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Why did Hirsi Ali take so long to make the unequivocal statement that there is no moderate Islam?
Well, she's actually been saying that all along, but she always qualified it with some kind of possibility for reform or evolution of the religion.
But, especially, she has watered down these beliefs because of her attachment to Muslim women, who she thinks can benefit from a reformed Islam since it is clear that they would never renounce their religion. Therefore, fully admitting that moderate Islam doesn't exist would be tantamount to saying that all those Muslim women are destined to suffer the consequences of their religion.
Her mission has thus been carefully camouflaged with feminist rhetoric above all, and atheistic and anti-religious (of all religions, including Christianity) sentiment, and a wishful thinking that ordinary Muslims can reject the religious Islam and turn it into some kind of an improved cultural non-religious version.
Ali's whole trajectory has been a bitter admission of the truth. And it is her feminist, leftist and atheistic positions that obstructed the truth from her. Like all ideologues, she is a self-proclaimed missionary. She has always felt that her role was to save her fellow Muslim women, despite her terrible film "Submission" which alienated her from those very women.
Still, I think there is a deeper issue here. Ali has nothing concrete or practical with which to replace this fundamental loss. She adheres to no country having moved from one to another all her life; she has no religion; the religion she denounced is also a denunciation of her culture; and she has no political aim other than to allow the individual to manifest himself to the fullest, as she has argued through her faithful adherence to the Enlightenment philosophies.
Thus, although Ali may temporarily bring awareness to these important issues of Islam and its incompatibility with the West, her behavior has repeatedly shown that she alienates friends, irritates governments, brings disastrous projects to the table, and publicly ruminates through her own thought's evolutions to arrive at a comfortable system. What more can she bring? And will she be a female, black version of Mark Steyn, who has the ability to narrow down problems affecting Western Civilization, but is ever-vague (I would say disingenuous) about bringing forth real solutions to these real dangers?
We have to wait and see. But, I wouldn’t idolize Ali too much.