,
38:21
'cause I mentioned, I was like, you know,
38:22
yeah, I support Israel, and he's like,
38:24
why would you support Israel?
38:25
I'm like, well, you know,
38:26
they're the only democracy over there in the Middle East
38:29
that we can support fully,
38:31
and not really think we're gonna get, you know,
38:32
screwed on the back end, and he's like,
38:34
why would we need another democracy in the Middle East?
38:36
Why is that a good thing?
38:37
Like, why should we support that?
38:38
As we're saying it in a pizza place,
38:40
in the middle of Oklahoma,
38:41
where we're not worried about anybody coming in
38:43
and trying to, you know, carpet bomb the place,
38:45
or wearing a S-Vest or something like that,
38:48
and so, you know, take us through, I guess,
38:50
why the state of Israel is so important
38:52
to the Jewish people and the world overall.
38:54
- Sure, so on just a purely biblical standpoint,
38:57
you know, the land of Israel is integral to the Jewish faith.
39:01
You know, even in Jewish law,
39:02
there are so many laws and rituals
39:05
that they cannot partake in
39:07
if they are outside the land of Israel.
39:09
So it is ingrained in, and if you read the Bible,
39:12
you know, the Old Testament, it talks about the land of Israel.
39:16
It talks about Abram going there,
39:18
Moses re-entering the land, and all these things,
39:21
or not entering the land, and, you know,
39:24
for Jerusalem has always been the center of Jewish life.
39:26
It's where they face to pray,
39:28
but to kind of fast forward to two aspects.
39:31
One, look, if you look at Christian history,
39:36
Jesus, John the Baptist, Mary,
39:39
the disciples, most of the disciples,
39:42
they were all Jewish.
39:43
Yeah, they all, that is where our faith started.
39:46
You know, you look at the stories of the Bible,
39:48
when you're in Israel, like it was in the documentary,
39:52
we walk along the road, which was uncovered
39:55
in the city of David, which 100%,
39:59
there is no doubt that Jesus walked along that road.
40:02
There is no doubt.
40:04
And the important thing to remember is this,
40:07
Christianity started in the Middle East.
40:10
And what we have seen in the last decade
40:12
is some of the most historic Christian communities.
40:15
Historic Christian architecture
40:18
completely destroyed by Islamist groups.
40:22
In Israel, not the case.
40:24
Every side is protected.
40:25
Most of them are run by Christian groups.
40:29
And, you know, that alone is something
40:33
which is incredible to me.
40:34
One, the Christian community is growing in Israel,
40:36
where everywhere else in the Middle East has been decimated.
40:39
And the very core of Christian heritage is preserved.
40:43
Because, you know, use the sites in Syria or Iraq are gone.
40:46
Like, there is not gonna be an opportunity
40:48
where you can take your kids, your grandkids,
40:50
to see these early Christian communities
40:53
where they thrived in them, that they're gone.
40:55
In Israel, not the case.
40:57
And that could have quite easily been different.
41:00
I mean, you've seen religious sites
41:02
underpassing your authority control,
41:04
being vandalized and attacked and destroyed.
41:07
But, from an American perspective,
41:09
I think this is so important.
41:11
We have no better ally.
41:12
And 9/11 is a great reminder of that.
41:16
On 9/11, there were Palestinians celebrating in the streets.
41:20
On 9/11, 2001, there was a video that,
41:23
I mean, they would never do it now,
41:24
but at the time CNN showed,
41:26
Palestinians celebrating in the streets.
41:29
In Jerusalem is the only memorial to 9/11,
41:32
which has the name of all the victims outside
41:34
of the United States.
41:36
You know, Israel has stood with us not just in 9/11,
41:38
when there would be natural disasters.
41:40
And like you pointed out, it is the only democracy
41:42
because ultimately, free societies are better societies.
41:47
You know, I mean, the Cold War was the biggest reminder of that.
41:50
Here we had this empire,
41:52
which completely controlled its population,
41:55
and we had the United States.
41:57
And we triumpred because of free society.
42:00
I mean, Reagan said it best, and paraphrasing,
42:03
when he said what we have over our enemies is in this country,
42:07
we have unleashed the greatness of the human,
42:10
the individual more than any place on earth.
42:13
And when we have that freedom, of course, we thrive,
42:18
it leads to innovation, it leads to so many great things.
42:22
And on top of that, Israel is,
42:24
I mean, Israel is in a tough neighborhood,
42:27
and they stand on the front line of defending,
42:29
we share the same threats, those same people,
42:32
and this is a naivety I find in the United States at times.
42:36
The people who hate Israel and want to destroy Israel,
42:39
they don't have any love for America.
42:41
There's no, there's not a one undone situation.
42:45
And Israel stands on the front line of that.
42:47
And Israel, keeping those enemies in that side,
42:50
on the other side of their border and defending themselves,
42:54
keeps us a lot safer here.
42:57
And then you can talk about intelligence sharing
42:59
and all these things.
43:00
And one of the other things I want to point out,
43:02
we have allies in the Middle East.
43:04
You know, we have allies with a lot of these monarchies
43:07
and other regimes, and I'm not gonna comment on them
43:09
right now, but Israel is an ally that never,
43:13
has never in its whole existence,
43:15
even when its existence was being corrected,
43:18
has ever asked American troops to come and defend it.
43:21
It's an ally, we have a lot of trade,
43:27
their Israel uses military hardware,
43:29
American military hardware, but it has never sought
43:32
American troops to fight for it.
43:34
It has always gone with the approach
43:35
that we will defend ourselves by ourselves,
43:38
but we value our alliance with America
43:41
because it is our greatest friend.
43:43
- Yeah, it's so important to point that out.
43:45
And also a lot of people have said something similar to this,
43:47
but even just with Israel and Palestine,
43:49
it's like if the Palestinians put all their weapons down today,
43:53
there would be peace in the Middle East,
43:55
or peace in Israel today.
43:57
But if the Israelis were to put all their weapons down today,
43:59
they wouldn't exist tomorrow.
44:01
And so that's the difference of what we see
44:03
in terms of what's happening here.
44:05
So it's very important to make sure
44:06
that we have a good overall idea.
44:08
And even as Americans, it's okay for us to pay attention
44:10
to things that are going on outside of our own neighborhood.
44:13
Now you mentioned Irving earlier in this podcast,
44:15
but obviously probably the most prominent personality
44:18
of the entire thing aside from just you is Irving Roth.
44:21
So he was actually sent to the Auschwitz death camp
44:24
at the age of 14 during the Holocaust.
44:26
And so the fact that he was just kind of walking around
44:29
one day is a pretty interesting thing for a lot of people.
44:32
And again, you'll have to watch the documentary
44:34
to get a better idea of who he is.
44:36
But you two had a very unique relationship and friendship
44:40
that you were able to develop.
44:41
So I guess how did Irving get involved
44:43
with this documentary project?
44:45
And then talk to me a little bit about y'all's relationship.
44:47
Obviously, as you mentioned earlier,
44:48
he's no longer with us, but take me through that.
44:51
- Irving had been working with the organization I now work
44:55
for Christians United for Israel for a number of years.
44:57
And in 2014, the organization reached out to me
45:02
when I moved to Canada and asked me to do a speaking tour
45:08
in California on some of the most hostile campuses to Israel.
45:12
I had never dealt with Christians
45:14
who supported Israel before.
45:16
It was something I didn't really understand.
45:19
And also, if you spend any time in Europe, the UK,
45:23
there are a lot of people who are Christian,
45:25
but have never sat put in a church, or even picked up a Bible,
45:28
or even owned a Bible.
45:29
So it was a very strange, okay,
45:32
I'm not really sure what this is, but it was,
45:35
I think it was February or March,
45:37
I'd just moved to Canada, it was like negative 40.
45:39
I was like, I can go to California for a week,
45:41
get out of class the Bible, it could be worse, you know?
45:43
So I did this speaking tour,
45:46
meta-aving, who I learned had been speaking
45:50
about his experiences for a long time.
45:52
He saw the importance of educating the next generation,
45:55
but also the importance of showing through his experiences
45:58
why Israel is important,
46:00
why it's important for the Jewish people to have a homeland,
46:03
and why it's so key.
46:04
So, Ervin was incredibly dedicated to education
46:07
and using his experiences to educate others.
46:10
And we just hit it off, and, you know,
46:13
when Ervin passed, like when anyone, you know,
46:18
who has lived a remarkable life passes,
46:20
people have a lot to say and, you know, Ervin was
46:25
a Holocaust survivor, but he was so much more,
46:27
like he was one of the funniest people I've ever met,
46:29
like he had a great sense of humor,
46:31
he was incredibly driven, had incredible energy,
46:35
and, you know, that's one of the most,
46:38
one of the things that really stands out even now
46:40
about Ervin, yes, he was a survivor, yes, he ended,
46:43
one horrific thing, but it didn't define who he was.
46:47
You know, he was just this very happy, content person
46:52
who lived a very full life, and, you know,
46:55
I think a lot of people could learn from that
46:57
because everybody is, we live in such a society now
47:01
where nobody has any resilience.
47:04
The most minor thing happens,
47:06
and that's it, the world is shutting down,
47:09
and I need to take a day off, like, you know, whatever,
47:12
and it's just, yeah.
47:14
So, I say, I mean, having just hit it off, and our friendship
47:18
just remained, and we did a lot of more events together,
47:21
you know, we stay in contact, so it kind of just,
47:25
and we both have a very similar sense of humor,
47:28
so it just worked.
47:29
- Right, I mean, what a unique relationship.
47:31
You said a couple of things there, so I don't know if you
47:34
use that word on purpose, but our mission here
47:36
at Undaunted Life is equipping men to push back darkness,
47:39
and we do that with content that provides spiritual,
47:41
mental, and physical resilience.
47:43
We talk about resilience all the time,
47:44
because everyone likes to focus on strength,
47:46
but no matter what strength will wane over time,
47:48
whether it's physical, mental, or spiritual strength,
47:50
it will wane, but the ability to bounce back,
47:53
that's something that we're losing as a people,
47:55
because you're right, people will take a self-help day,
47:57
you know, from work, like, if they stub their toe
48:00
that morning, and they just, like, well, I just really need
48:02
to kind of be with myself today,
48:04
and really kind of work through these feelings.
48:05
But you said something about Irving
48:07
that I thought was very important, is that,
48:11
when you hear someone that is a Holocaust survivor,
48:14
or a medal of honor winner that you mentioned earlier,
48:17
that is the dominant thing about that person's life.
48:19
Like, when they're introduced anywhere,
48:21
like, when they go pick up a cup of coffee,
48:23
like, they should say, a Holocaust survivor, Irving Roth,
48:26
like, that's what they should say,
48:28
because that's such a dominant thing about you.
48:30
But like, you know, I'm so glad you said that,
48:33
because this whole time I'm watching the documentary,
48:36
I'm just seeing Irving Roth, the Auschwitz survivor,
48:39
and thinking about, like, that's not a cool thing,
48:41
but it's like an unbelievably unique, mind-blowing thing
48:44
that that guy was just walking around
48:45
going to the grocery store, and, you know,
48:47
getting a little exercise, like, that is such a good thing
48:50
for everybody in the audience to think about as well.
48:52
Like, even for us, like, I'm not, you know,
48:54
the undaunted life of a man's podcast host,
48:56
like, I'm so much more than that, like, I'm a husband,
48:58
and I'm a father of two, and I'm a friend,
49:00
and I'm a son, and I'm all these different things.
49:02
And so, that's just such a good word.
49:04
I just wanted to kind of affirm you for saying that.
49:06
I thought that that was so good.
49:07
I know we're kind of rounding to a close here,
49:09
but one thing that wasn't really explicitly talked about
49:12
in the documentary, but my understanding is,
49:15
is that you did convert to Christianity
49:17
at some point during this entire process.
49:19
Is that correct?
49:20
- Right, that's right.
49:21
- Okay, so take me through that, because dumb Westerners,
49:24
especially dumb Western conservative Christians,
49:27
they have no idea what that means,
49:29
because we all have our come to Jesus experience,
49:32
you know, it was at church camp, or it was, you know,
49:35
I wanna, or it was at vacation Bible school,
49:37
or something like that, and that's just,
49:39
we were one thing, and then we became a Christian,
49:41
we got dunked in some water,
49:42
and then we got, you know, extra things to do at church now.
49:45
But like for you, and for being a Muslim,
49:48
that is a decision to basically turn off your entire identity,
49:53
because your faith, and your ethnicity,
49:56
and your identity are all wrapped into one,
49:58
and your family sprinkled over the top of that as well.
50:01
And if you're in a Muslim family,
50:03
especially a Middle Eastern Muslim family,
50:05
and then you convert to Christianity,
50:07
in large part, you don't really have that family anymore.
50:10
And so this isn't just turning to Jesus,
50:13
because, you know, I'm thinking he might help my business,
50:15
or because, you know, you actually did genuinely
50:18
accept the truth of the gospel.
50:20
So take me through that conversion experience,
50:22
what was it for you, and, you know,
50:24
talk to me about the family aspect as well,
50:25
I know that had to be rough, and still has to be rough.
50:28
- Yeah, so I'll back up a little bit.
50:30
So I went to Israel 2007,
50:32
I come back and banded and fought together,
50:34
'cause I'm kind of like I would lied to about this,
50:38
so this is all crap, essentially.
50:41
- Yeah, yeah.
50:43
- So I would say, you know, I was an atheist at the time,
50:47
and so for me, if I believe something,
50:51
or care about something, I wanna learn more about it.
50:55
And so I started reading more about,
50:58
not atheism, but books by prominent atheist writers,
51:01
Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, all these guys.
51:04
And kind of the overwhelming thing that stood out,
51:07
to me was, this is one of the most immature grovel
51:10
I've ever read, 'cause basically--
51:13
- It is, it's nonsense.
51:15
- Here's the core of their argument.
51:16
Okay, there's no proof of God,
51:17
and if you believe in God, you're stupid.
51:20
- That's essentially it, yeah.
51:22
- Okay, cool, not the definitive proof I was looking for,
51:27
but fine.
51:28
So I started, and look, just for me, logically,
51:31
on a totally logical basis,
51:33
like I look out of my window, and there are trees,
51:35
there's the sky.
51:36
I can't really find them that that just happened.
51:39
I mean, if you've ever bought furniture from Ikea,
51:41
it doesn't just make itself, it's a lot of hard work.
51:44
I mean, so I started to re-engage with faith,
51:47
and try and figure out, okay, I believe there is a God,
51:51
but who's got this right, basically?
51:57
So I look at different faiths, you know,
51:59
Sikhism, Hinduism, Buddhism, you know, all the cool things
52:03
that are out there, you know, all the kind of the cool,
52:06
you know, look at all these new age, kind of,
52:09
all the white people who don't shower or doing
52:12
all those kind of things.
52:13
And then I looked at Islam, 'cause, look, you know,
52:18
20 plus years of being steeped in Islam,
52:21
knowing so much about faith,
52:24
I was trying to find a way that maybe that could work,
52:27
and I just couldn't reconcile it.
52:29
I couldn't reconcile it with what I believed
52:31
on a personal basis, and just, I just couldn't reconcile them.
52:35
That was the truth.
52:36
Judaism appealed, again, there's a lot,
52:41
there are parallels, not parallels,
52:42
there's a lot that Islam has taken from Judaism,
52:45
so that resonated also, and having spent time in Israel,
52:48
but I really wasn't sure.
52:51
A Christianity, I didn't even consider.
52:53
It was not even, again, growing up in the UK is just not,
52:57
the term Christian doesn't really mean anything.
52:59
It means that somewhere, somewhere in your family
53:02
became a Christian, so you just identify as a Christian.
53:05
It doesn't really mean anything, in my experience.
53:09
So I moved fast forward, I moved to Canada,
53:12
and now I'm starting to look at faith more deeply,
53:15
because my concern was in the UK
53:18
to convert out of Islam, which I knew was gonna happen,
53:23
it's a death sentence, and the UK is not as safe as the US,
53:26
or Canada, for that matter.
53:29
So I'm looking at it more in Canada now, really,
53:32
and I'm leaning very heavily towards Judaism.
53:35
Then I get invited to the speaking tool
53:38
with Christianity National for Israel, we do that,
53:40
and I meet Christians for the first time,
53:43
like people who live by their faith,
53:45
people who little things like pray before every meal
53:48
who, you know, know the Bible,
53:50
and have a sense of what is beautifully right and wrong.
53:54
So that was really interesting for me,
53:57
and it was inspiring, but not, it changed anything.
54:02
I stayed, you know, friends with people at the organization,
54:05
and then I went to their conference to speak,
54:08
and fell in love with the organization,
54:10
wanted to work with them.
54:11
I literally said, I went, look, I wanna work for you guys,
54:13
and they were like, well, look, there's a few issues,
54:16
you don't live in the US, you aren't Christian,
54:19
but it's a conversation we can have.
54:22
I passed forward a few months later, they hired me,
54:25
rather at the blue, and I joked at the time,
54:29
I said, look, you know, this is great and all,
54:32
but this isn't gonna be he eventually comes to Jesus' thing.
54:34
So like, if that's on your radar, it's not gonna be a thing.
54:37
And then I came to Jesus, and it happened
54:41
in the most unexpected way of then Arizona for an event,
54:46
couldn't sleep, started reading the Bible, super cliché,
54:49
and I'm like, literally, I'm like, what in God's name am I doing?
54:53
Like, I'm reading the Bible in a hotel, room at 3 a.m.,
54:55
this is ridiculous.
54:56
So I went, decided to work out,
54:58
I had an early flight that morning,
55:02
and there was a flight delay, I think it was,
55:06
but I had a huge connection, a long connection,
55:08
or it was a flight delay,
55:10
and I ended up sitting at this table waiting
55:12
with a coffee for a few hours, and this guy sits down,
55:15
like, you mind if I sit here and I'm like, dude, whatever,
55:17
happened to be a missionary on his way to the Balkans,
55:20
and literally over the next week,
55:22
like, these things keep happening,
55:24
and I just came to realize, I don't even realize that,
55:26
I just, in my apartment in Winnipeg, Canada, was like, okay,
55:30
I accept Jesus as my Lord and Savior.
55:32
Like, it was a kind of, almost out of frustration,
55:34
like, is this what I'm meant to do?
55:36
And like, and just honestly, cliche is the sounds.
55:42
Actually, you know, I've always been one of those people
55:44
who's like, believe what you wanna believe,
55:46
but keep it in church, dude.
55:48
The minute I accepted Jesus, I was like, crap,
55:50
I gotta tell everyone about this.
55:51
Like, do you, do people not know what this is like?
55:55
- Right.
55:56
- So, yeah, and that was bad, and it's, look,
56:00
faith is a struggle, 'cause you're trying to get better
56:02
every day, and you deal with stupid people every day,
56:05
like challenges, but I'm in Bible school at the moment,
56:10
'cause I wanna know more, I want to dig as deep as possible,
56:13
and yeah, that's where we are.
56:15
Dude, I'm so glad you went into all that detail,
56:18
because, I mean, you can look at his coincidence,
56:21
but like, that was God calling you home.
56:23
That was, you know, that was the Holy Spirit,
56:26
that was the whole Godhead coming after you.
56:28
And I mean, you hear these stories about Muslims
56:31
in the Middle East converting,
56:32
because Jesus is visiting them in their dreams,
56:35
and that's not something that we really experience here
56:37
in the U.S. as much, and so it's like, you know,
56:39
God will not be denied, like, His gospel will spread,
56:41
and He is in charge of all that,
56:43
and that's just such a great story,
56:45
but man, we've gone everywhere in this conversation,
56:47
but there's so much more to talk about,
56:49
maybe we can have you back on in the future
56:50
and talk a little bit more about what you're working on now,
56:52
but for now, that's all for me.
56:54
Is there anything else you wanna get off your chest?
56:56
- Actually, I do wanna touch on one thing,
56:58
'cause you mentioned it.
56:59
So with the dreams thing, I think that is so cool.
57:02
So I don't know if you know this.
57:04
In Islam, it's dreams are incredibly important,
57:08
because there is a saying attributed to Muhammad,
57:10
or maybe in the Quran, in the blanking,
57:13
but if you have a dream, and there is a prophet in it,
57:16
and Muslims see Jesus as a prophet,
57:18
it is that person, because Satan cannot imitate the prophets.
57:23
So when Muslims see Jesus in a dream,
57:28
it's talking to them in a language that, okay,
57:30
this is Jesus, this must be the truth.
57:33
So I just, for me, I mean, I think that's amazing,
57:36
like, it's just amazing what God can do,
57:39
and how He speaks to people, and meets them where they're at.
57:41
- Yeah, when you hear about churches growing in Iran,
57:45
in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and all these places,
57:47
it's just like, these are not like Oklahoma,
57:50
where I can't like trip and fall and not land in a church.
57:54
Like, you know, it's just one of those things like,
57:56
yeah, I mean, the dream stuff is absolutely mind-blowing.
57:59
- Yeah, and yeah, I just one thing I would ask everyone,
58:04
don't take what you have for granted.
58:06
And I mean that from a faith perspective,
58:07
and as Americans, 'cause I think if you're born here,
58:10
or you've grown up, it's so easy to take it for granted,
58:13
because it just is.
58:15
But, man, if you were fortunate to be born a Christian,
58:20
if you were fortunate to come to Jesus in life,
58:22
don't ever take that for granted,
58:24
because you have something that I mean,
58:27
there are people who are risking their lives to have.
58:30
And you've got to ask why, like, there's something there.
58:33
If people are willing to risk everything for it,
58:36
there is something there.
58:37
And, yeah, on the second part of that, like, don't,
58:41
we're very fortunate to be in the United States.
58:43
And I'm not talking from just the perspective of,
58:46
it's a free country and X, Y, and Z.
58:48
No, this country represents something.
58:50
Then, yes, like politicians will twist and turn
58:55
and make it represent something else,
58:56
but it is, this country is important, I think, globally,
59:01
because what we do and what we represent
59:03
has been a light to so many nations,
59:05
and so many oppressed communities since our very founding.
59:10
And that's why when you see protests in Hong Kong,
59:13
they're waving the American flag.
59:15
So, again, don't forget that, it's important,
59:18
and we all have an important part to play.
59:21
- That's such a great word and right.
59:23
I mean, I've got multiple Bibles on my phone.
59:25
I've got four sitting right here to my right.
59:27
I've got the internet where I can look at that.
59:29
There are literally people risking their lives
59:31
in the Middle East and in Asia and other places,
59:34
just to get their hands on a few pages of the Bible.
59:38
Like, it's an absolutely incredible thing
59:40
that we should not lose sight of.
59:41
Kasim has fees.
59:42
Thank you so much for coming on "Daunted Life"
59:43
a man's podcast.
59:45
- Thank you, being awesome.
59:46
- There you go, guys.
59:47
I hope you enjoyed my time with Kasim Hafiz,
59:49
but before we let you go,
59:50
we are going to do a quick resilience boost.
59:52
Add on "Daunted Life" a mission is equipping men
59:53
to push back darkness with content
59:55
that for just spiritual, mental, and physical resilience.
59:57
So, the links I've got for you today,
59:59
I've got a link to the documentary "Never Again"
1:00:00
so you guys can go and check that out.
1:00:02
And also a link to "Christians United" for Israel.
1:00:05
That's the organization that made this documentary.
1:00:07
That's who Kasim works for.
1:00:08
It's a great organization to check out.
1:00:10
All right, guys, thanks so much for listening to the podcast.
1:00:11
We do appreciate it.
1:00:12
Wherever you're listening to this, please subscribe,
1:00:14
rate, and leave us a positive five-star review.
1:00:16
If you want me to come speak live at your event
1:00:17
or own your podcast to shoot me an email
1:00:19
to info@undontin.life.
1:00:21
That's I-N-F-O @undontin.life.
1:00:23
Follow us on Instagram and like us on Facebook
1:00:25
and check out our website for everything else,
1:00:26
including how to donate to keep more content
1:00:28
like this coming your way.
1:00:29
Just go to www.undontin.life.
1:00:31
And as always, we wanna thank the band August Burns Red
1:00:34
for allowing us to use their music for our content.
1:00:36
The music on this podcast is our song "Cutting the Tides,"
1:00:38
which is off their 10th anniversary re-recording
1:00:40
of their album, "Leveler."
1:00:42
The links are in the description.
1:00:43
I'm your host, Kyle Thompson.
1:00:45
Remember, keep pushing back darkness,
1:00:48
keep forging spiritual, mental, and physical resilience.
1:00:51
Keep seeking the lion of Judah.
1:00:54
♪ I don't die yet ♪
1:00:58
♪ There's a lion at night ♪
1:01:00
♪ And all you want is a side-based end ♪
1:01:05
♪ And a monster ♪
1:01:09
♪ You will be revived ♪