Friday, June 15, 2012

Gatestone Update :: Soeren Kern: Islam in Germany: "Germany Does Away With Itself", and more


Facebook  Twitter  RSS
Gatestone Institute
In this mailing:

Islam in Germany: "Germany Does Away With Itself"

by Soeren Kern
June 15, 2012 at 5:00 am
Be the first of your friends to like this.
"The values represented by Islam must correspond to our constitution. What applies here is the constitution, not Sharia law.... Those who do not accept this are in the wrong place here." — Chancellor Angela Merkel
German President Joachim Gauck recently said in a newspaper interview that Muslims living in Germany are a part of the country, but that Islam is not.
The comments -- Gauck is the ninth prominent German politician to voice an opinion about Islam -- have sparked a new round in the on-going debate over the role of Islam and Muslim immigrants in Germany.
During a May 31 interview with the German weekly newspaper Die Zeit, Gauck was asked about a quote from the previous German president, Christian Wulff, who during a keynote speech to mark the 20th anniversary of German reunification in October 2010, proclaimed that "Islam belongs in Germany" because of the four million Muslims who now live there. Germany has Western Europe's second-biggest Islamic population after France, with Turks the single biggest minority.
Gauck responded by saying that Wulff had wanted to encourage Germans to open themselves up to the reality that "many Muslims live in this country," but that he, Gauck, would have worded things differently than did Wulff.
Gauck continued, "I would have simply said that the Muslims who are living here are a part of Germany," but that religion should not be the defining mark for immigrants there. "Anybody who has come here," he said, "and does not just pay their taxes, but also likes to be here, partly because there is a level of justice and freedom not available in their country of origin, they are all one of us; so long as they adhere to our basic rules."
The 72-year-old Gauck, a former Lutheran pastor, also said he could understand people who might ask, "Where has Islam made an impression on this Europe? Did it experience the Enlightenment, or even the Reformation? … I am highly anticipating the theological discourse about a European Islam."
The leader of the environmentalist Green Party, Cem Özdemir, a German of Turkish descent, told the daily newspaper Ruhr Nachrichten that he could not understand Gauck's differentiation between Islam and Muslims. "When the president states that Muslims who live here belong to Germany," Özdemir said, "then of course Islam it part of Germany too."
Alexander Dobrind, however, the general secretary of the Christian Social Union (CSU), a conservative political party based in the southern German state of Bavaria and a partner in German Chancellor Angela Merkel's center-right ruling coalition, said, "Gauck has clearly found the right words. Germany is a country with a Christian character, a Christian history and a thoroughly Christian value system."
Dobrindt's comments directly contradicted those of fellow CSU politician Markus Söder, the finance minister of the state of Bavaria. On May 31, Söder surprised an audience of Turkish immigrants by declaring that "Islam is an integral part of Bavaria."
Söder made the comments at a Muslim cultural festival sponsored by an organization called the Turkish-Islamic Union for Islamic Affairs (DITIB), which is controlled by the Turkish government. According to Fikret Bilir, the Turkish chairman of DITIB in the Bavarian city of Nuremberg, Söder was met with "great applause. We hope that he remains steadfast."
In April 2012, German parliamentary spokesman Volker Kauder, in an interview with the newspaper Passauer Neue Presse, said: "Islam is not part of our tradition and identity in Germany and it therefore does not belong to Germany."
Previously, Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich said that Islam is not a part of Germany. Speaking to reporters at a news conference in March 2011, Friedrich said: "To say that Islam belongs in Germany is not a fact supported by history at any point." He also said that although Muslims should be allowed live in Germany, Muslim immigrants ought to be aware of Germany's "Western Christian origins" and learn German "first and foremost."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has stressed that Germany's roots are Judeo-Christian. She said: "Now we obviously have Muslims in Germany. But it is important in regard to Islam that the values represented by Islam must correspond to our constitution. What applies here is the constitution, not Sharia law."
Shortly thereafter, Merkel addressed an October 16 meeting of her center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party in Potsdam outside Berlin, where she conceded that Germany's efforts to build a post-war multicultural society had "failed utterly."
In a landmark speech, Merkel said: "We are a country which at the beginning of the 1960s actually brought [Muslim] guest workers to Germany. Now they live with us and we lied to ourselves for a while, saying that they will not stay and that they will have disappeared again one day. That is not the reality. This multicultural approach -- saying that we simply live side by side and are happy about each other -- this approach has failed, failed utterly."
Merkel also told the CDU annual conference in Karlsruhe that the debate about immigration "especially by those of the Muslim faith" was an opportunity for the ruling party to stand up confidently for its convictions. "We do not have too much Islam, we have too little Christianity. We have too few discussions about the Christian view of mankind."
Merkel continued: "Germany needs more public discussion about the values that guide us and about our Judeo-Christian tradition. We have to stress this again with confidence. Then we will also be able to bring about cohesion in our society." Merkel added: "We feel bound to the Christian image of humanity -- that is what defines us. Those who do not accept this are in the wrong place here."
In November 2010, the CDU passed a resolution stressing that Germany's cultural identity (Leitkultur) is based on the "Christian-Jewish tradition, ancient and Enlightenment philosophy and the nation's historical experience." The resolution also states: "Our country benefits from immigrants who live and work here. But Germany does not benefit from a minority that refuses to integrate, does not want to learn our language, and denies participation and advancement to their children.… We expect that those who come here respect and recognize our cultural identity."
The previous Interior Minister, Thomas de Maizière, rejected calls from some center-left Social Democrats and Greens for Islam to be recognized as a state religion along with Christianity and Judaism. Speaking on Deutschlandradio Kultur, he said: "If you now ask: Will Islam be put on the same level as the Judeo-Christian understanding of religion and culture that we have, then my answer is: not for the foreseeable future."
The president of the state of Bavaria, Horst Seehofer, has called for a halt to immigration from Turkey and Arab countries. In an interview with the German newsmagazine Focus, Seehofer said it was time for Germany to begin looking elsewhere for qualified workers, at a time when many parts of the labor market were facing grave shortfalls. "It is clear that immigrants from other cultural circles like Turkey, and Arab countries, have more difficulties," he said, " From that I draw the conclusion that we do not need any additional foreign workers from other cultures."
The current debate over the role of Islam in Germany was launched in August 2010 with the publication of a book entitled, "Germany Does Away With Itself."
The best-selling book shattered Germany's long-standing taboo on discussing the impact of Muslim immigration. It also resonated with vast numbers of ordinary Germans, who are becoming increasingly uneasy about the social changes that are transforming Germany, largely due to the presence of millions of non-integrated Muslims in the country.
The book, authored by 67-year-old Thilo Sarrazin, a renowned German banker who is also a long-time member of the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), is now on its 22nd edition. At the last count, it has sold more than two million copies, making it one of the most widely read titles published in Germany since the Second World War.
Polls show that almost half of the German population (from across the political spectrum) agree with Sarrazin's view that German immigration policies have produced a deeply divided society.
Soeren Kern is Senior Fellow for European Politics at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group. Follow him on Facebook.
Related Topics:  Germany  |  Soeren Kern

Can Muslims Reopen the Gates of Ijtihad?

by Harold Rhode
June 15, 2012 at 4:30 am
Be the first of your friends to like this.
Until Muslim countries and Muslim communities in the West allow their people to express themselves freely -- without fear of reprisal -- it is unlikely that the Muslim world will be able to think creatively and again become a center of science and knowledge, as it used to be in the early centuries of Islam.
The exercise of critical thinking and independent judgment – or Ijtihad --was an important way to address questions in the early centuries of Islam. After approximately 400 years, however, the leaders of the Sunni Muslim world closed the "Gates of Ijtihad;" Muslims were no longer allowed use itjihad to solve problems. If a seemingly new problem arose, they were supposed to find an analogy from earlier scholars and apply that ruling to the problem that arose. From the 10th century onwards, Sunni Muslim leaders began to see questioning as politically dangerous to their ability to rule. Regrettably, Sunni Muslim leaders reject the use of itjihad to this day.
As questioning could very likely upset the established order and bring down the autocracies and despotic regimes which rule most of the Muslim world, even Muslims who live in freer Muslim countries such as Turkey often hesitate to exercise ijtihad. How did the Muslim world succumb to this situation, and is there a way out?

Ijtihad in historical context

Ijtihad was important in early Islam: when questions arose - even while Muhammad was alive - for which there were no answers, Muhammad would call the Muslims together in their mosque. They would discuss the issues at hand, reason them through, and come to a consensus -- so came into being the Islamic concept of ijma' (consensus among the scholars).[1]
After Muhammad died, however, the Muslim community rapidly expanded; the community of scholars became too large, and ijma' no longer practical. What developed was a body of traditions – called hadiths – sayings and deeds attributed to their prophet Muhammad. When new questions arose, people would seek out individuals who had known Muhammad and ask them whether they had seen or heard Muhammad address the matter at hand.
Within 200 years, the number of hadiths was not ony thought to be in the hundreds of thousands, but people had no way of knowing which were true and which were fabricated. The great Muslim scholar, al-Bukhari (810 -870 CE), who analyzed them, concluded that only a few thousand were reliable.[2]
Later, when still more questions arose, diverse schools of thought developed. The Quran, the hadiths, and those schools of thought were collected into Islamic law. This body of Islamic religious guidance is known as the Shari'a, or "The Path."
During the first four centuries of Islam, Muslim scholars seem to have exercised independent judgment freely, and debated rigorously new issues that arose. The Muslim world at that time seems to have been inclusive and flexible; it accepted differing views, differing conclusions and differing sorts of influences that arose as part of the cultures of its large empire.[3]
Muslim scholars studied Arabic translations of ancient Greek texts which they thought might help them understand the nature of mankind as well as other aspects of life. These texts, though clearly non-Islamic, nevertheless provided scholars with useful insights. There were also intellectual interchanges with Jewish scholars, particularly in the fields of science, medicine, language, and geography. There seems to have been, however, little discussion with Christians.[4]
With time, however, the situation became unwieldy. Certain groups (called ghulat) were accused of extremism – going too far -- and attempts were made to rein them in.[5] Questions arose as to the limits of divergent views, and whether "extremist elements" could still be considered Muslim. The many schools of Islamic thought were reduced to four; these became the basis of the Sunni Shari'a.
As Islamic rule started to become more autocratic, Islamic rulers began to see discord as potentially able to undermine their rule.
All four schools accepted the Quran as the divine word of God, and the hadiths as the source for legal decisions. But it soon became apparent that the larger the number of hadiths a school of thought accepted, the more restrictive and rigid this school became. The Hanafi school of law, for example -- the most liberal school of thought, founded by Abu Hanifa (699-767 CE) -- accepted over a few thousand hadiths. In contrast, the most restrictive of the four schools – founded by Ahmad ibn Hanbal (778-863 CE) -- accepted tens of thousands. It is not surprising, therefore, that in the 18th century Wahhabism -- probably one of the most restrictive forms of Islam -- developed out of the Hanbali School of law.
The Islamic authorities possibly still worried that despite four schools of thought, dissent would become unmanageable. Towards the end of the eleventh century, therefore, they officially closed the "Gates of Ijtihad." There may have been too many different answers to the same questions, leading to confusion. Possibly this, in turn, may have made it difficult for the authorities to maintain order as well as to justify their autocratic rule.
Muslim scholars also appear to have decided that as all questions had been addressed, there was no longer any need to exercise independent judgment. The result was that exercising independent judgment became no longer permissible.
During the twelfth century, nevertheless, there were still attempts to use rational and deductive reasoning. In Muslim Spain, for instance, Averroes (aka Ibn Rushd, 1126-1198 CE), one of the founders of secular reasoning in Europe, refused to accept the closing of the Gates of Ijtihad. He continued to use Arabic translations of classical Greek sources, and preferred strictly rational methods to decide matters in contention. As in the Muslim world the Gates of Ijtihad had been closed, however, his rulings proved unacceptable.

What happened once the gates of ijtihad were closed: The Ottoman example

What followed the closing of the Gates of Ijtihad in the Muslim world were centuries of intellectual and political decline. At the same time, Europe, with its many states constantly at war with each other, was on the ascendancy. One of the major reasons Europe advanced appears to have been that its warring political entities needed to find new methods of defeating their adversaries. The Europeans were therefore drawn to study science and technology to enable them to produce weapons -- powerful naval vessels, for instance, that could be used in war both at home and overseas. The Muslims, on the other hand, who had fewer internal wars, had no incentive to invent new techniques to survive.
Yet all was not lost for the Muslims: European businessmen had weapons to sell and were perfectly willing to sell them to Muslims. Additionally, after many European wars, a continuous flow of refugees fleeing Europe brought their skills and knowledge to the Ottoman Empire. The Muslims were then able to take advantage of many of the technological and scientific developments in Europe. This was essentially how the Ottoman Empire (ca. 1389-1918) was able to hold its own land -- and even capture European land -- until the seventeenth century, when it began to lose battles and was forced to retreat from territories over which, for centuries, it had ruled.
Ottoman literature and chronicles are filled with descriptions of the Europeans who fled to the Empire, and the technologies they brought with them. The Ottomans, however, never seem to have asked why it was that the Europeans invented these technologies while the Muslims did not.
Why didn't the Ottomans invent these technologies? So long as the Ottoman Empire expanded, it did not need to invent them. Could the answer be -- even in retreat and today –- that, as of Gates of Ijtihad are still closed, Muslim culture does not allow the necessary creativity?

What happened once the gates of ijtihad were closed: The muslim world today

From what one reads and hears in the media among other places, many Muslims quietly ask themselves this question, but are afraid to state it publicly for fear of being ostracized, arrested, or even killed by their co-religionists. Why, these Muslims ask, can Muslims who emigrate to the West – especially to the U.S. and Canada – invent and innovate in the fields of science and technology, but not in their native lands?
When one looks at which Muslims succeed in the West and which do not, it seems that Muslims who live outside Muslim communities in the West, or who have, at best, only marginal connections with these communities, are the most likely to succeed. By examining the lives of successful Muslims in the West, it seems clear that those who live in Muslim communities -- and whose social life revolves around these communities -- seem to suffer from the intellectual constraints just as their fellow Muslims do in their lands of origin.
According to one Palestinian Muslim who has chosen to live outside the Muslim community in the U.S., the answer is, "They don't allow us to think." ("They" refers to the leaders of the community back home and abroad.) Muslims, he states, are subjected to intellectual oppression at home: they are not allowed to question. When young Muslims do ask questions, their elders usually humiliate them – often publicly -- a sure-fire way to discourage intellectual development and curiosity. If Muslims repeat what is proscribed, they are praised; if they question, they are chastised.
The political despotism that characterizes their governments also seems to filter down to lower levels to suppress dissent, keeping every individual and group both intimidated and dependent. The same appears to apply to Muslim communities outside the Muslim world. On paper, young Muslims who live in the Western world have the freedoms that any other Western citizens enjoy. In practice, though, this is not what takes place.[6] Those who speak out, or who do not conform to Islamic rules as dictated by their communities and families, suffer greatly.[7]
During the twentieth century, there were countless attempts, by Muslim scholars and non-Muslims, to address this problem; but little seems to have come from them.
The Chinese peasants who went to work as laborers for the British in Singapore in the 19th century managed to produce the economic marvel that Singapore is today. Similarly, South Korea went from a semi-medieval kingdom 50 years ago to the tenth largest economy in the world. The Muslims of Aden in southern Arabia, however, lived under British rule, like the Singaporeans, yet they remain as underdeveloped as their neighbors who never lived under foreign domination. Singapore's Lee Kuan Yu, for example, once asked a well-known scholar of Islam, "Why is it that whatever we do to help our Muslims advance fails? We provide them with educational opportunities, give them financial incentives, and so on, but nothing works. They still remain at the bottom. Why?"

Ijtihad among the Shiites: Introduction

Shiites have a different approach to the problem of questioning -- an approach which might help solve the Muslim dilemma of how to remain Muslim yet take part in the modern world. For Shiites, the Gates of Ijtihad have never been closed. Shiite religious figures also have the title mujtahid, or "one who engages in the exercise of independent judgment and critical thinking to try to solve contemporary problems."
There is a noticeable difference between how Shiites in Iran, for example, and those in Iraq or Lebanon approach exercising independent judgment. Most Iranian mullahs – even those who are known as mujtahids -- rarely use ijtihad. Even though their writings are often similar to those of the Sunni religious scholars, the Iraqi and Lebanese Shiites are more likely to engage in independent judgment than their counterparts in Iran. As the Shiites are the dominant group in Iran, they never needed to worry about what those around them might do to them; hence they had less incentive to innovate or think creatively. The Shiites under Sunni rule in the Arab world, however, always had to be concerned about what the Sunnis might do to them -- a situation that induced these Shiites to find ways to survive, and possibly be more open to exercising ijtihad.
If one compares different modes of exercising judgment: in the West, Judeo-Christian thinking is based on divinely-revealed law, but with a heavy dose of critical --
mostly Aristotelian -- deductive thinking, closer to the Shiite approach. The Western tradition also sees modern science and technology as gifts from God, developed by man -- and encourages their use.
When, for example, a medical question recently arose over whether to abort large numbers of fetuses (over three) to protect the life of the mother to enable the others more successfully to be brought to term, senior Shiite religious authorities responded that although they had not really studied the problem, these were questions to consider. The Sunnis, however, said that embryos turned into fetuses because of the will of Allah, so abortion would be unacceptable -- even if the mother and all the fetuses were to die, there was nothing to be done. Only one Sunni agreed with the Shiite approach – a Sufi mystic who refused to accept that the Gates of Ijtihad were ever closed – but his is not the prevailing approach in the Sunni world.
Even though both Sunni and Shiite religious leaders approach ijtihad differently, neither encourages their followers to think creatively. Although in theory Shiite religious leaders can exercise independent judgment, in practice only a few do so -- and rarely, at that. The rest of the Shiite community is encouraged instead, in a process known as taqlid, to choose a religious leader to follow, then "imitate" him. Although these leaders are allowed to question, the masses are not encouraged to think, but to follow. So on a fundamental level, neither Shiites nor Sunnis really approaches ijtihad all that differently.
Even if, on the surface, the Shiites appear to offer a solution to the problem of independent thinking, it is hard to imagine, given the present political climate, how the Sunnis, who constitute about 85% of the 1.3 billion Muslims of the world, would be prepared to borrow anything from their Shiite enemies.

Muslim attempts to re-open the gates of ijtihad

Most of the governments of the Muslim world are despotic regimes run by autocrats who do not allow their citizens to question them. Questioning might lead to insurrection; governments might be overthrown. These leaders, therefore, make sure to appoint "official" religious leaders who will endorse the government line. Ijtihad, might lead people to question regimes; a situation that cannot be tolerated. It is not surprising that calls for re-opening the Gates of Ijtihad fall on deaf ears, as the Saudis, Egyptians, Emiratis, and others all do their utmost to stamp out individual thought.
Because questioning religion -- and much else -- is not allowed, some young Muslims who grow up in Islamic lands find much of what was forced down their throats meaningless, then reject Islam. When some of them come to the West, often their first reaction is to stay as far away from Islam and Muslims as possible. Some, after they remain in the West for a while, stumble upon books about Islam in libraries; they start reading and realize that there is a lot of beauty and knowledge in Islam – just not forced down their throats. They read, but find almost no one with whom they can share their newfound curiosity.
If and when they do find a kindred spirit, there is often a sort of dance – a tiptoeing around the real questions – mostly out of fear and suspicion. With time, when they realize that other people might have similar interests and feel safe enough to open up, they introduce each other to other men who think like them, but as if these are secret societies: there is a fear that if others, who may not agree, find out what they are discussing, both they and their families back home could suffer. They know well that organized Islam, even in the West, is controlled overwhelmingly by forces that strongly oppose ijtihad.
The internet has offered many the anonymity to pursue an interest in Islam. A surgeon from Malaysia now living in California who says he is happy with his life there, writes on the internet extensively about his fascination with Islam and ijtihad. (See his blog at http://www.bakrimusa.com) His daring has attracted others who write on his blog about Islam. He also boldly states that he could never have engaged in these types of discussions about Islam in his native Malaysia. Could the internet be a way out of this Muslim predicament?
There is also a remarkable group called the Ahl al-Quran[8] which originated in Egypt. The group's adherents maintain that the only true source of Islamic law is the Quran, the only divine text of Islam. The hadiths and the legal exegesis which constitute Shari'a law, they argue, are just interpretations of the Quran. The interpretations were made by man, and occurred because of problems Muslims had after the Quran was revealed. The scholars addressed problems Muslims faced centuries ago. Muslims in the 21st century, they state, face different problems and should use the Quran – and only the Quran, just as the earliest Islamic scholars did – to find solutions to modern problems. They see no reason why Muslim scholars today cannot think creatively as the scholars of early Islam used to do.
As it is more comfortable to find Quranic material that can be used to address modern situations, and not then feel encumbered by the enormous weight of the hadiths and other legal and interpretive material from ancient religious scholars, an Egyptian organization, Ahl al-Quran, maintains that science and technology are Allah's gifts to man, to be used to address contemporary problems.
After Egypt's religious establishment ordered the Ahl al-Quran banned, arrested, or expelled, the group was forced to flee; it is now based in the United States. Why was it forced out? Its adherents, well versed in the Quran, rejected the imposed decision-making of Egypt's al-Azhar religious establishment,[9] and stated that Islam strongly opposes dictatorship in both its political and religious forms. Instead, this group has been using the Quran to demonstrate that the original Muslim community was inclusive and that it encouraged discussion,[10] both of which today are absent in Egypt and throughout the Muslim world.
When Western officials ask Egyptian political and religious officials about the Ahl al-Quran, the Egyptians laugh and smear the group, labeling its members as crazy extremists with no following. Sadly, because of our ignorance of Islamic culture, or political pressures, we usually accept what the Egyptian government officials tell us without subjecting their remarks to "our own ijtihad," thereby closing our eyes to a force which could help save the Muslim world from itself, and possibly even help prevent a clash between the Western and Muslim worlds.

Conclusion

Is there a chance that the Muslims could reopen the Gates of Ijtihad? For the foreseeable future, the answer seems to a resounding no. The mislabeled "Arab Spring" has turned into an "Arab Winter" in which the forces who apparently want to recreate an imagined, glorious past society modeled after what they believe their prophet established. Add to that the huge amounts of money Wahhabi "allies" of the U.S. are spending throughout the Muslim world, to propagate their militant version of Islam, and things do not look promising.
Those who understand that without itjihad, they have no future, are being forced underground, and, if they are lucky, then emigrate. These emigrants who think critically rarely move into Islamic communities where critical thinking is discouraged.
The way things look now, only if the forces which want to bring back seventh century Islamic society were to suffer a massive defeat, could there be much hope. Only then, after the anti-ijtihad forces were defeated and no longer had access to unlimited financial resources with which to spread their anti-critical thinking, can things change.
Until then, the Gates of Ijtihad will almost assuredly remain tightly shut, and the forces which now control Islam will see to it that they remain so.
Regrettably, if this analysis is correct, the future does not look able to be transformed for the Muslim world or its adherents in the near future. Until Muslim countries and communities in the West allow their people to express themselves freely -- without fear of reprisal -- it is unlikely that the Muslim world will be able to reopen the Gates of Ijtihad and again become a center of science and creativity as it used to be in the early centuries of Islam.
Notes:
[1] According to early Islamic doctrine, so Muslims as a community could not go wrong, decisions were made by discussing problems which faced the community. But as the community grew in size, it became unwieldy to call the community together in one meeting.
[2] The Sunnis (about 85% of the Muslim world) accept al-Bukhari; but the Shiites have their own collections of hadiths.
[3] For example, when the Muslims reached India about 100 years after Muhammad's death, they came across a culture not mentioned in the Quran. While Islam is fiercely monotheistic, Hinduism has many gods and idols, anathema to Islam. The Quran demands that polytheists be enslaved, then offered the choice of conversion to Islam or death. During the early Muslim conquests of India, Hindus were massacred or enslaved, but there were simply too many Hindus for the Muslims to be able to comply with what was required by the Quran. The Muslims therefore devised the following solution: The Quran lists three groups of people who had received a revelation from God prior to Islam, and were therefore allowed to live under Islamic rule: the Jews, the Christians, and the Sabi'ah. No one knew who the Sabi'ah were, so the Muslims seem to have decided that that this term referred to other large groups such as the Hindus and Zoroastrian Persians. This decision evidently enabled the Muslims to allow Hindus live as Hindus under Muslim rule.
[4] The Jews, who did not have a state of their own, seem not to have constituted a threat to the Muslims. Moreover, unlike Christianity and Islam, Judaism is not a triumphalist religion – one whose adherents believe they have the final revelation from God to mankind, and therefore the obligation to bring that religion to the rest of humanity. Christianity and Islam, on the other hand, were rivals.
[5] For example, a certain ruler of Egypt, the Fatimid (Isma'ili Shiite) ruler al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, (985- ca. 1021) declared himself God. The Druze still regard him as divine.
[6] When, for instance, the Canadian Muslim woman, Irshad Manji, as a teenager, questioned her imam about his sermons, she was chastised by the imam, and ostracized by her family and community. She said she clearly respected Islam and considered herself an observant Muslim, but that her thoughts on re-opening the Gates of Ijtihad as a way of saving Islam fell on deaf ears.
[7] This shows why surveys done in the Muslim world, especially in the more totalitarian countries, on topics involving politics or questioning authority, are meaningless: the consequences of telling anyone that you think differently from the prevailing trend could be devastating. Western academics and officials might do well to keep that in mind when they speak with locals about their thoughts.
[8] Probably best translated as "Quranics": those who believe only in the Quran.
[9] …which almost everyone in Egypt sees as a tool of the Egypt government. It repeats whatever the government tells it to say.
[10] See footnote 1 on ijma' – the concept of consensus in Islam.
Related Topics:  Harold Rhode

The Despots' Collaborator

by Shiraz Maher
June 15, 2012 at 3:00 am
Be the first of your friends to like this.
So, while Israel is "barbaric" and a "slaughter," Syria is merely an "internal problem." This is boilerplate hypocrisy for Galloway who has spent his career in obsequious servitude to any tyrant on condition that he has money, is anti-Israel, and anti-Western.
Viva Palestina is a charity that was started in the UK and which has spread to several countries around the world, including the United States. Conceived by George Galloway after Operation Cast Lead, the group is ostensibly concerned with delivering aid – which, according to the Israelis, could include weapons to be used against them – to Gaza.
The charity also claims to support the promotion of peace between Palestinians and Israelis, although little has been done in this regard. On the contrary, far from promoting peace, the group has frequently provoked conflict – not least in 2010 when it supported the illegal and ill-fated flotilla led by the Mavi Marmara to enter Gaza by sea.
The sixth Viva Palestina convoy left Britain last month bound for Gaza, revealing the organizers' overwhelming obsession with Israel. Without a hint of irony, it was announced that their supposedly urgent humanitarian convoy would be passing through Syria en route to Gaza. There was no discussion, however, of aiding the tens of thousands of Syrians who have been systematically tortured, abused, or displaced in that country. The convoy is to pass straight by the thousands of Syrians who are now forced to live in refugee camps in Lebanon, Turkey, and Jordan.
When the War in Gaza took place George Galloway said the following:
The barbaric Israeli assault on Gaza will go down in infamy alongside Deir Yasin and Sabra and Shatilla as one of the defining events of the Palestinian tragedy and resistance.
The atrocities are continuing – so too must the world-wide protests.
[…]
Our government arms the quisling Arab regimes whose cowardice and greed are as necessary to Israel's murder as its US supplied weapons.
[…]
Let's unify our efforts. Stop the Slaughter in Gaza.
No such evocative language is extended to Bashar al-Assad whose regime is indiscriminately massacring its own people – not least in Homs, the town which was shelled relentlessly for just under a month. Syrian activists suggest that more than 15,000 civilians have now been killed. Instead, Galloway glossed over atrocities there in the following terms:
I reject any foreign intervention in Syria's affair or in any other country. Western interference in Arab affairs is rejected…I am convinced that the Syrian people are able to solve their internal problems without any foreign interference.
So, while Gaza was a "barbaric" and a "slaughter," Syria is merely an "internal problem." This is boilerplate hypocrisy for Galloway who has spent his career in obsequious servitude to any tyrant on condition that he has money, is anti-Israel, and anti-Western. In Iraq he famously told Saddam Hussein, 'Sir, I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability – a man who arguably killed more Muslims and Arabs than any other leader in the region. But Saddam is no more, so on to the next. In Iran, where President Ahmadinejad crushed the "Green revolution" Galloway has showered the regime with fawning praise and unfettered encomiums. In Damascus, where no political parties are allowed, where no elections take place, and where human rights are a mere fantasy, he told a handpicked audience, "Syria is lucky to have Bashar Al-Assad as her president."
The problem within Viva Palestina extends beyond Galloway. So deep is its institutional hypocrisy that Kevin Ovenden – who sits on the leadership of both Viva Palestina and Galloway's Respect party – accompanied the latest Viva Palestina convoy through Syria. He told Syrian television:
The primary goal of the convoy is to remind the people that the Palestinian cause is an essential cause, and to carry aid to the Palestinians and the continuation of the efforts to lift the siege from them. The date which was chosen for the convoy to arrive at Gaza was the 15th of this month. This is to coincide with the occasion of Nakba day, to remind the world that the Palestinians who where displaced from their homes have to return to them and to their homeland.
No word on the thousands of Syrians who have not just been displaced from their homes, but have had them destroyed through relentless shelling. No word either on Syria's sponsors, Iran and Russia. All of this has, of course, played directly into the hands of the Syrian regime which has exploited the convoy for maximum propaganda value. The Syrian press reported Viva Palestina's arrival in the following terms:
The humanitarian aid convoy "The Right to Return" heading to Gaza entered the Syrian territories through Kasab crossing point on Wednesday.
The convoy is organized by a group of Europeans who stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people and Syria and headed by the British MP George Galloway.
Receiving the convoy, Lattakia Governor Abdel Qader Mohammad al-Sheikh and Secretary of al-Baath Party Branch in Lattakia, Mohammad Shreitah, expressed Syria's gratitude to the convoy members' stances in support of the Palestinian Cause which is the Arabs' central cause.
Spokesman of the convoy members thanked the Syrian government and people for facilitating their mission in conveying aid to the Palestinians in Gaza and continuing efforts to lift the siege imposed on them.
The unspoken corollary is clear – a British parliamentarian supports the Syrian regime, focuses on Israel, nothing to see here. This is something Bashar al-Assad has consistently tried to achieve since the revolution began over a year ago. He is keen to project himself as having international support, while trying to divert domestic unrest towards Israel, a time-honored strategy of Arab despots.
That an experienced politician and his supposedly humanitarian activists should have played into al-Assad's hands in such a way is no mistake. An agenda so myopically obsessed with Israel, the West, and "anti-imperialism" is necessarily blind to any reality challenging that worldview.
Related Topics:  Shiraz Maher
You are subscribed to this list as vicky13@rogers.com.
To edit your subscription options, or to unsubscribe, go to http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/list_edit.php
To subscribe to the this mailing list, go to http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/list_subscribe.php
Posted by solsticewitch13 at 2:50 PM

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)