I could not believe what I was hearing. I have studied the Bible for almost thirty years and have never read anything about the God of Israel tuning Jews into apes! Is the word "apes" even in the Bible?
The Qur'an acknowledges that God of the Jewish people command them to keep the Sabbath holy and not to work on the Sabbath day. This is the seventh day of the week, Saturday.
PICKTHAL: And We caused the Mount to tower above them at (the taking of) their covenant: and We bade them: Enter the gate, prostrate! and We bode them: Transgress not the Sabbath! and We took from them a firm covenant. Surah 004:154
The Qur'an then states the reason that the Sabbath must be kept:
PICKTHAL: The Sabbath was appointed only for those who differed concerning it, and lo! thy Lord will judge between them on the Day of Resurrection concerning that wherein they used to differ. Surah 016:124
The Qur'an continues by declaring that Allah cursed the Sabbath breakers.
PICKTHAL: O ye unto whom the Scripture hath been given! Believe in what We have revealed confirming that which ye possess, before We destroy countenances so as to confound them, or curse them as We cursed the Sabbath-breakers (of old time). The commandment of Allah is always executed. Surah 004.047
The Qur'an states the nature of the curse.
PICKTHAL: And ye know of those of you who broke the Sabbath, how We said unto them: Be ye apes, despised and hated! And We made it an example to their own and to succeeding generations, and an admonition to the Allah-fearing. Surah 002:65-66
The account of the curse.
PICKTHAL: Ask them (O Muhammad) of the township that was by the sea, how they did break the Sabbath, how their big fish came unto them visibly upon their Sabbath day and on a day when they did not keep Sabbath came they not unto them. Thus did We try them for that they were evil-livers. : And when a community among them said: Why preach ye to a folk whom Allah is about to destroy or punish with an awful doom, they said: In order to be free from guilt before your Lord, and that haply they may ward off (evil). And when they forgot that whereof they had been reminded, We rescued those who forbade wrong, and visited those who did wrong with dreadful punishment because they were evil-livers. So when they took pride in that which they had been forbidden, We said unto them: Be ye apes despised and loathed!
Surah 007:163-166
Muslims believe that the curse of the apes happened during the reign of Kind David. The turning Jews into apes is not in the Torah or the Bible.
In fact at the beginning of Surah 7 Muhammad was told to ask the Jews about the event that happened in the township by the sea. It has been suggested that the Jews of that day were testing Muhammad's claim of prophet hood.
It is a known fact that the God of Israel did send curses in the form of plagues and even death on the people of Israel for their disobedience.
Are apes referred to in the Bible? Yes, but it depends on the translation that is being used.
There are only two places in the Bible that the word "apes" appear. I Kings 10:22 and 2 Chronicles 9:21.
The New King James version of the Bible uses the word "monkeys" instead of "apes". However the New International Version of the Bible translates the word as apes, as does the King James Version and the New American Standard Version of the Bible.