Islamophobia Watch

"It was Katha Pollitt, writing in The Nation last month, who made me see it. Pollitt, a noted feminist writer, wondered why the American liberal-turned-neocon David Horowitz – founder of the bizarrely named Islamo-Fascist Awareness Week – had suddenly developed an interest in the rights of women. Specifically, Muslim women. 'Life is not a picnic for women in China, India, Africa and Latin America', wrote Pollitt. 'Why no interest in them?' She speculated that by focusing on the oppression of women, Horowitz had found an easy way to target the Muslim world.

"In his 'age of horrorism' essay last year, Martin Amis also developed a feminist sensibility. Amis, whose novels so often feature flat, cartoon-like women, connected the failure of Islamic states with the 'obscure logic that denies the Islamic world the talent and energy of half its people ... the suppression of its women'. Well, there is definitely work to be done regarding the rights of Muslim women, but a lot also needs to be done for all the non-Muslim women oppressed around the globe."

Noorjehan Barmania in the Guardian, 14 December 2007

"The reality is that parents are getting very jumpy about their kids getting involved in any kind of Muslim activity no matter how mundane for fear of them ending up on some watch, and that is dangerous, because when there is anger about foreign policy there needs to be an outlet, and that has effectively been shut down by the atmosphere and the approach to the Muslim community.

"Young Muslims are feeling angry at what is going on in the world with the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. What is vital is that these people are channelled into the democratic process, where they can air their views and make change."

Osama Saeed interviewed in The Scotsman 

Osama's blog is here 

"Ayaan Hirsi Ali first came to fame in the Netherlands, after emigrating there from Somalia. She was elected to the Dutch parliament and became known for criticizing that nation's Muslim immigrant communities, especially for their treatment of women and girls. The story of a young, pretty, African woman finding success and prestige in a foreign land was tailor made for Hollywood, or for right-wingers looking for the perfect person to excuse government sponsored mass murder.... She has become well paid and famous because she demonizes her fellow Muslims. As with black Americans or any other group of despised people, the self haters, the Uncle Toms, are given a clear path to fortune and favor."

Margaret Kimberley in Black Agenda Report, 12 December 2007

The welcome campaign launched by the prominent Christian Democrat and former trade unionist Doekle Terpstra against anti-Muslim racist Geert Wilders has been roundly denounced by the Right.

At Pipeline News Bella Rabinowitz (who finds it significant that the campaign is supported by "the ultra-left Amnesty International") denounces Terpstra's initiative as an attempt to deny freedom of speech to Geert Wilders and claims that "the assault on Wilders is reminiscent of the hysteria which led to the assassination of another Dutch politician, Pim Fortuyn".

Over at the Brussels Journal Thomas Landen opines: "Last month one of Holland’s most prestigious institutes, the University of Leiden, appointed the Islamist ideologue Tariq Ramadan to the post of professor of Islamology. Mr Ramadan is at least as controversial as Mr Wilders. One wonders why Mr Terpstra, contrary to Mr Wilders, did not oppose Mr Ramadan's appointment. Mr Terpstra did not make any effort to say 'Tariq Ramadan is evil, and has to be stopped'. Why has no-one heard him call upon his countrymen 'to rise in order to stop Ramadan'?"

"On the basis of the evidence presented by Newsnight, what we appear to be dealing with here is not flawed methodology, errors or inconsistencies, but wilful distortion and fabrication committed not against an individual, or an institution, but against an entire social group. The consequences go beyond the community in question to the wider society, given the report's exploitation by the media and political class, and aggravation of the existing climate of tension, anxiety and suspicion.... Coming on the heel of another report on on extremism among British Muslim youth, the report is yet another attempt to erase distinctions between mainstream and extreme Islam. Targeting mosques is no coincidence."

Soumaya Ghannoushi at BLINK, 13 December 2007

A rightwing thinktank which claimed to have uncovered extremist literature on sale at dozens of British mosques was last night accused of basing a report on fabricated evidence.

The report by Policy Exchange alleged that books condoning violent jihad and encouraging hatred of Christians, Jews and gays were being sold in a quarter of the 100 mosques visited. But BBC2's Newsnight said examination of receipts provided by the researchers to verify their purchases showed some had been written by the same person – even though they purported to come from different mosques. Several receipts also misspelled the names or addresses of the mosques where the books were supposedly sold.

The report, the Hijacking of British Islam, was based on the work of four teams of two researchers each who visited 100 mosques. They claimed to have found the controversial material in bookshops attached to 25 mosques, including one at Regent's Park, London, and others in Manchester, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Oxford and High Wycombe.

Inayat Bunglawala, assistant secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain, said: "Policy Exchange produced a report that was given a lot of publicity, and Newsnight deserve credit for exposing the incredibly shoddy and dubious methodology that Policy Exchange have resorted to. It would seem that Policy Exchange had already decided what they wanted to say about mosques and just went out to find or should I say invent the evidence to justify their prejudices."

Guardian, 13 December 2007

Watch video of yesterday's Newsnight programme here

See the British Muslim Initiative's press release, 13 December 2007

For Osama Saeed's comments, see Rolled Up Trousers, 12 December 2007

The Newsnight investigation concentrated on mosques in and around London but, as Osama points out, questions about the credibility of the Hijacking of British Islam report were raised at the time by the Edinburgh Central Mosque – where nobody had come across the literature that Policy Exchange claimed to have discovered on their premises.

For some useful background on Dean Godson and Policy Exchange, see Tom Griffin's article at SpinWatch.

Two members of the so-called Muslim Canadian Congress add their voices to the anti-Muslim campaign provoked by the tragic death of Aqsa Parvez.

National Post, 12 December 2007

For a response, see muslimmatters.org

"Scots are becoming increasingly prejudiced against Muslims, according to a wide-ranging survey carried out after the terror attacks of July 2005 but before the strike on Glasgow Airport this summer.

"Half of those questioned in the government study said Scotland would lose its identity if more Muslims come to the country – up on the 38% who said the same in 2003 when a similar survey was taken.

"The number of Scots who would be unhappy if a relative formed a close relationship with a Muslim was also up over the three years, from 20% to 24%, but while almost one-third of Scots believe there is sometimes a good reason to be prejudiced – an attitude which is on the rise – the number of people who are prejudiced against gays and lesbians is decreasing."

The Herald

Attitudes To Discrimination In Scotland

MONTREAL — No public servant – including Muslim teachers and judges – should be allowed to wear anything at work that shows what religion they belong to, leaders of Quebec's two biggest trade union federations and a civil-servants' union told the Bouchard-Taylor commission Monday.

"We think that teachers shouldn't wear any religious symbols – same thing for a judge in court, or a minister in the National Assembly, or a policeman – certainly not," said Rene Roy, secretary-general of the 500,000-member Quebec Federation of Labour. "The wearing of any religious symbol should be forbidden in the workplace of the civil service ... in order to ensure the secular character of the state," said Lucie Grandmont, vice-president of the 40,000-member Quebec union of public employees.

Dress codes that ban religious expression should be part of a new "charter of secularism" that the Quebec government should adopt, said Claudette Carbonneau, president of the Confederation of National Trade Unions. Such a charter is needed "to avoid anarchy," Carbonneau said Monday, presenting a brief on behalf of the federation's 300,000 members at the commission's hearing on the integration of immigrants in Montreal. That's the same point of view as the 150,000-member Centrale des syndicats du Quebec, which includes 100,000 who work in the school system, the commission heard.

The unions' anti-religious attitude – especially the idea to ban hijabs on teachers – got a cold reception from groups as disparate as a Muslim women's aid organization and the nationalist St.-Jean-Baptiste Society of Montreal. "What that would do is close the door to Muslim women who want to teach," said Samaa Elibyari, a Montreal community radio host who spoke for the Canadian Council of Muslim Women. "It goes against religious freedoms that are guaranteed in the (Quebec) Charter of Rights."

Elibyari said Muslim women routinely face discrimination in the workplace. They don't need unions on their back, too, she said. "When a young teacher calls a school to see if she can do an internship, and is asked on the phone straight out: 'Do you wear the veil?'; when a cashier at a supermarket is fired and her boss tells her 'The customers don't want to see that,' referring to the veil; when a secretary gets passed over for promotion even if she succeeds in all her French exams, and is told 'take off that tablecloth' – is that not discrimination?" Elibyari asked.

Canada.com, 10 December 2007

Part 1 of a series on Islamophobia in the USA, this one drawing on the book Islamophobia and Anti-Americanism, edited by Mohamed Nimer, research director at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

muslimmatters.org, 10 December 2007