Wafa Sultan, a Syrian-American psychiatrist whose essays on Middle East issues are widely circulated in the Arabic press, accepts the International Humanist Award from "Free Inquiry" magazine for her courageous work. The award ceremony took place at the Secular Islam Summit in Florida on March 4, 2007.
Here is something she wrote
The clash we are witnessing around the world is not a clash of religions, or a clash of civilizations. It is a clash between two opposites, between two eras. It is a clash between a mentality that belongs to the Middle Ages and another mentality that belongs to the 21st century. It is a clash between civilization and backwardness, between the civilized and the primitive, between barbarity and rationality. It is a clash between freedom and oppression, between democracy and dictatorship. It is a clash between human rights, on the one hand, and the violation of these rights, on other hand. It is a clash between those who treat women like beasts, and those who treat them like human beings. What we see today is not a clash of civilizations. Civilizations do not clash, but compete.
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