re: #135 kirkspencer

I stated why they’re unreliable.

The easiest evidence is to learn Arabic.

The second easiest is to check their translations against other translations of similar documents. For a long time you could check what MEMRI did against translations by Marc Lynch (Abu Ardvaark) and Juan Cole — dunno if there’s anything recent.

Again, the problem isn’t that they make crap up. It’s that if there is more than one way to interpret, MEMRI chooses the one that makes the Arabic source seem more fanatical. Use it, but keep your salt shaker stocked and handy.

Are there groups that regularly challenge the validity of the MEMRI translations?