Grande, my bad I was thinking of the Iranian Nobel Laureate (Shirin Ebadi, ah had to go check). Ayaan Hirsi Ali, now that you mention her Somali heritage and the "Netherlands"... she's the one who was a minister in the Dutch parliament, right? If in fact she was influenced by "Enlightenment" writers then I could understand her atheism as they saw religion a cloth used to stifle thinking and oppression...which at the time it was. But their undoing to me is that they failed to look at it universally, rather than from the confines of their own experience. To them man is supposed to free himself from 'servitude' (my word) to God in order for him to achieve his full potential.
So to her I could see, given her dissatisfaction with Islam, how their anti-religious rhetoric could find resonance with her. While a member of the Dutch Parliament wasn't she also opposed to increased immigration? Kinda ironic, if not hypocritical (assuming I have that factoid straight).
Yes Bakes she was the Dutch minister you were thinking about.
She say the major cataylst for her shedding Islam was Sept. 11 and how all what bin laden was saying/doing etc was emulating the Quran and life of Muhummad.
She have ah engaging debate with Tariq Ramadan on youtube if yuh ever get the chance.
Not sure if she was opposed to increased immigration. She had a serious issue with the Dutch concept of multiculturalism, where it lets communities of immigrants just 'be', letting them preserve their traditions and values without criticizing or questioning it especially when it is to the detriment of women, children, homosexuals etc. Accepting the differences without really scrutinizing what makes them/us different. By accepting the perceived injustices, one only perpetuates it and doesn't force the people within the communities to look inwardly and challenge their own values.