Jonathan Kay: Thirteen years after 9/11, the debate about Islam is still dominated, on both sides, by hysteria

2014/09/09 Leave a comment

Good commentary by Jon Kay on the difficulty in having a rational, balanced conversation:

The larger problem here is that, 13 years after 9/11, we still can’t seem to manage to have an adult conversation about Islam. Express any sort of compassion or nuance about the faith, and you’re accused of universal prostration before the Mohammedan hordes. Speak up about the religious and cultural traditions that cause someone to cut a journalist’s head off, and you’re an Islamophobe. Sometimes, it feels like the conversation hasn’t progressed much since the Twin Towers were still standing.

Thirteen years after 9/11, the debate about Islam is still dominated, on both sides, by hysteria

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Isils Western converts are not motivated by Islam. They are motivated by boredom – Telegraph Blogs

2014/09/08 1 Comment

Tim Stanley’s  take on radicalization from a conservative perspective, noting the similarities to Islamic-inspired radicalization to the European young terrorists of the Baader Meinhoff and Red Army in the 1970s:

To this collage of conservative thought, I’d add two observations. First, alienation from Western materialism being expressed through revolution is far from new. It demands comparison with the urban guerilla movements of the 1970s – all of which were predominantly drawn from middle-class kids who saw their parents’ success as a form of collaboration with capitalism and fascism.

Is there any real difference between, on the one hand, Mahmood allegedly abandoning professional achievement and the life of a liberated Western woman for Jihad, and, on the other hand, Ulrike Meinhof of the Red Army Faction abandoning her children and sparkling literary career for a life of assassinations and bombings in the 1970s German terrorist underground? None, except the contrasting ideological manifestations of their malaise.

And, aside from bourgeois angst, Seventies Marxism and contemporary Jihad are linked by a an obsession with America/Israel as a nexus of capital and military power that is responsible for everything wrong with the world and b an unrealistic sense of their ability to do anything about it. They are, in reality, grubby little criminals poking at the system with a blunt dagger. But they believe they are heralds of a New Order. They all suffer from the arrogance of youth.

….I’m not convinced. Aside from the terrible idea of turning history classes into propaganda about how wonderful the Whigs were, I also don’t believe that alienation is generally reduced by attempts at indoctrination. And while theocracy is a wretched idea, it’s pretty self-evident that the undoubted appeal of Anglosphere freedom is limited. That would be – to return to Michael Brendan Dougherty’s observations – because it offers material rewards but little in the way of spiritual sustenance. Mahmood was perfectly aware of the benefits of Anglosphere liberty (Magna Carta, kangaroos and apple pie?) because she had the privilege of growing up in the midst of its wealth and freedom. Yet, still, her family say that she has rejected it. Perhaps because it was not enough. And that’s the challenge that the West faces when fighting for the souls of narcissistic revolutionaries. What we have to offer as an alternative is, for many of them, not enough.

Isils Western converts are not motivated by Islam. They are motivated by boredom – Telegraph Blogs.

From the National Post, a profile on Aqsa Mahmood, the woman mentioned in Stanley’s piece:

Inside the life of a 20-year-old Scottish woman who ran away to become a hardline supporter of ISIS  

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Muslim America: Islamic, yet integrated | The Economist

2014/09/06 Leave a comment

The Economist’s survey of Muslim Americans and the contrast with European Muslims. Same general pattern with Canadian Muslims (about 3 percent of Canada’s population) in terms of the diversity of communities and outcomes, although overall have a higher low-income percentage.

And like the US, we also have that small number of those who radicalize and go off to fight in Syria, Iraq or elsewhere:

America’s Muslims differ from Europe’s in both quantity and origin. The census does not ask about faith, but estimates put the number of Muslims in the country at around 1% of the population, compared with 4.5% in Britain and 5% in Germany.

Moreover, American Islam is not dominated by a single sect or ethnicity. When the Pew Research Centre last tried to count, in 2011, it found Muslims from 77 countries in America. Most western European countries, by contrast, have one or two dominant groups—Algerians in France, Moroccans and Turks in Holland. This matters because the jumble of groups in America makes it harder for Muslim immigrants and their descendants to lead a life apart.

Different traditions get squashed together. When building mosques, says Chris McCoy, a Kentucky native who is a prolific architect of Islamic buildings, “the question is usually not whether we should have an Indian- or a Saudi-style dome but, can we afford a dome?”

Mixing breeds tolerance: Pew found that most American Muslims think that their faith is open to multiple interpretations, making them the Episcopalians of the Islamic world.

America’s Muslims are better off than their European co-religionists. They are almost as likely as other Americans to report a household income of $100,000 or more. The same cannot be said of the Pakistanis who came to work in the now-defunct textile mills of northern England or the Turks who became guest workers in West Germany. Many American Muslims arrived in the 1970s to complete their higher education and ended up staying. Muzammil Siddiqi, chairman of the Fiqh Council of North America, which issues fatwas, or religious opinions, to guide the behaviour of the country’s Muslims, is typical: he was born in India and holds a Harvard PhD in comparative religion.

There is a stark contrast between this group and some of the more recent immigrants from Somalia, who have fewer qualifications and lower wages as do African-American Muslims, who make up about an eighth of the total. This divide, if anything, makes America’s Muslims look more like the nation as a whole.

Muslim America: Islamic, yet integrated | The Economist.

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ISIS: The Death Rattle Of Islamism? « The Dish

2014/09/04 Leave a comment

Interesting take by Jonah Shepp:

This is all by way of saying, as a reminder, that “Caliph Ibrahim” Baghdadi represents Muslims about as thoroughly as Tony Alamo represents Christians. The fact that he has attracted enough funding and followers to run roughshod over northern Iraq and eastern Syria is nothing to brush off, but it’s not winning him any friends, and it doesn’t make his ideology any less ridiculous. It’s certainly not “Islam”, at least not as any Muslim I know practices it. That’s why I suspect it will fail, like most grandiose visions of world domination do. And by radicalizing the Islamic heartland against radicalism, as it were, perhaps ISIS will take the entire edifice of radical Islamism down with it.

The Death Rattle Of Islamism? « The Dish.

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Sikhs Vow to Litigate Helmets Issue – New Canadian Media – NCM

2014/09/03 Leave a comment

More on the Sikh motorcycle helmut controversy. A motorcycle as a “standard mode of transportation?” Perhaps, but a higher risk one, hence the need for helmets:

In Ontario, the helmet law as it applies to Sikhs was first challenged in 2008, when the Ontario Human Rights Commission took up the cause of Baljinder Badesha, who was fighting a $110 ticket he received a few years prior for refusing to wear his motorcycle helmet. Scott Hutchison, a constitutional lawyer at Henein Hutchison LLP, represented the OHRC in that case, arguing reasonable accommodation is justified for Sikh motorcyclists, given that observant Sikhs would otherwise be unable to access a standard mode of transportation. Ontario Court Justice James Blacklock, however, ruled against Badesha and the OHRC, issuing a 35-page decision. In it, he writes an exemption would render the helmet law unwieldy, since anyone violating it could simply claim they were devout.

“The officer wouldnt know if he was dealing with a devout Sikh or not, unless he took the word of the accused.”

The original challenge brought by the Ontario Human Rights Commission in 2008 sought an accommodation exemption based on the province’s Human Rights Code. A subsequent appeal of the decision to the Ontario Superior Court in 2011 upped the ante, focusing on Charter rights violations. In the end, Justice John Takach found no error in the lower-court ruling.

Sikhs Vow to Litigate Helmets Issue – New Canadian Media – NCM.

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Muslims can live faith more fully within Canadian society, Imam says in book aimed at ‘ostracized’ youth

2014/09/02 Leave a comment

Imam Delic’s book on the advantages Canadian Muslims have and the need for an intellectual renaissance within Islam:

Anybody who tries to destroy this creativity, who tries to block it, who tries to demean it, definitely does not understand what God Almighty was asking us with the first word that was revealed in the Qu’ran, and that is ‘iqra’ [read]. The first word that was ever revealed to the Prophet, peace be upon him, was not ‘pray,’ or ‘believe.’ It was ‘read.’ And ‘read’ came as a command. Why? Because if we don’t read, we will not learn. And if we do not learn, we will not know. And if we do not know, we will not understand. And if we do not understand, we will not be able to apply. Make sense?” Mr. Delic said. “Knowledge that does not actualize itself in positive action or ethical action is knowledge without base.”

The growth of Islam from the founding in Arabia through expansion as far as Moorish Spain suggests this intellectual command was once well understood, he said.

“At that time, when we stopped being intellectually challenged, or when we didn’t want to challenge ourselves, that creativity died out and that’s the reason why the Muslim community became stagnant, not progressive,” Mr. Delic said. “We need to re-read our historical texts in the context of modern times, modern societies, modern demands. I don’t want to take opinions of scholars from the 14th century that do not talk to my needs, my aspirations, even though I do respect them and their work for the time in which they lived. But their ideas do not apply to my time.”

In 2010, Defence Minister Peter MacKay cancelled a speech by Mr. Delic at an Islamic History Month event because he was then the new executive director of the Canadian Islamic Congress, which frequently indulged extremist views from 9/11 conspiracies to the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians by Israel, and whose founder Mohamed Elmasry once made controversial comments about the Mideast conflict on a talk show that he later apologized for and retracted.

Mr. Delic’s speech was by no means extremist. It was, like his book, a call to active citizenship for Canadian Muslims, and a rejection of Islam’s orthodox, insular traditions.

The Government’s decision to disinvite him Imam Zijad Delic: The cancelled speech | Full Comment | National Post), as well as a narrow focus on relations with minority Muslim communities, created some challenges for the security agencies that recognized the role they could play in reducing risks of radicalization.

Muslims can live faith more fully within Canadian society, Imam says in book aimed at ‘ostracized’ youth

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ICYMI: In Britain, School Report Cites Division Over Islam

2014/08/27 Leave a comment

I think the issue is not that this ‘turns’ students to or from terrorism, but the overall message it sends to students about acceptable behaviour in a multicultural and diverse society, based upon equality (see also UK: Michael Gove (Education Sec’y) accused of using ‘Trojan Horse’ row to push anti-Islam agenda):

British education inspectors investigated 21 schools after claims that Islamic fundamentalists had taken over leadership of schools in Birmingham, home to a significant Muslim population.

The inquiry found that the influence of hard-line school board governors sometimes left staffs polarized between those who favored a more Islamic approach and others who did not. In British state schools many governors are elected by parents or staff members.

Some teachers, for example, “actively discourage girls from speaking to boys,” the report said, adding that in one school “boys and girls are also taught separately in religious education and personal development lessons.”

At one school, Oldknow Academy, “governors have used the academy’s budget to subsidize a trip to Saudi Arabia for only Muslim staff and pupils,” the document said.

Among the striking details to emerge from the report was that a senior figure in one school was so scared of being seen talking to school inspectors that a meeting had to be arranged in a supermarket parking lot. Another school hired private investigators to check staff email, the report said.

Ofsted’s chief, Michael Wilshaw, described some of the findings as “deeply worrying and, in some ways, quite shocking.”

But the findings were criticized by the Muslim Council of Britain, which says it has more than 500 affiliated national, regional and local organizations, mosques, charities and schools. It argued that “extremism will not be confronted if Muslims, and their religious practices are considered as, at best, contrary to the values of this country and at worst, seen as ‘the swamp’ that feeds extremism.”

“There is scant evidence that the education system or the Muslim community are the reasons for why people turn to terrorism,” it added in a statement.

In Britain, School Report Cites Division Over Islam – NYTimes.com.

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ISIS betraying Muslims, says Calgary imam before hunger strike – Calgary

2014/08/25 Leave a comment

Consistent in his messaging and good both within the Muslim and broader communities:

Imam Syed Soharwardy, founder of Muslims Against Terrorism and the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada, says he wants to draw attention to the actions of ISIS — a group of militants fighting for an Islamic state in the Middle East whose violent activities show they are not Muslims.

“The atrocity that is being carried out by ISIS is quite horrible. It’s quite inhumane. Its terrorism and in Canada they have successfully recruited more than 100 people to go and fight for them in Iraq and Syria,” Soharwardy said.

“I want to create awareness about the nature of their work — they are using Islam, they are quoting Quran, they look like Muslims, they pray like Muslims but they are not Muslim. They are deviant people, and they are doing exactly everything which goes against Islam.”

Soharwardy said he wants to make sure Muslim youth know that ISIS militants are not Muslims because many are being brainwashed by the terror group and other radical leaders.

ISIS betraying Muslims, says Calgary imam before hunger strike – Calgary – CBC News.

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Canadian religious freedom ambassador Andrew Bennett says religious freedom violated in China

2014/08/22 Leave a comment

Not easy for this Government, as all governments, to balance economic interests with human rights concerns.

For the Conservative government, particularly challenging given their support, now muted, to Tibetans, their legitimate focus on issues relating to religious freedom and their overall anti-Communist regime framework:

“In China, unlike other parts of the world, religious freedom is being violated almost solely as a result of government restrictions.”​

“And that’s certainly a concern and an issue that we seek to raise with the Chinese,” Bennett told host Evan Solomon on Wednesday.

Under Canada’s long-standing “one China” policy, the Canadian government takes no position with regard to specific autonomy claims. But with religious freedom now a central tenet of Canada’s foreign policy, Bennett said it will take a stance when governments choose to discriminate on the basis of religion.

“In China right now, were seeing increasing state persecution of a variety of religious communities and this has been escalating over the last year or more.”

“For example, the case of China’s officials prohibiting Uighur Muslims from fasting during Ramadan. You know, this is completely unacceptable,” Bennett said.

“Now were seeing reports that the Chinese government wants to nationalize Christianity.”

Having Bennett do some early messaging will likely be followed by more discrete raising of the issues during the PM trip.

Interests are simply too serious to allow for “huff and puff” diplomacy.

Canadian ambassador Andrew Bennett says religious freedom violated in China – Politics – CBC News.

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In remote Xinjiang province, Uighurs are under siege

2014/08/18 Leave a comment

Good long piece by the Globe’s Beijing correspondent on Xinjiang and Beijing’s treatment of the Uighurs, China’s Muslim minority:

That the “Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region” is religiously and culturally unique, however, is beyond dispute. Islam arrived in the ninth century, largely displacing Buddhism. Today, many Uighurs are intellectually and linguistically oriented west toward Central Asia and the Middle East – watching Iranian music videos and reading Turkish news sites – rather than east toward coastal China.

Their home territory has, however, experienced tremendous change since the Communist Revolution in 1949. Briefly an independent state in the early 20th century, Xinjiang has in the past few decades become home to vast numbers of ethnic Chinese, many of them sent here by government settlement policies.

They now outnumber the Uighurs, and continue to arrive, drawn by untrammelled space and the jobs that flow from a land rich in resources.But the wealth hasn’t necessarily benefited the Uighur population. As the region’s oil and gas flow east, local filling stations routinely run short, with lineups 150 cars long.

In remote Xinjiang province, Uighurs are under siege – The Globe and Mail.

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