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CAIR-CT chairperson Farhan Memon took it upon himself to contact the Temple Sholom Synagogue in Greenwich earlier this week to relay his dismay about a planned visit with Somali-Born activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali, according to the Greenwich Time.
Memon took issue with Hirsi Ali's views on Islam, arguing that she condemns the entire religion and paints all Muslims as hostile. His letter called out Hirsi Ali for saying in 2007 that “we are at war with Islam” and that there is “no middle ground.” He stated that she fails to make a distinction between extremist groups—like ISIS, al-Qaeda, or the Taliban—and instead makes “sweeping judgments” about Islam.
He wrote that while the temple has a right to invite any speaker, and agreed that it is important to have honest conversations about “religious extremism, women’s rights, forced marriage, female genital mutilation, antisemitism, and other serious human rights concerns,” hosting Hirsi Ali at a synagogue without a Muslim speaker to challenge her would not be “welcoming and inclusive.”
“The consequences extend beyond the Muslim community,” Memon said. “Jewish-Muslim relations in Fairfield County depend upon the conviction that our communities will oppose hatred consistently, not only when members of our own faith are targeted.”
“We hope Temple Sholom will consider not only whether Hirsi Ali has a right to speak, which she unquestionably does, but whether elevating her in this manner strengthens or damages the relationships upon which our shared civil life depends,” Memon said.
Hirsi Ali does not speak like a diversity consultant focused on "inclusion," and she has never pretended otherwise. She is a Somali-born former Muslim who underwent female genital mutilation (FGM) as a child, she fled an arranged marriage, won asylum in the Netherlands, and entered parliament. She later collaborated with filmmaker Theo van Gogh on the 2004 short Submission, which used Quranic verses painted on women’s bodies to argue that Islamic scripture authorizes wife-beating and sexual control. Van Gogh was shot and stabbed on an Amsterdam street; the killer pinned a letter to the corpse promising Hirsi Ali was next. She has lived under protection ever since.
The quotes cited by CAIR-CT are real.
In a 2007 Reason interview Hirsi Ali said, “I think that we are at war with Islam. And there’s no middle ground in wars.” Asked whether she meant only “radical Islam,” she answered: “No. Islam, period.” She added that “there is no moderate Islam”—only Muslims who are more or less observant—and that the political, expansionist strain had overtaken quieter traditions.
In other interviews she called Islam a “cult of death” comparable to fascism in its demand for a sharia order in which apostates are killed and women who stray are punished. She has also said, repeatedly, that she is at war with the doctrine, not with every Muslim person. That distinction is inconvenient for Memon, so it does not appear in his letter.
Hirsi Ali’s later books—Infidel, Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now, Prey: Immigration, Islam, and the Erosion of Women’s Rights—make the same core claim: FGM, forced marriage, honor violence, Jew-hatred, and blasphemy killings are not “misunderstandings” of a peaceful faith. They track texts and a political theology that reformists have failed to dethrone.
Ironically, CAIR-CT is hosting its own controversial speaker in October: Cenk Uyger.
Uygur, founder of The Young Turks, is not exactly a mild interfaith panelist.
He has written that “it is not antisemitic to say Israel controls Congress,” claimed “94% of Congress works for Israel,” and called Israel “a genocidal terrorist state that thinks it owns America.” He has said the word “antisemite” now “more often means a very moral and kind person.” Britain barred him in 2026 as not “conducive to the public good” after commentary that officials linked to a risk of inflaming antisemitism. Uygur said he was banned “for criticizing Israel.”
His record also includes earlier denial of the Armenian genocide (which he later walked back), a 2013 on-air riff about legalizing bestiality, and giving airtime to former Klan leader David Duke.
But that didn't stop CAIR-CT from choosing him as its Annual Gala keynote speaker circuit without a challenger, which is hardly a plea for “honest conversations.”
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