Muslim Heretics Conference

Statistics on Muslims in Europe Raise Questions.

Posted At : 9:39 AM | Posted By : LAINA
Related Categories: Population, Islam, Op Ed

Pajaronian April 9, 2008

The “Islam in Europe” blog site has provided some statistics on the growing Muslim population in European cities. Of course these statistics do not tell us how many of these Muslims are integrated into Western culture; how many are new, illegal, and very radical; or how one gathers such statistics when European census data do not include religion as a category. (Political correctness forbids asking.) However, figures have been gathered—probably from mosques and Islamist organizations—which have every reason to fudge on the high side, as they do in the United States. With that caveat, these are the numbers we have:

Marseilles - 25 percent (200,000 of 800,000) Malmö - ~25 percent (67,000 of 270,000 Amsterdam - 24 percent (180,000 of 750,000) Stockholm - 20 percent (>155,000 of 771,038) Brussels - ~20 percent (some say 33 percent) Moscow - 16 percent-20 percent (2 million of 10-12 million) London - 17 percent (1.3 million of 7.5 million) Luton - 14.6 percent (26,963) Birmingham 14.3 percent (139,771) The Hague - 14.2 percent (67,896 of 475,580) Utrecht - 13.2 percent (38,300 of 289,000) Rotterdam - 13 percent (80,000 of 600,000) Copenhagen - 12.6 percent (63,000 of 500,000) Leicester - 11 percent (>30,000 of 280,000) Aarhus - ~10 percent Zaan district (Netherlands) - 8.8 percent Paris - 7.38 percent (155,000 of 2.1 million) Antwerp- 6.7 percent (>30,000 of >450,000) Hamburg - 6.4 percent (>110,000 of 1.73 million) Berlin - 5.9 percent (~200,000 of 3.40 million) Daniel Pipes one of our country’s best scholars on modern Islam, notes that the largest cities—mostly capitals—have disproportional representation of Muslims. With the exception of Marseilles, most are northerly capitals. Although the numbers do not provide rates of growth, Sweden’s Stockholm and Malmö may soon be the first western European cities with a Muslim majority—followed by Moscow, down the road. What this will mean for European culture depends upon three unknowns: whether radical Islamism will prevail, integration will prevail, or a nationalistic turn in Europe will at some point deport the immigrants.

The United States does not seem to have a concentration of Muslims in any one place, other than in Dearborn, Michigan. However, James Jay Carafano of the Heritage Foundation has assembled a partial list of terrorist conspiracies that have been aborted since 9/11 by law enforcement and/or alert citizens.

Richard Reid, December 2001 Jose Padilla, May 2002 Lackawanna Six, September 2002 Lyman Faris, May 2003 Virginia’s “Paintball Jihad” network, June 2003 Dhiren Barot, August 2004 James Elshafay and Shahawar Matin Siraj, August 2004 Yassin Aref and Mohammed Hossain, August 2004 Umer Hayat and Hamid Hayat, June 2005 Levar Haley Washington, Gregory Vernon Patterson, Hammad Riaz Samana, and Kevin James, August 2005 Michael C. Reynolds, December 2005 Mohammad Zaki Amawi, Marwan Othman El-Hindi, Zand Wassim Mazloum, February 2006 Syed Haris Ahmed and Ehsanul Islam Sadequee, April 2006 Sears Tower plot, June 2006 Assem Hammoud, July 2006 Heathrow liquid explosives plot, August 2006 Fort Dix plot, May 2007 JFK plot, June 2007

Daniel Pipes, who has also been keeping track, adds Ryan Anderson, the Portland Seven, Tarik Shah and Mahmud Faruq Brent, and others in his own November 13, 2007 list.

So far, it appears that most of the people on these lists were not part of any specific Al Qaeda plot, but were independent operators. Most appeared to be incompetent, fortunately. Perhaps American Muslims find it so much easier to integrate into American society than do those in Europe that even our Saudi-financed Islamist mosques have not succeeded in radicalizing young men in any numbers.

For Europeans, it is race to see which will happen sooner: integration or alienation of both Muslims and their host populations. The big unknown is what would happen if Al Qaeda or its subsidiaries were to succeed in pulling off another murderous attack: dirty nukes, suicide bombers, or worst of all, biological warfare. Political correctness should be packed away and instead campaign to promote integration.

659 words

Dr. Laina Farhat-Holzman is a lecturer, historian, and author. You may contact her at Lfarhat102@aol.com or www.globalthink.net.

GlobalThink Dot Net: Statistics on Muslims in Europe Raise Questions.

Laina Farhat-Holzman: The marriage of state and religion damages both

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Article Launched: 05/03/2008 01:35:13 AM PDT

After several hundred years of religious wars, founding fathers of the United States made a decision that the state must not promote a state religion. As a result, we have a marketplace of all sorts of religions and non-religions that cannot force their beliefs on the unwilling. This decision had roots traceable to early Christianity when Jesus urged “then render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s and unto God that which is His.” This separated faith from state power, a tradition that was both followed and quarreled over by European kings and Catholic popes until the Reformation.

The one exception to this was the Roman Emperor Constantine 312 A.D., who converted to Christianity and decreed it the only tolerated state faith. Christianity gave him legitimacy and he gave it muscle. Constantine’s action became the model for eastern orthodox Christianity in which the emperor and later czars of Russia had total control over the religion, creating a tyrannical state and an ossified religion. It was not good for either institution.

Islam did not believe in rendering unto Caesar; instead, the Prophet Mohammad was both spiritual leader and military head of state. This mixed mission was passed on to the first Caliphs who ruled early Islam, and it served them well in their mission of conquering much of the known world. But from the start, the marriage of faith and state did not go well. The Caliphs of Baghdad were not always spiritual

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beings appropriate for governing a religion; they were often corrupt, irreligious, and few of them died in bed of old age.

Later, as Islam spread across the world, national differences played a role; absolute monarchs ruled as they always have, using religion to pacify the masses. Some of those rulers were responsible for the great Golden Age of Islam because they invited talent — whether Muslim or not — to come to their capitals and enrich the culture. Out of this came the great period of Spanish Islam, the revival of Persia, Moghul India, Ottoman Turkey and tolerant early Indonesia. Muslim clerics have never been moderate, but Muslim rulers sometimes have.

Today, Islam is wrestling with the idea of separation of state and religion and some are revisiting the model of the Prophet Mohammed and the early Caliphs. Militant Islamists, who want to re-create their highly romanticized notion of early Islam, are promoting not only eliminating nation states, but of having a global Muslim world in which nonbelievers will be taxed and “invited” to convert. They dream of restoring the Caliphate, but have not agreed yet on how they would select such a leader.

Fortunately for Islam, a reformation is going on — its leaders persecuted and threatened, but nonetheless making strides see Christian Science Monitor, April 2. Abdullah Ahmed an-Naim, a Sudanese self-described “Muslim heretic,” has condemned the notion of an Islamic state. He claims that only a secular state can provide the human rights essential to protect Muslims and people of other faiths or non-faiths to practice their beliefs freely.

“I need the state to be neutral about religious doctrine so that I can be the Muslim I choose to be,” said this Emory University law professor. With this view in mind, he helped organize the first “Muslim Heretics Conference,” which was held to discuss such issues as Sharia Islamic law, democracy, women’s rights and coping with dissent.

Naim certainly has had experience with being jailed in a very nasty Islamist regime, Sudan. In 1983, Sudan fell into the hands of a dictator who replaced civil law with the Sharia. He jailed and killed dissidents, one of whom was a Sufi mystical Muslim thinker who believed that certain verses from the Koran were universal truths whereas others were relevant only to a particular historic context and no longer viable.

Naim has a growing following, among them Radwan Masmoudi, director of the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy in Washington. He believes that separating political and religious institutions is what most Muslims today really want. They have not had a spokesman like this before. It is time.

Laina Farhat-Holzman is a historian, lecturer and author. Contact her at Lfarhat102@aol.com or visit her Web site at www.globalthink.net.

Laina Farhat-Holzman: The marriage of state and religion damages both - Santa Cruz Sentinel

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is refusing to identify the “influential Muslim Americans” and “leading US-based scholars and commentators on Islam” who met with Secretary Michael Chertoff to help shape a softer approach to government lexicon about terrorists and theirideological motivations.

Women watch as a masked Palestinian gunman from the Popular Resistance Committees is seen during a rally in Gaza City.
Photo: AP , AP

“Our policy is we don’t comment on the Secretary’s private schedule,” spokeswoman Amy Kudwa told the IPT (Investigative Project on Terrorism). Nor would she identify any of the participants’ organizational affiliation.

DHS and the State Department’s Counterterrorism Communications Center each issued reports urging government employees to avoid words like “jihad,” “mujahedeen” or any reference to Islam or Muslims, especially in relation to al-Qaida. The IPT is making the documents available for the first time at its Website.

As we reported last week, the memos say a change in language from the US government is needed to win the hearts and minds of moderate Muslims and avoid glamorizing terrorists motivated by religious ideology. “Moderate” is also frowned upon in the memos, though, with “mainstream” or “traditional” suggested as replacements.

Among the recommendations not reported previously:

The experts we consulted debated the word “liberty,” but rejected it because many around the world would discount the term as a buzzword for American hegemony.

The fact is that Islam and secular democracy are fully compatible - in fact, they can make each other stronger. Senior officials should emphasize that fact.

The USG [US government] should draw the conflict lines not between Islam and the West, but between a dangerous, cult-like network of terrorists and everyone who is in support of global security and progress.

So America, after serving for more than two centuries as the sanctuary for huddled masses yearning to breathe free, is being asked to minimize liberty against fanatics bent on a global religious state. The memo doesn’t offer examples to show where Islam and secular democracy have reinforced each other, or explain how Shari’a law, the imposition of religion into state affairs, is “fully compatible” with secular democracy.

It is no surprise, however, to see the changes praised by the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC):

MPAC has long promoted a nuanced approach towards the lexicon of terrorism emanating from the United States government and media. It is essential that various elements of the government recognize the importance of decoupling Islam with terrorism. Furthermore, using Islamic language to describe terrorists falsely bolsters their religious credibility among the very people we most need - the majority of mainstream Muslims around the world.

The memorandum described by the Associated Press reportedly also draws heavily on a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) report that examined the way American Muslims reacted to different phrases used by US officials to describe terrorists, and recommended ways to improve the message. Through its regular government engagement with government agencies including DHS, MPAC has repeatedly addressed the importance of refraining from ideologically based language that mischaracterizes the Muslim community domestically and abroad.

The fact that the government agencies are implementing such recommendations in their communications is a victory for constructive engagement with the Muslim American community. Implementing the recommendations, as they are described in media reports would serve as a powerful tool in isolating the terrorists.

In other writings, MPAC’s more nuanced approach involves accepting, not isolating, terrorists. It repeatedly has lobbied to remove Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hizbullah from the US list of designated terrorist groups. Its 2003 counterterrorism policy critique says:

Arab states question Washington’s list of designated pro-Palestinian groups and humanitarian organizations. It is clear that the current terrorist threat to the US emanates from Al-Qaeda and not Palestinian groups. There is no evidence that Palestinian groups designated as terrorist organizations have any connections to Al-Qaeda. Yet the preoccupation with these groups raises the question as to whether targeting Palestinian groups serves true national security interests or is based on political considerations.

Now, look at the bottom of page 2 on the DHS memo: “Hizbullah and Hamas are distinct in methods, motivations and goals from Al Qaeda,” it says. “When possible, the experts recommend that USG terminology should make this clear.”

If only it were true. Suicide attacks are staples of the methods of each group. The imposition of Islamic law, or Shari’a, is a goal stated by each.

These organizations are responsible for the wholesale slaughter of innocent civilians - often by the preferred method of suicide bombing not to mention their roles in derailing U.S. foreign policy and efforts to achieve peace.

But MPAC, despite these obvious details, as well as the fact that the US has designated terrorist groups in every corner of the earth [Philippines (Abu Sayyaf), Spain (the Basque group, ETA), Japan (Aum Shinrikyo), Sri Lanka (the Tamil Tigers), Ireland (IRA and related groups), Colombia (FARC), Peru (Shining Path) and even Israel (Kahane Chai)], somehow finds itself engaging in conspiracy theorizing about the unfair “political” treatment of misunderstood entities like Hamas and Hizbullah. It is incredibly frightening to see government agencies directly involved in our national security buy into this philosophy, wholesale.

One prominent Muslim American who wasn’t consulted is physician M. Zuhdi Jasser, president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy. In response to an e-mail from the IPT about the memos, Jasser said the suggested changes could diminish American understanding of the ideological motivations behind those who threaten our security:

It is interesting that the only venues in which this nomenclature is even a question is in the West, where Muslims are a minority and Islamists are able to deceive the majority or just live in complete denial. In Muslim majority nations the radicals call themselves Muslims, Islamists, and Jihadists in Arabic and every other language with little time spent admonishing society not to call them what they call themselves.

‘Softer speak’ in the war on terror | Jerusalem Post

Editorial: Muslim extremism and wars

The ambassador of Saudi Arabia in Pakistan, HE Mr Ali S Awadh Asseri, in an interview given to Daily Times, has made some thought-provoking remarks on the state of the Muslim mind that need to be dwelt upon. Correctly, he said that there was a need to revisit “the logic behind the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq” and engage the fighting sides there in dialogue. He spoke of Muslim extremism in the same context: “Those few who are engaged in their nefarious effort to promote the cult of extremism and violence are heretics and deviants. They must be controlled through a combined effort of all peace-loving nations of the world”.
Of course, the world knows about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But those who think clearly separate the two wars on the basis of the sanction behind the two invasions and it is the extremist who equates the two to whip up immoderate emotion that has never benefited the Muslims. The war in Iraq has been analysed and the neocon administration of President George W Bush has been found guilty of having made a trespass into the region on false pretences. But if we are to get at the root of the current Muslim mind we must also look into the war of Saddam Hussein against Iran. And blaming the United States will not do this time.
The collapse of Arab nationalism tilted the Arab world into a new-found faith in Islam. This movement was greatly encouraged in all kinds of ways by Saudi Arabia which emerged as the ideological antithesis of Nasserism. But what was seen as the victory of Islam against secular nationalism was also objectively the victory of the United States in the Middle East against its Cold War rival, the Soviet Union. It is tragic that every time we help the US to win, the Muslims are the biggest sufferers. And Saudi Arabia helped America win its war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan too, and we are still living with the devastating after-effects of this victory. In fact, the victory of Islam against Arab nationalism came with a “faith package” that was funded by Saudi Arabia under the tutelage of its great mufti of immoderate views, Mr Bin Baz.
The rise of Islamism was accompanied by a recrudescence of its historical rift when in 1979 the Islamic Revolution broke out in Iran and immediately threatened the Arabs living across the Gulf. The Iranian revolution was understandably anti-American, but it also saw the conservative Arab states as America’s proxies. A new conflict began at this point which cannot be laid at the doorstep of the wicked West which is allegedly determined to destroy the Islamic world. In fact if we look at the transformation of Pakistan from a liberal Islamic state into a fanatically extremist one, with laws framed to reflect this tightening of the faith, we will clearly see the effect of a pan-Islamic change in the direction of intolerance. The Islamists, while fulminating against the West, have more effectively and violently eliminated the traditional pockets of moderation among fellow-Muslims.
Pakistan has seen the rise of extremism in the words of the religious leaders who have engaged in sectarian polemic while blaming the West for the “conspiracy” of pitting Muslim against Muslim. A “relocated” war between the Sunni Arabs and Iran was fought in Pakistan for over 20 years and it is still going on in the Kurram Agency and its adjoining areas. The Arab Islamists that fled their own country to fight jihad in Afghanistan — with Saudi money no less than American money — spread around their new intolerant faith that first materialised into governance in Afghanistan under the Taliban and is now spreading in Pakistan too under the name of Talibanisation. No one except the Muslims is to blame for this. If the image of Islam is negative in the world — and that includes friendly states like China — it is not the Western media covering the Sunni-Shia war of Iraq which is to blame, but the Muslims themselves.
How can we say goodbye to this extremism and Muslim-kill-Muslim violence? Now that Saudi Arabia and Iran are embarked upon a new and less adversarial relationship, they should agree that when Sunnis and Shias kill themselves they will not tell their funded madrassa leaders to simultaneously blame the West for the carnage. The biggest plus in the Islamic world today is that Saudi Arabia has begun to see extremism in the new religion masquerading as Islam which is, in the words of Ambassador Asseri, a faith of peace, not of violence and aggression. It is our great good fortune that Saudi Arabia is today asking the Muslims the right questions and has the capacity, by reason of its spiritual leadership and economic clout, to change their way of thinking. *
Second Editorial: Sardar Muhammad Iqbal (1928-2008)
Justice (Retd) Sardar Muhammad Iqbal passed away on Sunday at the age of 84. Had the judiciary not been politicised, his achievements as a servant of society would have been more properly recognised. That he was a brilliant lawyer was proved when he was made a permanent judge of the West Pakistan High Court at the age of 40 in 1962. He became chief justice of the Lahore High Court in 1972 at the relatively young age of 50. Because of politicisation, which gave rise to rivalry between senior judges, the Constitution was amended in 1978 to set his tenure at four years to make him retire prematurely. Sounds familiar today?
But Sardar Iqbal leaves behind landmarks of service that cannot be ignored. He was a great teacher, and after a lifetime time of teaching law, was made Professor Emeritus by the Punjab University on whose board of governors he remained a member practically all his life. In 1983, he was made Pakistan’s first ombudsman and set up the institution with the finesse native to him. He was Pakistan’s most capable representative at international conferences and jurists’ moots. Colleges and hospitals that needed his legal and organisational talent always put him on their governing bodies. His law office trained lawyers such as Mr Fazl Ghani Khan, Mr MA Ghani, Mr Khalilur Rehman Khan, Mr Rafiq Tarar, Mrs Nasira Iqbal, Mr SM Zafar — including the current chief justice of the Lahore High Court, Syed Zahid Hussain — who went on to distinguish themselves in the profession. May he rest in peace. *

Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan - Editorial: Muslim extremism and wars