The Associated Press has an article out asking why Europe's Muslims have been largely silent in the face of the terror attacks there that have killed at least 254 people. Bombings in Spain and England have received little if anything in the way of denunciation from Muslim leaders. The AP comes up with several reasons why Muslims have refused to come out against the terrorists. Shame is a recurring theme.
Seek them out in the neighborhoods where they live and work — in the outdoor markets and butcher shops that sell halal meat, in the book stores that display literature on Islam and the West, in the boutiques that promote Islamic dress codes, in the Turkish restaurants and smoky Tunisian teahouses, in their schools and youth clubs — and they denounce, the vast majority unequivocally, attacks against civilians in both Europe and the United States.
"Van Gogh was a crazy man, but no one has the right to kill anyone who says bad things about the Quran," said Mohammed Azahaf, a 23-year-old student who runs a youth center in Amsterdam. "If you kill one, it's like killing the whole of mankind," he said, quoting a line from the Muslim holy book.
Why, then, the public silence?
For some of the more than five dozen Muslims interviewed for this story in Amsterdam, Paris and London, it's a sense of shame, or even guilt, that innocents have been killed in the name of Islam; they say those feelings make them seek to be "invisible." For those lucky enough to have jobs, there is little time to protest or even write letters to newspapers. For others, there is fear of being branded anti-Islam in their communities.
Dutch Muslim rapper Yassine SB wrote a song about his anger over Van Gogh's murder but scrapped plans to perform it out of fear of being ostracized by the Islamic community. He also turned down requests by a popular Amsterdam radio station to sing a song against terrorism.
"If you sing that, it's like you choose the Dutch, not Muslims," said Yassine SB — the initials stand for his surname Sahsah Bahida — who is popular among Dutch North African youths like himself for his songs against racism.
"People will say 'you are a traitor,'" said the 20-year-old musician.
Shame is a strong motivator for many of the people interviewed it would seem. Shame that this kind of terror is being done by people claiming to do it in the name of their religion. Shame and fear that Europeans will see them as Muslims first and people second. There is also some anger.
Why, many Muslims ask, should they have to speak out against, or apologize for, actions of radicals who do not represent them — people they do not even regard as true Muslims?
Many find the very idea of being asked or expected to denounce such acts "extremely offensive and insulting," said Khurshid Drabu, a senior member of the Muslim Council of Britain.
"I'm British," said Tuhina Ahmed, 24, a British-born Muslim in London whose family came from Gujarat in India. "I could have been blown up as well." Why, she asked, should she have to make a public statement to prove her objection to terrorism?
To many, the pressure to denounce acts of terror smacks of President Bush's warning that 'you are either with us or against us.'
"People and politicians say where are the Muslim people, why aren't they on the streets defending themselves? They say we should go into the streets and condemn what happened so they see us as good Muslims," said Karima Ramani, a 20-year-old Dutch born to an Algerian father and Moroccan mother. "I don't feel it's my duty. I'm not responsible for the death of Van Gogh."
These are potentially good points, but there are real problems with these attitudes, too. Yes, you may be offended to have to denounce other people's actions. But if the actors claim to be doing it in the service of your religion do you not have an obligation to separate yourself from such people? The big problem, as I see it, is that the continued silence will end up as being seen as acquiescence unless action is taken soon. It may be offensive to have to denounce it, but things will only get worse unless Muslims step forward and disavow the actions of the few. The shame here is a missed opportunity to stand apart from those doing evil.
Now, can you imagine say one hundred muslims going to the street, shouting and waving flags denouncing terrorism in the name of islam?
And then can you imagine how fast they would be attacked on account of “booldy muslims trying to make a riot”?
You have some commenters here, who, upon seeing more than ten muslims marching together, would start to shoot.
Yes, I know there should be more vocal – but guess what, a lot of muslim leaders in Europe did just that. Stood up and publicly objected to terrorist actions commited in the name of islam.
These leaders has voiced their anger and denounced the terrorists.
In europe, you heard about that, read it in the news.
In the US, you did not?
We did not hear about that – at least I did not. I think you’re quite wrong about my commenters, by the way. Most, if not all, would be quite happy if Muslims denounced this behavior. What we have is CAIR – they keep excusing behavior rather than denouncing it.
I won’t even get into CAIR here. AND no I didn’t see where “A Lot” of Muslim leaders denounced Radical Islam. I heard “A Few”, like 2 or 3 and the BBC said these were local clearics denounced radical islam. I’m here in the states and we don’t hear of Muslims denouncing what is going on with the religion of peace, yeah right! Sorry, every time I say religion of peace yeah right! I automatically follow it with yeah right! We as in the people in the United States have asked time and time again, “Where are the Muslims on all this? Why don’t they say something?” The time is getting short and peoples minds are being made up that Muslims are bad because there is no one saying it isn’t so. They had best speak up before it’s too late……if it’s not already. We as Americans are pretty well balanced folks and would like to live and let live but if Muslims and their kind kill people over cartoons….we won’t stand for that over here. I saw this on a blog this morning at http://www.rightwinghowler.com it seems to ring pretty true to me. What say you?
by Vilmar @ 4:12 am. Filed under ISLAM, MSM, ARABS/MUSLIMS, ARAB WORLD
I don’t want to get all cerebral and philosophical about the issue of Muslims and Westerners so I will keep the point short and sweet…….and I hope clear-cut and understandable.
In the West we tend to have pretty much a laissez-faire attitude towards people. In a nutshell, the attitude is, “if you leave me alone I will leave you alone. You can live amongst us. Play amongst us. Eat with us. Go to the beach with us. Work with us. When it comes to prayer, you go to your place of worship and I go to mine. Afterwards we can all meet for breakfast. We can all attempt to live our lives as we deem fit and no one will try and stop another from doing so.â€
Then Islam came on the scene the past couple of decades and Muslims have infiltrated virtually every country attempting to impose THEIR way of life upon others. They use force, violence and unheard of brutality.
Naturally, we object. In some countries and locations, politicians bend over backwards to accommodate those who use this violence and live their lives by it.
What Muslims DO NOT have is tolerance for others. It has to be their way or the highway, never fully realizing they can live and worship as they please with no interference from us so long as they don’t attempt to convert others to their religion.
When they do, they should not be surprised to find that many people distrust them, consider them fanatics, and want nothing to do with them.
When talking to Muslims, the salient point should be: “you’ve been among westerners (Europe, Latin America, North America) for many, many years. No one made your lives miserable. Why is it that now, when you want to convert the entire population of the countries you live in to Islam and we get belligerent about it to the point of hating you, that you blame US for the hatred? We don’t suicide bomb your women and children forcing you to accept Christ or Buddha or some Wicca god. We don’t teach our children to hate Muslims. We don’t publish schoolbooks advocating death to the unbeliever. We don’t ask our children to kill themselves while we sit back and watch them.
So don’t be surprised when you push us a bit too far and you find yourselves getting exterminated like the vermin you are proving to be.
It’s YOU who needs to learn to be tolerant. Tolerance is not defined by EVERYONE being Muslim. Tolerance is acceptance that others may be different and so long as they are not cramming THEIR values down your throat, they should be left along.â€
So why is it never presented as that by the media when they talk to Islamists and Muslims?
So again….what say you?
I suspect there actually are any number of Muslims who have no interest in forcing their veiews on others. But they remain silent when others do and that is a problem.
No, I meant some of them – only two I think – are quite militant.
Some were quite vocal stating like “muslims only want to destroy us, yadda, yadda..”, but yes, only one or two.
Yes, I was not stating clear enough, my mistake, that only one or two commenters came through like that, and the majority of the commenters here are not like that.
Sorry, I was not clear enough.
Okay..
The cartoon story. Which was fanned by radical islamist, and it was widely reported that there were “riots” and “mass movements” about that – what was ommitted from the news was that it was a few hundred or maybe two thousand people brought together from all over the arab worlds by the radical leaders.
The other part, when people – a couple thousand – were making movements against terrorism and the iranian president’s remarks, well, that somehow did not make it to the news.
I wonder why. Maybe that would lessen all the hype against muslims.
And that Vilmar guy: sorry to see such assholes in the world. I hope my kids will never meet his kind, only seeing the dude in the TV being escorted to the prison where he belongs. Or the asylum.