Syria, Gaza and the Criminalisation of Islam

**سيف الله** · 09-15-2014

Salaam

Event: Syria, Gaza and the Criminalisation of Islam

Recent events from the Middle East have placed the Muslim community in Britain in the public eye once more with their every word and action coming under microscopic scrutiny by the media and politicians. This is only the latest chapter in an ideological attack that has been ongoing for significantly longer.

Whereas the attacks on Islamic concepts of war, political governance and the unity of Muslim lands are nothing new, they have now increased on an unprecedented scale in the wake of the rise of ISIS and its declaration of a Caliphate. The matter is not about supporting or opposing the version of a Caliphate as demonstrated by ISIS but rather the criminalisation of Islamic political thought and ideology. The concepts of jihad, shariah and khilafah are not the exclusive possession of ISIS but core Islamic doctrines subscribed to by almost one third's of the world's population. It is telling that the government's treatment of ISIS is similar to its treatment of Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, Hizb-ut Tahrir, and the Taliban, despite the enormous differences of belief and methodology between the groups.

The Islamophobic nature of the criminalisation of those who believe in fighting in Syria against Assad is underlined by the lack of concern for British Jews who fight in the Israeli Occupation Forces, particularly at times where they are engaged in war crimes and other atrocities, such as the recent attack on Gaza.

On the flips side, Muslims who wish to aid their brothers and sisters through the provision of humanitarian aid via aid convoys are having their homes raided, being harassed by the security services and are effectively being accused of engaging in terrorism. Charities are having their bank accounts closed without explanation and are coming under investigation by the Charity Commission simply for being involved in crisis zones like Gaza and Syria. Witch-hunts such as the Trojan Horse hoax and the mass hysteria over issues of the niqab, halal food and conservative Muslim values demonstrate that the criminalisation is spreading beyond Middle Eastern politics. Individuals and organisations within the Muslim community who have been speaking out against these policies are now under attack. They have had their organisation, business and bank accounts arbitrarily closed. Even their children's bank accounts have been closed. They are maligned in the media as terrorist sympathisers, extremists and jihadists. Some have even been imprisoned.

The common element across all these cases is that those targeted cared for the oppressed and for those who are suffering. They have been criminalised because they cared.

Join CAGE at this series of events around the country to unite the Muslim communities against this criminalisation of our faith, our beliefs, our mosques and organisations, and our leaders. The following regional events will take place with the large conference taking place on 20 September at the Waterlily in London.

Sunday 14 September - 6pm

Pakistani Community Centre, Park Hall, London Road, Reading RG1 2PA

Jamal Harwood
Dr Adnan Siddiqui
Dr Uthman Lateef
Anas al-Tikriti
Taji Mustafa
Wednesday 17 September - 7pm
East Pearl Banqueting Centre, Longsight, Manchester
Ibrahim Hewitt
Abdullah Andalusi
Jahangir Mohammed

Friday 19 September - 6.30pm

Muslim Student House (the Daar), Moseley, Birmingham

Dr Uthman Lateef
Ismail Adam Patel
Abdullah Andalusi
Dr Abdul Wahid
Fahad Ansari

http://www.cageuk.org/event/it-crime-care

**سيف الله** · 10-30-2020

Salaam

More comment.

The killing is not an act that as a Muslim I would approve. But while I believe in the freedom of expression, I do not think it includes insulting other people. You cannot go up to a man and curse him simply because you believe in freedom of speech.

In Malaysia, where there are people of many different races and religions, we have avoided serious conflicts between races because we are conscious of the need to be sensitive to the sensitivities of others. If we are not, then this country would never be peaceful and stable.

We often copy the ways of the West. We dress like them, we adopt their political systems, even some of their strange practices. But we have our own values, different as between races and religions, which we need to sustain.

The trouble with new ideas is that the late comers tend to add new interpretations. These are not what the originators intended. Thus, freedom for women, meant the right to vote in elections. Today, we want to eliminate everything that is different between men and women.

Physically we are different. This limits our capacity to be equal. We have to accept these differences and the limitations that are placed on us. Our value systems is also a part of human rights.

Yes, sometimes some values seem to be inhuman. They cause some people to suffer. We need to reduce the sufferings.
But not by force, if the resistance is great.

The dress code of European women at one time was severely restrictive. Apart from the face no part of the body was exposed. But over the years, more and more parts of the body are exposed.

Today a little string covers the most secret place, that’s all. In fact, many in the west are totally naked when on certain beaches.

The West accepts this as normal. But the West should not try to forcibly impose this on others. To do so is to deprive the freedom of these people.

Generally, the west no longer adhere to their own religion. They are Christians in name only. That is their right. But they must not show disrespect for the values of others, for the religion of others. It is a measure of the level of their civilisation to show this respect.

Macron is not showing that he is civilised. He is very primitive in blaming the religion of Islam and Muslims for the killing of the insulting school teacher. It is not in keeping with the teachings of Islam.

But irrespective of the religion professed, angry people kill. The French in the course of their history has killed millions of people. Many were Muslims.

Muslims have a right to be angry and to kill millions of French people for the massacres of the past.

But by and large the Muslims have not applied the “eye for an eye” law. Muslims don’t. The French shouldn’t. Instead the French should teach their people to respect other people’s feelings.

Since you have blamed all Muslims and the Muslims’ religion for what was done by one angry person, the Muslims have a right to punish the French. The boycott cannot compensate the wrongs committed by the French all these years.

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1...233811970.html

Khabibs reponse.

More comment. Fearless and unapologetic as always.

Responses to the video.

Mognodor

I'm French, and disrespect towards Islam is very normal, almost encouraged here. There really isn't a culture of free speech like in the USA, but when it comes to religion, you can be as mean as you want, even if it's for no reason other than being mean, provocative and disrespectful. This so called "freedom of speech" (freedom of insulting religion really) used to be practiced on every religion, but for the past few years it's been particularly targeted towards Islam and Muslims.

Some people say horrible things about Muslims, spread their hatred of Islam, sometimes on TV, and they're given even more visibility for that. French people will understand very well what I'm talking about (Eric Zemmour). And those people act like they're being so subversive, so brave, when in reality it's become the norm in the media, to just insult Muslims, blame them for everything bad in the country. And when you point all this injustice out, people say that you're whining, or they say "we are allowed to do that and that because it's in the law", but in reality they only do those things to Muslims. Because Christians are the majority, and criticising Jews is kind of taboo in France.

So yeah France really doesn't feel good to live in as a Muslim right now.

More analysis.

Blurb

In the West hearing the word beheading, Islam and terrorism is scary. What's even more scary is how worse violence is not linked to faith or terrorism. This makes it seem like Islam has the copyright over terrorism. Only difference is the other are state backed and well marketed.

Here I also present 6 cases where France didn't exercise freedom of speech when it came to Christians, Jews and others. Why are Muslims any different? (Memorise and share them)

A good academic video on freedom of speech by academic Hamza Tzortzis: https://youtu.be/WtRvdFu8i7I

If you are interested in learning more about Islam click here: https://onereason.org

Follow and support work being done by CAGE and MEND.

https://twitter.com/UK_CAGE
https://twitter.com/mendcommunity

The grass is not always greener on the otherside.

It gets worse and worse.

**سيف الله** · 11-04-2020

Salaam

UAE leadership are backing Macron surprise surprise.

UAE minister backs Emmanuel Macron’s remarks on Muslims

Anwar Gargash rejects accusations against French president that he seeks to exclude Muslims.

A prominent United Arab Emirates minister has called on Muslims to accept the stance of French President Emmanuel Macron on his claims about the need for “integration” in Western societies.

“[Muslims] have to listen carefully to what Macron said in his speech. He doesn’t want to isolate Muslims in the West, and he is totally right,” Anwar Gargash, minister of state for foreign affairs, said in an interview on Monday with the German daily Die Welt.

He said Muslims “need to be integrated in a better way” in Western nations.

“The French state has the right to search for ways to achieve this in parallel with combating extremism and societal closure,” he added.

Gargash rejected accusations against the French president that he seeks to exclude Muslims living in France.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/...rks-on-muslims

Meanwhile.

‘End to misunderstood tolerance’: Austria’s Kurz doubles down on vow to fight ‘political Islam’ following Vienna attack

Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz has said he expects Europe to abandon what he called “misunderstood tolerance” in the wake of a terrorist attack in Vienna while calling for an EU-wide effort to combat “political Islam.”

“I expect an end to the wrongly understood tolerance … in all European countries,” Kurz told Germany’s Die Welt newspaper, adding that the ideology of “political Islam” endangers “our freedom” as well as the very “European model of life.”

The chancellor maintained that the issue is grave enough to require a Europe-wide response, adding that he already raised this topic in phone calls with many European leaders and also plans to make a fight against “political Islam” an issue on the agenda at the upcoming EU summits.

Speaking to the Austrian media, Kurz also called a decision to release the Vienna attacker on parole “definitely wrong.” Earlier, the nation’s Interior Minister Karl Nehammer admitted that the Islamist radical that killed four people and injured 23 more in Vienna on Monday “tricked” a de-radicalization program overseen by the Justice Ministry.

The perpetrator was earlier sentenced to 22 months in prison in April 2019 over swearing allegiance to Islamic State (IS, former ISIS) and attempting to join terrorists in Syria. Yet, he was released just some eight months later since he was no longer considered a threat.

“Had he not been released from prison, a terrorist attack like this could not have happened,” Kurz admitted. Still, the chancellor also maintained that there is only “one culprit”“guilty” of this “barbaric, cowardly Islamist terrorist attack” and that is the assailant himself.

In the wake of the Monday shooting, Kurz apparently sought to ease any potential tensions by saying it was “not a conflict between Christians and Muslims, or between Austrians and migrants” but between “civilization and barbarity.”

https://www.rt.com/news/505444-austr...-islam-attack/

Macron leads the way in defending freedom of speech. . . .oh wait. . . . . .

**سيف الله** · 11-05-2020

Salaam

Another update.

Blurb

There have been only a select few terror attacks that have made the headlines, take a guess why the others didn't.

There is an active campaign against Islam, here we can see clearly with news from mainstream sites.

More discussion.

Macron being inconsistent, again. . . . .

**سيف الله** · 11-07-2020

Salaam

More comment.

“The enemy within”: Is there a place for Muslims in France’s secular republic?

“This terrorist wanted to kill the Republic, its values, the Enlightenment, the possibility to turn our children into free citizens. This fight is our fight, and it is an existential fight.” So President Emmanuel Macron announced to the nation in the wake of the murder of teacher Samuel Paty on 16 October 2020. Paty was beheaded by 18-year-old Abdullakh Anzorov, a Chechen refugee, following his use of Charlie Hebdo cartoons of the Prophet Mohamed as part of a classroom discussion on free speech.

Just days later, there was another attack, this time inside the Basilica of Notre-Dame de Nice, where three people were killed by recently arrived Tunisian migrant, Brahim Aouissaoui. For many French people, already dealing with further COVID-19 restrictions, and the ongoing Charlie Hebdo trial, these attacks are the latest wound on the nation’s bruised body — and a bloody reminder that France remains a prime target for some Muslim extremists.

In the wake of this latest paroxysm of violence, fierce public debates have re-ignited over the place and rights of Muslims in France, framed as part of an ongoing civilisational struggle between an “enlightened, beleaguered” France and a “regressive, violent” Islam — and this despite the fact that both of the most recent assailants were not actually French, and that French Muslims have also been among the victims of similar attacks.

At a time when working with Muslim communities to root out those who seek to harm us all is most urgent, the French state has persisted with a strategy which casts the net of suspicion so widely that it risks designating all religious Muslims as suspect citizens and fuelling the very binaries off which extremists feed. Worse still, in the name of a truncated version of republican values, this strategy risks undermining the core principles of the French state itself.

Caught in the middle of this illusory “clash of civilisations” narrative are regular Muslims, whose everyday practices — from wearing a headscarf to donning full-body swimming attire — were already in the nation’s crosshairs, and who are now facing tougher restrictions in the name of national security. Even halal shopping aisles are the latest Muslim “threat” to the republic in the firing line, while the new law on “separatism” is set to include a five-year prison sentence for those who request a physician of the same sex.

Some academics are pushing back against charges of “islamo-facism” being wielded by the French education minister. According to the interior minister, France is fighting a “culture war” — but to many Muslims, this feels more like a witch-hunt.

Whose freedom of speech?

Freedom of speech — the purported right to express the unpalatable — has effectively been sacralised in blood by the French government, through the institutionalisation of support for Charlie Hebdo, itself once a fringe, gratuitously offensive publication, now a litmus test of French Muslim patriotism. Claims of “freedom of speech” are currently being used as a form of “virtue signalling” by the same people who publicly support the suppression of the marginal voices, from comedians to rappers, and others who challenge the elite consensus.

In a measure of just how far this debate has strayed, in 2015 a French court had to adjudicate that “white people” do not represent a component of national identity after a rapper and a sociologist were accused of “anti-white racism” by a far-right Christian group on the grounds of “public injury”. By June this year, almost half of those surveyed said they accept the concept of “anti-white” racism, popularised by Marine Le Pen and other ideological movements on the far-right.

This victimhood narrative among the white majority, which began as a fringe movement, today serves to deflect from real issues of discrimination facing minorities, and is reflected in current debates over the principle of freedom of speech. The strategy, it seems, is no longer to commit to tolerating voices on the margins, but rather to weaponise a reified version of the principle in order to suppress the very groups it was meant to protect. As the French lawyer Nicolas Gardères stated back in 2018:

[I]f the far right defends freedom of speech, it’s so it can be more openly racist. They hate Jews and want to be able to say that Blacks and Arabs are less intelligent and should be sent “back” …

Make no mistake, freedom of speech does permit and protect voices which are deeply offensive, morally challenging, and upsetting. It doesn’t require the whole of society to approve of them, nor for the state to incorporate them into the defining markers of national identity. But that’s the point of free speech: it allows space for such views to be expressed, as long as they do not incite violence.

Free speech isn’t about defending cartoons now republished globally, or about projecting those cartoons onto government buildings in a display of state-sanctioned Islamophobia. It is certainly about the right, in principle, to publish such images. But it’s also about the right to voice opposition to those cartoons without risking criminalisation. It’s about the freedom to publish images of police wrongdoing without being prosecuted (as in the case of Loan Torondel), or to teach the full picture of colonial history, or to protest against the government’s environmental policies without fear of reprisal.

The truncated version of free speech currently being touted as a key republican value is applied in a politically self-serving way, leading some to question the underlying motives — particularly when compared to the limits imposed on such principles when it comes to other aspects of French political and social life.

Last week, the French Council of Ministers dissolved one of the largest Muslim charities in France, BarakaCity, on the grounds that it “incites hatred and justified terrorist acts” — claims that are based in part on social media posts which appeared to support a parent-led campaign against Samuel Paty. Anxiously awaiting a similar fate is the largest anti-Islamophobia organisation in France, the Collectif contre l’islamophobie en France (CCIF), which has been branded an “enemy of the republic” by the government, and yet is one of the few vocal groups pushing back against discrimination. Its loss would mean even less oversight and chronicling of instances of Islamophobia, in a country which has seen the number of Islamophobic acts more than double in just one year. CCIF has recently announced its decision to go into exile in order to escape the punitive environment which risks halting their work in France entirely.

The weaponisation of laïcité

France is, undoubtedly, a nation under attack — the question is: by whom, and why? President Macron has focused on the danger of what he calls “Islamic separatism”: a “politico-religious project, which is materialised by repeated discrepancies with the values of the republic.” The fact this term seems largely defined in opposition to republican values, themselves evolving and often nebulous, raises some concern that the term can simply be used to criminalise those deemed not to subscribe to the prevailing, mutable conception of those values.

Similarly, on the day after Samuel Paty’s murder, French Prime Minister Jean Castex told a group of teachers, “Secularism, the backbone of the republic, has been targeted through this despicable act.” But was it?

This transformation and manipulation of laïcité into an illiberal legal tool to restrict religious freedom has allowed elite public discourse to constantly question Muslim loyalty to France and debate whether or not Muslims can be good French citizens.

Although much of the public conversation assumes that Muslims are the ones eroding republican values, it isn’t Muslims who are seeking to change or challenge France’s longstanding republican edifice — it is the French secularist majority who are attempting to weaponise these values in order better to target Muslims, which may be the very definition of discrimination.

Consider this: not only did a 2016 study find that two-thirds of French Muslims believe laïcité allows them to practise their religion, but the same study also found that the majority of French Muslims do not see their understanding of “religion” as being in conflict with France’s republican framework. So why are some parts of the government pushing to change the definition of secularism, and with it the purportedly immutable republican values it claims to uphold?

Societal laws and the values that undergird them are constantly evolving, but for them to evolve fairly — which is to say, democratically — they must evolve in consultation with those groups they most directly affect. These laws must reflect a degree of social consensus, not be the result of governmental fiat. After all, this is no longer the colonial era in which the French could simply impose their “civilisational” values on the colonised “other” — is it?

I suspect the government’s current conception of laïcité would be utterly unintelligible to the torchbearers of the French revolution, who fought both for the strict separation of Church and State, and for freedom of religion from state intrusion. What would they make of President Macron’s latest plans for the French state to train Muslim faith leaders and bring mosques under tighter government control? The government’s own website on the meaning of laïcité states unequivocally that the free practice of religion is guaranteed, and that “laïcité is not an opinion, but the freedom to have one — it is not a conviction, but the principles which allows all opinions to exist, within the limits of the law.” At a time when a politicised, weaponised version of the term — formulated explicitly in opposition to Islam and Muslims — has become the measure of French patriotism, this struggle over terminology reveals a wider struggle over the very soul of France.

The struggle within France

Some might argue that the erosion of civil liberties in France in the wake of the November 2015 terror attacks in Paris poses the true existential challenge to the republic. Muslims may be first in the firing line, but such precedents set the tone for future violations of what was previously perceived as inviolable.

The state of emergency laws that held sway between 2015 and 2017 were widely criticised by human rights organisations for affording security services exceptional powers, including “the ability to place anyone deemed to be a security risk under house arrest, dissolve groups thought to be a threat to public order, carry out searches without judicial warrants and block any websites that ‘encourage’ terrorism.” The UN Committee against Torture raised concerns regarding allegations of excessive use of force by police during searches, and special rapporteurs warned of “excessive and disproportionate restrictions” on fundamental human rights. While Muslims bore the brunt of this legislation, such excesses were also used against leftist groups. The state of emergency ended in 2017, but there has been little scrutiny since of how these practices have eroded public trust and human rights.

Last year, as part of ongoing anti-terrorism measures, President Macron announced a list of “weak signs of radicalisation” to which authorities were told to be alert. The list makes for glacial reading. It includes ordinary aspects of Muslim religious practice, such as “growing a beard”, “praying regularly”, “greater religiosity during Ramadan”. Those “concerned” were advised to call a free government number — over 68,000 did. The list fuelled a McCarthyite witch-hunt in which any signs of religiosity could, and sometimes did, lead to Muslims being denounced to the authorities.

Just last year, Amnesty International called on French authorities to respond to growing discrimination against French Muslims. It reminded the French government to “beware of presenting Muslims as a suspect group through focusing on the practises of one religion, which should be protected in law, as a security risk.” And yet, in the wake of these recent attacks, this is exactly what has begun to happen once again.

Among worrying trends highlighted by Amnesty was the decision by the French senate to ratify a law prohibiting individuals from accompanying school outings from wearing “visible signs of religion” — legislation clearly understood to be targeting Muslim women in headscarves. In August 2018, the Human Rights Committee of the United Nations concluded that the restriction on the right to wear a headscarf by an employee at a private crèche constituted an attack on the employee’s religious freedom, defying French rulings on the matter. The reality is that French Muslims are now having to seek justice in international courts, because justice at home is in short supply.

This struggle for the French republic isn’t being fought between Islamist fanatics and the French public, but between the new France — a multi-ethnic, multi-religious nation which embraces its range of identities and beliefs under the republican banner, and internalises the notion of laïcité as a principle for the articulation of diversity— and the old elites, desperately clinging to power, drawing on nativist tropes to justify the two-tier republic and the exclusion of those who might challenge their monopoly on power and wealth.

Figures within the French government are increasingly pressing the Observatoire de la laïcité, a state-funded body tasked with protecting secularism, to change the meaning of the term laïcité (“secularism”) to more closely align with their desire for increasingly severe restrictions on Muslim religious practises. Such legal challenges are not new: at least since 1989, when the so-called Affaire du Foulard (“headscarf affair”) in French schools first erupted, the French government effectively has been at war with its own institutions over the meaning of fundamental French principles. Crucially, however, the parts of the population most directly and adversely affected by each proposed set of new laws are rarely, if ever, consulted.

Just this week, forty-nine public figures, from philosophers to journalists and professors, signed a public letter calling on the government, among other things, to create new state institutions to enforce secularism. But not only do such institutions already exist, their voices are most often drowned out because they refuse to bow to public and political pressure to instrumentalise laïcité against the very minorities republican principles were meant to protect. As the French legal scholar Rim-Sarah Alouane has observed:

The French terror

The history of the French republic is marked by the struggle to keep at bay state intrusion into the sphere of the individual — our personal, sacred space, wherein resides our deepest convictions and foundational beliefs. It is freedom which the French constitution guarantees as inalienable to all its citizens, and yet, today, it is this guarantee that is most under threat.

Since January 2020, the French government has shut down 73 mosques and Islamic schools. It has undertaken more than 120 searches of individual homes; it has implemented the dissolution of associations accused — often on scant evidence and without the opportunity for appeal — of spreading “Islamist rhetoric”; and it has applied considerable pressure on social media companies to police content. It has now rendered very normal markers of religiosity suspect and in so doing, linked ordinary Muslims to criminal and terrorist activity.

The erosion of civil liberties always begins at the margins, with minorities, but it creates the conditions for profound shifts in the relationship between the state and civil society. The “exceptions” contain within them the possibility of becoming the “rule”. At this moment, France is claiming to fight an amorphous enemy in the name of republican principles it itself is simultaneously undermining. And in so doing, it is ultimately fomenting rifts within French society which render the struggle against the very real threat of terrorism, much harder. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on Counter-terrorism:

Respect for human rights and the rule of law must be the bedrock of the global fight against terrorism. This requires the development of national counter-terrorism strategies that seek to prevent acts of terrorism, prosecute those responsible for such criminal acts, and promote and protect human rights and the rule of law. It implies measures to address the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism, including the lack of rule of law and violations of human rights, ethnic, national and religious discrimination, political exclusion, and socio-economic marginalization …

In France, as in other countries, terrorism has been used to justify “exceptional” legislation which has resulted in repressive measures being used to stifle the voices of human rights defenders, journalists, minorities, and civil society. The new “security state” has redirected resources normally allocated to civil society programmes, thereby effectively weakening their ability to assist at the grassroots level. Media debates bang on relentlessly about “separatism” and the “threat” of political Islam, while referencing ordinary aspects of Muslim religious life, with no consideration of the effect such rhetoric has on community relations, and on Muslims — whom the French Interior Minister recently referred to as “the enemy within.”

It is worth recalling that state terrorism was born during the French revolution. As Guillaume Ansart has argued, “The Terror” marked the first time a government attempted to institute what he calls a “despotism of freedom” — to base “a regime of terror on the universal values of liberty and equality.” He notes that two of the most infamous laws from this period were “the Law of Suspects” — which called for the arrest of all “those who, by their conduct, associations, comments, or writings have shown themselves partisans of tyranny or federalism and enemies of liberty” — and the Law of 22 Prairial Year II — which marked the culmination of the Terror, and broadened the notion of “enemy of the people” to such an extent that every citizen critical of the government could potentially be included in that category. “The Terror” was defined by this imposition of national unity through the criminalisation of any who dared critique its functioning. As a nation, we must do better than fall back into the terror of our darker times and meet the darkness of those who threaten our safety with the light of our shared humanity.

Today, France finds itself in a new period of “terror” in which terrorism poses grave threats: one form of terrorism threatens the peace and safety of the people; the other, a form of political terrorism, threatens the very fabric of society. Both are dangerous, but there is only one which truly represents an existential threat to the nation.

https://www.abc.net.au/religion/plac...ublic/12848512

**سيف الله** · 11-07-2020

Salaam

What else should be expected from the UAE leadership?

Comment.

Hah at least their honest about their intentions.

**سيف الله** · 11-13-2020

Salaam

Another update.

**سيف الله** · 11-20-2020

Salaam

And the mask continues to come off. The French are preparing for a mass conversion campaign.

Macron: Muslim organisations must say Islam is not a political movement

French President Emmanuel Macron has demanded that Muslim organisations sign up to a charter which proclaims that “Islam is a religion and not a political movement.”

According to French media, the charter must recognise the “values of the Republic” and put an end to foreign involvement in French mosques.

Macron has given the French Council of Muslim Worship (CFCM) two weeks to draw up a charter of “republican values” its member organisations and affiliates will be expected to comply with, as part of his efforts to centralise the formation and accreditation of Muslim religious leaders in the country.

During a meeting on Wednesday evening with a number of French Muslim leaders, including CFCM president Mohammed Moussaoui and Chems-Eddine Hafiz, Macron tasked the national Muslim body with filing a draft of the charter.

“This is historic,” a statement from the presidency quoted by French media read. “This has been in discussion for decades.”

“I put my trust in you and you are beholden to my trust,” Macron told the CFCM members on Wednesday. “If some do not sign this charter, we will draw the consequences from that.”

Created in 2003 under then-interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy, the CFCM is a federation of Muslim religious organisations in France. It has since become the principal interlocutor of the government with regards to issues of organised Islam in France.

It remains unclear what exact consequences will face imams and organisations that do not abide by the future charter.

In early October, Macron sparked controversy during a speech in which he called Islam “a religion in crisis” and vowed to crack down on alleged Muslim “separatism”.

Paris’s plans have since intensified following the killing of a schoolteacher and an attack in the city of Nice that left three dead that same month.

A draft law on “separatism” is expected to be presented to the cabinet on December 9.

Demonstrations also took place across the Muslim world denouncing France’s stance on Islam and calling for boycotts of France.

https://5pillarsuk.com/2020/11/19/ma...ical-movement/

Freedom of speech in action. . . . . . .

Lots of comment and analysis.

The biggest con ever 'secularism' was neutral.

More comment.

Usual hypocricy

What a surprise.

This shouldnt surprise anyone.

The future? I hope not.

**سيف الله** · 11-20-2020

Salaam

As serious as the situation is, heres some hunour to lighten us up in these dark times.

Blurb

French PM Macron has packaged his tirade against Islam and Muslims with the convenient label of "Freedom of speech" but here he owned himself (if he hasn't done so, many times before).

**سيف الله** · 11-23-2020

Salaam

Once again we see the French governments dedication to freedom of speech, oh wait. . . . .

France demands that Pakistan withdraws Macron Nazi jibe

Row escalates over images of the Prophet Mohammed by a French magazine

France's foreign ministry is demanding that Pakistan withdraws comments made by one of its ministers that President Emmanuel Macron was treating Muslims like the Nazis had treated Jews in the Second World War.

The comments were posted on Twitter on Saturday by Pakistan's Federal Minister for Human Rights Shireen Mazari.

The re-publication of images of the Prophet Mohammed by a French magazine in September sparked anger and protests in the Muslim world, especially in Pakistan.

"Macron is doing to Muslims what the Nazis did to the Jews – Muslim children will get ID numbers (other children won't) just as Jews were forced to wear the yellow star on their clothing for identification," Ms Mazari tweeted.

In a follow-up tweet on Sunday, Ms Mazari restated her claims after a condemnation by France's foreign ministry late on Saturday.

"These hateful words are blatant lies, imbued with an ideology of hatred and violence," said France's foreign ministry spokeswoman, Agnes von der Muhll.

"Such slander is unworthy of this level of responsibility. We reject them with the greatest firmness."

She said that Paris had informed the Pakistan embassy of its strong condemnation of the comments.

"Pakistan must rectify these remarks and return to the path of a dialogue based on respect," she said.

After the latest remarks, Ms Mazari later deleted her earlier tweet.

Pakistan's parliament at the end of October passed a resolution urging the government to recall its envoy from Paris, accusing Mr Macron of "hate-mongering" against Muslims.

Mr Macron had paid tribute to a French history teacher who was beheaded by an 18-year-old man of Chechen origin for showing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed in a class on freedom of speech.

French officials called the beheading an assault on the core French value of freedom of expression.

After satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in September re-published the cartoons it first published in 2015, Mr Macron said the freedom to blaspheme went hand in hand with the freedom of belief in France.

https://www.thenationalnews.com/worl...jibe-1.1115744

More analysis.

Blurb

On November 18, President Macron issued an ultimatum to Muslim leaders to accept a "charter of republican values," including a ban on political action from Muslim groups. Speaking to TRT World, civil liberties activist Yasser Louati believes the future of French Muslims lies in their capacity to stand against oppression.

**سيف الله** · 11-24-2020

Salaam

The scholar for dollars give judgement.

Comment.

Whats at stake.

**سيف الله** · 12-02-2020

Salaam

Another update.

France’s hypocrisy on liberty and equality laid bare as main anti-Islamophobia group is banned

The forced closure of the CCIF today (Collectif contre l’islamophobie en France; Collective against Islamophobia in France) [1] by the French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, exposes the French state’s brazen hypocrisy in advocating ‘free speech’ while legally denying Muslims the freedom to speak and organise.

The CCIF now faces the unprecedented situation of not only being banned, but also having its staff indefinitely blacklisted. This means they cannot moderate the CCIF, nor can they set up new associations or speak publicly. Their freedom of association and expression has been suspended indefinitely.

The move follows similar action against Baraka City, another household name among Muslims in France, and the violent arrest of its manager as well as a series of raids on mosques, Islamic schools and homes.

Muhammad Rabbani, managing director of CAGE, said:

“Individuals linked to the CCIF have been muzzled in a manner only heard of in the most autocratic countries. Governments are evading due process the same way that untransparent corporates such as World Check and other shady proscription lists operate, where there is no right to challenge and listing is indefinite.”

“This disruption and attempt to weaken the Muslim community follows Macron’s announcement of a new ‘Separatism Law’ [2] to curtail Muslim charity work and political campaigning. It also follows an EU Joint Statement of a “united front against Islamism” – to distract the EU from French violations of ‘liberty, egality and fraternity’ and even EU laws.”

“All those that claim to uphold the right to organise and collaborate to bring about positive social change cannot be silent any longer. This is not the way to nurture trust between people and government. We must speak up with courage for those in France who are standing firm despite state repression.”

https://www.cage.ngo/frances-hypocri...roup-is-banned

**سيف الله** · 12-03-2020

Salaam

Another update.

Abdullah bin Bayyah will no longer address Canada conference following UAE complaints

One of North America’s largest annual Muslim conferences has announced that Shaykh Abdullah bin Bayyah will not be speaking after complaints about his ties to the United Arab Emirates.

Bin Bayyah was due to speak at the Toronto-based Reviving the Islamic Spirit (RIS) conference on December 26-27, but organisers announced yesterday that this is no longer the case.

They said: “Shaykh Abdullah Bin Bayyah will not be participating in this year’s conference. We pray that the first RIS virtual conference provides an uplifting experience, as far removed as possible form the trials of our times, to enter for a few brief days into a shared space of lofty ideals and inspiriting heights. May Allah protect the community of believers wherever they may be, and may He protect us from the trials and tribulations of this world.”

Around a week ago the official Fatwa Council of the United Arab Emirates denounced the Muslim Brotherhood as a “terrorist organisation” and urged Muslims to steer clear of the group.

The statement came during an online meeting of the council led by Sheikh Abdullah Bin Bayyah and called on all Muslims to reject division and to refrain from affiliation or sympathy with groups that “work to divide the ranks and inflame discord and bloodshed.”

It reiterated that “it is not permissible to pledge allegiance to anyone other than the ruler,” and said the community should show “respect and commitment” to leaders.

A few months ago Bin Bayyah also supported the UAE-Israel peace deal that has widely been denounced as a betrayal of the Palestinian cause.

Bin Bayyah is the President of the UAE-funded Forum for Promoting Peace in Muslim Societies and his Arabic statement praised the “wisdom” of de facto UAE leader Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan and his “pursuit of a just and permanent peace in the Middle East region, and expressed the wish that this initiative would pave the way to peace and the promotion of stability in the region and the world.

Bin Bayyah is the teacher of U.S. Muslim theologian Shaykh Hamza Yusuf who has been heavily criticised by Muslims for giving credibility to the United Arab Emirates through his associations with the Forum for Promoting Peace in Muslim Societies.

Hamza Yusuf is still slated to appear at RIS along with other prominent Muslim speakers and cultural figures.

Last week a prominent American Muslim imam announced his withdrawal from the conference in protest against the UAE.

Imam Khalid Latif, the first Muslim chaplain at New York University, said he would not be taking part in the annual conference due to the participation of Bin Bayyah.

“Over the last few years, there have been a lot of dangerous positions from UAE-based councils that have named individual Muslim leaders and organisations like ISNA, Islamic Relief, and CAIR as being linked to terrorism,” Latif said in a Facebook post.

“The most recent fatwa that Shaykh Bin Bayyah’s UAE Council issued deeming the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organisation simply adds to an already problematic geopolitical agenda.

“That agenda seemingly has no qualms in assisting in the development of iniquitous policy in countries throughout the world that will disrupt the lives of so many people and justify the oppression of that many more all in the pursuit of power retention,” he added.

Commenting on the RIS announcement, American Muslim imam Shaykh Suhaib Webb said: “Kudos to Imam Khalid for taking a principled position and refusing to participate in any event which is going to showcase people who are being propped up by the UAE. God bless him.

“We need principled leadership. If you have seen the position of the UAE on Austrian Muslims and French Muslims it is absolutely unacceptable… unfortunately those positions were that they should just deal with these new laws that are being passed, that they should just step back and forgo some of their religious rights. Added to this is the position of the UAE an normalising relationships with the Occupier of Palestine, the support of the UAE for Sisi during the coup in Egypt and to undermine Muslims’ presence in America and Canada.”

https://5pillarsuk.com/2020/12/02/ab...ae-complaints/

**ashraf__** · 12-03-2020

BEFORE we blame the west for all our woes what have we done? we in our muslim majority countries always end up supporting the tyrants. I know when Bangladesh broke of from Pakistan most muslim countries didn't want to recognize us, guess what Israelis did. Nor did any muslim country pressure the Pakistanis to stop killing their own muslim citizens.

**سيف الله** · 12-03-2020

What an amazing obeservation! You dont think we dont know about this? That many have been arrested and jailed trying to talk about this? Incidentally why do you think Zios wanted to recognise you? Not out of the goodness of their hearts I can assure you.

Now stop trying to derail this thread and stick on topic.

**ashraf__** · 12-03-2020

What an epic failure at trying to take a jab. The cause I stated still stands to this day which allows the non Muslims to use this against us. I guess you received wahi about whats inside their hearts? how quick to judge someone. Looks like you are providing validation for what the Pakistanis did and at the same time you want non Muslims to stop doing that to you!

Unless you show the non muslims you have respect for rule of law they will not respect you. Simple as that.

Are you aware of the two sheppards visiting Nabi Daud and asking for insaf?

**سيف الله** · 01-30-2021

Salaam

Another update.

CFCM “Charter of Principles” rejected by twelve international Ulamā councils

A large number of international scholarly bodies and organisations have convened and released a joint statement condemning the French government’s foolhardy pursuit of forcing the crassly titled “Charter of Principles” down the throats of masājid and a’immah across France.

The Charter, devised in light of a spate of attacks blamed on ‘Islamists’, is the French government’s latest attempt to usher in a new era of Islam, one of so-called “enlightenment Islam”.

In an article published on The Spectator in October 2020, the President of France, Emanuel Macron, said:

“We intend to lead in finally building an Islam in France which can be an Islam of the Enlightenment. We must help this religion in our country to structure itself to be a partner of the Republic in terms of the affairs that we share.”

Macron is essentially set on watering down Islam.

In response to the Charter, the Ulamā councils that convened proclaim it impermissible to sign the Charter as it is an open declaration to give precedence to French liberal values before Islam. The Charter is a threat to Muslims in France and abroad, as it builds an openly discriminatory foundation against them. This sets a dangerous precedent that could be used to target any minority, and in particular the Muslims of Europe.

In a statement, the Chief Editor of Islam21C, Dr. Salman Butt, praised the sense of solidarity expressed by numerous scholarly councils from around the world, including committees in Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq.

“It is heartening to see such a huge international consensus of Muslim scholars speaking out against such an outrageous example of colonial hubris that has not yet left some quarters of the French establishment.”

“In order to score a few cheap political points, the French government are appearing to unravel the façade of tolerant values of the French Revolution, which were at least paid lip service to among nations claiming to be democratic and free.”

“French minorities are treated like laboratory animals for testing increasingly repressive secularist experiments. Secularism is now clear for everyone to see as an imposition of White Western-Christian norms under the name of neutrality.”

“Minorities across the rest of the Western world need to pay close attention to the all-too-easy descent into totalitarianism and legalised White supremacy if we fail to act now to strengthen our civil societies against such transgressions of people’s God-given rights.”

France’s right-leaning President Macron has been on a mission to collectively punish the entire French-Muslim population for what he deems ‘foreign interference’ and ‘political Islam’. In doing so, Macron has made no substantive attempts to engage with the Muslim community at large, instead preferring ultimatums and threatening language.[2]

Last week, three component organisations from within the CFCM (Conseil français du culte musulman) also denounced the Charter, saying:

“We obviously agree with the demand for non-interference by States, the non-instrumentalization of religions and respect for the Constitution and the principles of the Republic. However, we believe that certain passages and formulations of the submitted text are likely to weaken the bonds of trust between the Muslims of France and the Nation. In addition, certain statements undermine the honor of Muslims, with an accusatory and marginalizing character.”

The Faith and Practice movement, the Coordination Committee of Turkish Muslims in France (CCMTF) and the Milli Görüş Islamic Confederation (CMIG) insisted for amendments to various parts of the Charter, decrying the fact that such a document had been approved despite lacking the full consensus of other critical parts of the CFCM.

A translation of the statement can be read in full below, followed by the list of cosignatory bodies.

In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.

Muslim Scholars Association

Press release no.142 (08/06/1442 – 21/01/2021)

STATEMENT OF MUSLIM SCHOLARS ASSOCIATION ON THE CHARTER OF MOSQUES IN FRANCE

Praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds. Prayers, peace and blessings be upon the seal of prophets, Muhammad, his fellow messengers.

At a time when Muslims, both in France and abroad, were hopeful that the French State would take steps to rectify its relationship with Islam and its faithful, the Government has instead put forward a charter to the imams of France and requested their agreement.

After analysing the articles of this charter, the twelve international bodies of scholars (ulama) cited at the end of this press release declare the following:

Firstly, the ulama declare, to all their brothers and sisters in Europe and France who have questioned them, that it is illegal to sign a charter that elevates the principles of the French Republic and its constitution, and gives them authority over the Qur’an, the Sunnah and the fundamentals of the creed and law of Islam. This is all the more unlawful when the signature of this charter is optional and not imposed by the State.

The ulama greatly commends all those who refused to sign it and calls on the rest of Muslims to follow their example.

Secondly, this charter, which has become known as the “Mosque Charter”, and which imams have been requested to commit to by way of signature, clearly goes against everything that they, the so-called secular states (including the French government), as well as international organisations and institutions, have been proclaiming loudly – that they believe in: freedom of belief, and equal treatment of all regardless of language, ethnicity, race, colour or religion.

Thirdly, this charter is an official statement against Islam, clearly declaring this religion to be suspect. It is therefore rejected both in substance and in form. It opposes the unanimous respect afforded to the three Abrahamic faiths by the modern world and its institutions. The religion of Islam is followed by well over a billion people around the world and cannot collectively be deemed suspect.

Fourthly, this dangerous charter does not only constitute a clear violation of the rights and civil liberties of the Muslims of France, but rather against all Muslims around the world. It is a legal and ideological establishment of racial discrimination, of oppression against religions, of violations of rights, freedoms and human dignity.

Fifthly, all state constitutions, and all declarations of human rights, stipulate in no uncertain terms, that French Muslims and Muslims residing on French territory (who number well into the millions), are all an integral part of French society, with equal rights to their fellow citizens; therefore enjoying the same freedoms, rights and dignity.

This charter announced by the French government contradicts that very notion, and sets a very dangerous precedent in what threatens the presence of Islam not only in France but in the entire Western World.

Sixthly, the charter represents an explicit declaration, and dangerous example to follow, against all religious and ethnic minorities around the world. As it is well-known, nearly every nation and city includes religious or ethnic minorities. At a time when the whole world is striving to respect the rights of all through a framework of peaceful co-existence, mutual respect, principles of tolerance and good neighbourliness, the French State seems to be taking a decisive and destructive strike against these efforts.

Seventh, the body of scholars urge all people in the free world, and in particular Muslims in Europe, as well as all rights-based or religious organisations and institutions, to fulfil their duty by openly declaring their rejection of this racist charter.

Eighth, evil acts committed by individuals, wherever they may be from or whatever their background, does not give the right to label a divine religion as a religion of terrorism and violence.

All leaders and communities must confront and eradicate violent extremism, no matter which society or religion the preparator may belong to. The protection of public order is an obligation shared by minorities first and foremost, and upon communities before the State.

At the heart of this matter are the imams and Muslim leaders / organisations in the West, and they are amongst the best-placed people to elevate the principles of peaceful co-existence, mutual understanding and cooperation, and fairness between all societies.

In conclusion, Muslims have their hands outstretched towards peace, open communication and reconciliation, as opposed to the otherization and discrimination they are faced with, and this is part of the tolerance of their religion and from the greatness of their civilisation.

And God is the One who speaks the truth and guides to the right path.

The signatory organisations of this press release:

Muslim Scholars Association (رابطة علماء المسلمين)
The Committee of Scholars of Lebanon (هيئة علماء لبنان)
The Association of Scholars of Morocco (رابطة علماء المغرب)
The Union of Sudanese Scholars, Imams and Preachers (الاتحاد السوداني للعلماء والأئمة والدُّعاة)
The Religious Council of Aleppo (المجلس الشرعي في محافظة حلب)
The Association of Sunni Scholars, Iraq (رابطة علماء أهل السنة في العراق)
The Centre for Scholars in Mauritania (مركز تكوين العلماء في موريتانيا)
The Committee of Scholars of Palestine (هيئة علماء فلسطين)
The Association of Scholars of Eritrea (رابطة علماء إرتريا)
The Association of Scholars of Syria (رابطة العلماء السوريين)
The Committee of Scholars in Iraq (هيئة علماء المسلمين في العراق)
The Association of Sunni Scholars (رابطة علماء أهل السنة)

Meanwhile.

**Karl** · 01-31-2021

Are nuns "totalitarian and murderous"? Le Pen is talking like a lefty loon. Odd that she is considered "right wing" given she embraces concepts which stem from Marx rather than Hitler.

**سيف الله** · 04-26-2021

Salaam

As mentioned in another thread, French government is considering baning Headscarfs for young Muslim women.

Blurb

France is pushing forward with its xenophobic anti-Muslim legislations. A ban on minors wearing hijab in public has been added to the ‘anti-separatism’ bill.

Perhaps its all in preparation for something worse to come?

The hour is grave

20 French generals warn the corrupt globalist neoliberal regime that uncivil war is coming to France as a result of the mass immigration and multiculturalism and anti-racism they have championed. As it was foretold, the Nations are rising.

Mr. President,

Ladies and Gentlemen of the Government

Ladies and Gentlemen of the Parliament,

The hour is grave, France is in peril, several mortal dangers threaten her. We, who even after retirement, remain soldiers of France, cannot, in the present circumstances, remain indifferent to the fate of our beautiful country.

Our tricolor flags are not simply a piece of cloth, they symbolize the tradition, through the ages, of those who, regardless of their skin color or creed, have served France and given their lives for her. On these flags, we find in golden letters the words "Honneur et Patrie". Now, our honor today lies in denouncing the disintegration that is affecting our country.

This deterioration, through a certain anti-racism, has only one goal: to create on our soil a malaise, even a hatred between communities. Today, some speak of racialism, indigenism and decolonial theories, but through these terms it is the racial war that these hateful and fanatical supporters want. They despise our country, its traditions, its culture, and want to see it dissolve by tearing away its past and its history. Thus they attack, by means of statues, former military and civil glories by analyzing centuries old words.

This is a disintegration which, with Islamism and the suburban hordes, leads to the detachment of multiple parcels of the nation to transform them into territories subject to dogmas contrary to our constitution. However, each Frenchman, whatever his belief or his non-belief, is at home everywhere in France; there cannot and must not exist any city, any district where the laws of the Republic do not apply.

Delay, because hatred takes precedence over fraternity during demonstrations where the power uses the forces of order as auxiliary agents and scapegoats in front of French people in yellow vests expressing their despair. This while infiltrated and hooded individuals vandalize businesses and threaten these same forces of order. However, these forces are only applying the directives, sometimes contradictory, given by you, the government.

The dangers are rising, the violence is increasing day by day. Who would have predicted ten years ago that a teacher would one day be beheaded at the entrance of his school? Now, we, the servants of the Nation, who have always been ready to put our skin to the test - as our military status demanded - cannot be passive spectators of such actions.

Therefore, those who lead our country must imperatively find the necessary courage to eradicate these dangers. For this, it is often enough to apply without weakness the laws that already exist. Do not forget that, like us, a great majority of our fellow citizens is fed up with your wavering and guilty silences.

As Cardinal Mercier, Primate of Belgium, said: "When prudence is everywhere, courage is nowhere. "So, ladies and gentlemen, enough procrastination, the hour is serious, the work is colossal; do not waste time and know that we are ready to support the policies that will take into consideration the safeguard of the nation.

On the other hand, if nothing is undertaken, laxity will continue to spread inexorably in society, ultimately causing an explosion and the intervention of our active comrades in a perilous mission to protect our civilizational values and safeguard our compatriots on the national territory.

We can see that it is no longer time to procrastinate, otherwise tomorrow civil war will put an end to this growing chaos, and the dead, for which you will be responsible, will be counted in thousands.

http://voxday.blogspot.com/2021/04/t...-is-grave.html

**سيف الله** · 05-11-2021

Salaam

Its getting worse.

The French military warns the government

It appears the active-duty military is very much inclined to back up the retired generals who warned the French globalists about the civil war their pro-immigration, pro-Muslim policies are creating:

A group of serving French soldiers have published a new open letter warning Emmanuel Macron that the 'survival' of France is at stake after the President made 'concessions' to Islamism.

The letter published in the right-wing magazine Valeurs Actuelles late on Sunday echoes the tone of a similar letter printed in the same magazine last month which also warned a civil war was brewing and called for military action against 'Islamists'.

French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, a close ally of Macron, slammed the letter as a 'crude maneouvre' and accused its anonymous signatories of lacking 'courage'.

The previous letter, signed by 1,000 people including serving officers and some 20 semi-retired generals, warned of the 'disintegration' of France because of radical Islamic 'hordes' living in the suburbs.

The explosive letter sparked a furore in France, with Prime Minister Jean Castex called the letter an unacceptable interference while France's top general vowed that those behind it would be punished for the 'absolutely revolting' letter.

It is not clear how many people are behind the current letter or what their ranks are - and their anonymity is likely to due to the backlash faced by the authors of the previous letter, with 18 officers who signed the letter facing disciplinary action.

In contrast to the previous letter, it is also open to be signed by the public, with Valeurs Actuelles saying more than 93,000 had done so by Monday morning.

'We are not talking about extending your mandates or conquering others. We are talking about the survival of our country, the survival of your country,' said the letter, which was addressed to Macron and his cabinet.

The authors described themselves as active-duty soldiers from the younger generation of the military, a so-called 'generation of fire' that had seen active service.

'They have offered up their lives to destroy the Islamism that you have made concessions to on our soil.'

The nations rise. Time is running out again on The Empire That Never Ended. Now you know why the politicians are so desperate to keep their lockdowns in place and prevent the wars that are rapidly approaching. It won't take much of a spark to kick things off in any of over a dozen nations.

http://voxday.blogspot.com/2021/05/t...overnment.html

**سيف الله** · 05-26-2021

Salaam

And it continues - Germany government is gearing up for its mass conversion campaign.

Germany is following in the footsteps of France and Austria, with increasingly oppressive proposals to target Muslim communities

A spectre is haunting Europe: the spectre of political Islam. From France’s fight against “Islamo-leftism” to Austria’s battle against “political Islam”, Muslims and Muslim anti-racist civil society groups are coming under more and more pressure from state authorities.

In both countries, governments have shut down NGOs and mosques, limited freedom of expression, and raided homes and institutions under the pretext of the “war on terror”. Such measures intensified after terrorist attacks were carried out last year.

In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) appears set to follow in the footsteps of French President Emmanuel Macron and Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz. While Macron was met with harsh international criticism for his anti-Muslim legislation, Kurz’s initiatives went nearly unnoticed. But they all seem to follow the same playbook, claiming to protect the majority of peaceful and law-abiding Muslims while targeting only the “dangerous” Muslims.

In reality, they are dramatically widening the group of potentially "dangerous Muslims".

According to a recent publication by the CDU/CSU alliance in the German parliament: “Islamism is not confined to a certain number of violent menaces. The ideology behind it is poison for our liberal society. It endangers integration and social cohesion by inciting Muslims against our democracy.”

This crusader rhetoric does not come out of thin air. Statements like these build on a long and problematic history of “countering violent extremism” and “deradicalisation programmes”, which emerged after the “war on terror” was initiated two decades ago.

State surveillance

A more recent development has been the broadening of the notion of “countering violent extremism” to include the targeting of “non-violent extremism”. The latter term implies that non-violent Muslim groups share the same goals as violent ones, and differ only in methodology, as noted in a Bavarian intelligence report.

This term is used to exclude Muslim organisations from civil society by targeting Muslim associations that work within the western democratic political order and reject violence. According to the report, these legal, non-violent means include operating “cultural associations and mosques, which serve to recruit members on the one hand and to spread their ideology on the other hand. Through their umbrella organisations, they try to offer themselves to the state as the mouthpiece of Muslims.”

This concept targets mainstream Muslim groups, rather than subversive movements hiding in the shadows. Most mainstream Muslim associations have been subjected to state surveillance for years in Germany. A general suspicion underlies this discourse, treating Muslims with mistrust and cynically questioning their integrity.

The term being applied broadly is “political Islam”, but not in the way academics would use it to differentiate between diverse manifestations of the intersection of politics and religion. The problem with the vague term “political Islam” in countries such as Austria is that the government uses it to criminalise Muslim practices and to silence Muslims who express political opinions critical of the government.

In a sense, it has become the intellectual foundation upon which to institutionalise a general demonisation of Muslims, reminiscent of Joseph McCarthy’s witch hunt in the 1950s against Black and leftist groups under the banner of anti-communism.

Hardline positions

The growing hardline positions of European countries such as Austria, France and Germany seem to be coming in tandem. Last October, a group of well-known authors and politicians from Germany’s CDU/CSU signed an open letter that proposed five recommendations for “strengthening the free democratic basic order in the face of political Islam”. The letter noted: “It is high time to face the problems of the immigrant society openly and not to be intimidated by unfounded accusations of alleged Islamophobia.”

Similar to France’s culture war against gender, postcolonial and racism studies, these scholars were trying to immunise the status quo against any critique.

Did this letter gain traction because of the attacks in France and Austria last year? Not really, for the claim is that “political Islam” is much more dangerous than militant violence stemming from Muslims.

The five recommendations include establishing a “documentation centre” based on the Austrian model, in which “the structures, strategies and financing of political Islam are analysed and disclosed”; the establishment of 10 university chairs dedicated to analysing the structures of “political Islam” in Germany; and the establishment of an expert group within the interior ministry to make recommendations in the fight against political Islam.

Such ideas raise serious questions. Austria’s Documentation Centre is largely run by hawkish law-and-order figures who have a long history of supporting anti-Muslim legislation, including people like Mouhanad Khorchide, Susanne Schroter and Lorenzo Vidino.

The recent CDU/CSU position paper also argues that state authorities should stop supporting associations that fall under the category of “political Islam”, and proposes creating a "German imam", designed to be a Germany-trained student who is attached first and foremost to German national identity and thus reproduces the existing power structures. The paper also calls for stricter financial controls on Muslim groups.

The goal is to surveil Muslims as much as possible, violating secular notions of separating state powers and religious communities. As similar measures have not been enacted against other religious communities, it seems that Muslims are being singled out as targets yet again.

https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinio...olitical-islam