RELIGION: Why are conservatives so damn obsessed with Islam?

From what we know about Omar Mateen, this massacre was not an act of Islamic State-sponsored terrorism. 

When it comes to fighting nasty brown-skinned Muslim terrorists with unpronounceable names, you really don’t want to look like Neville Chamberlain appeasing Hitler. Hence, when introducing counter-terrorism law number 56 (or was it 57? I’ve lost count) in September 2014, then-PM Tony Abbott invoked Winston Churchill and declared: “I refuse to be impartial as between the fire brigade and the fire.”

Hitler and Churchill are long gone. But Hitler’s rhetorical and ideological legacy arguably live on in the person of the US Republican Party’s likely presidential nominee, Donald Trump. True, Trump hasn’t called for Hispanics and Muslims to be thrown into gas chambers. But then, neither had Hitler called for such treatment for Jews, disabled people, homosexuals, etc, when negotiating with Britain.

When it comes to the obvious danger arising from the election of Donald Trump, Australia’s conservative side of politics — its pollies and its media — are looking a lot like Chamberlain. Should Americans elect a President with xenophobic tendencies, it’ll just be a case of peace in our time for Malcolm Turnbull and Julie Bishop. Meanwhile, these same conservatives are attacking Bill Shorten for sounding more like Winston Churchill in alerting voters to the dangers of a Trump presidency. 

Nowhere has this been clearer than in the recent Orlando shooting. In case you’ve been asleep for the past 72 hours, here’s just a little of what we know so far about the killer Omar Mateen:

* He was born in New York, not in the mysterious nation of “Afghan” as Trump suggested;

* He dialled 911 and allegedly told the operator he was acting on behalf of the violently homophobic terrorist group Islamic State;

* Witnesses say he frequently attended the Pulse nightclub, approached men for sex, identified himself to friends as gay and used multiple gay apps such as Grindr;

*He occasionally went to the mosque with his son and performed congregational prayers. He did not attend the Friday prayer during which sermons were delivered; and

* He was violent and vicious toward his first wife.

Yet from Donald Trump to Andrew Bolt to Rita Panahi to Greg Sheridan to the editorial writer for The Australian to even Emma-Kate Symons, the message is that this is about the Islam, the whole Islam and nothing but the Islam.

And notwithstanding their almost constant linkages of terrorism to Islam, radical Islam, Islamism, Muslims, Islamists (and perhaps even those awful nasty pus-filled islamicysts), many of these same pundits allege that there is a conspiracy of political correctness stopping them from linking terrorism to Islam, radical Islam, Islamism etc etc. And when someone at the front line of fighting terrorism — say, for example, the ASIO chief — tells them that their rhetoric isn’t helpful, they go completely nuts.

This fixation with anything remotely Islam says more about alleged conservatives than it does about your average Yusuf Blow who buys halal/kosher certified products at the supermarket. Conservatives seem to have lost the ideological plot, more so than their most paranoid anti-communist forebears. Seriously, communism was an international threat with nuclear weapons and the ability to send men and dogs into space. Can we really compare groups like Islamic State, al-Qaeda, Jemaah Islamiyah and Boko Haram to the combined super power of the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies?

First published in Crikey on 16 July 2016.

COMMENT: Things I learned about the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) over the years

There's this scary creature in Egypt that has spread its testi ... woops ... tentacles across the world. It's a huge conspiracy that wants to transform each and every part of the planet into one huge bearded caliphate. Soon each nation will covered in a massive black burqa. At this time, no man will be allowed to lodge a develop application at their local council unless it makes provisions for a huge dome and at least 5 minarets surrounding each building.

Okay, now that I got that Murdochian bullshit out of my system, here are some things I've learned recently about Egypt's largest and most organised opposition movement:

[01] Here are some excerpts of what one Israeli neo-Con writes about the MB. I think he is surprisingly accurate in his assessment. Then again, I cannot read the original Arabic sources on the MB.

[02] One of the main ideologues of the MB during the 1950's was Syed Qutb. He was imprisoned by the military regime led by Neguib and then Nasser. Qutb was not a trained religious scholar but rather more of an intellectual. In prison he underwent severe forms of torture and was eventually executed. Qutb was one of numerous MB figures imprisoned by Nasser after the latter just dodged an assassination in Alexandria by an MB person. Nasser was a rather paranoid chap who assumed the entire MB was involved in some huge conspiracy to kill him. Believe it or not, Qutb did go to the United States, but found the experience extremely troubling.

[03] Qutb's books are widely available in the West and have been since the 1970's when the Saudis started spending petrodollars on spreading various forms of Islam they found friendly. The Saudis have always been big sponsors of MB.

[04] Among the most popular works of Qutb is his commentary of the Qur'an which has been translated as In the Shade of the Qur'an. Its English translation is widely available in bookshops across the Western world. Also widely available are other Qutb books such as Milestones which is also easily available on the internet.

[05] Qutb's works became especially popular during Ronald Reagan's Afghan jihad against the Soviet Union. MB activists took an active role in that conflict, and their literature was widely available.

[06] It is commonly claimed that Qutb was the founder of, if not the inspiration for, al-Qaida and other like-minded violent terror outfits. In a sense this is true. Bin Ladin and his colleagues do refer to Qutb. However, many peaceful political Muslim movements also make reference to Qutb.

[07] It is also claimed that Qutb is a founder or ideologue of the Salafi sect. I'm not sure what denomination of Sunni Islam Qutb belonged to or whether he subscribed to some form of Salafi/Wahhabi thinking. But I do know that many Wahhabis have attacked him for being akin to a Marxist.

[08] The MB have been active in Egypt since the 1950's. They gained a large following and infiltrated the Egyptian army. They were known to be a conservative rightwing party and were supported by both the Saudis and the British due to their strong anti-Communist stance.

REVIEW: Correspondent's ugly truth

Fit to Print: Misrepresenting the Middle East
Joris Luyendijk
Scribe, 243pp, $29.95

The Pope had just delivered his Regensburg address. The entire Islamic world (whatever that means) was up in arms. Churches were ablaze, nuns shot, flags and effigies in flames. Or so we in the West were told.

One such article reached my attention. It was accompanied by a photo taking up a quarter of the tabloid page and showing angry men in Basra burning effigies of the Pope and former President Bush. The caption read: “Muslims in Basra hold massive protest against Pope’s recent lecture”. The headline was “Muslim fury against Pope”.

It wasn’t until the 9th paragraph that the article noted that some 300 people had gathered at the protest. Basra is a city of some 3 million. As Americans would say: “Do the math”. This was no massive protest.

My attempt at critiquing the work of the foreign correspondent reporting this story could be dismissed as the rant of a Crikey-reading (and in my case, writing) amateur. We know what good foreign correspondents do. As Joris Luyendijk notes, the occupants of editorial ivory towers want average punters like me to believe that

... [j]ournalists know what’s going on in the world … the news gives an overview of these events, and it is possible to keep that overview objective.

Journalists are the gatekeepers of truth and perspective on world events.

Luyendijk also shared this common person’s perspective when he was an Arabic-speaking anthropology graduate employed by a major Dutch newspaper and broadcaster to be their Middle Eastern correspondent in 1998. After 5 years, Luyendijk through in the towel just as American troops foolishly threw an American flag over the falling statue of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad after temporarily winning the war in Iraq. You’d think that would be the worst time for Luyendijk to leave the fray, just as all the uncivilised action was starting in the cradle of civilisation.

Here’s how Luyendijk describes CNN’s version:

We saw the colossal statue of Saddam Hussein being torn down in Firdos (Paradise) Square in Baghdad . Jubiland Iraqis screamed into the camera lens and struck the icon with their shoes. ‘Thank you, Mister Bush!’ The presenter solemnly described it as an ‘historic moment’ – the war was over. They could put the nightmare of Saddam Hussein behind them. Baghdad was celebrating its liberation …

And what about al-Jazeera? Luyendijk writes:

They were showing Firdos Square, too, but their montage offered a different slant. In the same square, we saw American soldiers triumphantly throwing an American flag over the statue of Saddam. Then we were shown feverish discussions and the American soldiers rushing to remove the flag. Al-Jazeera went on to show the jubilant Iraqis from CNN, only they were shot from a longer range: you could see how few there were actually standing in the square, and that most of the people were watching from a safe distance.

Joris Luyendijk provides a highly accessible, irreverent and light-hearted account of the realities of life as a foreign correspondent in the Middle East. This is more a book about than of journalism. He describes the secrets, shortcuts and tricks of the trade used by foreign correspondents for both print, radio and television audiences. This includes regurgitating the content of wire service reports in a manner that, if done in an academic context, would almost certainly be considered plagiarism. Luyendijk’s news agenda about events in Baghdad or Ramallah would not be set in Baghdad or Ramallah but rather by a foreign editor in Amsterdam who had probably never been to Baghdad or Ramallah.

Luyendijk soon learns that

... the basic task of being a correspondent is not that difficult. The editor … called when something happened, they faxed or emailed the press releases, and I’d retell them in my own words on the radio, or rework them into an article for the newspapers.

Occasionally the correspondent would make use of the list of “talking heads” – diplomats (always Western ones), academics, UN workers and human rights activists on the payroll of Western countries - for obtaining “on the ground” perspectives. Otherwise, the role of a correspondent was merely to be the person at the end of the news assembly line.

Foreign correspondents and editors who take themselves too seriously may not enjoy reading Luyendijk’s descriptions about the insensitivity they show when checking into five star hotels whilst on assignment in impoverished war zones, or of their responses to the commencement of American bombing in Iraq in 2003:

... a wave of suppressed relief swept over the correspondents … No bombing would have meant no work, after money had already been spent on coming to Amman.

Or how about this hilarious description of Western journalists in the office of the Iraqi Consul trying to secure a visa to Iraq on the eve of the invasion:

We jostled [the Consul] like children clustering around a dubious-looking man with candy … I saw grown men in tears by the embassy gates when they discovered they’d be reduced to peering through the fence.

Luyendijk discovered that as he travelled to different hotspots and spoke to ordinary people, there were so many stories far more interesting and enlightening to tell than just which agreements were reached between what leaders and what accusations they made against each other when the deals inevitably became unstuck.

As a correspondent, I could tell different stories about the same situation. The media could only choose one, and it was often the story that confirmed a commonly held notion …

So the impact of conventional media processes was to confirm pre-existing stereotypes. Luyendikj’s book cleverly dispels not just our (generally negative) stereotypes about Arabs, Israelis and Muslims but also our (both positive and negative) stereotypes about journalists. A highlight of the book is the regular sprinkling of Arab jokes about dictators and secret police and even Israeli jokes about anti-Semitism and the Holocaust. People don’t just weep and burn flags in this part of the world.

This book was first published in Dutch as Het zijn net mensen (roughly “People Like Us”). A veteran correspondent who had seen his best friend had died in the Iraq-Iran war gave Luyendijk this piece of advice:

If you want to write a book about the Middle East, you’d better do it in your first week. The longer you hang around here, the less you understand.

After finishing this book, readers will be glad Luyendijk didn’t take this advice. This is an outstanding book on the limitations of reportage in the world’s perennial trouble spot. Or as Luyendijk repeatedly reminds us, in the Middle East

... good journalism is a contradiction in terms.

Irfan Yusuf is the author of Once Were Radicals: My Years as a Teenage Islamo-Fascist. An edited version of this review was first published in The Australian on 3 October 2009.

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf

Apologies for the corny retro music in this video!




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BOOKS: Robert Baer on the Iranian superpower ...

I’ve just finished reading a ripper-of-a-book by former CIA operative Robert Baer about Iran. The book is entitled The Devil We Know: Dealing With The New Iranian Superpower and was published in 2009.

I kept detailed notes of the book for the prologue which I’d like to share if for no other reason than that I’d like to throw them out and return the book to my shelf. So here goes:

[01] Iran’s war with the United States was undeclared on Iran’s part and largely ignored on the US’s part. The US at one stage was too busy fighting the Cold War.

[02] Iran and its proxy Hezbollah found ways of fighting an unconventional war against the US with precision-guided rockets, roadside bombs and human suicide bombs.

[03] The Gulf has 55% of the world’s oil reserves which Iran is now close to controlling.

[04] The cult of martyrdom plays a central role in Iran’s political ideology. Iranians say that no army can come in the way of martyrdom.

[05] Iran believes it has enough military power to challenge US interests in the Gulf. Iran is the new superpower, with unconventional warfare methods that could easily bring a conventional army to a standstill.

[06] Iran has all but abandoned Khomeini’s revolution. It is a rational actor which coldly and methodically pursues its national interest. Scratch at the veneer of Islam and what you get is old-fashioned nationalism.

[07] Iran’s proxy Hezbollah was the irst military force to defeat Israel on the battlefield since it was founded. Hezbollah defeated Israel again in the 34 day war of 2006. Israel withdrew with heavy losses achieving not a single military objective, and indeed strengthening Hezbollah’s presence in Lebanon.

[08] US interests in the Middle East were founded on the old Sunni order which has all but collapsed.

[09] This book is about defining Iran’s imperial drive.

This book is a riveting read, though at times it is prone to generalisations and a fair bit of the explanation of Sunni and Shia theology is just plain wrong. However, the basic proposition is well-argued and compelling.

You can read an excellent profile of the author by Rod McGuiness here.

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf


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REVIEW: Ambitious cultural journey loses its way ...

A Stranger to History: A Son's Journey Through Islamic Lands
By Aatish Taseer
Text Publishing, 323pp, $34.95

WE all inhabit the same planet, yet so often we hear phrases such as "the Muslim world" and "the Western world". Do such discrete entities indeed exist? Perhaps those best equipped to answer this question are those with one foot on either side of the divide.

Aatish Taseer, a 29-year-old freelance journalist and the son of an Indian Sikh mother and a Pakistani Muslim father, should have been such a person. That he isn't so is not entirely hisfault.

The two sides of Taseer's family share the culture and language of Punjab, a region in the northwest of the Indian subcontinent shared by India and Pakistan. Islam and Sikhism have inhabited Punjab's geographical and cultural space for centuries. Sikhism is indigenous to Punjab, while Punjabi Islam has adopted the cultural symbols of the land.

My background is a mixture of Indian and Pakistani. Having been reared in a small South Asian community in Sydney, I found it almost impossible to tell Muslims and Sikhs apart. To this day it is easy for me to confuse a mosque and gurudwara (Sikh temple) until the saffron flags of the latter become apparent.

But there is a huge difference between my upbringing and that of Taseer, whose parents' relationship was kept largely secret.

Taseer's father, Salmaan Taseer, became a senior figure in the Pakistan People's Party, at present the governing party of Pakistan. He is a businessman, media magnate and governor of Pakistan's Punjab province.

Aatish's parents met in India in 1980, where Salmaan Taseer was promoting a biography he'd written of his political mentor and former Pakistani prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Aatish's mother, respected Indian journalist Tavleen Singh, was then a young reporter.

At the time of his parents' brief affair, which lasted hardly a week, Salmaan Taseer was already married with three children.

After his parents' separation, Aatish was reared in his mother's Sikh household in Delhi, under the wing of his loving maternal grandfather. The grandfather had grown up in what is now Pakistan and still corresponded with his best friend from across the border.

Like other Sikhs, the Singhs had to flee their ancestral lands in what became Pakistan during the 1947 Partition, which still leaves some members of the family bitter and resentful towards Pakistan and Muslims in general. To his credit, the maternal grandfather wasn't affected by these sentiments.

'A human being,' my grandfather always asserted, when people asked whether I was being brought up as a Sikh or a Muslim. 'He's being brought up to be a human being.'

It wasn't until 1980, when he was 21, that the author met his father again. Taseer's interest in travelling through Muslim-majority states was sparked after he wrote a story on the July 7, 2005, London bombings for British magazine Prospect. Taseer's father wrote an angry letter ...

... accus[ing] me of prejudice, of lacking even 'superficial knowledge' of the Pakistani ethos. 'Do you really think you're doing the Taseer name a service by spreading this kind of invidious anti-Muslim propaganda?

Taseer was upset by his father's letter, an irreligious Pakistani politician who hardly embodied religious values.

Yet Taseer's language when describing his father is always restrained, consistent with the elegant and often hauntingly beautiful prose of the book, sadly spoiled by serious factual errors exhibiting not prejudice, which would have been understandable, but some elementary research.

In setting the stage for his travels, Taseer writes that the whole Islamic world ...

... stretched between my father [Lahore] and the place where I read his letter [London].

How does Taseer expect his reader to take his understanding of the Muslim world seriously when he excludes from it the world's largest Muslim majority state, Indonesia?

He claims his father's Pakistani Islam emphasises rejection of Hinduism. But this is hardly pan-Islam, as I discovered during a visit to the Javanese cultural capital of Yogyakarta in 2006.

There I saw Muslim artists perform the Hindu Ramayana ballet before Muslim audiences in one of Southeast Asia's oldest Hindu temples. Not all Muslims share the religious chauvinism of some Pakistanis.

Taseer's book covers his travels in Turkey, Syria, Saudi Arabia (including a visit to the pilgrimage centre of Mecca), Iran and Pakistan. In each country he provides us with tremendously detailed portraits of scenery, but when it comes to people our encounters are limited to the devout yet chauvinistic on the one hand or the irreligious and resentful on the other.

Are we to believe that only an insignificant unrepresentative minority exists between these two poles?

Most unfortunate for Taseer is that his paradigm for understanding pan-Islamic sentiment emerges largely from Hassan Butt, a young British man who for years claimed to have recruited British Muslims for al-Qa'ida.

Taseer brought Butt to prominence in the article that prompted his father's wrathful letter. Yet in December last year Butt admitted to a British court that he was a professional liar who had told journalists (including, presumably, Taseer) stories the media wanted to hear.

It's a shame such an elegant piece of writing is spoiled in a way that may make some dismiss it altogether.

Sadly for Taseer, this book, the product of months of travel and a lifetime of anguish, may vindicate at least some of his absent father's criticisms. It is not a vindication well-deserved.

Irfan Yusuf is author of Once Were Radicals: My Years as a Teenage Islamo-Fascist (Allen & Unwin). This review was first published in The Australian on 27 June 2009


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COMMENT: The Oz gives space to nonsensical analysis ...

Some years ago, I had an interesting exchange in Crikey with a former opinion editor of The Australian concerning what I saw as his refusal to allow space on his page for those who looked beyond his narrow binary view of a world divided into:

... two allegedly monolithic entities of ‘conservative Islam’ and ‘Western modernity’.

Could this judgment also be made about Mr Switzer’s successor? Certainly her choice of author to comment on President Obama’s recent address in Cairo about relations between the United States and Muslim-majority states seems curious to say the least.

Former Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Magaan has visited Australia on a number of occasions. I myself had the opportunity to interview her when she was the guest of honour at the Sydney Writers’ Festival some years back. Hirsi Magaan is a strident critic of Islam, her ancestral faith. She herself is an ardent evangelical atheist of the Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens mould.

Being an atheist and an ex-Muslim shouldn’t disqualify Hirsi Ali from commenting on the speech of a politician. But one wonders how seriously we should take someone quite happy to make remarks like this:

Nowhere in the world is bigotry so rampant as in Muslim countries.

How do we define and measure bigotry? How does Hirsi Magaan measure it? Does it include making crude generalisations about hundreds of millions of people? And what evidence does she have of widespread chronic bigotry across over 50 Muslim-majority states? The examples Hirsi Magaan provides are: Saudi Arabia , al-Qaida, Al-Azhar University and Iran ’s leadership. A monarchy, a terrorist organisation, a university and a country whose political establishment is at war with itself. Imagine if people judged the West and/or the "Christian world" by pointing to the KKK, Fox News and Moore Theological College.

And what about Indonesia ? How is it that Hirsi Magaan, a former Dutch MP, doesn’t regard a former Dutch colony as significant enough to mention in her column? Is Ms Hirsi Magaan prepared to convince Indonesia’s religious authorities, not to mention science teachers in pesantrens (traditional religious boarding schools), that there are “edicts of sharia law that reject scientific inquiry”? Or will she tell this to Malaysia ’s imam-cum-astronaut with a straight face? Or will she ignore developments in Iran relating to embryonic stem cell research as shown in the video below?



The Oz's opinion editor, back in February 2007, gave a most generous and uncritical profile of Hirsi Magaan, suggesting that her hysterical views – including that “Islam … discourages the work ethic that is the motor for economically successful societies” – were views that “have added weight because they are not those of an outsider or a dilettante”.

One wonders what kind of editor would give credence to a suggestion that 14 centuries of religious and cultural heritage have discouraged a work ethic and deterred economic development. One wonders how Hirsi Magaan and Weisser would respond to the paper of Chris Berg and Andrew Kemp published in the IPA Review in 2007 entitled Islam and the Free Market.

And as for the notion that former "insiders" always make good sources, should I take for granted the words of a jaundiced ex-Jew about Judaism just because she too isn’t an outsider?

People’s beliefs, cultures, communities, leaders and/or countries can and should and must be subjected to scrutiny and criticism. But there is a difference between criticism and ill-informed bigotry. By providing space for even such extreme and jaundiced opinions, certain segments of our national broadsheet are doing disservice to their readers.

COMMENT: Between free speech and hate speech ...

Some readers will recall the enormous fuss surrounding Michael Backman’s column in The Age column, which contained two questionable remarks:

*That, through its excesses against the Palestinians, Israel was responsible for inciting Muslims across the world to hate her;

*That the West suffered because of this through terrorist attacks by Muslim extremists; and

*That Israeli trekkers were all badly behaved in Nepal.

The first two claims, while dubious, were more political judgments than racist remarks. There was a fair bit of emotion-charged debate at the Crikey website, with media writer Margaret Simons insisting The Age had some explaining to do while other Crikey contributors denied Backman was anti-Semitic at all given Israeli newspapers print complaints about Israeli tourists.

The Australian ran hard on the story, its editorial asking whether editors at The Age shared Backman’s ...

... [u]ndergraduate, ill-informed nonsense.

It continued:

There is no evidence that Backman hates Jews, but people who do will endorse his arguments and continue to cloak their anti-Semitism in a faux concern for the Palestinians.

In the same vein, I cannot claim that Janet Albrechtsen’s recent claims on her blog that ...

... a significant distinguishing feature between Muslim countries and the West has been our belief in freedom of expression ...

... show that she hates Muslims per se, even if she refuses to distinguish between different Muslim-majority states.

(I myself have gone on record about the lack of freedoms citizens in most Arab states enjoy. However, I distinguished between Arab League states (who make up around 15% of the world’s Muslim population) and other states. I also don’t cast aspersions on all 1.2 billion, knowing that around one third live as minorities.)

But will Albrechtsen’s arguments, ostensibly defending a far-Right Dutch politician’s freedom to compare Muslim scriptures with Hitler’s autobiography, be endorsed by people who do hate Muslims and allow them to cloak their hatred in a faux concern for freedom of speech? Read the 7 pages of moderated comments and judge for yourself.

Or to use language Albrechtsen will no doubt appreciate, being the free speech crusader she is, should the rights of a far-Right Dutch MP to offend racial and religious minorities be deemed more important than that of a British columnist? Indeed, the big question in my mind is this: why didn’t Janet Albrechtsen raise her voice in defense of Michael Backman? I won’t bother holding my breath for an honest answer.

Writing in the New York Times on January 29, Dutch journalist Ian Buruma addresses the prosecution of far-Right MP Geert Wilders. He begins with this observation:

IF it were not for his hatred of Islam, Geert Wilders would have remained a provincial Dutch parliamentarian of little note.

(I can't help but wonder the same about Janet Albrechtsen, whose rise to fame was on the back of her rather creative use of the work of European academics.)

Buruma provides the context of the Wilders prosecution, something Albrechtsen finds impossible to do with an equal degree of clarity.

[Wilders] is now world-famous, mainly for wanting the Koran to be banned in his country, “like Mein Kampf is banned,” and for making a crude short film that depicted Islam as a terrorist faith — or, as he puts it, “that sick ideology of Allah and Muhammad.”

Last year the Dutch government decided that such views, though coarse, were an acceptable contribution to political debate. Yet last week an Amsterdam court decided that Mr. Wilders should be prosecuted for “insulting” and “spreading hatred” against Muslims. Dutch criminal law can be invoked against anyone who “deliberately insults people on the grounds of their race, religion, beliefs or sexual orientation.”

Buruma acknowledges that Wilders' supporters are not all far-Right fruitloops.

Whether Mr. Wilders has deliberately insulted Muslim people is for the judges to decide ... When the British Parliament refused to screen Mr. Wilders’s film at Westminster this week, he cited this as “yet more proof that Europe is losing its freedom.” His defenders, by no means all right-wingers, also claim to be standing up for freedom. A Dutch law professor said he found it “strange” that a man should be prosecuted for “criticizing a book.”

Buruma then identifies the method used by Wilders, and in doing so provides an effective and nuanced antidote to Albrechtsen's simplistic linear free-speech rant.

In a bewildering world of global economics, multinational institutions and mass migration, many people are anxious about losing their sense of place; they feel abandoned by their own elites. Right-wing populists like Geert Wilders are tapping into these fears.

Since raw nativism is out of fashion in the Netherlands, Mr. Wilders does not speak of race, but of freedom. His method is to expose the intolerance of Muslims by provoking them. If they react to his insults, he can claim that they are a threat to our native liberties. And if anyone should point out that deliberately giving offense to Muslims is neither the best way to lower social tensions nor to protect our freedoms, Mr. Wilders will denounce him as a typical cultural elitist collaborating with “Islamo-fascism.”

It is tempting to conclude (as Albrechtsen suggests) that Wilders is merely seekng to criticise a religious belief. Followers of that belief need not be afraid of that criticism. But is Wilders really just criticising a religious belief?

Comparing a book that billions hold sacred to Hitler’s murderous tract is more than an exercise in literary criticism; it suggests that those who believe in the Koran are like Nazis, and an all-out war against them would be justified. This kind of thinking, presumably, is what the Dutch law court is seeking to check.

One of the misconceptions that muddle the West’s debate over Islam and free speech is the idea that people should be totally free to insult. Free speech is never that absolute. Even — or perhaps especially — in America, where citizens are protected by the First Amendment, there are certain words and opinions that no civilized person would utter, and others that open the speaker to civil charges.

This does not mean that religious beliefs should be above criticism. And sometimes criticism will be taken as an insult where none is intended. In that case the critic should get the benefit of the doubt. Likening the Koran to “Mein Kampf” would not seem to fall into that category.

If Mr. Wilders were to confine his remarks to those Muslims who do harm freedom of speech by using violence against critics and apostates, he would have a valid point. This is indeed a serious problem, not just in the West, but especially in countries where Muslims are in the majority. Mr. Wilders, however, refuses to make such fine distinctions. He believes that there is no such thing as a moderate Muslim. His aim is to stop “the Islamic invasion of Holland.”

There are others who share this fear and speak of “Islamicization,” as though not just Holland but all Europe were in danger of being engulfed by fascism once again. Since Muslims still constitute a relatively small minority, and most are not extremists, this seems an exaggerated fear, even though the danger of Islamist violence must be taken seriously.

However, a closer look at the rhetoric of Mr. Wilders and his defenders shows that Muslims are not the only enemies in their sights. Equally dangerous are the people whom Mr. Wilders and others refer to obsessively as “the cultural elite.”

Yep, those blasted leftwing university-educated elites who can only be exposed by their exact opposite - rightwing edlites with doctorates in law who get appointed to the boards of national broadcasters.

So what do I think of the movie? Well, I'm still wondering what all the fuss is about. It's rather ordinary, dare I say "undergraduate" and somewhat "ill-informed". The responses of another bunch of Muslim "elites" can be viewed here, and you can also

My Dutch co-religionists didn't exactly feel threatened by the movie.

The lawsuit against Mr. Wilders has been hailed in the Netherlands as a good thing for democracy. I am not so sure. It makes him look more important than he should be. In fact, the response of Dutch Muslims to his film last year was exemplary: most said nothing at all. And when a small Dutch Muslim TV station offered to broadcast the film, after all other stations had refused, the grand champion of free speech resolutely turned the offer down.

I guess that's what happens when you aren't one of the elites.

Speaking of which, feel free to watch the movie here and judge for yourself. I doubt Janet Albrechtsen would have the guts to broadcast this freely-available YouTube clip on her elite blog.



Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf


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HATEWATCH: Yet even more great moments from Tim Blair's News Ltd blog ...

The Abu Hamza pseudo-controversy has provided the nazified imbeciles congregating around the News Limited blob ... woops ... blog of Tim Blair with further inspiration for laughably inane comment. Here are some excerpts. Try not to laugh too hard.

Barak Obama eating a hamburger (not a Sea Kitten, note) prepared by the wife of a Muslim cleric - in an unforgivable affront to the Jewish and Christian faiths! No! Just the Jewish one. Wait! Which one doesn’t eat ham again? Oh yeah, the Muslims.
bill of sydney
Fri 23 Jan 09 (05:28am)

What the ...? And for all you interfaith buffs, shove this up your halal/kosher ham sandwich!

dowp replied to bill
Fri 23 Jan 09 (06:59pm)

Er BIll. Jews don’t eat ham, bacon, pork or other pig-based ingredients. Not if they’re religious anyway.

Just ONE of the religious obligations MoHAMmed stole from the Jews to try to convert them to Islam.

Don’t you know anything?

But this isn't just about religion. It's also about colour. People with white skin clearly have more conscience ...

Speaking of contex, in the video of the audience there are many ‘non-Anglo’ faces. They all look expressionless as they listen to the hateful Imam - apparently drinking in the message obediently.
But there is one ‘Anglo’ and he has a smirk [of embarrassment?] on his face. He seems to be half looking to see how he should react to the teaching to beat his wife.
Which of these reactions shows assimilation to the Australian culture?
Barrie (Reply)
Fri 23 Jan 09 (08:33am)

Moving onto page 2, some people are wondering why conservatives aren't stupid enough to buy into this tabloid tripe ...

Where are our cultural commentators, Greer of the Long Face and John Pilchard, on this; and, more importantly, where is Malcolm Turnbull, every conservative think tank spokesman and people elected by half of Australian voters to speak stridently against those things that are inimical to our way of life?
Mick Gold Coast QLD of Gold Coast QLD (Reply)
Fri 23 Jan 09 (09:07am)

Even after someone pointed out that even Muslims have actively condemned any hint of condoning domestic violence, the usual cultural nuance and sophistication returns ...

John E replied to ann j
Fri 23 Jan 09 (01:33pm)

The mere fact that the video is 4-5 years old, and yet they still broadcasted it - knowing full well the filth that was contained on it, and the likely reaction by the public - means that the Muslims who produced it deserve every bit of the condemnation that rightly flows their way.

I’d like to think - and certainly hope - that this line of thinking is, in fact, limited to a bunch of fringe crazies within the Muslim religion, but there appears to be very little objective evidence that that is the case.

Meanwhile, it's time to bring in extraneous leftwing ideas like human rights ...

So according to this Muslim cleric it’s OK for Muslim men to beat their wives so long as they don’t draw blood or create bruises.

Then how come other Muslims complain that terrorist suspects were tortured at Guantanamo Bay ? Surely it’s not torture ? Surely it’s just a bit of harmless wife-beating ?

Men can hit there innocent wives but the US can’t interrogate terrorist suspects ?
Bruce Smith (Reply)
Fri 23 Jan 09 (01:37pm)

I look forward to comments from "Augustus", "tim blair" and the anonymous chap from Normanhurst to this post. Enjoy!

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf


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VIDEO: All-American sharia ...

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Noah Feldman

Colbert at Christmas
Colbert Christmas DVD

Green Screen
Bill O'Reilly Interview

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CRIKEY: Shame - the secret behind Amrozi's smile ...

I never realised just how much ordinary Indonesians hated the Bali bombers until I actually went there. It was January 2006, and I was on an exchange program organised by the Australia-Indonesia Institute. Before going, the AII gave is a briefing about Indonesia, its history, politics and its unique approach to religiosity. Indonesians are gentle, polite and quiet-spoken people.

Our delegation was further briefed in Jakarta by an awesome professional at the Embassy. We were advised to tome down our Aussie-style polemic. Apart from the odd dingo cartoon, Indonesians rarely engage in blunt or deliberately controversial discourse, let alone the sort of crass moronic ad hominem nonsense we've become accustomed to in this country.

During our trip, we were exposed to every kind of Indonesian Islam you could imagine -- from firebrand charismatic Salafis to ecumenical interfaith activists of Interfidei to youth reps of Muhammadiyah and Nahdhatul Ulama (Indonesia’s largest Islamic organisations) to students at a traditional pesantren (the kind of religious boarding school Barack Obama never attended outside Jakarta.

At the Gadjah Mada University in Jogjakarta, I met a Balinese postgrad doing his thesis on the impact of the Bali bombings on the economy of not just Bali but also nearby islands and even eastern and central Java, the island that forms Indonesia’s economic and cultural powerhouse. A year later in Sydney, I met another Balinese chap in Australia visiting on an AII exchange program. Both told me about how their families and communities had suffered thanks to the terrorist attacks in Bali, not to mention how so many locals as well as foreigners were killed and wounded.

(This fellow requested me to take him to Cronulla Beach. I assumed it was to see the scene of the 2005 race riots. It was only when I saw him reciting traditional Muslim prayers reserved for one’s deceased relatives at the memorial for Bali victims that I realised why he really wanted to be there.)

Mentioning Amrozi and other Bali bombers exhibits the kind of uncharacteristically brutal response I was told Indonesians only rarely exhibit. If more Australians understood just how unpopular the Bali bombers are in their own country and just how many ordinary Indonesians’ livelihoods have been destroyed, we would understand exactly why Amrozi smiles so much.

When Indonesians smile or chuckle, it’s often because they are embarrassed or ashamed about something they’ve said or done. Amrozi’s smile, referred to in today’s Age, is more likely one of shame or embarrassment. Notwithstanding his defiant words, Amrozi knows millions of Indonesians are looking forward to his execution. The bombs of Amrozi and Imam Samudra don’t discriminate on the basis of religion, even if their sick demented political theology does.

First published in the Crikey daily alert for 2 October 2008.

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf

COMMENT: The Jewel of Medina finds a publisher ...

Well, hurrah for all fans of free speech, blasphemy and all that other nasty decadent Western stuff. It looks like Sherry Jones, author of an historical fiction novel about the prophet Muhammad’s wife, has finally found a publisher.

Sherry Jones says she wrote The Jewel of Medina to show to “honour Islam”. She wanted to show how Aisha, the main character of the book and one of Muhammad’s wives, was ...

... a remarkable woman of intelligence, wit, and strength who helped shape the destiny of one of the world’s great religions.

Headlines in Western newspapers speak of Muhammad’s “child bride”, a reference to the fact that some classical Islamic biographical literature place Aisha’s age at 6 years old when she married him, and 9 when she went to live with him. Other versions state that she was in her mid-teens or even early twenties when she married him.

The weird thing about this entire book saga is the book was ditched by Jones’ first publisher because of some fear the book would cause a bigger sensation than Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses and the Danish cartoons combined. Why that is, I don’t know. For starters, it was a Muslim journalist who first broke the story.

You can read more about the saga here. It’s interesting to see what prominent North American Muslim journalist Shahed Amanullah had to say about the whole thing.

The book has already received mixed reviews, with one Muslim reviewer comparing it to the worst of Hollywood portrayals of Arab society and as ...

... fiction in the purest sense of the term, with little or nothing of history in it.

So it’s a work of fiction. I knew that. Why get so offended by a story?

We are living in a post-religion age. Religious beliefs and doctrines and personalities will be subjected to all kinds of scrutiny, interpretation and re-interpretation. I’m actually looking forward to reading Jones’ fictional interpretation of the story of Aisha. I'm also looking forward to reading Kamran Pasha's novel on the same subject.

You watch Kamran Pasha talk about his views on comparative theology, movies etc here ...


Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf


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OPINION: Justice the remedy required to help Bosnia heal ...

Radovan Karadzic, the murderous Sarajevo psychiatrist, was the architect of a brutal war in Bosnia Herzegovina during the mid-1990s that cost hundreds of thousands of civilian lives and that involved the gang rape of tens of thousands of women.

Karadzic masterminded the worst atrocities in Europe since World War II. His forces set up concentration camps where supporters of the Bosnian government were tortured, butchered and murdered.

In his memoir Enemy Combatant, former British Guantanamo inmate Moazzam Begg describes meeting a Bosnian Muslim refugee who was gang raped in the presence of her husband and with their three-month old baby screaming. Soon after the rape her husband was shot and her baby decapitated, all in her presence.

The bulk of Karadzic's victims were indigenous Bosnians who did not fit into the categories of "Serb" or "Croat" and whose ancestral faith was Islam. Of course, this did not make Bosnia a Muslim state in any theocratic sense. To be Muslim was more an ethnic than religious feature. Hence, the expulsion of Muslim and Croat populations by Karadzic's forces was appropriately referred to as "ethnic cleansing".

Indeed, when it declared its independence from the Yugoslav federation on March 1, 1992, Bosnia was a country of three large ethnic minorities - Muslim, Serb and Croat. Members of all three communities supported Bosnian independence. Politicians from all three communities formed the Bosnian government. Soldiers from all three communities fought to defend Bosnia's independence and territorial integrity.

Bosnia Herzegovina was established by Europeans who included Muslims not wanting a uniformly Islamic or theocratic state but rather a genuinely modern pluralist European state. Muslims showed their commitment to European values and liberal democracy.

And for this, they were rewarded with genocide and an arms embargo that crippled this young state's ability to defend itself. Karadzic rejected that pluralist vision and fought it using violence reminiscent of the worst excesses of Nazi Germany. He received international support by default in that the world refused to lift an arms embargo and so deprive Bosnia's army of weapons it needed to defend itself.

To describe the newly established republic of Bosnia back in the 1990s as a Muslim country was and remains an absurdity. At least 30 per cent of Bosnians had ethnically and religiously mixed parentage. One tragic image of the war was two young lovers, a Bosnian Serb boy, Bosko Brkic, and his Bosnian Muslim girlfriend, Admira Ismic, gunned down by Serb snipers while attempting to flee Sarajevo. They died in each other's arms. Their funeral service was attended by both families and friends, and included elements of both Orthodox Christian and Muslim liturgy.

Yet if Karadzic's war actually achieved anything arguably positive for his foes, it was putting indigenous European Islam on the world map. This was an Islam happy to live in (and indeed lead) a genuinely pluralist society. The central square of Sarajevo, once Europe's oldest centre of Islamic learning, still has the houses of worship of four communities (a synagogue, a mosque, an Orthodox and a Catholic church).

It's a bitter irony. For many non-Western Muslims and Muslim migrants living in Western countries, the existence of Bosnian Islam first hit their radar via the images of imams leading the funeral prayers of children shot by Karadzic's snipers or cut to pieces by shrapnel fired by Karadzic's forces. For many of us, Bosnian Islam became a reality at a time when it faced extermination.

Countries like Bosnia and Kosovo serve as reminders that Islam is a European faith. If it were not so, large indigenous European Muslims would not exist in the heart of Europe.

I remember being told of an incident where an imam was invited to say a prayer at an interfaith service a few weeks following the September 11 attacks on the United States. The imam was Bosnian. A Muslim attending the service went up to the imam and asked why he was wearing European dress. "Because I am European," was the imam's reply.

For some Western Muslims, the message of the Bosnian war was clear. What point is there in trying to culturally integrate into Western societies? Integration didn't stop Bosnian Muslims from being slaughtered, raped and butchered. Muslims felt they were damned if they did and damned if they didn't ...

Karadzic may be in custody and awaiting trial but his sentiments and prejudices are alive and well.

The International Court of Justice has already described the Bosnian war as genocide, even if it deprived Bosnians of justice by refusing to rule in favour of Bosnia's application holding what is left of Yugoslavia responsible. Let's hope the International War Crimes Tribunal can deliver the justice Bosnia needs to heal.

Irfan Yusuf is a Sydney lawyer and writer. An edited version of this article was first published in The Canberra Times on Monday 18 August 2008. Another version of this article was published on the same date in The New Zealand Herald.

UPDATE I: Queensland is an amazing place. But some Queenslanders continue to display the sort of disposition a certain deceased peanut farmer was famous for. Among them is this tasteless creature who views everything through the prism of masturbation. Read it and understand why modern medical science (as in psychopharmacology) cannot assist everyone.

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf

COMMENT: UK neo-Con mass debaters withdraw from debate

As this is a family-friendly blog, I will refrain from using too much sexual innuendo.

A number of allegedly conservative Englishmen have been invited by organisers of the IslamExpo (IE) being held in London.

Among them is Douglas Murray, a writer for the CentreRight blog. Murray reproduces an open letter to the organisers of the IE explaining his withdrawal symptoms, which you can read here.

His reasons? Apparently one of the directors of IE has commenced defamation proceedings against another conservative blogger who produces the Harry's Place blog.

The result?

I will not come on a platform hosted by people carrying out legal action against a deeply admirable and informed proponent of free speech.

What a bunch of sooks these so-called conservatives are. They refuse to partake in a debate at a forum attended by at least 50,000 people. Then they wonder why people don't take them seriously.

In the past 6 months, I've had numerous phone calls from journalists and in-house lawyers working for a certain media organisation. They've threatened me with defamation action because of material I've written on this and other blogs. Yet if that same media organisation provides me with a venue to share my views and participate in debate, why should I refuse?

After all, just because one or two individuals within an organisation enjoy providing humble bloggers like myself with an enormous ego boost, it doesn't mean the entire organisation reads (let alone objects to) the contents of this blog.

Of course, the real reason these so-called conservatives don't wish to participate is that they don't wish their own views to be subjected to intelligent scrutiny. Murray and his co-horts are happy to label IE as part of a giant jihadist conspiracy to take over the Western world. They are happy to lead us to believe some directors of IE have links to groups often associated with theocratic Islam. Or groups or individuals who allegedly support groups or individuals associated with theocratic Islam. Or groups or individuals who allegedly support groups or individuals who allegedly support groups or individuals associated with theocratic Islam (the lattermost being people who, according to writers like Ed Husain, are just waiting for the right moment to blow up a bus or two).

But they won't be too happy if someone mentions their associations with political extremists such as the Israeli Likud Party which is opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state. They won't be happy for their support for the disastrous Iraq war or their own links to theocratic Christianity (and its allies in the neo-C0nservative movement) to be discussed.

They don't like engaging in debate because they prefer to engage in another exercise. One that rhymes with the words "mass debate".

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf

UPDATE: Stuff recently published ...

OK, in case anyone gives a stuff, here's what I think of 2 recently published books which provide some analysis on what people living in various Muslim communities think of life, the world, politics and just about everything else (well, apart from hoochies). You can read the slightly unedited version here.

The NSW Liberals always make fascinating writing, even if their antics can bore readers to death. Little wonder this piece in New Matilda managed to generate absolutely no comments.

It seems people are more interested in talking about the possibility of killing criminals. I hope this piece for ABC Unleashed reaches a double-century of comments.

And I give British author Imran Ahmad another plug here.

But why read when you can watch this superb display of bowling from Wazzi A-Crim?

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf


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OPINION: Griffith IRU controversy ...

Al-Qaeda's latest recruits showing off their camouflage and weapons ...







Attempts to whip up hysteria over Islamic issues

It's good to see The Chaser boys let off the hook. Their silly APEC Summit prank illustrated just how ineffective expensive security-related hysteria can be. Despite costly and thorough security precautions, Chas Licciardello (dressed up as Osama bin Laden sitting in a limousine sporting the Canadian flag guarded by a few blokes sporting badges printed with insecurity) came within metres of President Bush's hotel.

One newspaper that has turned security-related hysteria into an art form is The Australian. In recent times, reporters Richard Kerbaj and Natalie O'Brien from The Australian have made use of the Anna Coren-style segue to link all kinds of people to international terrorist organisations. The result has been material which will generate a few laughs down at the Canberra Islamic Centre, even if it makes non-Muslim readers feel like reaching for their National Security Hotline fridge magnets.

In one recent article headlined "Christians should wear veil", O'Brien claimed former Mufti Sheik Tajeddin Hilaly says the Bible mandates the wearing of the veil by Christian women.

Whilst this is an improvement on his "catmeat" remarks, I couldn't find anywhere in O'Brien's article where Hilaly actually spoke of Christians being told to wear veils. The only vaguely suggestive comment from Hilaly O'Brien could quote was him saying the Virgin Mary is often depicted with a veil covering her head.

This is a scurrilous suggestion! I trust O'Brien and her editor will insist the Pope refutes all suggestions of Mary being depicted with a covered head during his World Youth Day address.

The Australian also reports that Griffith University in Queensland is in the process of becoming a Saudi-style madrassa, where female students will be forced to wear veils over their heads and faces and where the grand international al-Qaeda jihad will be launched to transform Australia into a sharia state.

OK, that's a slight exaggeration. The actual story is that Griffith University accepted an injection of $100,000 from the Saudi embassy for its Griffith Islamic Research Unit, a postgraduate research facility.

In January 2007, a consortium consisting of GIRU, Melbourne University and the University of Western Sydney won approval from the Commonwealth to form the National Centre for Excellence in Islamic Studies. The Australian Government's initial investment into the NCEIS (which presumably will also benefit Griffith University) is $8 million.

So will Griffith accepting 1.25 per cent of this amount from the Saudi embassy mean the university will be pressured to adopt the rather unsavoury theological line of an unsavoury regime with a human rights record that makes it fit to host the next Olympics?

Of course, Griffith isn't the only university to be the subject of media controversy over accepting cash from foreign governments. As Griffith Vice-Chancellor Professor Ian O'Connor points out, the Saudi Government has entered into similar arrangements with Oxford, Harvard and Georgetown Universities, the latter being a private Catholic university.

O'Connor's arguments, made in an op-ed published in The Australian, have been attacked by that newspaper for being partially plagiarised from Wikipedia. Interestingly, the same newspaper had no hesitation in defending one of its own columnists who in 2002 not only plagiarised but also distorted the writings of European academics to suit her race-based agenda. I guess what's good for the gander isn't good for the goose.

So should Griffith Uni have taken the money? I'm no fan of the Saudi Government or of its official creed. But I wonder whether the Saudis have gotten value for money.

None of the research topics of PhD candidates of the centre display any strong inkling of Wahhabism. One candidate is studying the prevalence of domestic violence in Muslim communities. Malaysia's de facto opposition leader, Anwar Ibrahim, is researching Asian Renaissance, hardly a topic of interest to Saudi religious police enforcing the country's strict veiling laws.

Then again, I could be accused of bias. After all, Griffith Uni did pay for my airfare and accommodation to attend and speak at their recent conference. Naturally someone like me, who has used just about every public forum in Australia and New Zealand I could get my hands on to lambast Saudi-style Wahhabism, is clearly someone the Saudi ambassador would be delighted to share a conference program with.

Back to The Chaser crew. It's always a joy to see them poke fun at Channel 7 Today Tonight host Anna Coren manufacturing segues out of two unrelated topics. Richard Kerbaj, a reporter for The Australian, has also put segues to good use.

Griffith's centre is headed by Dr Mohamad Abdalla. Kerbaj claims Abdalla is a leader of an allegedly shadowy group called the Tablighi Jamaat, an international Sufi reform movement with tens of millions of followers worldwide. Kerbaj tells us that the TJ are linked to al-Qaeda and the London bombings. How so?

Because al-Qaeda shoe-bomber Richard Reid and at least two of the London bombers attended TJ gatherings. I doubt even Anna Coren could come up with such an outrageous segue.

South Asian readers will confirm that current and former TJ members include former Indian President Dr Zakir Hussein and former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. The International Herald Tribune reported that at one TJ gathering in Tongi in Bangladesh, some three million Muslims attended.

Twenty-20 cricket fans will be pleased to note that champion batsman Shahid Afridi, who plays for the Deccan Chargers in the Indian Premier League, is also a TJ member.

Applying Kerbaj's logic, that means the Indian Government, Pakistani Muslim League Party, at least three million Bengalis and the Deccan Chargers (including perhaps Adam Gilchrist and Andrew Symonds) are all linked to al-Qaeda. Go figure.

Al-Qaeda's new logo ...

Irfan Yusuf is a Sydney lawyer and writer. This article was first published in The Canberra Times on 1 May 2008. May Day, May Day!!

CRIKEY: Ignorance of Kerbajian proportions exposed ...

Dicky Kerbaj makes it a hat-trick, today managing to extract his third article on Griffith University’s Islamic Research Unit (GIRU).

This time his article in The Australian cites various people from Griffith Uni (including its Vice Chancellor) who have defended the measley $100,000 donated by one of the wealthiest royal families on the planet.

The university authorities also refer to similar arrangements Saudi royalty have made with universities as controversial as Harvard, Oxford and Georgetown (a private Catholic university in Washington).

I’d love to see His Honour Judge Wall (again quoted today by Kerbaj) suggest the Catholic Church established educational institutions akin to extremist Pakistani madressas.

Kerbaj finally shows his own lack of expertise on what he describes as "the secretive Muslim group Tablighi Jamaat". In doing so, he shoots his own argument in the foot even more.

The TJ’s operations are extremely limited in the Saudi kingdom. TJ textbooks are banned from the country as they allegedly contain "deviant" Sufi teachings. Hard-line Saudi Wahhabi religious authorities have severely criticised TJ’s methodology and teachings.

Anyone with even a kindergarten understanding of Muslim sectarianism knows of the fatwa issued by the former Mufti of Saudi Arabia attacking the TJ and forbidding Wahhabis from spending time with them unless it is for the purpose of correcting them.

Kerbaj’s silly attack on GIRU head Dr Mohamad Abdalla reflects more on Kerbaj’s poor research skills than on Dr Abdalla.

To its credit, The Oz did run an opinion piece today by Griffith University Vice Chancellor Ian O’Connor. Professor O’Connor reveals that the university had received 10 times the amount of the Saudi donation from a Singaporean Buddhist elder. He also gave Crikey a plug. Grouse.

(First published in the Crikey daily alert for Thursday 24 April 2008.)

UPDATE I: Check out the unedited version of the Griffith Uni VC's article published by the marvellous folk at ABC Unleashed here.

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf

MEDIA/SATIRE: It's time to expose the extremists at Griffith University ...

The Australian continues with its witchhunt of the Griffith Islamic Research Unit (GIRU), this time with both an article and editorial claiming GIRU will actively promote Wahhabism after receiving a measley $100,000. This time The Oz has pulled out its biggest expert gun yet - a Queensland District Court Judge.

His Honour Judge Clive Wall QC has found GIRU guilty of acting as ...

... an agent to promote their [i.e. Saudi] bigoted brand of Islam.

Really? Where is Wahhabi bigotry to be found in the seven criteria listed here?

Objectives

*To encourage research between Griffith University and the wider Australian Muslim community.

*To promote scholarly co-operation between Muslim and other religious scholars on issues high on the agenda.

*To provide commentary on issues related to Islam and Muslims in Australia.

*To conduct research, organise seminars, lectures, conferences and meetings on Islamic issues, with emphasis on issues that pertain to Australian Muslims as a minority group.

*To organise, participate and assist in educational activities that seek to bridge the gap between Islam and the West.

*To publish on issues pertaining to Islam and the Muslims in Australia.

*To provide scholarships for research aimed at examining the condition of Islam and Muslims in Australia; research that strives for understanding in order to bring positive and lasting change in our communities.

A brief perusal of GIRU’s website shows its real role: to provide a venue where postgraduate students can conduct academic research toward their PhD’s. The last time I checked, most Aussie PhD students prefer to seek approval for their topic from their university faculty, not from the embassy of an overseas country.

But let’s take for granted The Oz’s claims. Let’s look at one al-Qaeda sympathiser resident at GIRU - Dr George Saliba, formerly of that notorious Wahhabi institution known as Columbia University. Pictued below are some of the radical Taliban fanatics who attend this den of anti-Western hatred ...


Clearly these non-integrated youth are ready to strap bombs to themselves. They have been brainwashed by Saliba's teachings on such radical subjects as the history of science and medieval Arab astronomy.

But it gets worse. One rather nasty anti-democratic fundamentalist doing his PhD at GIRU is Anwar Ibrahim, a former Distinguished Visiting Professor at that nasty Saudi-funded madressa known as Georgetown University. Georgetown is part of an international network of Islamic extremists led by this man.


I trust our immigration authorities act quickly before this man is allowed anywhere near our country.

Returning to Anwar, this fellow is conducting highly dangerous anti-Western research on the “Asian renaissance”. No doubt this research will increase the rate of suicide bombings in downtown Lakemba and Coburg .

Anwar, of course, is busy promoting extremism and radicalism in our region through his role as Malaysia ’s de facto opposition leader. In the past, he has lectured on such favourite topics of Usama bin Ladin as the works of William Shakespeare and Muslim democracy. His friends include radical cleric Ayatollah Greg Sheridan and terrorist financier Mufti Paul Wolfowitz.


Radical wahhabi cleric, Ayatollah Greg Sheridan, sporting a sharia-compliant beard.


Terrorist financier, Mufti Paul Wolfowitz, removing his shoes before entering a radical maddressah.

Some readers may also recall Anwar was also jailed for opposing an extremely moderate Muslim leader. He was certainly given the sort of royal treatment usually reserved for opponents of the Royal Family in Saudi prisons.

Without doubt, we must take heed of warnings given by The Oz on this nefarious research unit and its den of Wahhabist extremists. I just wish someone in Mr Rudd’s office listened and not have invited GIRU head, Dr Mohammad Abdalla, to the 2020 Summit.

Either that, or Mr Rudd prefers not to take his cue from American newspapers ...

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf


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