Mr. Ellison believed that Mr. Obama’s message of unity resonated deeply with American Muslims. He volunteered to speak on Mr. Obama’s behalf at a mosque in Cedar Rapids, one of the nation’s oldest Muslim enclaves. But before the rally could take place, aides to Mr. Obama asked Mr. Ellison to cancel the trip because it might stir controversy. Another aide appeared at Mr. Ellison’s Washington office to explain.

“I will never forget the quote,” Mr. Ellison said, leaning forward in his chair as he recalled the aide’s words. “He said, ‘We have a very tightly wrapped message.’ ”

When Mr. Obama began his presidential campaign, Muslim Americans from California to Virginia responded with enthusiasm, seeing him as a long-awaited champion of civil liberties, religious tolerance and diplomacy in foreign affairs. But more than a year later, many say, he has not returned their embrace.

[. . .]

“A lot of us are waiting for him to say that there’s nothing wrong with being a Muslim, by the way,” Mr. Ellison said.

"Muslim Voters Detect a Snub From Obama," 24 June, 2008, New York Times.

I am among those waiting for him to say this (though this probably will not happen, because most Americans indeed believe that there is something wrong with being Muslim). The Times article makes an interesting point on the reluctance of most candidates to be seen in association with Arab and Muslim American organizations and individuals.

Before the Virginia primary in February, some of the nation’s leading Muslim organizations nearly canceled an event at a mosque in Sterling because they could not arrange for representatives from any of the major presidential campaigns to attend. At the last minute, they succeeded in wooing surrogates from the Clinton and Obama campaigns by telling each that the other was planning to attend, Mr. Bray said. (No one from the McCain campaign showed up.)

McCain has a history of ignoring Arabs and Muslims, and indeed his campaign draws greatly on base level fear and hatred of them. While Democrats claim to be "inclusive," their record with Arabs and Muslims is anything but, going back to the 1980's and the Obama campaign is following in the tradition of ignoring these voters, treating them like an ulcer and offering insulting snubs along the way, while claiming that its platform does not support such behavior. The only Democratic tradition he has not participated in, it seems, is returning Arab and Muslim donations. That hasn't stopped American Muslims, especially first and second generation ones, from drinking his Cool-Aid. And it hasn't stopped some commentators of Muslim origin from excusing the excesses of his campaign and defending Obama's distancing himself from the community.

One cannot look at the history of national Democratic candidates and American Arab and American Muslim voters and have any kind of serious confidence in a Democrat on American Muslim issues and not be smoking the very best rock cocaine in Philadelphia. (It is politically correct in this country to treat Muslims as a "liability" and to deliberately spurn them, where as such behavior with respect to any other minority group (save perhaps the Mormons) would be regarded as nothing short of bigotry and a betrayal of the civil rights tradition and of common morality.) And the snubs, the insults, the displays of ignorance by his aides and supporters will continue, because "right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.”

Addendum: There is a curious paragraph in the NYT's article, discussing the ethnic composition of the American Muslim population.

In those states and others [ like Virgina, and Michigan ], American Muslims have experienced a political awakening in the years since Sept. 11, 2001. Before the attacks, Muslim political leadership in the United States was dominated by well-heeled South Asian and Arab immigrants, whose communities account for a majority of the nation’s Muslims. (Another 20 percent are estimated to be African-American.) The number of American Muslims remains in dispute as the Census Bureau does not collect data on religious orientation; most estimates range from 2.35 million to 6 million.

There are two problems with this paragraph. The first is historical/factual. I am not aware of a time when "well-heeled" immigrants "dominated" American Muslim political activity. To my knowledge, prior to the 1990's, Muslims were generally politically disorganized for the most part, and immigrant leadership only arose in the mid to late 1980's and 1990's when issues of racial profiling, secret evidence, and other matters of civil liberties. For most of the history of American Muslims, which is longer than most think, blacks led Muslim politics in this country, to whatever extent Muslims were politically active. Black Muslim leadership declined in popularity for many reasons, partially because of a stigma in popular culture (identifying black Muslims and indeed most other Muslims with the Nation of Islam and its racialism) and because of the rise in perceptions of unjust treatment of Muslims among the immigrant population. The immigrant leadership has worked assiduously to remove the stigma of Muslims as black convicts, NoI sympathizers and radicals, militants, and black racists. In order to "mainstream" American Muslims, most American Muslim FAQ pages on the web will explicitly address these matters, clarifying why the Nation of Islam is not Islamic and noting that most of its former followers have found their way into the Sunni Islamic tradition (some use "black Muslims" to refer to NoI members, others to any person of African origin who has any connection to Islam; I use it to refer people of African American descent who are Muslims in the traditional sense; I refer to NoI supporters as such, as this is what my experience with black Muslims has instructed me to do). Immigrant leadership is the result of the rise of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA, which has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, so it is said by some) and CAIR. Black Muslims participate in these groups, but are not at the highest levels, which are mostly occupied by immigrants of Arab and Pakistani origin.

The second problem with this paragraph is numerical/demographic. Generally, statistics tell us that Arab-Americans make up a smaller proportion of American Muslims than do African-Americans and South Asian Americans. I recall numbers stating that blacks accounted for something like a little more or less than 30% of American Muslims, and I have never seen numbers as low as 20%. On the contrary, I have seen numbers for Arab Americans being around 20-25%. Going by the 2001 mosque attendance survey, about South Asians were 33%, blacks 30% and Arabs 25%. According to the 2007 "Muslim Americans: Middle Class and Mostly Mainstream" Pew Poll (in which I was a participant),

No single racial group constitutes a majority among the Muslim American population: 38% describe themselves as white, 26% black, 20% Asian, and 16% other or mixed race. Foreign-born Muslims are 44% white, 28% Asian, and 18% mixed or other. Just 10% say they are black. By comparison, a 56% majority of native-born Muslims are black, 31% are white and just 2% describe themselves as Asian.

It is unclear from the report how many Muslims are Arab (most of them describe themselves as "white," with a significant minority describing themselves as "other" or "mixed race"). It is difficult to tell where different nationalities placed themselves, as Arabs and South Asians did not agree as to whether they were "Asian" or "white" or "other." The survey did not sample most Muslims or even a large chunk of them. In any event, I do not think it is accurate to say that Arabs and South Asians together are the majority of American Muslims. If one took any two of the three major American Muslim ethnic chunks (Blacks, South Asians, and Arabs) they would get the same result. Blacks and South Asians could just as easily be said to comprise the majority of American Muslims. The Times article, though, seems to be making a point of stating that American Muslim leaders are mostly Arab and South Asian. This is one I disagree with, for the reasons above, as well for another: no American Muslim leader of national consequence is Arab or South Asian. Both Congressmen are black, and Muslim mayors of significant cities have been black as well (though I know of one or two Arab Muslims). Most Muslim elected officials are black or South Asian. So I see this paragraph as problematic.

There is a serious problem and I believe it must be addressed soon and head on. The communities as a whole must be told that racism and prejudice based on class, nationality or any other prejudice is incorrect. Telling people that they should not marry converts is not correct. Telling people that they should only marry within their culture is not correct as a general statement. These issues must be dealt with on an individual basis but the larger picture- the overwhelming prejudice in some communities is a large backward step for the Ummah.

I wanted to share a brief comment from an African American brother who is very close to me. He was born sunni and converted to shi'ism at 15 years old. He has been trying to get married for 6+ years and is now 25 and in dental school with an industrial engineering degree. He has memorized much of the Qur'an and is extremely intelligent. However he has been rejected time and time again for marriage from parents because, and only because, of his skin colour- even when the sister agreed and was hoping to marry him. Here are his feelings he shared with me:

In all honestly, I'm tired of this game...Immigrant Muslims come here enjoy this country while bashing it all the time and (insert explicit word for defecation here) on us, the Muslims here...They treat us like we are criminals or kafirs even...I'm through...This isn't an ummah...Its not a brotherhood...Loyalty to family, tribe, and ethnicity is paramount to these people...I honestly feel like the immigrants should go back to their home countries and focus on fixing the problems there instead of coming here and being hypocrites...Other Shaykhs have said racist things on calls...I'm done with all of it...And I will be a witness against them on the day of Judgment Insha Allah...

I believe if we all banded together and decided to confront these poisonous issues together, head on, with CLARITY and PERSISTENCE then Allah will change the believer's hearts and help us stay away from hypocrisy in our deen. I think this should also been done on individual bases too where we talk with individuals about these issues and exalt the righteous and forbid the evil and satanic. There must be a pro-active way to bring communities together, just as the Prophet (may Allah bless him and his progeny) brought tribes together. We should realize that most of the children of immigrants do not hold extremely traditional outlooks and even are very happy to marry cross-culturally. It is often the parents and elders who forbid these actions- and often with terrible excuses, sometimes racist and nationalist in nature. Every day my brothers and sisters are getting hurt because of backward mindsets...

The Holy Prophet (p.b.u.h.) said: "He who hurts a Muslim believer, surely he has hurt me."

Bihar-ul-Anwar, vol. 67, p. 72

Be part of the solution, inshaAllah....

Imam Amir-ul-Mu'mineen Ali (a.s.) said: "May Allah have mercy upon the person who services a right and removes a wrong, or refutes an injustice and establishes justice."

Qurar-ul-Hikam, p. 181

With Peace, Hope, and Blessings,
Your brother in Islam,

TC

One response has come from Danish-born Muslims. A poll by Politiken, a daily, of 315 young Muslim students, found that two-thirds of them were considering emigrating after graduation. Most gave as their reason “the tone of the Danish debate about Muslims”. Jakob Lange, head of studies at Copenhagen University, says that children of immigrants deliberately choose portable qualifications. “They want an education they can use abroad, where the tone of the debate is different. Which is why they often choose medicine, engineering or business-related disciplines.”

“Covering up,” The Economist, 29 May, 2008.

I think there may also be another piece to why these young people are taking up “portable” fields of study. Whether in Europe, North America, or the Middle East, professional fields are favored by Muslims (and others within their societies). One notices a preponderance of engineering, biology, business, pre-medical/pre-dental, and other such majors among American Muslim (and Muslim international students) undergraduates. Accounting is also quite popular. Art, English, art history, political science, and general studies are frowned upon or even viewed contemptuously. Why study something “useless?”

When it is revealed that one is of a Muslim or Middle Eastern background and not in one of these fields there is quite often an element of surprise, if not disappointment from others of a similar background. “What do you plan on doing with a [liberal arts] degree like that?” Or, with eyebrows raised, “Oh.” Useful and lucrative fields are generally preferred (and the more prestigious the better). While my parents are generally supportive of my academic pursuits, my cousins and friends parents are often shocked that they are so willing to indulge a field of study with no solid job prospects. When it was revealed that I wanted to eventually study art — in the visual sense — my mother and uncle (one who is especially prone to offering his opinion where it is not always wanted or appropriate) were quite disappointed. My uncle, who is a surgeon, and whose son has followed in his footsteps, told our holiday dinner table that “From day one I have made it abundantly clear to your cousin that the son of immigrants does not study art.” Thus went my mother’s logic: There is no security in art; if you like to draw, become an architect. I suspect that the preference for the professions begins before these students encounter hostility and/or bigotry in Danish society.

Af Batulo Abdirahman

Måske vil jeg kunne bygge broer imellem muslimer og Vesten, og vil håbe, at de kommer til at forstå hinanden, hvilket jo vil medfølge, at de respekterer hinanden og i sidst ende acceptere hinandens forskellighed.

For hvis de ikke kommer til at forstå hinanden, så tænk på al de kræfter, talenter og succeshistorier, der går tabt. Kræfter hvilket folk som jeg og mange andre muslimer i vesten eller vesterlændinge i muslimske lande udstråler. Hvis vi får chancen, så kan det godt være, at vi rejser en hel ny civilisation. En enorm civilisation som den i Andalusien og bedre, hvor man side om side på trods af forskellige trosretninger rejste minde ” at man godt kan være enig, og opbygger et fantastisk samfund.”

Som en muslim i Vesten ønsker jeg virkeligt, at muslimer og Vesten kan leve i fred med hinanden, side om side. Men hvordan det ønske kan komme i opfyldelse, og hvordan jeg som et individ kan være med til at realisere det, er et stort spørgsmål?!

Hvis jeg skulle udgive mine følelser igennem billeder, så vil jeg tegne to have. De to have blander sig ikke med hinanden, fordi de har to ensrettede poler. Polerne frastøder hinanden. Jeg står midt i mellem de to have, der rører sig ved hinanden, men alligevel ikke blander sig med hinanden. Man prøver, og prøver at føre dem sammen, men kan det lade sig gøre? Kan man måske ændre naturloven?

Secondly, he says to those who look so negatively on talking to HAMAS and Syria that "just because you talk to them doesn't me you endorse their world view," asking "who else do you talk to?" if you are attempting to secure a peace deal. Arguably, there are few actors actually seeking a "peace process" (it is not in the interest of various regimes, both Middle Eastern and Western), but his point is valid to a great degree. On the other major issues Zakaria discusses (most of which do not deal with the MENA region) he is as insightful as ever. I will post the video link when I find it online.

Musikvideo

En meningsbærende video udarbejdet af en amerikanskmuslimsk organisation, MASS MEDIA FOUNDATION. Den smukke sang, som spilles i baggrunden ’ A Land Called Paradise’ synges af den ny countrysanger og amerikanskmuslim Kareem Salama.

Kareem Salamas forældre er født og opvokset i Egypten, men han er selv  født og opvokset i Ponca City, en lille by tæt ved Green Country i delstaten Oklahoma, USA.

Videoens indhold: Kortsagte handler videoen om amerikanskmuslimers eller generelt om muslimer i Vestens levemåde.  Videoen konkluderer, at muslimers liv er lige så forskellige som alle andre ikke-muslimsk amerikaners liv.   

NB! Med videre beskrivelse kommer jeg til at afsløre historien. Så, nu får I muligheden for at tilfredsstille jeres nysgerrighed. Og som en fantastisk video som denne, beder jeg jer om at efterlade en lille kommentar, om hvad du/I synes om videoen.

Held og lykke

ma'salama

PARIS — France assigned 100 police officers to investigate the desecration on Sunday of 148 Muslim graves in a war cemetery in northern France.

President Nicolas Sarkozy called the attack “sordid” and expressed “profound outrage” after it was discovered that vandals had hung a pig’s head from one tombstone, desecrated others and wrote slogans insulting Justice Minister Rachida Dati, who was born in France to parents from Northern Africa.

The graves were in the Muslim section of Notre Dame de Lorette, among France’s largest war cemeteries, near the northern town of Arras. The dead are mostly from World War I, and the Muslim graves, representing the dead of colonial armies, are turned toward Mecca.

Ms. Dati issued a statement condemning a “hateful act” with “racist connotations” that “hurts the memory of our dead, of the veterans who gave their lives for France.”

Dalil Boubaker, rector of the Paris mosque, told France Info radio: “These are probably the tombs of heroes who fell in combat. This is a hateful, scandalous act, an insult to all Muslims.”

In April 2007, Nazi slogans and swastikas were painted on about 50 graves in the Muslim section of the same cemetery, and two men found guilty in the case were sentenced to a year in prison.

About 78,000 colonial subjects of France, many of them Muslims, died in World War I.

Elsewhere in Europe, Geert Wilders, a man for whom many appellations are fitting, gives an interview plainly illustrating that he is no less than a bigot fishing for attention, and give lie to the narrative that he is merely attempting to goad Muslims into reform or attempting to defend Western values through controversy:

SPIEGEL: Your tirades are a challenge to all moderate Muslims and those pushing for Islamic reform.

Wilders: Moderate Islam? That's a contradiction. It's going to be a long time before we see a new Koran, an equivalent to the New Testament. Attacks don't happen in the name of Buddhism or Christianity; nor do homosexuals get beaten up, as happens daily in Amsterdam.

SPIEGEL: But immigrant youth crime has nothing to do with religion.
Wilders: It's true, they don't carry the Koran under their arms. But it's at home. And their fathers go to the mosque. They don't tell their children that beating women or believers of other religions is not allowed. That's why we have to push harder for a kind of Leitkultur, a guiding culture. Not a monoculture but a culture that draws on our Christian, Jewish, humanistic traditions and that poses a challenge to the Islamic problem. This is patriotism, not nationalism, this is pride in our own culture.

In comparative perspective, it is several time better to be a Muslim or an Arab in North America than anywhere in Europe.

-- Nikolas K. Gvosdev, "OIC Summit and the Dakar Declaration," 20 March, 2008.

As I wrote in my previous post about the global Islamic community's response to Kosovo's declaration of independence, their hesitation to immediately extend recognition to the Balkan territory has more to do with geopolitical responsibilities than it does with any set of ideational concerns.

There is no evidence to suggest that Kosovo's emphasis on its European identity will hinder Islamic countries from recognizing it. Thus far, the justifications given by those Muslim states -- the overwhelming majority of them -- who have not recognized Kosovo have either been that they were concerned with matters of national sovereignty or were entirely indifferent to the matter. Countries such as Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Libya, Morocco, Sudan and others all supported the Serbian position outrightly. Some of them did so as a result of obviously Russian (or perhaps even Chinese) leverage, others out of fear of the the application of the "Kosovo precedent" to their own territorial disputes. Various others, such as Jordan and Egypt have not recognized Kosovo's independence, but will likely do so if a positive resolution is produced by Security Council. Turkey proposed a document that would have called for recognition on the part of the Islamic community, but due to opposition this was watered down to merely supporting the Kosovar people.

None of the discussion in Dakar revolved around how more or less Islamically oriented Kosovo was in relation to the wider Islamic world, and none of it questioned the territory's identity or fidelity to Islamic civilization. On the contrary, the discussion on Kosovo has been quite upbeat, and has tended to question the legality of the country's independence and whether or not it conforms to international norms. The OIC's Secretary General, Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu (himself a Turk), said that Kosovo "will be an asset to the Muslim world and will further enhance joint Islamic action,”" and none of the member states seem to disagree. Nevertheless, Muslim countries have national interests aside from being Muslim countries and on many, if not most, occasions act on those interests before acting on their religious prerogatives.

The concerns of Muslim countries are identical to those of much the rest of the international community when it comes to matters of state sovereignty and the preservation of existing borders, two categories into which the Kosovo situation fits snugly. The component relating to the territory's Islamic identity does make it a more salient affair than it would be if it were a non-Muslim country, but it is still of far less concern to the Muslim world than it is to Europe, and its tangible geopolitical results, in the eyes of Muslim governments, outweigh the religious or civilizational responsibility to recognize it right off the bat.

I have always found it odd that Christian conservatives posit Islam as the barbaric outsider, when in fact the real death cult is right at the heart of all forms of Christianity (and the many atrocities that have followed from that). Spengler, however, is always refreshingly honest on this point.

It would be quite easy to take undermine the 'Judeo-Christian' viewpoint Spengler promotes, or pick apart his odd claims about Christian universalism, or comment on his abuse of a brief note on procedural law as discussed by classical Muslim jurists. But I don't actually see the value in 'fisking' pieces like Spengler's. The thing with polemics is that they're meant to simplify fuzzy boundaries, solidify muddy centres and patrol the borders of group identity. They are not designed to be informative or a way of learning something. Polemicists promote an orthodox position and rebut heresies. They tell us who is on our side and who is the enemy. Everyone engages in these polemics, Muslims no less than others.

Nonetheless, I think there is some value to this particular Spengler piece on whether Islam can be blamed for 'barbaric' acts. Islamphobes and Dhummies wail loudly that Muslims are required by their beliefs to destroy and supplant other cultures. Spengler, however, actually acknowledges that Islam has not replaced the cultures into which it arrived (he accuses Islam of allowing practices like honour killing or female genital mutilation room to continue breathing). This means he acknowledges, implicitly, that Muslims in the West can to integrate and participate fully in their societies.

These were the words of The Economist on February 21, shortly after Kosovo declared its independence from Serbia. The United State, much of the EU, and Russia did precisely as The Economist predicted. But the Muslim states have bucked the trend. Thus far, only five Muslim countries (Afghanistan, Albania, Senegal, Malaysia, and Turkey). Instead of welcoming Kosovo to the family of Muslim nations, most have opted not recognize it. Those countries who have long standing ties in the Balkans as a result of ideology -- such as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and some of the other Gulf states -- or have especially strong ties with the United States or major EU states like France (as do Morocco and Tunisia) are slated to recognize Kosovo sometime in the near future. Pakistan and Bangladesh will too. Malaysia already has. Albania, the motherland with which many Kosovars hope to eventually merge, also recognized the new statelet.

But why are so many other Muslim states abstaining from the recognition festival?

One needs only to look at who's recognizing and who's not. All the Muslim states that have or are slated to recognize Kosovo have strong ties with the West. Turkey -- the successor to the caliphate for which much of the ethno-religious troubles in the Balkans is often blamed -- hopes to join the EU. Aside from satisfying its own national interests in that field (the most powerful EU states have recognized Kosovo), this also fits in line with Turkish policy in the region which has tended to side against Russian prerogatives and with the former Muslim populations in the area. Mauritania, Morocco, and Tunisia will recognize the new state because of their close ties to both France and the United States; Morocco's military is almost wholly the result of this relationship and would like to keep it that way; Mauritania tends to support French policy generally and its ties with the United States have done nothing but grown over the past decade. Tunisia and Senegal are in the same boat. The Gulf Arab states and Afghanistan will recognize it in order to support the United States and under the pretensions of protecting the `umma.* All of these states, save for perhaps Malaysia and Bangladesh, are governments that are and have been in the Western camp. They are states that either could not function or persist without Western support, and their recognition of Kosovo is a part of fulfilling their end of the bargain.

Those who will not, briefly and broadly, have strong relations with Russia. Algeria, Syria, Sudan, the Central Asian states, and Iran all have strong economic, political, military, and geopolitical ties to the Russian Federation, the strongest critic of Kosovar independence outside of Belgrade. Russia, along with China, has been the main international backer of so-called "rogue" regimes as Sudan and Iran and has been one of the largest sources of arms for such other states as Algeria, Syria, and several other major Muslim states. They are the states on the opposite -- though not necessarily opposing -- side of the fence from their brothers recognizing Kosovo.

On the economic side, many of these nations enjoy FDI from Russia. On the political and military side (the more important one), Russia provides cover in the Security Council and international forums for regimes finding themselves under scrutiny from the West. Russia, with China, is often seen as the international guarantor of national sovereignty in the face of Western interventionism. Russia's problems with the "Kosovo precedent" is the same as Sudan's, Syria's, Algeria's, Iran's, Indonesia's, and a variety of other Muslim states with ethnic and sectarian tensions. Militarily, Russia provides high-tech weaponry to all of the major Muslim states that will not recognize Kosovo. The arms trade is Russia's chief interest in most of the developing world, and its most prized customers do not want to jeopardize that relationship.

In both cases, recognition has very little to do with sympathy for the Muslims of Kosovo, though such sentiments are felt throughout much of the Muslim world. If recognition had much to do with philosophy, Morocco would withhold its recognition and Algeria would recognize it. Morocco is a state occupying another one (the Western Sahara), by some estimates illegally and unjustly and the "Kosovo precedent"'s effects are very much understood in Rabat (as the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic's embassies in Africa and Asia have proliferated and Morocco's membership in the African Union has been a casualty of the Saharawi movement). Algeria, a poster-child for national liberation/independence movements (especially among Muslims), would have been among the first states to recognize Kosovo if it were operating on its foundation principles. Such concerns may be why some of the Muslim states that have pledged recognition have been hesitant to do so.**

* [ The Saudis pumped millions into Kosovo and Bosnia during the 1990's in an effort to protect the embattled Muslim populations there. Such is the responsibility of the custodians of the Holy Cities and a regime whose legitimacy is based on its championing of Islamic causes and providing for the `umma. Palestinian leaders have expressed interest in following Kosovo's model of unilaterally declaring their independence. Such as a move would be ideologically consistent, but would be less practical than Kosovo's. While Kosovo's infrastructure is decrepit and its political system as thoroughly corrupt as can be, the Kosovars can claim that they control their country. This is not the case in the large majority of the Occupied Territories. ]

** [ Of course, there are exceptions to these dominant trends. Iraq has not recognized Kosovo, perhaps out of fear of the Kurds aping Kosovo's example. Jordan has not either. Many states are taking a "wait and see" approach, out of fear of potential blow back. ]

So if Obama has a campaign strategist worth his or her weight, we will never hear any serious public support or defense of Muslims from him or his campaign. For Muslims to demand anything from him simply demonstrates a misunderstanding of reality. Muslim support for Obama is akin to George Bush's support for democracy in the Middle East. The mere association with the former will undercut the credibility of the latter. It is an analogy that Muslims should understand.

Obama's lack of public defense of Islam is not so much an indictment against him as it is a demonstration of the infantile state of Muslim political participation in America.

...

This is a political reality that Muslims in America must face. It is a clear demonstration that the collective efforts of Muslim institution building over the last 20 years have largely failed to make any real progress when it comes to impacting the American political process, at least at the national level. Muslims have found the perfect candidate, but cannot vocally support him for fear that if they do, they may be the reason he loses. How is that for a wake-up call.

...

If Muslims do not want to suffer the indignation of political irrelevance for many elections to come, instead of giving money to politicians, they should start investing in journalism scholarships. They should establish fellowships for Muslim academics to take a year off and write a book for a general audience, and then back them up with a PR firm to get the book on a best seller list. They should invest in publications that demonstrate a breadth and depth of thinking on a range of issues. They should invest in think tanks that analyze public issues and present actual value to the overall public discussion. All of these institutions exist right now for Muslims in America. But for the most part they are underfunded, underappreciated and undervalued. Because the community in general has not rallied behind them, they are for the most part invisible. Because they are invisible, Muslims are effectively invisible when it comes to Obama or any other serious candidate.

Read the whole thing.

If you have checked out Islamica Magazine, you should. The pieces are extremely well-written, and a wide variety of opinions and perspectives are represented. The team leading the effort is incredible (full disclosure: A number of them are friends who I have a lot of regard and affection for at a personal level.)  Pick up a copy at your nearest Barnes and Noble. You will be pleasantly surprised by the amazing production values of the magazine.

Theo van Gogh, was murdered in 2004 by a Muslim extremist on the streets of Amsterdam. A note attached to van Gogh's body threatened Hirsi Ali with a similar fate.Since then she has lived under constant security surveillance, and in 2006 she left Europe for the United States. The Dutch government announced last October (more...) that it would no longer cover the cost of her around-the-clock protection. The American government refused to pick up the tab because she is a foreign national, obliging her to find independent funding.

Here is my question: The article seems to imply that the US government offers those citizens that need it 24-hour security coverage. If this is the case, why not just become an American citizen? Is she foaming at the mouth with anti-American fervor? Her friends at AEI might make the case that a foreigner who comes to this country for less than two years and demands that the taxpayer put up the cost for an enteroge that can be paid with private funding was behaving not quite like an American. Perhaps we should deport her. [Sarcasim off.] Meanest post ever.

In fact, of course, he said nothing of the kind. But what he did advocate was not uncontroversial: he suggested there could be a “plural jurisdiction” in which Muslims could freely decide whether disputes (in which only co-religionists were involved) were resolved in secular courts or by Islamic institutions which offer an alternative forum for arbitration.

This is from an Economist article titled "What role for sharia in the West?" My answer: the same role it should have in the Islamic world -- none or heavily burried under a pile of secular laws. Unless you want to let everybody use religious law at the personal level, scratch this idea. The next thing you know, European countries be even more balkanized and segregated than they are now, looking more like Lebanon than themselves. And Lebanon is not a model for anybody to follow (neither is Egypt or Jordan or other places where this practise exists between communities).* One law for all.

Vaguely related: What's up with Western opposition to not having interest?

* [ I will explain why Lebanon is not a model in a later post. ]

As explained by Georgina Henry, Comment is free's editor, the blog will be similar to Blogging the Bible, a project started by Slate's David Plotz. Blogging the Qur'an was started in part as a response to the views expressed by people in the threads of Comment is free (Islam/Muslim themed posts tend to attract some of the worst trolls on the internet).

I expect the choice of Sardar will annoy some Muslims who will deem him unsuitable to talk about the Qur'an to the public. However, I don't think they need to be too worried. For a start, Sardar has admitted in his introduction that he is not an expert -- so he is not usurping the role of the alim. Secondly, we should recognise this is a journalistic endeavour (as was Plotz's interest in the blogging about the Bible), not necessarily a scholarly one. Basically, what we will be reading is Sardar's interaction with the Qur'an. Sardar has interesting views as a cultural critic (e.g. on Islam and postmodernism), but sometimes I find his comments on certain aspects of Islam (like history) factually incorrect (and by factually incorrect I don't mean 'different opinion'). And perhaps a Muslim scholar of the Qur'an could, on occassion, write into the blog to help out?

It is disappointing, if understandable, that they will have no comments on this blog and will only take comments by email (this is the same format laid out by Blogging the Bible). Comments received by email will be reviewed and published each week when the blog is updated. I would encourage Muslim bloggers (or anyone else for that matter) who feels up to it, to keep track of Sardar's blog and write their own responses, as well as emailing the Blogging the Qur'an team. Whatever your views on Sardar, or indeed religion as a whole, this is an interesting attempt by the Guardian, which has been at the forefront of improving relationship between sections of the mainstream media and Western Muslims.

Related:
Muslims and the Western media: giving credit where it’s due

I think Masroor had his tongue lodged in his cheek somewhere when he was writing this piece, though I am sure others will have different views. In whatever way you read the piece, the website of a major British newspaper has allowed a Muslim to engage in polemics against another faith and touch some controversial points. So, if the Guardian happens to invite a Catholic blogger to type a piece criticising Muslims for not leaving Islam and entering the Church, I hope we do not see the kind of outrage we have seen in the last couple of years by some Muslims and cries of Islamophobia -- this sort of exchange of views is 'free speech', however strained, in action.

Across the Atlantic a somewhat similar argument on free speech has been unfolding, involving Mark Steyn and his rant against Muslims, which was published in a Canadian magazine. There a Muslim organisation, the Canadian Islamic Congress (CIC), is using the law to demand some kind of remedy against Macleans, the magazine which published Steyn's polemic.

I am against this sort of 'solution' to rebut anti-Muslim bigots. As has been pointed out by people with as differing views as Ali Eteraz, Inayat Bunglawala and the bloggers at Austrolabe [1, 2], such legal remedies will only come to hurt Muslims, their beliefs and causes they hold dear. What if Christians take exception to their beliefs being criticised by Muslims as 'idolatry'? What if a staunchly pro-Israeli organisation demands space in a pro-Palestinian media outlet to respond to criticisms? There is nothing to stop the arguments used by some Muslims to curtail the freedom of others to criticise their own beliefs from being applied to Muslim criticism of Christianity, Hinduism, secularism and materialism. Indeed, as Sunny Hundal points out, it is Muslims living as minorities in liberal societies who will bare the brunt of such attempts to curtail public utterances.

Despite my reservations of the move made by the CIC, I would say that I do not think an abstracted freedom of speech under threat in cases such as this, the Danish cartoon fiasco or Popegate, largely because the state or its agencies are not directly intervening to prevent publication (there is no board of censorship which reviews suitable material prior to public release -- that would be a direct attack on freedom of speech). Rather, most of the fuss is caused after the event. In the Macleans case, for example, a Muslim group with its allies are using a legal avenue to try and remedy a grievance they believe they have. I assume this legal body will review the case, and if the case is as flimsy as defenders of Macleans say it is, then it will be dismissed. I also assume this will have the added side affect of helping future cases to define what is and isn't 'free speech'.

In addition, speech, like our 'conscience', is always 'free': we are free at all times to utter words, have beliefs and so on. What is really at stake in discussions such as these are the consequences, if any, a society metes out for holding specific beliefs and expressing them in public. Despite pious assertions, liberal democracies seek to restrict and regulate our public utterances too: a wide variety of reasons are invoked to curtail what can be said such as the right to privacy, the national interest, symbols of cultural importance or protecting the vulnerable from harm (whether this is a good thing or not is a separate discussion). What some Muslims living in liberal democracies would like is for their beliefs to be held in such regards with respect to the law; but in liberal democracies, religious beliefs are generally not deemed worthy of legal protection from scrutiny or even ridicule -- doing so would lead to the problems highlighted by Eteraz, Bunglawala and Austrolabe [1, 2].

It might be worth nothing that there is some tension here with Burke's criticism of abstracted rights as laid out in his attack on the French Revolution. Burke attacked the 'pretended rights' of those who created abstracted theories of rights, by pointing out that an talk of such rights (e.g. the right to food or medicine) is all when and good, but what good is it if there are no farmers or doctors? Similarly, it might be said that while one may talk of the right to free speech for all, what good is it without the 'vehicle' to express these views? This is what at least one individual directly supporting the case against Macleans has suggested. I think this tension can be resolved by looking at the actual case of Muslims in Canada, and Canadian society in general (which is what Burke's critique forces us to do). Examination shows that Canada is largely a tolerant, multicultural, society in which people are largely provided means to get an education, earn a living and engage in society in a variety of means (yes, these are all generalisations, but fair ones). There are no records of state-sponsored pogroms against Muslims. Those Muslims who found Macleans to be in the wrong when publishing Steyn's piece were not totally powerless to respond. Avenues open to them included writing letters, starting boycotts, getting pieces written in magazines more sympathetic to their situation (rivals of Macleans), setting up public debates, raising funds to start their own magazine, and a whole host of other initiatives suggested by Eteraz -- all of which, I assume, are legal in Canada. These would have been better means in which to respond to Steyn; they would certainly have been more effective.

The Macleans affair reminds me of a similar case that arose in France several years ago. Then the author Michel Houellebecq was accused of racism after an interview he gave to a magazine in which he called Islam a 'stupid religion'. Houellebecq was eventually acquitted in court. That case was similarly a short-sighted moved by Muslim organisations, albeit the situation in France for its Muslim minority is vastly different to those in Canada.

Once again, I am forced to conclude with the insight by Atif Imtiaz that too many Muslims living in liberal democracies remain 'cultural delinquents' (Imtiaz is discussing British Muslims, but I think it is fair to extrapolate to this case in Canada). The first response of some Muslims, or at least the organisations that claim to represent them, to situations such as the Danish cartoons and the Macleans case is to resort to law and politics rather than engage through rhetoric and the arts -- look at this piece by Chris Morris as an example. With time, however, I am more confident now than I have been in the past, that this will change.

Related:
Muslims and the Western media: giving credit where it is due

I am sure there are really interesting avenues to pursue here (for example, universalism, romanticism, and cultural protectionism amongst Muslim peoples). However, I don't see why promotion of ethnocentric identities (Pakistani, Indian, Lebanese, Afghan, Turk, etc) is any better than the 'Muslim' label. Ali's concern that the "Muslim" label ties a British or American Muslim in with what Muslims elsewhere do, can be mirrored (much more strongly in a world of nation-states I would argue) with the hyphenated identities he wants to promote. And, contrary to what Ali implies, "Muslims" were identified by their ethnic origins for many years: we have Pakistanis in Britain, Turks in Germany, Algerians in France and Moroccans in Holland for many years -- none of this has necessarily helped overcome racism and bigotry they face. Indeed, I don't see how being "African American" or "Roma" has helped these peoples, even though they have been around for a lot longer than Muslims in US or Europe, respectively.

I do agree with him that some cultural identities (e.g. Iranian, Turkish) seem a bit more 'secure' and well-rounded than others -- I am sure this will have something to do with the relative age of how the nations imagine themselves too, given that history appears to be as important (if not more important) to human societies than blood and biology. For example, it is a little harder for Pakistanis to call upon ancient histories (this hasn't stopped some strained attempts) than Iranians -- the latter can call upon a heritage that predates the advent of Islam, and even with the rise of Islam the influences of Iranian pre-Islamic heritage are clearly with us today.

I suspect that most of the impetus behind being "British Muslim" rather than "British Pakistani" has to do with a desire to distance oneself from cultural origins that are seen as a restraint in a way religion might not be. For example, I would not all be surprised if the rise of "British Muslim" over, say, "British Pakistani" is in many cases an attempt to overcome cultural conservatism ("Islam gives women rights" is an oft-cited phrase in the face of conservative attitudes towards family and women in Indo-Pak communities).

Just as importantly, religious groups, sects and schisms form part of the histories of America and Britain (Quakers, Jews, Non Conformists, Puritans, Methodists, Evangelicals and so on); seen form this perspective "Muslims" are just another addition to these groups.

Whilst I understand Ali's desire is to oppose unnecessary 'theocentrism' in the public sphere, and even identify with it in some cases, you cannot stop people coalescing around whatever label they wish to identify themselves with. In my view it is better to get people to work together whatever they wish to call themselves.

I am going to say that this is not a matter of religion, not in its origin. It is a matter of race and class. In France, as in most of Western Europe, there is an underclass of black African and Maghrebi workers and their unemployed and poorly educated children and grandchildren. These young people, in the words of a cousin (who was arrested for rioting in 2005), "have no future in France, absolutely". The French economy, and business culture, for one thing, is not structured around aiding young people; it is structured around preserving the place of those already in the workforce or those recently retired from it. It is a system that operates in spite of the young and un- and underemployed. More importantly, French attitudes towards race and religion are generally exclusionist, even if they operate on the pretense of equality among the races, as they demand that the "immigrant" abandon his heritage in its entirety in favor of the French one, a demand not easily met by Arabs, Maghrebis, or Muslims. These are people who come from a civilization that was, for many centuries (and continues to be), kind of a big deal in the history of humanity. No self-respecting Arab, Maghrebi, or Muslim could accept the French ultimatum; indeed no self-respecting human being could do so. And in fact, it is a demand made almost exclusively of Maghrebis and black Africans in France, and one that has been made of them since they first came into contact with the French, when the French conquered their forefathers centuries ago.

This is to say that France has not abandoned the colonial world view in which it is the hearth of world civilization, refinement, and culture and all others -- particularly those hailing from darker lattitudes -- are inherently inferior. The French attitude towards the North African today is very little than it was fifty years ago. As a Muslim, the North African is a threat; culturally, politically, economically, morally, and even sexually. The African is a barbarian. They are unfit, even when given the best training and education possible, for the work of white men and women. Any indication that one comes from these backgrounds is an indication of their inferiority. Identity in France is a zero-sum game that has become a war of attrition.

That young people born in France, often to French-born parents, are routinely referred to as "immigrants" illustrates the uneasiness with which the French allow people from the African continent to reside in their country. Huddled up together in crumbling ghettoes, often next to the descendants of colonial settlers, these young people, because of their names, because of their skin color, because of the size of their lips, because of the direction in which they pray, because of every other instance in which their blackness or Maghrebitude is expressed, are less likely to find themselves employment than their white neighbors, and even less likely to move up the social ladder, even if they do make it big economically.

Generations of discrimination, colonialism and colonialist attitudes, and poverty have left many of these young people with out hope, with out direction. And yes, many of them have turned to crime, to drugs, and to other vices. Yes, the young men whose deaths triggered bother the riots in 2005 and this week were either breaking the law or were under suspicion of having broken the law. Yes, these young men had every bit of agency as you or I, and yes, they made what can only be called poor decisions. Yes, Mouhsin and Lakamy broke traffic laws. This, contrary to how many European commentators would present it, does not detract from their humanity, nor does it justify the fundamentally and utterly racist social structure within France. It does not make them less or more human than "natives" against whom crimes have been committed, and it does not make their deaths any less of a tragedy. And the brutality of individual murders should not draw attention away from the more pressing matter of a society that has failed its citizens in the most basic way, by refusing to allow them to operate as full human beings.

And yet they came from a society in which their decisions were limited to their existences in the ghetto. Such is the life of the non-European.

There is a trend in many places, in Europe, America, and elsewhere, to explain the plight of the European Muslim as being the fault of his religion; Islam, a religion "incompatible" with Western civilization and democracy. This position is not only simplistic, emanating from a profound misunderstanding not only of Islam and Muslims, but also of Western societies at large (the Muslims of America are the social and demographic opposite of their brethren in Europe), but it also removes agency from Europeans. Those who clammer of "Eurabia", and who complain of hordes of men from the South, ought to remember that it was Europeans who conquered these peoples, plundered their nations (at least until they released them, which was in most cases not that long ago; in France's case, it never actually left most of its African colonies), and then invited them to come to Europe and work as their nannies, janitors, and construction workers, working at the bottom of the European social hierarchy. It was also Europeans who failed to provide a mechanism by which these "guest workers" could return to their home countries; and it was Europeans who further failed to provide a means by which the offspring of these men and women could become Europeans, rather than the second, third, fourth, and in some cases even fifth generation of "immigrants".

Dysfunctional societies are not constructed in isolation. If "immigrants" have failed to assimilate, or to try to do so, it is very often because the native population has made no effort on its part to adjust its self to a modern standard. Europeans have increasingly turned to rightist parties and movements, reacting against immigration and culture change. In many European countries there are movements among Muslims that call for a rejection of white European society and its excesses, and for a clannish, often violent, Islamic lifestyle. These Muslims, along with others who live insular lives only amongst other Muslims, are reacting to change as well.

Both phenomena are counter productive. European society is not growing; there are not enough European children born to provide for a sustainable population in the near future. Migrants are needed to fill blank spots in the economy and the population. Europe has a very bleak future in comparison with the rest of the world, as a continent made up of a mixture of ultra-PC retirees and bigoted retirees facing vigorous and voracious Asian tigers, a zooming and booming India, a still competitive America, an increasingly active Latin America, and I think it will be inevitable that within the next century the powerful nations of Africa, both in the North and the South will come of age, and negate much of the European (particularly French) stranglehold on the continent. And there will come a time when, if Europe has not yet become a single entity, that other states and regions will not tolerate nearly 30 states casting 30 votes for a single policy at international forums; there will come a time when Europe's voice will either be dispersed or narrowed down to one vote among many, many others. And this will all be the result of Europe's own doing.

If there is a realization that the nativist models employed by most European states (which include bizarre notions of "multiculturalism" that amount to little more than formalized ghetto life) are out of date and insulting to the collective humanity of all involved, perhaps there is a modicum of hope. My thought is that this will not happen. Say there is a major down turn, economically, one too many riots; this could, in my mind, lead very likely to what would be nothing more than a series of ratonnades, breaking the will or capability of "immigrants" to riot. Europeans have dealt with minorities before, and they have advocated to expulsion or elimination of their latest burden for years. Increasingly, it seems, Europeans are open to the idea of solving the migrant problem (the French have never had any problems cutting down gatherings of North Africans, but of course always in the most refined and humane ways possible).

Thus is Europe. Thus is yet another reason that the phrase al-hamdulilah comes to mind when I compare the prospect of having been raised in Europe as an "immigrant" of Algerian or otherwise African descent versus my upbringing in America, where I and just about every other Arab and Muslim I grew up with and have known have felt at home, and like owners of ourselves, our democracy and our country. Despite recent rejectionisms on the part of some politicians, and growing paranoia and suspicion, American Muslims continue to be and feel American, even if some have momentary doubts. It is in America where American Muslims have their future, absolutely.

Det interessant er så, hvordan Pia Kjærsgård vil have reageret, hvis Ayaan var pågrebet i at lyve om hendes personligoplysninger til fordel for sin asyl? Vil Pia Kjærsgård have opført sig som hendes hollandske partifælder? Det hører vi desværre ikke i det her interview!

Jeg vil så sige tillykke til Ayaan Hirsi, fordi hun har opnået berømmelsen i Vesten for ingenting! Man skal bare være islamkritiker for at være berømt hedder det i Vesten, og jeg tror Ayaan Hirsi har fattet beskeden, som hun dermed fuldførte. Berømmelsen hjalp hende på vej til USA, efter hun fik frataget sin nederlandsk statsborgerskab, smidt ud af hendes parti og udviste af Holland. I USA fik hun et job i en amerikansk krigsarkitekt firma, AEI, som blandt andet har ført USA i Irak (læs i Hamza, den somalisk-norsk folketingskandidats blog 2 udgave 2007 )

Mit politiske forbillede"Jamen, jeg er jo helt vild med Ayaan Hirsi Ali
(hollandsk politiker med somalisk baggrund, der er kendt for sin kritik af
islam, red). Min indsats kan ikke sammenlignes med hendes, men jeg beundrer
hendes udholdenhed. Hun står helt stilfærdigt og siger, hvad hun mener. Det er
hårde ord, men hun mener det, og jeg synes hun har ret. Hun er mit idol."
Læs here ( siger Pia Kjærsgård i Dagbladet Information)

Jeg falder af grin når jeg dermed hører Pia Kjærsgård ser op til den forvirret kvinde, som ikke aner, hvad hun taler om. Det er også trist, at et parti som indgår i regeringen, støtter en useriøs og propaganda kvinde, som ikke nok har vokset fra den 1.fase af hendes liv. Det er også trist at man dermed vil kalde hende for en lektor, hvor hun dermed vil modtage priser, og bliver sammenlignet med alle de andre ’rigtige’ universitetslektorer, der knokler for at gøre verden til et bedre sted. Det er virkeligt trist!

Peace and respect!

(Via Eteraz.)