Voices - Norman Finkelstein: "Israel Has to Suffer a Defeat"

 

Norman Finkelstein: "Israel Has to Suffer a Defeat"

N. Finkelstein (Interview)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDe65-nF3FQ&eurl=http://sabbah.biz/mt/
http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/1676.htm
http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/1676.htm

Following are excerpts from an interview with American Political Scientist Norman Finkelstein, which aired on Future TV on January 20, 2008. The questions were posed in Arabic, and Finkelstein’s responses are in English.

Norman Finkelstein: I was of course happy to meet the Hizbullah people, because it is a point of view that is rarely heard in the United States. I have no problem saying that I do want to express solidarity with them, and I am not going to be a coward of a hypocrite about it. I don’t care about Hizbullah as a political organization. I don’t know much about their politics, and anyhow, it’s irrelevant. I don’t live in Lebanon. It’s a choice that the Lebanese have to make: Who they want to be their leaders, who they want to represent them. But there is a fundamental principle. People have the right to defend their country from foreign occupiers, and people have the right to defend their country from invaders who are destroying their country. That to me is a very basic, elementary and uncomplicated question.

My parents went through World War II. Now, Stalin’s regime was not exactly a bed of roses. It was a ruthless and brutal regime, and many people perished. But who didn’t support the Soviet Union when they defeated the Nazis? Who didn’t support the Red Army? In all the countries of Europe which were occupied – who gets all the honors? The resistance. The Communist resistance – it was brutal, it was ruthless. The Communists were not... It wasn’t a bed of roses, but you respect them. You respect them because they resisted the foreign occupiers of their country. If I am going to honor the Communists during World War II, even through I probably would not have done very well under their regimes... If I’m going to honor them, I am going to honor the Hizbullah. They show courage, and they show discipline. I respect that.

Interviewer: That is an accurate description of the situation before 2000, but after 2000, the Israelis withdrew from South Lebanon. There was a rift within Lebanon between the Lebanese political players on the issue of the future of the weapons and the issue of the resistance. This rift, which has taken place... You are now taking sides. After all, you are saying that you are only visiting Lebanon, but you don’t see the ramification of the July war for the people.

Norman Finkelstein: Listen, if you want to close your eyes and believe it was all over in May 2000, you can do so. You can play that game. But the reality was – and everyone understood it – that the Israeli attitude was: We are going to knock out Hizbullah. They began planning for a new war right after they were forced to leave in 2000. They found their excuse, their pretext, in July 2006, but there is no question among rational people that Israel was never going to let the Hizbullah victory go by. They were determined to teach their...

Interviewer: The war could have been avoided.

Norman Finkelstein: It could not have been avoided. There is no way that the United States and Israel are going to tolerate any resistance in the Arab world. If you want to pretend it can be avoided, you can play that game. But serious people, clear-headed people, knew there was going to be a war sooner or later.

[...]

Do you think there is not going to be another war? Do you think Israel is going to allow that defeat in July 2006? Do you want to pretend it is Hizbullah that is causing the trouble? No, there will be another war, and the destruction will probably be ten times worse – maybe even more – than July 2006, because Israel is determined, with the United States, to put the Arabs in their place and to keep them in their place. Now, how can I not respect those who say no to that? You know, during the Spanish Civil War there was a famous woman – they called her “La Pasionaria” – Dolores Ibárruri, from the Spanish Republic. She famously said: “It’s better to die on your feet than to walk crawling on your knees.”

Interviewer: But that is up to the Lebanese people in its entirety.

Norman Finkelstein: I totally agree. I am not telling you what to do with your lives, and if you’d rather live crawling on your feet, I could respect that. I could respect that. People want to live. How can I deny you that right? But then, how can I not respect those who say they would rather die on their feet? How can I not respect that?

[...]

Israel and the United States are attacking, because they will not allow any military resistance to their control of the region. That’s the problem. If Hizbullah laid down its arms, and said: “We will do whatever the Americans say,” you wouldn’t have a war – that’s true, but you would also be the slaves of the Americans. I have to respect those who refuse to be slaves.

Interviewer: Is there no other way than military resistance?

Norman Finkelstein: I don’t believe there is another way. I wish there were another way. Who wants war? Who wants destruction? Even Hitler didn’t want war. He would much prefer to have accomplished his aims peacefully, if he could. So I am not saying that I want it, but I honestly don’t see another way, unless you choose to be their slaves – and many people here have chosen that. I can’t really say... I can understand it – you want to live. I can’t really say I respect it. You know, so many dead, so much destruction... Before the bodies are even buried, before the buildings are even rebuilt, the person who is responsible for it all – you can’t wait to welcome him. You can’t wait to roll out the red carpet. I can’t respect that.

In that respect, I like the Jews much more. I like their attitude. Do you know what the Jewish attitude is? Never to forgive, never to forget. I agree with that. Who roll out the red carpet less than two years after your whole country was destroyed by them? The Secretary of State said it was the birth pangs of a new Middle East. That’s the statement of a freak. A human freak would compare the birth of a child with the destruction of a country, and yet, there are people here who are so anxious to welcome her. They are trying to figure out what the Americans are thinking. They can’t wait for their banquets. How can anyone respect that? I respect the Jews a thousand times more - never to forgive, never to forget. All the death and all the destruction – and you can’t wait to welcome him.

Interviewer: Norman...

Norman Finkelstein: It’s disgusting!

[...]

Who the hell cares if Bush is coming?

Interviewer: But you say there will be another war.

Norman Finkelstein: You should have declared him persona non grata. He’s not welcome here. He destroyed your country. He was responsible for the war. You know full well that resolution could have been passed three weeks earlier. He destroys your country, and you can’t wait to greet him. You have no self-respect. How can you expect other people to respect Arabs, if you show no respect for yourselves?

[...]

If the Lebanese people overwhelmingly vote to let the Americans and Israelis have their way, I guess you have to accept that. I could see that. I couldn’t possibly say that they don’t have the right to make that choice. Listen, in Nazi-occupied Europe, you have to remember, most of the populations made the choice to live under the Nazis. All this talk about a French Resistance is just a joke – it never happened. The French Resistance... About 20% of the French population read the Resistance’s newspaper. There were maybe 10% of the French who resisted. The rest said: “Don’t resist,” because the Nazis were ruthless. You resist – four hundred are killed for each soldier who’s killed. That’s how the Nazis operated. So most of the French said, like you: “We want to live.” “Don’t resist.” But now I have to ask you, in retrospect: Who do we honor? Do we honor those who say: “Let us live,” or do we honor those who said: “Let’s resist”?

[...]

Leaders come last. There will be a leader who comes to power in Israel, who is willing to make the concessions, after the conditions have been created – namely, Israel has to suffer a defeat.

¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤

Dr. Norman Finkelstein - received his doctorate from Dept. of Political Science at Princeton University. He is the author of several books including The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering( Verso, 2000 ), which was attacked by organizations in North America dedicated to defending Israeli state policies. Finkelstein, both of whose parents were Holocaust survivors, says "The Holocaust Industry is, as I conceive in the book, institutions, organisations and individuals who have put to use Jewish suffering for political and financial gain." Finklestein’s book Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict ( Verso, 1995 )was praised for its "intellectual integrity" by Israeli historian Avi Shlaim, now teaching at Oxford. His book (with Dr. Ruth Birn) A Nation on Trial: The Goldhagen Thesis and Historical Truth ( Henry Holt, 1998 ) was praised by Israel’s outstanding Holocaust historian Raul Hilberg, as well as renowned historians of Nazism Arno Mayer, Ian Kershaw and Christopher Browning.

© 2008 N. Finkelstein

SOURCE: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/shamireaders/message/1068

URL: http://www.thepeoplesvoice.org/cgi-bin/blogs/voices.php/2008/02/22/norman_finkelstein_israel_has_to_suffer

Voices - Norman Finkelstein: "Israel Has to Suffer a Defeat"

AlterNet: Rights and Liberties: Christian Right's Emerging Deadly Worldview: Kill Muslims to Purify the Earth

 

Christian Right's Emerging Deadly Worldview: Kill Muslims to Purify the Earth

By Chris Hedges, Truthdig. Posted February 12, 2008.

Christian extremists are preaching a war against tolerance to target and persecute all Muslims, including the 6 million who live in the U.S.

Technorati Tags: Kill Muslims,Christian right

Walid Shoebat, Kamal Saleem and Zachariah Anani are the three stooges of the Christian right. These self-described former Muslim terrorists are regularly trotted out -- a few days ago they were at the Air Force Academy -- to spew racist filth about Islam on behalf of groups such as Focus on the Family. It is a clever tactic. Curly, Larry and Mo, who all say they are born-again Christians, engage in hate speech and assure us it comes from personal experience. They tell their audiences that the only way to deal with one-fifth of the world's population is by converting or eradicating all Muslims. Their cant is broadcast regularly on Fox News, including the Bill O'Reilly and Neil Cavuto shows, as well as on numerous Christian radio and television programs. Shoebat, who has written a book called Why We Want to Kill You, promises in his lectures to explain the numerous similarities between radical Muslims and the Nazis, how "Muslim terrorists" invaded America 30 years ago and how "perseverance, recruitment and hate" have fueled attacks by Muslims. 

These men are frauds, but this is not the point. They are part of a dark and frightening war by the Christian right against tolerance that, in the moment of another catastrophic terrorist attack on American soil, would make it acceptable to target and persecute all Muslims, including the some 6 million Muslims who live in the United States. These men stoke these irrational fears. They defend the perpetual war unleashed by the Bush administration and championed by Sen. John McCain. McCain frequently reminds listeners that "the greatest danger facing the world is Islamic terrorism," as does Mike Huckabee, who says that "Islamofascism" is "the greatest threat this country [has] ever faced." George W. Bush has, in the same vein, assured Americans that terrorists hate us for our freedoms, not, of course, for anything we have done. Bush described the "war on terror" as a war against totalitarian Islamofascism while the Israeli air force was dropping tens of thousands of pounds of iron fragmentation bombs up and down Lebanon, an air campaign that killed 1,300 Lebanese civilians.

The three men tell lurid tales of being recruited as children into Palestinian terrorist organizations, murdering hundreds of civilians and blowing up a bank in Israel. Saleem says that as a child he infiltrated Israel to plant bombs via a network of tunnels underneath the Golan Heights, although no incident of this type was ever reported in Israel. He claims he is descended from the "grand wazir" of Islam, a title and a position that do not exist in the Arab world. They assure audiences that the Palestinians are interested not in a peaceful two-state solution but rather the destruction of Israel, the murder of all Jews and the death of America. Shoebat claims he first came to the United States as part of an extremist "sleeper cell."

"These three jokers are as much former Islamic terrorists as 'Star Trek's' Capt. James T. Kirk was a real Starship captain," said Mikey Weinstein, the head of the watchdog group The Military Religious Freedom Foundation. The group has challenged Christian proselytizing in the military and denounced the visit by the men to the Air Force Academy.

The speakers include in their talks the superior virtues of Christianity. Saleem, for example, says his world "turned upside down when he was seriously injured in an automobile accident."

"A Christian man tended to Kamal at the accident scene, making sure he got the medical treatment he needed," his Web site says. "Kamal's orthopedic surgeon and physical therapist were also Christian men whom over a period of several months ministered the unconditional love of Jesus Christ to him as he recovered. The love and sacrificial giving of these men caused Kamal to cry out to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob acknowledging his need for the Savior. Kamal has since become a man on a new mission, as an ambassador for the one true and living God, the great I Am, Jehovah God of the Bible."

This creeping Christian chauvinism has infected our political and social discourse. It was behind the rumor that Barack Obama was a Muslim. Obama reassured followers that he was a Christian. It apparently did not occur to him, or his questioners, that the proper answer is that there is nothing wrong with being a Muslim, that persons of great moral probity and courage arise in all cultures and all religions, including Islam. Christians have no exclusive lock on virtue. But this kind of understanding often provokes indignant rage. 

The public denigration of Islam, and by implication all religious belief systems outside Christianity, is part of the triumphalism that has distorted the country since the 9/11 attacks. It makes dialogue with those outside our "Christian" culture impossible. It implicitly condemns all who do not think as we think and believe as we believe as, at best, inferior and usually morally depraved. It blinds us to our own failings. It makes self-reflection and self-criticism a form of treason. It reduces the world to a cartoonish vision of us and them, good and evil. It turns us into children with bombs. 

These three con artists are not the problem. There is enough scum out there to take their place. Rather, they offer a window into a worldview that is destroying the United States. It has corrupted the Republican Party. It has colored the news media. It has entered into the everyday clichés we use to explain ourselves to ourselves. It is ignorant and racist, but it is also deadly. It grossly perverts the Christian religion. It asks us to kill to purify the Earth. It leaves us threatened not only by the terrorists who may come from abroad but the ones who are rising from within our midst.

This article has been corrected.

AlterNet: Rights and Liberties: Christian Right's Emerging Deadly Worldview: Kill Muslims to Purify the Earth

BBC NEWS | The Reporters | Mark Mardell

 

This is my first visit to Albania and it is a fascinating, beautiful country: Tirana much more impressive than I had been led to believe; the run-down Durres tower blocks and shanties more in keeping with my preconceptions.

I am here to report on Albania’s reaction to the looming independence of Kosovo and my report will be on Radio Four and the World Service next week and I will link to it when it is ready.

But that is for another day.

Today, religion.

On the way up into the town of Kruja, perched on the side of a mountain, we stop at a small road side shrine, a Teke, a green-domed, white walled, small building.

Down a few stone steps is a neat little room, covered with small, Turkish-style rugs. But a little area of the floor is bare, and what looks like limestone.

There’s a hole, about eight inches deep and it doesn’t take much imagination to see it as a footprint.

The shrine’s guardian, 79 year-old Masmut Subashi, tells me this is the footprint of Sari Saltik .

Holy man

The holy man’s portrait hangs on one wall, robed, with long dark hair, his hands apparently resting on the hilt of a sword. Masmut tells me how he was taken to the shrine by his father as a small boy and now he tends to it. Then he tells me the story of the saint.

A nearby village was terrorised by a monster who demanded a human life every day. Sari Saltik cut off the monster’s seven heads and for 25 years lived in the large cave which the beast had inhabited.

When he left, he first stepped on this mountainside. His next foot print was a hundred miles away and his next in Crete .

He tells us that the legend is that Sari Saltik had a brother who was a Christian, St Anthony, who had his own cave not far from here.

Please don’t hold me to the highest standards of BBC accuracy on this one.

A Muslim saint, a Muslim portrait, acknowledging a Christian brother?

Well, yes, Albania is the headquarters of the Bektashi, a Sufi group.

Sunni Muslim

Muslims are said to make up 70% of the population in Albania, and most of them are not Bektashi, who are Shia, but Sunni.

It’s mildly curious to me that while some people argue Turkey shouldn’t join the European Union because most of its population is Muslim, I have never heard the same argument applied to Kosovo or Albania.

Perhaps it’s because they are so small. Perhaps it’s because, for many, the religion is only nominal. As I write this, in Albania’s capital Tirana , I can hear the call to prayer but the approach to religion seems much more European than the more profound attachments one may find in other parts of the world.

I hasten to add I am not just talking about Islam and the Middle East: America’s devoutness seems very shocking to many worldly Europeans.

Anyway while some websites warn that Albania could be a base for “extremism ” or “fundamentalists” there seems little sign of even moderate conservatism or devotion on the streets or indeed in the villages.

Not a headscarf in sight, let alone a hijab or burkha. Is there a European Islam that is as different from Wahhabism as the Church of England is from Baptists of the Bible Belt?

Is it to be found in these lands?

Rock-and-roll poet

Ervin Hatibi is a poet and intellectual, a Sunni Muslim, who became serious about his religion after living a rather rock-and-roll lifestyle.

While some, like the historian Bernard Lewis, argue that secularism is a specifically Christian phenomenon, Ervin says Islam has its own secularism and should not be seen as a monolithic whole.

“Everywhere Islam is different,” he says.

“As an everyday experience in the Balkans, for centuries it has created unique features. I consider Islam as part of the European landscape. It was for centuries. It kept changing, especially in Europe, the continent of continuous change.

“As a believer I may have fantasies about a society that moves towards certain values, and so will an Albanian Orthodox, or an atheist from a Muslim background or one of the new Protestant Christians, but we all have to live within an Albanian space.

“We have to live in harmony with the will of the majority and this is our culture, a more and more European and Western culture. It has something special that is not only Islam, but Ottoman and from the communist regime, so we have our special flavour that gives more beauty to the European experience and is not something dangerous.”

Is he right ? Could the much derided Ottoman Empire ,multi-ethnic and relatively religiously tolerant, have got something right in the Balkans?

BBC NEWS | The Reporters | Mark Mardell

American Chronicle | Does Islam teach a believer (a Muslim), to hate Christians?

By Mark Harding

Islamic teaching requires one to believe in Allah and his prophet Muhammad. But doing this requires the believer to do good which means that it is the works of the believer by his own actions that allows or disallows him or her to heaven.
It is not my intension to preach in this article, nor do I try to convince one through scripture that one is wrong and the other is right. My intention is only to compare and allow the reader an opportunity to see the differences so that one can find the reason, if any, for why Islam might teach to hate Christians.
In Luke 23: 39 to 43 tells of two men who were criminals being crucified beside Jesus. One said to Jesus “LORD, remember me when you come into your kingdom”. And did Jesus say to him “NO you have not done enough works”?. Or did Jesus assure this man that he would be with Him in Paradise Today? Therefore Christians believe that it is not by works that one can enter paradise but by faith in Jesus Christ.
What is then the good works that are taught from the Islamic teachings that allow a Muslim to be good enough to get to heaven?
Of course we find Islamic teachings that on the surface, seem to be a legitimate course of action to this challenge. For example,
Sura 21: 94 Then whoso doeth some good works and is a believer, there will be no rejection of his effort. Lo! We record (it) for him.
Sura 22:50 Those who believe and do good works, for them is pardon and a rich provision
So then what are these good works that Allah wants Muslims to do?
Sura 2:216 Warfare is ordained for you, though it is hateful unto you; but it may happen that ye hate a thing, which is good for you, and it may happen that ye love a thing, which is bad for you. Allah knoweth, ye know not.
Sura 4:76 Those who believe fight in the cause of Allah, and those who reject Faith Fight in the cause of Evil
So then who are those that believe in the Quran, Allah of Islam and its messenger Muhammad and who are those that reject?
According to the Quran the believers are those who:
Believers
Sura 2:136 Say (O Muslims): We believe in Allah and that which is revealed unto us and that which was revealed unto Abraham, and Ishmael, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the tribes, and that which Moses and Jesus received, and that which the prophets received from their Lord. We make no distinction between any of them, and unto Him we have surrendered.
I have been exhorting Muslims for many years now here in Canada to help them see the difference from what the Holy Bible teaches compared to that of the Quran. The biggest challenge is the Muslims belief that their god, ‘Allah’ in the Quran, is the same one found in the Holy Bible, the God of Israel.
Sura 2:136 is often used to promote this idea. The fact is nothing can be further from the truth. For in almost every situation found in the Quran, whether it is Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Noah or even Jesus, there are very little similarities if any at all.
One of the questions I would ask the many thousands of Muslims I have questioned over the 20 years when speaking to them about their faith, has been about the severe persecution of Christians in every Islamic society. The answer that I would receive was generally the same and that was that the media was lying, there is no persecution at all in any Islamic society. They would never acknowledge the persecution of Christians in their home countries or comment on all the media reports regarding the same in any other Islamic society. Here is the reason that they must deny this terrible slaughter-taking place in every Islamic society today, which incidentally is more severe, more brutal today than it ever has ever been.
Sura 2:62 Lo! Those who believe (in that which is revealed unto thee, Muhammad), and those who are Jews, and Christians, and Sabaeans - whoever believeth in Allah and the Last Day and doeth right - surely their reward is with their Lord, and there shall no fear come upon them neither shall they grieve.
This verse, and Sura 2:136, are used by Muslims to prove what Allah has to say about Christians and the fact that their god is our God. According to what they have to say there is never any persecution of Christians in Islamic societies and, they say, Muslims and Christians live in peace in their homelands like Egypt, Pakistan, Indonesia, Somalia Sudan Turkey ect…
Of course the problem with Sura 2:136 has already been discussed, but one of the greater difficulties is that no Christian can ever believe in “Allah or the last day” thus making Sura 2:62 of no use to any Christian or Jew living in an Islamic society. This is a huge problem for many Christians living in an Islamic society who openly deny Allah, Muhammad or the Quran. Yet this is what they must do according to their religious convictions, for if the Quran preaches a lie and deception, according to what the Holy Bible dictates, it must not only be acknowledged by Christians, ALL Christians, but Islam must as well be openly discredited publicly. For God, the true God of Israel is a jealous God and is not willing to share His kingdom with Allah the god of Islam, and out of love for all Muslims, Christians must start to feel the need to encourage them to accept this truth and not the lies of Muhammad.

Un-Believers
Sura 84:20, 21, 22. What then is the matter with them that they believe not?
And when the Qur'an is read to them, they fall not prostrate,
But on the contrary the Unbelievers reject (it).
Sura 058:055 Those who resist Allah and His Messenger will be humbled to dust, as were those before them: for We have already sent down Clear Signs. And the Unbelievers (will have) a humiliating Penalty,-
Of course many living in these democratic societies like Canada, have a difficult time understanding the logic of killing someone because of their religious convictions, however that is what Islam teaches. Islam teaches a believer that they must kill those who will not believe in Allah or his prophet Muhammad until they are subdued into submission and pay a protection tax called a Jizyah tax. In other words, they mustl fight all non Muslims until all is Islam. Even the People of the book, which is Christians and Jews, must be subjected to persecution until they all are willing to admit that the god “Allah” is greater than the God of Israel which is the one we worship. And with willing submission we must pay the Jizyah tax to prove we have been subdued. This law is part of the Shaira Law which although may not be practiced yet in many Islamic societies, will be implemented to its fullest when there is an Islamic state and all the world is Islamic.
Sura 9:29 Fight those who do not believe in Allah, nor in the latter day, nor do they prohibit what Allah and His Messenger have prohibited, nor follow the religion of truth, out of those who have been given the Book, until they pay the tax in acknowledgment of superiority and they are in a state of subjection.
This goal of taking over the world and making it all Islamic is still in the works today.
In the course of the last 20 years, which I have been learning about Islam, I have found out what it is like for those living in an Islamic society who disagree with Islamic teachings, like the one, which says that the god of Islam is the God of Israel. For my opinion and my religious convictions have resulted in Muslims hating me so much that they would spit on me, curse me by swearing vulgarities at me on the streets of Toronto and threaten me with such graphic and horrific statements of torture, I dare not mention them. We have all seen the carnage around the world by Muslims, because of a simple cartoon depicting Muhammad as a terrorist, which most Un believers who have studied Islam’s history believe to be very true.
Many moderate Muslims have been desperately trying to separate themselves from those who use the teachings in the Quran to further their goals of an Islamic state. But the separation that these moderate Muslims seek can never take place, because the Islamic teachings do not allow for any type of peace through democracy. For in democracy there is freedom of religion, in Islam there is no such law. In democracy there is freedom of religious choice, in Islam there is freedom of religious choice only providing you except the punishment of paying a tax for your choice of being Non Muslim. Homosexuality is outlawed and punishment includes 100 lashes or death. Women have very few rights in Islam and according to the teachings of the Quran, women risk being beaten by their husbands if they will not obey them.
I do not hate Muslims, yet in Canada there was such an outcry by Muslims who are against me for being public with my convictions about Islamic teachings of hatred, they were successful at having me arrested. The courts in 1997 found me guilty of hating Muslims and I was convicted of this crime. But I have continued my work of exposing Islam, the results of which have been extraordinary, and I will bring these stories to you at a later date.
The answer than to my original question “Does Islam teach a believer (a Muslim), to hate Christians?” is YES .
Web sites to consider:
http://www.theirownwords.com/site/showvideo/52
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=57521
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.aspx?GUID={8C1D2863-9FE5-43E9-BA8E-B21C2FFE5158}

American Chronicle | Does Islam teach a believer (a Muslim), to hate Christians?

How to Combat Radical Islamists

 

By Mehdi Mozaffari

Mr. Mozaffari is Professor of Political Science at University of Aarhus, Denmark.

Note: This article is intended to follow another by Mr. Mozaffari, which we published two weeks ago: "Is It Possible to Combat Radical Islamism Without Combating Islam?"

We need a cognitive approach to Islamism by conceiving it as a totalitarian ideology.
A clear and full internalization of the fact that Islamism is an ideology and not a religion will purify the whole question from a variety of difficulties. In many ways, Islamism is like an octopus. We have to aim directly at the head in stead of wasting our time and energy to deal with the complicated body. By evacuating religious contents from Islamism, we change our direction from theology to ideology, from religion to politics. In this way, we put forward the real face and real nature of Islamism. The Muslims, especially among the young people, who are potentially ready to give their lives for the sake of Islamist ideals, will find out that their struggle is not a part of a religious duty but purely an ideological and political one emanating from a dangerous utopia.

We also need an international tactical or ethical consensus. This is especially needed in the Western hemisphere. The reason for such a consensus is motivated by the fact that often some western political parties and leaders use anti-Islamic rhetoric for political purposes. This policy is not productive, and it can be dangerous.

Attacking Islam is precisely what Islamists are waiting for. They are insatiably trying to convince Muslims of two things: 1) Islamism is the true face of Islam, and 2) the West is an enemy of Islam. Therefore, politicians must choose their vocabulary more carefully by avoiding attacks on Islam as a religion and by avoiding hostile remarks about Muslims in general. Americans became aware of this necessity and consequently transformed their language in this field. They talk about "terrorists who hijacked a religion" and rarely comment on Islam or Muslims in a negative way. We have to remember that Islamists are still today using President Bush's famous "crusade" pronounced in September 2001 as an evidence for American hostility against Islam. It seems that to avoid attacking Islam and Muslims, indiscriminately, has become general U.S. policy. In this respect, the most recent evidence are the apologies which a top Pentagon intelligence official, Lt. General William Boykin, offers (October 17, 2003) to Muslims because of his negative comments on Islam. The Americans' prudence is re-affirmed in President Bush's speech in Indonesia (October 22, 2003). In an elaborated and well-balanced speech, the president repeated that "Americans hold a deep respect for the Islamic faith. We know that Islam is fully compatible with liberty and tolerance and progress because we see the proof in your country [Inodonesia]." Then, he states "Terrorists who claim Islam as their inspiration defile one of the great faiths. Murder has no place in any religious tradition". In this way, President Bush tried to reach two important goals: To make a clear distinction between "Islam" and "Islamism" and to demonstrate that Islamists have hijacked Islam itself.

During the past decades, repetitive experiences have showed that dialogue with Islamists leads nowhere. While in a democratic culture, dialogue is a MUST and a natural process, Islamists consider dialogue a clear sign of weakness; their own weakness if they accept a dialogue, and especially weakness in their opponents. Dialogue is an unknown word for Islamists. Nothing positive has come out of different dialogues of diplomacy with totalitarian regimes and groups in general, and nothing positive with Islamists either. The Chamberlain and Hitler agreement, the Roosevelt and Stalin dialogue, the European Union's "critical dialogue," the "constructive dialogue," the "Iran gate," the "dialogue" with Taliban and so on and so forth. None of these attempts at dialogue have been successful for the Western diplomacy.
If dialogue or compromise is impossible and ineffective, what to do then? The answer is short and brutal: pressure! Pressure can be gradual or accumulated; but it must be real and sufficiently strong and consistent for Islamists to feel it as such. If the pressure has no positive effect-- as it was the case with Taliban -- war should not be excluded as a last resort.
Therefore, we must constantly remember and learn from previous, related experiences to deal with other totalitarian regimes, groups and ideologies. They were defeated either by war or by heavy pressure. This goes for Nazism and Fascism. It also goes for the breakdown of the USSR. Based on criteria of success, it will be wise to forget any possible arrangement with Islamists and start using systematical force and pressure.

Finally, it is necessary and urgent to acknowledge what is predominately important is democratization of the world. If there is a clash, the clash is not between civilizations or between religions. The real clash occurs between democracy and despotism.
Democratization of the Muslim world stands as the key word to combat Islamism and with it to combat current global terrorism. It represents a huge and vast task. Let me emphasize only one aspect of this, which I think is the most important. The Islamic world is producing three main things: Oil, Terrorism and Emigration. Thus, we have an Islamic Bermuda Triangle which is threatening peace and security in the world. The best way to break down this Bermuda Triangle is of course to do it within the Muslim world and by Muslims themselves. Unfortunately, democratic forces inside the Muslim world have not been able to break this Triangle. Therefore, external support is essential. To support democratic forces inside the Muslim world is an inherent and necessary part of the anti-terrorism war. External support can take different forms: conditioning economic aids to improving human rights and democracy is the first step. Awarding the Nobel Peace Price to a Muslim and Iranian woman (Shirin Ebadi) is an elegant and hopefully efficient stimulus. In extreme case, military intervention cannot be avoided. The ongoing war in Iraq - despite its doubtful legal foundations - represents a method to break down the Islamic Bermuda Triangle. In this sense, the war in Iraq is a 'strategic war' against the roots of terrorism, while the war in Afghanistan stands mostly as an "operational war" or simply a "theâtre d'opérations."

When combating Islamism, one of the main problems and difficulties is how to deal with millions of Muslims who are living in Western countries. Starting from the facts, it is apparent that Muslims in western countries are far too dispersed to constitute a compact bloc. In terms of social, cultural, political and religious orientations, the division among them is deep and real. Roughly, Muslims are divided into two large categories: Muslim Believers and Cultural Muslims. Islamists are predominantly issued from the first category. Cultural Muslims represent an agglomerate of peoples embracing agnostics, liberals, socialists and so on. In general, Cultural Muslims do not represent any tangible threat. The attention therefore must be oriented to the Muslim Believers who roughly are divided into Moderates and Radicals. Both are potential sources for Islamism; the former lesser than the latter.

Now, how to identify a Radical Muslim today in the Western countries? In this regard, there are a number of helpful indices. First, a Radical Muslim is of course a believer, who practices the rituals of Islam. But, this alone is not enough. A Radical Muslim is a man (rarely a woman--perhaps because Prophet Muhammad expressed his skepticism over women's capacity to hold a secret!). A Radical Muslim is constantly in communication with others. He can be a lonely man in the city and locality where he lives, but is with permanent communication with the outside world. Communication goes through mail, e-mail, fax, telephone (mobile and public) and so on. He is also a man who reads much and is generally a quiet person carefully avoiding clashes with the police and other public authorities. He is also traveler, a globetrotter! He is a young man with an average age of 25-27 years. In Southern Europe, Radical Muslims are issued from North Africa (Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia). In the U.K. essentially from Pakistan. In Scandinavia, from Palestine, Lebanon, Egypt and Pakistan. Iranian Islamists are working under the auspices of Iranian authorities, generally as diplomatic personnel or as business persons.

Conclusion

Today, the world is facing a single global terrorism, which is Islamist. In my analysis, I did not approach the force of the global terrorism. I took it as a given fact. Islamist terrorism is perhaps not as powerful as some people would imagine. However, according to Institute for Strategic Studies (in London), Islamist terrorism has been reinforced following the war on Iraq (October Report 2003). We may say that global terrorism at least appears as a huge troublemaker. In this study, I tried to demonstrate that the real danger lies somewhere else. Islamist terrorism is the expression of a totalitarian ideology. Therefore, the world is facing a new totalitarianism, which has been neglected for decades. Consequently, combating Islamist terrorism cannot be reduced to a simple classic counter-terrorism. Classic Counter-terrorism's highly necessary efforts and investigations must be accompanied by coherent political, cultural and economic actions.

In short, my propositions to combating Islamist terrorism without combating Islam are resumed in the three following points:

¢ Continuous pressure on Islamists and, if necessary, conduct of war;
¢ Dialogue and cooperation with moderate Muslims, and
¢ Effective support to democratic forces inside the Muslim world.

© Mehdi Mozaffari

Related Links

• What Is the Difference Between Islam and Islamism

How to Combat Radical Islamists

ArabComment » In the Name of Hijab?

 In the Name of Hijab

As an American Muslim woman who chooses the hijab, I was shocked, enraged, and saddened to hear of the murder of 16-year-old Aqsa Parvez in Mississauga, Canada. Aqsa was a young Muslim girl struggling to balance the more traditional values of her family with Western culture.

This brave young girl was allegedly killed at the hands of the man that should have been protecting her: her own father. Canadian media has reported that the 16 year old argued with her father about wearing the hijab, or traditional Islamic headscarf. Friends said she would leave the house in traditional dress and change into western-style clothing when she arrived at school.

Her father, Muhammad Parvez, called 911 to report that he had killed his daughter on Monday, December 11th. She died from her injuries only hours later. Her 26 year old brother has been charged with obstruction of justice for failing to cooperate with police. To me, Aqsa is a martyr for the freedom of individual choice.

I am especially distraught that this alleged murder happened in Canada, home of “Little Mosque on the Prairie,” a TV sitcom produced by a brilliant Canadian Muslim director, Zarqa Nawaz. In the episode, “The Barrier,” first aired earlier this year; the teenage girl, Layla and her very conservative father, Baber, disagreed about her attire. She was an active girl and didn’t want to be restricted by her garments. She hid the fact that she had had her period—a traditional moment when girls are encouraged to begin covering their hair–for fear that her father would want her to wear a headscarf. While the two fundamentally disagreed about the issue, as is the case in most civilized families (Muslim or not), violence was never an option.

To some zealots, there is no place in heaven for a Muslim woman who doesn’t cover her hair. For some, it is an ancient patriarchal tradition that should be abolished. But American Muslim teens themselves are embracing the autonomy that Islam and America afford individuals. In recently released The American Muslim Teenager’s Handbook, Yasmine Hafiz, her brother, Imran Hafiz, and their mother, Dilara Hafiz, of Phoenix, Arizona, advise teens (and parents): “According to the Quran, as long as Muslims are dressed modestly and behave respectably, no specific dress code is required… modest behavior is also encouraged, therefore ogling the cute boy in Chemistry class or leering at the cheerleaders is definitely out! …Each person must read the Quran for herself and form her own opinion.”

Teens and others are turning to interpretations of Islam that assert that there isn’t one way to look if you’re a Muslim girl or woman. According to the distinguished Islamic scholar, Reza Aslan, “The veil was neither compulsory, nor for that matter, widely adopted until generations after Muhammad’s death, when a large body of male scriptural and legal scholars began using their religious and political authority to regain the dominance they had lost in society as a result of the Prophet’s egalitarian reforms.”

Some so-called “traditional” Muslims argue that ‘Western’ women are oppressed because they must derive their self-worth from the gaze of men. However, it is also true that within some Islamic communities a woman who does not cover is not afforded the same respect as one who does. The expectations are different but the result is the same; a woman’s worth is still determined by others, including men.

While living in Yemen, my friend, Kelly Wentworth, who is also a convert to Islam, experienced pressure to cover herself that did not stem from a religious mandate but a cultural one. As the wife of a Yemeni man, if she chose not to cover, the society would consider it a dishonor to her husband’s family.

It is essential that men and women make their own choices about dress for internal reasons rather than succumbing to external pressures. This is only possible when individuals have the freedom to choose. Personally, by wearing hijab, I experience a sense of autonomy, confidence and femininity I did not before. Yet, for those who have been forced to wear it, I believe it is a very physical barrier to connection with the Divine. Perhaps it is because of her belief in this freedom of choice that Aqsa Parvez was so viciously murdered.

As a Muslim, a woman, a wife, a daughter and a citizen of the free world, I am outraged by the fact that Aqsa was taken from this earth. No human being has the right to destroy the life that God has made sacred. I am sickened that this man has shamed Islam through his very unislamic acts. There is no place in the world for this kind of intolerant, chauvinistic and bigoted thinking, no matter in what faith tradition it appears.

An important distinction difficult for fundamentalists of all faith traditions is that dress codes are a matter of choice, not religious mandate or obligation. Without choice, no act bears meaning. According to Islamic scripture, an act is judged by the intent with which it was performed. If a woman chooses to wear a scarf because she believes in its benefit to her, she has a pure motive. However, if she covers to please another person, whether that person is her husband, brother, father or mother, while not believing in its benefits, the motive is lost and the act of wearing it loses all meaning.

I believe Aqsa has found her place in Paradise. I pray that in her passing we will not miss this opportunity to take a lesson from the tragedy of her death, inspiring us to practice tolerance, love, kindness and understanding with all, however they are dressed.

Tags: canada, family, hijab, islam, violence

ArabComment » In the Name of Hijab?

Abused Muslim Women in U.S. Gain Advocates - New York Times

 

Abused Muslim Women in U.S. Gain Advocates

Peter Wynn Thompson for The New York Times

A resident of the Hamdard Center for Health and Human Services, a shelter near Chicago that caters mainly to Muslim women.

 

By NEIL MacFARQUHAR

Published: January 6, 2008

CHICAGO — After enduring seven years of beatings from her husband, a young Yemeni-American woman recently fled to a local shelter, only to find that the heavy black head scarf she wore as an observant Muslim provoked disapproval.

The shelter brought in a hairdresser, whose services she accepted without any misgivings. But once her hair was styled, administrators urged her to throw off her veil, saying it symbolized the male oppression native to Islam that she wanted to escape.

Instead the woman, who asked for anonymity because she feared further violence from her relatives, decamped to the Hamdard Center for Health and Human Services in suburban Chicago, a shelter that caters mainly to Muslim women by not serving pork and keeping prayer rugs handy. Such shelters are extremely rare nationwide, activists say, because Muslim Americans only recently began confronting the issue of spousal abuse.

Domestic violence among Muslims has long straddled a blurry line between culture and religion, but now scattered organizations founded by Muslim American women are creating a movement to define it as an unacceptable cultural practice. The problem occurs among American Muslims at the same rate as other groups, activists say, but is even more sensitive because raising the issue is considered an attack on the faith.

“The Muslim community is under a lot of scrutiny, so they are reluctant to look within to face their problems because it will substantiate the arguments demonizing them,” said Rafia Zakaria, a political science graduate student at Indiana University who is starting a legal defense fund for Muslim women. “It puts Muslim women in a difficult position because if they acknowledge their rights, they are seen as being in some kind of collusion with all those who are attacking Muslim men. So the question is how to speak out without adding to the stereotype that Muslim men are barbaric, oppressive, terrible people.”

The answer, she and other activists have concluded, is to show that Muslim Americans are tackling the problem.

“Domestic violence is an issue we can deal with as a community, and not by saying we don’t have this problem, which is obviously a lie,” Ms. Zakaria said.

Some activists describe being expelled from mosques and holiday fairs when they first tried to broach the topic five years ago, but they have achieved a wider audience by allying themselves with sympathetic clerics.

The Yemeni-American woman sought advice from several imams after her Yemeni husband of just a few months started to slap, punch and degrade her.

The clerics offered marriage counseling, but only if the husband came too, a condition she knew doomed the idea. Her sister suggested she lose weight and be more obedient. Her father encouraged obedience, too, while her husband hit her through three pregnancies. After she filed for divorce, she said, her father hauled her home and hit her too, for shaming him.

“Both my dad and my husband told me that women don’t talk back,” said the 29-year-old woman. “They told me the Koran said I had to be obedient, and I answered that it does not say beat up your wife.”

At Hamdard, calls for help come from Muslim women as far afield as Wisconsin, Kentucky and Louisiana, shelter workers said, far more than they can accommodate with just 11 beds. They turned away 647 women and children in 2007, said Maryam Gilani, the director of Hamdard’s domestic violence program, noting that about 55 percent of the women the center helped were Muslim. Some large, wealthy Muslim communities, like the one in the San Francisco area, have been unable to raise money for a shelter, which activists attribute to the wish to label the problem as foreign to Islam.

“There was resistance, and there still is,” said Ms. Gilani, adding that opponents dismissed shelters as some kind of brothel. “There are some who say what we do is not right, you have to stay with your husband and make it work. They try to turn it either into a religious thing, or they say that it is just a normal thing that happens in the family.”

The challenge for most organizations is getting accurate legal information to women who are often closeted at home and may not speak English. Hamdard developed several novel solutions. Briefing area grocery store owners and hairdressers that cater to Muslims produced numerous referrals. More often, it organizes mosque seminars about breast cancer, then slips in a few minutes about domestic violence.

Activists describe mosques as the most effective way to reach Muslims because immigrant societies remain heavily patriarchal and because American mosques serve as community centers. The latter also means that immigrant imams ill-equipped to deal with social problems are prone to give battered women advice like “Read the Koran more,” or will try couples counseling, which can bring disastrous consequences at home.

One outspoken cleric is Imam Muhammad Magid, who runs a collective of seven mosques in suburban Virginia and is vice president of the Islamic Society of North America, the country’s main Muslim umbrella organization. Anyone getting married at one of his mosques must undergo marriage counseling during which domestic abuse is discussed.

But activists expect real change will only come with the next generation of Muslim women here, raised in an American context that condemns such violence.

In most Muslim countries, the law is rooted in a combination of the Koran and tradition, so immigrants are more reticent.

“It is much more difficult there to say I want a divorce, I want custody or my husband is forcing me to have sex without my permission,” said Samira Ansari, a family lawyer in San Jose, Calif. “Because they don’t get that legal support back home, it takes them a while to understand what exists here.”

Mr. Magid said older immigrants in particular refused to hold men accountable and expected imams to advise the wife to return to her husband.

“So many people emphasize trying to keep the family together regardless of the pain or consequences,” he said. “We tell them that the foundation of the family is peace and tranquillity and if that doesn’t exist, then the family doesn’t exist as a unit.”

To counter opposition rooted in religious texts, Mr. Magid and others use the example of Prophet Muhammad. There is no record of him striking one of his wives; rather, he would withdraw when angered. The raging debate comes with Chapter 4, Verse 34 in the Koran, long interpreted as giving husbands the right to strike their wives as the final step in an escalating series of punishments for being rebellious.

Maha B. Alkhateeb, who helped edit a book on domestic violence called “Change From Within,” is among the leading activists pushing a new interpretation of the verse that understands it as calling for women to be obedient to God.

But given that the Koran is considered the unassailable word of God, it is particularly difficult for young, often secular women to promote a new interpretation.

Although few men cite the Koran as justification for hitting their spouses, Ms. Alkhateeb said that in every seminar she organized about ending domestic violence, at least one man invariably asked on what authority the verse could be reinterpreted.

Toward that end, Imam Johari Abdul-Malik, the outreach director for Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Va., is trying to set up a nationwide movement of Muslim men who will lobby for the new interpretation.

“That is the linchpin, the fulcrum that justifies domestic violence in the Muslim context,” the imam said.

Abused Muslim Women in U.S. Gain Advocates - New York Times

Family Security Matters

The Right to Offend: Putting the Muhammad Cartoons in Context

By Nicholas Guariglia

Pity Sofia Karlberg, the spokeswoman of the Swedish foreign ministry, who was tasked with the highly weasel-like chore of expressing regret for something she was not responsible for; for something that need not be regretted. It seems that Lars Vilks, a cartoonist for the Swedish paper Nerikes Allenhanda, drew unflattering depictions of the Islamic prophet and seventh-century general Muhammad. Karlberg eulogized to the BBC that the Swedish government “expressed regret that the publication of the cartoons had hurt the feelings of Muslims,” but continued that the government “can’t apologize for the cartoons because (the government) did not publish them.” .....

 

Nor should we forget the visceral reaction to previous doodlings. The publisher of the first Muhammad cartoons in 2005, Jyllands-Posten of Denmark, had also published satirical cartoons of Jesus and (what were Iran-sponsored) Holocaust-denying cartoons. Nobody killed anyone. But once the Danish newspaper violated the “sanctity” of Islamic aniconism, embassies went aflame, civilians were butchered across the world, diplomats cowered and then were attacked for their perceived passivity, countless death warrants ordered by old men in robes were issued, and suicide bombs were discovered all over Europe.

The charade was entirely manufactured and stoked by the Iranian theocracy and various loose-end clerical theocrats jockeying for power. Boycotts on the small pacifistic European democracy were intended to destroy its economy. The majority of Western papers whimpered away from reprinting the drawings in solidarity with free expression (and one that did, Free Inquiry out of New York, was banned from Borders bookstores).

Apologies, mea culpas, and soft-spoken confessions continued for months, underscoring the necessity for a bit more stoicism and a lot less sentimentality in our society. “Perhaps the cartoons were tasteless? Maybe they were a tad too insulting? Was their publication really prudent?” The sniveling, self-loathing masochism entirely missed the point.

Family Security Matters

"Reform Conference Reaches Out to Muslims, Evangelicals - Forward.com"

 

Reform Conference Reaches Out to Muslims, Evangelicals

By Anthony Weiss
Thu. Dec 06, 2007

The head of the largest Muslim organization in the country is expected to address the national gathering of North America’s largest Jewish denomination at its annual conference next week. The speech is part of a broader push at the conference to elevate interfaith dialogue with Muslims and Christians.

Ingrid Mattson, president of the Islamic Society of North America, will appear at the Union for Reform Judaism’s biennial, which is being held in San Diego. The event comes three months after the URJ’s president, Rabbi Eric Yoffie, addressed ISNA at its annual convention. Building on Mattson’s appearance, Yoffie is planning to announce a national dialogue and education program that Jewish and Muslim scholars have been developing together.

“We feel that American Jews and American Muslims need to sit down together and get to know each other, so you need a congregational component to that,” Yoffie told the Forward. “It’s not just a matter of bringing together a few rabbis and a few imams.”

In the past, Muslim-Jewish interfaith efforts have taken place on a small scale or within individual communities. Last month, a meeting of imams and rabbis from across the country billed itself as the first national interfaith effort. The Reform movement’s push is an attempt to encourage interaction nationwide, not only between clergy but also between rank-and-file members.

The appearance of Mattson at the convention is a triumph for Yoffie, who had insisted, in the face of criticism from within the Reform movement and from outside it, that ISNA was not a viable, moderate partner. But by attempting to push the dialogue from the leadership level down to the grassroots, the URJ and ISNA are entering difficult territory, testing the notion that congregants are as eager to work together as their leaders.

ISNA has been criticized in the past for its positions on terrorism and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but the national umbrella organization has recently been moving toward more moderate positions — a shift symbolized by the leadership of Mattson, who is both a woman and a convert to Islam.

Mattson could not be reached for comment.

Reform movement leaders said that the response in the Reform movement to Yoffie’s ISNA speech was generally positive. Pre-registration levels for a panel discussion on Islam are among the highest of any session at the conference. Other Reform leaders caution, however, that Jews might not find the same level of interest in dialogue from the less-established American Muslim community.

“The American Muslim community is just not there yet. They’re still busy dealing with things that feel like survival issues to them,” said Mark Pelavin, associate director of the Religious Action Center, the Washington office of the Reform movement. “So much of that community is still first generation, second generation, and still feeling its way through the organizational structure.”

Jewish and Muslim scholars have put together academic materials for congregations interested in pursuing a dialogue, or for those who, lacking a dialogue partner, wanted to educate themselves. But Rabbi Laura Geller, of Temple Emmanuel in Los Angeles, stressed that dialogue, by itself, wasn’t a sufficient basis for a connection.

“It used to be there was a Jewish-Catholic dialogue, there was a Muslim-Jewish dialogue, and the point was dialogue,” she said. “It’s important, but isn’t sufficient. I think what is really the goal of all of these connections is working together.”

The Reform movement’s interest in reaching out to religious groups with which the Jewish community has sometimes had contentious relations will also extend to evangelical Christians. Pastor Rick Warren, founder of the evangelical Saddleback mega-church in Orange County, Calif., and author of the mega-bestseller “The Purpose-Driven Life,” will be speaking at a workshop about community building, drawing on the enormous success of his own church.

The Rev. Jim Wallis, author of his own bestseller, “God’s Politics,” will be appearing on a panel about progressive religion and social action. Wallis has risen to prominence by arguing that evangelical values such as concern for poverty dictate a break with the religious right. More recently, Warren, too, has begun to speak about the importance of combating AIDS and global poverty.

"Reform Conference Reaches Out to Muslims, Evangelicals - Forward.com"

Muslim community growing in Connecticut -- Newsday.com

 

"This is a national effort to establish some understanding of Islam, to start an interfaith dialogue"

 

HARTFORD, Conn. - The Muslim community in Connecticut is growing, drawing more faithful to a mosque that provides room to expand and prompting efforts to reach out to others.
For example, a billboard on Interstate 84 west near Cheshire invites motorists to turn east, or toward Mecca.
The Connecticut chapter of the Islamic Circle of North America that paid for the billboard has sponsored similar highway messages nationwide to inform non-Muslims about Islam and counter negative images that followed the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

"This is a national effort to establish some understanding of Islam, to start an interfaith dialogue," said Naveed Khan, a member of the United Muslim Masjid, a Waterbury mosque under construction. "There is a great need to educate people about Islam after 9/11. As a community we need to address this issue."
Islamic Circle's national convention in July at the Connecticut Convention Center in Hartford was attended by about 15,000 people.
"What we see in the news media and television is a picture of Muslims that is far from reality," said Muhammad Ahmad, a member of the Islamic Circle of North America and a doctor who practices internal medicine in Chicago. "Unless we go out and tell our neighbors who we are, there is no one who will correct the image."
Ahmad, who answers phone lines that inform callers about Islam, said he's received calls from curious priests, students, Muslims, non-Muslims and news reporters. Some callers have even tried to convert him to their faith.
"We are giving out information. What people want to do with that information is their problem," he said.
Construction of the United Muslim Masjid in Waterbury is more evidence of the growing Muslim community in Connecticut. Khan said the group is building a 24,000-square-foot building because its current mosque can no longer fit the growing number of Muslims in the Waterbury area who pray there five times a day and gather for Islamic holidays.
Attendance at the mosque has grown in the last decade as a rising number of Muslims have arrived in the Waterbury area from Albania, Ghana and elsewhere.
The new mosque will have a community hall, library, gymnasium, learning center and a minaret tall enough to be seen from I-84. The new mosque also will allow its members to hold more outreach activities to educate the public about Islam and Muslims.
___
Information from: The Hartford Courant, http://www.courant.com

Muslim community growing in Connecticut -- Newsday.com

Be the moderate you're looking for | Indian Muslims

 

"O ye who believe! Stand out firmly for justice, as witnesses to God, though it may be against yourselves"

By Kareem Elbayar

"O ye who believe! Stand out firmly for justice, as witnesses to God, though it may be against yourselves, or your parents, or your kin, and whether it be against rich or poor: for God can best protect both. Follow not the lusts of your hearts, lest ye swerve, and if ye distort justice or decline to do justice, verily God is well-acquainted with all that ye do." (Qur'an 4:135)

Washington, DC - In a 7 December op-ed in The New York Times, Ayaan Hirsi Ali asked where the moderate Muslims were, and concluded that the very notion of a moderate Muslim majority was "wishful thinking". Ali's claims are echoed by many prominent commentators on the American right, and judging by the comments left on The New York Times website, by many average Americans as well. But the popular idea that mainstream Muslims either do nothing to condemn (or worse, secretly applaud) the outrages perpetrated in the name of our religion is not only reductive and misinformed – it is dangerously wrong as well.

The vast majority of the world's 1.5 billion Muslims are indeed moderate, peace-loving people who reject violent extremism and terror. Moderate Muslims are all around us, from the attorney and husband of the rape victim from Saudi Arabia, both of whom expressed revulsion and shame at the decision made by Saudi Arabian courts; to the delegation of British Muslims who travelled to Sudan and worked with Sudanese MP Ghazi Suleiman to secure the "teddy bear" teacher's release (and prove that the entire controversy was more about distracting international attention from Darfur than it was about Islam); to the literally hundreds of thousands of Muslim individuals and organisations in the United States and around the world that expressed shock and disgust at the events which Ali cites.

Ali conveniently omits these facts from her narrative – just as she plucks a single verse from the Qur'an, devoid of any context – in order to create a black-and-white fantasy world of Muslim radicals versus civilised Westerners. Yes Ms. Ali, verse 24:2 of the Qur'an sets out a harsh punishment for adultery – but verse 24:4 requires four eyewitnesses (an almost impossible standard to meet) and, more importantly, verse 24:5 states that the punishment should not be applied to those who sincerely repent. (So much for your argument that the Qur'an orders believers to show no compassion).

Ali may make headlines by writing polemics condemning Islam as a "backward religion" and "the new fascism", but in the meantime Muslim organisations like the one I am a member of, Muslims for Progressive Values, will continue to quietly but effectively do what we can to counteract the hateful nonsense that regretfully is being taught as Islam in far too many places. Moderate and even progressive Muslim organisations can be found all over the world, but we are too busy working within our communities to promote a message of reform and tolerance to do as Ali asks and "rise up in horror" every time some lunatic commits a crime in the name of our faith. Nor should we be expected to do so. It seems that Ali would like me and my co-religionists to go about our lives constantly marching around the streets apologizing for the acts of zealots – but I will not do so, for I bear no more responsibility for these acts than she does.

Moderate and progressive Muslims are everywhere, but we are ignored and marginalised by the media and by commentators like Ali. It seems that in our modern age of sound bites and one-liners, strident if uninformed criticism will always outperform calm and reasoned debate. If Ali is serious about supporting tolerance among Muslims, perhaps she should spend less time penning distracting and misleading screeds against Islam and more time reaching out to groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Muslims for Progressive Values, Al-Fatiha, and Sisters in Islam. The only way to prevent the "clash of civilisations" from becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy is to build bridges between our communities. Promoting a black-and-white caricature of reality serves no one – least of all the tolerant Muslims Ali can't seem to find anywhere she looks.

------------------
Kareem Elbayar is the vice-chair of Muslims for Progressive Values. This article is distributed by the Common Ground News Service (CGNews) and can be accessed at www.commongroundnews.org.

Source: Common Ground News Service, 18 December 2007, www.commongroundnews.org
Copyright permission has been obtained for publication

Be the moderate you're looking for | Indian Muslims

BBC NEWS | UK | Magazine | The battle over mosque reform

 

British Muslim leaders are to tell mosques to reform - but do young Muslims even care?

This week began as just another for Britain's mosques. But by the end of it, things could be very different.

The four largest Islamic organisations in the UK have, against expectations, agreed professional standards for mosques. It may sound like management speak - but these standards on a mosque's obligations to society are part of a battle for hearts and minds in the face of violent extremism.

The unwieldily-named Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board (Minab) is seeking signatures on the dotted line. The question is whether any of it will make a difference.

The great era of mosque building was in the 1970s and 1980s, led by the first generation immigrants. They copied what they knew and mosques were built as prayer halls largely run on ethnic, cultural or tribal lines.

• PROPOSED MOSQUE STANDARDS
• Democratic and accountable
• Transparent finances
• Open to women and youth
• Counter-extremism programmes
• Inter-faith schemes
• Work against forced marriage

Mosques body targets extremism

Today there are at least 1,500 institutions which are broadly independent of one and other. But while they may be about to get a dose of 21st Century management consultancy, tens of thousands of young British Muslims have already drifted away.

Many British-born Muslims believe mosques offer them nothing - and so they are looking elsewhere for answers. Navid Akhtar is a commentator and a producer of muslimcafe.tv. It's a polished internet broadcast with guests debating big issues of the day in a media-savvy way.

When some Muslim leaders condemned a recent groundbreaking Channel 4 drama about a British Muslim joining MI5 while his sister became a terrorist, muslimcafe.tv was one of the places where British Muslims debated the issues.

Complex identities

"The communities have changed and the mosques have not kept in touch because they are still run by the first generation," says Akhtar.

"Today we have got very complex identities as Muslims living in the West - but the mosque as an institution has not tuned in to that."

"People go, they learn the Koran, they do their communal prayers and that's about it. It's the bits that are missing that concern us - people going through divorce, social problems, alienation - people born here but feeling marginalised or betrayed as Muslims.

Prayers: But many mosques have little space for women

"They look to the mosque for support - but they are desperately inadequate in delivering it."

Akhtar tells a story that can be heard time and again among British Muslims who say Mosques have unwittingly played a part in extremism.

"If I go to my local imam who is Pakistani, whose identity is Pakistani, to talk this stuff, he will just give a flick of my ear - he is not really concerned about me being British or not.

"This is what gave birth to radical organisations - kids came to the mosque and battled with the first generation over cultural issues, like arranged marriages or being forced to learn Urdu. They went elsewhere for answers and found people like the radical preacher Omar Bakri.

"Some of the birth of radical Islam in this country came out of these cultural issues that the first generation didn't want to address."

Sensitivities

It's this accusation that has caused the most tension between the generations in Muslim Britain - and what will make the attempts to modernise mosques so they appeal to the young so difficult. Government is pushing hard for the work to be done because it needs results on extremism. But the communities are scared of becoming being political stooges.

Leicester-based imam Ibrahim Mogra is involved in the reform agenda and a leading figure in the Muslim Council of Britain - but he warns against creating a body that does government's bidding.

"This won't be a body with any legislative powers where we can police mosques and tell them what to do or dictate what not to do," says Sheikh Mogra.

Janmohamed says change must come from within

"We're going to be promoting good practice and highlighting where the formulas are extremely successful and encouraging others to buy into that model. The creation of this body is not in response to our so-called 'war on terror' and is not part of the agenda of preventing extremism. It will be a useful tool - but it's not the primary purpose."

Shelina Zahra Janmohamed is the voice behind Spirit21, an influential blog with readers across the cultural and religious spectrum. Her commentary on Muslim Britain has a following among key government figures. She is typical of growing numbers of Muslim women debating critical issues because they very often find no welcome at the steps of the mosque.

"You've got to realise that there are some that are small and run by 'uncles' who, to be frank, would not let a woman within three feet of the mosque. There are others which have large spaces for women. Some mosques sometimes seem to be a bit of a working man's club. And the problem is that many young people leave the mosque behind because there is no social element or relevance for them."

Pro-reform Muslims

Janmohamed argues that the new mosques body needs to encourage rather than force change and avoid the taint of government interference. The trick, she say, is to get changes like representations for women to happen from within. Only then will mosques start to look like progressive institutions playing an active role in building community ties.

And it is community that pro-reform Muslims see as essential to success. If Minab is a success, they believe it will bring Muslims closer to the mainstream because it will help build a sense of what it is to both a British citizen and a Muslim.

Hardline islamists see the two as incompatible. In the shadows of the real world and the internet exist extremists ready to identify confused young and women who can be sold a simple story that ends with a bomb being strapped to the body.

The fact is that these recruiters will be there for a long time to come. Janmohamed says government needs to change its language so the debate around mosques and improving the lot of Muslims is not automatically and always linked to terrorism.

"The really serious individuals intent on violence don't go to the mosques - but if mosques step up to the plate then some may not go down that route. But it's only one part of the answer."

BBC NEWS | UK | Magazine | The battle over mosque reform

Where is the Muslim outrage?

By: - Mike Ghouse

As a Muslim I am outraged at this nonsense going on in Sudan and Saudi Arabia.
When Prophet Muhammad's cartoons were published, the few Muslims around the world were outraged to the point of becoming destructive. They burned the embassy in Syria. Their contention was that the Prophet cannot be contained in an image, they were right but they were dead wrong on destroying any property, it went against the very principles taught by the Prophet "to forgive the wrong doers". Not enough of us were outraged against those criminals to make a difference.
Ms. Gibbons affectionately calls the Teddy bear "Muhammad" and the fanatics cry foul. The good for nothing silent majority needs to step up and condemn the individuals and the government of Sudan for treating a lady for her benevolence in such an ugly manner. She probably would not have named, had she known about it.
Prophet Muhammad would be saddened with these guys behavior.
When the Buddha Statue, a world heritage monument was destroyed in Pakistan last month, Where was the Muslim outrage?
When the Buddhist Monks were locked up in Burma, where was the Muslim outrage?
What is good for the goose has got to be good for the gander. The third Caliph Omar punished his own son against a complaint from a Jewish businessman; such was the sense of Justice. Where is that sense of justice and fairness now?
Mirza A. Beg writes, "…a woman in Saudi Arabia was gang-raped. She was seen in a car with a person not of her family. She was also found guilty along with the rapists and recommended punishment under the Saudi Law."

Where is the Muslim outrage?

On Faith: Guest Voices: The Real Teddy Bear Tragedy

The Real Teddy Bear Tragedy

By Hamza Yusuf

In all the heat generated by the teddy bear controversy in Sudan, we are missing a deeper reality: As irrational and backward as the reaction in Khartoum might seem, it is yet another example of some Muslims attempting to assert themselves and exercise a little authority in the face of the immense onslaught of Western hegemony in the region.

The facts are that Gillian Gibbons, a British teacher at a private school in Khartoum, had her 7-year-old students name a teddy bear and they overwhelmingly chose "Muhammad." The students took turns taking the bear home and wrote a diary about what they did with it, which was compiled into a book with a picture of the bear and the title "My Name is Muhammad." Some parents were offended and the Sudanese government responded by arresting and charging Gibbons with insulting the Prophet of Islam.

The charge is without merit, of course. But it is worth noting that for Muslims, the idea of calling any object other than a human being "Muhammad" is sacrilegious. With Jews, Muslims share a prohibition of making physical images of any living things. An exception is made for children's toys. Calling the image of any animal Muhammad, a name that Muslims won't utter without a benediction is, for them, beyond the pale. Turks even prefer the contraction Mehmet to avoid using the name in common circumstances. Westerners have a hard time understanding such reverence in a markedly irreverent age.

In the West, teddy bears are objects of devotion for little children and for most adults fond memories of a cuddly teddy bear endure. A child calling a teddy bear Jesus, for instance, may seem inappropriate, but would likely elicit a response of "How cute!" Westerners are dumbfounded at what appears to be an absolutely insane response to an unfortunate lack of cultural sensitivity. But so, I would venture, are most Muslims.

I was appalled by the response of the Sudanese authorities and denounce their arrest of Ms. Gibbons. I am glad she has been released. The danger here is that despite most Sudanese being beautiful and proudly hospitable people, too many Westerners will nonetheless see them as barbarians unworthy of respect. Hence, it fuels the current attacks on them due to their government's failure to address Darfur's serious problems. Far from being xenophobic or genocidal, I know the Sudanese to be a serene and irenic desert people. Even Ms. Gibbons now says that she has been treated well by the Sudanese. "I have encountered nothing but kindness and generosity from the Sudanese people. I have great respect for the Islamic religion and would not knowingly offend anyone and I am sorry if I caused any distress," she said.

Unfortunately, millions of Muslims all over the globe are humiliated and betrayed by the ignorance and lack of basic humanity that a small minority of Muslims too often exhibits. Should I, however, bring this up with many of my Muslim brothers and sisters a common response is: "It's true, but look at what the West is doing to Muslims; 800,000 thousand dead in Iraq. And what about Palestine, Kashmir, Chechnya and the rest? Why don't Western people denounce these atrocities against us and only harp about how backward we are?" A famous Iraqi poet once wrote, "If one person is harmed it is an unpardonable sin, but a whole people's destruction is something to debate." Unfortunately, these Western horrors against the Muslims demand responses, but Muslims must also recognize and denounce these wrongs too often associated with our Prophet and our faith without always pointing fingers elsewhere.

Our current world can go one of two ways at this crossroad. We can go down the path of more violence, more hatred and more alienation, or we can attempt to understand each other, recognize our real differences, and display mutual respect. True religion -- as well as the highest secular values -- demands we take the latter road.

Indeed, the situation in Sudan is a medieval misunderstanding and overreaction. So are the myriad cases of torture, rape and pillaging that are now part of our daily patch of foreign, and increasingly, domestic news. Indeed, our dark medieval past seems to be having an ironic renaissance in the West and the Muslim world.

So when we see an irrational or misguided reaction of some Muslims, as we now see in Sudan, it behooves us to reflect on the deeper reality causing it.

On Faith: Guest Voices: The Real Teddy Bear Tragedy

Al-Ahram Weekly | Profile | Hans Kèng: Moral moorings

For him, one opportunity for Muslims to indulge in reform came during the era of the French Revolution, when Muslims were obliged to face modern realities and to examine the fundamentals of their religion

Hans Kèng: Moral moorings

Roman Catholic theologian Hans Kèng was ordained a priest in 1954, and in 1962 he was appointed peritus, or special theological advisor, by Pope John XXIII. However, in December 1979, he was stripped of his licence to teach, largely because of his opposition to the doctrine of papal infallibility, expressed in his book Infallible? An Inquiry, published in 1971. Nevertheless, Kèng has not given up his quest to reform the Catholic Church, and he is both a respected Christian theologian and a widely recognised authority on world religions, especially on the "Abrahamic" religions -- Islam, Christianity and Judaism. Until his retirement in 1996, Kèng was professor of ecumenical theology and director of the Institute for Ecumenical Research at the University of Tèbingen in Germany, where he worked with his friend Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI. Today, he heads the Global Ethic Foundation. Following the 11 September 2001 attacks on New York and Washington, the then UN secretary-general Kofi Annan appointed Kèng a member of an international group of eminent persons brought together to promote dialogue among civilisations. Kèng was a natural choice for the position, since he was familiar with the Judeo-Christian Bible, the Hindu Bhagavad-Gita, the discourses of the Buddha and Confucius, and the Quran. Kèng's works include Does God Exist? An Answer for Today (1980); Eternal Life? (1984); Christianity and Chinese Religions (1988 with Julia Ching); Paradigm Change in Theology (1989); The Catholic Church (2002); and My Struggle for Freedom (2003). He was recently named one of the world's top 100 intellectuals by the British magazine Prospect.

Interview by Gamal Nkrumah

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'The history of Islam is about a third shorter than Christianity, it is no less complex. The more Islam spread, the less monolithic it became'

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It is mid-morning, and the calm of the corner of the Cairo hotel in which Hans Kèng explains his views on Islam and inter-religious dialogue is disturbed by the infuriating ring-tones of mobile phones.

Misreading the Muslim world has had grave ramifications, he says, and he infuses his understanding of the history of Islam with a wealth of detail and a kind of unanticipated solemnity. "There will be no peace among nations without peace among religions," he states, matter-of- factly, and his deepest desire is precisely to help bring about an atmosphere of greater understanding between Muslims and Christians.

Kèng is unhappy with the current state of affairs and particularly about growing tensions between Muslims and Christians in the West. What he advocates above all is a common ethical framework for humanity as a whole, which must "demolish the walls of prejudice stone by stone and build bridges of dialogue, rather than erect new barriers of hatred, hostility and vengeance." In particular, for this Swiss-born Christian theologian, Westerners must build bridges of dialogue with Muslims.

Al-Ahram Weekly | Profile | Hans Kèng: Moral moorings

The Canadian Press: Calgary imam says Islam, family violence don't mix; goes on hunger strike

 

CALGARY - An imam from Alberta was planning to go on a weekend hunger strike to bring attention to domestic violence and how it is completely against the teachings of Islam.

Any violence involving families is "absolutely un-Islamic," Syed Soharwardy of the Calgary Islamic Centre said Friday.

"We should not be using religion as a scapegoat to justify what we need. We should resolve our disputes based on reasoning, logic (and) cool-mindedness."

The imam's comments came after the death earlier this month of 16-year-old Aqsa Parvez of Mississauga, Ont., who reportedly had a long-standing dispute with her family over her apparent reluctance to wear the traditional Muslim headscarf, the hijab.

Her father, who has not yet entered a plea, has been charged with her murder.

Soharwardy, who is also national president of the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada, said family violence plagues every group in society, but it seems that faith is only used as an excuse when it comes to Muslims.

He also said it is against his religion to force Islamic will upon others. "Islam wants people to have a righteous and a pious life, but Islam leaves that decision up to that person."

Other Canadian Islamic leaders have also publicly come out this week to emphasize that their religion condemns violence and teaches its followers not to force their beliefs upon others.

The Canadian Press: Calgary imam says Islam, family violence don't mix; goes on hunger strike

Islam’s Silent Moderates - New York Times

Islam’s Silent Moderates

By AYAAN HIRSI ALI

Published: December 7, 2007

The woman and the man guilty of adultery or fornication, flog each of them with 100 stripes: Let no compassion move you in their case, in a matter prescribed by Allah, if you believe in Allah and the Last Day. (Koran 24:2)

She very conveniently leaves out the rest of the verses;

[24:5] If they repent afterwards and reform, then GOD is Forgiver, Merciful.
[24:6] As for those who accuse their own spouses, without any other witnesses, then the testimony may be accepted if he swears by GOD four times that he is telling the truth.
[24:7] The fifth oath shall be to incur GOD's condemnation upon him, if he was lying.
[24:8] She shall be considered innocent if she swears by GOD four times that he is a liar.
[24:9] The fifth oath shall incur GOD's wrath upon her if he was telling the truth.

And finally

[4:15] Those who commit Adultery among your women, you must have four witnesses against them, from among you. If they do bear witness, then you shall keep such women in their homes until they die, or until GOD creates an exit for them.*
[4:16] The couple who commits Adultery shall be punished.* If they repent and reform, you shall leave them alone. GOD is Redeemer, Most Merciful.

Sungyoon Choi

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"The key to ending this tyranny of interpretation of the Koran is within the Koran itself, if the people have the courage to use it. "

IN the last few weeks, in three widely publicized episodes, we have seen Islamic justice enacted in ways that should make Muslim moderates rise up in horror.

A 20-year-old woman from Qatif, Saudi Arabia, reported that she had been abducted by several men and repeatedly raped. But judges found the victim herself to be guilty. Her crime is called “mingling”: when she was abducted, she was in a car with a man not related to her by blood or marriage, and in Saudi Arabia, that is illegal. Last month, she was sentenced to six months in prison and 200 lashes with a bamboo cane.

Two hundred lashes are enough to kill a strong man. Women usually receive no more than 30 lashes at a time, which means that for seven weeks the “girl from Qatif,” as she’s usually described in news articles, will dread her next session with Islamic justice. When she is released, her life will certainly never return to normal: already there have been reports that her brother has tried to kill her because her “crime” has tarnished her family’s honor

Islam’s Silent Moderates - New York Times