ISLAMOPHOBIA: Anti Muslim Racism
Entries in Norway (5)
Pig tactics threatened
Norwegian anti-immigration politicians in Bergen have promised to chase off Muslims with pigs feet and squealing noises if Bergen's central square is used for prayers.
The leader of the Demokratene, an extreme populist party formed by outcasts of the populist Progress Party, Vidar Kleppe, said Wednesday that he backed the remarks of city council representative Kenneth Rasmussen.
Rasmussen reacted with threats of porcine tactics after Labour Party politician Jerad Abdelmajid said that the city's Muslims could take their Friday prayers in Torgallmenningen, Bergen's central square, when they will be without a mosque from March 31. Building of a new mosque is behind schedule.
"I completely agree with Kenneth Rasmussen that Muslims having their Friday prayers with their butts in the air in the city center is no solution. They can find other places," Kleppe told news agency NTB.
Kenneth Rasmussen told newspaper Dagbladet's web site that Bergen residents should hang up pig's feet and play pig squeals over loudspeakers to scare off Muslims, and claimed these tactics worked when he was a soldier for the United Nations in Somalia and Lebanon in the 1990s.
The fascists of the British National Party give sympathetic coverage to Demokratene's threats, observing that "the onus is on the Islamic newcomers to abide by the wishes of the overwhelming majority who have never been asked if they wanted their ... harmonious neighbourhoods turned into warring ghettos resembling Third World slums".
They add that "the situation is mirrored in the UK. The taxpaying, hard working and increasing frustrated and beleaguered Britons were never asked by the politicians who were and continue to be paid from the public purse if they wanted their own villages, towns and neighborhoods colonised by Third World immigrants."
Martin Sullivan
Rise in rape charges? Blame it on Muslims
"There has been an explosive increase in the number of rape charges in the city of Oslo, but both the media and the authorities consistently refuse to tell us why. They did do so, however, in 2001, when two out of Norway's three largest newspapers, Aftenposten and Dagbladet, reported that most of these rape charges involve an immigrant perp, which again mostly means Muslims.... The reported number of rapes in Oslo is now six – 6! – times as high per capita as in New York City, yet the media keeps warning against Islamophobia."
Protest niqab ban in Norway
Last month, the Directorate for Primary and Secondary Education of Norway gave permission for the niqab (which covers the whole face except the eyes) to be banned in schools. This law denies Muslim girls many fundamental rights including the freedom to practice one?s religion and the right to education.
Erling Lae, the leader of Oslo City Council, has decided to remove the veil in schools because it causes problems for teachers who cannot see their students' faces. The ruling will now make it possible for the niqab to be banned from schools in other municipalities in Norway. The Oslo city councillor for schools and education has said that the niqab makes communication impossible between teachers and students and between students as well.
However, under Article 9 of the European Convention of Human Rights, everyone has the right to freedom of religion unless it is in the interest of public safety and health. It is clear that wearing the niqab in classrooms does not pose any threats to other students and teachers. Furthermore, in some schools of thought within Islam, wearing a niqab is obligatory and so a ban is clearly an infringement on religious freedom.
France, and parts of Germany and Belgium have already prohibited the wearing of the headscarf in schools and unless effective action is taken, the ban will spread throughout the whole of Europe.
Please contact your political representative, the Foreign Minister of your country and the Norwegian Embassy in your respective countries to condemn the law.
Freedom of speech is not absolute – Sivanandan
The Institute of Race Relations has reprinted an interesting interview with A. Sivanandan conducted by the Norwegian Maoist daily Klassekampen.
In connection with the cartoons crisis, Sivanandan points out that "in our time – after Hitler and the Holocaust, in an era of ethnic cleansing and genocide and Islamophobia – the freedom to life comes before the freedom of speech. You cannot use freedom of speech to endanger other people's lives by incitement to racial, ethnic or religious hatred".
He also explains Islamophobia as the ideology of western imperialism: "Racial superiority is back on the agenda – in the guise this time not of a super-race but a super-civilisation on a mission to take the ideals of freedom and democracy, by force if necessary, to the benighted people of the Third World, especially to those who have got oil in their backyards. ( 'Post-modern imperialism' Robert Cooper, one-time adviser to Blair and the EU, calls it.) Conversely, western civilisation and its values should be jealously guarded against the pagan hordes now circulating in Europe's midst."
Anti-Muslim hatred in Norway
A letter from an anti-racist worker in Oslo warns of the dangerous anti-Muslim climate in Norway in the context of the Danish cartoon debate:
"We are experiencing extreme times here at the moment. After a Christian fundamentalist paper printed the drawings of the Prophet Mohammed, things have been on the far side of crazy. The editors and all mainstream papers support the publishing of the drawings and proclaim this as an important battle for freedom of speech. What is actually won is not easy for me to discover, but the climate is worse than ever. The Islamic Council has done a terrific job and its spokesperson has made it perfectly clear that Muslims are angry and hurt, but will try to put this behind them and go forward because 'we are all brothers in this country and must treat each other with respect'. But the papers, websites and blogs and discussion groups are flooded with anti-Muslim statements now, and the word 'Islamophobia' is not the correct word for Norway today – it is pure hate. Thankfully the far-Right is weak, but we are very close to violence."