When I found out about this debate, I was really interested to see what was going to happen. I was severly disappointed. Ijaz was all over the map right from the start. McCarthy, a very patient but determined man, really gave him numerous opportunities to explain at a basic level how the muslims can refute their "mistaken" bretheren. Ijaz first tried blustering through it, and then ignored the more pertinent questions or gave ridiculous answers. Ijaz seems like a nice man, but his understanding of Islam is baffling. You post points out one of those baffling contradictions.

I can't remember the Surah, but I remember that somewhere it says that the commands of the Koran are easy to understand. So, we basically end up with the easy to understand Koran that some muslims distort and lead other muslims astray to commit violence. Yet, it is a baffling array of contradictions that supposedly one understands better if they know Arabic. However, not enough muslims really know Arabic. My head is really spinning.

I think one thing that really annoyed me about Ijaz's comments is that in the end he blamed the West for not helping muslims become moderate. His basic reasoning is that the West doesn't say nice things about Islam (I guess he doesn't watch TV or read the paper), doesn't have enough muslims is positions of power, and we haven't poured enough money into their economies. What does any of that have to do with how muslims think about their religion?

In the end, it just shows that the "moderates" are whispering in the wind. I read one site that attempted to, in detail, explain the violence in the Koran in a moderate manner. Between the stretches of logic (somehow people with caravans were always attacking Mohammed) and alright distortions, I gave up on it. It all sounds nice, but the reality is that anyone looking at the complicated explanations is going to go "It says slay the infidel wherever you find them. I think that makes more sense."
 

Didn't Ijaz also say that Bin laden's big problem was blaming everything on the west?

You mentioned Ijaz does it himself at the end. Yet another double standard.