Category Archives: Anti-Muslim violence

Another example of religious extremism

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Tempers are reaching boiling point in the French Jewish community after the torture and murder of a young Jewish man by a suburban gang calling itself “the barbarians”.

Police had said that the gang kidnapped Ilan Halimi, 23 using a beautiful, young, blonde woman as bait to extort money from his family. However, the victim’s family and many other Parisian Jews are convinced the crime was, at least partially, racially motivated.

A Parisian member of parliament, Claude Goasguen, said yesterday the city could face “extremely serious intra-community violence” unless the authorities abandoned their “persistent silence on the real motives for this murder”.

At the weekend, a mainly peaceful protest march by Parisian Jews was marred by a number of violent actions by radical young Jewish men. A black man was beaten up, allegedly for “smiling” at the protest. An Arab-run grocery was attacked. A motorist who was caught up in the march was assaulted and had to be rescued by demonstration marshals.

Tracts were handed out by Jewish radical groups which claimed that Ilan Halimi, a mobile telephone salesman, was a victim of “Islamo-fascism”.

Independent, 21 February 2006

Which only goes to show that there are extremists and thugs within every ethno-religious community. However, in this case, I rather doubt that “clash of civilisations” rhetoric will be wheeled out to explain the actions of an unrepresentative minority of demonstrators or that liberal and right-wing commentators will produce articles asserting that Judaism is incompatible with western values. Islamophobia is so much more acceptable than anti-semitism.

Good for Dobbo

Posted on by Bob Pitt

DobboMPs supportive of the government during the Commons debate on the Racial and Religious Hatred Bill included Frank Dobson who said:

“I do not believe that anyone – Rowan Atkinson or anyone else – needs the right to incite hatred against someone because of their religion. He has apparently said that we should look at things from the point of view of the comedian. Other people in the world are just as important as comedians. Muslim women who have been assaulted, abused and spat on for wearing the hijab are as important to me as Rowan Atkinson, for all his sense of humour.”

Not so sure I agree with you about Rowan Atkinson’s sense of humour, Frank, but otherwise – spot on.

Battle waged in Boston over new mosque

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Boston MosqueWorshippers at the Islamic Society of Boston (ISB) still pack into their cramped mosque in Cambridge, Mass. The crowd spills out into the parking lot for the Friday prayer service. Their hopes of celebrating this past Ramadan in a brand-new mosque and cultural center were dashed.

The stated aim of the quarter-century-old society was to build a center for worship, education, and community outreach. Instead, the $24 million project in Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood is snarled in accusation, acrimony, and lawsuits. It’s a microcosm of the suspicions about Islam that have played out across America since 9/11.

After the city of Boston conveyed a parcel of land to the ISB, articles appeared in the Boston Herald in 2003 linking society leaders to Islamic extremists. The ISB denied the story, responding in detail to what it saw as inflammatory distortions. “When you place a picture of Osama bin Laden next to a picture of our mosque, that is completely misrepresentative of who we are,” says Salma Kazmi, assistant project director.

Four years after 9/11, mosques in many communities continue to encounter wariness and resistance ranging from suspicions raised at zoning hearings to vandalism and worse. On Dec. 20, two pipe bombs damaged an Islamic center in an upscale neighborhood of Cincinnati. The FBI said the powerful explosion could have been deadly had people been present.

“It’s all part of the unfortunate temper of the times,” says John Esposito, a professor at Georgetown University in Washington. “There is such a thing as Islamophobia.”

Christian Science Monitor, 5 January 2006

Cronulla riots caused by multicultural education

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“In Western Australia, as evidenced by the Curriculum Framework document, students are told they must value ‘the perspective of different cultures’ and ‘recognise the cultural mores that underpin groups and appreciate why these are valued and important’. The curriculum policy of the South Australian branch of the AEU is underpinned by ‘five core values’. One of the underlying values is that there should be respect for diversity and ‘no discrimination on any grounds’.

“The contradictions and weaknesses evident in the way multiculturalism has been taught in schools are manifold. Tolerance, the rule of law and a commitment to the common good are the very values needed if people are to live peacefully together. Cultural relativism and an uncritical acceptance of diversity denies such values…. Nobody should condone the violence in Cronulla perpetrated by those wearing the Australian flag or the actions of young Lebanese Muslims abusing women, destroying property and burning churches. But we also need to recognise that the PC approach to teaching multiculturalism in schools in part underpins the recent violence.”

Kevin Donnelly in The Australian, 19 December 2005

Muslims to blame for Australian riots (cont.)

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“As in France, Australia’s Muslims have inflicted on their hosts harm that exceeds by far the scratches and other scurrilities they suffered from the surfers…. Decades of indoctrination by the ‘managerial professional elites’ were supposed to emasculate the surfer dudes for good. They were expected to toke it up or turn the other cheek. Instead, they fought back against what they perceive as a threat to their land and life. A threat that commenced approximately 40 years ago, when Australian central planners decided in favor of mass importation of immigrants from the Third World.”

Ilana Mercer in Front Page Magazine, 19 December 2005

White supremacists arrested with petrol bombs

Posted on by Bob Pitt

CronullaFive white supremacists have been arrested carrying material to build petrol bombs, enabling police to claim they were vindicated after locking down more than 200km of beaches to prevent a repeat of Sydney’s ugly race riots.

The men, dressed in camouflage gear, were caught yesterday in the southern suburb of Brighton-le-Sands carrying equipment to make Molotov cocktails including 25l jerry cans filled with petrol, as well as commando-style utility belts and Kevlar helmets.

The lockdown occurred on a perfect summer weekend when many Sydneysiders were winding down ahead of Christmas and forced Premier Morris Iemma to deny the gangs had won the battle. Police officers also found car stickers promoting the white supremacist movement in the men’s car.

The Australian, 19 December 2005

Meanwhile, in today’s Observer, Australian novelist Gabrielle Carey explains: “The war is essentially between one group of macho men and another. The hatred and bigotry shown by the blond Cronulla boys is equalled by that demonstrated by their enemies, ‘the Lebs’.”

Australians march against racism

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Aussies Against RacismThousands of Australians in Sydney and Newcastle rallied on Sunday, December 18, against racism after a week of violence against Arabs and Muslims.

About 2,000 people have marched through the streets of Sydney’s central business district calling for racial harmony and understanding, Australia’s Sydney Morning Herald newspaper reported.

Unite Against Racism Rally organiser and National Union of Students (NUS) anti-racism officer, Osmond Chiu, said today was about uniting in opposition to a racist Australia. “The riots have drawn attention to the racism in this country,” Chiu told the paper. “I am shocked and appalled by what’s been happening, I never fathomed anything of this scale, that such violent racist clashes, could happen here.”

Chiu condemned some media and political leaders who he said may have fuelled the riots. He was particularly critical of Macquarie Radio for “spreading word about the wave of text messages this week that urged further race-based attacks.”

The rampage began when more than 5,000 people gathered at Sydney’s Cronulla beach last Sunday, December 11, after e-mail and mobile phone messages called on local residents to beat-up “Lebs and wogs” – racial slurs for people of Lebanese and Middle Eastern origin. They moved after Lebanese youths had beaten a beach guard for reportedly snatching the hijab of a beachgoer.

Chiu also called on Prime Minister John Howard to admit the existence of racism in Australia. “John Howard, the leader of our country, has denied that racism played a part in the week’s violence,” he said. “He needs to admit that racism played a big part in what happened.”

Islam Online, 18 December 2005 

See also “Rally cry: ‘We are all Australians'”, Sydney Morning Herald, 18 December 2005

Leadership required to create calm – Australian Arabic Council

Posted on by Eddie Truman

The Australian Arabic Council (AAC) today voiced concern and alarm at reports that text messages are remaining to circulate in Sydney and spreading to Melbourne and other Australian cities.

Speaking for the AAC, Chairman, Roland Jabbour said the riots, must be condemned by all, recognised for what they are as ‘racially motivated’, and long-term not quick fix solutions found.

“These events of the last few days have exposed the anti-Arab racism that exists in Australia. Arab Australians have had to cope for sometime with vilification, racism and abuse after numerous international and domestic events. We are more than anybody aware of the fringe elements of society that have racist agendas and prejudicial propensities.

“This reality must now be recognised by political leaders and government agencies as a significant impingement on the rights of Arab and Muslim citizens.

“The AAC has for some time predicted the occurrence of events over the last few days. We are now concerned that similar sentiments and ‘calls to action by people with racist agendas’ are now spreading to Melbourne and other cities.”

Continue reading →

Germaine Greer on Cronulla

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“… it does seem that Australian-born Muslim teenagers have finally had enough. Antagonism towards them has been mounting for years, so that even the most presentable middle-class young men of Middle-Eastern appearance find themselves routinely turned away from clubs and effectively ostracised from mainstream youth culture.” Germaine Greer on the background to the clashes in Cronulla.

Guardian, 15 December 2005

Blame Muslims for Australian riots (2)

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Melanie Phillips agrees with Tim Priest: “… the widespread spin that has been placed on this disorder, that it has been caused by white racists and that what it reveals is that, under its veneer of multiculturalism, Australia is a fundamentally racist society positively heaving with people with despicable views who have been itching to have a pop at blameless Lebanese Muslims, is very wide of the mark. For it appears that the current unrest was sparked by Lebanese Muslim attacks on two indigenous lifeguards, and that this was only the tip of an iceberg of aggression by this minority which – thanks to the censorship imposed by multiculturalism – has gone all but unreported.”

Melanie Phillips’s Diary, 14 December 2005