It was a clip with serious viral potential in certain political circles: an “Arab guy” vehemently renouncing his faith live on Egyptian television. The breakdown apparently comes after reading a controversial book, by author JK Sheindlin, called “The People vs Mohammed”.
But the clip was not all it seemed.
Arabic speakers will quickly realise what’s going on here: the subtitles to the video are pretty much made up.
An apparent translation that reads “I was warned not to read ‘the People vs. Mohammed’ because they want to keep us in the dark, they don’t want us to know he was a psychopath,” are pegged to a discussion of how Morsi depends on foreign influence.
In fact, the man in the clip is opposition activist Ihab al Khouli, and he’s railing against Former Egyptian President Morsi. The outburst dates back to 2013, when Morsi objected to military demands for him to leave office, and protests against him were filling Cairo’s streets.
Those that can’t understand the spoken segment, but were paying close attention, will also have realised that something’s not quite right. The video is published on a channel called Nothing But the Truth Films – which is owned by JK Sheindlin, who wrote the questionable book al Khouli is allegedly reacting to.
The clip was exposed on Snopes earlier this month, and a note is now added to it explaining that it’s a parody. But J.K Sheindlin’s work is still being publicised on his channels, in apparently laughable and never ending attempts to smear the entirety of Islam with racist and unacceptable material.
