Book on apostasy in Islam earns writer the moniker Somalia’s Salman Rushdie – Religion News Service

2014/11/19 Leave a comment

Brave and courageous.

But it is a test within Islam between those more open believers and the literalists/fundamentalists:

Ismail said the book furthers the growing voice of Muslim scholars, intellectuals and prominent clerics worldwide who are increasingly rejecting the abuse of Islam by extremist groups such as the Islamic State, Nigeria’s Boko Haram and Somalia’s Al-Shabab.

“What we need are secular states where there is democracy, justice and equality for all,” he said. “Not theocratic ones where leaders rule by the name of God.”

Ismail’s concern is that Somali Islamic militants, clerics and other extremist groups in Muslim-majority countries are applying apostasy as a political tool, branding those with contrary opinions as apostates who need to be killed. He has watched Al-Shabab justify the deaths of those who oppose their hard-line interpretation of the Quran by branding them apostates. Somali civil servants, national army officers, local or international nongovernmental organization officials, are considered devil’s spies who deserve death, he added.

“I wanted to explain to my people the true meaning of apostasy in Islam,” he said.

A graduate of the Umm Al-Qura University in Saudi Arabia, Ismail, 50,  has written four other books on globalization and economics.

But he appears to have struck a raw nerve with the latest book, which he had hoped would stimulate a debate on religious freedom in Islam. The book also touches on other issues, such as gender equality and stoning adulterers to death in Islam.

“Apostasy is crime in Islam,” said Sheikh Abdallar Kheir, a religious scholar at Kenyatta University in Nairobi. “It is mentioned in the Quran and the traditions of the prophet. It is like treason.“

But there conditions and situations in which the rule is applied,” Kheir added. “It must be in an Islamic state, there must be dialogue and reasoning before it is applied, and it is applied if the person in the new faith causes disturbance to Muslims or the Islamic faith.”

Sorry, Sheikh Kheir, your conditions don’t cut it from a human rights and dignity perspective.

Book on apostasy in Islam earns writer the moniker Somalias Salman Rushdie – Religion News Service.

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Government rethinking counter-terrorism plan, Senate learns | Ottawa Citizen

2014/11/18 Leave a comment

Sensible focus on prevention strategy, particularly community outreach and intervention:

[ADM at Public Safety, Gary] Robertson and other officials from Public Safety and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, in response to committee questioning, also revealed Monday that:

– Contrary to rumours, the government is not contemplating outlawing the promotion or glorification of terrorism on the Internet – beyond existing laws against hate speech and hate crime.

– Some of the estimated 80 to 90 radicalized Canadians who have returned home from foreign terror activities have become “disillusioned” with jihad.

– Disruptive measures, such as no-fly lists, seizing passports, immigration actions and officially banning activities related to terrorist organizations and individuals so-called federally listed entities, help explain why more traditional criminal arrests and prosecutions haven’t occurred in Canada.

– The 2012 counter-terror strategy, which put some badly needed meat on the bone of the government’s 2004 national security policy, has four pillars: prevent, detect, deny and respond.

Robertson said the government believes prevention, largely through community outreach and intervention, is the most effective way to address the problem of radicalization.

That includes training individuals, from imams, teachers and school counsellors to community nurses, to recognize changes in behaviours and attitudes that may signal an individual is becoming radicalized.

There also are “law enforcement personnel that are trained and sensitized to these unique issues, that they understand how to (deal) with the community practitioners,” he said. “It isn’t necessarily going to lead to incarceration” if a family or friends of a person approach police about them.

Government rethinking counter-terrorism plan, Senate learns | Ottawa Citizen.

Quebec Premier Couillard emphasizes the importance of addressing social inclusion and causes of radicalization in his meeting with members of the Muslim community:

«Il ne faut pas faire semblant d’ignorer la question, qu’il y a quelque part un lien entre la déformation de l’islam, de la religion et ces actions. Ça, ça contribue davantage à l’incompréhension entre les communautés», a fait valoir le premier ministre.

Il reconnaît que les crimes qui ont récemment ébranlé le Canada ne s’expliquent pas simplement par une cause unique comme l’islam radical, mais précise que souvent des jeunes aux prises avec d’autres problèmes sont plus vulnérables et deviennent des proies pour ceux qui prônent la violence.

Il faut examiner les causes de la radicalisation des jeunes, a avancé M. Couillard.«L’idée nest pas de dire ceci est compréhensible, parce que… Non. Ces gestes sont condamnables de toute façon, dans l’absolu», a-t-il dit.

«Mais on doit travailler ensemble sur notre société pour mettre en place un environnement qui éloigne les jeunes de ce projet, on peut dire, maléfique.»

Il croit de plus que cette discussion est nécessaire, car il faut aussi protéger les Québécois de confession musulmane qui sont eux-mêmes victimes de harcèlement ou de violence.

M. Couillard veut notamment améliorer l’intégration des membres de cette communauté, pour éviter qu’ils ne se radicalisent, en favorisant l’éducation et l’emploi. Il a notamment dit qu’une reconnaissance des diplômes étrangers plus souple est sur la table et que sa ministre de l’Immigration, Kathleen Weil, prépare actuellement une nouvelle politique d’immigration.

Couillard a rencontré des membres de la communauté musulmane | Stéphanie Marin | Politique québécoise.

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Halifax monument to the ‘none is too many’ vessel looking for new home

2014/11/18 Leave a comment

More on the Libeskind Wheel of Conscience, ironically a refugee given the Canadian Museum of Immigration doesn’t want it:

But both [Museum CEO Marie] Chapman and Shimon Fogel, CEO of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, said that despite the Libeskind design being chosen democratically by a selection committee, the museum location might never have been ideal.

They note the original space chosen to display it meant the back part of the monument — where the names of ship passengers are inscribed — was inaccessible to the public, that it has needed repairs more than once and that it had to be unplugged when it started producing a foul-smelling black substance.

“Where the process failed was in ensuring that some feasibility study was done about this kind of an exhibit, given the parameters or the constraints of the geographic location that it was proposed for,” Fogel said.

Fogel said possible locations include the newly opened Canadian Museum for Human Rights in Winnipeg and the site of the future National Holocaust Monument in Ottawa.

Builder Darius Mosun, who said his company wants to be left out of the controversy, confirmed Monday the monument has been “continuously running up until now with no problems whatsoever” since it was repaired this summer and added that no one has come to inspect it.

Halifax monument to the ‘none is too many’ vessel looking for new home | Toronto Star.

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When Whites Just Don’t Get It, Part 4 – Kristoff

2014/11/18 Leave a comment

Kristoff on the enduring legacy of race and history:

Yet one element of white privilege today is obliviousness to privilege, including a blithe disregard of the way past subjugation shapes present disadvantage.

I’ve been on a book tour lately. By coincidence, so has one of my Times Op-Ed columnist colleagues, Charles Blow, who is African-American and the author of a powerful memoir, “Fire Shut Up in My Bones.” I grew up in a solid middle-class household; Charles was primarily raised by a single mom who initially worked plucking poultry in a factory, and also, for a while, by a grandma in a house with no plumbing.

That Charles has become a New York Times columnist does not mean that blacks and whites today have equal access to opportunity, just that some talented and driven blacks manage to overcome the long odds against them. Make no mistake: Charles had to climb a higher mountain than I did.

WE all stand on the shoulders of our ancestors. We’re in a relay race, relying on the financial and human capital of our parents and grandparents. Blacks were shackled for the early part of that relay race, and although many of the fetters have come off, whites have developed a huge lead. Do we ignore this long head start — a facet of white privilege — and pretend that the competition is now fair?Of course not.

If we whites are ahead in the relay race of life, shouldn’t we acknowledge that we got this lead in part by generations of oppression? Aren’t we big enough to make amends by trying to spread opportunity, by providing disadvantaged black kids an education as good as the one afforded privileged white kids?

Can’t we at least acknowledge that in the case of race, William Faulkner was right: “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.”

When Whites Just Don’t Get It, Part 4 – NYTimes.com.

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Jonathan Kay: In the heart of urban America, a troubling Hasidic theocracy

2014/11/18 Leave a comment

Jon Kay on the hasidim of Brooklyn:

The highly localized, hermetically sealed nature of Hasidic life helps explain why the theocratic rot in Borough Park has persisted, even as America more generally has been simultaneously engaged in a full-on culture war against the purveyors of shariah.

Because we are engaged in a global conflict with Islamists who seek to impose Muslim theocracy on the whole planet, every hint of shariah seems threatening. But ultra-orthodox Judaism, including its Hasidic strain, isn’t a prosletyzing, universalist faith. They don’t strap bombs to their chests or speak of waging “resistance” against “infidels.” In their highly concentrated communities in Brooklyn, London, Montreal, Belgium and Israel, the Hasidim pretty much just want to be left alone, free of outside cultural pollutants.

And for the most part, we give them what they want — until something horrible happens, like child sex abuse, that causes us to take notice. At that point, there must be, as McGuinty put it a decade ago, “one law for all.” Imposing that single law starts with whistleblowing, investigation and fearless reporting. In that regard, Sam Kellner and Rachel Aviv are both true heroes of Borough Park.

Jonathan Kay: In the heart of urban America, a troubling Hasidic theocracy

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Douglas Todd: The dangers of scapegoating religion: Karen Armstrong

2014/11/18 Leave a comment

Good interview with Karen Armstrong on her latest book, Fields of Blood:

Armstrong would not be content with the platitude that such and such a faith is strictly “a religion of peace.” She defends the need for countries to have responsible militaries and reveals how religious people have often been far from innocent, allowing their faith to be co-opted for destruction.

For instance, she notes that while Jesus was a near-pacifist, Mohammed was a powerful leader. When Mohammed was locked in open war with Jewish tribes, Armstrong judges his decision to slaughter 700 Jewish men and put their wives and children into slavery as “an atrocity that marked the lowest point in the Prophet’s career.”

Otherwise, she believes, Mohammed was a consensus builder and deal maker who respected Jews and Christians as “the people of the Book Bible,” adding, “Mohammed must be one of the few leaders in history to build an empire largely by negotiation.”

In discussing religion, in other words, we have to avoid stereotyping, but we also have to be realistic.

That requires acknowledging that religion around the planet, as many immigrants to North America will attest, is not all sweetness. It can be used to persecute minorities — and it frequently comes with scriptural literalism, patriarchy, intolerance of homosexuality and opposition to individual freedom.

Yet, with all the accusations flying around blaming religion for virtually all conflict and oppression, it’s more than valid to recall how religion has also long been an inspiration for peace and reconciliation.

“It is simply not true that ‘religion’ is always aggressive. Sometimes it has actually put the brakes on violence,” says Armstrong in Fields of Blood.

Douglas Todd: The dangers of scapegoating religion.

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Minister knew Canada wouldn’t meet Syrian refugee commitment

2014/11/17 Leave a comment

Caught out. At best, misleading the House and Canadians.

Four days later [March 25, 2014], C.I.C. officials told Alexander in a briefing note that the government “will not meet its Syrian private sponsorship commitment by the end of 2014” because “it takes time for private sponsors to organize and raise the funds to welcome a refugee to Canada.”

Highlighting the point, officials provided Alexander an update on June 10 that showed just 58 private sponsorship applications had been approved since January.

The update, which did not say how many, if any, had actually arrived in Canada, was provided the day before Alexander hung up on CBC’s As It Happens when he was being asked about the government’s response to the Syrian refugee crisis.

The minister later said he hung up because he was late getting to question period. But the incident prompted suspicions the government was lagging in its promise to resettle 1,300 Syrian refugees.

Alexander had repeatedly said more than 1,150 Syrians had received “Canada’s protection,” a figure he also cited in the House of Commons throughout the spring.

However, the documents show that number refers to all Syrian refugees accepted since 2011, including 942 who had travelled to Canada on their own before applying for asylum in the country.

Only 219 had actually been resettled from overseas, of which 93 had arrived in 2014 and would count toward the commitment to take in 1,300.

Liberal immigration critic John McCallum says the fact the Conservative government won’t meet its own “pathetically, ridiculously small” commitment demonstrates it has no real interest in accepting Syrians into Canada.

“They don’t care,” he said Friday. “It’s not a priority. If they cared, they could get the United Nations and people out in the field to give them huge numbers. There’s no shortage of needy people out there.”

NDP immigration critic Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe said the documents could explain why Alexander has been extremely evasive when asked to provide concrete numbers about how many Syrian refugees have arrived in Canada as part of its commitment to the UN.

“I would be very ashamed if I was the minister and I wasn’t able to fulfil such a small commitment in that massive crisis,” she said. “There’s nothing to be proud of in how the government has answered the international call.”

Always safer to stick to the truth, provide an explanation for some of the difficulties, rather than being ‘clever’ and  evasive. Eventually, the truth will come out.

Minister knew Canada wouldn’t meet Syrian refugee commitment | Ottawa Citizen.

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More refugee claimants get 2nd chance with new appeal process

2014/11/17 Leave a comment

Interesting:

Under the old system of judicial review, only about seven per cent of rejected claimants were granted leave to appeal their cases to the Federal Court. That means the number of people who are now getting a chance at an appeal has nearly tripled.

“They’re doing a better job, a much better job than the previous federal court process,” said Peter Showler, professor emeritus at the University of Ottawa and a former chair of the Immigration and Refugee Board. “[But] that’s because that process was so drastically limited.”

Under the old system, the standard for overturning a decision was too narrow, Showler argued. Federal Court judges could only consider whether the decision reached by the refugee board was “reasonable” in law. That filter, he said, prevented many legitimate claims from being reviewed.

“One way of seeing it is the Refugee Appeal Division is certainly doing a better job of identifying mistakes than the federal court,” he said.

“Another way of seeing this is we’ve had 10 years of lack of justice in this country where claimants were incorrectly refused and we did not catch those mistakes.”

CBC News asked officials in Immigration Minister Chris Alexanders office to comment on the new figures. His office did not immediately respond.

But other experts say that while the numbers are encouraging, there are still far too many restrictions on who gets to appeal their case.

Refugee lawyer Lorne Waldman noted that claimants from so-called safe countries like Hungary and Mexico are barred from appealing their cases, as are claimants who arrive and lodge a refugee claim at the U.S. border.

The Government could tout this as evidence that refugee reform both tightened the system and made it more fair than the previous Federal Court process.

But that might undermine their overall anti-fraud and misrepresentation messaging.

More refugee claimants get 2nd chance with new appeal process – Politics – CBC News.

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Ontario girl can rely on traditional medicine to treat cancer, court rules

2014/11/17 1 Comment

This is a very uncomfortable ruling. So the rights of the parents and their belief in aboriginal healing outweigh the rights of the child to have a future:

Hospital president Dr. Peter Fitzgerald says there are no plans to appeal the ruling at this time.

“My main concern is for this child’s life,” he said. “Without treatment this child has no chance of survival. We really want to keep our doors open to the family and reach out as much as possible.”

The judge sided with McMaster on all other issues. He ruled the girl was not capable of making her own medical decisions. He affirmed that a court is the place to decide these cases, not Ontario’s Consent and Capacity Board. He agrees she requires medical treatment that her “caring loving” parent is not providing.

The hospital told court that before she withdrew from treatment in August, the girl had a 90 to 95 per cent chance of being cured by chemotherapy done in phases. However, in the end, it came down to Edward’s conclusion that the mother’s choice to pursue traditional medicine “is her aboriginal right.”

“This is not an eleventh hour epiphany employed to take her daughter out of the rigours of chemotherapy,” the judge wrote in his decision. “Rather it is a decision made by a mother, on behalf of a daughter she truly loves, steeped in a practice that has been rooted in their culture from its beginnings.”

“It is this Court’s conclusion therefore, that the mother’s decision to pursue traditional medicine for her daughter is her aboriginal right. Further, such a right cannot be qualified as a right only if it is proven to work by employing the western medical paradigm. To do so would be to leave open the opportunity to perpetually erode aboriginal rights.”

Noteworthy that the other aboriginal child in a similar situation, Makayla Sault, has relapsed, given her parents’ choice for alternative therapy.

Sad.

Ontario girl can rely on traditional medicine to treat cancer, court rules | Toronto Star.

Commentary by Arthur Schafer on the medical ethics involved:

Respect for the autonomy of children is important, especially when, as in cases involving chemotherapy, the proposed treatment is highly aggressive and distressing. These days, even quite young children are encouraged to participate. That’s good medicine as well as good ethics.

The question that should always be asked is whether this particular child is competent to make the difficult medical decisions on which the child’s life may depend. If a child appears to be dominated by the scientifically eccentric beliefs of her parents, then it may be the duty of a judge to rule that the child requires protection.

If the odds of survival were reversed, if chemo treatment had only a five to 10 per cent (instead of a 90 to 95 per cent) likelihood of saving the child’s life, then it would be reasonable for the family to make its own decision, without interference from doctors or courts. But when the scientific evidence strongly favours treatment then, whatever the family’s culture or religion, courts generally see it as necessary to override family autonomy in favour of child protection.

Canadian society has an ugly record of riding roughshod over the wishes of First Nations families. We should never forget the shameful legacy of the residential schools. Respect for First Nations cultural values is undeniably important.

When the crunch comes, however, and the life of a child hangs in the balance, then even if the parents and child favour traditional healing or alternative medicine our courts should take the child’s best interest as the deciding criterion. In this case, that didn’t happen.

First Nations children not well served by chemotherapy ruling: Arthur Schafer

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Saskatchewan Multicultural Week kicks off with forum, new PSAs

2014/11/17 Leave a comment

Despite its relatively lower level of diversity compared to neighbouring provinces Alberta and Manitoba, clear focus on multiculturalism:

A forum on multiculturalism kicked off Saskatchewan Multicultural Week on Saturday at the First Nations University of Canada.

“We need to understand everybody’s different cultures and embrace them as opposed to just seeing differences,” said Mark Docherty, minister of Parks, Culture and Sport.

The free event, titled ‘Remember our Past, Envision our Future’, focused on topics such as how to grow multiculturalism in Saskatchewan. The provincial government and the Multicultural Council of Saskatchewan MCoS partnered for the annual week to celebrate the 40-year anniversary of The Saskatchewan Multiculturalism Act.

Many in attendance at the forum weren’t born in the same country but could find unity in their experiences of living in Saskatchewan.

Saskatchewan Multicultural Week kicks off with forum, new PSAs – Regina | Globalnews.ca.

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